From First Dates to Heartbreak: Storytelling At The Monti

WUNC News | By Laura Lee,

Published June 2, 2016 at 12:37 PM EDT

When a volunteer storyteller takes the stage at the Triangle’s storytelling event, TheMonti, the audience never knows what to expect. He might share a poignant tale about a complex relationship with a parent. Or she might prompt roars of laughter with the story of a first date gone wrong.A conversation with Monti founder Jeff Polish about the art of storytelling.

Host Frank Stasio talks with Monti founder Jeff Polish about the twists and turns of modern storytelling and listen to samples from some of the best performers. The Monti hosts its season finale show, “End of the Road” Saturday at 8 p.m. at the ArtsCenter in Carrboro.

Laura Lee

Laura Lee began her journalism career as a producer and booker at NPR. She returned to her native North Carolina to manage The State of Things, a live daily statewide show on WUNC. After working as a managing editor of an education journalism start-up, she became a writer and editor at a national education publication, Edutopia. She then served as the news editor at Carolina Public Press, a statewide investigative newsroom. In 2022, she worked to build collaborative coverage of elections administration and democracy in North Carolina.

Laura received her master’s in journalism from the University of Maryland and her bachelor’s degree in political science and J.D. from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.

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Frank Stasio

Longtime NPR correspondent Frank Stasio was named permanent host of The State of Things in June 2006. A native of Buffalo, Frank has been in radio since the age of 19. He began his public radio career at WOI in Ames, Iowa, where he was a magazine show anchor and the station's News Director.

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