Checking In w/ Jawn Murray

Michelle and Jawn are accepting plan B! Jawn discusses his journey to becoming the executive producer of the Sherri Show. He also shares how being open to change can contribute to cultivating a reality much bigger than your dreams. CHECK IN to this episode if you need some encouragement to keep working towards your goals. 

 

For all things Jawn Murray, visit: https://allmylinks.com/jawnmurray

 

Make sure you’re following Michelle on social media!

Instagram: @MichelleWilliams 

Twitter: @RealMichelleW

 

 

See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
Welcome to Checking In with Michelle Williams, a production of
iHeartRadio and The Black Effect.

Speaker 2 (00:18):
What's Up, everybody?

Speaker 1 (00:19):
Thank you for tuning in to another episode of Checking In, y'all.
It's going to be a fun one. When you've got
a longtime friend that's checking in, you are bound for laughs, wisdom.
I have no idea what he's gonna share, but I'm
so excited to have award winning television producer, my personal friend,

(00:43):
John Murray is coming up next on Checking In. Y'all.
Welcome to another another fabulous week of Checking In. I
cannot do what I do without you and your continuous
support and those downloads. You gotta keep those downloads going.
I'm excited about today's episode because I've got a dear friend,

(01:05):
oh going on a lot of number of years. He
has been a TV commentator, executive producer, pop culture expert.
Once again, did I say executive producer executive producer of
the Emmy nominated amazing show, The Sherry Shepherd Show.

Speaker 2 (01:21):
Please welcome my friend John Murray.

Speaker 3 (01:26):
I love that because you always say my name like
we're on Bobby, Joe, Bunny, judesus.

Speaker 1 (01:31):
But John, he calls me, so we talked, so he
never gets to see how I look when I said, John.

Speaker 3 (01:37):
Murray, you know, since we hear checking in, I'm just
checking into my checking in. Candles that I have from
you over here still smells really good, so good that
I haven't burned it yet because you haven't sent me
another one.

Speaker 1 (01:50):
So black people, black people, why don't we burn the candles?

Speaker 3 (01:57):
Sometimes they smell too good to birth. Sometimes you just want,
you know, burn that.

Speaker 2 (02:02):
Candle so you can get another one.

Speaker 3 (02:04):
Yes, I need to go, and I do need to
go and get me another one. But it's wonderful. I
love it so and you said, I have it right
here behind me, y'all.

Speaker 1 (02:11):
He is sitting in his office of The Sherry Shepherd Show.

Speaker 2 (02:16):
So I'm so thankful for his time.

Speaker 3 (02:18):
Is that? Okay?

Speaker 2 (02:19):
Let me guess what it is? NAACP Award in the back.

Speaker 3 (02:22):
Oh, this little thing right here. Yes, this is my
NAACP Image Award that I got for Season one of
the Sherify Show for Outstanding Talk Shows. One of the
executive producers, you get one of the awards. So yeah,
I'm very proud of this. You know, there's another award
on my other side. You can't see it in the shot,
but it's called the Telly Award. So all of our

(02:43):
digital campaigns are something that we used to launch the
Chevy Show. We got recognized for this was the Telly
Bronze Award for a fun Joy and Laughter and fun
Joy Laughter was the part of the campaign that also
got us Emmy nomination for season one. So we're excited
that folks have connected with our little show that Could,
and you know, one a few wards nominated for some others.

(03:04):
We just got nominated for People's Choice Awards, So we're
just grateful that people really are connected with our message.

Speaker 1 (03:10):
You know, well, that's what our relationship has been about.
And the relationship that you have with people translate very
well on television because that's just who you are, a
person that loves to have fun, full of joy, full
of laughter.

Speaker 2 (03:29):
I met John.

Speaker 3 (03:33):
Two thousand and eight, so the first time we met
was brief. He was at one of the Soul Traine Awards.
You had just put out your solo album Hard to Yours.

Speaker 4 (03:42):
Oh, two thousand and two one, and Tony Ferguson, who
worked at Sony Records with your personal publicis Now You've
Got No Shore, was handling you at.

Speaker 3 (03:53):
The Soul Train Awards. Tony and I were good friends.
He's a big champion of around when I started in
the business, initially as a writer, and so he knew
I always love people who could bridge the gap. You
are a church girl who's doing mainstream music, and hearty
yours was your fur way back into gospel music. So
he knew I wanted to meet you, and he brought
me up and introduced me to you. He was like,
this is your biggest fan, and he jokingly says, one
day y'all gonna get married. He was like, well, honey,

(04:15):
where's the ring? And we laughed and we took a photo.
And then years later I was at the opening of
The Color Purple in La so you might remember that
year better than me, and one of the guys who
was in the ensemble of the show went to introduce us,
and he was like, I don't know who you are.
You've been talking about me on the town a boarding show.

(04:37):
I've been hearing you. I love when you talk about me.
And we laughed and he was like, here, stay in
touch with me. But you gave me your email address,
not your telephone number. And but years later, you know,
we built our rapport and I remember there was something
going on in the industry that I was like, I
want to give you some insight on something, and I
sent you an email and you called me. I was

(04:58):
on my way to the toront Film Festival, because I
remember I can see myself sitting in the airport when
we had our conversation and we sat and talked, and
we've been talking on the phone ever since.

Speaker 1 (05:10):
Y'all, listen, that's why you gotta be careful how you
treat people, because sometimes they remember more. I guess maybe
the person that's on the receiving end of various types
of communication remembers more.

Speaker 2 (05:25):
I only gave you my email address.

Speaker 3 (05:27):
And but listen, boundaries, you've learned that over time, sometimes
you got to you know, you got to start slow
with people on the same way down. People will run
up to me on the street. Now, this is a
working in this business. I've always had a level of notoriety,
but being in people's homes every day, it's a whole
different investment. Like people feel like they know you. And

(05:48):
because Sharry and I are friends in real life, though
I happen to be the executive producer or her talk show,
people see our friendship, and they try to emulate that
when I run to them in the grocery stores and
then the target and places like that. And so people
can be really aggressive and run up for you. You'll
give me a number, And so I had to learn
how to establish boundaries because you know, you know, sometimes

(06:08):
you don't want the confrontation of an aggressive Now though
I'm very comfortable with the word no, but sometimes people
can catch you in a weird predicament where they put
you on the spot and you're trying to navigate out
of it. And so Google Voice and those telephone numbers
have worked to create a great alternative to the fact
that no, no, you can call this number. You just
hain't called the one that's you know, getting direct access

(06:30):
to me.

