A very nice piece. Well focused exploration of the topic. Some great thoughts in the interviews - I love the kid talking about how he wants a job that is something he loves to do. Nice use of sound and good transitions. The piece is a little "rough around the edges" production-wise, but the content is very solid/ engaging.
The piece would work well in a show about career choices, in a show about music, in a show about teenagers.... and a lot of more focused variations on those bigger themes and more.

Great storytelling, great radio. Makes you think and feel. It's funny and sad. I like Gwen's presence and style, her matter of fact tone and insightful writing.
One of the best things about the piece is how it begins. I was not sure where it was going but I was happy to be on the ride. And then the piece turns. It's a great surprise, and the set-up makes sense and the subject matter becomes more "meaningful." Gwen takes us on a journey (love the stuff about how she could not get editors interested). She starts with herself, single voice, memories of childhood, and it becomes an investigation/ documentary full of other voices, probing questions.
I have two constructive pieces of critique. If I was editing this piece, I would have pushed hard to cut down on the middle/ end segments about the police. The story makes a very distinct shift when the tape of the TV news story is played in its entirety. That tape was too long, and did not add anything to my understanding of the story. And from there the story gets side tracked, to my ears. Not that the hard questions for the police are not really important ones, but I didn't think all the time spent on that was really part of THIS story. I think the time spent on challenging the accounts of the shooting got me off track a bit, took me away from the story/ journey that the producer was on.
Also, music at the end is too dramatic. I had to turn it off. The music made much too strong a comment. The story didn't need that drama to conclude.
Overall though, great, great work and I loved listening.

This piece starts promising. You hear a little girl (7 1/2 years old) talking about her love of animals, and finding a baby robin in her yard. The tape is raw (p-pops and distortion) but it's OK at first..... I love little kids voices
... after about a minute, however, I found myself getting restless. I was expecting a story, a reason I was hearing this girl talk about the bird. I was waiting for a narrative, but it never comes. The piece needs a story. Without it, there is not a reason for me to keep listening. The important and difficult question the producer needs to answer is: Why do we care? Why should I care about what this little girl is talking about? I think a good way to find an answer to the question is for the producer to ask herself why she cares, and then use this tape of the girl as a starting point. This tape is, I think, the beginning of a piece, or an element of a piece.... but it needs more to keep me and others listening.

This is an excerpt from the longer (29:00) interview. I think the producers have taken one of the best parts of the interview. This is Wilson talking about the writing process -- how he develops characters, or "discovers" them and how the themes of his plays build from these "discovered" people and their lives. As Wilson puts it, he finds "the play out of what the characters say."

This is a good piece to play to remember Wilson, best in a context where getting into the details of writing process makes sense, rather than trying to remember the "life." This short excerpt does not have those details.

Good updated intro and outro (tape is from a 2002 interview). A note to PRX - as a station it would really help to have the script of intros and outros. That would make these pieces more flexible. I could imagine playing this piece, but wanting my own host to read the intro and outro - for flow, continuity, etc.

If you have a spot in your schedule to play something for kids, and you’re looking for a Halloween theme, this would work well. If not, I think it would be hard to find a spot for it. The music itself, or some of it, might appeal to an adult audience, but the show is intended for children. That’s why I asked my five year old to be the judge. He called it “cool” and “funny” and “gross” ("gross" is a high compliment from a little boy). We listened on a long car trip, and about half way through the Halloween special I thought he was drifting off to sleep (which I would attribute mostly to a late night and a long afternoon). I turned off the program (this being my second time through), but was immediately scolded from behind with “Moooom, I was listening!”

This is a beautiful piece. You don’t quite know what you are listening to at first. Turns out you’re hearing a mother admit, or acknowledge, that she abandoned her own daughter… and the person she is speaking to is her daughter, who is interviewing her. It’s a stunning example of the power of an interview, and what having a microphone and a purpose can do, how concise and direct an interview can be. The piece is simple and well-constructed, the “information” of the story is organized well. The piece is great radio - it takes you deeply (briefly) inside another experience, brings up emotions that make you think. It’s worth making a place for this piece – as part of a series, within a talk show, on ME or ATC with the right set-up. It’s the kind of piece that will cause listeners to stop and wait to hear the end. One note: I think there is a technical problem at the end of the piece. A dropout? And an echo? Maybe the echo is on purpose? If it is, I didn’t like it. The end, in general, was a bit disappointing. It needs something else. But I am not sure what. I imagine it was very difficult to find an ending for this piece.