LeVar Burton has been a storyteller for decades. From his acting roles as Kunta Kinte in "Roots" and Geordi LaForge on "Star Trek: The Next Generation" to his decades of work with "Reading Rainbow," he's been a central figure in some of the most influential media in recent memory. Also a director, producer, and author, Burton has now turned his storytelling skills toward the world of podcasting with "LeVar Burton Reads." On this episode of the Curiosity Podcast, he discusses the power of literature and why books are such a meaningful tool for storytelling. Resources from LeVar Burton and other related links: "LeVar Burton Reads" Podcast LeVar Burton Kids The Science Of Breathing: How Slowing It Down Can Make Us Calm And Productive | Forbes Spontaneous Group Synchronization of Movements and Respiratory Rhythms | NCBI Follow Curiosity Daily on your favorite podcast app to get smarter withCody Gough andAshley Hamer — for free! Still curious? Get exclusive science shows, nature documentaries, and more real-life entertainment on discovery+! Go to https://discoveryplus.com/curiosity to start your 7-day free trial. discovery+ is currently only available for US subscribers.
LeVar Burton has been a storyteller for decades. From his acting roles as Kunta Kinte in "Roots" and Geordi LaForge on "Star Trek: The Next Generation" to his decades of work with "Reading Rainbow," he's been a central figure in some of the most influential media in recent memory. Also a director, producer, and author, Burton has now turned his storytelling skills toward the world of podcasting with "LeVar Burton Reads." On this episode of the Curiosity Podcast, he discusses the power of literature and why books are such a meaningful tool for storytelling.
Resources from LeVar Burton and other related links:
Follow Curiosity Daily on your favorite podcast app to get smarter with Cody Gough and Ashley Hamer — for free! Still curious? Get exclusive science shows, nature documentaries, and more real-life entertainment on discovery+! Go to https://discoveryplus.com/curiosity to start your 7-day free trial. discovery+ is currently only available for US subscribers.
Full episode transcript here: https://curiosity-daily-4e53644e.simplecast.com/episodes/levar-burton-believes-the-stories-we-tell-determine-who-we-are
CODY GOUGH: I'm curious, how have you maintained a passion for reading for such a long time?
LEVAR BURTON: I guess because I believe that storytelling in all of its forms and reading is I think, one of the forms that has the most impact because the narrative lives in our imaginations. It's created, it's formed, and expressed in our imagination. It's the stories that we tell each other that really determine who we are, why we're here, and what our contribution is going to be on our uniquely human journey. It's that elementally essential to the human experience, reading, and storytelling.
[MUSIC PLAYING]
CODY GOUGH: Hi. I'm Cody Gough with the imaginative curiousity.com.
ASHLEY HAMER: And I'm Ashley Hamer. Today, we'll boldly go into the world of storytelling with the legendary LeVar Burton.
CODY GOUGH: Every week we explore what we don't know because curiosity makes you smarter.
ASHLEY HAMER: This is the Curiosity Podcast with LeVar Burton.
[MUSIC PLAYING]
CODY GOUGH: Yes, the LeVar Burton. You might know him as Kunta Kinte from the 1977 miniseries, Roots or as Geordi La Forge from Star Trek: The Next Generation.
ASHLEY HAMER: Or maybe you know him from Reading Rainbow. He's also a director, educator, and author. And he has a podcast called LeVar Burton Reads.
CODY GOUGH: He's been an advocate of reading for decades and has been able to entertain and educate millions using the power of books. Today, we'll talk to LeVar Burton about technology, podcasting, and how to tap into the magic of storytelling.
Well, you've been a storyteller for years. And I mean, everyone knows you as a lot of different roles in the storytelling pipeline, right? I mean, you're an actor, you're a director. You can fill an entire audience of a thousand people in a church on a Friday night who wants to listen to you read a book to them.
LEVAR BURTON: Yeah.
CODY GOUGH: I mean, I'm just surprised that you're gravitating so closely towards telling stories of this particular form. And I'm surprised you're not a novelist that's written like 35 volumes of books.
