Storybeat with Steve Cuden

Novelist Chad Boudreaux is a Washington insider who was hired by the US Department of Justice the night before the attacks on September 11, 2001—launching him immediately into counterterrorism work that earned him high accolades at an early age. 

Chad’s success at the DOJ carried him to the Department of Homeland Security, where his role as deputy chief of staff allowed him to work directly with the head of the department, advising on significant policy, operational, and legal issues. 

He’s currently the chief legal officer of a publicly traded, Fortune 300 company and America’s largest mi...

PJ Gaynard is a multi-talented award-winning storyteller with over thirty years of experience as a producer, director, writer, director of photography, and editor. 

PJ is the current producer for Pittsburgh’s 48 Hour Film Project. He also created and is the executive director of the nonprofit Pittsburgh Shot. He co-created the accredited Film Technician Associate Degree and Certificate Program at The Community College of Allegheny County. Recently, his work has strongly leaned toward community filmmaking.

In 2025, PJ received seven Telly Awards for his commercial work. 

I’ve seen 2 short films that he’s made, Art Tabl...

Writer-producer Michael Tove is finally seeing his long-term vision of a film career coming to life with the successful completion and multiple festival run of his first film, the Hitchcockian short, “Yard Saleing.” 

It’s rare to find a screenwriter whose first project is made in what would otherwise be one’s retirement years, but Michael has always been a big fan of unpredictable stories like those by O. Henry, and on shows like ‘The Twilight Zone”.  

As a young man, writing stories didn’t seem like a lucrative future, so Michael earned degrees in biology, only to...

Joe Lex retired in 2016 after 45+ years in emergency medicine. He started as a combat medic in Viet Nam and ended as a professor of Emergency Medicine at Temple University 

When he took a tour of Philadelphia’s historic Laurel Hill Cemetery, which was founded in 1836, he realized that the role of a cemetery docent seemed to suit his personality. After a year or so of giving tours, he decided that both cemeteries, Laurel Hill East and West, needed a podcast to talk about their amazing inhabitants. The result was "All Bones Considered: Laurel Hill Stories", followed a cou...

Laurie Berkner has been recognized by People Magazine as “the queen of kids’ music.” Laurie’s a singer, songwriter, performer, author, and founder of Two Tomatoes Records. Laurie’s songs have become beloved classics for children worldwide. Her work has received more than 1.7 billion online streams, averaging more than 22 million streams monthly. She’s also amassed more than 578 million YouTube channel views. And her CDs and DVDs have sold in the millions.

A leader and innovator in children’s music and entertainment for the past quarter century, Laurie has released 17 bestselling, award-winning albums. She was the first recording arti...

Spade Robinson is an award-winning screenwriter, producer, and director, with experience that spans feature films, documentaries, TV, commercials, and theater.

Spade is the owner of the full-service production company Spade Ink Media, producing and developing a slate of film, television, and podcast projects.

In 2015, Spade founded Atlanta Film Project to support storytellers more democratically, around the world, with labs, workshops, and bespoke consulting, helping storytellers and companies tell the most compelling versions of their stories.

Spade began curating screenplays, films, and documentary projects during her time at the Sundance Institute, where she worked...

This is Thaao Penghlis’s second time on Storybeat. Among Thaao’s many talents, he’s an actor, writer, director, and podcast creator. If you’re a fan of daytime dramas, then you know Thaao from his more than 40 years of playing Tony DiMera and Andre DiMera on Days of Our Lives and Days of Our Lives: Beyond Salem. For his work, he’s been nominated for three Emmy Awards. 

In 1989, he starred as disguise master Nicholas Black on the primetime TV series revival of Mission: Impossible. You may have also seen Thaao in various miniseries and movies like...

P. K. Edgewater, a military veteran and doctor of 40 years, is the debut author of the novel Passages: A Voyage From War To Peace, which offers a timely and deeply human perspective on recovery after conflict. The book focuses not just on war itself, but on mental health challenges that follow, like trauma, grief, moral injury, and the difficult work of healing. I’ve read Passages and can tell you it’s a wonderfully well-written exploration of how lives intertwine in unexpected ways, changing our perspectives on life and how we live it, even through deep trauma. P.K.’s vivi...

