Participate

Dust off that diary! Unearth those letters! Share your awkward and embarrassing childhood journals, artwork, letters, poems, lyrics, home movies, and plays. We’re the largest and longest-running project of its kind, and we’re always looking for people like you to join our community. Never been on stage? We love that! As celebrated by This American Life, Entertainment Weekly, Time, The Guardian, All Things Considered, and Wired.

Don’t see your city listed? If you don’t mind traveling for the event, select the city nearest to you and our producers can hold virtual curating sessions.

Request to Participate

How It Works

1. Unearth

You dig up some of your old embarrassing childhood artifacts (old letters, lyrics, journals, cassettes, artwork, plays, videos, even old blogs).

2. Contact

You request a producer’s session on the form on this page.

3. Collaborate

We meet up and help you identify excerpts & a backstory that our audience will love.

4. Share

You share the results on stage.

5. Impact

Someone in the audience returns home, inspired to unearth their own stuff! (Fun, eh?)

Tips

    • DO. Earmark 5-8 excerpts that you’re embarrassed to admit you wrote. When we meet up, those will give us a very helpful starting place. That said, we’ll wander around your pages and hear other stuff you brought, too, so bring as much as you can.
    • DO. Look for entries where your writing was very dramatic– whether you were ultra angry or ultra happy. These tend to be funny.
    • DO. Look for entries where your writing was oblivious to an obvious-to-anyone-else reality. (For instance, a closeted teen writing about their love of Broadway musicals.)
    • DO. Look for entries that make you react, “I can’t believe I actually thought like that.”
    • DO. Stick with it. Some of our best stuff takes a few sessions to find the right excerpts. If we don’t find enough stuff initially, the door is always open to return. It’s a strange but fun process, and our curators spend hours and hours helping you identify material that our audience will love.
    • DON’T sweat it. This is NOT an audition or a tryout. Our curating process is not about judging your talents– our goal is to simply help you find stuff. When we find enough material that matches our needs, we invite you on stage. When we don’t, we suggest ways to find more and offer to meet again.
    • DON’T censor material because you think it doesn’t fit in a storyline or theme. Ignore storylines or themes for now–just focus on finding stuff that you embarrasses you. Even if it jumps from topic to topic. We’ll help you find a way to make it all connect as a story LATER.
    • DON’T make stuff up. The fun of our show is that people sharing actual mementos from childhood. If you want to write an essay about your childhood, there are plenty of great projects (like the Moth) that are better forums for that.