[LAUGHS]
LEVAR BURTON: Well, first of all, I have come to the conclusion-- I mean, I do see myself as a storyteller, that's what I am. That's not just what I do, it's what I am. It's how I express and as you pointed out, in several different ways. Writing, it is one of them but I have a love-hate relationship with writing. I feel that writing is something that I will do when I retire from all of the current ways in which I do storytelling now. And that at the end towards the end of my life, I will move to an island in the Caribbean. And I will sit and I will write.
But reading aloud for me is one of the most pure forms of storytelling. I think because it gives me an opportunity to wear all of my storyteller hats simultaneously. I get to act and create characters. I get to direct because I'm visualizing the story as I'm reading it. I get to produce because my producer had-- is sort of helping me frame mood, tempo, inflection. I get to exercise a lot of my storyteller yayas when I'm reading aloud.
CODY GOUGH: Yeah, it's certainly theatrical as I experienced. At the first-- I guess, the first stop on LeVar Burton Reads as you're taking on the road.
LEVAR BURTON: LeVar Burton Reads live, yeah. Our first stop was in Chicago. Recently, at the Fourth Presbyterian Church and you were there. You were in the house.
[LAUGHS]
On the night.
CODY GOUGH: I had to be. I was raised with a Catholic background and I think I've actually been to mass at that church. And I got to tell you, you were reading a book and the place was packed. And it was quieter than any Catholic service I think I've ever been to. If only because there were no crying babies the entire time.
LEVAR BURTON: There were no crying babies.
[LAUGHS]
For which I am eternally grateful. It was a great house. It was amazing to feel the energy in that room, in that church. It was full and people were hyper-attentive. And they all came for the purpose of hearing a good story.
CODY GOUGH: Exactly. And I was taken aback by it because-- I mean, the median age was young adults to middle adults or whatever you would call it. I don't know. But these are grownups again that are spending a Friday night, all congregating to hear you read a story in 2018.
LEVAR BURTON: Yeah.
CODY GOUGH: How did you do that?
[LAUGHS]
LEVAR BURTON: First of all, pretty delicious to contemplate, right? And I think that has everything to do with the fact that you're the generation that grew up on Reading Rainbow. And so we have a history together, of me introducing stories and promoting my love and enthusiasm for the written word. We have that dynamic that's been expressed over time. And it's a comfortable, I think, and maybe even a comforting dynamic that exists between us, millennials and me. And it's an opportunity to as an adult, I think, engage in storytelling while sort of in a nostalgic sense, revisiting a piece of childhood. But as an adult, I don't know, it's very complex. You're probably better able to explain it than I am.
[LAUGHS]
ASHLEY HAMER: OK. OK. I'm going to come out of my millennial bliss for a second and actually try to explain why we all feel this way. For kids like me who grew up on Reading Rainbow, LeVar Burton hits on two very important psychological triggers. The first, obviously, is nostalgia. You associate him and the sound of his voice with who you were when you first saw him on television. And that probably makes you reminisce about your family, your childhood friends, and the way you felt when you were young and life was simple.
The feeling of nostalgia has all sorts of benefits. Studies have shown that people tend to wax nostalgic when they feel depressed or lonely and that makes them feel better. In one study, people who listen to nostalgic music were more likely to say they felt loved and that life was worth living. And in another, they actually felt physically warmer.
That's probably pretty obvious but you might not know about the second heartstring that LeVar plucks. The phenomenon of the parasocial relationship, that's the one sided yet very real connection you can make with a fictional character. If you watched Reading Rainbow throughout your childhood, LeVar probably became a kind of surrogate parent or at least a beloved friend of the family who came into your living room each day to read to you.
Psychologists think that in our brains, parasocial relationships actually can play the same roles as real ones. People tend to watch their favorite TV shows when they feel lonely and even thinking about a favorite show can boost people's self-esteem and lighten their moods. This is real stuff you're feeling, don't fight it.
CODY GOUGH: I was read to as a child. I had fantastic parents like I have nothing to complain about on my childhood. But it being read to you was never like a core part of my childhood experience. It's not the one thing that I go back to but I know many people who had different experiences growing up, where being read to by their parents or being read to on Reading Rainbow were really, really impactful. So I was interested to see, just look around and see how are these people responding in the moment to being in a full-house and being read to. And I saw a variety of reactions. Did you get any feedback afterwards that particularly surprised you or stood out to you?
