We caught up with the brilliant and insightful Matt Brown a few weeks ago and have shared our conversation below.

Matt, thanks for joining us, excited to have you contributing your stories and insights. It’s always helpful to hear about times when someone’s had to take a risk – how did they think through the decision, why did they take the risk, and what ended up happening. We’d love to hear about a risk you’ve taken.

I dream of becoming a professional podcast host and producer and from there, I want to create a Podcasting/Media Network. I produce and host a podcast called the Productive Conversations Podcast and I want this podcast to lead to my own network.

I have always dream of having a career in the media and communications. I originally saw myself as a TV showrunner, I wanted to create TV shows or become a TV executive. However, I have had a hard time finding my footing in starting my career doing that.

Despite that dream, I always had a fascination for radio and podcasting, I never got tired of listening to Podcast and Radio. My first internship was at Sirius XM Radio.

In December 2019, I was at a promising job at a production company start up, the company would sell TV shows to networks, I left a good job at a TV network to join this start up. I took this as a temp to perm job and the deal was that if one of our shows we pitched got picked up, then you would become an Associate Producer for it and work full time. None of the shows we pitched got picked up and I was let go.

I was looking for a new job at the start of 2020 and we know what happens in March 2020. In fact, at the beginning of March 2020, I was interviewing for a job at The Daily Show and it was very promising. I was a former Viacom intern, I hit it well interviewing with the hiring managers (one of them was a PA when I was an intern at Nickelodeon) and I really thought I had a chance. Of course once the lockdown began, I lost that job opportunity and I was unemployed already.

I was out of a job for 6 months and what kept me going was listening to the radio and podcasts. Fast forward to September 2020, I saw 2 of my friends start a podcast, and I was shocked that they did.

With no job at this point for 9 months, no income coming in, and seeing these 2 friends make a podcast, I thought “why not me”.

So with little money I had from our stimulas checks, I bought podcasting equipment (mics, podcasting software, RSS feed, logo rights, cameras, hard drive) and I decided to start a podcast.

Took about a month of preparation, changed my basement room into a podcast studio, interviewed my brother and 2 close friends and on October 20th, 2020, I launched the Productive Conversations Podcast.

As always, we appreciate you sharing your insights and we’ve got a few more questions for you, but before we get to all of that can you take a minute to introduce yourself and give our readers some of your back background and context?

My name is Matt Brown and I am the host of the Productive Conversations Podcast. My dream is to turn my podcast into a podcasting network.

Productive Conversations is a long form interview podcast hosted by Matt Brown that includes both long form interviews and full panel discussions regarding the worlds of sports, news, entertainment, and culture. It is a biweekly show and as long as you get something out of each podcast, then it becomes a Productive Conversation.

I was unemployed for close than a year amongst the pandemic and I started this podcast so I did not have a gap on my resume. It then turned from a regular project to a passion project and a passion project to a lifetime goal to create a major brand. I plan to turn the Productive Conversations Podcast into a podcast/media network. We aspire to be like Barstool, Jomboy, The Ringer, Nerdest, Pat Macafee. But we hope to be our own brand, the Productive Nation, a podcasting network that covers Sports, News, Entertainment, and Culture.

I have been fortunate enough to work at some really awesome media companies and networks, such as Sirius XM, Nickelodeon, CNN, MTV, A&E, and much more. I also worked in Theater, Events, and Productive Houses. As a freelancer and employee, I had a hard time finding consistency and I have been unemployed often since I graduated college. Despite this, I always took jobs that never really unlocked my potential and after the Pandemic hit and I created the Podcast, I found my job, i have met so many cool people, I have interviewed over 100 different people from various backgrounds, and now I have a small team that shares the same vision in turning this Podcast into a legitimate brand.

Since episode 1, we have had 10,000+ downloads, 100,000+ YouTube channel views. 100,000+ social media reel views.

And we’re just getting started. Lots of work to still do.

This show has included Musicians, Entrepreneurs, Drag Queens, Athletes, Comedians, Refugees, Actors, OnlyFans Models, Influencers, Other Podcasters, and more.

We have done fundraisers for charity and we have done livestreams.

We’ve talked NFL, NBA, MLB, PGA, The Oscars, The Elections, Year in Reviews, WWE, World Events, and much more.

There are more events to cover and more people to interview and yeah that’s our reflection today. Time to get back to work. And we have a lot more work to do. We have a brand to grow.

Plus I got this far because of my collaborators, especially from my Associate Producer, Alex “Dolo Ren” Dejesus, Ayoung, Bryan, FreshFaces, Ryan, AJ The Man, AR. I really hope I can give back to them once this brand takes off and give them opportunities.

