In January, Anna Martin became the voice of the popular podcast. She shares how she holds empathetic interviews.
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Modern Love explores all types of imperfect, messy and totally worth-it love: Not just the romantic kind, but the familial, the platonic and the kind you have for yourself.
It’s Anna Martin’s job to bring those stories to life in audio. Ms. Martin, who previously worked as a co-host and senior producer for Pop-Up Magazine and as a producer at the Moth, became the host of The Times’s “Modern Love” podcast in January. The program is based on the popular column of essays edited by Daniel Jones and Miya Lee; for the podcast, an audio team chooses some essays to be read aloud by a narrator or the writer, and Ms. Martin provides perspective, often interviewing the essayist or posing questions to listeners. In a recent episode, she mused on romantic comedies and bad dating advice.
A producer speaks with the guests before a show, and helps Ms. Martin prepare, but Ms. Martin does not talk to the guests herself in order to maintain, as she calls it, the “wait, what?” element of surprise. Though she admits that she’s still working on the “natural hello” (how she greets her guest and opens an episode), she has an affable essence that lends itself to the show’s intimate nature.
Ahead of the season’s finale on Wednesday, which will conclude Ms. Martin’s first season as host, she shares more about empathetic conversations and honing her voice — and getting used to the sound of it. This interview has been edited and condensed.
What is it that interests you or inspires you about love?
Candidly, it’s the stuff I talk about over brunch. It’s the perennial interest of my life. It’s the thing I text my friends about, constantly; it’s the thing I talk to my sisters about. I’m talking about the expansiveness of love. Personally, it is so wildly aligned with my interests, this work.
The exciting thing about being a podcast in tandem with a print column is that with the possibilities of audio, you get to hear the stories. Even the inflection of someone’s voice, when they’re talking about their mom or a breakup or a crush, is so powerful.
What’s the process of bringing Modern Love essays to life on the podcast?
The podcast team pulls 10 or so essays from the archive, with a special ear for essays that will sound good in audio, because there is a real difference between essays that read well and essays that play well to the ear. We select a mix of voices, perspectives, types of love and geographical diversity of the authors, and that’s tricky and really fun.
What’s the key to hosting empathetic interviews?
You’re not owed anything as an interviewer, at least in this work. In Modern Love, people are writing about, very often, the story that they feel defines them or one of their hardest moments or one of the most beautiful, which is still very loaded to talk about. I think approaching it from a place of gratitude and wonder at that person opening up is key.
How does your experience in production inform the way you approach hosting?
It completely informs it. In your favorite podcast, you hear the voice of the host and the person they’re interviewing, but the fingerprints and the magic of these producers are all over it. There are things that hosts can do that empower producers’ work to be creative and fulfilling and exciting, and there are things a host can do that make your job really, really hard. I’ve tried to employ those firsthand lessons about the good ways to work with a host, now being a host myself.
What new things have you learned from hosting?
I’ve always considered myself to be pretty good at chatting. I’m the kind of person that talks to people when they’re waiting in line. I feel pretty good at that. But I’m realizing that an interview is a total construct. You’re asking them to have an intimate conversation and basically forget the mic. One thing I’m learning to navigate is, how can you maintain the human aspects of a conversation?
I’m now thinking really critically about sounding authentic, which is exactly the way not to sound authentic. The episodes I feel the most proud of are when my friends or my mom will text me, “You sounded so much like yourself in that conversation.” That’s the kind of authenticity I’m chasing.
Are you used to hearing your own voice on the recordings?
I get this question a lot from friends. When the first episode came out, I was like, “Don’t say anything about my podcast voice!” They were like, “Actually, it sounds pretty similar.” I think I’m getting accustomed to it, which is a weird feeling.
What do you want listeners to know?
These are stories from the person sitting next to you on the train; they’re stories from your best friend. The podcast and the column will continue to work because people are so willing to share. I want people to know that they should feel empowered to do that. Love stories are stories about being human.
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April 13, 2022 at 04:00PM
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The Host of ‘Modern Love’ Opens Up About Helping Guests Open Up - The New York Times
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