My friend Raven Snook is a writer, editor, performer, mom and all-around diva (in the positive sense of the word) who’s currently the editor in chief for TDF Stages and a contributing theater critic for Time Out New York. She joins me once again to discuss this year’s Tony Awards.

This is part two of our kibbitz session, and we discuss Death of a Salesman, the musical flop Queen of Versailles, and The Jellicle Ball, an actually good version of Cats.

Links:

Raven's website: www.ravensnook.com

Connect with Stephen:
Twitter: https://twitter.com/SER1897
YouTube: https://youtube.com/@ThePlayTyperGuy
Email: ser1840@gmail.com

Join the Player Typer Guy Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/stephenrobinson

My friend Raven Snook is a writer, editor, performer, mom and all-around diva (in the positive sense of the word) who’s currently the editor in chief for TDF Stages and a contributing theater critic for Time Out New York. She joins me once again to discuss this year’s Tony Awards, but first, we chat about Rocky Horror, Chicago, and the current state of musicals. (This was recorded before the sad announcement that my beloved Death Becomes Her is closing at the end of June.)

Raven’s work has also appeared in New York Magazine, Yahoo Parenting, the New York Post, The Village Voice, Bon Appétit, Better Homes & Gardens and Parents.com, among others.

We’ll be back next week for part two of our kibbitz session.

Guest Info:

Raven Snook is a writer, editor, performer, mom and all-around diva (in the positive sense of the word) who’s currently the Editor of Creative Content for TDF and a contributing theater critic for Time Out New York.

Raven's work has also appeared in New York Magazine, Yahoo Parenting, the New York Post, The Village Voice, Bon Appétit, Better Homes & Gardens and Parents.com, among others.

Links:

www.ravensnook.com

Connect with Stephen:
Twitter: https://twitter.com/SER1897
YouTube: https://youtube.com/@ThePlayTyperGuy
Email: ser1840@gmail.com

Join the Player Typer Guy Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/stephenrobinson

Reality Checking the Bulwark is the ongoing project by Steward Beckham and Evan Stern. As Steward says, “We believe that institutions matter, but when institutions fail, democracy falters. And institutions that are built to counter Trump should not repeat the same mistakes that laid the groundwork for Trump. We respect and value the The Bulwark, but when it becomes a central pillar of our pro-democracy movement, it also needs to be interrogated for narrating our political stories in the same frames that may have produced the problem and also may not be the medicine for that problem. So that’s why we want to identify its failures in the best faith possible.”

Steward and Evan return for Part Two of our discussion about The Bulwark, the Never Trump movement, and who controls the Democratic Party narrative. Enjoy! And go check out Steward and Evan’s substacks, Stew on This and Certain Thoughts.

Make sure you check out episode 79 of the podcast to hear Part 1 of this enlightening conversation!

Links:

Evan’s Substack: https://substack.com/@therealevanstern

Steward’s Substack: https://substack.com/@stewardbeckham

Stew on This Podcast: https://www.stewonthis.com/podcast

Connect with Stephen:
Twitter: https://twitter.com/SER1897
YouTube: https://youtube.com/@ThePlayTyperGuy
Email: ser1840@gmail.com

Join the Player Typer Guy Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/stephenrobinson

I’ve enjoyed Reality Checking the Bulwark, an ongoing project by Steward Beckham and Evan Stern. As Steward says, “We believe that institutions matter, but when institutions fail, democracy falters. And institutions that are built to counter Trump should not repeat the same mistakes that laid the groundwork for Trump. We respect and value The Bulwark, but when it becomes a central pillar of our pro-democracy movement, it also needs to be interrogated for narrating our political stories in the same frames that may have produced the problem and also may not be the medicine for that problem. So that’s why we want to identify its failures in the best faith possible.”

I was fortunate enough to speak about this in depth with Steward and Evan. Watch and/or listen to Part One here, and come back next week for Part Two. Also, go check out Steward and Evan’s substacks, Stew on This and Certain Thoughts.