How did you build your audience on social media?

Its all about collaborators. The podcast’s audience has grown 4x since August 2022 and how did this happen? Alex “Dolo Ren” Dejesus.

The podcast had a small audience and I was creating shows for about 2 years, an old friend reached out and we lost touch and got back in touch. That friend was Alex and he simply asked “hey let me make clips for your podcast.” This truly was a godsent.

The first reel he made for the show was after I interviewed Jake Kosak from The Bronx Zoo, incredible guy and he runs a New York Yankee fanclub, Jake told me about how he went viral talking about a “hall pass” story where a girl with her boyfriend at a Yankee game talked about wanting to have a hall pass for her ex-boyfriend and that was Alex’s first reel and it crossed 500+ views. From there, we just kept making relevant reels discussing relevant topics. We noticed especially when we covered the NFL and did specific hashtags, we noticed we went from having 100s of viewers a reel, to thousands. At the moment, our post popular reel was failed Super Bowl predictions and that has been seen over 43k times.

Not only did we go semi-viral for Sports, but we’ve talked about other major pop culture stories and figures. We hit 5k+ views on one reel discussing the Selena Gomez/Hailey Bieber beef, Elon Musk, Ice Cream Trucks in the hood, and much more. So we noticed if you make 90 second or less clips, add some interesting pictures and graphics, throw in some catchy music, catchy hash tag, and have confident takes, then you can get a reaction out of people, get people talking, get people to share your content, and just be entertaining, anything can happen. We are still learning and very new to this, but we are having a lot of fun with it too.

Let’s talk about resilience next – do you have a story you can share with us?

March 2nd, 2009, I was in 8th Grade and stayed up super late and snuck into the living room to watch the debut episode of Late Night with Jimmy Fallon and everything changed from here on out. I had a career destination already in 8th Grade, I wanted to work on the staff of Jimmy Fallon’s show.

I started becoming a fan of Late Night by watching Conan O’Brein in middle school. I always have watched Conan and I truly believe he is the funniest man on TV and is absolutely brilliant and genuine as well. However, I did not aspire to work for his show simply because since I started watching him, I knew he was gonna take the Tonight Show and move to Los Angeles and I am from the Tri-State area growing up in Norwalk, Connecticut an hour outside of New York City. I didn’t have aspirations to go out west, much rather work in show business in New York.

So after Conan left his Late Night show, there was Jimmy Fallon, the guy from SNL, Fever Pitch, and Taxi.

From Middle School, up until the summer going into my senior year of college, I truly became one of the biggest Jimmy Fallon fans in the world. Watching his show was one of the inspirations for me to go in TV Production as a career and to be a Writer/Producer. I truly knew EVERYTHING about the production and history of his show and watched almost every episode that was live or on Hulu through both incarnations of his Late Night and then Tonight Show. I use to research his Producers and Writers just for fun because I wanted to be amongst them and work for them as well as learn how the show operates.

The dream to work there was assured when in my Senior Year of High School, I went to see Late Night with Jimmy Fallon at 30 Rock. I specifically remember it was December 21st, 2012 was when I went to the show. It is easy to remember that day because it was the day that the world was supposed to end according to the Mayians, obviously that didn’t happen and I got to watch Paul Rudd on his set.

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What was also special about that time and why the Late Night Show was important to me was that in December 2012, my mom was very sick with Pnumonia. It was really bad at one point and she was literally in the hospital from Thanksgiving that year up until Mid-December. She was fighting for her life and that was such a scary time, she was in the hospital for 3 weeks. On top of that, my Dad was laid off early that year and he was in between jobs during that time and wasn’t working when my mom got sick. He finally got a contract job and he had to delay working to be with her during this crucial time.

Remember, its Christmas time and none of my parents are working and my mom is extremely sick. So there was nothing jolly about that time and I was really scared of losing my mom. So what got me through that time was watching the Late Night show, watching Conan’s TBS show, Watching Letterman, and watching a lot of SNL.

When my mom got out of the hospital, the family had to start from scratch. My mom was recovering and my Dad would travel to Boston during the week to work that December, because that was where the work was. So we knew that probably there wasn’t going to be a lot of money for Christmas gifts that year. My youngest Brother Tommy was 9 at the time and you know, its tough on Christmas when Santa isn’t able to provide for a 9-year-old. My parents were very sad that they weren’t able to give good gifts for Tommy.