John Vorhaus is making his third appearance on StoryBeat.  John is best known for his classic comedy-writing book, The Comic Toolbox: How to be Funny Even if You’re Not.

At last count, he’s taught and trained writers in 40 countries on six continents, and created TV shows of his own in Nicaragua, Romania and elsewhere. His writing credits include dozens of teleplays and screenplays, plus seven novels and more than two dozen works of non-fiction.

John’s latest books are The Book of Practice: How to do Better What You Want to do Well and The...

Marsha Scarbrough worked in Hollywood as an Assistant Director on major motion pictures and primetime television for almost 20 years. As a graduate of the prestigious Directors Guild of America’s Assistant Directors Training Program, she supported many directors, including Clint Eastwood, Leonard Nimoy, Blake Edwards, Colin Higgins, and Carl Reiner. And she worked directly with stars like: Pierce Brosnan, Dolly Parton, Burt Reynolds, Gena Rowlands, Gene Wilder, Farah Fawcett, Mary Tyler Moore, John Travolta, and more.

Marsha is also the author of two award-winning memoirs about her spiritual adventures, Medicine Dance and Honey in the River, both av...

This episode includes discussions of mental health issues, substance abuse, and sexual assault. Listener discretion is advised.

Christa Parravani is the author of the bestselling books, Her: A Memoir, and Loved and Wanted: A Memoir of Choice, Children, and Womanhood.

Loved and Wanted is acclaimed for its take on curtailed maternal health care as it pertains to children, and its condemnation of the personal, financial, and emotional repercussions of curtailed access for women. Loved and Wanted was a New York Times Editor's Choice, and one of Dwight Garner's favorite books of the year. 

C...

Gabby Gruen is appearing on StoryBeat for the second time.  He has been a writer and producer of ads and commercials for several top tier ad agencies and their high-profile clients. 

As a screenwriter, he’s sold work to Fox 2000 Films, and wrote movie scripts on assignment for a number of independent production companies.

More recently, Gabby has been publishing novels. We chatted about his excellent first book, The Uniform, a Holocaust thriller, during his first time on this show. I found The Uniform to be an intense page-turner with real heart and wit.

Ga...

Tricia Gardella, who is known as National Park Gramma, is the award-winning author of scores of children’s books, including a 10-book Mouse Travelers Series, which explores and promotes a love of national parks and monuments. I’ve read Mouse Visits Everglades National Park and can tell you it’s a charming story, wonderfully illustrated, about Tricia’s hero, Mouse, exploring the Everglades during a most engaging journey through the park so that young audiences can get a sense of the beauty of the endangered species that live there.

Tricia’s had her writings published in Highlights Magazine...

Barbara Mujica is a multi-award-winning, bestselling novelist, and a professor emerita at Georgetown University. She’s also a short-story writer, essayist, and critic. She’s been published in The New York Times, The Miami Herald, and The Washington Post. Barbara's stories have appeared in numerous magazines and literary journals.  She’s a two-time nominee for the Pushcart Prize for Fiction. And her work has been optioned for the movies and adapted for the stage. 

Her latest novel, Miss del Río, which is a historical fiction about the great Mexican-American actress, Dolores Del Rio, has been optioned for a fil...

Mike Bodayle is a semi-retired insurance company executive. His favorite things in life are proudly displayed in the images on the four luggage tags found on his suitcase: the Yankees logo, a cassette mix tape, a slice of pizza, and the Starbucks logo. 

In the mid-1970s Mike wrote about music for his college newspaper. From 1995-2001, Mike published Beyond Belief, an Elvis Costello international fanzine. In 2016, he left printed media for two blogs: The Pizza Snob and Music City Mike. 

In 2025, Mike published A League of His Own, the family memoir he’d long drea...

Crystal Manich has directed over 90 productions of opera, plays, musical theatre, and circus across the USA, Argentina, Australia, and Europe. Her work has been acclaimed by the New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, and other major publications for her “lively” and “imaginative staging.” 

She wrote and directed her first opera libretto, Time to Act, written with composer Laura Kaminsky, which premiered at the Pittsburgh Opera in 2026. I saw Time to Act and found it to be well-written, hard-hitting, and compelling. She is also the writer-director for Triângulo: A Mixed Martial Arts Opera, which premieres in 2027.

