This is an iHeart original.

Welcome back to very special episodes, and this is a very special, very special episodes because we're going to do our first mail bag issue.

We put out a call for reader emails and you guys really came through, which was very Not only just to get any emails is great, but to get good questions that will hopefully make for a good episode.

I'm joined as always with Danish Swartz and Zaren Burnette.

Hey, yo, I'm going to start here.

Hi all.

This is from Katie.

By the way, Josh, I don't think this is your wife, Katie.

It's not my daughter, Katie.

I think actual listener.

Hi all, curious as to how each of you got connected to very special episodes.

Who conceived of the idea of this my current favorite podcast and flattery gets you everywhere in the mailbag segment.

So we'll take Katie's question first.

Jason, I feel like you should kind of take the lead on this one.

Yeah, I mean you were the mastermind.

Well, I'll tell you how this all came together.

When I started here in twenty twenty, we were making a lot of limited series, which are great, and that's how we both started working in podcasting.

With both of you doing Black Cowboys and Haleywood and Stealing Superman, and the appetite for those series got a little bit less in the years, but we had so many good ideas, and our head of development here, a woman named Nikki Atore, came to me at one point and said, well, could you do one story per episode and just keep the show on all the time.

I thought, well, we had note cards of ideas that we wanted to do.

Maybe we're not ever going to get to do the eight episode version, but I'd love to still tell these stories.

And so I reached out to both of you, thinking, like, no one cares about this podcast if it's just me on here telling these stories.

I need some proven commodities in the podcast space, and thankfully each of you have agreed to do this.

Jason, we sort of have an interesting origin story, which is when I was a senior in college, I was like really desperately trying to make money as a writer and try to figure out whether I could be a writer as a career.

And I wrote to Mental Floss with a few pitches of articles that I wanted to write as like a freelance writer, and you mercifully I think pulled me out of a slush pile, let me write to Mental Floss articles that after I graduated, I moved to New York and kept writing for Mental Floss, and then our paths diverged and it was years later that we reconnected in the podcast world.

You've been my guardian angel multiple times in my career.

I love that story.

To describe your pitches as like one of many in a pile.

This is like you ever see those sports movies where I scout see somebody just so outperforming their peers and like, Woho's that person?

That was my reaction to reading your pages of pitches and just nodding like, yeah, yes, how have we not done that before?

We got to do all these and so I have not been surprised to watch your career blow up from your early days Brown and Mental Floss.

Well, thank you, Jason, and it's been such a pleasure of working with you Data.

I mean, I didn't know you before this show, but I'm so glad that I know you now, because you are quite a talent.

I gotta agree with Jason on that.

Zara and I feel the same way.

I'm honestly so grateful to very special episodes for connecting me with you this amazing group and getting able to like learn genuinely.

I love every time I record an episode because I get to learn something that I didn't know about.

Same same It's such a fun experience of both learning and then also the curiosity gets paid off because the stories are so fun, but they're also emotionally compelling.

It's been a blast, and zaren a similar experience with you where we did not know each other.

I had a friend who really understands the digital media and what's important, and I'll meet with her about once a year, and there was a time, maybe twenty nineteen, she said, watch what MEL magazine is doing.

They're doing more interesting stuff than anyone else.

They're taking chances, they're writing stories nobody else.

And so I started reading Mel, and I started gravitating to anything with your byline and just thought like, how's he coming up with this stuff?

And then very well written, deeply reported stuff.

Well, thank you.

And so when I got here and was tasked with let's go make some new shows, I kind of in a panic sent you a blind direct message asking if you'd ever thought about doing a podcast, and thankfully you also responded to my plea and here we are years later.

Oh it was a great I remember we helped on the phone call and I was like, this guy, that's dope.

This should be fun.

Because I was a little hesitant because I was like, you know, deep into journalism and I didn't really know much about podcasting.

But I loved radio, and I was like, Okay, well it's basically the same as radio, so let me just think that if I can pull this off.

But you gave me the confidence that it would be fun, so I was like, all right, let's try this a new adventure.

All right.

Let's move on to a question from Carter, and again the flattery's right to the top of the podcast.

I love your podcast.

Your stories are interesting, well written, and Dana is easy to listen to.

Oh thank you.

After hearing all of your very special episodes.

My favorite is the Arctic Balloon, so that's a recent one.

I'm curious to know each of your favorite episodes.

Keep the stories coming.

Anyone to have a favorite, I.

Think I do.

I like Westward Hoax, which was the one about Palisade, Nevada, about whether this town was faking Wild West fights for tourists.

I think because it's sort of a double hoax.

It's possible that these writers were just inventing this sort of interesting story to dazzle I don't know newspaper readers.

There's a Mark Twain cameo.

That's my favorite episode.

I think I just love a hoax.

Obviously.

I have another podcast with iHeartRadio called Hoax exclamation Point.

We actually did do a very deep, deep dive into Palisade and the Mark Twain several other Mark Twain hoaxes.

I love a good hoax.

That was such a good episode.

Actually, I had that on my short list of favorite episodes.

