SERIAL's Sarah Koenig & Julie Snyder Come to Kimmel Center Tonight

Pop culture sensation Serial is ripped from the headlines when Binge-Worthy Journalism: An Evening With SERIAL Creators Sarah Koenig & Julie Snyder comes to the Merriam Theater tonight, May 14 at 8p.m. Presented by the Kimmel Center for the Performing Arts, this live presentation allows Koenig and Snyder to take the audience backstage in the creation of this cultural phenomenon. Using some of their favorite tape, they'll tell personal behind-the-scenes stories, explain how they constructed certain episodes and allow the audience to follow the ups and downs of creating a new form of modern journalism that has captured the attention of a nation.

"Serial has become a cultural phenomenon," said Kimmel Center President and CEO Anne Ewers. "Sarah Koenig and Julie Snyder are two veteran radio journalists and producers. Their brand of modern journalism is at the forefront of some of the new performing arts programming the Kimmel Center is bringing to Philadelphia."

After it launched in the fall of 2014, Serial became the fastest podcast to reach 5 million downloads in iTunes history. Co-created by veteran radio journalists and producers, Sarah Koenig and Julie Snyder, Serial quickly went on to become the most popular podcast in the world. At a time when being first and being fast dominates the media, and quick sound bites are offered at every turn, Serial did exactly the opposite: in Season One, it presented a 12-part series centers on one legal case, taking its time, and proving that slow-motion journalism could captivate and sustain its vast podcast listenership.

"More than merely a whodunit, Serial tells us about the messiness of human interaction and our infinite versions of truth...It tells us how one man's hero is another man's villain, and that you can never, despite your best efforts, know what is going on in another person's head." -The Independent

The podcasts focus on Koenig's reinvestigation of the murder of Hae Min Lee, a Maryland high school student who was strangled in 1999. Her 17-year-old ex-boyfriend, Adnan Syed, was arrested for the crime, and within a year, he was convicted and sentenced to spend the rest of his life in prison, but Adnan has always maintained he had nothing to do with Hae's death. Some people believe he's telling the truth. Many others don't.

Koenig first learned about this case more than a year ago. In the months following she sorted box after box of legal documents and investigators' notes, listened to trial testimony and police interrogations, and talked to everyone she could find who remembers what happened between Adnan Syed and Hae Min Lee fifteen years ago. What she uncovered was a far more complicated story, which neither the jury nor the public got to hear.

Sarah Koenig began her career as a newspaper reporter. She worked for The New York Times in Moscow, and later at the Concord Monitor in New Hampshire. Her work focused on criminal and political reporting, eventually leading to a position at the Baltimore Sun. She transitioned into radio in 2004 as a producer at This American Life. She has produced and reported some of TAL's most popular shows, including "Switched at Birth," "Dr. Gilmer and Mr. Hyde," and "Habeas Schmabeas," a Peabody Award-winning show about Guantanamo Bay.

Julie Snyder began working at This American Life in 1997 alongside host Ira Glass. Winner of four Peabody awards, she has produced many of This American Life's most entertaining and memorable episodes, including "24 Hours at the Golden Apple," and "Notes on Camp," while also heading up the program's most ambitious and topical programs, notably shows covering the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, health care reform and urban violence in Chicago. In 2013, she began working with Sarah Koenig on a show that covered one story over the course of its season. The advent of the podcast made the format a natural fit for the show that would become Serial.

Tickets are available from $35-$99 at the Kimmel Center Box Office on Broad and Spruce Streets, online at www.KimmelCenter.org or charge by phone at 215-893-1999. $99 Ticket Includes a Pre-Show Meet & Greet with Sarah Koenig & Julie Snyder!

Serial's Awards and Achievements

· The world's most popular podcast

· Fastest podcast to reach 5 million downloads in iTunes' history

· Winner of the 2014 Peabody Award

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