Speaker 1 (06:31):
They go, get this number, yeah, yeah, John, and I
go as far back to what was known as AOL
Black voices.

Speaker 3 (06:43):
Yeah, that was a good time.

Speaker 2 (06:47):
Such good times.

Speaker 1 (06:48):
I always looked forward to looking to see what was
going to be on AOL Black voices.

Speaker 2 (06:57):
So you got your start. You are a writer and
me he was a writer journalist like.

Speaker 3 (07:01):
Yeah, yeah, real journalisten. Yes. I went to an HBCU
Norfolk State University, inspired to go to an HBCU because
I love the sitcom A different world. And I went
to school and I would tell my professors, I'm not
learning any of the technical stuff. I gonna be a star.
I'm working in television. I only need to learn how

(07:22):
to work a camera. That kid was so arrogant, even
though he wasn't. He just had a vision, you know.
But I had a professor that told me, he was like, listen,
TV's gonna be hard, and as a black man, it's
gonna be particularly harder for you to break into it,
and you need to think of a plan. B He's like,
you're a really good writer. So I started taking journalism
courses as my electives. And the whole dot com boom

(07:43):
was happening. All the digital companies were happening. Everybody was
really thriving in the digital space. And here I was
a college kid who created a newsletter after an internship
at a radio station in DC just started generating national
attention for me. It was based off my middle name.
It was called Garrick News. I had to set up
in a Hotmail account and people would come to the

(08:04):
radio station or come into my market. They give me
their email and you had to email me to get
added to my database because it didn't have one of
those lists serves and stuff like we have now to
send out newsletters and stuff like that. So our master's
database of celebrities, and then sometimes I signed it to
my AOL account and celebrities would hit me in the
instant message and then I'd have to hit some other
celebrity I met and be like, YO, is this such

(08:25):
and such celebrities real message chat name? But I had
like four major celebrity friends who befriended me through instant
message chat because they love the work. And so the
newsletter turned into me working for a newsworter called euur Web.
I was there a short amount of time, and then
AOL had acquired Black Voices, and I got approached about
doing what was initially a weekly column. And then when

(08:49):
the age of the blog came about, they turned our
weekly content into like daily content to kind of compete
in the blog space. But my column was one of
the most successful columns there, and so I left Norflea
State before graduating because the work and the money offers
got so good. I was like, how come I can
finish this up later? But my writing career really took off,

(09:10):
and here I am, indeed at the time was in
DC uh and even though DC had b ET's headquarters,
TV one's headquarters, Discovery had an office there. Serious had
a headquarter there before merging with Serious x M. It
was a political time and I was able to make
a national name for myself as a writer. And one
of the things that worked for me was that, for
the most part of a celebrity freely. You know, sometimes

(09:33):
celebrities would get mad if you just would report the
truth about them, as celebrities often do. But I was, well,
you know, but I cared more about the human nature
of celebrities than I did about the selacious nature of
stories and a headline or what we now call clickbait
of gotscha moments, and having that level of care for

(09:55):
people and their humanity early on, and maybe it was
the church boy and me, it has served me well
my entire career because many of those relationships that started
when I was just the writer continue to flourish now
and have even helped me with booking some of the
guests and calling in some favors here to talk show.

Speaker 1 (10:13):
Listen, let me tell you something. Everything that he is
saying is true. I'm going to share this with you,
y'all remember those times I was co hosting on the
View or the talk.

Speaker 2 (10:28):
Meredith Vieira.

Speaker 1 (10:31):
It is all because of John Murray's insight, and I
have to thank him for that, Like that is what
I've wanted to do, was to be a co host
on one of these talk shows. And I believe it
is going to happen one day. But John could have,

(10:53):
knowing that that's something that he wanted to do, he
didn't have to tell me that. He could have easily
just kept it to himself for himself to be on there.
And we thought we were going to be doing Meredith
Viera together.

Speaker 3 (11:08):
Yes, because people don't know it's in this business, they
do this thing called chemistry test, which is like musical
chairs of auditioning. And so this one summer week weekend
it was we all got brought into New York. At
the time, my agent was told I was the only
man up for the job because I had gone in

(11:29):
and met with NBC. They liked me and they were like,
we want to figure out something to do with him.
So they tried me out on Meredith Show. And after
the first appearance, they offered me more dates to come back,
and so I had done like twelve appearances on her
show prior to we got to this secret test. But
you and I never worked together. They had you working
with everybody else, they had me working with everybody else.
We never worked together. But we did this secret test,

(11:50):
and I'll never forget. You were like, well, why do
I have to get there like three hours earlier than you?
And I was like, I don't know. And you went
there and they had you tested with another male entertainer.
Text me and he was like, such and such entertainers there,
but they not as good as you are on cameras,
so you could be fine. And I got your text
message and I text my agent. I said, this is
his job, and she's like, what do you mean. I said,

(12:13):
they know what I do, they know why I'm here,
and they've misled us into believing that I was the
only man testing for this show. Now they brought this
other guy in at the eleventh hour. Somebody's called in
a favor. I'm gonna go and do what I do,
but this is somebody else's getting And that was the
first time you and I actually got to work together.
And it was a lot of fun.

Speaker 1 (12:30):
It was tons of fun, y'all. There is so much
history here. I want to respect John's time, but I
also want to respect everything that he is. But I'm
going to go back to something that you said that
is so important. When you were in college, you were

(12:51):
talking about how you knew you wanted to be on TV,
but someone told you you probably should also get into writing.
What do you think would have happened had you been
too arrogant or prideful to take their suggestion.

Speaker 3 (13:08):
I probably would have ended up like a lot of
people that I know who started on the pathway to
entertainment realized that it was tough, and you know, you
start living life, you start making bills, you start making babies,
you start families, and you have to support that financially.
So a lot of people needed to take jobs to
support their lifestyle, and that caused them to have to

(13:30):
avoid their dream. And I was really blessed that the
plan b writing open doors for me that I could
not have fathomed for myself. I was able to create
my own space. It was the quintessential example of when
time and preparation meet. I was prepared for that moment,
but the timing of the business was wide open, and

(13:51):
I was someone who was able to make space. And
so it's been great to see some of the people
who now use social media and digital media to make
space and they're having success and their bloggers and their
YouTubers and they're you know, doing video content and stuff
and cultivating an audience with it, because that's what I
was able to do with the print medium at that time.
And so I was able to be a full time

(14:13):
writer for twelve years and it opened doors for me.
So I was maybe four or five years into my
writing career when one day I got a call from
an executive named Sheila Eldert who said, Hey, the Tom
Jorder Morning Show is interested in adding a younger voice
to their show. They like to test you out, and
so they booked me for a one off segment. I
did the segment the same day they made me an

(14:33):
offer to join the show. So I was aoll block
Voices for seven years. Six of those years I also
was on the time during the morning show. So I
had this rock star media life. One hundred thousand frequent
five miles a year, five Star hotels, flyinding to La
taking the anitrak to New York to interview top music
stars and top Hollywood stars because the industry respected my

(14:55):
platform and my voice. And one of the graces that
God gave me early into this thing was I could
sit with a celebrity they have done twenty five interviews
that day, and I would sit and have a conversation
with them. And the biggest compliment to give a media professionalist,
Oh my god, that's such a great question. Nobody's ever
asked me that before. If I know, you know, I've
done thirty interviews today as a part of some press
junket and you say that to me, I've just gotten

(15:17):
off like I'm my ego is just like yes. But
at the end of these interviews, celebrities will say to me,
there's just something about you. You're different than the regular
industry guy. Can I give you my information and listen?
You know, I'm in my forties now, so like I remember,
there was a time where you go out with a
music artist and they'd be like, yo, I got to
hang out with you, or can I call you for advice?
Sometimes I'm thinking you got Grammys and you calling me

(15:39):
for advice, And they would say, here's my two way
page number, it changes every sixty days. If it changes,
called my Mama's house line, and the cod word is Gertrude.
If you say gert true, She'll give you my new
number and then I'll make sure I hit you back. Well,
it was I remember like and I was nineteen twenty

(16:00):
years old hanging out with these bold face named superstars
just because we'd have an authentic connection through conversation. So
it was a crazy time in my life. But I
never tried to dishonor those relationships, and again those relationships
continue to serve me to this present day.

Speaker 1 (16:17):
That's so good because you have a genuine passion for
all things entertainment, broadway, film, television, music, everything as it
relates to the art.

Speaker 2 (16:31):
You have a genuine passion versus I don't know if.

Speaker 1 (16:35):
It's because social media or what it is. It makes
me scary about people's true intentions.

Speaker 3 (16:43):
Oh yeah, yeah, And I got into this business because
I love the business. Listen. I was a latchkey kid,
you know. As a teenager, we lived in a two
bedroom apartment. My mother worked, her husband worked because her
husband with my daddy, and so I had to let
my hope in after school and talk shows with my babysitters.

(17:04):
Ricky Lakeer was my babysitter, Orlanda Watch was my babysitter.
Mantel Williams was my babysitter. Sally Jesse, Roelfaia, all those hosts.
It was my babysitters. And I fell in love with
this format. I fell in love with television. I fell
in love with the escapism that TV provided, you know
what I'm saying. I had that even as a pretty team.
I had an aunt that used to babysat me, and

(17:26):
when she was babysit me, she loved to watch the
vintage talk show. So she would watch repeats of I
Love Lucy and leave It to bab And I love
the comedic storytelling of I Love Lucy. And my favorite
iteration of that show is when Ricky went to Hollywood.
And so I always had these visions and fantasies of
getting to LA because I wanted to do what Ricky

(17:47):
and Lucy did on those episodes. And you know, so
as kids were impressionable, you know, these are the foundations
that are stat and so I had a clear vision
that I wanted to get into this business. And then
once you started a business, I came in this business
and I was just a black entertainment journalist. I could
tell you what was going on with black celebrities and
music in Hollywood and that was it. But I realized

(18:09):
in order to have greater successor you had to be broader,
and I'll never get two thousand and eight, I was
on the time during the morning show my AOL column
is Thriving. Star Jones had a talk show on Core TV,
and she called me and told me, she says, I
really want you to come and do my show, and
you know, start war her where She's like, baby, you know,
I know you got this black stuff down on lock,
but I need you to be broader than that. So

(18:31):
I'm having you come on here talk about Britney Spears
and a few people, because you know you're an expert
on them too. And it stretched me. It requires that
I had to work a little bit. And the truth
of the matter is the storytelling was still the same
I you know, I always brought with and I tried
to bring a comedic aspect to my storytelling. That was
still the same. But if it requires that I did
a little research, which mean I always had to be

(18:51):
well read and I always had to study before I
showed up to do a segment. And so, you know,
just being prepared, doing your research and having an appreci
ciation for every facet of the business really makes you
a well rounded talent because the business changes. You know,
I made a real joke about how our celebrity would
give me their two way pager number. We don't have

(19:13):
two way pages anymore, you know what I'm saying. Vinyls
having a resurgence, but it went on a style for
a while. All of us used to have CD collections.
We don't know CDs anymore. This industry changes and genres change,
and we used to have just linear television and it
would get twenty million viewers on a TV show and
now we have streaming networks. And so you have to

(19:33):
be versatile enough to be in the pivot because if
the sector of the business that you're working in goes
out of style, what do you do next? If you're
not well read.

Speaker 2 (19:42):
That's so good preparation.

Speaker 1 (19:45):
And we've both been in this for so long and
having to be flexible and navigate even through being prepared,
and y'all, it's been so much fun watching John throughout.

Speaker 2 (19:57):
The years on CNN. Heck, the BBC Meani.

Speaker 1 (20:01):
There are times he would have to be ready at
all times of.

Speaker 3 (20:06):
The O in the morning, absolutely and.

Speaker 1 (20:09):
Or night to talk about even some of the biggest
stars to ever be on our planet, like Michael Jackson.

Speaker 2 (20:19):
So much stuff that has.

Speaker 1 (20:20):
Happened, but you've handled even some of the most scandalous stories.
You would insert a joke here or there, and you
never I guess you weren't the guy that was gonna
come even if you had the tea.

Speaker 2 (20:38):
It's how you shared it, especially if it was true.

Speaker 3 (20:42):
Yeah. You know, one of my benchmarks as a journalist
was you're not empowered by the stories you tell. You're
empowered by the secrets you keep. And so for me
it was always the long game. There are countless examples
of people who had a big scoop or big exclusive
and they knew it would get them huge traffic. But

(21:02):
then they walk into a room at a party and
nobody wants to talk about them, talk around them, or
once they'm there, because they don't feel safe. There's nothing
sacred about their presence. You know, this space now has
been co opted by somebody who might see something. Then
they gonna go say something. You know, for me, when
I was on and I was working. I'd identify that
I was working. If I sat down with you with

(21:23):
a recorder in front of you, I'm working. When we
turned the recorder off, we talked human to human and
that was one of my gifts. And so I remember
there were a couple of the bloggers who started out
in the business and they would reach out to me
for advice. And because when I started doing entertainment news,
there really wasn't any black men in the space. There
were some women and some folks who would come and

(21:44):
were thriving. You know, when I was a last key
kid as a teenager watching TV, I remember seeing Tanya
Heart on. You know a lot of the talk shows
would have entertainment experts. On Friday, it'd be Tanya Heart, Flow, Anthony,
and every now and then you'd see Jamie Foster Brown
from Sister to Sister, and those were like the three
African American people that I would see on television. And

(22:06):
when I started in the business, both Tanya and Flow
were exceptionally welcoming to me and kind to me and
offered me advice on how to you know, just to
break through, you know what I'm saying, and so Both
of those are ladies who also had great relationships. Flow
is somebody who was very close with the Jackson She
considers LaToya Jackson one of her best friends. I one
time walked in the barber Flow Anthony and Lena Richie

(22:28):
jumped up, and you would have thought it was Queen Elizabeth.
How excited he was to see her based on their relationships.
And Tanya Heart as a woman who opened up BET's
West Coast bureau, you know, she, you know, had gave
Tupac Shakur his first mainstream interview and the documentaries and
stuff that you see now when you see this pretty

(22:48):
light skinned ladies sitting down having a conversation with Tupac,
that's Tanya. People who have relationships, you know, they have
celebrity friends, and then they have friends that happen to
be celebrities, And so I looked at them, and the
other lesson that I learned early on is that networking
will take you further than your skills and ability. Ever.
Can we all know talented people all over this country

(23:10):
sitting at home wishing that somebody would take them off
the sidelines and put them in the game. And the
truth of the matter is they haven't fostered the type
of relationships to give them the access to be able
to showcase what they're actually able to do. And so
learning to network early on and then moving with an
integrity by being able to understand as a professional, I
can get what I get and I can tell a

(23:31):
really good story when I was a journalist without having
to violate your trust, without having to disrespect you, without
having to shame you, you know. And so I was
able to do that and again now in the second
act of my life, you know, because before I became
Shrey's executive producer, you know, you mentioned some of the
TV stuff that I did. I think I walked away

(23:52):
from the writing part of my career and really just
focused on the on camera stuff. And so this was
the next iteration, you know, being able to be one
of the bosses behind the scene and go on to
this journey with Sherry and some of the same relationships
from the beginning of my career. I can call those
same celebrities if a publicist is blocking them from coming
on the show or they want to send them to
one of the competition show, I can pick up the

(24:13):
phone and say, remember in twenty twenty seven, man, I'm
sorry when two thousand and seven when you told me
if I ever needed anything to call you, I'm calling
in my favor and you can't call in favors and
if you aren't good to people in the early phases
of those relationships.

Speaker 1 (24:29):
Y'all, y'all want to talk about secrets. John is so correct.
Weren't you on the phone when I was going through
a breakup?

Speaker 3 (24:42):
Yes, I try not to ever talk about that because
it was but that was on one day. I wish
there was a camera in your house because I felt
like if there was a camera in your house recorded you,
it was like there was perfect audition tape for like
if they ever did like the movie version of Snaps,
or or if Tyler.

Speaker 5 (25:01):
Perry won remember the role Tasha smith Lane when she
was the evil mother girlfriend going nuts on it just
Elba and that movie.

Speaker 3 (25:12):
There was a side of you I had never seen
on that phone, And I said, if she was recording this,
this is the audition tape. She ever means free.

Speaker 2 (25:20):
And it's rare. It is rare, But don't play in
my face. I'm trying to figure out.

Speaker 1 (25:27):
What I literally got on the phone, and I called
John because I think I was in such disbelief. Maybe
it was just the audacity of this individual. I can't recall,
but I just remember every now and then we talk
about that. But y'all, this is because of years of
relationship has been cultivated. He has shown me that I

(25:49):
can trust him and vice versa.

Speaker 2 (25:51):
So I'm just thankful to.

Speaker 1 (25:53):
Have somebody like that when I was going through managerial
transitions and everything, not knowing who can can I tell
this to?

Speaker 2 (26:01):
What can I do?

Speaker 1 (26:03):
John Murray walked me through that. He's walked me through
so much, which leads me to the fact that you've
talked about the safety and the relationships that you.

Speaker 2 (26:13):
Have with people. And I'm excited. We're going to get
to Sherry Shepherd.

Speaker 1 (26:16):
In a moment, but talk about the fact that you
have been a coach as well to a lot of
talent on how to be on television or if something
comes out on them, you show them how to navigate
trouble or what could possibly be career ending.

Speaker 3 (26:35):
Yeah. One of the things listen, as a writer, you
learned early on you need multiple strings of income. And
so I was having a level of success, but I
want a greater success, and so one of the things
that I started doing was media training and artists development.
And so what most people don't know is, and you
hear about it when you hear about the glory days
of Motown or the golden years of Hollywood, how the

(26:56):
studios will prepare the stars on being stars, or how
the record companies would prepare the artists on how to
present themselves and how to talk to the public. And
so it went away for a long time, but there
were several record companies that started to reinvest in their
artists and shout out to Karen Jackson, who at the
time was an EMI and then Motown. She was somebody

(27:18):
who really saw the need to work on some of
her artists, and so they became a major client of mine.
And on the faith based side, I started to help
artists like Kiara Sheard and Tasha Cobbs and Forever Jones
before Doe broke out to become a solo singer, and
I was working with jazz artists and R and B artists,
and then I had a whole crew of Hollywood stars

(27:39):
that would not do major media appearances without begetting them together.
And so Sherry Sheppard was a friend of mine and
also a client and so like the we met at
Doctor Bobby Jones. Funny enough, I used to do a
artists in the Treatment Price a year in Las Vegas,
and Sherry was a big reader of my column. She
came up to me in the hallway one day. It

(28:00):
was like, Hey, I know you don't know who I am,
but I'm a big fan of your work. And I
was like, oh, you're the little black actress on all
the big white sitcoms. Of course I know you. And
we became friends.

Speaker 1 (28:08):
John and John really, John really will say that like, yeah,
that line, go ahead, and she laughed.

Speaker 3 (28:15):
And we had changed information and we became friends. And
so whenever Shery would do appearances when she was co
hosting the View, sometimes whenever topics and stuff she wanted
to work through, she'd bring me on to help her
figure that out. If she had to go do a
promo run for a movie project or something, she'd have
me come and help her finessial sound bites and stuff.
And so what I did not realize then was that

(28:37):
it really was setting me up for my life as
a producer. It was now it was teaching me how
to get the best out of people. It was teaching
me how to connect with people so that they could
be their best And so when I was so prior
to this executive producer run with Sherry, I had done
a bunch of consulting, producing for some awards shows and
some specials. I had both produced and directed some episodes

(29:00):
TV ones Uncensored. But the executive producer role is you're
the boss. You know, you hire your fire, you have
one of the final says on creative. You're leading the team.
And so there were people when Sherry said I will
only go on this journey with John that was looking
like how did he get the leap fro of all
those people? And you know, how is he in this position?

(29:20):
And the truth of the matter is the late great
Bill Getty, who helps create the view with Barbara Walters,
he helps mentor me through this process of going on
this executive producer journey along with Twitch. He was at Ellen,
along with Heather Gray who was at the Talk, and
along with my dear friend Kat mackenzie who's at GMA three.
But Bill says something to me, He said, John, Throughout
the course of my career, I've seen celebrities give their

(29:42):
hairdressers executive producer credits their Dog Walkers executive producer credits.
He said sometimes crazy celebrities would sometimes want to give
people EP credits just to put money in their pockets
so they wouldn't have to pay them their salary directly.
He said, But you have a superpower here. There's nobody
who knows Sherry as good as you do. There's nobody
who's going to get the performance out of her the

(30:02):
way that you will because of that relationship. And you,
guys are going into a situation where people who need
to learn her and you're almost like the Sherry whisperer.
He says, that's an invaluable asset. So he said, despite
the fact that you know this genre, despite the fact
that you're great with people, you're going to be a
great leader, and you're really going to help produce this
wonderful content. If they were just paying you for the
relationship alone, he said, it's worth every time. And it

(30:24):
really shifted my perspective walking into this space, and it
prepared me for a lot of what I was going
to encounter as we were embarking on the journey of
the Sherry Ship.

Speaker 1 (30:33):
So so good, and you have been walking with Sherry
Shepherd for a number of years in a four way
to some of the shows.

Speaker 2 (30:42):
She was a call host.

Speaker 3 (30:44):
On The View.

Speaker 1 (30:45):
Well, and now you two she if I'm not mistaken,
correct me if I'm wrong. I think she made a
promise like John, when I get my talk show, you're
coming with me.

Speaker 3 (30:57):
Yeah. So you know, Shary I had a very unique
relationship because when Cherry was approached to join The View,
she had agents, she had managers and all that stuff.
She said she was praying and she asked, God, I
want to talk to somebody who's not on my payroll,
and I really want to get objective advice from them.
And literally, I was in Chicago. I was doing a

(31:18):
speech at Burrell Communications. I was out shopping, walking down
Michigan Avenue. Phone rings and Sherry I answer it, and
she told me about her offer to join the View
and we talked about it, and that particular year it
didn't happen because they brought Rosie O'Donnell on the show
and they didn't want to add a second co host.
Fast forward about eight months later, Sherry started guest co
hosting on the View again. The whole Rosie and Elizabeth

(31:41):
blow up happens, and then all of a sudden, they're
looking to bring Sherry on the show again as a
permanent co host well her team at the time. The
negotiations didn't go very well and ABC took their offer
back from her, and Sherry called me and she cried,
she's really upset, and I coached her on how I
thought she could resurrect the deal. I basically told her,

(32:02):
I need you to call Bill Gaddy. I need you
to share his heart, your heart with him and tell
him why the financials the mathe' mathing. And so she
did exactly as I said. Bill Gatty told her, if
you take this deal, the rest of the money's going
to come, and she said, those were the exact words
I had said to her, So it was almost like
God was using him to confirm what I said. The

(32:25):
deal happened, and the rest is history, and Sherry's never
made another major decision in the entertainment industry again without
talking to me. So that set the foundation of our relationship.
When she went into guest hosts for The Wendy Williams
initially in twenty and nineteen, Cherry said, Hey, can you
come in and help me in addition to you just
helping produce me, and my approach to the questions, I

(32:47):
want you to come and help write the show, helped
me structure the show, and so I came in. I
helped write her monologue for the top of show, you know,
helped her with the guests and things like that. What
most people don't know is this particular company had offered
Cherry a deal in two thousand and nineteen to embark
on a talk show journey, and things didn't work out.
The pandemic didn't happen, and so twenty twenty one, Sherry

(33:09):
happened to be in New York City. She was filling
in at the View that week for somebody who was
out all week, and she got a call to come
in and fill in for Wendy again. This was the
season which Wendy didn't have. Everybody was guest hosting that
particular season, and Sherry called and said, do I really
want to do this? This is something I should do.
And I said to her, Well, don't look at it
like you're going back to co host this time. How
about go in and do a five day pilot shore America.

(33:31):
What the Sherry Shepherd Show would look like. You've been
taking all these meetings people are uncertain about the market.
They want panel shows. Let's show them that you can
do a single host show and that you can own
this space. And she said, well, I'll only do it
if you come and do it with me again. I
came in five shows. I helped her write the shows,
you know, and it was a tough time. We're coming
out of the pandemic. There are all these testing and protocols,

(33:53):
and we had to sit in the hotel for hours
and build out this show. And we helped her hand
pick each of the guests and the segment that she did.
And by the end of the first week, the ratings
were through the roof. The research was great, and everybody
was saying, this should be the Sherry Show. And so
Sherry came to me and said, I know you're talking
to one of the news agencies about coming on as
a contributor. I know you're off for another cable show,

(34:16):
and I know this big company's talking to you about
a podcast. What would it take for you to walk
away from everything that you have going on to come
on this journey with me? And I said, well, I
got to pray about it first, and so I came
back to her the next day and I said, listen,
come on this journey with you. If I at this title,
if I have these responsibilities, and if they pay me
my money. And she said, cool, I won't have a

(34:38):
deal unless you have a deal. And Sherry called our
team and said, listen, until John's dealer is done, don't
send me a contract. And she also had an offer
so she could either do a sitcom or she could
do a talk show. Shit options. And she said, I'm
only doing the talk show and John is a part
of it. She says, because I serve it up. This
is his vision. He's the one who made it look good.
And so my deal was fin only done. And you know,

(35:01):
it's been an interesting journey. I wouldn't have I wouldn't
necessarily walked away from as much as I had going
on to do this with anybody else. But in hindsight,
it's really been a blessing. And I think it's a
blessing because this whole opportunity has been ordained by God.

Speaker 1 (35:17):
Absolutely, was it tough to have that conversation with Shrey
because she's your friend, Like that was a tough conversation,
Like Sharry, I'll come, but I gotta have this title.

Speaker 2 (35:29):
I gotta get paid. This mine, I gotta do this.

Speaker 1 (35:31):
Like you're always good at having tough conversations.

Speaker 3 (35:36):
You weren't nervous, you know what. I think maybe ten
years ago would have been nervous. Maybe six years ago
i'd have been nervous. Let me say the mind space
I was in in twenty twenty one when we had
this conversation, I would never faced as much rejection as
I had in my life until I walked away from
being a writer in a radio personality to live my
dreams in television. The truth of the matter is, and

(36:00):
I'm not speaking out of the turn, It's widely reported
and times Up and moments like that have really kind
of shown that the television business and entertainment and hole
is still really controlled by a bunch of very old
white men, and sometimes people of color and diverse people
aren't always the flavors of the month. And so I

(36:22):
went through a phase where I would go in and
meet with the executives and they like, you're amazing, You're
so great, but you're broad and I don't know what
to do with you. Why I'm broad because I wouldn't
study broadcasting, and so doing me what you did with
Tom burg Rock or doing me what you did with
Regis filming, or do with me what you did with
my white count of parts that seemed to get all
the jobs. And during this particular phase when I'd have

(36:43):
these meetings and stuff, it felt like only black NFL
players and black comedians were getting the jobs, and so
it was a tough place to come down to me
and somebody else. And then the one they caught the
football got the gig, or they say we're looking for
Michael Strahan type, then they just hire Michael Strahan. And
the one time I met him, I was like, can
you stop taking every job so somebody else can work?

(37:05):
And he laughed. And so all that was going on,
and then the pandemic hit and nobody was working, and
I really took the pandemic and did some self work.
I really tried to empower myself and better myself and
really connecting with people who were enriching and encouraging, and
somebody who was so pivotal and keeping me in carriage

(37:26):
doing that season my life with somebody you've had on
the show. Doctor J Barnett just a good brother and
has a really great gift of being able to pour
into people right in the time that they needed. And
so by the time twenty twenty one came around, I
had heard Robin Roberts do an interview where she said
optimism is a muscle that gets stronger put the practice,

(37:49):
and something about her saying that shifted me, because they say,
if you do something for twenty eight days, it becomes
normal for you. And so I decided I'm going to
try twenty days of optimism because I want to make
that my new norm. And so literally, every day, starting
in May of twenty twenty one, I woke up with
this blind anticipation that some good news was coming my way.

(38:11):
I woke up every day just I would pick up
my phone to see if it was a text message
or an email. I would check out voicemail to see
if it was a job offer. I believe that something
good was coming in my way, coming my way. And
the first few days it was silly. I'd wake up
with this smile on my face. Yeah, I go looking
for these messages. But I did it until it became comfortable.
It became my norm. And so by the time Sherry

(38:34):
and I are having this conversation, which is November of
this year, there have been so many great things that
had happened that summer leading up until this point, and
so I was so confident and what God was about
to do in my life and what I was manifesting
by my own goodwill and my own optimism, that I
was so comfortable having this conversation because I knew I

(38:57):
had options and if I was going to go on
a journey that I knew wasn't gonna be comfortable for me,
that I was walking with some people that didn't want
me to be there, and that I was gonna have
to catch the bullets that Cherry would never see. That
I needed to be able to do it with the
cushions of knowing when I leave here, I have this title,
my bank account, I have this amount of money, and

(39:19):
all the other elements will work together, because I need
to have those things to make up for what I'm
losing in some mental mind space. Because it's a lot
that you take on and go on a journey like this.

Speaker 1 (39:29):
You know, John, you just gave somebody here something that
they probably need to do. For twenty eight days, they've
been trying to figure out, what is this secret to
my success? How am I gonna make this transition, How
is this dream gonna come true? But maybe sometimes our mindset,
maybe we wake up being negative, we have negative conversations,

(39:53):
We're surrounding ourselves with negative people, and maybe, just like
you said, waking up being opt a mystic. Come on,
Sounds of Blackness sings the song Honey be Up.

Speaker 3 (40:04):
They save the blueprint and really we You know, there
was a time on the Opera show where they were
talking about the secret, and the secret dealt with manifestation.
You know, if you were in the Pentecostal church, they
would say, name it and claim it. Everybody has an iteration,
you know, of what you put out is what you
get back. And I put out the anticipation that there

(40:26):
was a blessing coming my way, that the opportunity was
coming my way. And if I would have stayed in
the space of well, I'm about to go ahead and
lose another job to another football player. Uh, it's coming
down to me and somebody else used to be in
a boy band. They're gonna choose him again, even though
he can't talk that well. I would have become so
cynical and so negative that I would not have been

(40:48):
open to receive the blessing. That came in. I'm a
great example of state of chorus, like, yes, my act
one is a writer and as a radio personality. I
was twenty five years old and I joined the number
one and the first nationally syndicated black morning show to
ever be successful with time join the morning show. For
some people, that was the dream. For me, that was

(41:09):
just cracking the surface because I knew that was just
one more step and what I wanted to do, you know,
And when I started taking my TV meetings and stuff,
I have to tell people all the time. You know,
you meet with these executives. I don't care how long
your resume is and how much you've done. They've never
heard of you before. And you go in and you
have to sell yourself to them.

Speaker 2 (41:28):
And so, by the way, what is our good friend
Isaac say? Never heard of them?

Speaker 3 (41:33):
Never heard of them. But I go on to meet
with these executives, the ainy't say, so, tell me about yourself,
And I was like, I want to be the black
Regis Fielman, And they go, oh, because they could understand that.
I feel like I want to be the black Tom
brgul Round. I love his versatility. Oh but what I
didn't know then that I know now is being the
Black Regions Filming would have been fun and I could
have done it and made a whole lot of money.
It is so much rewarding being the black Michael Gelman

(41:56):
Michael Gelman is the executive producer who produced the show
that Regis was and he's sometimes on camera and so
you see him enough that you recognize him and you
know him. But he has the power to be able
to take people off the bench and put them in
the game. And there have been some folks that I
used to test against for shows, or I've seen them work.
I respect their work, and all of a sudden we're

(42:17):
launching some new franchise, I'm like, you know what, you'd
be good for that? And then having the ability to
take some correspondent or some hosts or somebody who I
know only needs an opportunity and knows somebody who sees
them for the value that they bring and give them
an opportunity and they have that looking at how like
thank you like I used to when somebody gave me
an opportunity.

Speaker 1 (42:37):
Best feeling in the world, John, not only I believe
was it your optimism that landed you the role of
being the executive producer of one of the most refreshing
daytime talk shows, which is The Sherry Shepherd Show.

Speaker 2 (42:53):
But I believe it was the seed so prior.

Speaker 1 (42:57):
Like you said, for telling me and the host of others, Hey,
there's gonna be some opening slots coming on. Make sure
you get your management and your agent, you know, make
sure you know you know about it. And sure enough
John what lie and he knew what he was talking about,
and so I believe it was that too. I also
believe just how you treat people matter so much. If

(43:20):
y'all don't take anything away from this conversation too, how
you treat people along the way can determine your future.
So I am not dismissing the optimism that you did
for the learning of Days, but I think it was
so much that you did along the way. I wanted

(43:41):
to ask about diversity. You kind of touched on it
a little bit, and then, as they say, I won't
keep your bear, I.

Speaker 2 (43:47):
Won't hold you much longer.

Speaker 1 (43:49):
But I'm just excited to see I mean, hey, we
looked at the Emmys, how many of us were up
winning holding that trophy, which gives me so much hope.
But you probably you know a little bit more on
the inside or the algorithm of what's going on on
the inside of black hosts, black executive producers. Do you

(44:11):
think it's getting better in that area of diversity?

Speaker 3 (44:14):
You know, in front of the camera, it's been It's
been better for a long time. Hollywood still has a
pay inequity when it comes to people of color and
our white counterparts, and that's something that I think everybody's
working to eradicate. We've seen Taraji be very vocal recently about,
you know, the pay disparity between her and some of
her white actress counterparts, O Tavia Spencer, Biblea Davis, They've

(44:38):
all talked about it. But I do think the ability
to work. I mean, listen, there was a time where
h in black Hollywood in particular, the only roles you
could get were in Tyler Perry movies and TV shows
because being black was not the flavor of the month
in Tintotown. They didn't see the value in us. And
so but then you know, shortly thereafter you have Shonda

(45:00):
Rhimes who emerged and with Scandal, and Kerry Washington and
How to Get Away Work Murder, and Viola Davis and
all of this diversity started to come back, and in
the hosting space, black women have had it really, really
good for quite a while. I mean, at one point
there were almost like ten black female holes on TVs,
whether panels or solo shows or even some of the

(45:22):
news shows. If you look at two of this most
successful morning anchors, you have Robin Roberts and you have
Gail King and I'm not sure exactly holding a copy's
nationality breakdown, but she's a woman of color. And so
diversity has been particularly good for the women. It's been
a little slower for the brothers.

Speaker 2 (45:44):
Black men.

Speaker 3 (45:45):
Yeah, the opportunities have been a little slow. And I
think part of the reason why I'm grateful for Cherry
is that that very few black men have rose to
the level of executive producer at day time. There are
lots of black women who've achieved this milestone, but black men,
this isn't our norm. And so you know, you had
Rashan McDonald who did it with Steve Harvey, you had

(46:07):
Twitch who did it at Ellen, and there may have
been a few others whose names I just don't know.
But even when I talk to some of the journeymen
and producing in this format. In particular, they can't name
you a lot of black men to do this work,
and so I didn't realize I was walking in such
rare fied air until I got in this space and
people began to connect with me. You know, I want

(46:30):
this business to start to look more like our country,
which is a very inclusive country. You know, jokingly, I
tell people, but it's the truth. I never saw an
episode of Friends because it was based in New York
City and none of the Friends look like me, and
anybody who's been to New York City on any street
corner at any given time, it looks like the United

(46:51):
Nations is having a session in this city because it's
just such a diverse and inclusive city, and their studies
and all type data that support that when projects and
films and TV shows are very diverse, they just performed
better with an overall audience. And the sooner the industry
catches up with the stats of it all, I think
they'll continue to have more success. You know. I think

(47:14):
streaming has offered an alternative because a lot of these
streaming apps have these series that are very diverse and inclusive,
and people were looking for something that was a little
more refreshing that also looked like them, And I'm hoping
that we continue to make some milestones. And seeing the Emmys,
you know, you had two agent actors who I think

(47:34):
had historic wins. You had Quintin Brunson who won an
inby in a category that had not been won since
nineteen eighty one, when Isabelle Samford won for playing Weezy
on The Jeffersons. It is twenty twenty four and someone
had not won in the category that was a black
woman of nineteen eighty one. So for all the progress

(47:56):
we've made, there's still a lot to be done. And
I'm hoping that I can just move the card of
the heel a little more, that I can have an
impact on that. You know, Yes, John and Michelle, let
me say this to you. We were talking about versatility
and stuff. There is nobody who's been more versatile than you.
One of the things that I really respect about the

(48:17):
Destiny's Child story is that each of you all have
come out of this thing with your own lane. You know,
the Supremes. Mary Wilson had a solid career, but many
of the other women that came through the Supremes did
not have the same level of success as either Mary
or Diana Ross. And you know you decided you wanted

(48:38):
to conquer theater. You know, wanted to get back to
your roots and do gospel. But you have one of
the best dance records. And I know I talked your
head off about your dance records, but you have one
of the best dance records that was right before its
time because you did this dance record and all of
a sudden, everybody else was dancing. And as an actor
and as a TV host, I mean you hit multiple sectors.

