Let's Build a Scene + Interview Prep with Natalia Petrzela

Elie Honig: 00:00:00

One of the things I always tell students is if, if, if you enjoy human drama, if you enjoy crazy stories with wild twists and things

Doug Fraser: 00:00:11

Today on The Pod Lab, we're digging into bringing a mafia story to life.

Doug Fraser: 00:00:26

Welcome to The Pod Lab, a Podcast Movement original series.

Doug Fraser: 00:00:30

I'm Doug Frasier, producer, and host of the NPR podcast, "What We Do."

Doug Fraser: 00:00:34

Today is a "let's build a scene" episode where I'll break down a scene from a narrative podcast I've produced.

Doug Fraser: 00:00:41

And today's scene is a wild one centered around Elie Honig.

Doug Fraser: 00:00:45

He is a former federal and state prosecutor.

Elie Honig: 00:00:48

But I tried mobsters or made guys, captains, bosses, murder, rico...

Elie Honig: 00:00:54

primarily Genovese and Gambino family, which is two of the five families.

Doug Fraser: 00:00:58

And the scene is just, well, you'll see.

Doug Fraser: 00:01:02

But before we jump into that, let's talk about the structure of the episode as a whole.

Doug Fraser: 00:01:15

This was the longest What We Do episode I've produced so far.

Doug Fraser: 00:01:18

The total runtime was about 30 minutes.

Doug Fraser: 00:01:21

And how these episodes work is I interview someone for about half an hour, and then I create a narrative by taking bits of our interview and mixing them with a voiceover in sound design.

Doug Fraser: 00:01:31

And then the final product is usually between 10 to 15 minutes.

Doug Fraser: 00:01:35

He just had so many incredible stories to tell.

Doug Fraser: 00:01:37

I was trying to get every bit of information I could while I had him on the call.

Doug Fraser: 00:01:42

Which, this was before Zoom became so popular.

Doug Fraser: 00:01:46

Um, and I was using Skype.

Doug Fraser: 00:01:47

During the interview, we ventured into a bunch of topics and I was feeling things out, trying to find an angle for the episode while the interview was going on.

Doug Fraser: 00:01:55

Uh, so I could steer the conversation accordingly.

Doug Fraser: 00:01:58

So Elie started talking about his three most movie worthy cases, and of course that sounded like gold to my ears.

Doug Fraser: 00:02:05

And those were the actual words he used.

Doug Fraser: 00:02:07

He asked if I wanted the most movie worthy cases.

Doug Fraser: 00:02:10

And obviously the answer to that is yes.

Doug Fraser: 00:02:13

So I use that for the basis of the episodes, these three very different stories.

Doug Fraser: 00:02:19

And I created three distinct chapters that together painted a picture of the wild, the funny, and also the fact that justice isn't always

Doug Fraser: 00:02:30

I wanted to create intrigue for the stories by giving each one, a title.

Doug Fraser: 00:02:34

So something to tease, what was to come.

Doug Fraser: 00:02:38

To get a taste for this, here's an example of how I transitioned into the first story.

Case number one: 00:02:44

We came, we saw, we buried him in the woods.

Case number one: 00:02:52

In part of that first story is what we're breaking down today.

Case number one: 00:02:55

So come along and let's build a scene.

Case number one: 00:03:07

Since this comes in about a third of the way into the episode, um, let me give you some context for this particular scene.

Case number one: 00:03:12

So a made guy named Anthony Arlotta shows up in Elie's office.

Case number one: 00:03:17

Anthony's come in to flip or like they say, he's now a rat.

Case number one: 00:03:22

So he tells Elie that they got all the info correct.

Case number one: 00:03:25

And by they, I mean, the investigators got all the information, correct on a murder case that they'd been working on.

Case number one: 00:03:31

So that was good news for Elie.

Case number one: 00:03:33

And then something bizarre happens.

Case number one: 00:03:36

Anthony says, I can tell you where Gary Westerman is.

Elie Honig: 00:03:40

I don't know who the hell Gary Westerman is, but the agents who are Massachusetts FBI agents, their eyes light up.

Doug Fraser: 00:03:48

Wait, wait, wait.

Doug Fraser: 00:03:48

Okay.

Doug Fraser: 00:03:48

So hold on a second.

Doug Fraser: 00:03:49

Let's pause.

Doug Fraser: 00:03:50

I love that sound that is called a bram it's a great sound effect, that's often laid over with other effects to create tension or suspense or intrigue.

Doug Fraser: 00:04:00

And you've heard this variation.

Doug Fraser: 00:04:02

I promise you on just about every movie trailer ever.

Doug Fraser: 00:04:06

Here, listen to a few and you'll see what I mean.

Doug Fraser: 00:04:24

Okay, so back to the scene.

