The Dollop

The podcast began as a way of preparing for Anthony's one-man show at the Melbourne Comedy Festival. It was a solo project where Anthony would talk out loud about various subjects. Unsatisfied with the initial results, Anthony decided to change to a history focus, and invite other comedians to listen to the stories. Gareth Reynolds was the first guest; after his performance, Anthony decided to keep him as the only permanent guest.[3] Anthony was inspired by the book A People's History of the United States by Howard Zinn because it taught him that the history he was taught as a child was full of lies.[4]

Reynolds and Anthony have recorded a number of live episodes in various U.S. cities,[5] as well as Canada[6] and five tours of Australia.[7] Live episodes performed outside of the U.S. have featured stories from those respective countries; for example, topics covered in Australia included the Emu War and Arthur Phillip. Live shows both inside and outside the U.S. often include additional guests, including Patton Oswalt,[3] Wil Anderson,[7] and Georgia Hardstark and Karen Kilgariff of the podcast My Favorite Murder.[8] Occasional episodes reverse the format, and consist of stories selected and read by Reynolds to Anthony (for example the episode on Nim Chimpsky).[9]

As of late October 2019, the podcast has produced more than 400 episodes.

On 5 August 2019, the first season of The Dollop: England (& the UK) was announced. The first of ten episodes was released on 15 August 2019.

A sister podcast, called El Dollop, was announced on March 16, 2020. It is a spanish version of the Dollop. It is hosted by Eduardo Espinosa who reads to José Antonio Badía as Dave does to Gareth on The Dollop.[10]

Since shortly after its debut, The Dollop has consistently ranked in the iTunes top 100.[11] In 2016, The Guardian rated the podcast as one of the 50 best podcasts of 2016.[12]

On July 9, 2015, Alan Bellows of the history website and podcast Damn Interesting posted an open letter, accusing The Dollop of plagiarism.[13] Following this incident, Anthony claimed that all research and writing for new episodes was done by himself and others specifically for The Dollop, with sources referenced on a separate website.[4][14] However, in August 2019, Slate's national editor Josh Levin alleged that Anthony performed a live episode of The Dollop in 2017 that lifted almost entirely from Levin’s reporting, with no public credit.[15] Author Paul Brown further accused The Dollop of piecing together another 2017 episode from snippets of his book The Rocketbelt Caper.[16] Anthony subsequently posted a public apology to Levin on the podcast's Reddit discussion board, acknowledging this pattern as a personal failing and promising to do better in the future.[17]

In 2016, Anthony announced the upcoming release of a book featuring stories like those discussed on the podcast.[18] It was revealed that this book would be titled United States of Absurdity: Untold Stories from American History, and would be released in May 2017.[19] The book featured twenty-nine stories that had previously been featured on the podcast.[20] As of June 2017, United States of Absurdity ranked #15 on the LA Times bestseller list.[21]

Notes

Further reading

• Jones, Kevin L. (November 4, 2015). "Earful: Dave Anthony Makes History Hilarious with 'The Dollop'". KQED Arts. Retrieved September 15, 2017.

• The Dollop on iTunes https://itunes.apple.com/us/podcast/dollop-dave-anthony-gareth/id643055307?mt=2