loader from loading.io

Second Printing: Jeff Daniels

As Told To

Release Date: 08/04/2026

Second Printing: Jeff Daniels show art Second Printing: Jeff Daniels

As Told To

This episode originally aired Oct 10, 2023. “Sometimes I’m asked if I’ll ever write a book,” notes actor, playwright and singer-songwriter Jeff Daniels, “and I always answer that I already have. It’s in my songs.” This is true. But now it’s also true that the stuff of Jeff Daniels’s life is on delightful display in the Audible Originals memoir “”—a collection of stories, musings and songs that invites listeners into the heart and mindset of one of our most versatile performers, offered with grace and good cheer and midwestern soul.  Daniels, the two-time Emmy...

info_outline Between the Lines: In the Wake of Golgotha show art Between the Lines: In the Wake of Golgotha

As Told To

Join us as As Told To podcast guest reads a passage from his first novel, , just published by the indie press Koehler Books.   Grace, a veteran ad agency executive and acclaimed winemaker, turns his creative talents to an entirely new form of expression with the publication of his first-novel, a modern-day retelling of “the greatest story ever told.”   If you’re intrigued by Daniel’s reading, we hope you’ll double back and , in which our guest reflects on the very many ways his very many creative pursuits—as an ad man, vintner, and novelist—have become...

info_outline Episode 117: Daniel Grace show art Episode 117: Daniel Grace

As Told To

“There is no crime to fit this sentence; there is no sentence to fit this crime.” The words of the Roman Prefect Pontius Pilate echo across the centuries in Daniel Grace’s first novel , a daring retelling of “the greatest story ever told.” As the specter of Pilate collides with a modern-day incarnation of Judas Iscariot in the shadows of a New York City basement, a profound religious mystery unfolds in a dark and dazzling literary thriller. The book is a bit of a departure for Daniel Grace, the London-born, California-bred former owner of an internationally-acclaimed advertising...

info_outline Between the Lines: Cobra show art Between the Lines: Cobra

As Told To

reads his favorite passage from the baseball memoir he helped to write with the late, great Dave Parker—a seven-time All-Star, a two-time batting champion, a three-time Gold Glove winner, a two-time World Series champion, and the 1978 National League MVP. In , the writer and filmmaker lends his collaborative storytelling skills to one of the greatest ballplayers of his generation, known to fans and teammates as “Cobra.” Parker was inducted into Major League Baseball’s Hall of Fame just weeks after his death in June, 2025, following a decade-long struggle with...

info_outline Episode 116: Dave Jordan show art Episode 116: Dave Jordan

As Told To

“We ain’t doin’ none of this Tuesdays with Morrie shit,” baseball great Dave Parker once told his collaborator Dave Jordan, as they worked together on the soon-to-be-Hall-of-Famer’s memoir. “We goin’ out poetic and wild.” As Told To podcast guest Dave Jordan is a writer and filmmaker and founder of Instream Sports, a pioneering athlete-author writing platform. He is the co-author of the acclaimed memoir , with the late Dave Parker, who was inducted into Major League Baseball’s Hall of Fame just weeks after his death in June 2025, following a decade-long struggle with...

info_outline Between the Lines: Gursha show art Between the Lines: Gursha

As Told To

Upon publication, acclaimed chef and restaurateur Beejhy Barhany’s  was hailed by The New York Times as “a work of extraordinary scope and ambition.” In the hands of , the award-winning book collaborator and food writer, her story leaps off the page and invites readers to taste the full flavor of a life purposefully lived, as well as the full flavors on offer at Beejhy Barhany’s Tsion Café in Harlem. Join us as Elisa Ung shares an excerpt from her collaboration with the celebrated chef. Please support the sponsors who support our show: Daniel Paisner's Daniel...

info_outline Episode 115: Elisa Ung show art Episode 115: Elisa Ung

As Told To

Best-selling ghostwriter Elisa Ung credits her lifelong love of musicals with gifting her the tools she relies on in her collaborative work. “They’ve taught me to listen for rhythms and cadences in authors’ voices,” she writes. “They help me understand how to respect readers by telling the most powerful story in the least amount of time.” Elisa’s path to this type of storytelling might seem familiar to As Told To listeners, but she has walked it with a song in her heart… and an appetite for the stories we share at the family table, and in our family kitchens. A former news...

