The World Beneath

Billionaire Zappos founder and tech CEO Tony Hsieh was obsessed with happiness and helping people achieve it. After running “the world's happiest company” for two decades, Hsieh created his experimental community — The Downtown Project — dedicated to pursuing happiness. But what do Tony's life and death reveal about Silicon Valley's obsession with re-imagining how society functions? "A gripping tale" - The Guardian Listen and follow now: https://link.chtbl.com/costofhappiness Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Here's your special preview episode of the new series Elizabeth the First – about the remarkable life of Elizabeth Taylor. In this preview, we learn how Elizabeth's ambitious spirit was unmistakable early in life. The relationship with her parents and the push into the glamour and prestige of Hollywood collided with the reality of a male-dominated business – one that was more interested in making Taylor a product, than the person she knew herself to be. Headline News says ‘I love Elizabeth the First' and the Toronto Star says the podcast is ‘sumptuously produced'. Find out what all the buzz is about by listening to the full series right now: https://link.chtbl.com/elizabeththefirst Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

The Vanished is a true crime podcast that explores the stories of those who have gone missing. The Vanished goes beyond conventional news reports to take a deep dive into the story of a different missing person each week.      Host Marissa Jones brings you exclusive interviews with family members, friends, law enforcement and experts on mainstream cases, as well as little known ones.   Listen in, to hear what The Vanished will uncover next: wondery.fm/vanished_worldbeneat Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Warsaw, Missouri, is a small, rural town of just over 2,000 people in the American Midwest. Locally it's known as the “quiet end of the Lake of the Ozarks.” Very few realize that it's the paddlefish capital of the world. But when a new group arrived driving flashy, imported cars and dropping hundreds of dollars on bait and tackle, the town became the setting for an undercover federal sting operation tasked with bringing down a suspected international caviar poaching ring.  Financial Times says Paddlefish is an "intriguing crime caper" and "a Hollywood thriller begging to be made" Listen now: https://link.chtbl.com/paddlefish Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Fear and hysteria grip the small town of Gilmer, Texas, when the search for missing teenager Kelly Wilson takes a series of bizarre and shocking turns. Thirty years later, journalist Wes Ferguson returns home to uncover what really happened to Kelly, who has never been found, in this wild, 10-episode true crime podcast.  Listen now: https://link.chtbl.com/deviltown Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

In a world where “influence” equals follower counts and likes, there was one woman who, over the course of her career and half a century before, defined the meaning of influence and transformed its power.  She went the distance by living a remarkable life beyond the dazzle - breaking ground as the first true influencer. Her name?  Elizabeth Taylor. Narrated by Katy Perry, Elizabeth the First is a 10-episode podcast series exploring the life of Elizabeth Taylor as Hollywood icon, mother, wife, entrepreneur, advocate… and influencer. Listen now: https://link.chtbl.com/elizabeththefirst Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Once called “the miracle on the beach,” Synanon began in the 1960s as an experimental rehab facility in Santa Monica, California with a radical claim: It could cure heroin addiction. Before long, it would make an even bolder claim: It could cure any of your problems. All you had to do was move in. What started in a house on the beach, soon spread to compounds across the country. The man who made the miracle happen, Charles E. Dederich, aka “Chuck,” would be the one to destroy it all, along with the lives of many of his followers and millions of dollars in assets. The Sunshine Place tells the mind-blowing, true-story of Synanon - one of America's most cutting edge social experiments, turned into one of its most dangerous and violent cults - as it's never been told before: by the people who lived it. Executive Produced by Robert Downey Jr., Susan Downey, and Emily Barclay Ford for Team Downey and C13Originals, together with Josh McLaughlin for Wink Pictures and written, produced, and directed by Peabody-nominated C13Originals, a Cadence13 Studio.  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