Doug Fraser: 00:04:27

Anthony said, "I can tell you where Gary Westerman is."

Doug Fraser: 00:04:30

Here's Elie.

Elie Honig: 00:04:31

I don't know who the hell Gary Westerman is, but the agents who are Massachusetts FBI agents, their eyes light up,

Doug Fraser: 00:04:41

As it turns out Gary Westerman had been missing for seven years.

Elie Honig: 00:04:45

He just disappeared off the face of the earth.

Elie Honig: 00:04:48

Now a lot, it was like, yeah, we killed him too.

Elie Honig: 00:04:49

We buried him in the woods.

Elie Honig: 00:04:50

I can show you where do you want it?

Elie Honig: 00:04:52

You want me to show you where?

Elie Honig: 00:04:53

We were like, yes, we do.

Doug Fraser: 00:04:59

At this point, there's a couple seconds of no voices to let that tail end of the bram float there and build a little anticipation.

Doug Fraser: 00:05:07

And then Elie gets into the story.

Doug Fraser: 00:05:10

You'll hear some subtle and not so subtle sound effects during the scene.

Elie Honig: 00:05:14

Westerman was a bad guy.

Elie Honig: 00:05:15

He was hanging out with these guys and he also was co-op.

Elie Honig: 00:05:19

He was really cooperating with the cops.

Elie Honig: 00:05:21

And so what they did is they learned him into the woods.

Elie Honig: 00:05:23

Um, they told them they were going to rob a drug dealer and they were going to go to the drug dealers house, like through a back way

Elie Honig: 00:05:32

So Westerman was wearing like a ski mask and he had a taser on him and he had gloves and everything, and they all were, but they knew what the plan was.

Elie Honig: 00:05:40

They had already actually dug a hole for Westerman and Arlotta told us, he goes, we all been just like we were in the middle of the woods and me and the two Greek guys that I'd

Elie Honig: 00:05:53

And we were using 22's.

Elie Honig: 00:05:54

He goes, but the weird thing was, he didn't die.

Elie Honig: 00:05:57

He said like, bullets seemed like they were bouncing off his head.

Elie Honig: 00:06:00

And we were like, what the hell.

Doug Fraser: 00:06:02

How wild is that this guy gets shot a bunch of times and doesn't die.

Doug Fraser: 00:06:07

It feels like something like Elie said straight out of a movie.

Doug Fraser: 00:06:11

I wanted to use the sound effects to reflect this feeling of helplessness.

Doug Fraser: 00:06:15

The murders must have felt in that moment.

Doug Fraser: 00:06:17

So I used a couple of effects in Adobe Audition to achieve this.

Doug Fraser: 00:06:22

I gave the gunshots a sound effect that's called a medium shot.

Doug Fraser: 00:06:25

And this just gives a bit of distance to the sound.

Doug Fraser: 00:06:28

And then I applied a light reverb and lowered the volume of the clips about 50%.

Doug Fraser: 00:06:32

This gives those gunshots, that distant and muffled sound.

Doug Fraser: 00:06:35

So it really does feel like the bullets themselves don't have the power that they normally would have, which plays again into that helplessness.

Doug Fraser: 00:06:44

So I'll let Elie take it from here.

Elie Honig: 00:06:47

And so I took a shovel and another guy took a sh, the two shovels we'd use to dig the hole and we cracked them over the head and cracked the skull and killed him.

Elie Honig: 00:06:56

And then we pushed him in the hole and he flopped in at first and we buried him.

Elie Honig: 00:07:00

And we were like, okay, holy shit.

Elie Honig: 00:07:03

You can take a guy out of jail.

Elie Honig: 00:07:05

You can get a judge's order to take a guy out of jail for a day.

Elie Honig: 00:07:08

So the FBI agents, I didn't physically go, but the FBI agents got an order and they took him, they got him in a van.

Elie Honig: 00:07:14

They drove, drove him up to the woods of Agawam, Massachusetts, and Anthony like walked them through the woods, and was like, uh, looking at different trees and stuff.

Elie Honig: 00:07:23

And he was like, oh, I think it was right around here.

Doug Fraser: 00:07:26

Let's jump back there for a second to the music choice.

Doug Fraser: 00:07:29

Um, the overall tone of the episode is, is lighthearted, right?

Doug Fraser: 00:07:32

It's not a hard-hitting journalistic piece.

Doug Fraser: 00:07:35

It's more of a pop corner or bubble gum story.

Doug Fraser: 00:07:38

So at this moment, when the music comes in, how to use a darker song, the feeling would have been entirely different.

Doug Fraser: 00:07:45

So the story itself, or the story that I'm trying to tell would be different as well.