So I'm gonna go with one of my other choices, which is the attempted Sinking of the Titanic.

It was our first episode, and the story is the last day of filming Nova Scotia.

They had the whole cast and crew there and then they get dosed with PCP and then the whole set just goes wild, or basically everybody who was on the set goes wild.

And it's a mystery.

You know, you get this like who did it?

Who would want to even like dose everybody with PCP?

And then the imagery of like the wheelchair race to the Hospital, the James Cameron to Bill Paxton grabbing beer just like you know, like we're just gonna drink our way through this.

I just thought that one was a really fun one.

What about you, Jason Classic.

Yeah, this is hard.

This is like picking a favor child, which I will do if that question comes up in the mailbag.

I'm going to go with an episode from last year.

We called it Et and Me, and it's the story of the kid actor who was inside the ET costume for some of the stunt work, and Jake Rosson got a great interview with him, and you get some good movie history.

You get a lot of family, interpersonal, tragedy, drama, but also just love spending time with him and reliving his experience.

And sometimes someone new will come on and ask for sample episodes just to kind of get up to speed.

They can't go back and listen to everything they should.

I will send them that.

I will send them Andy the sneaker wearing Goose just topic selection wise, that's a classic we did with our friends at Wonder Media, and really like this could be the whole podcast, just me listening out because they're all my favorites.

That's a cop out, but oh wait.

I also want to shout out eleanor Roosevelt.

Yes, Amelia Earhart.

Their flight, that's the one that I really love.

I had that also my short list.

That was, oh my god, that was the best them in their nightgown or the evening gowns rather but going up in the plane top of the world, unobstructive view.

I loved that one, especially because something that seems like such a fun like tidbit and then you're like, everything was a.

Pr move, everything's pr all right, Hi, very special people.

I started listening to the show earlier this fall, and I'm slowly getting to the older episodes.

One of my favorite parts of the show is when Zaren casts the movie version of the story you told me the episode thank you.

If you had to cast a movie version of the Very Special Episodes podcast, who would play each of you?

Thanks for keeping me entertained at work?

This feels dangerous.

Definitely, definitely dangerous.

This is a great question from Jill.

Totally great question, and I promise I did give this thought and really thank you again.

That was a nice compliment, Joe.

So I was like, okay, let me rack my brains.

I want to have ones that both fit but also are fun, and it's like, you guys go walk away with going what why him?

Why her?

So I'll start with you, Jason.

I needed somebody who was smart and kind and open hearted and decent.

So I was like, okay, that's kind of a heavy lift in Hollywood.

But I came up with two either Jason Sudeikis without the mustache or Chris Pine.

Both of them I thought were both really like curious, decent, open hearted guys, and I was like, okay, so those are my picks.

Both of them obviously would have to wear glasses, but I thought either one of them would do the trick.

I'll take it.

That's good, Okay, cool.

Now.

For Dana, I was like, okay, I need someone who's smart and savvy but also has that great voice and a good laugh.

And so I came up with two.

I had Eva Green or Scarlet Johansson.

What are you kidding me?

Okay, Yig, sure?

How much did I have to pay you?

And I'm sure Margot Robbie too, Natalie Partman, but thank you.

I'm glad you'd liked it.

No, for me, I had to go with someone a little bit eccentric and kind of odd and obviously care so I really only had one choice.

Just can jump right to the top of the list, which was Lakeith Stanfield.

Yes, we did that work, okay, So first, that's perfect the producer, Josh, I also went and casted you because I wanted to get a shout out for you.

So I had kind of a tough one with this one because I was like, Okay, there's Charlie Huntum from The Gentleman, there's Travis Fimble for Vikings.

But I thought again, I was like, you know what, I think the best one because I need somebody who's you know, intelligent, somebody who has obviously, you know, great ears, but also has a great sense of the flow.

So I went with the rapper mac miller rip mac miller Ow.

Although, as you said, Charlie whun I'm like, I really see that, right, I think that's like a really good pull.

So there you go.

That's my cast for the crew.

That's pretty good, Dana, you break the screenplay for that.

Yes, I'm on it all right, Dear Dana's Aaron Jason and team love your show.

I hope one day you'll take the show on tour.

Are there any plans for a live event that's from Blaine.

Tour is probably a little bit more.

I think that would be overshooting the size of the actual audience.

But maybe a live events.

Aaron and I did something in Venice, lest I guess I was earlier this year at the lighthouse there.

They have already invited us back, Dana.

Maybe we can get you to come over to the West side for that.

Yeah, then the same tour can follow us.

Have you done Noble Blood or Ridiculous Crime tours yet?

No?

No, we've talked about it.

I would have no idea how to do that.

No one has talked to me, and that the idea seems very intimidating.

But if you are someone who knows how to do a live tour or has an idea for how Noble Blood should be alive, or please let me know.

Hello, VS, I'm writing the week before Thanksgiving.

Do your families have any unique holiday traditions?

Your answer can relate to any holiday, not just Thanksgiving.

Thank you Carolyn for giving us some leeway here.

You guys have any Thanksgiving or other holiday traditions.

We watched the parade, we watched the dog show.

Those are classics.

I would say the only like sort of like weird unique tradition we have that it comes to mind is for Passover, where we used to make like a home video version of the Passover story every year and like cast each other.

Like my older sister and I would swap whose nepher Titi and who's Miriam and then my little sister.

Even as she got older, my baby sister, Hallie was always baby Moses getting hold from the bathtub.

So yeah, I love that she was like too big to still be naked into that.

So in my family, when my sister and I got out of college and were having families of our own and everyone started kind of moving away, my mom did a very smart thing, which was plant a flag on Thanksgiving Friday.

She branded it and the idea was like, I know, everyone's pulled in a bunch of directions and the time might not work out on Thanksgiving, But on Thanksgiving Friday, I'm going to get a tent.

We're going to put up big table in the backyard.

We'll get it catered, and everybody came.

No one had excuses for many years, but the only time I saw many of my relatives on that day, my Aunt Laura's kept up the tradition, we'll go see her on Friday this year, So I staunch advocate for Thanksgiving Friday or slightly alternative holiday schedules.

Catering is clutched because no one will want to cook.

Yeah right, not two days in a row, super smart and better than I mean, no offense to leftovers.

But you have that to look forward to too, you know.

Now you guys have like a double dipping on the deliciousness we'll see.

For my Thanksgiving family tradition, there was always the question of who will Zreon bring to Thanksgiving, because like every year I'd bring some friend or somebody from college or somebody who was like a roommate who just couldn't either make it home or didn't want to go home, but they wanted some family time.

And my family's very accepting, and also there's just kind of like some odd characters and their fun folks to hang out with.

So it was always like, who's there going to bring this year?

And then I also have another one, which is at for Christmas, I have to go to church with my mother.

Then I have to have her priest guilt me about never seeing me in the flock the rest of the year.

So there's that as what huh?

All right, let's see.

Okay, this from Anna.

I heard you were doing a mail bag episode and decided to write in with a question, why do you call it a mail bag episode?

I'm not saying I don't understand the term.

What I'm saying is everyone calls their listener email segment a mail bag.

Shouldn't you come up with something?

Dare I say special or at least original?

So Anna taking us to task?

Good question.

I spent a little time on this, and I'm still scrambling to try to come up with anything to say.

A letter sec I'm trying to think of, like basically, I mean, she really pretty intelligently identified something that I think is called a retronym if I remember correctly, which is like, it's not actually a physical mail bag anymore, but we still use it.

Why don't we just call it an email dump?

Oh?

I love email dump?

You know.

Also, I was thinking we could either include very special listener letters or listener can But then I had more fun with the idea of our pandemonium episode.

It's pandemonium but with fans.

Oh, I like that we can brand that.

Well, I'll run that by Anna and see, he says, if she'll accept that this is from Maura, I'm a very special listener.

I've listened to every episode since you asked for questions, I'll ask this, what topics will you be covering this winter?

We got a lot packed schedule.

Josh and I were just going over the calendar for the next few months.

We've got some Olympics stuff, We've got Super Bowl.

We've got some variations on the format where Dana and Zara have gone into the field to do some original historical reporting.

If that's a term that makes us, Zara or Dana anything stand out that we've recorded recently.

I mean, I'm very very excited for the very special, very special episode that I'm working on now.

I don't want to spoil too much, but I, as Jason said, it went into the field, took some pictures, did a little investigating, and I hope we can do more of this type of episode in the future.

Ooh nice.

Well, in line with the Titanic PCP episode, I took on another great drug inspired urban legend, which is what I knew urban legend.

I guess you's very much factual, which is the picture of Doc Ellis pitched a perfect game, or rather a no hitter on Acid and I went and talked to a bunch of people about that, including his wife, and got the inside story.

So that one's a fun one.

I think, Joshua have a lot of fun with it.

Good next few months.

All right, Well, I think that wraps it up here for our initial Pandemonium episode.

I want to thank everyone for seriously, for anyone who's listens to the show, that's amazing to listen and take the time to write in also even more amazing, and I want to thank you Dana Zarin, josh everyone behind the scenes here.

This is a dream to get to work on this show.

And I'm very proud of all the great stories we've been able to put out into the world.

More to come, Happy Thanksgiving, Happy Thanksgiving Friday, and we will see you here next Wednesday.

Thank you so much.

It's such a privilege to be able to do this show.

Yeah, completely, thank you for the listener emailed and all of the kind words, and just happy Thanksgiving and happy Holidays to everybody.

And thank you for putting me in the same sentence as Ava Green.

Very Special Episodes is made by some very special people, including Danish Schwartz and Zaren Burnett.

Senior producer Josh Fisher.

Today's episode was edited by Josh Fisher.

Original music by Alisa McCoy, Show logo by Lucy Cantonia.

Thanks again to everyone who wrote in.

Sorry we didn't get to all your questions, but they're now preserved in the Pandemonium Google doc.

I just renamed it Reyese, Gail Matthew, Derek Lydia.

We're going to get to yours next time.

I promise, Happy Thanksgiving.

Very Special Episodes is a production of iHeart Podcasts.