LEVAR BURTON: I'm always amazed, I guess, at the idea that people would come out to hear a story being read. It gives me a sense of personal satisfaction but it also fills me with a great amount of hope and inspiration. And really validate some of my core beliefs about the important nature of storytelling and how important it is to the human being.
You're absolutely right, a lot of us do have in common that lap experience of having been read to as a child as being a real-- it's not that we remember the imagery but we certainly-- that feeling of being cherished and loved and focused on. And being delivered this gift of that focus and a transmission of so much that is inarticulable about culture and language and literature.
Just that experience of sitting in the lap of an adult and being read to is such a powerful common experience that communicates much more than can be put into words. And so when we seek out those experiences as an adult, it really can be powerful. It just reminds us of the elemental nature of humanity that we are a part of.
CODY GOUGH: You're a very thoughtful guy, you know that?
[LAUGHS]
LEVAR BURTON: Well, thanks. These are things that I think about though.
CODY GOUGH: And you can tell. And I almost feel like that's-- you said that you, it's not just that you like to tell stories but you are a storyteller and you've kind of discovered that about you. And I almost feel like with the amount of reflection that you put into all this stuff, I mean, you clearly think about how to tell a story a certain way whether directing something or acting in a TV show or a movie. And it's almost like the only way for you to even express all of that storytelling power is through art or through some type of performance.
LEVAR BURTON: Yeah, different modalities of storytelling definitely work for me because I genuinely feel that I have something to say in all of these different expressions. I love being a director. I love being an actor. I love being a producer. I love having a podcast, where I can literally read a story aloud. I haven't found any one expression that does it all for me, which is why I continue to try and do all of these different things.
CODY GOUGH: So you're into this whole podcasting thing? You guess it would stick around?
LEVAR BURTON: Yeah, I believe it will. It's crazy how it has exploded and the wonderful way that it's just exploded. It's an absolute brilliant medium. And there's such a low barrier to entry that it was just too delicious to pass up for me. It was an opportunity for me to just do something that I really wanted to do basically for myself. I wanted to engage in a creative activity where I did not have to ask permission, where it wasn't necessary for a network or a studio to say, OK, yes. Go and do that. It was something that I could just decide to do and then do. And it's part of what I call the democratization of content creation, where-- we live in an amazing era right now, where we can all realize the storyteller inside of us.
We've all got a story to tell I believe and the tools are available for us to share our stories. And that's the basis of a civilization evolving. It's getting to know one other stories, finding the commonality in the person next to us, or across the room, or across the ocean and recognizing our commonality. Our common humanity. That's how civilization evolves in a peaceful and civilized way.
CODY GOUGH: Speaking of commonalities and humanity, I was very surprised with what you just said about why you got into podcasting because it's almost word for word the exact same reason I got into it. And what's crazy about that to me is like-- I started podcasting 2011, 2012. I was not a struggling actor but I was dabbling in acting and not getting roles and I thought to myself, well, you know, I don't have to get cast if I can just do a podcast. But it blows my mind that you would say something similar like that you get all that control. I mean, you're LeVar Burton.
[LAUGHS]
I mean, you probably shouldn't have a hard time finding an acting role or a directing role, you know? You're very accomplished and you've certainly done a lot. So it's just crazy to me that you-- even you would look at the medium and say, you know what? I have complete control over this and that's why I'm going to go for it.
LEVAR BURTON: Yeah, absolutely. I'm not one of those guys. I'm not like a George Clooney or a Tom Cruise who can dictate what I do and just come up with an idea and have all the resources in the world at my disposal. No. I'm a guy who grinds it out each and every day. I'm really fortunate to be able to do what it is I do. I love what I do. But I'm a hustler. I recognized a long time ago that just waiting for the phone to ring was not a satisfying experience for me. So I work hard at creating the career that I have because it's mine.
CODY GOUGH: Yeah, it certainly is. I thought a lot about your career in particular and it's so dynamic. I mean, almost every character that I think of you for is an iconic character in a very different way. From Reading Rainbow, to Geordi La Forge, to Kunta Kinte. Is there one that you identify with more than others or do you do you ever feel like you've got almost like a split personality between all these huge roles you've had?