Doug Fraser: 00:07:50

I wanted a tongue in cheek, almost feeling to this little track, and it's also there to help transition into this next part.

Elie Honig: 00:07:59

So FBI starts searching the area.

Elie Honig: 00:08:01

Sure enough.

Elie Honig: 00:08:01

There's 22 discarded shell casings from 22's all over the place.

Elie Honig: 00:08:04

Seven years later, they're still there, still intact and they do the dig and, um, they did one inch at a time.

Elie Honig: 00:08:11

That's the way the FBI does a dig.

Elie Honig: 00:08:15

They get a backhoe and they dig off one layer, one inch of dirt at a time.

Elie Honig: 00:08:20

And then they filter it like through a gigantic, like one of those sand, um, you know, those like Sims kind of thing.

Elie Honig: 00:08:26

But I can't, except because there's evidence.

Elie Honig: 00:08:28

And so I still remember getting emails throughout that day from the FBI team.

Elie Honig: 00:08:32

And they were like, okay, first inch removed nothing.

Elie Honig: 00:08:35

Second interim move, nothing.

Elie Honig: 00:08:36

Third inch removed, nothing.

Elie Honig: 00:08:37

Fourth inch removed.

Elie Honig: 00:08:38

We found what appeared to be two sneakers, fifth inch removed.

Elie Honig: 00:08:43

It's two Nike's.

Elie Honig: 00:08:44

Six inch.

Elie Honig: 00:08:45

Yup.

Elie Honig: 00:08:45

Two leg, b- two ankle bones.

Elie Honig: 00:08:46

Yup.

Elie Honig: 00:08:47

Two shinbones and all that.

Elie Honig: 00:08:49

I was like, okay, I think you got it.

Elie Honig: 00:08:50

Basically, just like Anthony said, they had pushed him in head first and then buried him.

Elie Honig: 00:08:53

So he was head down feet up.

Elie Honig: 00:08:56

Seven years later, they dug up Gary Westerman's body.

Elie Honig: 00:08:58

His Nike's were still intact.

Elie Honig: 00:09:00

We used to joke like Nike should have done like an ad, like how well, um, still had the taser still had the ski mask on.

Doug Fraser: 00:09:10

When the forensic examiner looked at the body, she confirmed the dent marks in his skull, which appeared to be from bullets.

Doug Fraser: 00:09:17

There was also a crack from blunt force trauma, like from a hammer or a shovel.

Doug Fraser: 00:09:22

Everything was exactly as Anthony told them.

Doug Fraser: 00:09:26

Here's a question I wrestle with here.

Doug Fraser: 00:09:27

How many times should I use that email sound effect?

Doug Fraser: 00:09:31

Should I do it every time that he mentioned that he got a new message?

Doug Fraser: 00:09:35

Or just once to help make that moment feel more real and, and then just let it play out because if I use it every time, it might turn from a part of the story to a distraction.

Doug Fraser: 00:09:46

So that was a big concern for me, but let's just play around here for a second and let's hear it with the email sound at every mention and see what it sounds like.

Elie Honig: 00:09:54

I still remember getting emails throughout that day from the FBI team.

Elie Honig: 00:09:58

And they were like, okay, first inch removed nothing.

Elie Honig: 00:10:01

Second inch removed nothing.

Elie Honig: 00:10:02

Third inch removed, nothing.

Elie Honig: 00:10:03

Forth inch removed.

Elie Honig: 00:10:04

We found what appeared to be two sneakers.

Elie Honig: 00:10:07

Fifth inch removed.

Elie Honig: 00:10:08

It's two Nike's.

Elie Honig: 00:10:10

Six inch.

Elie Honig: 00:10:10

Yup.

Elie Honig: 00:10:11

Two legs, b- two ankle bones.

Elie Honig: 00:10:12

Yup.

Doug Fraser: 00:10:13

Actually, now that I've heard it after all of these months, since I produced the episode, I think this newer version may work better at bringing

Doug Fraser: 00:10:26

Right.

Doug Fraser: 00:10:27

So it feels like an onslaught.

Doug Fraser: 00:10:28

And those extra sound effects, help that sort of play out.

Doug Fraser: 00:10:32

It's funny how that works.

Doug Fraser: 00:10:33

Um, maybe you've had this feeling as well, where you look back at an episode from months or even years ago and find better ways of doing things.

Doug Fraser: 00:10:42

Um, I guess that's just part of creating.

Doug Fraser: 00:10:50

MUSIC

Doug Fraser: 00:10:56

Now it's time to hear a question from the Podcast Movement, Facebook group

Doug Fraser: 00:10:59

. Christophe: Hi, I'm Christophe Zajac-Denek.

Doug Fraser: 00:11:03

My podcast is called, "I'm Kind Of a Big Deal."

