fbpx
  • Subscribe & Support
  • Sign up for Free Newsletter
  • Print Edition
    • Get Home Delivery
    • Read ePaper Online
    • Newsstand Locations
  • HV1 Magazines
  • Contact
    • Advertise
    • Customer Support
    • Submit A News Tip
    • Where’s My Paper?
  • Manage HV1 Account
  • Free HV1 Trial
  • Holiday Gift Subscription
Hudson Valley One
  • News
    • Schools
    • Business
    • Sports
    • Crime
    • Politics & Government
  • What’s Happening
    • Calendar Of Events
    • Featured Events
      • Art
      • Books
      • Kids
      • Lifestyle & Wellness
      • Food & Drink
      • Music
      • Nature
      • Stage & Screen
  • Opinions
    • Letters
    • Columns
    • Editorials
  • Local
    • Special Sections
    • Local History
  • Marketplace
    • All Classified Ads
    • Help Wanted
    • Post a Classified Ad
  • Obituaries
  • Podcast
  • Log In
No Result
View All Result
  • News
    • Schools
    • Business
    • Sports
    • Crime
    • Politics & Government
  • What’s Happening
    • Calendar Of Events
    • Featured Events
      • Art
      • Books
      • Kids
      • Lifestyle & Wellness
      • Food & Drink
      • Music
      • Nature
      • Stage & Screen
  • Opinions
    • Letters
    • Columns
    • Editorials
  • Local
    • Special Sections
    • Local History
  • Marketplace
    • All Classified Ads
    • Help Wanted
    • Post a Classified Ad
  • Obituaries
  • Podcast
  • Log In
No Result
View All Result
Hudson Valley One
No Result
View All Result

Welcome to Night Vale‘s Jeffrey Cranor launches new season of his other hit, Within the Wires

by Jeremiah Horrigan
September 12, 2017
in Stage & Screen
0
Welcome to Night Vale‘s Jeffrey Cranor launches new season of his other hit, Within the Wires
Podcast creator/writer Jeffrey Cranor lives in Saugerties with his wife, choreographer Jillian Sweeney.

Jeffrey Cranor remembers the first reactions to the podcast that he and a friend created in 2012. They collaborated on scripts that ran on Facebook and Twitter under the title Welcome to Night Vale. When they posted the inaugural episode, they got about 50 downloads the first couple of weeks it was up, “which meant that we had 50 friends,” Cranor recalls.

The traffic picked up over the next few weeks. They were looking at a surprise success, but neither Cranor nor his co-creator Joseph Fink had any thought of quitting their day jobs.

Welcome to Night Vale continued to gather attention, averaging about 1,000 downloads a month as Cranor and Fink wrote episodes that told the story of a small desert town whose radio broadcasts include community updates, local weather, announcements from the Sheriff’s Secret Police and dark-hooded figures with unknowable powers. Its tagline was “Turn on your radio and hide.”

A year after the first posting, Cranor was hoping for 100,000 downloads. The program received 140,000. Then, in the 13th month, as Cranor recalls, “Something happened.”

Cranor is 42. He and his wife, choreographer Jillian Sweeney, moved to Saugerties a couple of years ago. He identifies primarily as a writer. He was born in Texas and studied Journalism at Texas A & M. After gigs at a few weeklies, he realized that it wasn’t journalism that he loved so much as writing for theater.

When the couple moved to Brooklyn, he became involved with the New York Neo-Futurists in their long-running show, The Infinite Wrench. Members of the company would write, perform, produce and direct short-short plays. They’d be put on a one-hour timer. Every week, Cranor said, the group would create new works and throw the previous week’s efforts out the window.

“It was always changing; we were writing for the now, for the moment. It really changed the way I looked at writing: It made it a lot more immediate, made the relation between actor and audience active rather than passive. It made me think about, ‘How do you connect? How do you tell a true story to an audience that’s hungry for a story better than their own lives?’” Ultimately, Welcome to Night Vale was his first attempt to answer those questions.

Podcasts were just looming on the horizon in 2011. Both men were enthralled by the format’s possibilities, even though early podcasts weren’t much more than improvised chat shows between friends. “You kind of just got to know them; it was a feeling I had growing up: listening to the radio, how close I felt to the radio host, how connected I felt to their voices…. So, we said, ‘We should make a podcast.’”

There were no fiction podcasts to speak of at the time, he said. Neither man felt capable of doing NPR-style journalism nor improvised comedy that was becoming common, so they decided to play to their strengths: “Both of us were writers. We made and told stories and we were into theater.”

That “something” that happened in the 13th month of the show? “We had 2.5 million downloads. And in the 14th month alone, we had 8.6 million. It was really weird.”

Weird, and gratifying, even shocking. Cranor said that he believes the program caught fire on Tumblr, and for whatever reasons, Welcome to Night Vale has been downloaded roughly 180 million times since it was first posted. The program has been performed on more than 200 stages in 35 states in 16 countries over the past three years. A print version of the program debuted at #4 on The New York Times best-seller list.

Cranor has long since left his day job. What started off as something of a lark has become a juggernaut of creative energy.

The success of Welcome to Night Vale culminated in the Night Vale Presents network last year. Its aim is to encourage independent podcasting from writers and artists who haven’t worked in the format before. To that end, Night Vale Presents has offered fictional podcasts by other artists including Alice Isn’t Dead and The Orbiting Human Circus (of the Air). Each debuted in the Apple Podcasts Top 10.

Cranor’s latest hit podcast, co-written with Janina Matthewson, is called Within the Wires, and it is described as “found audio from an alternate universe.” Using the conceit of a recorded museum tour, the second season, titled “Museum Audio Tours,” spins an allusive tale of a mysterious, sci-fi-flavored world that explores the complex relationship between the tour’s narrator and a renowned artist with whom the narrator has had a relationship.

Cranor describes this season as “a bit esoteric,” in that it requires the audience to visualize and make decisions about artworks that they have no idea about. It’s also playful, inventive and immersive – a dramatic example of how Cranor and his co-conspirators continue to blend writing and performing and acting into this still-evolving world of podcasting.

Within the Wires’ “Museum Audio Tours” season premieres on Tuesday, September 5, with new episodes every two weeks through January 9. The season will be available for free on Apple Podcasts, RadioPublic and wherever listeners can access podcasts. Visit www.nightvalepresents.com for links to additional podcasts.

Join the family! Grab a free month of HV1 from the folks who have brought you substantive local news since 1972. We made it 50 years thanks to support from readers like you. Help us keep real journalism alive.
- Geddy Sveikauskas, Publisher
Previous Post

Tracking shots: Wind River will chill you to the bone

Next Post

Shakespeare amongst the sculptures

Jeremiah Horrigan

Related Posts

To be young, gifted and brown: Hudson Hall screens new documentary Hudson, America this Saturday
Stage & Screen

To be young, gifted and brown: Hudson Hall screens new documentary Hudson, America this Saturday

February 2, 2023
Special dance, comedy, theater and movie events in Ulster County this week
Stage & Screen

Special dance, comedy, theater and movie events in Ulster County this week

January 20, 2023
Rent revival dazzles at Center for Performing Arts at Rhinebeck
Stage & Screen

Rent revival dazzles at Center for Performing Arts at Rhinebeck

January 11, 2023
Bringing Shakespeare to life in Boiceville
Education

Bringing Shakespeare to life in Boiceville

December 21, 2022
Dzieci returns to Kingston with its annual offering of Fools Mass (photos)
Community

Dzieci returns to Kingston with its annual offering of Fools Mass (photos)

December 19, 2022
Movies with Spirit screening of Merry Christmas December 17
Stage & Screen

Movies with Spirit screening of Merry Christmas December 17

December 16, 2022
Next Post
Shakespeare amongst the sculptures

Shakespeare amongst the sculptures

Trending News

  • One-man crime spree comes to end after Kingston man runs out of luck 3.5k views
  • Saugerties to host inaugural Snow Moon Festival February 3 to 5 1.8k views
  • The Bruynswyck Inn Oyster & Clam Bar offers fresh seafood and Shawangunk views 1.4k views
  • 20-foot, 10-wheel big rig overturns in Saugerties, injuring driver 1.1k views
  • Three-story, mixed-use building proposed for Agway property in New Paltz 1k views
  • Neighbors protest Ulster County Veterans’ Cemetery flagpole spotlights 685 views

Weather

Kingston
◉
7°
Mostly Cloudy
7:06 am5:13 pm EST
Feels like: -11°F
Wind: 15mph WNW
Humidity: 42%
Pressure: 30.23"Hg
UV index: 0
SatSunMon
23/18°F
46/32°F
45/25°F
Weather forecast Kingston, New York ▸

Subscribe

Independent. Local. Substantive. Subscribe now.

  • Subscribe & Support
  • Sign up for Free Newsletter
  • Print Edition
  • HV1 Magazines
  • Contact
  • Manage HV1 Account
  • Free HV1 Trial
  • Holiday Gift Subscription

© 2022 Ulster Publishing

No Result
View All Result
  • News
    • Schools
    • Business
    • Sports
    • Crime
    • Politics & Government
  • What’s Happening
    • Calendar Of Events
    • Featured Events
      • Art
      • Books
      • Kids
      • Lifestyle & Wellness
      • Food & Drink
      • Music
      • Nature
      • Stage & Screen
  • Opinions
    • Letters
    • Columns
    • Editorials
  • Local
    • Special Sections
    • Local History
  • Marketplace
    • All Classified Ads
    • Help Wanted
    • Post a Classified Ad
  • Obituaries
  • Podcast
  • Subscribe & Support
  • Contact Us
    • Customer Support
    • Advertise
    • Submit A News Tip
  • Print Edition
    • Read ePaper Online
    • Newsstand Locations
    • Where’s My Paper
  • HV1 Magazines
  • Manage HV1 Account
  • Log In
  • Free HV1 Trial

© 2022 Ulster Publishing