LEVAR BURTON: Interestingly enough, I see them all as aspects of me. All of them. And I guess for most actors that's really true. There is a lot of me that lives in Kunta. There's a lot of me that makes up Geordi. And I've said this before. I think, I said this at the LeVar Burton Reads live in Chicago that I believe that there is this continuum, a line on which I exist in these three distinct places in the past as Kunta and in the future as Geordi and that LeVar is in the middle of that continuum. And that these are all expressions. You could look at it as the evolution of a soul. Right? These are all expressions of the same consciousness in different timelines, on different points in the space-time continuum. It is the expression of evolution.
CODY GOUGH: I can see that and to ask a question actually about putting a little of yourself into everything. I almost felt like you had a yoga background because when you said, let's start by in a deep breath, which you do in your podcasts. That church was like-- it was locked and loaded. It was like a synchronized thousand people breathing at the exact same time.
[LAUGHS]
So I've got to ask. And I did some research, I couldn't find it. Why do you always start with the deep breath?
LEVAR BURTON: For a couple of reasons. Number one, for me, the deep breath is a starting off point. And it separates the moment before from the moment which comes after. That deep breath is an opportunity to be in the now moment, right? And that does come from having practiced yoga for many, many years and knowing that we tend to walk around in lives holding our breath. And that a conscious breath is an active measure of claiming the awareness of a now moment space.
CODY GOUGH: That's a beautiful answer.
ASHLEY HAMER: That was a beautiful answer. And I hope I don't muck it up too much by adding what the science has to say. There's a good reason why in a deep breath helps you relax when you're stressed. It comes down to your autonomic nervous system. This system runs the things you don't have control over. Mostly because they keep you alive. Stuff like your heart rate, digestion, your run of the mill organ functions. Stress, whether that's a lion in the grass or a late night email from your boss kicks your sympathetic nervous system into high gear, making your heart beat faster and your blood pressure rise.
But here's the thing, breathing is both an autonomic system you don't have to think about and a voluntary function you can control. If you can slow your breathing, you can urge a lot of those other fight or flight responses to follow suit. Deep breathing basically hacks your nervous system, taking it from a state of panic to a state of calm. Cool, right? But here's one more thing LeVar's group breathing does. It unites the audience.
Studies show that when a bunch of people are all asked to do the same thing. They tend to sync up their movements. But they sync up more than just that. Sometimes, their breathing synchronizes and their heart rates match. And of course, when a group all does the same thing together, it helps them to bond and cooperate. That's why some performers and presenters will start by getting the audience to do a coordinated movement. It turns them from a bunch of individuals into a united group.
CODY GOUGH: Hey, Ashley. Real quick before we get back to LeVar. I want to mention that the Curiosity Podcast is brought to you by Skillshare.
ASHLEY HAMER: That's right. Skillshare is an online learning platform with over 18,000 classes in business, marketing, entrepreneurship, technology, and more.
CODY GOUGH: Yeah, and it's a great place to learn a variety of skills so you can be a jack of all trades like LeVar. You can take classes in productivity and time management, social media strategy, Google analytics.
ASHLEY HAMER: Basically, you name it, they've got it. And it's not just professional skills. I'm taking a course right now on Indian cooking.
CODY GOUGH: Please bring some to the office when you're done because that sounds delicious.
ASHLEY HAMER: No promises.
[LAUGHS]
CODY GOUGH: Well, I've actually been using Skillshare for my work here at curiosity.com. You've probably noticed we're making a lot of videos on Facebook Live and YouTube and those required, well, video editing. So Skillshare has been a lifesaver because they have courses on how to use Final Cut Pro 10 which is the software I use. And there are a lot of changes in the newest edition of Final Cut Pro, so the Skillshare course is specifically designed to train for this tool, helping me make better videos faster.
ASHLEY HAMER: It's good to know you can learn the latest and greatest tips and tricks on Skillshare. And you can learn new skills today with a special offer just for Curiosity Podcast listeners. Get two months of Skillshare for just $0.99.
CODY GOUGH: That's right. Skillshare is offering Curiosity Podcast listeners two months of unlimited access to more than 18,000 classes for just $0.99 total. To sign up, go to skillshare.com/curious.