HOWEVER, the Late Night Show I went to was a special one because they were giving out Xbox 360s as a giveaway and I got one. Tommy was able to get an Xbox that Christmas, all thanks to the Late Night Show. So I forever had a special place in my heart for that show because they truly gave a miracle to my family. I really wanted to work for them after that.

Also fun fact, Jimmy once said in an interview that one of his favorite shows during his Late Night gig was the one I went to, because he was got off guard by Steve Higgens who caught him off guard during 12 days of Christmas sweaters and he started laughing hysterically on stage. I was actually at that show.

I then went to College with the sole purpose to be able to work for Jimmy Fallon. So I did the TV and Radio Station, started interning my Junior Year in the city at Sirius XM and Nickelodeon to gain Production Internship experience needed to qualify for the shows internship. I became a President of my Fraternity because I heard that shows like that like to hire interns who are leaders on their campus, so might as well get the best leadership position possible, even though my Fraternity Brothers put me through a lot of stress that year. I also became a Tour Guide at my college, for the sole purpose to one day give tours of 30 rock. Everything I did in college was to prepare for working for Jimmy and his show.

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The summer into Senior Year, I happen to actually get Tickets again, this time for The Tonight Show. I had a blast again going to 30 Rock and Zac Efron, Carmelo Anthony, and Lauren Hill was on the show. Its also funny because I brought my friend Jordan and my low key sister Abby and Jordan has a HUGE crush on Zac Efron. He has such crush on him that literally during the broadcast, you can hear him screaming YASSSSS and then he literally scream in the middle of the live Broadcast “TAKE YOUR SHIRT OFF”. I cant believe my friend actually did that on TV. Jimmy responded to Jordan’s request instead by saying “I will not take my shirt off”

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That was the 3rd time I was apart of the studio audience and I remember leaving 30 Rock that day and thinking I can work here someday.

I would always apply to the show for an Internship, but I understood that so many people are applying and despite my qualifications, there was a good chance I might not get to interview, despite how many prayers I had for it. Though the chances were slim, I always thought I had a chance to be a great intern with my prior experience, talent, and PASSION. Despite the slim chances of my resume getting seen, I would apply anyways.

I remember it was a summer day a week after I was at the show. I was working at Kohls, I went to the Break room to sit down and eat my lunch, then I got the email of a lifetime, “You have been selected to interview for The Tonight Show Fall 2016 internship.” HOLY SHIT!! I GOT ASKED TO INTERVIEW FOR THE TONIGHT SHOW!!!!!

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I NOW HAVE MY CHANCE TO WORK FOR JIMMY FALLON!

So once I got home from Kohls that afternoon, I answered some questions online and did the video interview. I wound up talking to myself on screen and had to answer questions like “How would a reference speak of you?, Name an impossible task you were given at work and how did you handle and complete the assignment?, How does your prior experience relate to this internship?, etc.” So I do what I have to do, completed the interview, and nervously waited to see if I made the next round.

A month goes by and at this point it is late June and I FINALLY hear back from the show. I was told I made the next round and I was invited to an in person interview at 30 Rock.

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I felt like I was on a cloud reading that. I was literally in heaven. Words can not describe how amazing I felt about this email. I truly have a chance to make my boyhood dream a reality. The chance to work for the show that has meant so much to my family in a time of crisis. All the times I would watch Jimmy Fallon through high school, sometimes in the middle of my classes (I apologize Mr. Karl), and shaping my college experience to work for Jimmy Fallon on the brink of my senior year of College, it all comes down to this. It looks like this might ACTUALLY work out. I literally have the opportunity of a lifetime at 21 already.

After I filled out the questionnaire they asked me to do and set up the interview for July 6, 2016 at 30 Rock, I spent the next 2 weeks dedicated to getting ready for this interview.

July 6 arrived, it was a Wednesday and it was about 75 degrees, sunny, and not a cloud in the sky. It LITERALLY was a perfect day outside. Riding into the city, I remember being steadily calm on my train ride. I did not have any nerves going through my body, yet at the same time my heart was racing, and my eyes were with pride.

The amount of focus I had was insurmountable and my hand was steady, I have never been more focused on something in my life. Plus, the amazing support I had from the people I told that I am doing this meant a lot. I had a bunch of people vouching for me and that was real special and I just hope I can tell them the good news soon.

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I got off the train and headed straight to Rockefeller Plaza, 48th and 6th ave, the area I knew the best in the city at the time and it was next Yankee Stadium, my favorite place in the world because of how much I dreamt of working there. I also knew this area well because a year prior, I was interning at Sirius XM across the street. I use to walk into that internship hoping that when I am done at Sirius, I can wind up across the street someday.

