Finding Favorites with Leah Jones
Leah Jones
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Poet Dan O’Brien loves modern British comedies
Poet and playwright Dan O'Brien joined Leah this week to discuss his three books coming out this fall, before diving into the world of British comedies of the last 10-20 years. (We start talking about comedies at 35 minutes, but first 30 minutes is a lot of cancer talk.... schedule your mammograms and colonoscopies, friends). Follow Dan online Instagram @bydanobrien DanOBrien.org Buy or pre-order Dan's books Our Cancers True Story: A trilogy Survivor’s Notebook From Scarsdale Show Notes The Deep Dive podcast Foundation for Peripheral Neuropathy Colon Cancer screening info Mammogram guidelines Scanxiety Story Studio Chicago Menopause: A Comic Treatment Lucy Shair Foundation Garth Marenghi's Darkplace Mortimer and Whitehouse: Gone Fishing Toast of London Alan Partridge The IT Crowd Steve Coogan Matt Berry The Fast Show That Mitchell & Webb Look The Peter Serafinowicz Show Armstrong & Miller Harry and Paul's The Mighty Boosh Bob Mortimer Would I lie to you compilation Tim Key Green Wing Party Animals Midsommer Murders Rate and Review on Apple Podcasts or Good Pods Send questions, comments or guest pitches (pitch yourself and YOUR favorite thing) to findingfavoritespodcast [at] gmail.com Otter.ai Transcript follows Dan O'Brien 0:00 Hello, my name is Dan O'Brien. And my favorite thing is British TV comedy of the last 20 years. ----more---- Announcer 0:09 Welcome to the Finding Favorites Podcast where we explore your favorite things without using an algorithm. Here's your host, Leah Jones. Leah Jones 0:22 Hello, and welcome back to finding favorites. I'm your host, Leah Jones. And this is the podcast where we learn about people's favorite things and get recommendations without using an algorithm. I finally remembered the intro. I did not remember the introduction on Monday, when I recorded today's interview. Who knows what was going on with my brain on Monday? I took a few weeks off and completely forgot how to podcast. Yes. So since we last talked, I went to Israel for 10 days and had a really nice trip. I had three or four like super busy days up front. And then three or four days where I just had breakfast and then napped. And then the trip ended with a long anticipated dinner at a restaurant called OCD in Tel Aviv, Ronnie and I made reservations in March. And I got very worried that our anticipation had gotten too high that we had gotten too excited for the dinner. Because we had waited almost six months between reservation and dinner. But then it was absolutely phenomenal. I had been to OCD once before in 2019. A friend of mine took a number of us there for dinner. It's a molecular gastronomy restaurant in Tel Aviv. But I had suffered 48 hours of the worst food poisoning of my life before I went the first time. And so while I knew it was a good meal, I didn't appreciate it. And the return trip, locked it in as you know, like a top five meal probably from Thai zoo from last summer, also still in the top five. So Israel was a really nice trip, I was not able to attend any protests. While I was there, due to kind of family and friend obligations. I did see the queer gala drag show the seamless protest, it was phenomenal. The whole show was in Hebrew, but it was still very impactful for me. And then I found a news article that I was able to translate that explained the intricacies of, of different performances. So I was really glad I went to that I got to catch up with a number of friends who are involved in leading the democracy movement in Israel, and civil rights movements. And they are still working hard to try and reverse the actions of the current government. So that was good to talk to them in person. Then I got back from Israel, and immediately turned around and went to Philadelphia for one night to see how did this get made. And I did a real what is now unfortunately becoming a real classic Lea sort of thing, which is I booked travel for Philadelphia and bought a show a ticket to the show in Washington DC. And found out I realized my mistake on the plane going to Philadelphia. But the producers of How Did This Get Made? Because they knew that I had bought a ticket and wasn't I wasn't making shit up. I'm just my ADHD. I was what we're gonna blame for this one. I just it made more sense to go to the Saturday night show. So why would I have bought tickets to a Sunday night show when I would have had to use a vacation day to attend? Who knows? Who knows it's a mystery to everyone. But it was a really fun live show. I got to see Gino from the Doughboys fan community catch up with him. So I saw some Doughboys fans I saw some How Did This Get Made fans that I know from my Facebook group. What took myself to Cheesecake Factory. didn't see a single friend because I am a jerk again who doesn't plan things well, and who was still jet lagged. But I'm back I'm booking this next season of finding favorites. I put a call out on Instagram