Do It Today

Kara talks to Dorie Clark, a keynote speaker, consultant, and author of four books, most recently The Long Game: How to Be a Long-Term Thinker in a Short-Term World. She has been named one of the Top 50 business thinkers in the world by Thinkers50, and is a frequent contributor to the Harvard Business Review. Dorie is also a musical theater lyricist and member of the BMI Lehman Engel Musical Theater Workshop (where we met!). Big moments include a new fitness routine and myofunctional therapy, the power of four-way wins, how she uses forcing functions to make progress on her musical, and more.

More about Dorie Clark

https://dorieclark.com/

Follow Dorie on LinkedIn

https://www.linkedin.com/in/doriec/

Buy The Long Game: How to Be a Long-Term Thinker in a Short-Term World

https://dorieclark.com/books/

Do It Today is a podcast created by Kara Cutruzzula. She's the author of three motivational journals and a musical theater writer, playwright, and editor.

Buy Do It Today: An Encouragement Journal
Buy Do It For Yourself: A Motivational Journal
Pre-order Do It (or Don't): A Boundary-Creating Journal

Subscribe to Kara's newsletter: https://brassringdaily.substack.com/
Visit www.karacutruzzula.com, or follow her on Instagram @karacut

Kara talks to actor, singer, and writer Samantha Massell, who is starring as researcher Rosalind Franklin in the world premiere of the new musical Double Helix by Madeline Myers. Big moments include the four-year journey of Double Helix, treating creative projects like they're non-negotiable, her script for saying "no," and how plants and word puzzles create the structure of her day.

More about Samantha:

• Visit her website
• Follow Sam on Instagram @smassellsings
• Double Helix tells the story of the race to discover the structure of DNA in the 1950s and follows the brilliant young researcher, Rosalind Franklin, as she contends with adversity, anti-semitism, and love to uncover one of life's great mysteries.
  Buy tickets for Double Helix, running May 30-June 18 at the Bay Street Theater in Sag Harbor, New York
• New York Times article: Untangling Rosalind Franklin’s Role in DNA Discovery, 70 Years On
• And Sam uses the app Planta to create her plant schedule!

Do It Today is a podcast created by Kara Cutruzzula. She's the author of three motivational journals and a musical theater writer, playwright, and editor.

Buy Do It Today: An Encouragement Journal
Buy Do It For Yourself: A Motivational Journal
Pre-order Do It (or Don't): A Boundary-Creating Journal

Subscribe to Kara's newsletter: https://brassringdaily.substack.com/
Visit www.karacutruzzula.com, or follow her on Instagram @karacut

 
Artwork by Tyler Spangler and music by Kristoffer Bjarke

Kara talks to certified professional organizer Julie Bestry, an expert in all aspects of organizing and time management, who writes articles and teaches seminars on how organizing can make your life more functional. Big moments include creating time blocks for your most meaningful work, her 1-2-3 system for moving through the day, and letting go of the stress, shame, and overwhelm of not doing "enough."

More about Julie:

• Visit Julie Bestry's website
• Julie's article on Body Doubling for Productivity
• Julie turned the tables and interviewed me!
• Now Is the Right Time to Declare Bankruptcy on Your Projects

Do It Today is a podcast created by Kara Cutruzzula. She's the author of three motivational journals and a musical theater writer, playwright, and editor.

Buy Do It Today: An Encouragement Journal
Buy Do It For Yourself: A Motivational Journal
Pre-order Do It (or Don't): A Boundary-Creating Journal

Subscribe to Kara's newsletter: https://brassringdaily.substack.com/
Visit www.karacutruzzula.com, or follow her on Instagram @karacut

 
Artwork by Tyler Spangler and music by Kristoffer Bjarke

Kara talks to screenwriter and author David Koepp, who's written or co-written the screenplays for over 30 films, from Death Becomes Her and Jurassic Park to Mission: Impossible and his latest film Kimi. He's also a director and has written two novels, Cold Storage and Aurora, both of which are being adapted into films. Big moments include reworking a draft, how to respond to notes you may not agree with, and his method for fighting the number one enemy of work.

