Illegal Tender · Ronan Farrow · Ohio
Plus: Some stuff we covered a while ago that's out now
the true crime that's worth your time
The Illegal Tender podcast has turned its focus to multilevel marketing. The show, from Yahoo Finance, is classified as “True Crime” on Apple and other platforms, but it’s just as much about business, with seasons on disgraced fracking billionaire Aubrey McClendon (don’t know who that is? Texas Monthly can help!) and the role of drug companies in the opioid epidemic.
Its latest three-episode season, brilliantly named “Hey Hun” (side note: I know I should get over my irritation at the common use of “hun” but it’s SO HARD. It’s short for “honey,” so it should be “hon” UNLESS YOU ARE WINNIE THE POOH. OK, I’m done), is about MLM companies like Arbonne, Rodan + Fields, and Beachbody, which “are sold by a network of independent distributors who don’t receive a salary or benefits,” Yahoo Finance says. It’s a business model that’s rife with “intimidation, manipulation, and lies that leave women broke and friendless,” the podcast claims. I’m in! All three episodes are available here. — EB
Speaking of MLM: When I was writing the Hey Hun entry above, I googled around a bit to see if there was any hope that Sounds Like MLM But OK, my favorite podcast on the subject, would ever return. There aren’t any signs on its website that it’s returning, BUT I did discover its Facebook group, which is wildly active. Ugh, the last thing I want to do is spend more time on Facebook but now I am so curious! Are any of you folks members? Is it worth giving more of my time on earth to Mark Zuckerberg? — EB
Catch And Kill author Ronan Farrow has dumped his publisher over its plans to publish a memoir by his father, alleged sexual assailant Woody Allen. The New York Times reports that via email, Farrow said:
“Your policy of editorial independence among your imprints does not relieve you of your moral and professional obligations as the publisher of ‘Catch and Kill,’ and as the leader of a company being asked to assist in efforts by abusive men to whitewash their crimes,” Mr. Farrow wrote in an email to Michael Pietsch, the chief executive of Hachette, whose Little, Brown imprint published “Catch and Kill.”
“As you and I worked on ‘Catch and Kill’” — a book “in part about the damage Woody Allen did to my family,” Mr. Farrow added — “you were secretly planning to publish a book by the person who committed those acts of sexual abuse.”
“Obviously I can’t in good conscience work with you any more,” he wrote at the end of his message. “Imagine this were your sister.”
When asked about the motive behind Allen’s book, which will be published by Hachette imprint Grand Central, Pietsch said “Grand Central publishing believes strongly that there’s a large audience that wants to hear the story of Woody Allen’s life as told by Woody Allen himself. That’s what they’ve chosen to publish.”
On Thursday, Deadline reports that about 70 Hachette staffers staged a work walkout, saying via statement that “We stand in solidarity with Ronan Farrow, Dylan Farrow and survivors of sexual assault.” The demonstration was made, Deadline says, after “Pietsch was unable to persuade senior staff to support him” and “failed to pull together a town hall” to explain the disconnect between Catch And Kill’s reporting on sexual abuse allegations against powerful men and a decision to publish a book by a powerful man accused fo sexual abuse. — EB
Murder in Stark County, Ohio drops on Monday. Author Kim Kenney isn’t your typical true crime scribe, as she’s the executive director at Canton’s Wm. McKinley Presidential Library & Museum. She tells the Canton Rep that she stumbled across the case that inspired the book when researching her previous book, Stark County Food: From Early Farming to Modern Meals (which as a food writer I am also intrigued by!).
And what’s the case, you ask? Well, things began with “Amelia Richardson, who in the 1870s was accused of killing her husband, Edward, owner of a Massillon grocery store,” and things expanded from there, to others written about in newspapers at the time: the triple-hanging of three teens, the slaying of McKinley’s brother-in-law, and countless domestic homicides.
Kenney says that her goal is to “suck people in who aren’t necessarily interested in local history, and then they later find they’re interested in history that isn’t as sensational as murder,” but I feel like you don’t have to give two hoots about Ohio to be interested in Henry Popp, who “was drinking at a bar and…killed the owner of the bar because he was trying to throw him out.” Who hasn’t been there? Murder in Stark County, Ohio is available for pre-order now, and will be released on March 9. — EB
A couple follow-ups…
Obsessed With: Abducted in Plain Sight launched on Monday. We covered the companion podcast to the Netflix documentary last month, and the show’s full four-episode season is now available to listen to here. If you still want more, here’s Sarah’s interview with Abducted In Plain Sight director Skye Borgman, audio of which is available here.
I’ve been looking forward to The Sneak, and now it’s here! Back in November, we covered The Sneak, a narrative podcast from USA Today about football star slash armored truck robber Anthony Curcio. It was initially paywalled, a decision that (as subscription content creators ourselves) we totally support — but this week the entire show was released for free, which is also nice.
Speaking of subscriptions: Got any birthdays/get-well-soon occasions/just because gifts on the horizon? Consider the gift of Best Evidence! It’s zero-waste, it won’t take up room in anyone’s house, and it’s only $55 for a year.
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