Analysis Of Karina Longworth's 'You Must Remember This'

“You Must Remember This” is a podcast created by Karina Longworth, who is a former film critic for the LA weekly and founder of Cinematical.com. Karina not only writes the episodes, she also produces and edits the original copy. It really is, as the description calls it, her passion project. You can hear that passion in every word she speaks; with her sultry tone that emulates the classic Hollywood she is describing. Karina accomplishes this by making the timbre of her voice very warm, trailing off at the end of almost every sentence while using high frequencies to accentuate certain phrases. She also uses her voice to her advantage when quoting people in Marilyn’s story. She does this by acting like a man or adding an accent depending on the
character she is portraying. By doing this, she creates the feeling of a one woman show because she is the narrator and the personification of the characters. In the following I will use these aspects to prove why Karina is such a good storyteller and why people should look to her for techniques to improve their own writing and storytelling. The specific story she was telling in the episode I listened to was that of the rise of Marilyn Monroe.
It was a part of a series called “Dead Blondes” and was the first of three episodes about Marilyn. As all the episodes do, this one started with the podcast’s theme music and introductions that lasts until [00:54]. Karina then introduces the specific series the episode is a part of, in this case “dead blondes”. The music soon morphs into a montage of women from classic movies stating that they are “running off to Hollywood”. The crackling of the film, the tinny car horns, and the sensual jazz music build the scene of the classic Hollywood Karina is about to describe. The Hollywood that made little Norma Jeane into Marilyn
Monroe. Once Karina finishes introducing the series, she introduces the episode and how it will be about Marilyn Monroe’s beginnings. Karina uses the descriptor “former Norma Jeane” to imply that that was Marilyn’s real name. This was difficult for me in the beginning because I hadn’t caught on to that information and by the start of the story I had forgotten that Norma Jeane was her real name. I believe Karina doesn’t give much explanation of the name in the beginning because she assumes that her audience consists of avid pop culture and movie fanatics. By doing this, she is perfectly catering and directing to a specific audience which is what makes for great writing and storytelling. I was still able to catch on quickly and followed along as Karina chronologically listed what events in Norma’s life the episode would hit on. This specific road map technique made me aware of the timeline structure that was going to be used and allowed me to be a prepared listener. Karina explained that she would start with Norma’s upbring by a single mom, to a teenage marriage, and then to the nude photo shoot that would be her unlikely key to stardom. These little bits of information not only allowed me to picture the order of Norma’s life in my head, but gave me a scratch that I could only itch by listening further. What teenage husband? What nude photo shoot? I have never heard of these before! I must learn more! The transition into the story that holds these answers is obvious because the monotonous upright bass that was playing in the background of the introduction begins to fade out. In its place comes a bright piano that feels like a breath of fresh air after the Twilight Zone effect that was given off by the introduction. However, the piano still plays the same three notes over and over, just like the bass did, which keeps the rhythm similar but transcendent. Karina’s pacing also changes with the transition, from slow and sultry, to faster paced and higher pitched storytelling. Although it was different, Karina still sloped her sentences down at the end as she did in the introduction which kept up the nostalgia. These same repeating aspects excellently aid the subconscious of the listener. Once she begins this new section of storytelling, it is obvious why she has to pick up the pace. There is so much detailed information given right off the bat, that there is no way she would have been able to keep up the slow and seductive pacing and still finish in less that an hour (which is how long all the episodes are). The amount of details and how quickly and intricately she explained them almost became too much to keep up with. What saved it each time was the fact that at the end of every bit of detail Karina slowed down to almost the pace of the intro and allowed for pauses between each statement. She does this particularly well when transitioning from the first story about Marilyn's childhood and how it translated into Marilyn's future career. The story was about how Norma Jeane never had a father figure and Karina described how Marilyn’s lack of patrilineal line made her “a black slate. A white sheet. For the projection of fantasies. The fantasies of men and her own fantasies of using the adoration of men, to replace...the father that she never had.”(Longworth, 5:40). This made the connection of the implications her childhood as Norma Jeane had on the woman we know as Marilyn. It also served as the perfect segue into her next point, alluding to the fact that male figures will be a motif throughout the rest of the episode. If the listener didn’t realize by the finality and allusion combo of the sentence that that was the end of that section, they do when there is another dramatic change in music. This tactic is used throughout the episode and makes for subtle signposting that tells the listener “here is when we are going into the next event and here is what the tone will be”. In this case, it was a complicated staccato piano much different than the basic three note lines my ear was used to. This indicates the picking up of the story and the pivot point that no one was expecting based on what they had previously heard. The turning point was how Norma’s fun-loving mother gave her daughter over to be boarded with super religious foster parents so that she could continue working. The turn gave a great contrast because, until now, Karina was describing Norma’s mother as a movie lover and whose job was to work in the movie industry, but now Norma’s new guardians told her that “movies were the product of the devil”(Longworth, 6:15). Karina said this quote in her own voice, but only seconds later quoted Norma’s foster mom specifically and used an old, grouchy, and almost comical voice to bring out the character of the foster mother. As I had said, Karina uses this tool amazingly to create character since she can’t interview these long-dead people or have recordings of them. Voice acting was not the only way Karina made it seem like the podcast wasn't just featuring her.
She also talked frequently about the opinions of biographers who have written about Monroe. In many cases, she goes back and forth between what she believes and the opinions of the biographers, giving it the feeling of a conversation. She does this particularly well when detailing how many biographers believe that Monroe “loved the camera so much that she became sexually excited while posing and that this accounted for her alleged tendency to go to bed with the man behind the camera”(Longworth, 21:40) but then saying in her own voice that “I have no reason to doubt her claim that in the 19040s, sexual coercion was endemic to the culture of freelance pinup posing”(Longworth, 22:50) which turned the biographers into the perfect villains of the
story. During this time, there are snippets of recording that are the only instances of another voice besides Karina’s. They are supposed to be Marilyn herself speaking and during the first couple clips I actually did think it was the voice of Monroe herself. However, once I heard the third and fourth clip, I knew that they were all too similar and must have been done by an actress. Even if the magic of thinking it was her wore off, the fact that she was the only other voice used brings attention to the fact that Marilyn was a real person and creates the image of her by giving off the airy innocence in her voice. This detail, as well as many other subtle instances, allowed this podcast episode to truly take me back in time. The music, the movie clips, the style of the narration, and the description of character with acting are the highlights of the artistry Karina Longworth puts into her work. Even if I got lost for a moment in the beginning, I quickly learned the style of Karina and picked up on her structure to the point where I knew what each subtle detail and signpost meant for what was directly to come. I truly enjoyed every minute and not only learned more about Marilyn Monroe, but about how to truly tell a story.