BUDD MISHKIN

BROADCAST JOURNALIST

INTERVIEWER

HOST

MODERATOR

BEFORE THE CHEERING STARTED WITH BUDD MISHKIN

“Before The Cheering Started with Budd Mishkin” is all about the journey to success and professional fulfillment: the early years, plan B’s, obstacles overcome and the passion to push forward.  My career as a news and sports anchor/reporter has shown me that the stories of striving and struggle for success are almost always more compelling than the stories about the moment that symbolizes that success.

It’s Stevie Van Zandt quitting the music business to work construction for two years. It’s Bob Costas calling minor league hockey and occasionally Bowling For Dollars before a big break right out of college. It’s David Crane selling ink toner over the phone, years before he and Marta Kauffman would create the TV show Friends.

Guests on the first 80 episodes of the podcast have included broadcasters Bob Costas, Ian Eagle and Mike Breen, Basketball Hall of Famer and former Senator Bill Bradley, thought leaders and changemakers like Ford Foundation President Darren Walker, Global Citizen creator Hugh Evans, real estate and environmental racism activist Majora Carter, musicians Steven Van Zandt, Shawn Colvin and John Pizzarelli, writers Jacqueline Woodson, Patrick Radden Keefe, Scott Turow and Colum McCann. actors Paul Reiser, Aasif Mandvi and Richard Kind, “Friends” creators Marta Kauffman and David Crane, screenwriter Tony Gilroy, fashion design icon Norma Kamali and more.

Welcome to “Before The Cheering Started with Budd Mishkin.” Thanks for joining us on the journey.

I’m through the first 4 episodes and already hooked, but hardly surprised. If you remember Budd Mishkin from his decades at NY One, you already know he’s a nonpareil interviewer – curious, eloquent, with a natural warmth and dry humor that allows him to shift the tone with uncommon ease. In this format, he is stellar: No one wants their skin peeled back, yet these guests all recognize the importance of imparting the journey and sharing their growing pains, even when the pain
persists – Norma Kamali’s humiliating experience with sexual harassment at a job interview, years before she became a fashion icon, was particularly compelling. There are common threads, such as the importance of mentorship and the element of luck, or as the humanitarian and Global Citizen CEO Hugh Evans put it, “how the lottery of life is the most unfair reality on the planet.” It is important to understand why highly accomplished individuals succeed at what they do, but what Mishkin does here is indispensable — for listeners of every age and every aspiration. This series is a keeper..

Dave D’Allesandro