Ira co-wrote and produced Mike Birbiglia's 2012 indie comedy Sleepwalk With Me, and on June 14, @boondocksfilmsociety is bringing him to @communitytheaterny in Catskill, NY to talk about it. Q&A moderated by @susannafogel , with pre-film music from @matesofstate . Don't sleep on it! (Sorry.) Tickets at boondocksfilmsociety.org.
Their neighbor made their lives miserable for years. Carved slurs into their lawn with weed killer. Killed their cat. Then he threw out his trash — and they found his social security number. Link in bio to listen to this week's episode, With Great Power.
From Ira: "Hi New Yorkers! I was excited to have tickets for Julian Fleischer and his big band, and then he invited me to join the show and sing a song. Who says no to that? It'll be a fun show! Thursday night! @joespub !"
Ira has always believed commencement speeches are a doomed form — cloying, impossible, full of puffy platitudes about grand adventures and the journey ahead. He's opposed the form on principle.
Then in 2012, his old boss from NPR — who had become president of Goucher College in Baltimore — called in a favor. And Ira said yes, for reasons he ended up putting directly into the speech.
We released Ira's speech as a bonus episode for Life Partners. It's about his grandma Frieda, Goucher class of '31. About what it actually looks like to build a life when nobody's handing out grades anymore. (And yes, he still opposes the form, even as he does one.)
🎧 To hear the episode and support our show, there's a link in our bio to sign up.
Since the war began in February, Iran has been under a near-total internet blackout — imposed not from outside the country, but by its own government, on its own people.
We worked with reporters @roxanasaberi and @fatemehjamalpur to collect voice memos from inside the country. It took days to get some of them out — short files, expensive VPNs, the risk of arrest. People wanted to be heard anyway.
This week: what everyday life sounds like inside Iran right now. Link in bio to listen.
Illustration: @bykellymalka
The actors who performed the voice memos for us include: @baharbeihaghi , @avalalezarzadeh , @abmakany , @pejvahdat , @navidnegahban , @darius.homayoun , @jerry.habibi , @dontworryitssheila , @babaktafti , @taragrammy , @arianmoayed .
Blackout: Since the war began, Iran has been under a near-total internet blackout. We worked with reporters @roxanasaberi and @fatemehjamalpur to collect voice memos from inside the country. Even though it was dangerous and difficult, people wanted to be heard. Link in bio to listen. (illustration @bykellymalka )
Ira went digging through decades of old recordings. In the fourth box: something he's been looking for. Link in bio to become a Life Partner and hear the bonus episode to find out what's on the tape.
This week: Sarah Koenig tells the story of a woman who sued the casino where she lost her inheritance, saying that it was to blame, not her. Plus more stories about blackjack, the game everyone thinks they can beat. Link in bio to listen.
Ira's overflowing storage space contains recordings he's made dating back to 1978. The other day, he headed there in search of a particular tape. On our newest bonus episode, Life Partners can hear what he found.
Bless This Mess: At a time when the U.S. government is trying to make American history tidier, we try to learn from the mess — including the untold, messy story of Paul and Essie Robeson. (photo: Getty Images)
M. Gessen on the title of their new podcast, "The Idiot": "I think I'm giving him the grace of perceiving what he did as just an incredibly dumb thing." The new season of Serial is out now. Link to listen in bio.
