What if you had the power to make the places you imagine real -- so real that people can walk through them and touch them, and millions of strangers could see the setting that once only existed in your mind? My guest this week is James Connelly, who designed the sets for show...
2018-05-10 13:00:01 +0000 UTC View Post
This week's guest grew up idolizing comic book heroes, which presented a problem as he entered adulthood: how could he possibly measure up to the flying, crime-fighting, invisible-jet-flying role models of his youth? Richard's mission in life became seeking out the opportunities for heroics in everyday life. In other words -- not expecting to becom...
2018-05-03 13:00:00 +0000 UTC View PostHello Patrons!
It's gonna be May for the next few weeks, and that means you can look forward to lots more livestreams and videos and a bonus ep of Sewers of Paris! Hooray for your wonderful support that makes it all possible. Here's what I'm working on, just for you:
Livestream on May 5: Join us at 2pm PST for another Sewer...
2018-05-01 22:28:22 +0000 UTC View Post
My guest this week is actor Wyatt Fenner, who you've seen on Veronica Mars, Bones, and the movie Take the Yuletide Gay. New Yorkers, you can see him right now in the show Transparent Falsehood at Theater 511 on West 54th Street. As an actor, Wyatt's an expert at inhabiting personas and hiding himself behind someone else. But an accidental outing an...
2018-04-26 13:00:00 +0000 UTC View Post
What's the difference between confidence and arrogance? My guest this week is Evan Peterson, author of the memoir The PrEP Diaries. For years, he trained himself to be aggressive, aloof, above it all, as a way to pre-empt criticism. That meant erecting masks and disguises, from gothic costumes to club-kid confusion. But what was missing behind his ...
2018-04-19 13:00:01 +0000 UTC View Post
Hello, and welcome to a bonus episode of The Sewers of Paris! Thanks to the support of everyone on Patreon, I'm able to bring you extra episodes with guests beyond just gay men. This month, we're going beyond the Sewers with a very special guest: Aydian Dowling, the first trans man to appear on the cover of Men's Health.
You might know him as the...
2018-04-17 13:00:02 +0000 UTC View Post
My guest this week is Drew Mackie. You might know him from the podcasts Gayest Episode Ever, or Singing Mountain, or We Are Not Young Anymore. The point is that he does a lot of podcasts, generally about the art & entertainment that makes the world a more joyful place. It's a long way from where he started his career, as a hard journalist cover...
2018-04-12 13:01:00 +0000 UTC View Post
Why is villainy so much fun? Whether it's cackling Emperor Palpatine or Joan Collings smirking smugly on Dynasty, bad guys invariably seem to be having such a good time ... and it can be hard to resist wanting to join them. My guest this week is Ira Madison, culture writer for The Daily Beast and co-host of the Keep It podcast. As a kid, he was qui...
2018-04-05 13:01:00 +0000 UTC View PostHi! Happy April! Ah, spring: when a young queer's fancy turns lightly to love. Wherever you are in the world, I hope you're experiencing fair weather and dazzling rainbows. Thanks to your support, I've got a full calendar of delights awaiting you this month! Here's what you can look forward to:
Saturday, April 14: A livestream about queer...
2018-04-03 01:52:28 +0000 UTC View Post
Is there some secret to turning pain into art? My guest this week is Justin Saint, whose artistic expression takes the form of makeup and cosplay. Justin's chosen medium involves costumes and disguises, but behind those beautiful facades are some struggles that are still pretty tender: periods of homelessness, parents setting his creative works on ...
2018-03-29 13:00:02 +0000 UTC View PostWe often talk on this show about escape, and it’s usually with the assumption that having an escape is a good thing. But there can be consequences to leaving the world you've always known behind -- even when that world is actively causing you harm. My guest this week is Ryan Kendall, whose parents subjected him to devastating homophobia, and dang...
2018-03-22 13:00:00 +0000 UTC View Post
How do you forgive someone who won't, or can't, apologize? My guest this week is JP Brammer, who dispenses advice in the column Hola Papi on Grindr's news site Into. JP's made a name for himself by providing thoughtful insights into living your best gay life, but his understanding of life and love didn't just spring into existence fully formed. It'...
2018-03-15 13:00:00 +0000 UTC View Post
Welcome to a special bonus episode of The Sewers of Paris! On most episodes, I talk to a guest about the entertainment that changed their life. But tonight I'm speaking to five guests who create entertainment that they hope will change the lives of other...
2018-03-13 13:01:00 +0000 UTC View PostHi Patrons!
Hope to see you tomorrow, March 10 at 2pm Pacific, for the next Sewers of Paris livestream! Can't wait to chat live with you about the entertainment that changed your life -- or the entertainment that you're enjoying right now.
RSVP for the livestream and get a reminder when we go live: 2018-03-09 20:29:48 +0000 UTC View Post
For most of us, it's fun to speculate about the drag character we have hidden within. But what do you do if you've got multiple characters kicking around inside you -- and you suspect they might not get along with each other? This week's guest is Pollo Del Mar, who is both a drag queen and a professional wrestler. It took a long time for her to get...
2018-03-08 14:00:59 +0000 UTC View Post
Were you a free range kid? If you were lucky enough to survive growing up pre-2000, you were probably allowed to spend a lot of time outdoors on your own with little to no structured time. My guest this week is Andrew Putschoegl, whose childhood mirrored that of 80s movies where groups of weird neighborhood kids are thrown together by simply becaus...
2018-03-01 14:00:59 +0000 UTC View Post
My guest this week is Ari Shapiro, host of All Things Considered. These days, he tells other people's stories on NPR, but his own story was considerably is more winding than you might expect -- behind his calm journalistic voice is a man who spent some time as an illegal immigrant, who carried mace for protection in high school, who nearly became a...
2018-02-22 14:00:59 +0000 UTC View Post
Thanks to everyone supporting The Sewers of Paris on Patreon, I'm able to bring you bonus episodes every month. We're going to go Beyond the Sewers of Paris, with special guests beyond just gay men, and deep-dives on topics I think you're going to love.
This month, I'm bringing you an unusual conversation with a very special guest: radio DJ Cindy...
2018-02-20 14:01:01 +0000 UTC View Post
How do you awaken your own untapped courage? This week's guest is Andrew Wheeler, writer of adventure and intrigue novels featuring defiantly gay characters. Though his stories are swashbuckling, Andrew tends to live a quiet, more domestic life than his globetrotting heroes. It was through his books that Andrew was able to explore beyond the town w...
2018-02-15 14:00:01 +0000 UTC View Post
Have you ever found a monster beautiful? It's rare that something can be both gorgeous and grotesque, but when those two qualities overlap it can be hard to look away -- and hard to resist following it wherever it wants to take you, no matter how dangerous. This week's guest is Tyler Coates, Culture Editor at Esquire.com. He felt the allure of the ...
2018-02-08 14:00:01 +0000 UTC View PostHi Patrons!
Thanks so much for your support! Here's the content you can look forward to this month -- your pledges make all of it possible:
Hello Patrons!
Thanks so much for supporting The Sewers of Paris. Your pledges make the show possible, and I'm eternally grateful to you. Starting this month, I'm bringing you even more: I'll be releasing bonus episodes of the podcast, along with YouTube videos about LGBT entertainment, livestream chats, and more.
Of course, you'll st...
2018-02-01 19:17:07 +0000 UTC View Post
What would you do if your life's work turned out to be killing you? My guest this week is Alberto Davalos, a horse boy. His whole life he expected to work with horses. And fresh out of college, he was on a farm in Kentucky, wearing gloves up to his shoulders and helping multi-million-dollar animals give...
2018-02-01 14:01:00 +0000 UTC View Post
My guest this week is Chi Chi Devayne, who competed on Season 8 of Drag Race and is appearing now on All Stars Season 3. Despite having competed -- twice, now -- on the world's most prestigious drag show, there was a time when Chi Chi hated drag. That was before she realized that everything in life had prepared her to perform in heels -- from churc...
2018-01-25 14:00:01 +0000 UTC View Post
It's a Hollywood cliche -- the pretty young face that moves to LA with no plan other than to get into the motion pictures. And yet it happened to this week's guest, Justin Root. He was a shy Ohio kid who feared the spotlight until he discovered how good it made him feel to be in it. A few weeks after graduating high school, he'd moved to LA. A few ...
2018-01-18 14:00:01 +0000 UTC View Post
When you need to get away from it all, how far do you go? My guest this week reached his fill of human interaction and so he did what so many of us have done: flew to South America to wander the forest for weeks while befriending a mountain lion.
And just a reminder about what's coming up for The Sewers of Paris in 2018. Starting in Februar...
2018-01-11 14:00:59 +0000 UTC View Post
My guest this week is George Alley, a musician and choreographer who paid his does on the mean streets of suburban Cleveland, where he was the secretary for a local street gang. The son of a Detroit blues singer and a demolition derby driver, George often felt anger at the world and at people who tormented him. That anger, it turned out, would be a...
2018-01-04 14:01:00 +0000 UTC View PostHi Sewers of Paris patrons! Happy New Year! I wanted to share some exciting plans for 2018.
First, the big news: starting in February I'll be releasing bonus episodes of The Sewers of Paris each month, featuring more personal stories about how entertainment has changed the lives of queer people. And on top of that, I'll be hostin...
2018-01-02 19:49:08 +0000 UTC View Post
We're coming up on a new year -- what are you going to change in 2018? My guest this week is Jay Michaelson, who several years ago found himself unhappy, unfulfilled, and disconnected from meaningful relationships, both with other people and with a higher power. So he decided to stop waiting for the life he wanted, and to start pursuing it -- throu...
2017-12-28 14:00:01 +0000 UTC View Post
Hello and welcome to the Sewers of Paris Holiday Special Special! In the spirit of the season, I've invited some guests, past and future, to share with us their favorite seasonal entertainment. We'll have an appreciation of Batman Returns from Anthony Oliveira, aka @meakoopa. There's a tribute to Snow Miser from Glen Weldon of NPR's Pop Cu...
2017-12-21 14:00:04 +0000 UTC View Post