info_outline Between the Lines: Phases show art Between the Lines: Phases

As Told To

“Sometimes my memories feel like a dream,” writes Brandy, the Grammy Award-winning singer, songwriter, producer, and actress, in collaboration with New York Times best-selling author and . In this “Between the Lines” episode, we revisit a passage from Brandy’s just-published memoir , in which she reflects on the inspiration for her title. As you listen, consider what it takes for an accomplished journalist to help give singular voice to such a singular voice, while working to stitch a lifetime of dream-like memories into a compelling narrative. Please support the sponsors who...

info_outline Episode 114: Gerrick Kennedy show art Episode 114: Gerrick Kennedy

As Told To

“You're a co-pilot, you are a therapist, you are an archivist,” reflects journalist and cultural critic Gerrick Kennedy of his role as a ghostwriter. Kennedy is the co-author of the just-published memoir , from singer, songwriter and actress Brandy—an immediate #1 New York Times best-seller. He is the author of two previous books, and his work has appeared in a variety of publications, including Vanity Fair, Rolling Stone, GQ, Men’s Health, Spin, and Playboy. A former staff writer for The Los Angeles Times, where he covered pop music and culture, Kennedy was honored in 2012 with an...

info_outline Between the Lines: When the Garden Was Eden show art Between the Lines: When the Garden Was Eden

As Told To

In this “Between the Lines” episode, we look back at Harvey Araton’s 2011 classic . In any other NBA post-season, Harvey’s latest book, , a soccer novel for young adults about a seventh-grader who discovers the power of the beautiful game to hurt and to heal, would be spotlighted here. But as the 2025-26 Knicks continue to fight for an NBA championship, we turn our attention to Harvey’s thrilling reflection on the franchise’s championship teams from the early 1970s. As many basketball fans know, When the Garden Was Eden was later adapted for an ESPN “30 for 30” documentary,...

info_outline
 
More Episodes

This episode originally aired Oct 10, 2023.

“Sometimes I’m asked if I’ll ever write a book,” notes actor, playwright and singer-songwriter Jeff Daniels, “and I always answer that I already have. It’s in my songs.”

This is true. But now it’s also true that the stuff of Jeff Daniels’s life is on delightful display in the Audible Originals memoir “Alive and Well Enough”—a collection of stories, musings and songs that invites listeners into the heart and mindset of one of our most versatile performers, offered with grace and good cheer and midwestern soul. 

Daniels, the two-time Emmy Award-winning actor and star of such iconic films as “Terms of Endearment,” “The Purple Rose of Cairo,” “Dumb and Dumber,” “Pleasantville,” and “The Squid and the Whale,” recalls being inspired in this effort by the story-laced songs of Steve Goodman and Arlo Guthrie, and, more recently, by Bruce Springsteen’s “Springsteen on Broadway.”

Part podcast, part musical memoir, part bulletins from the frontlines of contemporary storytelling, “Alive and Well Enough” is a wildly entertaining mash-up of Jeff Daniels’s many gifts as a writer and performer, including scenes from some of the author’s original plays, many of which have been staged at The Purple Rose Theatre Company in his hometown of Chelsea, Mich. “[It’s] is the only place where I get to do everything I do,” he says of his new audio project, which he calls “an adventure of an accidental artist who one day looked up and realized he had a sense of humor, a passion for writing, and stories to tell.”

Join us for an insightful, engaging and surprisingly candid conversation on what it means to channel the work of some of our finest playwrights and screenwriters – like Lanford Wilson (“Fourth of July”), Scott Frank (“Godless”) and Aaron Sorkin (“The Newsroom” and the Broadway adaptation of “To Kill a Mockingbird”). 

“When you’re inside the writing, it rubs off,” he says. 

This is true as well. 

Note: This episode of As Told To: The Ghostwriting Podcast features narrative and song excerpts from Jeff Daniels’s audio memoir “Alive and Well Enough,” presented courtesy of Audible Originals.

Jeff Daniels photo credit: Sam Jones

More from Jeff Daniels: 

Please support the sponsors who support our show: