American Hysteria

Carmen Maria Machado is the author of three books, the award-winning Her Body and Other Parties, a collection of vibrantly haunting short stories, In the Dream House, a bestselling memoir and examination of queer relationship abuse, and most recently, a graphic novel horror story called The Low Low Woods. She has also taught several courses at the University of Pennsylvania, most relevant today, a...

Horror movies, consistently written-off by critics, exist unbound from mainstream respectability and because of this, they can often tell us the brutal truth. For this two-part series, we will be investigating what horror movies, their plots, their victims, and their villains reflect back to us about the dominant repressed fears of each generation. From the Big Bug movies of the atomic era, the ea...

Mara Wilson is a writer, actor, and the former star of the 1996 classic movie Matilda as well as the author of the memoir 'Where Am I Now? True Stories of Girlhood and Accidental Fame'. In this episode, Mara shares her relationship to the character that many in the public still see her as 25 years later, and we talk about the dramaturgy of living, our on-stage and off-stage personas, and for Mara,...

The new American archetype known as the “Influencer” has existed in various forms long before the advent of social media, and long before Kendall Jenner and the offensive brand activism of a now infamous Pepsi commercial. For this episode, we will trace the history of how corporate brands have used the idea of personal “authenticity” to sell us shit we don’t need since the mid 1800s: we’ll hear ab...

Gael Aitor is a senior in high school and the host of the podcast Teenager Therapy, a show where he and four other teenagers talk about mental health and the experiences they share with a rare and empathetic nuance. Today Gael and I will explore the differences and similarities between Gen Z and Millennials and the importance of moving through our egos and being vulnerable. Today, I’ll check in wi...

Our Live Variety Hour is not your run-of-the-mill podcast live show, but an actual two-hour theatrical production performed in 2019. For the first time ever, you can get access to the full video on Patreon (pay what you can)! Using my background as a drag and performance art producer, a handful of my brilliant creative partners and I created a vaudevillian bananas bonanza with skits, drag, dance,...

As the nation grapples with a volatile culture war over just what version of American history our children will grow up learning, in this episode we will see that the Public School has always been a complicated, explosive, sometimes bizarre socio-political battleground. We’ll look at the messy transformations of children’s curricula through the conservative and progressive clashes over the bible,...

Ellen Cushing's recent piece in The Atlantic called “I was a teenage conspiracy theorist” tells her story as a young Illuminati-truther during the post-9/11 years. Her history with conspiracy theories isn't all that different from my own, so I asked Ellen to join me to talk about our experiences to try to explain what these stories were like back in the 2000s, and how they intersect with the stori...

Join me and our Disney darling of the day, podcaster Sarah Marshall of ‘You’re Wrong About’ and ‘Why Are Dads?’ as we discuss our love for Disney parks, the weird history of animatronics, and Disneyland’s hilarious, disastrous opening day. So grab a Dole Whip, sit back and enjoy the tour through this gleefully haunted mansion of America. Listen to You’re Wrong About Listen to Why Are Dads? Subscri...

Disney has been presenting a fairytale reality within a reality since the 1920s, a far cuter reality that mimics our reality until reality is no longer reality at all. Make sense? For this episode, we will look at the possible underlying biological reasons for the success of the Disney corporation and the history of this ever-softening societal construction we call childhood. We’ll explore both th...

Alissa Bennett is co-host of The C-Word podcast on Luminary as well as a decorated historian of bad behavior. “By sifting through the cultural trash heap of history,” her podcast dives deep into the lives of famous women who have been called "Crazy" throughout history, the stories that we’re told about them through the tabloid press, and the real life that was happening behind the scenes. Alissa i...

There are few pieces of popular culture as problematic as the trash talk shows of the 1980s and 90s. Many of us remember Jerry Springer, Geraldo, Jenny Jones, and so many others trying to outdo each other in a parade of sensationalized deviance. The more outrageous, the better, but some of what was considered outrageous then is different than it is today. These programs certainly reinforced stereo...

Due to the what appears to be an attempted coup happening right now at the Capitol, I wanted to re-release this vital interview immediately. Please listen and share if you can. This is the colossal power of conspiracy theories. Today we are talking to Jason Stanley, Jewish-American professor of philosophy at Yale University and author of the New York Times bestselling book 'How Fascism Works'. He'...

