<description>&lt;p data-rte-preserve-empty="true" style="white-space:pre-wrap;"&gt;My guest this week is Caleb Roehrig, author of young adult mysteries and the occasional romance. Caleb had always wanted to be an author, but life intervened and he found himself living in LA, working as a producer on reality TV shows. He didn’t realize it at the time, but that work was a training ground for storytelling. Though he still might not have figured it out until an economic crisis forced him to try something new.&lt;/p&gt;&lt;p class="" data-rte-preserve-empty="true" style="white-space:pre-wrap;"&gt;&lt;br&gt;We’ll have that interview in a moment. First a quick heads-up that Sewers of Paris episodes will take a pause for the month of May — but you can come see me live, because I’ll be on a book and speaking tour all month long. Come see me in Stockholm; Vienna; Utrecht; and Heidelberg, Germany. &lt;a target="_blank" href="https://mattbaume.com/events"&gt;Details and dates here! &lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p&gt;</description>

murder mysteries, Buffy, and reality TV

My guest this week is Caleb Roehrig, author of young adult mysteries and the occasional romance. Caleb had always wanted to be an author, but life intervened and he found himself living in LA, working as a producer on reality TV shows. He didn’t realize it at the time, but that work was a training ground for storytelling. Though he still might not have figured it out until an economic crisis forced him to try something new.

We’ll have that interview in a moment. First a quick heads-up that Sewers of Paris episodes will take a pause for the month of May — but you can come see me live, because I’ll be on a book and speaking tour all month long. Come see me in Stockholm; Vienna; Utrecht; and Heidelberg, Germany. Details and dates at mattbaume.com

We Went Through the Ringer (Ep 568 - murder mysteries/Caleb)

<description>&lt;p data-rte-preserve-empty="true" style="white-space:pre-wrap;"&gt;The world just celebrated Shakespeare’s birthday — born in late April, a scant four hundred and sixty two years ago, which makes him almost as old as this podcast. Over the years we’ve had many guests on &lt;em&gt;The Sewers of Paris&lt;/em&gt; for whom Shakespeare’s work was an inspiration, and this week we’ll hear my 2021 with &lt;a href="https://www.jeffrey-masters.com/"&gt;Jeffrey Masters&lt;/a&gt; — then the host of the acclaimed podcast &lt;a href="https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/lgbtq-a/id1151561226"&gt;LGBTQ&amp;amp;A&lt;/a&gt;, and now a senior producer at &lt;em&gt;The New Yorker Radio Hour&lt;/em&gt;. Jeffrey launched his career in interviews and storytelling with a move to LA, planning to be an actor. And at first, he found that his Shakespearean training left him unprepared for what Hollywood was looking for.&amp;nbsp;&lt;/p&gt;&lt;p class="" data-rte-preserve-empty="true" style="white-space:pre-wrap;"&gt;Also: A quick heads-up that the &lt;em&gt;Sewers of Paris&lt;/em&gt; will take a little pause for the month of May — but you can come see me live, because I’ll be on a book and speaking tour all month long. Come see me in Stockholm; Vienna; Utrecht; and Heidelberg, Germany. &lt;a href="https://www.mattbaume.com/events"&gt;More details and dates are on my website.&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p&gt;</description>

The Tonys, Shakespeare, and red carpets

The world just celebrated Shakespeare’s birthday — born in late April, a scant four hundred and sixty two years ago, which makes him almost as old as this podcast. Over the years we’ve had many guests on The Sewers of Paris for whom Shakespeare’s work was an inspiration, and this week we’ll hear my 2021 with Jeffrey Masters — then the host of the acclaimed podcast LGBTQ&A, and now a senior producer at The New Yorker Radio Hour. Jeffrey launched his career in interviews and storytelling with a move to LA, planning to be an actor. And at first, he found that his Shakespearean training left him unprepared for what Hollywood was looking for. 

Also: A quick heads-up that the Sewers of Paris will take a little pause for the month of May — but you can come see me live, because I’ll be on a book and speaking tour all month long. Come see me in Stockholm; Vienna; Utrecht; and Heidelberg, Germany. More details and dates are on my website.

The Luckiest Little Homosexual in the World (Ep 567 - The Tonys/Jeffrey)

<description>&lt;p data-rte-preserve-empty="true" style="white-space:pre-wrap;"&gt;My guest this week on &lt;em&gt;The Sewers of Paris&lt;/em&gt; is &lt;a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer nofollow" href="https://jbattis.com/"&gt;Jes Battis&lt;/a&gt;, who’s just written an appreciation and analysis of the movie &lt;em&gt;Labyrinth&lt;/em&gt; entitled &lt;a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer nofollow" href="https://ecwpress.com/products/its-only-forever"&gt;&lt;em&gt;It’s Only Forever&lt;/em&gt;&lt;/a&gt;. Labyrinth turns 40 this year, which marks 40 years of Jes’ particular fascination with the goblin characters — and wondering why he’s always felt so eager to descend into their weird scrungly world. Fortunately, writing a book about it provided some clues.&lt;/p&gt;</description>

Beauty and the Beast, Labyrinth, and portals into fantasy worlds

My guest this week on The Sewers of Paris is Jes Battis, who’s just written an appreciation and analysis of the movie Labyrinth entitled It’s Only Forever. Labyrinth turns 40 this year, which marks 40 years of Jes’ particular fascination with the goblin characters — and wondering why he’s always felt so eager to descend into their weird scrungly world. Fortunately, writing a book about it provided some clues.