Cryst...

Barry Greenfield is making his second appearance on StoryBeat. He’s a working musician and songwriter whose career spans from 1968 to the present. His 12 CDs have enjoyed global sales. Barry’s written three number-one songs and had twenty-plus songs covered by other artists. In 2025, his music was selected by HBO, BBC TV, and Australia Films for their original programming.

Barry’s also an author. His first book, a memoir, My Journey to Blue Sky, was published in March 2025. He and I chatted about My Journey to Blue Sky during our first conversation. You can find that episode on sto...

Doug Thompson started his broadcast career at CHUM Radio Toronto in the mid 1960’s. Since then, he’s worked in New York, Los Angeles and London, England. He’s created programming for the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation and Telemedia Network Radio in Canada as well as ABC Radio, NBC Radio, and the Unistar network in the U.S.

Doug has written, produced and directed over 1000 hours of network and syndicated radio programming that’s been heard by millions around the world as well as creating several thousand radio commercials and promos. He’s worked with major celebrity hosts like John...

My guest today, the actor David Reivers has had a career spanning 40 years in theatre, film, and TV.  

He’s best known for various TV roles in shows like Charmed, Felicity, Drake and Josh, The Disney Channel’s Jump In, and recently in season one of The Pitt. 

Film roles include Malcolm X, After the Sunset, Circle, Poseidon, and most recently, The Accountant 2.

You may have also seen David from his appearances in over 200 commercials.

For the record, David played the voice of Lucky, in the movie called Lucky that I direct...

Stephen Cole is returning to StoryBeat for the third time. He’s an award-winning musical theatre writer whose musicals have spanned the globe.

Stephen’s first production was Dodsworth starring Hal Linden. His Off-Broadway musicals include After the Fair, The Road to Qatar and Inventing Mary Martin. He won the prestigious Kleban Award for The Night of the Hunter. And Saturday Night at Grossinger’s had successful runs in Dallas, LA, Florida, and Sonoma.

Broadway legend Chita Rivera toured in Casper, which was reborn as Casper-The Friendly Musical. Merman's Apprentice, premiered at Birdland in New York a...

Natalie Lander was inspired to become an actress by watching her dad, David L. Lander, who was best known for playing “Squiggy” on Laverne & Shirley. Natalie has built a résumé that includes a wide range of credits as both a performer and creator.

On camera, Natalie has had recurring guest star roles on The Middle, Lopez, and Major Crimes. Other guest-starring credits include Grey’s Anatomy, Étoile, 13 Reasons Why, 9-1-1: Lone Star, Castle, Hannah Montana, and more.

She voiced “Goldie” on Disney Jr.’s Goldie & Bear and “Stargirl” in DC’s Justice League franchise. She’s also...

The prolific screenwriter, David Silverman, is back on StoryBeat for the second time. David has written for stars like Robin Williams, Bob Newhart, Rosanne Barr, Drew Carey, Sarah Silverman, Pee Wee Herman, and others. David has co-created 5 TV series and written and produced on more than 30 different series, including hugely popular shows like Newhart, Roseanne, One Day at a Time, The Jeffersons, Alice, Dilbert, and South Park.

David co-created The Wild Thornberrys, which spawned two feature films: The Wild Thornberrys Movie and Rugrats Go Wild. Other feature films David has co-written include Stepping Out, Purple Haze, and...

My guest today, Christine Pedi is known as the “Lady of 1000 Voices." She discovered her talent for multiple personalities through her long association with the legendary Off-Broadway revue, Forbidden Broadway, performing in companies all over the world, including New York, London, Japan, Singapore, and more. Among the dozens of personalities Christine is known to impersonate are: Liza Minelli, Rosie Perez, Ethel Merman, Angela Lansbury, Bernadette Peters, Julie Andrews, Katherine Hepburn and many, many others.

She’s received a Drama Desk nomination, as well as an L.A. Ovation & NAACP Award for her work.

On Broadway, Chri...

Ron Roman has written extensive travel, academic, and political articles for regional, national, and international publications. He studied both fiction and creative writing for his third graduate degree in Humanities from Wesleyan University. 