which is exciting because I got like four people right away who were tagged by my friend, Amy Guth, who are interested in coming on the show. Also, Nicole Zelnick are tagged in a few people. If you are interested in being a guest on finding favorites, please Send me an email finding favorites podcast@gmail.com and I'll send you my Calendly link. This week I'm talking with Dan O'Brien. Dan is a poet and playwright based in Los Angeles. He has three books coming out this fall. And when I saw that on Instagram, I sent him a note and said, Hey, I like to talk to authors, please come on the podcast. I got to Dan's poetry the normal way, which is to say through his wife's podcast. Dan is married to comedian and actress, Jessica St. Clair, who co hosts the deep dive podcast with June Diane Revell. Diane, of course, is on How Did This Get Made. All roads lead back there. So when his book of poetry, our cancers was released, Jessica talked about it on deep dive, and I bought a copy. And I tried to read it. And I was still a little too early in my own cancer journey to handle it. But now that I'm a little bit further in to my survivorship journey, I was able to read more of our cancers, and I'm looking forward to reading his book of poetry survivors notebook. So, if you don't want to hear about cancer, you're going to need to skip ahead, like 2025 minutes into the podcast. Because Dan is a cancer survivor. I'm a cancer survivor. The two of his three books are about cancer. And so we talk about it a lot. But then we talk about British comedies. And so if you're not here for talking about cancer fast forward, and I'll put the exact time in the show notes, so you know where to jump to. So there we go. Again, if you are interested in coming on the podcast, shoot me an email. Without further ado, wear your mask. Wash your hands, get your booster and keep enjoying your favorite things. Leah Jones 7:19 Hello, and welcome to finding favorites. I'm your host, Leah Jones. And this is the podcast where we get recommendations without makeup. Nope. I have taken a few weeks off. Hello, and welcome to finding favorites. I'm your host, Leah Jones. This is the podcast where we get recommendations without using an algorithm and learn about people's favorite things. Today I am with playwright and poet Dan O'Brien. Dan has not one, not two, three books coming out this fall survivors notebook from Scarsdale and true story, a trilogy September 7, if you are in Brentwood, you there's an event at diesel, which is a bookstore in Brentwood. So you can reserve a seat by buying one of these books in advance. But Dan, welcome to finding favorites. How are you doing? Dan O'Brien 8:10 Thank you, I'm good. Thank you for having me on. And I should say the the the launch on September 7 is free. You don't have to buy a book. But it's only if you want to reserve a seat. The bookstore suggests you buy a book, which you know, Far be it for me to tell you not to buy a book. But you're also welcome to just show up. And, and we're still working on we're hoping to use it use the launch also as a charity fundraising event, because World Cancer Day is September 8. And at least one of these books is explicitly about my wife and I having cancer at the same time are being treated for cancer pretty much at the same time in 2015 and 16. And that's the book survivors notebook, which is prose poems and some of my photographs as well. Leah Jones 9:03 Yeah. And that's how we initially met on social media is I listened to your wife's podcast. And so I bought the book our cancers, which is a book of poetry, and tried to read it and I was like, Ooh, I am maybe not beyond my own treatment enough to be able to handle the book yet. But I did pick it back up this weekend. And you and Jessica both said, you know how it ends? Like, you know, like, you, you're both alive. You're both here. You're both healthy, so that I and I could read it without the fear of, of death, I guess. Right, right. And so I dug back into it a little bit more of this weekend, but that was how we initially connected was over the book our cancers. Dan O'Brien 9:53 Yeah, that's the book that came out. I came out two years ago. And I wrote that book during our treatments. So the first half are poems written in a very, very sparse, minimalist poems. Very, it's a very quick read, but it is an intense read the first half is, is really from the point of view of a caregiver to somebody who's going through cancer treatment as I was helping Jessica through her treatment. And then as it happened, it was her last day of chemotherapy, that I was diagnosed. So she was being treated for stage two breast cancer, and then I was diagnosed with stage four, but treatable colon cancer. And so we, you know, we switched roles, you know, in a moment on a single day. And so the second half of the book is from the perspective of somebody in treatment for cancer. And, and this new book is, you know, I think, I think, in many ways, it's p
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