From Sean Kipe and Imperative Entertainment comes the story of former Georgia police officer Michael Chapel, convicted of the 1993 robbery and brutal murder of Emogene Thompson and sentenced to life in prison. However, with the recent surfacing of new information, Chapel's story may have taken a dramatic turn – one that could potentially prove his innocence. Kipe takes a deep dive into Chapel's past to find the unbelievable truth behind a story that involves corrupt police officers, crime rings, drug trafficking, steroids, and murder. Listen to the series right now: https://link.chtbl.com/inthelandoflies Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Our family members are not always who we think. When Eleonore Richland exposed her father's dark legacy, she vowed to clean up the family business – and hired her half-brother, Santino Reyes, to help her do it. But old habits die hard. In the shocking new third season, Eleonore reckons with what her father always taught her growing up: medicine is a bloody business. From Wondery, the makers of “The Shrink Next Door” and “Dr. Death,” Blood Ties stars Gillian Jacobs (Community, Love), Christian Navarro (13 Reasons Why), and Peter Stormare. Listen to all six episodes ad free on Wondery+ on May 9.  Listen to Blood Ties - Strange Days: https://wondery.app.link/wplus/twb_bts3 Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

A new series on the 1974 Huntsville, TX prison siege, one of the most infamous hostage crises in American history that played out in dramatic fashion over 11 days – all in front of a terrified national audience. 100 hours of newly uncovered audio containing the actual hostage negotiations and the deadly shoot-out tell the story like never before. Listen now: https://link.chtbl.com/standoff Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

In the series premiere, radio DJ Fred Heckman (Jon Hamm) receives an unexpected call from a listener that turns his life upside down. Follow American Hostage on Amazon Music, to hear all 8 episodes right now:   wondery.fm/TWB_AmericanHostage Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

 In this C13Features podcast movie presentation of Ghostwriter, Kate Mara and Adam Scott star in a psychological thriller about a former journalist who reluctantly accepts a job ghostwriting a new murder mystery novel for an eccentric billionaire. Kate Michaels has been living a solitary life after a traumatic experience, but after pressure from her rational agent and candid best friend, she begrudgingly concedes that she needs the work. As she collaborates with the enigmatic James Webber on the project, she finds herself growing dependent on him and starts to suspect that something is wrong…deeply wrong. Will Kate be able to trust herself with James' story, or even her own voice? Grab some popcorn, and get lost in your imagination in this gripping and suspenseful podcast movie experience, Ghostwriter, from C13Features. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

The Agent is the remarkable true story of Jack Barsky, the longest-surviving known member of the KGB illegals program operated during the height of the Cold War. Barsky hid in plain sight in America for 10 years, all the while leading dual lives on both sides of the Atlantic Ocean. On one fateful day, he was confronted with an impossible choice. Narrated by Alden Ehrenreich. Listen now: https://link.chtbl.com/theagent Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Enjoy a clip from Smoke Screen: The Sellout. Subscribe and listen to Smoke Screen: The Sellout wherever you get your podcasts Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

In the summer of 2017, the FBI's Deputy Director stood firm at the helm of that agency, guiding it through an all-out assault from the realm of mobsters and spies - foreign and domestic… and paid the price. LB sits down with Andrew McCabe to learn about how his early experience at the Bureau - as a street agent investigating Russian Organized Crime in Lucky Luciano's old territory, prepared him for an investigation into a Presidential candidate - who once housed those Kremlin-connected gangsters in his concrete cartel tower. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Now having walked through the origin and partial evolution of the Second Economy - built from a smuggling empire, we return to the two assassinations that launched the series. And find our way into the space between them - where a wave of Russian mobsters and spies landed, conquered, and left us buried alive in their avalanche of crime.  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

LB sits down with author Jason Fagone to discuss his extraordinary book "The Woman Who Smashed Codes", and what we all can learn from the life and work ethic of our heroine, Elizebeth Friedman. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

The underworld re-organizes after the departure of Lucky Luciano. Elizebeth and William set down their swords and go gently into the good night. And Meyer Lansky's old business fronts lead us right to a modern President's old fixer.  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

LB sits down with author and investigative journalist, Craig Unger, and former KGB agent Yuri Shvets - Unger's source for his deep dives on Donald Trump's Kremlin history before the Presidency, and career money-laundering for Putin's mobligarchs. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Elizebeth breaks the German enigma machine - twice, and defends the Western Hemisphere from an Axis invasion. The extensive clandestine intelligence operation she ran during World War 2 has finally rightfully been attributed to her, despite the machinations and thievery of the man who hijacked her legacy as his own - J Edgar Hoover. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