Ron has acted in numerous Korean TV dramas and motion pictures like Operation Chromite, portraying Admiral Forrest Sherman opposite Liam Neeson’s General Douglas MacArthur. 

In 2025 Ron published his alternate-history apocalyptic doomsday thriller novel, Of Ashes and Dust, which was a Finalist for the Chanticleer International Book Award in the Global Thrillers category.

I’ve read Of Ashes and Dust and ca...

Leslie A. Rasmussen wrote TV comedies for folks like Gerald McRaney, Burt Reynolds, Roseanne Barr, Norm McDonald, and Drew Carey, while working on popular sit-coms such as Major Dad, Roseanne, ALF, The Wild Thornberrys, Sweet Valley High, Evening Shade, Norm, and The Good Life.

After leaving the TV industry to raise her boys, Leslie obtained a master's degree in nutrition and ran her own business for ten years.

She’s been published over twenty times in the Huffington Post and speaks on panels discussing female empowerment.

Leslie’s debut novel, After Happily Ever Afte...

Paige N. Regan is a dark fantasy author known for her great ability to infuse humor into the macabre. With a focus on Young Adult and Adult novels, her captivating stories transport readers into worlds teeming with magic, myth, and murder. Her most recently published works include: Sin and Bones and Blood and Stone, which are the first two books of the Sin and Bones trilogy. Paige’s upcoming Gothic Fantasy novel, We Are Buried in the Garden, is set to be released in September 2026.

I’ve read Sin and Bones and can tell you it’s an exc...

Amy Meislin Pollack was a teacher for over four decades. From her own childhood, to the classroom, to being a parent of three and grandparent to seven, she’s perfectly positioned to write her coming-of-age book series based on a mischievous young girl, Jillian Kramer, who everyone calls Jelly Bean. After 60 years of occasionally working on her Jelly Bean books, Amy took advantage of the Covid pandemic to finish them.

The series began with The Adventures of Jelly Bean, which first came to Amy when her fourth-grade teacher asked her to get up in front of the cl...

My guest today, P.S. “Pat “Conway has published more than 50 poems across four online journals and 16 poetry anthologies. Two of those anthologies have been Amazon Best Sellers.

Pat released his first poetry collection, Echoes Lost in Stars, in March 2024. To date, it’s garnered significant critical acclaim. In 2025, Pat released Life Sucks: Memories and Introspections During the Great Covid Lockdown, a compilation of satirical essays written during the pandemic.

I’ve read Life Sucks and can tell you it’s a witty, acerbic, wry look at life and its many foibles as viewed through Pat Conway...

The novelist, John David Bethel, is appearing for the second time on StoryBeat. David’s the author of award-winning political and psychological thrillers, including Mapping the Night and Holding Back the Dark. His short fiction has been published in popular consumer magazines, and his essays and opinion editorials have been published in respected political journals.  

 David spent 35 years in politics and government. He served in the Federal Senior Executive Service as Senior Adviser/Director of Speechwriting for the Secretaries of Transportation, Commerce, and Education; Editorial Director for the U.S. Small Business Administration; and Assistant Administrator for the...

My guest today, British author and pop culture historian Jon Kremer is appearing on StoryBeat for the second time. He’s best known for his memoirs and books detailing the 1960s pop and rock music scene. 

A long-standing friendship with “Year of the Cat” singer-songwriter, Al Stewart, along with owning his hometown Bournemouth’s original vintage vinyl shop led to Jon experiencing many aspects of the UK music industry.

The recently released updated version of Jon’s book Bournemouth A Go! Go! – A Sixties Memoir features meeting the Beatles in 1963 at the height of Beatlemania in England. J...

Thomas Cullen is a federal trial judge and former U.S. attorney in Virginia. He was recently honored as the 2024 Carter O. Lowance Fellow from the William & Mary Law School, which is his alma mater.

A native of Richmond, Virginia, Thomas studied history and ran track at Furman University in Greenville, South Carolina, from which he was recently awarded an honorary doctorate.

Thomas is also an accomplished writer. For more than ten years, he regularly published op-eds and essays in national and regional media outlets until his appointment to the bench made publishing further such...

Art Bell is a writer and former television executive. While at HBO, Art became known for developing and launching the Comedy Channel, which later became Comedy Central. As President of Court TV, he oversaw daily live courtroom coverage and the production of hundreds of hours of original true-crime TV series, documentaries, and movies.