Doug Fraser: 00:11:06

It's an interview show and I talked to people affected with dwarfism.

Doug Fraser: 00:11:10

We talk about the successes, the struggles, the funny, and the real day to day experiences of little people.

Doug Fraser: 00:11:18

I'd like to know, what's the best way to prepare for an interview?

Doug Fraser: 00:11:22

Thank you for that great question, Christophe.

Doug Fraser: 00:11:24

To help answer it, let's have a chat with Natalia Petrzela.

Doug Fraser: 00:11:28

She's a historian as well as host and producer of "Welcome to Your Fantasy."

Doug Fraser: 00:11:33

A podcast that dives into the history of Chippendales.

Doug Fraser: 00:11:36

Yes, that Chippendales.

Doug Fraser: 00:11:38

And a fair warning, if you're gonna listen to that show at work, put headphones in, cause it gets a bit steamy.

Doug Fraser: 00:11:43

Natalia also cohosts "Past Present" where she and her co-host bring historical insights to political and cultural debates.

Doug Fraser: 00:11:50

So when it comes time to preparing for interviews, Natalia's game is strong.

Doug Fraser: 00:11:55

And as a historian, it will come as no surprise to hear that she believes research is crucial.

Natalia Petrzela: 00:12:01

The way I think of any interview is that I am so lucky if I've set up time that someone is taking to spend with me to talk about their life or their job or whatever the topic is.

Natalia Petrzela: 00:12:13

And so what I really try to do is a ton of research beforehand, to make sure that I understand who this person is.

Natalia Petrzela: 00:12:21

I'm not going to waste time on questions that I could have figured out earlier on, and that I'm not going to miss a chance to ask questions that I

Natalia Petrzela: 00:12:32

So that's the number one thing, you know, we read as much as you can do everything you can to make those moments valuable.

Doug Fraser: 00:12:39

Are there any particular sources that you find yourself going back to, again and again in your research?

Natalia Petrzela: 00:12:44

Um, yeah, well, it really depends who I'm talking to, but you know, I think I, you know, I'm lucky to have an academic affiliation, so I have access to all these

Natalia Petrzela: 00:13:02

And it has so many local newspapers going back even to the 19th century.

Natalia Petrzela: 00:13:06

Not that you're going to be interviewing somebody who was alive in the 19th century, but I find that that historical press is really, really valuable in not just reading like a Wikipedia page or

Natalia Petrzela: 00:13:23

And so for me, that's always a place that I go to newspapers.com or if you have access, ProQuest historical.

Natalia Petrzela: 00:13:29

Those are just really, really valuable.

Natalia Petrzela: 00:13:31

Ooh.

Natalia Petrzela: 00:13:31

One more on that, you know?

Natalia Petrzela: 00:13:32

No, not that many people know this, but totally for free Google books has catalog Life Magazine, out some of Time Magazine for the stuff.

Natalia Petrzela: 00:13:43

I do Yoga Journal, like there are a lot of periodicals there, which are there in full color and full print and are freely available.

Natalia Petrzela: 00:13:51

So, um, yeah, historical press is a really a good place to go.

Doug Fraser: 00:13:56

If the person you're about to interview has never been in a newspaper and is not in any books, where would you go to find information?

Natalia Petrzela: 00:14:05

Yeah, well, again, it really depends like, um, for example, uh, for "Welcome to Your Fantasy," I interviewed a lot of Chippendales dancers.

Natalia Petrzela: 00:14:14

Sure.

Natalia Petrzela: 00:14:14

Some of them were famous and were written about, but, um, most of them were not.

Natalia Petrzela: 00:14:18

And so for that, it doesn't let you off the hook for doing research.

Natalia Petrzela: 00:14:23

For example, I'm thinking of one dancer, Scott Marlowe, who was very important to the story we were telling, but he wasn't a name that people were writing about, but it was important

Natalia Petrzela: 00:14:37

So, um, the little that I knew about him, he danced with Chippendales for these particular years in New York city, he was from New York.

Natalia Petrzela: 00:14:45

I tried to, understand what the neighborhood was like at that time where he was working, what it might've been, um, to get a job at that in, in that period, like I went to still

Natalia Petrzela: 00:15:00

a book about, you know, um, nightlife culture in New York City to help me who never lived through that moment have smart questions to ask him, even though he's not a famous person.

Doug Fraser: 00:15:15

That does it for this week at The Pod Lab, be sure to subscribe, to get notified of new episodes as they're released.

Doug Fraser: 00:15:20

And if you'd like to be featured in a future episode, submit your question at the Podcast Movement Facebook page.

Doug Fraser: 00:15:27

Until next time, keep experimenting

Doug Fraser: 00:15:31

The Pod Lab is a Podcast Movement original series.