Your next storyteller is Jim Hunt. Jim has been acting in Denver theatre for over 50 years, including a run as Zeus in Buntport Theater’s The Zeus Problem. He shared this story in front of a virtual audience last month and then was kind enough to re-record it with us because we had technical difficulties. The theme of the show that night was “Hindsight.” 

Special thanks to Jobless for this episode’s outro music!

Your next storyteller is Shelsea Ochoa. Shelsea is an improviser with Playback Theatre West and the creative director of Soul Stories, another wonderful storytelling organization here in Denver. She shared this story in front of a live audience at Buntport Theater in October 2019; the theme of the show was “Fake.”

Special thanks to Mega Gem for this episode’s outro music!

Matt shares a true story about working at the world-famous Casa Bonita restaurant

Today’s story comes from Matt Zambrano. Matt is a performer and poet, formerly from Colorado, who currently resides in New York City with is his wife and his cat. Matt told this story live from his apartment, through a web cam, up to a satellite, then back to a Zoom window in front of a live but virtual audience on 16 December 2020. This was the last story told at The Narrators in 2020 and felt like a perfect start for our newest season of the podcast. The theme of the show was “Hindsight.”

Special thanks to Kyle James Hauser for this episode’s outro music.

For more info about today’s storyteller or The Narrators, check the show notes for this episode or visit thenarrators.org. Follow us on Facebook and Instagram for more details about upcoming events in 2021 and beyond. And please, take a moment to tell a friend about this podcast, or leave a review on your favorite podcast app. That helps more people find us, so we really appreciate it. We’ll be back next Friday with another episode; until then, thanks for listening!

Last month we were supposed to do a show on the theme “Don’t I Know You?” which obviously didn’t happen. So instead, we gave our booked storytellers a chance to record stories on their own, without an audience, and send them into us. Three of our storytellers thankfully took us up on that offer.

As always, we didn’t screen coach or edit our storytellers in any way—they just sent these stories in and we’re presenting them here now.

On the podcast, you’ll hear co-host Erin Rollman giving a brief introduction, followed by three stories from these three wonderful humans:

Megan Sound is a mom and a writer. Her most recently published piece related to both of those things can be found at Mom Egg Review. She also uses Doo-Wop Bibimbop as a space to write about her mixed identity.

Nikki Fleming is a regular attendee of The Narrators who has spent her quarantine taking long baths and meandering walks, writing plays, watching the entire Harry Potter film series, and more.

Bethany Roinestad is a free-spirited Denver local who spends every free second doing yoga or playing in the mountains. She love houseplants, rock n’ roll, and keeping her Grandma’s tradition alive by almost constantly consuming true crime podcasts.

A special thanks to Beau Beverage for the outro music in this episode.

You can subscribe and listen to The Narrators for free wherever you get your podcasts. Browse our archives for past episodes. In lieu of our live show, we will be hosting a live-streaming edition of The Narrators on 20 May 2020 at HoldThePhone.tv. The theme will be “Gray Area.” For more details and the latest information, check our Facebook page.

So, last month our 10th anniversary live show was cancelled due to the coronavirus, our live show for April has also been cancelled, and we let the podcast go silent for a month.

The Narrators is a storytelling show,  but what we’re really trying to do is build empathy and compassion for our fellow humans, and right now, that’s what we’re all doing—putting our empathy to the test and isolating ourselves, trying protect one another.

But that doesn’t mean we need to be alone. Every episode of this podcast is a little 10-minute friend, a place you can escape when you need a break from the insanity and just want to listen to someone else for a little while.

So, we’re back, and since the world is a little different right now, we’re going to try something a little different too. For the next couple of episodes, I’m going to bring folks from our community to introduce a story they want to hear or to share a story of their own. This week, The Narrators co-host Erin Rollman joined the podcast to catch up briefly and introduce the story she most wanted to hear most.

Without further ado, this week’s story comes from Mitch Slevc. Mitch is a professional fake astronaut who works for the Denver Museum of Nature an Science. He shared this story in February 2020 at Buntport Theater. The theme of the evening was “Over the Top.” There’s a point in the story where Mitch takes his shirt off to reveal his dance crew uniform—here are those photos!

A special thanks to Nathan Hall for the outro music in this episode. Nathan recently released an album of music from Buntport’s “Cabaret de Profundis, Or How To Sing While Ugly Crying,” a production that they have not yet been able to debut. You can support Nathan and Buntport Theater by purchasing that album or one of these limited-edition t-shirts.

You can subscribe and listen to The Narrators for free wherever you get your podcasts. Browse our archives for past episodes or attend one of our live shows, which take place every third Wednesday at Buntport Theater in Denver, Colorado when there’s not a pandemic underway. For more details and the latest information, check our Facebook page.