Ira Glass Shares His Storytelling Secrets

My absolute favorite show of all time is This American Life …and that’s saying a lot, because This American Life is primarily an NPR documentary radio show, not a tv show. (Although they did do some video episodes of the show as well on Showtime.)

However, I would put T.A.M.  up against just about any tv show for sheer human drama, humor, entertainment, and  intelligent thought-provoking STORYTELLING.  And at the end of the day that’s all we’re doing as film, tv and media-makers – telling stories.

This American Life has the unique ability to consistently make it’s listeners laugh, cry, cringe and feel warm and fuzzy- sometimes ALL during the same 20 minute story. It truly is a work of master storytelling, especially when you take into consideration that there are no visuals at all.

So I want to share a very short clip of great advice from the show host master storyteller, Ira Glass, that mirrors my own common advice for people just getting started in the art of video storytelling.

Soooo many of you give up and get crushed early on by disappointing filmmaking results – especially with your first few projects, but as Ira explains here that’s just a normal part of the professional storytelling process, baby!

If you liked that little excerpt, check out the full interview with Ira Glass on Storytelling in 4 parts HERE on YouTube.com.