The Crew
Lila Newman
Creative Editor
Lila Newman wanted to grow up to be a “dancing biologist.” Now she’s a New York-based writer, actor/performer and audio nerd. Lila has written extensively for radio, including: Garrison Keillor’s A Prairie Home Companion (Minnesota Public Radio/PRX), Live from Here with Chris Thile (American Public Media) and The Truth Podcast (Radiotopia). Her work has been aired both nationally and locally on WNYC, WBEZ and NPR. She also engages with sound as a Voiceover actor; from time to time, her voice can be heard during the ad break. Lila is a recipient of the Edes Prize for Emerging Artists for new audio theatre, the University of Chicago’s FOTA Grant, and recently was a quarter finalist in the international ScreenCraft Short Screenplay Contest. To her neighbor’s chagrin, she also plays the banjo. As for dancing biology — she’s not far off: she’s dancing with sound waves. Education: the University of Chicago, Drama Centre London. SAG/AFTRA & AEA. lilanewman.com
Mark Solomon
Principal sound recordist
As a student attending NYU some years ago, well before the term “Podcast” existed, I majored in TV Production in the hope of pursuing a career in writing, comedy writing to be specific.
Well, as so often happens, life takes you along on a path unintended or unpredictable, thus explaining my “accidental career” as an Audio Engineer.
Thankfully, blissfully, it has allowed me to occupy the best seat in the house as the principal Sound Recordist on Peter Riegert’s wonderful new Podcast series, “Vocal Heroes.”
I hope you, the listeners, enjoy these thoughtful, compelling and diverse conversations as much
as I did sitting at the table recording them.
Maryedith Burrell
Creative Consultant
Maryedith Burrell is an award-winning writer/performer/producer who figured out a way to never get bored. She has produced documentaries for National Geographic, TLC, The History Channel and Discovery. Her latest effort, RAISE HELL: The Life And Times of Molly Ivins premiered at Sundance 2019, won the Audience Award at SXSW, and is now streaming on Amazon and Hulu.
With over 30 feature screenplays and teleplays under her belt, she stays busy working as a script doctor and Stage & Screen professor. As an author, she has contributed to Vogue, Rolling Stone, and The Los Angeles Times among other publications; her essay “An Affair to Forget” is anthologized in the bestselling What Was I Thinking? (St. Martin’s Press.) Theatre-trained, she has performed and directed the classics on three continents, starred and guested in TV series, and earned her improv credentials at Second City, The Groundlings, and War Babies.
Cornelia Read
Cornelia Read is a crime novelist who has circumnavigated the globe. Like most writers, her actual work experience ranges from having been a chamber maid at the Tickle Pink Hotel to serving frozen yogurt at Zaro’s in Grand Central Station. She has one-and-a-half tattoos and her main talent is spelling, but she would still like to be Batman when she grows up. She is the mother of twins and secretly married to Peter Riegert. When not composing copy for this website, she is working on a time-travel novel. If she possessed a real time machine, Cornelia would have finished writing it yesterday.