How Much Host Is Too Hot, Too Cold, or Just Right?

Applying the Goldilocks Principle to microphone time: Too Cold, Too Hot, and Just Right (where I've got 3 reccos for you)

Too Cold

After more than a year of waiting to see what—and how— In The Dark would re-emerge from the ashes of APM Media to its new home at The New Yorker Magazine and its parent company, Condé Nast, the series sees Madeleine Baran hosting in the role of a mid-wife as she helps to bring the new series Runaway Princes to life on the In The Dark feed as a “Bonus” feature.

Runaway Princess explores the dark and mysterious question: Why do so many of the Princesses of the United Arab Emirates (UAE) keep going missing? The story follows the harrowing escape of Emirati Princesses Latifa and Shamsa. It asks how, and why, much of the world turned a blind eye toward this story of the kidnap, and torture of the various women who don’t fall in line with the palace track. It also examines how former heads of state were implicated in this process differently.

Madeleine Baran is a well-reputed investigative audio journalist. Her work with In The Dark (previously with APM Reports) had an actual impact on the world; Curtis Flowers was released after 23 years in prison, for a crime he was tried for six times. The podcast is widely cited as the reason why this happened.

The co-host, Heidi Blake, is a seriously credentialed British journalist and author but she appears to be new to audio. And that’s where the midwife analogy comes in. Baran is here to help introduce Blake into the audio world, and in the process of doing this, she’s also taking a leadership role within the growing world of audio that The New Yorker, along with Condé Nast, who have impressively expanded their audio selections this year.

The first episode reads like a long trailer; the two-host format, with Baran playing the role of inquisitor to Blake, the journalist on file and primary reporter for this story. It took me most of the first episode to realize it was the first episode, and not just the trailer, that I was listening to.

As the series began, I found the two-host interesting, but also, a bit quite jarring. They borrowed the well-used technique from The Daily, where the primary host tells the story, and the secondary host is there to ask the scripted questions to make sure that the listeners catch all the story details…and also to move the story along quickly and fill in some blanks along the way.

I assumed that Baran would be there at the beginning, and then fade away, allowing Blake to conclude the story after the listeners had a chance to meet her and get to know her. It felt like a long email introduction. But that’s not quite how it all worked; both hosts continued, which led to a somewhat stilted vibe. Blake clearly could have taken this story and run with it, but it seemed Baran was there out of duty, and also to keep her voice alive again in a beloved feed that’s been quiet for a long time (rumour has it an all-new In The Dark is coming sometime this summer/fall).

I understood why this choice was made, from a producer’s stance. But as a listener, I didn’t buy Baran’s interest in the story. Her role as secondary host felt out of place, and not quite right. Meanwhile, it took away from the potential that Blake had to report and host the story that she had been reporting for years. Her chops as a host were ready to go.

In this story, the double format, one host invested in the story, and the other there as emcee, took away the shine of the piece as a whole. For me, it was an interesting experiment, but to my mind, not a successful one. It felt cold and left a distance between both hosts.

Too Hot

Before I begin, I should say that this is a story I want to hear and a story I think the world should learn more about. The Road - from Canada’s National Observer centers around a road in a remote area of Northern Ontario called The Ring of Fire. It’s an oddly mineral-rich area that’s both literally a gold mine and also one of the world’s largest deposits of rare earth minerals, the same ones needed to power batteries (to fuel the forthcoming green energy revolution). 

The story begins with the narrator laying out the promise, but yet also the challenge of what this road is, both in terms of what it signifies, and what it can deliver. It takes a full four minutes for the narrator of The Road to introduce himself. The cold open moment is given to a man who lives on the First Nation affected by the Ring of Fire, Harry Wabasse, and I like this approach. But then, before the host introduces himself, we learn about the platform that published this series, the funding body that paid for it, and the sturgeon population of fish which will be greatly impacted…by the time Isaac Phan Nay announces himself as the narrator, I’ve lost the thread of where this story is going.

Phan Nay is formal and articulates his words very carefully. Yes, he presents as a serious journalist who knows his stuff, but on the downside, it also comes across as impersonal and overly academic. It took away his ability to connect with me in the moment when I was listening to this—on a dog walk—and left me feeling like I should be taking notes in a university classroom.

I’ve seen this go wrong before; it’s that editorial tendency to make environmental stories super serious, which makes them sound incredibly earnest, rather than leaning into the story elements buried inside. Canada’s National Observer is a well-respected digital publication. But here we have an environmental story, which makes it a very difficult story to tell with pizzaz, and instead of letting the story shine, they let the facts shine. In this process, it loses some of the “jooze”, a serious journalistic term I learned from Queer Eye years ago. It doesn’t make it less factual or tone-deaf. But it does allow that unmistakable element of personality to bring a story to life, even if that sometimes means they are adorned with glitter and sequins.

Just Right

Instead of listing just one here, I’ll give three choices.

1 - The Competition

Host Shima Oliaee goes back to her old stompin’ grounds; a distinguished young miss competition/pageant….only to have the entire experience be eclipsed by a seminal moment from the Supreme Court of America, in the exact moment when Roe vs. Wade was overturned. What a front-row seat to be at while history re-wrote a big and complicated new chapter.

2 - Lowlines

Host Petra Barran takes you off on a wandering moment through various enclaves to discover how to re-connect the earth, by watching where your feet are placed, one in front of the other. The entire series is a sonic playground, designed to draw you in and make you feel things, which it did in spades for me. Highly recommended for a night out on your own.

3 - Pack One Bag

It’s a complex story that tells a multi-layer history. Host David Modigliani finds a way to entertain you as he skillfully impersonates the banter of his grandparents. In a series that both brings you back in history, to Italy during World War II, and then shares the present day, a love story told through the generations, it also managed to skillfully weave together multiple elements: field tape, the actor Stanley Tucci reading a character, archival tape, original music. Even through all these high-ticket pieces, the host stands clear and present; a tough balance to strike.

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