We're All Ears

Overall Impressions The show didn’t feel an hour long. It moved seamlessly from one story to the next, thanks to techniques like musical interludes, host comments, reporter comments and great use of silence and pauses in conversation. You could feel the interviewees thinking; the reporters weren’t rushing them through what they had to say. The [...]

Nancy Updike took the first shift—she uses the storytelling element of ambient sound with Eddie who was playing the harmonica.  She describes the scene: that there are all types of people in the restaurant (regulars) and that no one seems annoyed with Eddie.   Next she moves to Joe and describes him (78 years old, [...]

Overall, I enjoyed listening to 24 Hours at the Golden Apple.  I thought the reporting was really creative, especially the part when one of the reporters used a “Sex and The City” theme.  What I also liked most was how the piece included stories that everyone could relate to- stories about history, hard financial times, [...]

Having written a number of radio pieces over the past few months, what stood out to me the most in This American Life’s Big Apple Diner show was its variety of style. Each period of time (or, well, story) throughout the day that the episode consisted of was produced in a different way, giving the [...]

With each story the reporters create a vivid scene of what’s going on around them.  The description of the Golden Apple in Chicago and their customers is a scene that could be played out in any diner across the country.  With each character description and interview, the image of an average American diner is solidified.  [...]

This piece really struck a chord with me. I’ve always sort of fetishized the romantic notion of a diner at the wee hours having some sort of near-mystical significance, so I enjoyed this a lot. What I liked lot about it was how much the “TAL” team let people tell their stories in their own [...]

24 Hours at the Golden Apple produces a lot of stories to tell. Reporters go to tables of customers, staff, and even Ira Glass throws in his own 2 Cents once or twice when he relays his knowledge of kids in this neighborhood in Chicago loving the Golden Apple’s Micky Mouse Pancakes. The story starts [...]

The Golden Apple piece was surprising in its delivery. I expected something a little less theatrical and intentional, but it was still a cool look into Americans in the 21st century. In fact, I continuously found myself conscious of this fact – the who, where, and when of the situation. It’s the kind of thing [...]

There’s an old Steven Wright joke where Wright says he went to a 24-hour grocery store only to find that the doors were being locked. He tells the guy, “Hey, the sign says you’re open 24 hours,” to which the grocery store worker responds, ”Not in a row.” There are no keys at the Golden Apple in [...]

24 hours at the Golden Apple uses quality storytelling and the elements of radio to create a surprisingly visceral listening experience. This American Life’s storytelling success is the product of their keen attention to detail and their willingness to follow the thread of interviewees’ thoughts past their initial comments to the underlying reasons and justifications, [...]

Twenty-four hours at a diner. That could’ve gone wrong — been consigned to the bin of ideas labeled “Good Ideas in Theory.” But This American Life pulled it off. Here’s how. Establish the World Ira Glass closes his description of the diner with the octagonal pie case, transitioning into an actuality from co-owner Nick about [...]