Revisionist History

Understanding the Death Penalty: Malcolm Gladwell on The Intercept Briefing

11 Dec 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Malcolm and Liliana Segura, a criminal justice reporter at Intercept, sat down for an episode of The Intercept Briefing to discuss The Alabama Murders...

How to Experience the Joy of Giving Right Now: A Giving Tuesday Special from The Happiness Lab

02 Dec 2025

Contributed by Lukas

According to the science, it really is better to give than receive. Donating a dollar; sharing a kind word or lending someone a hand changes lives, bu...

IBM CEO Arvind Krishna: Creating Smarter Business with AI and Quantum

27 Nov 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Today we're sharing a recent episode from another show Malcolm hosts, Smart Talks with IBM. Malcolm Gladwell sits down with IBM Chairman and CEO Arvin...

Introducing Business History: How Free Whisky, Hot Pants and Low Fares Led to Southwest's Success

19 Nov 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Today, we're sharing a new podcast from Pushkin Industries we think you'll enjoy. Former Planet Money hosts Jacob Goldstein and Robert Smith examine t...

From Medal of Honor: Showing Up On Veterans Day

11 Nov 2025

Contributed by Lukas

To mark Veterans Day, host J.R. Martinez sits down with producer Ryan Sweikert to talk about what he’s learned from the stories of veterans who ...

The Alabama Murders - Part 7: The Second Warrant

06 Nov 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Holman Correctional Facility. January 2024. Over three decades after the murder of Elizabeth Sennett, the failure cascade comes to an end, but not bef...

The Alabama Murders - Part 6: The Porterfield Sessions

30 Oct 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Manhattan, NY December. 2022. What do you do, after the state has tried to execute you, but failed? Kenny Smith’s legal team calls Kate Porterfi...

The Alabama Murders - Part 5: Cruel and Unusual

23 Oct 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Holman Correctional Facility. November 2022. The State of Alabama tries to execute Kenneth Smith. Get early, ad-free access to the full season of The...

The Alabama Murders - Part 4: The Protocol

16 Oct 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Holman Correctional Facility. June 2010. John Forrest Parker is put to death by lethal injection. He didn’t appear to suffer. But did he? Get e...

The Alabama Murders - Part 3: A Peculiar Institution

09 Oct 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Colbert County. May 1989. One of the men charged with  Elizabeth Sennett’s murder stands trial. But the prosecution’s case has  ...

The Alabama Murders - Part 2: Coon Dog Cemetery Road

02 Oct 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Florence, Alabama. 1988. After a horrifying murder takes place, an anonymous caller names three young men as suspects. But speculation swirls about th...

The Alabama Murders - Part 1: The True Church

02 Oct 2025

Contributed by Lukas

In a small town in the northwest corner of Alabama, a cascade begins with a man and an affair. Get early, ad-free access to the full season of The Al...

The Alabama Murders

22 Sep 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Florence, Alabama. 1988. A preacher has an affair. A woman is murdered. One death cascades into more, stretching across decades and leaving no one unt...

L’Oréal and IBM: AI-Powered Beauty from Smart Talks with IBM

28 Aug 2025

Contributed by Lukas

This week we're sharing an episode from Malcolm's other podcast, Smart Talks with IBM. The episode takes you behind the scenes at L'Oréal&rsquo...

Americana Music Live with Drew Holcomb and Malcolm Gladwell

14 Aug 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Wrapping up our summer music series, the Memphis-born, East Nashville-based singer songwriter Drew Holcomb talks with Malcolm in front of a live audie...

What Is Your Life For? From Hidden Brain

31 Jul 2025

Contributed by Lukas

What should you do with your life? There's no one-size-fits-all answer to that question. But there are scientifically-tested methods that can help you...

Encore: Good Old Boys

24 Jul 2025

Contributed by Lukas

In 2019, Malcolm just wanted an excuse to hang out with Randy Newman so they sat down at the piano together and tried to answer the question: If you d...

Encore: Analysis, Parapraxis, Elvis

17 Jul 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Malcolm’s habit of reading footnotes leads him to the psychologist Alan Elms, which leads him to the one song Elvis couldn’t sing. We revi...

Encore: The King of Tears

10 Jul 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Why does country music make you cry, but rock and roll doesn’t? We revisit a musical interpretation of a divided America in this episode from 20...

Encore: Hallelujah

03 Jul 2025

Contributed by Lukas

How does genius emerge?  Kicking off our summer series, Malcolm digs into the Revisionist History archive to revisit Elvis Costello’s song ...

Encores

26 Jun 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Starting next week, we revisit four of Malcolm’s favorite episodes from the Revisionist History archives, all about music.See omnystudio.com/lis...

