ShortDocs

Discover hundreds of short audio gems produced in response to a prompt from Third Coast for the ShortDocs Competition, hosted between 2003 and 2016. Each year ushered in a new set of rules, new creative partners, and ever-more magical results.

The Golden Mug Award

The coveted golden mug award is given to an actor or actress for their portrayal of an independent woman in history.

2007
02:30
David Weinberg

Sidney

Of a cat, a Necessary, litter, and oh yeah, mice.

2007
03:01
Kay Collins

Musings Over Coffee

Half commentary, half documentary, the inscription on this coffee mug took me back to old memories.

The New Pleasant Revolution

A bike messenger provides alternatives to horrible traffic horns.

Red Baiting

Decommissioned Soviet mousetraps in Brooklyn's Little Odessa.

2007
03:00
Joe Milutis

Avant Guardian

The Avant Guardian fights crime using the power of surrealism and his trusty P.S.M.G.

2007
03:00
David Weinberg

Thrifty Liquidators

In addition to writing lyrically ABOUT the wonders of the dollar store phenomenon...

Chinese Pants

An unscripted talk between a mom and her almost teenaged daughter, inspired by a handmade Mother's Day card listing all the things a mother should never do.

I Thought I'd Be Rewarded for My Dating Gumption

You think you're being mature and courageous, trait which will surely be rewarded with reciprocal sentiments of love...right?

2007
03:00
Saya April Hillman

Mini-Meta-Mouse-umentary

Mousetraps and other intersections between human beings and mice.

2007
03:00
Sue Mell

Latin Mass

Long before the women's movement even had a name, some Oak Park girls began questioning tradition without even knowing they were doing so.

2007
03:00
Chris Angelos

Thirteen Ways of Looking at a Mousetrap

Both brief reflection on mousetraps and a nod to Wallace Stevens.

2007
02:35
Ezekiel Weaver

The Irresistible Draw of the Dollar Store

A dollar store addict is confronted with a horrifying discovery among the aisles.

2007
02:38
Kevin Theis

A Time to Tip

The courageous story of one coffee mug trying to get by in a house of people he hates. (Writing from the perspective of the mug in the first person, present tense.)

2007
02:58
David Hain

Miss Cholita Pageant

The "Miss Cholita" pageant celebrates a female ideal that is fast disappearing among Bolivian indigenous women. This year, the pageant was shaken by a scandal: the winner had turned out to have been wearing fake braids.

2007
02:55
Ruxandra Guidi

Can't Catch Us All

What mice find offensive is the fact that these traps are not only lethal, but also cheap, low quality imports. (Don't mess with the mice.)

2007
02:31
Conor Lennon

Riding Through the Summer

Pilsen, 2009: Chicago summer is full of life and full of sound - you can hear it best on two wheels.

2009
03:34
Katie Mingle

Studs & Jimmy

Jimmy Yancey, the blues pianist and White Sox groundsman, and Studs Terkel, the broadcaster and author, may have lived at different ends of Chicago but they're both as integral a part of the city as the El...

2009
02:59
Alan Hall

Gray Day Gin and Juice

A former suburbanite shares a pint of gin and juice on her front porch with her new neighbor in the city.

Coach Class Up in the Wild Blue Yonder

13D meets her neighbors 13C and 13E.

2012
02:58
Melissa Gerr

Black Paris Spleen, American Mouths

Journalist Ajai Raj muses about art, fact, and truth with his metaphysical neighbors, the notorious dramatist Mike Daisey and Charles Baudelaire, the renowned poet.