LB does the important work of asking dumb questions about spies, so that we can all learn the meaning and value of counter-intelligence from the former assistant director of that division at the FBI, Frank Figliuzzi. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

The President that Lucky Luciano put into office transforms into the leader a world at war needs. Meyer protects the homefront by taking on Hitler's American Bund and living rent-free in that monster's head. And Lucky finds his way into the sacred hen house - US intelligence, walking away with all of the eggs. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Eunice Carter was the first woman prosecutor to take on the mob, and Jill Wine-Banks followed her lead to become the first to take on a President. LB sits down with the legend to discuss what it's like to be a woman warrior in the ultimate inner sanctum of male power. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Thanks to a woman prosecutor, Lucky Luciano finally faces the long arm of the law. And with a second world war on the horizon, the stage is set for the realms of mobsters and spies to cross the rubicon… and become partners.  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

When crime lords, or their puppets, find their way into political office, the worst of mankind is unleashed. LB sits down with scholar and author Ruth Ben-Ghiat to talk Mussolini and Hitler, the techniques and circumstances that lead to a Strongman's rise, and the devasting parallals and symbiosis they have with mob bosses - past and present. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Two gangland hits propel Meyer and Lucky to the top of the world they helped create; while Elizebeth's investigations show a darker product being shipped through their smuggling empire. One that would only grow with Prohibition's repeal, and ravage our families and communities for generations to come. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

The offshore laundromat that Meyer Lansky created continues to ravage the free world today. LB sits down with Stuart Syvret, former Senior Senator of Jersey Island - a Crown Dependency in the English Channel. Senator Syvret is the only political prisoner in the world without legal representation thanks to the global mobsters who control the Queen's island. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Elizebeth successfully hunts and exposes a pivotal piece in The Syndicate's smuggling empire, enabling Elmer Irey and his T-Men to finally nail Public Enemy #1…and leaving Meyer Lansky shaking in his fedora. To save The Syndicate's money, Meyer runs to Switzerland to create the global laundromat... and the Second Economy is born.  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

LB sits down with Melissa Davis - Director of Library and Archives at the George Marshall Foundation, guardian of William and Elizebeth Friedman's legacy, and world's happiest librarian. Melissa lets us into the more personal side of Elizebeth and William's life together, raising a loving family while protecting the nation's most valuable secrets. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Meyer Lansky and Lucky Luciano find the business mentor they need to launch their bootlegging empire. Once they do, the Treasury Department sends an officer to go knock on Elizebeth's door. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

LB sits down with friend and novelist Greg Olear, who was one of the first artists to write and warn about the invasion of mobsters and spies that swarmed us in the Trump Presidency. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

We meet our first season's hero: Elizebeth Smith Friedman, creator of cryptanalysis and godmother of the NSA. And she would never have formed what would become the world's most powerful intelligence agency without a conspiracy theory about Shakespeare. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

LB's first sit-down is with her uncle, Jeremy Black - a loving father, terrific twin brother, and 35+-year veteran of the National Security Agency. Mr. Black walks us through the everyday workings of the NSA. And the man from the world's most secretive intelligence agency let's the cat out of the bag: his niece's real name. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

LB introduces The World Beneath with two assassinations in 1985: the Boss of Bosses of the American Mafia and the Little Godfather of the KGB's Russian Vor. Unanswered details between the two hits lead us on a journey back in time to find the first intersection of mobsters and spies. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Season one of The World Beneath explores the motivation behind the creation of the underworld of mobsters and spies. It was built in pursuit of one, simple thing. Treasure. When the pirates of the old world were taken over by the gangsters of the new, the criminal realm organized itself around the money – the bounty - that could be earned through Prohibition and vice. And our most formidable spies found the way to both capture them and partner with them through the map to their treasure, they left behind. We're going to follow the money. The World Beneath launches on June 28. Season one publishes new episodes every Monday and Thursday or you can binge the entire season right away on Apple Podcasts Subscriptions. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

COMING JUNE 28: The first-ever series that defines and exposes the true nature of the underworld: a second economy of dirty money, born from the intersection of organized crime and intelligence operations. They are twin heads of this realm, and they have never been separated. This is the world of MOBSTERS & SPIES. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices