Matt Shaer here. I’m one of the co-founders of Campside and host of shows like Suspect and We Came to the Forest.
Today I’m writing with a bit of news about my podcast Origin Stories, which was launched late last year with a simple premise: Get very smart writers and reporters and TV & movie people to explain how their most beloved works were created.
If I’m being honest, it was also an excuse to talk craft with folks I admire.
And on that front, I was not disappointed:
I talked with the podcaster Dan Taberski (Hysterical, Missing Richard Simmons) about how to tell when the story you set out to tell is no longer the story you’re reporting.
Mimi Leder, the showrunner of The Morning Show, spoke about the specific challenges of writing as team sport and collaborative exercise.
And with Patrick Radden Keefe, we worked backwards, to the beginning: How does a story actually get pitched? What does a promising starting point look like before it becomes the polished magazine piece that the rest of us encounter months — or sometimes years — later?
One of the things I’ve liked most about making the show is discovering just how idiosyncratic the whole messy creative process can be.
There is no single correct way to report or write a story. The people I’ve spoken with have their own systems, habits, anxieties, tricks, and (occasionally) deeply strange methods for getting from a first glimmer of… something to a masterpiece.
Anyway, it’s been a deeply rewarding experience, at nearly every level.
And now, Origin Stories is getting a new home, with you, as part of Campside’s Substack community. Starting next month, you’ll find new episodes of the show, along with trips back into the archive — more stories and insights into the work of reporting, writing, and making narrative stories.
Same podcast. New venue.
If you’ve listened to the show before, thank you. Truly. And if you’re new to it, there’s plenty to catch up on.
Origin Stories is a Campside Media podcast. Email us with questions or comments: questions@campsidemedia.com.
We hope to see you inside the tent again soon. Subscribe now for updates on all of Campside’s hit shows.