You will hear:

• Discussing The Bulwark - How it started and how it’s going
• Why Steward and Evan decided to discuss conversations happening on the conservative site and debate whether they were getting things right as a talking point to Democrats who are looking to take a more conservative view on politics and their expansion beyond the “Never Trump” crowd
• Is it arrogance or is it victory? - The Bulwark seems to be slow to catch up on matters that will shape an election (after the fact, by a mile) and have a very narrow viewpoint on whose opinion matters
• Stereotypical archetypes are used (the moonshining hillbilly, the longhorn-riding Texan, the Callifornian juicer, etc.) to drive how politician candidates are told to talk to different voters, infantilizing and demoralizing voters
• And more!

Links:

Evan’s Substack: https://substack.com/@therealevanstern

Steward’s Substack: https://substack.com/@stewardbeckham

Stew on This Podcast: https://www.stewonthis.com/podcast

Connect with Stephen:
Twitter: https://twitter.com/SER1897
YouTube: https://youtube.com/@ThePlayTyperGuy
Email: ser1840@gmail.com

Join the Player Typer Guy Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/stephenrobinson

Evan Barker is a former Democratic campaign operative and political strategist. Her upcoming book Nothing Left explores her departure from the party. Eric Swalwell, the disgraced former congressman and gubernatorial candidate, perhaps represents everything Evan dislikes about her former party.

Evan and I discuss the Swalwell fallout and debate how to maintain the balance of believing victims while preserving the presumption of innocence. We also reject guilt by association, which we're starting to see more of recently.

You will hear:

• The difference in America of the presumption of innocence is what we want (when it applies to us), but how one anonymous accusation of sexual misconduct can ruin a life or career long before any guilt is established
• Consensual versus nonconsensual relationships with staffers and others
• Does “believe all women” automatically equate to “don’t believe all men”?
• And more!

Guest Info:

Evan Barker is a political and cultural commentator who has worked in Democratic politics, primarily as a fundraiser for progressive US Senate, House, and DA campaigns. After attending the DNC in 2024, she left the party and became an Independent. Evan has been published in The Times, Newsweek, and The Free Press. She has appeared on System Update with Glenn Greenwald, Batya!, Cuomo, Jesse Watters Primetime and Fox News at Night. Evan writes on substack, hosts a podcast, and her first book, NOTHING LEFT is forthcoming from Simon and Schuster in July 2026 and is now available for pre-order.

Links:

Evan’s Website: https://www.evanbarker.net/

Evan’s Substack: https://evanbarker.substack.com/

Evan’s Podcast: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SHtWrIrkPmY

Evan’s Book (pre-order): https://www.amazon.com/dp/1668213176?ref=cm_sw_r_ffobk_cp_ud_dp_T6J7K2VZ9R6MB0KCV192&ref_=cm_sw_r_ffobk_cp_ud_dp_T6J7K2VZ9R6MB0KCV192&social_share=cm_sw_r_ffobk_cp_ud_dp_T6J7K2VZ9R6MB0KCV192&bestFormat=true

Connect with Stephen:
Twitter: https://twitter.com/SER1897
YouTube: https://youtube.com/@ThePlayTyperGuy
Email: ser1840@gmail.com

Join the Player Typer Guy Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/stephenrobinson

Author Patricia Martin joins me to discuss her new book, Will the Future Like You? Reflections on the Age of Hyper-reinvention. Martin has written four books, and her work has been featured in Harvard Business Review, Huffington Post, The New York Times, and Psyche Magazine.

She holds an MFA in non-fiction from Bennington College, with post-graduate work in medical narrative at Duke University. She holds workshops in Jungian theory at the C. G. Jung Institute of Chicago and hosts the podcast Jung in the World.

You will hear:

• How other people see us is how we see ourselves (letting the algorithm define us) and how we can consciously choose who we want to be and claim our authentic selves
• Our consciousness is for sale and social media is the supply chain - How parasocial relationships affect and influence us
• How social media has exacerbated the FOMO (fear of missing out) because we can see everything everyone is doing and wondering why we weren’t invited
• Modern society is in the grips of what Freud termed a cultural “death drive”
• And more!

Links:

Patricia’s website: https://patricia-martin.com/

Patricia’s book: https://rb.gy/fojfup

Connect with Stephen:
Twitter: https://twitter.com/SER1897
YouTube: https://youtube.com/@ThePlayTyperGuy
Email: ser1840@gmail.com

Join the Player Typer Guy Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/stephenrobinson

The Wall Street Journal article reported recently that some young voters are starting to regret their vote for Donald Trump, who set the world on fire and didn’t even lower the price of eggs. A new poll finds 58 percent of voters under 30 disapprove of his job performance.

This is actually good news, if you’re up for Democrats winning elections. I know many liberals insist that Trump won because he’s a racist, sexist bigoted fool rather than in spite of those obvious character flaws. However, if all 2024 Trump voters wanted him to Make American Antebellum Again, he’d enjoy much higher approval. I don’t need to like former Trump voters to accept them in a winning coalition. It’s like Buffy teaming up with Spike in that epic Season 2 finale of Buffy the Vampire Slayer. Spike’s motivations were self-centered and hardly noble, but ultimately, he still helped her save the world.

This week, my guest is political strategist and friend of the podcast Cliston Brown.

You will hear:

• Online shaming might feel good, but is it the most effective persuasion technique?
• Why Democrats too often fall for “silver bullet” thinking
• Why John Fetterman’s curious Senate career likely ends after one term
• Why “the math is the math” when it comes to winning elections
• And more!

Guest Info:

Cliston Brown is a political analyst and communications executive. He writes on U.S. politics at ClistonBrown.com, having previously written for the New York Observer and the California Globe. On average, Brown has projected the final composition of the U.S. House of Representatives within 7.5 seats and the U.S. Senate within 1.222 seats. In the most recent election, he correctly predicted every U.S. Senate race.

Brown began his career as a journalist in the Chicago area in 1994, covering government and politics, intellectual property law, international business issues, education, and law enforcement. He moved to Washington, D.C., in 2001, where he served for two years as director of communications for U.S. Rep. Pete Visclosky (D-Indiana), then transitioned back into the private sector as a communications professional and political analyst in the insurance industry, holding positions in Washington, Chicago and San Francisco.

Follow Brown on Twitter: @clistonbrown

Connect with Stephen:
Twitter: https://twitter.com/SER1897
YouTube: https://youtube.com/@ThePlayTyperGuy
Email: ser1840@gmail.com

Join the Player Typer Guy Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/stephenrobinson

My friend Lynne Streeter Childress answered the Bat signal for an emergency session about what the hell just happened at the BAFTA awards.

John Davidson, the Scottish Tourette’s syndrome activist and the inspiration for the film I Swear, shouted the “n-word” — the full Tarantino — at presenters Michael B. Jordan and Delroy Lindo. That was unsettling but even worse was the BAFTA response.

The usual suspects also emerged to argue that Jordan and Lindo having the “n-word” shouted at them is no big deal because they appeared in Sinners, where the word is used. It’s as if people who support Donald Trump don’t understand how consent works.

Someone on Threads even posted in my feed that white people learned the n-word from “our” music. It’s a pathetic argument. Besides, if we’re talking about “my” music, I don’t think the “n-word” comes up much in Candide or Jesus Christ Superstar.

Guest Info:

Lynne Streeter Childress is a playwright, actor, teaching artist, singer, director, and the founder and artistic director of Building Better People Productions! Her show, “We Got It!: A Show About Empathy”, is among several of BBPP’s shows that are currently travelling to schools in Maryland and surrounding areas. This is her 25th year in professional theater, with much of that experience in theater for young audiences. This includes performing at the Kennedy Center, Arena Stage and Adventure Theater, and teaching for institutions like the Folger Shakespeare Library. Through all those experiences, Lynne has seen firsthand how theater can communicate the most important things in the clearest and most interesting of ways, especially to young people.

Links:

Lynne’s Website: https://lynnestreeterchildress.com/

Building Better People Productions: https://bbpproductions.com/

Fine Beats and Cheeses Podcast: https://finebeatsandcheeses.com/

Connect with Stephen:
Twitter: https://twitter.com/SER1897
YouTube: https://youtube.com/@ThePlayTyperGuy
Email: ser1840@gmail.com

Join the Player Typer Guy Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/stephenrobinson