ASHLEY HAMER: Again, that's skillshare.com/curious to start your two months now.
CODY GOUGH: That's skillshare.com/curious. Now, let's take a deep breath and get back to the episode.
[DEEP BREATHS]
For the Q&A, a gentleman, I guess, walked up in the church and asked you to give a blessing to him and his fiancee.
LEVAR BURTON: That was wild.
CODY GOUGH: Yeah, wasn't it, though?
LEVAR BURTON: That was wild that they would ask me to bless-- they had just gotten engaged and they wanted a blessing from LeVar like what? But we did. I mean, we--
CODY GOUGH: Has that ever happened before?
LEVAR BURTON: Not so spontaneously. I mean, I have performed the wedding ceremony before as an ordained minister. And I've stepped into that space before, but I've never been asked by strangers to step into that space and actually bless their union. It was quite-- it was an extraordinary moment.
CODY GOUGH: Yeah, you better be careful or you're going to start to get a lot of requests.
[LAUGHS]
LEVAR BURTON: Well, most of them have come from people who want to get married and want me to dress up in a Star Trek uniform and marry them. And for the most part, I've turned those all down.
[LAUGHS]
CODY GOUGH: Just for the most part?
LEVAR BURTON: OK. In truth, all of them. I've turned all of them down.
CODY GOUGH: OK, yeah. I mean, you don't want anybody out there thinking, oh, he turned me down. And worked for the other one.
LEVAR BURTON: No, no, no. It's been a universal no so far.
CODY GOUGH: With the caveat for a yes be that you have to get a captain's uniform?
[LAUGHS]
LEVAR BURTON: Yeah, yeah, yeah. I'll do it if I get for pips, yeah.
[LAUGHTER]
Yeah.
CODY GOUGH: Yeah. Well, I know that initially when we were talking about coordinating this interview, you mentioned that you are familiar with Curiosity and you're kind of behind what we're doing, which we really appreciate. And I wanted to give you a chance to talk a little bit about some of your current projects like LeVar Burton Kids and all the other great fantastic work that you're doing outside of your podcast.
LEVAR BURTON: Right. LeVar Burton Kids is one of my companies. It is the work that I did for many years with the Reading Rainbow brand. I continue to do that work only under a different name, a different moniker. Our mission at LeVar Burton Kids is to harness the unique curiosity of a child and to help them explore the world with an open heart and an open mind. It's one of the reasons why I relate so much to the work that you're doing with the Curiosity Podcast.
Curiosity is a key component in helping to develop a love of learning in a human being. And we all possess it. But depending upon where we are and what system we're brought up in, our curiosity is tapped into at varying levels and in different degrees. And I genuinely believe that harnessing a child's innate curiosity is really key to getting them hooked on being a learner for life. If you're a learner for life, then you're going to be OK.
You are compelled to move through life as an open book and as one who continually wants to expand their knowledge as well as their information and experiential base in life. And that kind of attitude and approach really does lead to a fulfilled experience. A full experience of being human. So we really-- we focus at LeVar Burton Kids on that curiosity and as I say, helping children explore the world with an open heart and an open mind.
We definitely need to create compassionate human beings, especially in this day and age. And through storytelling and the products that we produce, the Skybrary app, for instance. And Skybrary school, our product specifically for schools, for teachers to use in the classrooms. That mission statement is very much alive in that work.
CODY GOUGH: It's very cool what you're doing. And it's really cool that technology is allowing people like you and people like curiosity to present information to people and help them on that lifelong learning path.
LEVAR BURTON: Yeah.
CODY GOUGH: You talked about-- it's kind of a double edged sword, though, like on one hand, it's more accessible. But on the other hand, you can walk around and see a lot of little kids on their cell phones and tablets. Have you found that it's harder to convince people to learn on an ongoing basis or that it's more challenging to get kids to read over the years?
LEVAR BURTON: I don't necessarily-- my experience is it's necessarily more difficult to get kids to read. I think that the challenge of the modern age is to help children in as much as their lives as well as ours as adults, are really dominated by technology and technological devices. And it's these devices that are the delivery systems for so much entertainment and information. The challenge is to cultivate a desire for balance because these devices are so pervasive in our lives. And so addicting that we're not very good yet at expressing balance in terms of our relationship with them and how much time we spend on them, right?