To Be a Goblin (Ep 566 - Labyrinth/Jes)

<description>&lt;p data-rte-preserve-empty="true" style="white-space:pre-wrap;"&gt;To mark the recent re-re-re-rebooting of &lt;em&gt;The Muppet Show&lt;/em&gt;, this week we’re heading into the &lt;em&gt;Sewers&lt;/em&gt; archives to revisit my 2020 interview with Dan Steadman. Dan grew up in a household that was so religious, his parents forbade him from watching certain episodes of &lt;em&gt;The Muppet Show&lt;/em&gt;, due to a guest appearance by Alice Cooper. His upbringing in a sheltered religious community found him placed in a lot of unusual circumstances, including a reboot of his entire identity when his family swapped lives with a family in Brazil. A career in showbiz took him to Los Angeles, where he worked alongside big-time celebrities and also faced a crisis — the more comfortable he was living as an openly gay man, the more he realized that he’d have to cut ties with some of the homophobic celebrities he worked with.&lt;/p&gt;</description>

The Muppet Show, Christian broadcasting, and Amy Grant

To mark the recent re-re-re-rebooting of The Muppet Show, this week we’re heading into the Sewers archives to revisit my 2020 interview with Dan Steadman. Dan grew up in a household that was so religious, his parents forbade him from watching certain episodes of The Muppet Show, due to a guest appearance by Alice Cooper. His upbringing in a sheltered religious community found him placed in a lot of unusual circumstances, including a reboot of his entire identity when his family swapped lives with a family in Brazil. A career in showbiz took him to Los Angeles, where he worked alongside big-time celebrities and also faced a crisis — the more comfortable he was living as an openly gay man, the more he realized that he’d have to cut ties with some of the homophobic celebrities he worked with.

I Saw Myself in Kermit (Ep 565 - The Muppet Show/Dan)

<description>&lt;p data-rte-preserve-empty="true" style="white-space:pre-wrap;"&gt;A few weeks ago I came across an online video from a comic convention featuring a phalanx of comic book figures — life-size statues, painted to look like they’d walked off the pages of a comic book. Their creator is &lt;a href="https://www.instagram.com/gregmaraio/"&gt;Greg Maraio&lt;/a&gt;, an actor and artist in Boston who fills his time between shows with this unique project that’s turned into an artistic calling … though for many years, it seemed like it was bringing him to financial ruin.&lt;/p&gt;&lt;p class="" data-rte-preserve-empty="true" style="white-space:pre-wrap;"&gt;&amp;nbsp;We’ll have that interview in a moment. First a quick reminder that I host weekly livestreams every Sunday &lt;a href="http://twitch.tv/mattbaume"&gt;on Twitch&lt;/a&gt;, and I hope you’ll join me for those. Plus — check out my book &lt;a href="http://gaysitcoms.com"&gt;Hi Honey, I’m Homo!&lt;/a&gt; at &lt;a href="http://gaysitcoms.com"&gt;GaySitcoms.com&lt;/a&gt;; subscribe to my email newsletter at &lt;a href="http://mattbaume.com"&gt;MattBaume.com&lt;/a&gt;, and if you’re enjoying The Sewers of Paris, &lt;a href="http://patreon.com/mattbaume"&gt;support the show on Patreon&lt;/a&gt; at &lt;a href="http://patreon.com/mattbaume"&gt;Patreon.com/mattbaume&lt;/a&gt;.&lt;/p&gt;</description>

Catwoman, Shakespeare, Miss Piggy, and The X-Men

A few weeks ago I came across an online video from a comic convention featuring a phalanx of comic book figures — life-size statues, painted to look like they’d walked off the pages of a comic book. Their creator is Greg Maraio, an actor and artist in Boston who fills his time between shows with this unique project that’s turned into an artistic calling … though for many years, it seemed like it was bringing him to financial ruin.

 We’ll have that interview in a moment. First a quick reminder that I host weekly livestreams every Sunday on Twitch, and I hope you’ll join me for those. Plus — check out my book Hi Honey, I’m Homo! at GaySitcoms.com; subscribe to my email newsletter at MattBaume.com, and if you’re enjoying The Sewers of Paris, support the show on Patreon at Patreon.com/mattbaume.

Theater is My Version of Church (Ep 564 - Catwoman/Greg)

Revealing stories about the books, movies, tv, music and more that have changed the lives of gay men. Each week, a guest plucks a piece of entertainment from their past, and answers the question: how did it change your life?

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