(48:59):
You're an invest and a WNBA team. You don't talk
about your entrepreneur endeavors. And look what Kelly has done.
You know, she went and conquered the international market. She
too was one of the first a partner with the
DJ and had one of those big euro smash records.
And her acting and her work with brands, I mean,
she's become one of the brands. Kelly always selling a

(49:21):
dag On product is so it's bad. Well, it's something,
you know, it's something. But seeing how you all have
become all these multi hyphen its and you work a
win and how you want to and only do projects
that are rewarding and serve you well. It speaks to
the choices and the versatility that each of you all
have had too. So I couldn't have you talk about

(49:42):
me being versatile. And I've had these multiple iterations with
I'm putting the mirror on you and reflecting on the
fact that you've done a dag on good job of
doing it yourself.

Speaker 2 (49:51):
John, as our good friend, Tim says, my g that
was so kind.

Speaker 3 (49:58):
Thank you.

Speaker 1 (49:59):
I said so many names because we just have so
many mutual friends. This episode has been an absolute masterclass.

Speaker 3 (50:09):
John.

Speaker 1 (50:09):
I really hope you do something this year or next year.
Just John Murray presents, I just sitting here listening to
you is just give me so many memories. It's letting
me know what persistence, being consistent, being nice, what being
prepared and being optimistic what it can do. We are

(50:34):
so excited about Sherry Shepherd's these upcoming season.

Speaker 2 (50:38):
You're in season what it.

Speaker 3 (50:40):
Is, our second season. We are at the halfway mark.
You know, we'll be doing original episodes through like late
May sometime early June, and you know, we got picked
up for two seasons, so we'll be starting it all
over again in season three and so I'm just grateful
that people. I'll tell you this real quick. We had
an eighty one year old woman come to the show.

(51:00):
She's been going through a cancer procedure. She just finished
her first round of it, was about to go through
a second, and she said, I have my two daughters
bring me to this show because I told them I
need to experience this joy in person. And then we
got another letter from a lady who gets chemotherapy on Monday,
Wednesdays and Fridays, and she said she schedules her appointments
around the airing of our show because while she's going
through the worst thing in her life, we give her

(51:22):
the escapism she needs. So I said in that Forbes
article that recently came out on me that I feel
like we're in the ministry of joy and laughter, that
we're connecting and inspiring people and non traditional ministry. But
to know that you're offering people something that not only
just connects with them, makes them laugh and gives them

(51:43):
an hour of escapism, but people are scheduling their medical
appointments because you're serving their soul in the way they hadn't.
It's the most rewarding thing and one of the greatest
aspects of doing this work.

Speaker 2 (51:55):
That's so good.

Speaker 1 (51:56):
I would say, do you have any party words that
you want to say to people? Because my podcast, you know,
the foundation of it has been mental health and everything
that you've said should definitely bright somebody's day. Even in
the Forbes article, you share things about your father not

(52:17):
being in your life, and you know.

Speaker 2 (52:19):
Things like that.

Speaker 1 (52:20):
But you're here and we're talking today. What do you
have to share to people who might kind of be
struggling a little bit today.

Speaker 3 (52:28):
Yeah, listen. If you've got dreams, goals and aspirations, I
tell you to stay the course. TV host personality Bevy
Smith has a phrase where she says, it gets greater
later and so often, and particularly because of social media,
we feel the pressures of having that microwave success you
put in sixty seconds of voilat. But the truth of
the matter is, and I stole this line from a

(52:48):
comedian in Coco Brown, some of the best meals you
can get they come out of a crockpot. And so
they're these people who you they look like their overnight successes,
but they've been putting in twenty years. You know you're
taking you set that meat in your crack pip before
you leave the office and let it cook for eight days.
Now you come home and it's the most tender. There
are a lot of things that I wanted to do

(53:09):
early on in my career, and I can't tell you
that I was mature enough or would have had the
responsible nature of being able to sustain the financial benefits
of this work. But now, as a man in my forties,
I have to say I understand and appreciate every milestone
of this journey. I understand the importance of this journey,

(53:29):
and I appreciate the blessing of being able to walk
in this elevated space now more than ever before. And
so I tell everybody stay the course, work with integrity,
and be kind to people. Anybody that tells you that
you can't be a leader or you can't have success.
And you also can't be kind to people as somebody
who's lying or they're intentionally nasty just because. But I

(53:51):
remember before the whole slat with Chris Rock, will Smith
was one of the greatest Hollywood stars I'd ever encountered,
because I don't care where I was, and when you
saw him, he would go out of his way to
speak to you. He would make you feel like you
were the only person in the room. He would remember
your name, and there was just something about him. And
you don't have to be this successful and this kind,

(54:14):
and yet he was. And so I said that to
say that you can have a level of success. You
can reach your goals and your dreams and your beliefs
and thriving business, and you can also be nice to people.
I promise you it's easier to be nice to most people,
not as I said, most people, right, most people.

Speaker 2 (54:32):
You did say that it's easy, got easy to be nice.

Speaker 1 (54:37):
We should be kind to all people, but it's easier
to be nice to most.

Speaker 3 (54:43):
And if you don't know how to be nice, and
you apply to that twenty eight day having rule that
I told you, well, you practice being nice for twenty
eight days, so that can become your new normal. Come
on to somebody.

Speaker 2 (54:54):
You talking right, y'all? He said, and did he has said.

Speaker 1 (54:59):
So this whole episode deserves its own praise break John,
Thank you for checking in.

Speaker 3 (55:06):
It's my pleasure anytime you need me to check it
in the fouture.

Speaker 2 (55:09):
I'm here for you, all right, my dude, love you
so much. We'll talk again soon. Listen. I'm blessed. I
am so blessed.

Speaker 1 (55:22):
I've had some of the most amazing conversations today, John
Murray being one of them.

Speaker 2 (55:28):
I'm so thankful for relationship.

Speaker 1 (55:31):
Along the years, one of my truth tellers, and I'm
so glad to see him rise. I'm so excited to
see him sore and live his dreams. And I pray
you have friends that they're excited to see you sore,
excited to see you rise as well.

Speaker 2 (55:50):
If you don't, you've got the wrong circle of friends.

Speaker 1 (55:54):
And so if you can also put into practice when
he was talking about those twenty eight days of options
to miss, I'd love to see.

Speaker 2 (56:02):
How it's working out for you. Know that I love.

Speaker 1 (56:05):
You and thank you again for listening to this amazing
episode of Checking In. Checking In with Michelle Williams is
a production of iHeartRadio and The Black Effect. For more

(56:28):
podcasts from iHeartRadio, visit the iHeartRadio app, Apple podcast, or
wherever you listen to your favorite shows.