What we need to do is we need to cultivate in this generation and every generation that follows, it seems. The innate desire to put the device down, to use it appropriately not indiscriminately. These are our first steps with this technology, in our relationship with this technology. And we're just indiscriminate in our use. We haven't developed any sort of balance yet, that's the challenge.
CODY GOUGH: Everything in moderation, right?
LEVAR BURTON: Absolutely.
CODY GOUGH: I know that you're obviously very busy with lots of different projects and reading lots of books all the time but do you have any favorite podcasts? And what do you listen to? Other than, of course, I'm sure the Curiosity Podcast.
LEVAR BURTON: Yeah.
[LAUGHS]
I have kind of eclectic tastes in podcasts listening. Everything from to the Queen's, The Read. I love Ear Hustle. I had an opportunity, recently, to be on a radio show that's now a podcast called, Wait Wait... Don't Tell Me! out of WBZ in Chicago. I love Lore. I love Lore. And it's one of the few storytelling podcasts that I listen to. I tend to gravitate, I think, when I'm just listening to podcasts for my own enjoyment. I tend to gravitate towards personalities that I enjoy spending time with. But Aaron Mahnke's Lore is really-- it's storytelling after my own heart.
CODY GOUGH: Yeah. I've heard that one too and it's quite good definitely. And I was going to ask you too about preparing for storytelling. There's certainly a difference in tone between Reading Rainbow and LeVar Burton Reads as you've advanced to the age of your audience.
LEVAR BURTON: Yeah.
CODY GOUGH: But how do you perform that differently? And is there a difference in preparation?
LEVAR BURTON: No. It's really the material that determines the performance, right? I'm the same performer. I'm the same LeVar. But when I'm reading a children's book, that part of me that relates to being a child and what a child would want to hear and how a child would want to hear it. When I'm reading to an audience of adults, I'm in that frame of mind. And I'm reading and performing in a manner that I would want to be entertained by someone if I were being read to.
CODY GOUGH: Well, it was very entertaining and I'm not just saying that because we're talking. And of course, I've listened to the podcast, which is also excellent. And I'm sure you know about the Mr. Rogers documentary.
LEVAR BURTON: I do.
CODY GOUGH: I haven't seen it but everyone's talking about it so I want to ask, what do you think the LeVar Burton documentary is going to look like?
[LAUGHS]
LEVAR BURTON: Oh, man. I have no idea.
CODY GOUGH: What do you want it to look like?
LEVAR BURTON: I'm not sure I want there to be one, not necessarily.
[LAUGHS]
Too much of an opportunity for my friends to go on the record embarrassing me.
CODY GOUGH: Exactly, you better have some pretty good notes so nobody misinterprets anything.
[LAUGHS]
LEVAR BURTON: Maybe I'd better get to work on that just in case.
CODY GOUGH: Yeah. I mean, you're already a writer and a producer. I mean, you might as well.
[LAUGHS]
LEVAR BURTON: That's a funny concept. It's like somebody writing their own obituary.
CODY GOUGH: I feel like Joan Rivers did something like that for E! Entertainment or like a True Hollywood story spoof of herself so it can happen.
LEVAR BURTON: She might have done. Yeah. She might have done. She might have done.
ASHLEY HAMER: She did. E! True Hollywood Story Joan Rivers aired on April Fool's Day in 2001 and featured interviews with a-list celebrities like Tom Hanks and Bette Midler, just totally trash talking her. It was a parody so the many revelations about her country music album and her secret twin weren't actually true. If you'd like to see a real documentary about this legendary performer, check out the critically acclaimed Joan Rivers, a piece of work.
CODY GOUGH: I have one final question from curiosity.com. We call this the curiosity challenge. So here's my question for you. It's actually about storytelling.
LEVAR BURTON: Ooh.
CODY GOUGH: Now, there is a scientific study and scientists had people read a series of exciting stories--
LEVAR BURTON: Awesome.
CODY GOUGH: that they had mixed up to change where the ending was. And usually, it was a story with a bit of a plot twist or something unexpected happens in the ending. So there were three groups. Which of the groups do you think enjoyed the story the most? The story where the ending was part of the introduction, the story where the ending was revealed in a separate text, or the story where the ending was not revealed at all.
