The Grift

Panoply

4.2 (479)
SOCIEDAD Y CULTURA

When we hear about confidence games, we think, “never me.” Welcome to The Grift, a show about con artists and the lives they ruin. Best-selling author and New Yorker writer Maria Konnikova takes us to the darker side of human nature and deceit. Ten stories about card sharks, cult leaders, art forgers, impostors, and more. Why do we fall for them time and time again?

11/12/2017

The Grift Presents: Family Ghosts

The Grift presents an episode of another Panoply podcast we think our listeners will love: Family Ghosts. When Nick's grandfather died in 1994, something bizarre happened: his aunt Susan stole the body and hid it. Susan died shortly thereafter, and for the last twenty-three years, Nick and his family have agonized over his grandfather's whereabouts - but much to Nick's frustration, never enough to actually try and find him. This week, Nick asks "Family Ghosts" host Sam Dingman to see what he can do. Find us on Twitter and Instagram: @famghoshow. Join our mailing list, the Ghost Post: eepurl.com/c6qJIL. Thanks for listening!

56 min
06/06/2017

The Greatest Impostor

Ferdinand Demara is quite possibly the greatest con artist you’ve never heard of. With good reason: he hardly ever used his own name. Demara was a professional impostor. In his long and prolific career, he passed himself off as a surgeon on a warship, an engineer, a college dean, a cancer researcher, a cop. And the list goes on. Demara operated for over fifty years, and impersonated at least fifty people, that we know of… and he got away with all of it. We hope you enjoyed the last episode of this season of The Grift! Let us know what you think of the show on social media and by leaving us a review in Apple Podcasts. twitter: @thegriftpodcast facebook: The Grift Podcast email: thegrift@megaphone.fm

40 min
30/05/2017

Crooked Carnival

Peter Fenton made a career out of crafting that con we’ve all fallen for: the con of fantasy, of alternative realities that are much more pleasant than the existing one. This week, we go inside the world of carnival game scams, why we fall for them even when we know the odds are against us. Later, Peter recounts his career as a tabloid fabulist. Peter Fenton is the essential grifter – he sells us the stories we most want to believe.

33 min
23/05/2017

Psychic Faith

A fraud is lurking on most every block of most every city and town, all over the world: the psychic. When you’re down, when you’re alone, when you’re uncertain: that’s when you’re perfectly vulnerable to that old teller of the future, the person who offers you certainty and clarity and counsel and support when you most need it. The person who knows just how to take advantage of the basic human desire for control over our lives. They search for the perfect victim, work their way into her life, and gradually, take away everything. That’s what happened to Lyla.

33 min
16/05/2017

For a Small Investment...

Oscar Hartzell, born to humble beginnings, would go on to craft one of the most elaborate and successful mail fraud cons of all time. Pirates, lost treasure, the Wild West — it's the Spanish Prisoner, with a very English twist.

33 min
09/05/2017

The One Who Almost Got Away

Sam Israel not only ran one of the most successful Ponzi schemes in history, he would eventually go on to the single most extreme con there is: the con of life and death. Who knows how often it happens? After all, its success stories are dead….or so we think.

32 min
02/05/2017

Loving a Lie

Maria talks with the Atlantic’s Emily Yoffe about the most common grift of them all: the sweetheart scam. It’s a catfishing bait and switch where the person you fall in love with isn’t the person you thought. It has likely happened to someone you know. Someone intelligent, nice, attractive. Someone like you. Because where are we more vulnerable than in matters of the heart?

32 min
25/04/2017

The Religion of the Black Dog

A small secretive cult was started in the 1970s and operated out of New Jersey for decades without notice. A survivor tells us her dark story of abuse and manipulation at the hands of the charismatic cult leader, and how she eventually escaped his clutches.

45 min
18/04/2017

The Self-Made Heiress

Cassie Chadwick was one of the most famous, or infamous, seductresses of the Gilded Age. She excelled at impersonating high society royalty—and at getting everyone in her path to shower her with cash, even though they never got anything in return. And she got away with it – until she took the con too far.

33 min
11/04/2017

Genuine Fake

The only thing Ken Perenyi loved as much as art was swindling the art world. He relished the contest of wits, the risk of getting caught, the thrill of deception, the sense of power that comes with a successful con. But more than anything else, he wanted to see his work get the recognition he always felt it deserved. This week, we speak to the man behind some of the greatest art frauds of the twentieth century.

42 min
04/04/2017

Fast Jack, the Card Shark

“Fast Jack” Farrell is one of the greatest card and dice manipulators of the twentieth century - an undisputed leader in the vast world of crooked gambling. He cheated John Wayne and Frank Sinatra, worked for mobs in several states and several continents. Fast Jack turned cheating into an art form. If you’d like to hear more from Jack, you can check out his memoir Fast Jack, the Last Hustler.

36 min
30/03/2017

Introducing: The Grift

Coming soon from Panoply and Maria Konnikova, The Grift: stories about con artists and the lives they ruin.

2 min

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4.2

de 5

479 calificaciones

Still hoping for season 2

18/12/2022

Sharon in Barcelona

I always enjoyed the stories of The Grift, and recently old episodes have been randomly popping back into my feed. Please bring more stories! Of course I’m giving the old shows are-listen when they come into my feed, but new shows would be much appreciated. Thanks!
Wonderful stories, incredible characters

07/11/2020

Billy472747

This podcast lies at the intersection of what you hope isn’t true and what you want to believe. The tales of grifting are akin to what Da Vinci did for inventions. There are certainly parts that are fanciful, but everything is rooted in truth. The trouble is that you can never tell what is an elaboration and what is historic. Thus making the intrigue all the greater.
Terrible Narration

02/07/2022

BSharpe77

I really want to enjoy this podcast, but the narration is very strange and unnatural. There is no natuaral rhythm or flow to the narration. Each sentence is read in a different rhythm and its difficult to get in to it. THe voice seems forced but pretending to be natural. Just weird. I can't.
Don’t repeat my mistakes

06/08/2020

D-B-007

I missed this one and consistently overlooked it. It is excellent and so is family ghosts.

When we hear about confidence games, we think, “never me.” Welcome to The Grift, a show about con artists and the lives they ruin. Best-selling author and New Yorker writer Maria Konnikova takes us to the darker side of human nature and deceit. Ten stories about card sharks, cult leaders, art forgers, impostors, and more. Why do we fall for them time and time again?