By Chuck Darrow
A list of popular show business-focused podcasts would probably fill much of this space. But it’s far easier to name those emanating from Marlton: CooperTalk.
At last count, the digital chatfest hosted by Marlton resident Steve Cooper was up to 1,059 episodes, with no end on the horizon. The segments cover a wide swath of the entertainment world including film (Chris Sarandon and Robby Benson are among the movie actors who have guested on the podcast), TV (David Duchovny, Tom Arnold, Ed Asner) and, especially, pop music: Among those whom Cooper has chatted with are classic-rock titan Ian Hunter; ’80s pop chanteuse Sheena Easton; guitar god Joe Bonamassa and Steve “Little Steven” van Zandt of Bruce Springsteen (and The Sopranos) fame.
Earlier this month, Million Podcasts, a database for the public relations industry, put CooperTalk at No. 74 on its list of the top 100 celebrity-interview podcasts.
Not bad for someone who didn’t set out to be a celebrity interrogator.
Cooper’s journey to the podcast universe began in the 1980s when the Cherry Hill East High School and Stockton University (business degree) alum began attending a Learning Annex comedy class conducted by standup comic and Pennsauken native Brian McKim and his Philadelphia-raised wife, Traci Skeene. That led to Cooper spending several years working the nation’s comedy-club circuit. In the mid-1990s, he decided to relocate to the west coast.
“I wanted to pursue writing,” he recalled during a recent interview. “I was in San Diego first and just wanted something different – to pursue comedy writing and try to get some [jobs acting in TV commercials}.”
So, in 2001, he made the move north to Los Angeles.
“When you’re in L.A. you have a bunch of different hustles,” he offered. “I was a waiter and then I ended up in event planning for a restaurant chain called Granville. And [in 2011 ]I met this guy who had an internet radio station.”
The station, continued Cooper, was primarily music-focused, but when he was invited to host a program, he knew immediately what its format should be.
“I said I want to do an hour-long talk show. And [the station manager] said, ‘We have to do [what’s known as “indie-rock”], but you can do half-indie music and half-talk.’ So, I started getting comics to come in, and then I started getting a lot of listeners.”
First ‘get’
Ultimately, Cooper was given the go-ahead to forgo playing music altogether and do an hour-long conversation program, which he dubbed CooperTalk. While his guest list was pretty much limited to comedians he knew, he soon enough branched out to non-comedy guests.
His “first big ‘get’ ” was Brian “Kato” Kaelin, who earned his 15 minutes of fame by living in O.J. Simpson’s guest house when the double murder that captivated America and etched both men’s names in the True Crime Hall of Fame occurred.
Fittingly for someone whose workspace was the internet, Cooper, who is also a full-time substitute teacher in the Evesham School District, started contacting performers via their social-media accounts. To his surprise, many responded. For instance, he noted, “I saw Robby Benson on Facebook, so I reached out to him. He was in L.A. and he came to the studio and did it.”
Other times, coincidence aided his booking efforts.
He spoke of the day he stopped at a store to buy some onions for the chili that JoAnn, his then-girlfriend, now-wife, was making for dinner. In the store was someone who looked familiar to him. It turned out to be Erik Paladino, who at the time was best-known for his role on the NBC-TV medical drama, ER (more recently, he’s had recurring roles on The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel, Suits and Godfather of Harlem). Cooper approached Palladino, confirmed the actor’s identity and invited him to be a guest on the podcast, a proposition to which Palladino agreed.
As Cooper quickly learned, even if a program host is unknown, all it takes is a couple of “name” guests to establish credibility in the entertainment world. His early subjects soon led him to book Asner (The Mary Tyler Moore Show, Lou Grant) and he was off and running.
Because of modern technology — specifically, Zoom — when, in 2017, Cooper and JoAnn moved back to South Jersey because of sky-high real estate prices in Southern California, he was able to continue CooperTalk without missing a beat.
‘Organic’ interviews
When asked what makes his show different from the myriad other similar podcasts, Cooper — who also hosts two other podcasts, Coop’s Comedy Corner and the business/business-law-focused Lawsuits & Lessons – didn’t hesitate before responding.
“I do ‘organic’ interviews,” he said. “I don’t even call them ‘interviews;’ they’re organic chats,” which, he explained, is why he keeps editing to a minimum.
While he said he does remove segments on request if a guest is afraid they might have said something slanderous about someone else, he keeps things like long pauses and the occasional tripping over words in the final product.
“I think the normal person stammers; we all stutter once in a while,” he said. “And sometimes people take a while to think about what they’re going to say. But that’s what real conversation is.
“That’s why I don’t like asking [specific] questions and I don’t think in terms of editing. I just want it to be like I’m BS-ing with someone at a bar or at dinner. That’s why I don’t edit. I want that natural flow.” ••