Podcaster and storyteller Glynn Washington grew up in an extremist religious sect called the Worldwide Church of God and also hosted the Heaven’s Gate podcast about the UFO cult that famously committed a mass suicide in 1997. He’ll tell us all about this experience and how it shaped him, and together we will talk about how cults draw well-meaning people in, and what it means to be a seeker. For mo...

The charismatic leaders we are talking about today offer utopia and doomsday, salvation and absolute truth, perfection of the self and of the world at large, as long you dedicate yourself completely to the reality of these embodied Gods. Their radical alternate realities can draw in hundreds, thousands, even millions, as they preach spiritual wholeness and heaven, equality and communalism, or apoc...

“I would like to step out of my heart/and go walking beneath the enormous sky”, poet Rainer Maria Rilke wrote in 1918, probably consumed with a similar human anxiety to the one we each bear every weirdass day of our lives. This is the first episode of our new biweekly Patron’s-only podcast where you’ll come on a walk with me, either literally or figuratively, from wherever you happen to be. Walks...

Today we are talking to two scholars of religion, Professor Lerone A. Martin of Washington University in St. Louis and Professor Anthea Butler of the University of Pennsylvania about the relationship between white and black evangelicalism and televangelism in the 20th century through the present day. Lerone is also the author of Preaching on Wax: The Phonograph and the Making of Modern African Ame...

At this point in American culture, televangelists are often seen as overblown parodies, with their pleas for private jets, their fiery sermons, their many scandalous falls from grace. However, millions of people believe in the messages of these celebrity Christians who preach the Prosperity Gospel, that money donated to their megachurches will return to the donor in fantastical ways. Since the 195...

Today we are talking to Jason Stanley, Jewish-American professor of philosophy at Yale University and author of the New York Times bestselling book 'How Fascism Works'. He'll help us understand more about the relationship between conspiracy theories, moral panics, and the tactics of fascist movements. Make sure you check out Jason's book 'How Fascism Works', it's vital! Next time on the show: Tele...

PLEASE VOTE!!! Fake news was the unofficial buzzword of 2016, as incendiary disinformation spread prolifically across the tabloids, TV news reports, and social media, along with accusations of liberal media bias and even accusations of a democratic satanic cult. Some of what we are covering today are fantastical hoaxes that duped a gullible American public, priming future generations with a prefer...

Today we’ll be talking with one of the big influences for our True Crime episode, Rachel Monroe, author of Savage Appetites: Four True Stories of Women, Crime, and Obsession. Rachel talks to us about true crime fandom, getting to know the real people behind the sensational stories, and the impact of crime narratives on public policy. Next time on the show: Fake News PLEASE VOTE OMG PLEASE VOTE!!!!...

To this day, glossy tabloids show the face of a six-year-old pageant girl murdered in a wine cellar in 1996, and 20 years later, an NBC special about the unsolved case still pulled in more viewers than the Emmys. Over the last few years, America has experienced a serious boom in True Crime entertainment; endless docuseries, TV shows, films, podcasts, and books, but our fascination with crimes that...

American Hysteria is back for season four beginning October 19th! Join us as we investigate our ‘vehicles of hysteria’, everything from True Crime to Televangelists, Tabloid Talk Shows to Fake News to see how pop culture, the media, misinformation, and disinformation have influenced and manipulated the reality we share, and sometimes, the reality we don’t. Become a Patron for more content every mo...

Just in time to kick off this Halloween season, I got to be a guest on the amazing podcast ‘You’re Wrong About’ talking what else, but killer clowns. Mike Hobbes and Sarah Marshall are super smart and hilarious journalists obsessed with the past. Every week they reconsider a person or event that's been miscast in the public imagination. They talk about everything and everyone from Tonya Harding to...

We finally have the extremely dope merch you’ve been asking for, and it's ready for preorder! The design (from Brothers Design Co (https://brothersdesignco.com/) ) reimagines our razor-blade-in-the-apple logo with brand new nods to the illuminati and the Satanic Panic. Shipping in September just in time for our season four premiere and Halloween, find the design on our social media or our website....