Art’s memoir, Constant Comedy: "How I Started Comedy Central and Lost My Sense of Humor", was a finalist in the 2020 Best Book Awards in both the memoir and business categories.

Art has had short stories, nonfiction, and satire published in several jo...

Rusty Austin was a reality TV show producer for over three decades and is now the author of six published books, including an illustrated children’s book series.

Rusty broke into Hollywood as a freelance electrician on dozens of movies, including Terminator 2. After a few years, he decided to give up movies because everything in the lighting and grip department weighed no less than 50 pounds.

He then spent 35 years producing reality TV shows like: Real Stories of the Highway Patrol, Big Brother, Survivor, Nanny 911, COPS, and Hell’s Kitchen, which he worked on for 16 seasons, and...

Brad Oscar is a two-time Tony Award nominee for his performances on Broadway as Franz Liebkind in Mel Brooks’ The Producers and as Thomas Nostradamus in Something Rotten!

Brad has performed in more than 15 shows on Broadway, including being in the original casts of the stage version of Schmigadoon, Mrs. Doubtfire, Big Fish, Aspects of Love, and a show I know a little bit about called Jekyll & Hyde. He’s performed in Wicked, Nice Work If You Can Get It, The Addams Family, and Spamalot. He’s also starred in The Producers in both the West End and La...

JJ Nelson is a Michigan native who, as a kid, made schlocky home movies with his best friend. He then built his comedic chops as an editor of his high school newspaper, writing irreverent Onion-inspired articles mocking the establishment. Somehow, he got away with all of it, diploma in hand. 

JJ honed his writing skills as an undergrad at the University of Michigan before earning an MFA in Screenwriting from UCLA’s renowned School of Theater, Film, and TV, where he also received the prestigious Samuel Goldwyn Award for screenwriting. He interned at Will Ferrell and Adam McK...

Virginia DeLuca is a writer and psychotherapist. She’s the author of the award-winning novel, As If Women Mattered. Her work has appeared in The New York Times, Modern Love, The Boston Globe, Vulture, The Huffington Post, the Iowa Review, and The Writer. 

Virginia’s also a graduate of GrubStreet’s 2020 Memoir Incubator.

Her most recent book is If You Must Go, I Wish You Triplets, a candid, funny, and emotionally rich memoir about her divorce and reinvention in her 60s. She published this debut memoir at 72, proving it’s never too late to tell your stor...

Haris Orkin is a prolific novelist, playwright, screenwriter, and game writer.  His play Dada premiered at The La Jolla Playhouse. His feature film, A Saintly Switch, was produced by Disney and directed by the great Peter Bogdanovich. Haris has written screenplays for Universal, Sony, Fox, and Paramount.  

He’s also has written numerous video games, many of which have been nominated for the WGA and BAFTA Film Awards. Games he’s worked on include Call of Juarez, Red Alerts, Shadow Warrior, Black Hawk Down, and many others.

Haris recently released the sixth book in his James...

Debi Derryberry is one of the most in-demand voiceover actresses in Hollywood. She’s perhaps best known for voicing Jimmy Neutron in both the Academy Award-nominated film Jimmy Neutron: Boy Genius and in the TV series The Adventures of Jimmy Neutron, Boy Genius. Debi’s also played dozens of memorable characters in features like the original Toy Story in which she’s one of the aliens, The Boy and the Heron, Despicable Me 2, Kiki’s Delivery Service, The Christmas Chronicles and many more. She’s also appeared in well more than 100 TV series, including Monster High, Sharkdog, Bugs Bunny Builders...

The highly renowned classical clarinetist, David Singer, has performed many times at Carnegie Hall. He was a principal member and soloist with the Grammy Award-winning Orpheus Chamber Orchestra for 36 years and is featured on many of the group’s 70 CDs on Deutsche Grammophon. 

David began with Orpheus when the group was playing for free. He has played with many of the world’s greatest classical musicians, including legends like Yehudi Menuhin, Itzhak Perlman, Rudolf Serkin, and Yo-Yo Ma among others.

David has also performed at the White House with Music from Marlboro and The Lincoln Cente...