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Hysterical Stares Into the Abyss


Dan Taberski’s latest audio docuseries probes an unsolved mystery of mass contagion.

Later, the specter of environmental pollution came into play, a natural hypothesis for the industrial town about an hour from Niagara Falls, where the Love Canal disaster, in which toxic-chemical dumping was discovered in the late 1970s to have harmed residents over decades, still looms large. This could be owed to the nature of his breakout hit, 2017’s Missing Richard Simmons, an impish jaunt that sought to track down the titular reclusive fitness star (who died earlier this summer) while doubling as an adoring biography that drew pearl-clutching condemnation from the Times, which called it “morally suspect” for what it deemed to be excessively invasive tactics. Among his projects: Running From COPS, an extended critique of the copaganda reality show; The Line, a vigorous investigation into a war crime in Iraq; and 9/12, an essayistic series taking stock of the manifold experiences processing the long tail of the September 11 attacks.

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