Róisín Meets podcast: ‘One guy had a whole journal written in Elvish’

On the latest Róisín Meets podcast, David Nadelberg, creator of Netflix's The Mortified Guide, talks to Róisín Ingle about the teenage crush that spawned a movement.

After the discovery of an unsent teenage love letter, Nadelberg and his Mortified co-founder Neil Katcher launched an online appeal for other people who wanted to share their embarrassing childhood musings on stage.

It went viral, as they say, and 15 years later, Mortified has become a hugely popular podcast, a stage show, a 2013 movie and now a Netflix show.

On each episode, real people share their highly embarrassing adolescent memories, writings and art, with an eager audience ready to laugh and cheer at their most excruciating moments.

There is a Dublin arm of the movement, but there have only been a handful of shows so far. Nadelberg thinks that is because there are too many good writers here.

“It’s a city known for its great writing, but we want the bad writing. We need more submissions for our Dublin chapters,” he says.

Nadelberg spoke to the podcast about the most memorable Mortified contributions to date – including a man who presented him with an entire teenage diary written in the Elvish language in Lord of the Rings – his unrequited childhood crush that started it all and his Irish roots.

You can find all our podcasts on www.irishtimes.com/podcasts

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