Radio host Ira Glass takes 20 years of 'This American Life' to the State Theatre stage

Ira Glass began the phone interview with an unexpected term of endearment.

"Beloved?" Pause. "Beloved?"

No, just a reporter on the other line, I said, scratching "nickname for his wife" off my question list.

"Oh, that wasn't my wife," said Glass, creator and host of "This American Life," the popular public radio program aired on nearly 600 stations and one of iTunes' most downloaded podcasts every week. "I said 'beloveds,' which is what I call some of the people I work with sometimes. But we're normal journalists, it's not always like that."

Glass, who appears at the State Theatre on Saturday armed with only his iPad and 20 years of broadcast storytelling magic stored in his cavernous cortex, still displays the wide-ranging curiosity and knack for getting at the core of complicated issues that got him to his perch at the top. Since taking the show independent two years ago after 17 years with distributor Public Radio International, Glass and crew have launched the intensely followed spinoff podcast "Serial." His show is now broadcast in Britain, Canada and Australia. He has also produced two movies with comic/filmmaker Mike Birbiglia, "Sleepwalk With Me" and "Don't Think Twice," which just premiered at SXSW.

Q: What makes "This American Life" different from public radio journalism as a whole?

A: We consciously do things differently in the way stories are structured. They're way more character-based with a narrative and a plot, designed around feeling and humor. We are still doing mainstream-media-fare stories, but our narrators are three-dimensional people, showing more personality and casual voice. I'm moving in a corner of journalism where we're experiencing a boom — podcasting. We were broke for years and now have a little money to do more ambitious stories. We're working on starting more shows like "Serial."

A: It's more idiosyncratic than encyclopedic, and varies each time. A few weeks ago I added a section on two stories we cut. Part of the formula for why the show works is we generate much more than we put on the air.

Q: Which episodes have resonated most with live audiences?

A: The experiments, like when we did the show as a musical, or the episode where we covered that week's news, but in our style. I have talked a lot about the Harper High School [Chicago] episodes, where 29 students were shot in one year. And now I talk about "Serial." I've been telling a story lately we can never rerun on the air because people across the country e-mailed us that it made them very queasy. One said she passed out and crashed her car.

Q: The last time you were here, you showed off one of your ever-changing new passions, dancing. How will this show be adapted for the stage — will you be a sort of DJ mixmaster up there?

A: For years I would have a console and CD players on stage to make it look like a radio broadcasting studio, like at the very first speech I gave as an adult publicizing the show at Macalester College. Now I have all the quotes and music in the palm of my hand, so I just wander around the stage and re-create the sound of the show around me.

A: I do like to get a break from working, but not so much that I'm doing anything to make it happen. I've been doing the dance show once a month. We're going to retire it at the Sydney Opera House. It's ridiculous I'm performing in the same place as Yo-Yo Ma.

Q: As a master storyteller, can you give some tips for the average person who wants to hold the family spellbound at the next holiday dinner?

A: It's true that good stories happen to those who can tell them. First, you have to have good taste about what's interesting or there's nothing anyone can do to help you. Keep an eye on pacing and stay attuned to the attention of your listeners. Know your plot points. Sometimes it's appropriate to go a bit longer with reflection than the beats of action. A story is like a train you can hop off for a minute to schmooze with the locals, but you've got to hop back on.

Q: Is planning "TAL" week by week a democratic process, or do you get final say?

A: With [the episode] "When the Beasts Come Marching In," we kept renaming the show over and over as the stories changed. My favorite name was rejected by the group: "You're an Animal. No, Seriously, YOU ARE AN ANIMAL." The Beloveds were not with me on that one. Maybe I'll take an audience vote in Minneapolis.