Back in August of this year, I did a Thursday Theatre Thoughts post about Theatre Podcasts (you can read it here: https://aviewfromthebox.net/2023/08/03/thursday-theatre-thoughts-theatre-podcasts/). Cue6 Theatre has just released a new Audio Drama style podcast called Feedback, and I wanted to take this opportunity to tell you about it, as well as how my own work history helped me relate very strongly with one of the main characters.

Feedback, written by Kevin Shea, tells two stories simultaneously: one is of Akbar, call centre employee by day, drag queen by night, who’s recently reunited with their ex-boyfriend after a nasty breakup. The other is of Val and Marty, whose estranged son is on the run from the police. What starts out as a simple phone call turns into Val and Akbar becoming friends and ultimately helping one another on what was a very difficult day for the two of them.

I LOVED that Akbar is also a Drag Queen! They mention Drag Race and Canada’s Drag Race (the new season starts November 16 so you know what I’ll be watching!) and those are some of my favourite shows. I really want to get out and experience the drag scene here in Toronto more than I have; I love walking down Church after a show at Buddies and seeing all of the queens performing in the bars. It also acts as an interesting experiment for Val and Marty, to see what they’ll say to Akbar about his career when we’ve already heard some pretty interesting opinions coming from their side of the conversation.

I love getting to hear familiar voices in these audio dramas, like Qasim Khan, Rosemary Dunsmore, and Tom McCamus, along with the rest of the talented cast, comprised of Nadine Bhabha, David Coomber, Caitlin Driscoll, Nkasi Ogbonnah, Ben Sanders, Jonathan Tan, & Connor Thompson.

I’m not going to lie, I was a little nervous to start listening to this podcast when I initially heard about it. I’ve worked in two different call centres in two different cities since graduating university, and I haven’t had a very good time at either one. The second one, which was a work-from-home situation which I started less than a month after moving to Toronto, was by far the worst. There were several moments in this podcast where the rush of emotions I remember feeling at hearing the same vitriol from my customers came rushing back to me. Clearly, Shea has either worked in a call centre themselves, or did a lot of extensive research with people who have. And I’m one of the lucky ones; because I’m white, I didn’t get the racism thrown directly at me like my colleagues did. That doesn’t stop people from voicing their racist opinions to you though, as if I’m going to somehow agree with them to the detriment of the employees of the company. It was one of the hardest things to deal with on a daily basis, that and continually being accused of being incompetent, and I was thankful that Shea didn’t shy away from including this reality in his story.

However, another thing that this podcast did get right, is that sometimes all it takes is one call to make your day. Sometimes, you just happen to get to speak to the right person at the right time and, stats be damned, you talk with them for as long as you want, purely because you’re going to have a good time. I once had a man give me a recipe for what he called his wife’s “man catching pasta”, I’ve connected with people all over North America at various times in my life and learned a great deal about what it’s like to live in other parts of the continent. I loved getting to speak with people who lived in cities I like to visit, they love it when you know about their favourite places to eat or shop. I’ve even spoken to the occasional celebrity! It’s an interesting way to interact with humanity, and while you see people on their worst days, sometimes you really can help and make things better.

I highly recommend Feedback; the story is intriguing and compelling, the performances are fantastic, and the sound editing is awesome. You can find it wherever you normally listen to podcasts, or on Cue6’s website: https://www.cue6.ca/feedbacklistennow

Do you have a play you’d like to see as an Audio Drama on a podcast? Or a favourite one you’ve listened to? Let me know in the comments!

---

Thank you to my Patrons:

B. Kinnon, D. Moyes, D. Nelson

And to my supporters who’ve bought me a coffee:

Angelica and Paul

Would you like to become a Patron? Check out my Patreon at: https://www.patreon.com/AViewfromtheBox?utm_campaign=creatorshare_creator