Visit David Koepp's website 

Read his Script Archive

Buy Cold Storage

Buy Aurora

Do It Today is a podcast created by Kara Cutruzzula. She's the author of three motivational journals and a musical theater writer, playwright, and editor.

Buy Do It Today: An Encouragement Journal
Buy Do It For Yourself: A Motivational Journal
Pre-order Do It (or Don't): A Boundary-Creating Journal

Subscribe to Kara's newsletter: https://brassringdaily.substack.com/
Visit www.karacutruzzula.com, or follow her on Instagram @karacut

 
Artwork by Tyler Spangler and music by Kristoffer Bjarke

Kara talks to author, speaker, and personal finance expert Erin Lowry, who helps broke millennials get their financial lives together. Big moments include how to do a deep dive with your money, managing wildly variable income as a creative or self-employed person, and bucketing your accounts to reach your financial goals. 

More about Erin:

Buy Erin Lowry's Broke Millennial books

Subscribe to her Substack

Follow her on Instagram

Do It Today is a podcast created by Kara Cutruzzula. She's the author of three motivational journals and a musical theater writer, playwright, and editor.

Buy Do It Today: An Encouragement Journal
Buy Do It For Yourself: A Motivational Journal
Pre-order Do It (or Don't): A Boundary-Creating Journal

Subscribe to Kara's newsletter: https://brassringdaily.substack.com/
Visit www.karacutruzzula.com, or follow her on Instagram @karacut

 
Artwork by Tyler Spangler and music by Kristoffer Bjarke

Kara talks to author, TV writer, and journalist Carrie Seim about her day. Big moments include the release of The Flying Flamingo Sisters 2, how she overcame setbacks on her "wild and weird" creative path, why everyone needs lifeguard friends in their corner, her secret to finishing drafts, and how working on a gigantic project is like building a canoe. (Yes, a canoe!)

More about Carrie: https://carrieseim.com/

Twitter: https://twitter.com/ckseim

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/carriekseim/ 

Mentions in the episode:

• The Flying Flamingo Sisters 2, Carrie's brand-new sequel
• The Flying Flamingo Sisters, the bestselling Audible series
• Carrie's wonderful novel Horse Girl
• Carrie's New York Times article about people taking a creative hiatus (including the canoe story)
• And the canoe builder himself, Trent Preszler, whose excellent memoir is Little and Often
• The art of the TK
• The Groundlings Theatre & School in Los Angeles

Do It Today is a podcast created by Kara Cutruzzula. She's the author of two motivational journals and a musical theater writer, playwright, and editor.

Buy Do It Today: An Encouragement Journal
Buy Do It For Yourself: A Motivational Journal

Subscribe to Kara's newsletter: https://brassringdaily.substack.com/
Visit www.karacutruzzula.com, or follow her on Instagram @karacut

 
Artwork by Tyler Spangler and music by Kristoffer Bjarke

Kara talks to composer, singer, and multi-instrumentalist Steve Wallace about his day. Big moments include working on the arrangements for a new musical adaptation of Animal Farm, how he avoids over-analyzing and gets stuff done, the faith that guides his creative vision, and more.

More about Steve: https://stevewallacemusic.com/

Twitter: @stevewstudio

Instagram: @stevewstudio1

A developmental production of Animal Farm: The Musical — music by Steve Wallace, lyrics by Daniel Abrahamson, book by Sarah Mucek — is running at the BMCC Tribeca Performing Arts Center from Nov. 16-20 in New York City. More info here (it's free!).

Mentions in the episode:

• Watch Hal King, a hip hop/R&B-style musical set in the jazz era of the late 1950s, based on Shakespeare's King Henry IV and V.
• Steve's first album, Come With Tha Real!
• Finale, the music notation software

Do It Today is a podcast created by Kara Cutruzzula. She's the author of two motivational journals and a musical theater writer, playwright, and editor.

Buy Do It Today: An Encouragement Journal
Buy Do It For Yourself: A Motivational Journal

Subscribe to Kara's newsletter: https://brassringdaily.substack.com/
Visit www.karacutruzzula.com, or follow her on Instagram @karacut

 
Artwork by Tyler Spangler and music by Kristoffer Bjarke

Kara talks to actor and singer Liz Callaway about her day. Big moments include releasing her live Sondheim album, realizing it's never too late to learn something new, creating your own breaks, the joys of starting before you're ready, her favorite reads on creativity, and more.

