The Liberated Podcast

Nicolas Jimenez

Conversations about how we understand, secure and exercise freedom. Hosted by Nicolás A. Jiménez Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Episodes

  1. 12/14/2023

    Actor and playwright Robby Ramos on telling Cuba's story, holding heterodox views in the art world, and Hollywood's writer and actor strike

    Robby Ramos’ play “The Walls Have Ears” is about three Cuban siblings who’ve taken diverging paths in the early years of the Fidel Castro’s Cuban revolution, only to find themselves confronting those differences in an unexpected encounter at Presidio Modelo, a notorious prison on Cuba’s Isla de Pinos. In writing the script, Robby drew not only from the life of his own grandfather (who had himself been a political prisoner in Cuba), but also from the stories he’d been told by others in his family who lived through those early days of what would become the most most brutal, influential and durable dictatorship in the western hemisphere. While the subject matter makes “The Walls” an inescapably political work, Robby didn’t go about the project with an activist motive. Instead, he was looking to tell a compelling story about a family and a people torn apart — from a perspective that is too often handicapped by too much emphasis on the politics and too seldom explored outside of Cuban and Cuban exile circles. In this conversation, Robby Ramos talks with Nick Jiménez about his play, how growing up in his Miami Cuban family informed his politics and his views on liberty and why moving to New York to pursue theater opened his eyes to the need for work like “The Walls Have Ears.” The two also talk about Robby’s broader acting career, including his work in theater and TV — especially his role on the cast of Heels — and the business side of “The Walls,” which was as much an entrepreneurial venture as it was a artistic passion project. Finally, Robby and Nick talk about the strikes by the Writers Guild of America (WGA) and SAG-AFTRA (which, at the time of this recording, were in their last days). Become a Patron for exclusive perks and content from DADE. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

    1h 24m
  2. SEASON 1, EPISODE 1 TRAILER

    Intro to The Liberated Podcast

    In this first, very short episode of The Liberated Podcast, I’m just taking a minute to introduce myself and the podcast. I’m Nick Jiménez, and this is where I’ll have conversations with people about how we understand, secure and exercise our freedoms. This first installment is a short one. Just a few minutes for introduction so that, if you’re new, you have some idea of what this thing is … and what it is not. First, a bit about what it is. On this podcast, as with other DADEmag.com podcasts like Pan Con Podcast and Step Into The Sandbox, we’ll be doing primarily long form interviews on the subject of freedom. While that has the benefit of lightening the editing load a bit, that’s mainly because I want these podcasts to be a way to dive a little deeper than we could in other formats. For purposes of what this podcast is about, when I say words like “freedom” and “liberty,” I’m defining them very broadly. The first episode, for instance, gets into some pretty explicitly political themes with a former member of the Libertarian Party who — at the time we recorded that and now as I record this — was running for office. But I expect to bring in guests who have things to say about other kinds of freedom. Maybe religious freedom. Artistic freedom. Freedom from addiction. What freedom looks like in the home or in relationships. Who knows? It’ll be a lot of things. That said, I do come to a lot of these discussions from a particular perspective, and I’ll generally make that known. I’m a lot of things — a lowercase libertarian, an uppercase Libertarian, a Cuban, an American, a journalist, a Catholic, a home cook, a dog owner … All that (not necessarily in that order) and more will inform what I do with this podcast and I won’t pretend otherwise. Now a bit about what this podcast is not. This podcast is not my personal soap box. I’m bringing my perspective to it as I explore ideas with my guests and with you, but the idea is not to make this the corner of the Internet where I pontificate about liberty stuff. This podcast is not an echo chamber. Yes, I’ll bring in people who agree with me. But I’ll also bring in people who don’t. That’s part of the thing. Besides, I don’t think there are any two people anywhere who agree on everything. Finally, as with other DADEmag.com podcasts, this thing is not just for Miami. It’s from Miami. And it might in some ways, at some times, be very Miami. But the goal is always to make something that’s from here that’s for people everywhere. That’s it. The rest can come together as we go. Feedback’s always welcome. liberated@dademag.com Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

    6 min

Trailer

About

Conversations about how we understand, secure and exercise freedom. Hosted by Nicolás A. Jiménez Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.