There are some big questions in life that Google can’t give you a straight answer to. How tall is Jake Gyllenhaal? What makes Britney Spears choose her self-help books? And why has the local video shop shut down? It’s questions like these that modern-day Columbo Starlee Kine sets out to answer in Mystery Show (Gimlet Media). She gives a masterclass in storytelling that wanders from the point and then back again, painting pictures as she goes. Six episodes are lined up, ripe for a binge-listen.
The magic of Mystery Show lies in the everyday details. Self-confessed “writer no one reads” Andrea Seigel wants to know how her book To Feel Stuff ended up in the hands of Britney Spears. In Case #2: Britney, Seigel confesses she’s been obsessed with the pop princess since the Justin Timberlake and double-denim era. Getting the alert that told her Britney was photographed clutching her book as she headed out to dinner with her parents made her more excited than having a baby. “I have a Google setting of myself, because I’m a Kardashian,” admits Seigel. Kine attempts to track Britney down to find out why she chose the book and, more importantly, if she liked it. No spoilers, but the answer does nothing to dampen Seigel’s love for the pop star.
Case #5: Source Code provides one of the most satisfying conclusions to an investigation as Kine turns sleuth to find out how tall Jake Gyllenhaal is. Enlisting the help of Twitter, Kine relishes followers checking in with reports of sightings of the actor, as well as tales about where he wasn’t. “Sick in bed today,” writes one. “He is not making reassuring jokes while dabbing my forehead with a cool washcloth.” The climax is worth waiting for: a phone interview with Gyllenhaal where he charms and induces giggles like a good ’un. “There are days when I’m sure I seem taller than I am,” he says, stringing out the issue as he discusses the illusion of Dennis Quaid’s height in Innerspace.
Kine wraps up each mystery in a style that Columbo would be proud of, but it’s the layers she finds along the way that make you hang on her every word.
