The Phone Book

Series produced by RadioArt(r)

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The Phone Book was inspired by an actor's highest compliment - she could read the phone book and make it sound great - a series of dramatic readings of phone books, as if they were written by Shakespeare or O'Neill--and other strange lists. Read for laughs. Most segments are < 3:59, suitable for short cutaways. FREE for the first season of 26 episodes.

The idea is simple: record the best actors in the English-speaking world interpreting phone books and all kinds of strange lists: instruction manuals and codes of behavior like Royal Etiquette: How To Behave When Presented to the Queen • recipes from old cookbooks • drug side effects • processed food ingredients • The Motion Picture (Hays) Code (1930) — read for laughs, whether the original text was intended to be humorous or not.

F. Murray Abraham, Alec Baldwin, John Lithgow, Renée Fleming, Garrison Keillor, Dick Cavett, Barbara Rosenblat, a top voice actor, and many others have read for the project.

Paul Dooley, Anne Enright, Bob Odenkirk, Philip Roth, Wallace Shawn, Jerry Stiller, Kate Valk and many other members of our radio rep company have read for us on past projects. Most of them will also read for The Phone Book.

We will invite actors of diverse talents and backgrounds to record for the project including Morgan Freeman, Laurence Fishburne, Nathan Lane, John Leguizamo, Bobby McFerrin, Ian McKellen and Patrick Stewart.

The Phone Book was created by Executive Producer and Director Larry Josephson, who has created award-winning public radio series for 55 years. He started The Radio Foundation, a non-profit tax-exempt radio production company, in 1977. Larry won the prestigious Peabody Award, and three Grammy® nominations for producing Bob & Ray.

All pieces in the series can be aired at any time of day and do not require a content advisory. Hide full description

The idea is simple: record the best actors in the English-speaking world interpreting phone books and all kinds of strange lists: instruction manuals and codes of behavior like Royal Etiquette: How To Behave When Presented to the Queen • recipes from old cookbooks • drug side effects • processed food ingredients • The Motion Picture (Hays) Code (1930) — read for laughs, whether the original text was intended to be humorous or not. F. Murray Abraham, Alec Baldwin, John Lithgow, Renée Fleming, Garrison Keillor, Dick Cavett, Barbara Rosenblat, a top voice actor, and many others have read for the project. Paul Dooley, Anne Enright, Bob Odenkirk, Philip Roth, Wallace Shawn, Jerry Stiller, Kate Valk and many other members of our radio rep company have read for us on past projects. ... Show full description


19 Pieces

Order by: Newest First | Oldest First
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These three "work sample" files include two or three episodes each of The Phone Book. Performers include Dick Cavett, F. Murray Abraham, Garrison ...

  • Added: Jul 27, 2016
  • Length: 25:17
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John Lithgow, with a dramatic reading of the Manhattan White Pages.

Bought by KZMU Moab Community Radio, PRX Remix, and WYAP


  • Added: Jun 09, 2016
  • Length: 03:54
  • Purchases: 3
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Garrison Keillor, reading a list of reasons for admission to a 19th-century insane asylum

Bought by WRST-FM Oshkosh, WMUU-LP, KZMU Moab Community Radio, PRX Remix, and WYAP


  • Added: Jun 09, 2016
  • Length: 02:52
  • Purchases: 5
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Alec Baldwin, reading the reported side effects of Ambien

Bought by KUER, WRST-FM Oshkosh, WMUU-LP, KZMU Moab Community Radio, PRX Remix and more


  • Added: Jun 09, 2016
  • Length: 02:40
  • Purchases: 6
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Dick Cavett, reading a list of newspaper corrections

Bought by KUER, WUFT, KZMU Moab Community Radio, PRX Remix, and WYAP


  • Added: Jun 09, 2016
  • Length: 03:58
  • Purchases: 5
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Barbara Rosenblat, reading a list of Roman Catholic patron saints

Bought by WUFT, WMUU-LP, KZMU Moab Community Radio, PRX Remix, and WYAP


  • Added: Jun 09, 2016
  • Length: 03:55
  • Purchases: 5
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Alec Baldwin, reading a list of Irish Heroes and Heroines, from James Joyce’s Ulysses

Bought by KUER, KZMU Moab Community Radio, and WYAP


  • Added: Jun 09, 2016
  • Length: 03:07
  • Purchases: 3
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John Lithgow, reading Royal Etiquette, or How to Behave When Presented to the Queen

Bought by KZMU Moab Community Radio, PRX Remix, and WYAP


  • Added: Jun 09, 2016
  • Length: 03:58
  • Purchases: 3
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Garrison Keillor, reading an excerpt from Italo Calvino’s If on a Winter’s Night a Traveler

Bought by KZMU Moab Community Radio and PRX Remix


  • Added: Jun 09, 2016
  • Length: 02:35
  • Purchases: 2
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Alec Baldwin, reading from the Motion Picture Production Code of 1930, the “Hays Code”

Bought by KUER, WUFT, KZMU Moab Community Radio, and PRX Remix


  • Added: Jun 09, 2016
  • Length: 05:04
  • Purchases: 4
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Renée Fleming, reading a list of characters from Richard Wagner’s Der Ring des Nibelungen

Bought by KZMU Moab Community Radio


  • Added: Jun 09, 2016
  • Length: 04:59
  • Purchases: 1
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F. Murray Abraham, with a dramatic reading of the Manhattan White Pages.

Bought by KZMU Moab Community Radio


  • Added: Jul 05, 2016
  • Length: 04:32
  • Purchases: 1
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Garrison Keillor, reading a list of Biblical Begats from the Testament of Matthew, King James edition

Bought by KZMU Moab Community Radio


  • Added: Jul 05, 2016
  • Length: 02:53
  • Purchases: 1
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John Lithgow, reading a list of Shakespearean Insults

Bought by WUFT, PRX Remix, and KZMU Moab Community Radio


  • Added: Jul 05, 2016
  • Length: 03:49
  • Purchases: 3
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F. Murray Abraham, reading a list of Collective Nouns from the Animal Kingdom

Bought by KUER, WUFT, WRST-FM Oshkosh, KUFM - Montana Public Radio, PRX Remix and more


  • Added: Jul 05, 2016
  • Length: 02:59
  • Purchases: 6
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Dick Cavett, reading a list of Strange Medical Syndromes

Bought by KUER, WRST-FM Oshkosh, and KZMU Moab Community Radio


  • Added: Jul 05, 2016
  • Length: 03:31
  • Purchases: 3
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John Lithgow, reading a list of Royal Epithets

Bought by WUFT and KZMU Moab Community Radio


  • Added: Jul 05, 2016
  • Length: 03:51
  • Purchases: 2
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Garrison Keillor, reading an excerpt from Mark Twain’s A Tramp Abroad

Bought by KZMU Moab Community Radio and WEZU


  • Added: Jul 05, 2016
  • Length: 03:51
  • Purchases: 2
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F. Murray Abraham, reading a list of Phobias

Bought by KUER, PRX Remix, KZMU Moab Community Radio, and WEZU


  • Added: Jul 05, 2016
  • Length: 03:16
  • Purchases: 4