Shohreh Aghdashloo is an Iranian and American actress. She has received various accolades, including a Primetime Emmy Award and a Satellite Award, in addition to a nomination for an Academy Award.
Starlee Kine is an American public radio producer and writer. She was the creator and host of the podcast Mystery Show, which was done in production with Gimlet Media. Her work has been featured on This American Life. She was a frequent guest on the CBC Radio show WireTap. Her writing has appeared in the New York Times Magazine and California Sunday.
Spotify is a Swedish audio streaming and media services provider founded on 23 April 2006 by Daniel Ek and Martin Lorentzon. It is one of the largest music streaming service providers, with over 527 million monthly active users, including 210 million paying subscribers, as of March 2023. Spotify is listed on the New York Stock Exchange in the form of American depositary receipts.
Shabnam Rezaei is a children's television creator, director, producer and co-founder of Big Bad Boo Studios and VOD service Oznoz. She is the director and producer of Hulu Original series The Bravest Knight, the first children's series with an LGBT protagonist. The all-star cast includes T. R. Knight, Bobby Moynihan, Storm Reid, RuPaul, Wanda Sykes, Wilson Cruz, and Christine Baranski. The Bravest Knight won the 2020 GLAAD Media Award for Outstanding Kids and Family Programming.
Gimlet Media LLC was a digital media company and podcast network, focused on producing narrative podcasts and headquartered in Brooklyn, New York. The company was founded in 2014 by Alex Blumberg and Matthew Lieber, who serve as the company's CEO and president respectively until Lieber stepped down in 2022. In February 2019, Spotify announced it had entered into a definitive agreement to acquire Gimlet for $230 million. In 2023, Spotify merged Gimlet into Spotify Studios.
StartUp is an American podcast from Gimlet Media hosted by Alex Blumberg and Lisa Chow. While the first two seasons follow stories of starting businesses – Season 1 about the starting of Gimlet Media itself, and Season 2, a dating company called "Dating Ring" – the third season follows one business per episode. Season 4 began by following Gimlet Media again, then aired episodes focusing on other companies. Season 6 followed the making of the TV series created about the podcast. The most recent season covers the founding of Success Academy Charter Schools in New York City. The final season of Startup premiered in late 2019 and covered the process of selling Gimlet Media to the streaming media company Spotify.
Noah Egidi Galvin is an American actor and singer. He is best known for playing Dr. Asher Wolke in the TV series The Good Doctor, Kenny O'Neal in the ABC sitcom The Real O'Neals and later taking over the title role in the Broadway musical Dear Evan Hansen.
Megaphone is a Software as a service (SaaS) business owned by Spotify. The company provides software for podcast hosting and monetization as well as an ad network to generate additional revenue for podcast publishers. It was formerly an audio content producer started by The Slate Group as Panoply Media, and later shifted to focusing solely on software for monetizing, measuring and distributing podcasts of media companies and independent producers.
Nazanin Rafsanjani is the former head of new show development for Gimlet Media. Previously she was creative director at Gimlet Media and before that, a senior producer for The Rachel Maddow Show.
The Pitch is an American podcast hosted by Josh Muccio, produced in partnership with Vox Media. The show features entrepreneurs in need of venture funding as they pitch to a live panel of investors, similar to ABC's hit TV series Shark Tank. Billed as, "A show where real entrepreneurs pitch to real investors—for real money", the podcast aims to capture the essence of what happens when entrepreneurs pitch investors.
Ari'el Stachel is an American actor. He won the 2018 Tony Award for Featured Actor in a Musical for his role in The Band's Visit.
Breakmaster Cylinder, also known as The Mysterious Breakmaster Cylinder or by the initials BmC, is a musical composer and producer who has provided title themes and background music for a number of radio shows and podcasts, principally with Gimlet Media's Reply All. Known for their pseudonymity, Breakmaster Cylinder does not make public appearances and has employed stand-ins for interviews, photographs, and other media appearances.
The depiction of LGBTQ characters in animated series in the 2010s changed significantly from the previous decade; especially in Western animation. This included Rebecca Sugar's Steven Universe which aired on Cartoon Network and praised for going "above and beyond when it comes to inclusive storytelling" The 2010s also brought with it shows such as Adventure Time, The Legend of Korra, BoJack Horseman, OK K.O.! Let's Be Heroes, Amphibia, She-Ra and the Princesses of Power, and The Bravest Knight, among others, all of which had strong LGBTQ characters. Representation of LGBTQ characters would only continue to grow in the 2020s.
Dungeons & Daddies is an actual play Dungeons & Dragons comedy podcast.
Q-Force is an American adult animated comedy series on Netflix. In April 2019, Netflix ordered 10 episodes of the series, with Gabe Liedman as a showrunner, along with Sean Hayes, Todd Milliner, and others as executive producers. It was released on September 2, 2021.
A fantasy podcast is a podcast related to or discussing the fantasy genre, which usually focuses on the magical, supernatural, mythical, or folkloric. Fantasy stories are set in fictional universes or fantasy worlds that are often reminiscent of the Middle Ages and the early modern period. Despite having a fictional setting, fantasy stories can contain or reference locations, events, or people from the real world. Characters in these stories often encounter fictional creatures such as dwarves, elves, dragons, and fairies. Common types of fantasy podcasts are audio dramas, narrated short stories, role-playing games, or discussions and reviews of fantasy topics such as fantasy films, books, games, and other media. The intended audience of a fantasy podcast can vary from young children to adults. Fantasy podcasts emerged from storytelling and the creation of the radio. Fantasy podcasts have often been adapted into television programs, graphic novels, and comics. Fantasy podcasts are a subgenre of fiction podcasts and are distinguished from science fiction podcasts and horror podcasts by the absence of scientific or macabre themes, respectively, though these subgenres regularly overlap.
Batman Unburied is an American superhero audio drama podcast series created by David S. Goyer featuring the DC Comics hero Batman. It is the first of an intended series of Spotify-produced scripted podcasts based on DC's characters.
Red Frontier is a science fiction podcast produced by Gimlet Media and starring Betty Gilpin.
Naomi Shah is an American media executive. She started her career as a macro equities trader at Goldman Sachs, then joined the investment team at Union Square Ventures. In 2020, she founded venture-backed entertainment company Meet Cute when she was 24 years old. In 2022, Shah was included on the Forbes 30 Under 30 list and on Marie Claire’s first annual culture power list.
