Fantasy Love Better Than No Love

Calling all This American Life fans. Any thoughts about the first episode of Ira Glass’s tv show? Haven’t seen it? Watch it here.

My thoughts: First segment: Peezilla, a total reenactment. Verdict: Leave it on radio. My bias is that reenactments are basically cheesy – they’re in that presentation purgatory – trying to be a documentary without documentary footage.

Second Segment: Second Chance. Some reenactment parts, but more documentary than reenactment. Verdict: Liked it.

Third Segment: The Spy Who Loved Everybody. Even less staged – or at least whatever was reenacted blurred well into live and archived footage. Verdict: Liked it. Check out Improv Everywhere (they’re expecting us to visit) and Ghosts of Pasha here and here (they weren’t expecting anything).

Of course, they were all strong stories. That’s Ira’s deal. But the question is: What is it? Is the tv version just going to mimic the radio version or will it turn into a separate, distinct partner show? What would it take to do that? In the Ira Glass style, are some stories better served on radio and some on television?