Author, comedian and actress Susanna Brisk is an outrageous Aussie with a penchant for the shocking. Her AfterParty stories have documented her feelings about sex and mental health and her memoir, I'll Be The Death of Me, and blog Malibu Mom provide even more details. Here, she and AfterParty's Anna David discuss if being a dry drunk counts as sobriety, parenting, mental illness and whether or not Brisk can leave the podcast office with a phone number (spoiler alert: she does).
Actress Janie Haddad Tompkins has appeared in more TV shows than could fit in this space—Desperate Housewives, Criminal Minds, Monk, Happy Endings and Modern Family, to name just a few—and just as many comedy sketches and storytelling shows (she's married to the comedic genius Paul F. Tompkins). She's charming as can be and seems to live a charmed life but in fact spent years involved with and engaged to a sociopath who was leading a double life. Here, she and AfterParty's Anna David talk about what makes people suspectible to toxic relationships and what can be learned from them, among other topics.
Professional athlete Lewis Howes and host of the podcast The School of Greatness is also what's known as lifestyle entrepreneur. The short version of the story is this: sidelined by an injury while playing professional football, Howes had no money, nowhere to live and no interest in doing anything but the sport that he could no longer do. So he took to his computer and managed to become a social media maven in just a few years, earning millions in the process and then coaching and inspiring many others to do the same. As it turns out, he was also dealing with having been sexually abused as a child—an event he never shared with anyone until recently. Now he's doing what he does: telling others about it so that they can be released from their own shame and then become, as he would say, great. Here we talk about dreams, passion, finding inspiration and handling adversity, among many other topics.
The legendary comedian and host of the immensely popular WTF podcast needs no introduction but we're giving him one anyway: he's spent a couple decades honing his craft, has appeared on Conan more than 40 times, stars in and writes a TV show based on his life and, whether he likes it or not, does a better job of spreading awareness about addiction and recovery than perhaps anyone else out there. Here, he and AfterParty's Anna David discuss cocaine psychosis, taking meds for mental issues, how success has changed his recovery and much more.