Warlords, Espionage, and Disinformation | Introducing Hot Money: Agent of Chaos

19 Jun 2025

Contributed by Lukas

In 2020, the Financial Times exposed a 2 billion euro fraud at Wirecard, a high-flying German fintech. Many thought that was the end of the story. But...

From Smart Talks with IBM: How AI Assistants Can Transform Education

12 Jun 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Malcolm Gladwell visits Kennesaw State University to learn about Jiwoo, an AI Assistant that helps future teachers practice responsive teaching by sim...

Medal of Honor: Journeys of Courage with J.R. Martinez

05 Jun 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Medal of Honor, Pushkin's podcast about those who have received the United States’ top military decoration, returns for Season 2. Malcolm, who h...

The Formula

29 May 2025

Contributed by Lukas

In our season finale, we team up with the Culinary Institute of America to reverse engineer the secret recipe for Thomas’s English Muffins. You ...

Nooks & Crannies

22 May 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Seven people knew the recipe for a half-a-billion dollar muffin. Then, one of them tried to leave. Get ad-free episodes to Revisionist History by sub...

Rat vs. Raccoon

15 May 2025

Contributed by Lukas

What if we picked the wrong animal? Get ad-free episodes to Revisionist History by subscribing to Pushkin+ on Apple Podcasts or Pushkin.fm. Pushkin+ ...

Face Value

08 May 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Malcolm and Lucie discover that they experience something very differently.   If you suspect you might have a problem recognizing faces and you ...

The Origin of “You” – A Conversation with John McWhorter

01 May 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Malcolm sits down with the linguist John McWhorter, to discuss his new book, Pronoun Trouble: The Story of Us in Seven Little Words. Among other thing...

The Joe Rogan Intervention

24 Apr 2025

Contributed by Lukas

The world's most famous interviewer has a problem with interviewing. Revisionist History is here to help. Get ad-free episodes to Revisionist History...

The RFK Jr. Problem

17 Apr 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Malcolm investigates the origins of what the U.S. Secretary of Health and Human Services believes (and doesn’t believe) about viruses. Get ad-f...

Running Hot

10 Apr 2025

Contributed by Lukas

You might think unbelievably loud, shrill sirens on ambulances and fire trucks are just a fact of life. But what if we got the facts all wrong? In thi...

The Sporkful Presents: How Did ‘Super Size Me’ End Up In Schools?

03 Apr 2025

Contributed by Lukas

We're sharing an episode from the Sporkful podcast. In 2004, Morgan Spurlock released his low-budget documentary Super Size Me, and achieved succ...

In Defense of PAW Patrol

27 Mar 2025

Contributed by Lukas

PAW Patrol is in trouble. Like Ryder and the pups, Malcolm comes to the rescue. Get ad-free episodes to Revisionist History by subscribing to Pushkin...

Memorial Day, 2020 | Part 2

20 Mar 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Five years ago a police officer tried to stop Derek Chauvin from murdering George Floyd. Why didn’t he try harder? Get ad-free episodes to Revi...

Memorial Day, 2020 | Part 1

13 Mar 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Five years ago the entire world watched Derek Chauvin murder George Floyd. What did we miss? Get ad-free episodes to Revisionist History by subscribi...

Revisionist History is Back

06 Mar 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Revisionist History will be back with an all-new season starting March 13th. We’ll be investigating everything from Paw Patrol to the secret beh...

Welcoming Heavyweight

27 Feb 2025

Contributed by Lukas

We are thrilled to welcome the acclaimed narrative series Heavyweight to the Pushkin network. In each episode Jonathan Goldstein sets out to help some...

Malcolm Breaks Down the Perfect Break Up Song

14 Feb 2025

Contributed by Lukas

In this Valentine’s Day special from Pushkin Industries, Malcolm breaks down the perfect break up song. But first, Broken Record hosts Justin Ri...

The Future of Healthcare Technology with Eli Lilly and Company's Diogo Rau

06 Feb 2025

Contributed by Lukas

How is technology transforming the healthcare space? Malcolm sits down with Diogo Rau, the Chief Information and Digital Officer at Eli Lilly and Comp...

How to Trust and Be Trusted with Rachel Botsman

23 Jan 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Rachel Botsman, Oxford University Lecturer and author of the new Pushkin audiobook How to Trust and Be Trusted, joins Malcolm to talk about how to mak...

Presenting Gone South

26 Dec 2024

Contributed by Lukas

Here's an episode from a podcast that you may enjoy. Presenting Gone South. This episode looks at the life and legacy of Buford Pusser, an iconic Amer...