More about Liz Callaway: http://lizcallaway.com/ 

Twitter: @LizGoesOn

Instagram: @LizGoesOn

Facebook: LizCallawayOfficial

Watch Liz's YouTube channel

Buy Liz's new album, To Steve With Love: Liz Callaway Celebrates Sondheim
Listen to To Steve With Love on Spotify
See Liz and her sister Ann Hampton Callaway at 54 Below in November. Tickets here
Buy Liz's Christmas album, Comfort and Joy: An Acoustic Christmas

Follow Liz on Spotify: http://bit.ly/SpotifyLizCallaway 

Follow Liz on Apple Music: http://bit.ly/AppleMusicLizCallaway 

Mentions in the episode:

• Billie Jean King's book Pressure Is a Privilege
• Richard Maltby Jr and the BMI Musical Theater Workshop
• Jimmy Webb, Paul Williams, and Liz Callaway at Feinstein's in 2001
• The organizational app Things
• David Allen's book Getting Things Done
• Circa Notebooks
• Austin Kleon's book Keep Going
• Jeff Tweedy's book How to Write One Song
• Listen to Stephen Sondheim's 1971 talk at 92nd Street Y
• Oliver Burkeman's newsletter The Imperfectionist
• James Clear's 3-2-1 newsletter

Do It Today is a podcast created by Kara Cutruzzula. She's the author of two motivational journals and a musical theater writer, playwright, and editor.

Buy Do It Today: An Encouragement Journal

Buy Do It For Yourself: A Motivational Journal

Subscribe to Kara's newsletter: https://brassringdaily.substack.com/
Visit www.karacutruzzula.com, or follow her on Instagram @karacut

Artwork by Tyler Spangler and music by Kristoffer Bjarke

Kara talks to book editor Zack Knoll about his day. Big moments include how he protects his creative editing time, maintaining author relationships, fighting the three o'clock slump, and why he organizes his multi-folder inbox while watching Real Housewives.

Follow Zack on Twitter: @zackknoll_
Follow Zack on Instagram: @rack__roll

Mentions in the episode:

• Do It Today: An Encouragement Journal (which Kara wrote and Zack edited!)
• Abrams Books
• Turning on airplane mode and logging out of Outlook while editing
• Why he creates folders for each book project in his inbox
• Beating back the three o'clock slump by putting tasks on his calendar

Do It Today is a podcast created by Kara Cutruzzula. She's the author of two motivational journals and a musical theater writer, playwright, and editor.

Buy Do It Today: An Encouragement Journal

Buy Do It For Yourself: A Motivational Journal

Subscribe to Kara's newsletter: https://brassringdaily.substack.com/
Visit www.karacutruzzula.com, or follow her on Instagram @karacut

Artwork by Tyler Spangler and music by Kristoffer Bjarke

Kara talks to Broadway stage manager, producer, and educator Cody Renard Richard about his day. Big moments include navigating a two-show day for Into the Woods, why he brings his full self to work, his "sh*t to get done" list, finding the path he was supposed to walk, and how he winds down after working long hours. 

More about Cody: https://www.codyrenard.com/ 

Follow Cody on Instagram: @codyrenard

Follow Cody on Twitter: @codyrenard

Mentions in the episode:

• Parade at New York City Center
• The Cody Renard Richard Scholarship Program
• Into the Woods on Broadway
• Producing the Tony Award-winning musical A Strange Loop on Broadway
• Seeing Avenue Q and knowing he wanted to be a stage manager 
• The gateway musical power of Wicked
• And check out Cody's Tony Award, which arrived since we recorded this episode!

Do It Today is a podcast created by Kara Cutruzzula. She's the author of two motivational journals and a musical theater writer, playwright, and editor.

Buy Do It Today: An Encouragement Journal

Buy Do It For Yourself: A Motivational Journal

Subscribe to Kara's newsletter: https://brassringdaily.substack.com/
Visit www.karacutruzzula.com, or follow her on Instagram @karacut

Artwork by Tyler Spangler and music by Kristoffer Bjarke