LEVAR BURTON: So let me make sure that I understand this. So scientists did an experiment where they exposed people to stories where the location of the ending was changed. The placement, when you say location, you mean the placement of the ending.
CODY GOUGH: Yeah. Yeah, the location of where it was placed within the text.
LEVAR BURTON: And so for some people, they experienced the ending at the beginning of the story. Some people experience the ending as an addendum outside of the story. And other people experience the ending chronologically at the end of the tale. And your question is which group enjoyed the story the most? I'm going to say those who experienced this during the ending at the end.
CODY GOUGH: So surprisingly, in this study, the participants who enjoyed the stories the most were the ones who had the ending spoiled for them.
LEVAR BURTON: At the beginning of the story, that's so wild. Do they know why?
CODY GOUGH: So part of it is this. And I think you'll find this particularly interesting, is that knowing the end of a movie or a book or TV show frees up some space in your brain to focus in on the details instead of expending mental energy on trying to predict the ending.
And it's so funny. I saw this study and I thought back to a previous episode of LeVar Burton Reads where you read a short story by Neil Gaiman. And it was an excellent story but I found myself not experiencing it in the moment the way I know I should have because I was focused on the ending. And then the next couple of episodes of the podcasts to listen to, I didn't do that and I didn't think about the ending at all and it was phenomenal.
LEVAR BURTON: Wow.
CODY GOUGH: So maybe the next time you read a book, maybe spoil the ending for yourself and see if you enjoy it more.
LEVAR BURTON: You know that's really weird because oftentimes, I will begin the reading of a story by going to the end and reading the last paragraph. Sometimes only the last line, but oftentimes the very last paragraph. Not that it necessarily informs how the story unfolds for me but I guess it just sort of gets it out of the way. I guess that's really interesting.
CODY GOUGH: Yeah.
LEVAR BURTON: I guess I do that too.
CODY GOUGH: And I have to correct myself, they preferred the stories with the ending in a separate text the best.
LEVAR BURTON: In a separate text? Aah!
CODY GOUGH: But either way, they enjoy--
LEVAR BURTON: Interesting.
CODY GOUGH: --the spoiled story more than they enjoyed the story where the ending was where it belonged at the end.
LEVAR BURTON: Right. Right. Right, right, right. Wow, wow. You learn something new every day.
CODY GOUGH: Oh. Oh, I'm going to use that soundbite everywhere. You just made my day.
[LAUGHTER]
And I believe you have a question for me.
LEVAR BURTON: OK. Let's see. Let me see if I can put this in the form of a question. The 1977 miniseries, Roots holds a unique distinction in television history. What is it?
CODY GOUGH: Oh. Is it the most watched miniseries in TV history?
LEVAR BURTON: It is partially correct. The final episode of Roots is in the top five, I believe, of most watched episodes of television in the history of the medium go to the head of the class.
CODY GOUGH: Wow.
LEVAR BURTON: Well done.
CODY GOUGH: How do you feel about that?
LEVAR BURTON: I think it's pretty cool.
[LAUGHTER]
CODY GOUGH: Me too. Me too. It holds up too, by the way. I actually watched it somewhat recently and my God, it is powerful storytelling.
LEVAR BURTON: It is.
CODY GOUGH: Powerful storytelling.
LEVAR BURTON: It is indeed. It definitely is.
CODY GOUGH: Well, of course, people can find your podcasts LeVar Burton Reads which just wrapped its second season. And where can people go to get tickets?
LEVAR BURTON: LeVarBurtonpodcast.com. We still have some live dates coming up in Portland, Seattle, San Francisco, and Los Angeles. So go to LeVarBurtonpodcast/tour for information. And the last episode of LeVar Burton Reads for this season, I'm happy to report that it is indeed a story by my favorite science fiction author of all time, Octavia Butler. So it gives me great joy to end season 2 on that high note. But there will definitely be fresh episodes of the podcast coming out this summer as well. So get you some, y'all.
[LAUGHS]
Go get you some.
CODY GOUGH: And we'll have links in the show notes to everything we talked about today. I cannot thank you enough for joining me on the Curiosity Podcast.
LEVAR BURTON: I have enjoyed it and and as I say, I am a fan of Curiosity and what you all are doing. You're doing the work. You're doing good work. You're doing God's work. Keep it up.
CODY GOUGH: You're an inspirational guy so I thank you and appreciate that. Thank you so much LeVar Burton. It was great talking to you.
LEVAR BURTON: You are welcome. Thank you so much, peace and blessings.
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ASHLEY HAMER: We wrap up every episode with an extra credit question to give curiosity.com readers a chance to show off their knowledge or to learn something new. This week's question comes from our new Facebook group called I'm Curious, where Curiosity fans ask the questions and share the discoveries that get them excited about the world. This question comes from Kevin Bertolotto, who wants to know if going for two weeks without sleep would mean guaranteed death. The answer? After this.
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CODY GOUGH: We've mentioned curiosity.com a couple of times on this episode and that's because this podcast is a part of curiosity.com.
ASHLEY HAMER: Yeah. I think we might have a few new listeners who don't really know about what we do outside of this podcast.
CODY GOUGH: We do everything outside of this podcast. Don't we?
ASHLEY HAMER: We definitely do. We write a lot on all sorts of things like science, psychology, travel, productivity and life hacks. We even have some puzzles. It's great.
CODY GOUGH: It's kind of a one stop shop for anybody who is curious. And in addition to our website, we offer a five-star app for Android and iOS which is by the way completely free. You can check that out and have stories delivered to your phone every day to learn just a little bit about the world.
ASHLEY HAMER: Yeah. It's great when you're like standing in line at the coffee shop. You can just flip through the five stories of the day and learn something new right there.
CODY GOUGH: You can also subscribe to our magazine on flipboard. And of course, we're on Facebook and Twitter and Instagram and you can sign up for our email list. And there's so many ways to get in touch with us, including listening to the Curiosity podcast.
ASHLEY HAMER: Instagram is actually a really cool thing because if you follow us on Instagram, you'll get our Instagram stories which are daily polls, where you can show off how smart you are by telling us what the right answer is.
CODY GOUGH: We're just here to really have a lot of fun and maybe help you learn something new about the world. So check us out on curiosity.com or again the curiosity app for Android or iOS.
ASHLEY HAMER: All right. Wake up, it's time for the extra credit answer. Kevin Bertolotto wanted to know if two weeks of sleep deprivation would automatically kill you. The answer? Probably. But how long could you go without dying? We know that within the first 24 hours without sleep, you go through hormonal changes that lead to a rise in blood pressure. A day or two after that, you stop processing glucose properly and get really hungry. Your body temperature then drops and your ability to fight infection weakens. It's definitely not good for you. But where exactly is the line between unhealthy and lethal?
The Guinness Book of World Records no longer accepts entries for the longest period spent without sleeping so don't even try. But the last person to hold that title was Randy Gardner. In 1963, the 17-year-old stayed awake for 11 days and let his friends do tests on him in the process along with one scientist who caught wind of the project. It just took two days for him to have problems repeating simple tongue twisters. And he started to become sensitive to strong smells.
By day five, he was hallucinating and experiencing memory problems. Gardner is still alive but he suffers from nightly insomnia and thinks the sleep deprivation probably caused it. In any case, we know that humans can stay awake for at least 11 days without dying. Trying to go any longer is definitely not worth it. You can read all about Randy Gardner's experiment on curiosity.com. And if you have a question you'd like us to answer, check out the I'm Curious Facebook group in the show notes or send an email to podcast@curiosity.com.
CODY GOUGH: I just want to give a very special thank you to LeVar Burton, his wife Stephanie, and his producer Julia for helping to set up this interview. It was a privilege beyond words to be able to have this conversation and I am extremely grateful.
ASHLEY HAMER: I'm still so excited. This was just so fun. Next week, we're going to talk about the limits of the human body.
CODY GOUGH: It's going to be another good one, so thanks for tuning in and we will talk to you next week for the Curiosity Podcast. I'm Cody Gough.
ASHLEY HAMER: And I'm Ashley Hamer. Stay curious.
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SPEAKER: On the Westwood One Podcast Network.