A Very Terminator Christmas

18 Dec 2024

Contributed by Lukas

What happens when the biggest movie star in the world directs the smallest Christmas film on basic cable? A holiday miracle.  Today on the show: ...

Gambling with Michael Lewis

21 Nov 2024

Contributed by Lukas

Michael Lewis, host of Against the Rules and author of Moneyball, The Big Short, Liar’s Poker, and Going Infinite, joins Malcolm to talk about the w...

John Birch vs. the PTA

31 Oct 2024

Contributed by Lukas

In the 1960s, a right-wing organization led by a former candy tycoon rose to fame in America for their anti-communist campaigns. They called themselve...

Exploring Life-Saving AI Tech with T-Mobile for Business

29 Oct 2024

Contributed by Lukas

How is 5G powering the use of AI to revolutionize life-saving solutions? Malcolm sits with T-Mobile for Business CMO Mo Katibeh, 3AM Innovations COO R...

The Tipping Point Revisited: Broken Windows

24 Oct 2024

Contributed by Lukas

In The Tipping Point, Malcolm helped popularize a controversial approach to policing called “Broken Windows Theory” that is often credited for kee...

The Tipping Point Revisited: Live with David Remnick

17 Oct 2024

Contributed by Lukas

On the very first stop of the Revenge of the Tipping Point book tour, Malcolm sat down with David Remnick, editor of the New Yorker, at the 92Y in New...

The Tipping Point Revisited: Georgetown Massacre Part 2

10 Oct 2024

Contributed by Lukas

What exactly constitutes a bribe? The Georgetown Massacre continues, and the defense calls a surprise witness. See omnystudio.com/listener for privac...

The Tipping Point Revisited: Georgetown Massacre Part 1

03 Oct 2024

Contributed by Lukas

In the ‘Varsity Blues’ college admissions scandal, the government indicted more than 50 people. Business leaders. Celebrities. Actors. Rich people...

The Tipping Point Revisited: An Excerpt

26 Sep 2024

Contributed by Lukas

Today, we’re sharing an exclusive preview of the audiobook of Revenge of the Tipping Point. All about bank robbers and doctors. Find Revenge of the ...

Hitler’s Olympics, Part 9: A Plague on Both Your Houses.

22 Aug 2024

Contributed by Lukas

In the season finale, we turn back the clock four years, take a side trip to Alabama, meet an extraordinary man named Billy Garland, and ask: What is ...

Hitler’s Olympics, Part 8: “Vater, It is to be Fayetteville”

15 Aug 2024

Contributed by Lukas

In the early 1930s, a young German law student spent a year in Arkansas, studying American “race law.” The fight over the 1936 Games provided Amer...

Hitler’s Olympics, Part 7: Long Jump, Tall Tale

08 Aug 2024

Contributed by Lukas

Jesse Owens spent the rest of his life retelling the story of the 1936 games and his encounter with Luz Long. We trace the evolution of a tall tale, d...

Hitler’s Olympics, Part 6: The Jiggle & the Giddy Up

01 Aug 2024

Contributed by Lukas

The most famous athlete in Berlin was the American sprinter Jesse Owens, and one of the most famous stories from those Games was the unexpected, heart...

Pushkin Goes to the Olympics

26 Jul 2024

Contributed by Lukas

Legends are made at the Olympics and this summer shows across the Pushkin network are bringing their unique takes to Olympic stories. This special epi...

Hitler’s Olympics, Part 5: The Amateur’s Hour

25 Jul 2024

Contributed by Lukas

A German Jewish high-jumper is determined to get her shot at Olympic greatness. And an idealist faces an existential choice. In the fifth episode of H...

Hitler’s Olympics, Part 4: Outcast in Olympia

18 Jul 2024

Contributed by Lukas

The cheerleader-in-chief for the American Olympic movement was a brilliant, self-made Chicago tycoon named Avery Brundage. Brundage did more to ensure...

Hitler’s Olympics, Part 3: Mustache to Mustache

11 Jul 2024

Contributed by Lukas

With the fate of the Olympics on the line, Charles Sherrill travels to Germany to take up the question of Jewish athletes directly with the Führer. W...

Hitler’s Olympics, Part 2: Pangloss, Polonius, Prufrock

04 Jul 2024

Contributed by Lukas

Charles Sherrill was everything a gentleman of his generation was supposed to be: rich, handsome, charming, Ivy-Leagued. He was impossibly well connec...

Hitler’s Olympics, Part 1: The Blue-Eyed Tornado

27 Jun 2024

Contributed by Lukas

In the early 1930s, Adolf Hitler granted a rare interview to the American journalist Dorothy Thompson. When Hitler later came to power, and prepared t...

Hitler’s Olympics

21 Jun 2024

Contributed by Lukas

Adolf Hitler swept to power in Germany in the early 1930s and soon set out to stage the most extravagant and spectacular summer Olympics yet: the 1936...

Malcolm on No Small Endeavor

18 Apr 2024

Contributed by Lukas

Malcolm recently sat down with friend and award-winning theologian Lee C. Camp to discuss his journey on the acclaimed podcast No Small Endeavor. In t...

Blue Seattle with Cameron Crowe | Development Hell

11 Apr 2024

Contributed by Lukas

In 1986, Cameron Crowe, the film director, and Nancy Wilson, of the rock group Heart, got married. They honeymooned in a little cabin in the Pacific N...

Labor of Love with M. Night Shyamalan | Development Hell

28 Mar 2024

Contributed by Lukas

Before M. Night Shyamalan became a household name for his mind bending thrillers like “The Sixth Sense” and “Signs”, he was just a young scree...

I Am Superman with Patty Jenkins | Development Hell

21 Mar 2024

Contributed by Lukas

Between her big hits, “Monster” and “Wonder Woman”, Patty Jenkins wrote an R-rated fairy tale, starring a dog. She hoped that the dog would de...

The Birthday Party with Charles Randolph | Development Hell

14 Mar 2024

Contributed by Lukas

Before Charles Randolph won an Oscar for writing “The Big Short,” he adapted a memoir called “The Birthday Party”: the true story of a white m...

Bubbles with Isaac Adamson | Development Hell

07 Mar 2024

Contributed by Lukas

This is the story behind a biopic about a chimpanzee named Bubbles, sidekick to the King of Pop. Malcolm talks with the writer, Isaac Adamson, about t...

The Variable Man with Gary Goldman and Angus Fletcher | Development Hell

29 Feb 2024

Contributed by Lukas

Gary Goldman was a writer on “Total Recall”, a Philip K. Dick adaptation directed by Paul Verhoeven and starring Arnold Schwarzeneger. It was a bi...

Blink with Stephen Gaghan | Development Hell

29 Feb 2024

Contributed by Lukas

It’s the mid-2000s, Malcolm and writer/producer Stephen Gaghan (“Traffic”, “Syriana”) are running around Hollywood pitching their scripted a...

Welcome to Development Hell

23 Feb 2024

Contributed by Lukas

Abandon hope, all ye who enter here. On February 29th, Revisionist History is returning with Development Hell, a series of untold stories about Hollyw...

Revisionist History LIVE with Nate Berkus

15 Feb 2024

Contributed by Lukas

Malcolm Gladwell sits with interior design legend Nate Berkus in a live conversation covering everything from travel, to their moms, prestige TV, and ...

The IT Revolution

01 Feb 2024

Contributed by Lukas

The digital revolution has been happening for a while now, but with 5G, it’s about to reach a whole new level. IT departments are about to rule the...

Board Game Season

21 Dec 2023

Contributed by Lukas

A young family nearly lost everything in the 1970s farm crisis. Then, they invented a board game. Today on the show, producer Ben Naddaff-Hafrey share...

A New Day at the Races

04 Dec 2023

Contributed by Lukas

Revisionist History heads to Las Vegas for the Formula One Las Vegas Grand Prix, courtesy of T-Mobile for Business. Malcolm talks with T-Mobile and La...

This Is Your Captain Speaking

16 Nov 2023

Contributed by Lukas

What does a pilot sound like? Malcolm and Ben Naddaff-Hafrey take off on a long, strange investigation that takes them from Las Vegas to Family Guy to...

The Bear Was Poked With Maria Konnikova

02 Nov 2023

Contributed by Lukas

Maria Konnikova returns as Revisionist History’s ombudsman. Today, she talks with Malcolm about assault rifles, tales of the two Matt Dillons, moral...

Oil and Blood: The Osage Murders from Cautionary Tales

31 Oct 2023

Contributed by Lukas

Today, we’re bringing you an episode from another Pushkin show, Cautionary Tales with Tim Harford. This episode is based on Killers of the Flower Mo...

Unlocking Hidden Potential with Adam Grant

26 Oct 2023

Contributed by Lukas

Malcolm Gladwell hosts a rollicking live discussion about Adam Grant’s new book, “Hidden Potential: The Science of Achieving Greater Things,” wh...

Silicon Valley on the Couch

19 Oct 2023

Contributed by Lukas

Why is Silicon Valley where it is? How did a narrow valley in California become the epicenter of the computer age? People usually say it’s because o...

Guns Part 6: “Sin is the failure to bother to care”

05 Oct 2023

Contributed by Lukas

Abdullah Pratt grew up in one of the most dangerous neighborhoods in America, then returned to be an ER doctor in his neighborhood hospital. At the en...

Five Burning Travel Questions with Malcolm Gladwell

03 Oct 2023

Contributed by Lukas

Revisionist History hits the road, courtesy of Airbnb. Malcolm shares some travel tips, including music for poolside relaxation, how to find your way ...

Guns Part 5: The Footnote

28 Sep 2023

Contributed by Lukas

At the end of a forgotten study of convicted murderers, the author left a devastating footnote.  We travel to an old plantation house outside Montgom...

Guns Part 4: Moral Hazard

21 Sep 2023

Contributed by Lukas

Robert Kennedy was killed by an assassin's bullet in 1968, ending his presidential run. Had he been shot today, would he have lived? A what-if story a...

Guns Part 3: A Shooting Lesson

14 Sep 2023

Contributed by Lukas

Malcolm goes to a shooting range in the woods of North Carolina to get a tutorial on the AR-15. It’s scary. It’s ugly. It’s at the center of the...

Guns Part 2: Getting out of Dodge

07 Sep 2023

Contributed by Lukas

The longest running television series of the 20th century was Gunsmoke, a western set in the notorious Dodge City, Kansas. Malcolm sweeps away mountai...

Guns Part 1: The Sudden Celebrity of Sir John Knight

31 Aug 2023

Contributed by Lukas

In the battles over gun rights, a shadowy English nobleman from the 17th century has unexpectedly taken center stage. Who was he? What did he do that ...

Doctors, Guns, and Money

17 Aug 2023

Contributed by Lukas

Coming soon – a six-part series from Revisionist History about everything Americans get wrong about guns.  The series will air weekly, starting Thu...

Taxonomy of the Modern Mystery Story

27 Jul 2023

Contributed by Lukas

Today, another episode from the Revisionist History Live universe. It's an old fashioned lecture, recorded at the New Orleans Book Festival at Tulane ...

Acting Out

06 Jul 2023

Contributed by Lukas

Malcolm talks with Ben Naddaff-Hafrey, host of The Last Archive, about the forgotten origins of a major social science, the missing chapter in Ella Fi...

A Good Circle

29 Jun 2023

Contributed by Lukas

This season, Malcolm's covered a lot of the problems in higher education. Today on the show: A solution. A big idea being tested at a little school on...

Feeling A Bit Attacked with Maria Konnikova

22 Jun 2023

Contributed by Lukas

Maria Konnikova, Revisionist History’s ombudsman—who's also an author, psychologist and professional poker player—is back for another round. Thi...

The Pushkin Prize for Egregiously Deceptive Self-Promotion

08 Jun 2023

Contributed by Lukas

Consider this your invitation to the greatest award show no one’s ever heard of: the Pushkin Prizes, created to honor the giants of the American edu...

The Crisis in Girls’ Sports with Lauren Fleshman and Linda Flanagan

25 May 2023

Contributed by Lukas

In a live conversation taped at the 92nd Street Y in New York City, Malcolm and his Martian friend consult athletes Linda Flanagan and Lauren Fleshman...

The Mystery of Mastery with Adam Gopnik

18 May 2023

Contributed by Lukas

In a live conversation taped at the 92nd Street Y in New York City, Malcolm chats with his old friend and New Yorker magazine colleague, Adam Gopnik, ...

Introducing: So Many Steves, A New Audiobook from Steve Martin and Pushkin

03 May 2023

Contributed by Lukas

Today, we’re bringing you a preview of Pushkin's new audiobook, “So Many Steves.” Steve Martin is more candid than he’s ever been about his cr...

Malcolm Goes to Debate School

13 Apr 2023

Contributed by Lukas

What do you do after you've been humiliated at the Munk Debates? You call in the A-Team. See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Higher Animals with Michael Specter

06 Apr 2023

Contributed by Lukas

Malcolm talks with his old friend, the brilliant science writer Michael Specter, about the future of life on Earth. Michael's response to the Covid-19...

Started From The Bottom with Justin Richmond

16 Mar 2023

Contributed by Lukas

Today, we dig into the fascinating life of someone Malcolm knows very well: fellow Pushkin host Justin Richmond. Malcolm and Justin talk about being t...

Rodents and Red Wine with Maria Konnikova

09 Mar 2023

Contributed by Lukas

Author, psychologist and professional poker player Maria Konnikova joins the show as Revisionist History’s first ombudsman. Maria advocates for the ...