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As co-creator and host of Gimlet Media’s Resistance, Saidu Tejan-Thomas Jr. specializes in powerfully crafted narratives. He recently spoke with documentary podcaster Doug Fraser (What We Do) about written versus audio storytelling, editing your work to the very end, and an audio drama he calls “phenomenal.”
Resistance was nominated for two Ambies this spring, including Best Scriptwriting. “If you want to sound like yourself, for the most part, it really starts and ends with the writing,” Tejan-Thomas says. “Focus on working to make [your script] as close to your speech as possible. Because if you get it close, your mouth will do the rest.”
Anxiety is a natural part of producing vulnerable work — before, during, and after the process. With a background in competitive slam poetry, Tejan-Thomas brings the tension of performance to his podcasts. He encourages creators to lean into their own curiosities, which is how he finds the perfect opening hook.
When Catherine Saint Louis began editing audio, she’d been at The New York Times for 18 years. Now the executive editor at Neon Hum Media, she credits the skills she’s built to quality resources and hard work. Here’s how she learned what she didn’t know going in, like writing for the ear and recognizing audio problems.
“When explaining the steps I took, I’ll say from the jump: the way to learn to edit podcasts is to put the work in,” Saint Louis says. “The bad news is it takes discipline and consistency. The good news is I think it’s possible to become a better editor — at least in part — on your own.”
While it’s invaluable to learn directly from experts, Saint Louis emphasizes the power of studying what they’ve made, and figuring out how. “If you have dissected dozens and dozens of podcasts to figure out what works, then you’re already well on your way to becoming a story editor. What are you waiting for?”
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