On this day, I am now actually going into the NBCU Floors of 30 Rock with a purpose. A purpose I have dreamed of my entire life and I want to make this a reality and prove to everyone that you literally can even make the biggest dreams come true.

I went to the NBCU visitor center, got my pass, went into the elevators that I always have dreamed to go into and went up to the 6th floor to see my interviewer. I turned off my phone at that point and just kept thinking that these are the elevators that some of my personal heroes of have gone through like Lorne Michaels, Conan O’Brein, David Letterman, Will Ferrell, Tina Fey, and of course Jimmy Fallon.

Once the doors opened, I was locked in.

I walked down the tight floor where The Tonight Show staff is located and it honestly just looked like any office setting anywhere in the country. You had your copy machines, your water colors, historic memorabilia of the show, you know how it is. The show was having an off week so not as much activity was going on as their probably is, but still people were working and doing what they had to do to earn their paycheck. I happen to walk by Jimmy’s office that was open, he wasn’t at his desk, but I mean, damn……

I then made it to the lobby of the office, a young raggedy college kid who had a T-Shirt and jeans who was an intern signed me in. He looked really bored, I wanted to say “DUDE, YOU WORK FOR THE TONIGHT SHOW”. Hopefully this is my chance to earn my place and spread a more positive vibe then he did.

I then met with the internship coordinator, she brought me into the writer’s room to interview. At that point my heart was racing even more, this is where The Tonight Show staff has created some of the coolest bits EVER like any of the games they play with celebs, all the great sketches, all the monologue jokes, this is literally the only place I want to be in the world and I finally am here to try to get a job…

Despite my heart is racing, I was still as cool and as calm as Leonardo DiCaprio. And for the next 40 minutes, yes we talked for a good 40 minutes, I had the interview of my life. A mixture of both easy and hard questions from talking about the stuff I did at Nickelodeon and Sirius XM, my familiarity in the show, what would make me a good intern, what are my dreams and aspirations, etc.

I genuinely believed I killed it, but by the time I left the office and went to the lobby of the 30 rock building itself to leave and go home, I almost passed out. I truly believed I gave every little bit of energy I had in me that by time I was done, I truly had nothing left. It was the best effort I gave in anything in my life and I was nothing but proud of myself by getting that far in the process and now all I had to do was let it go and wait to see if it was meant to be. I wish I was able to do that.

There would be 10 days until I heard back from the show. Those were 10 of the longest days of my life. I remember constantly checking my email every minute, looking at my phone, I had a high amount of anxiety waiting for the fate of my interview and whether or not my dream was gonna come true, it was brutal.

On July 16th, it was a Sunday night, I was trying to sleep. One thing I like to do before I go to sleep is listen to Howard Stern, simply because he is the man and I love his radio show a lot. I was listening to an old interview from a few months ago where he was speaking to Conan O’Brein actually. This is one of my favorite Howard interviews and he was talking about his experience with his own incarnation of The Tonight Show and well, idk why after hearing Conan talking about his time on The Tonight Show made me feel eerie, I had a feeling like I was supposed to listen to this, but I don’t know why…..

I woke up the next morning on July 17th like it was any other summer day. I am trying to get a Fall internship somewhere, so after my morning workout, I sent applications.

I remember sitting on the chair in my porch, doing what I need to do, I was looking at something and I got this email.

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When I read that email, the world stopped. I felt my soul leaving my body and I sat still. My gut felt like it was hit by 1000 bricks. I have dislocated my kneecap before playing football in high school and nothing could be more painful then reading this email. My dream was destroyed.

For a good 30 minutes, I was completely lost, it hit me then that I was not going to be an Intern for The Tonight Show, I am not going to work for Jimmy Fallon. Despite designing my entire LIFE from 8th grade up until now (a good 5 years) to work for Jimmy Fallon, it was not going to happen, I just came up short.

Thinking about how am I going to tell people that they rejected me, how am I going to tell people I failed at this? I thought if you had a dream and you truly worked hard for it, that no matter what as long as you work for it, your dreams will come true. This was my dream and IT IS NOT GONNA HAPPEN. I just broke down.

I remember going outside in my backyard, no phone, no anything, and sitting on a rock and just breaking down crying. I try my best to stay strong and calm in times like these and I really try hard to not cry, but I just couldn’t help it. I cried as much as I did when I found out a family member died or a pet. Maybe that is kind of pathetic, but its true, that’s how much it meant for me to work in 30 Rock and for Fallon. It meant EVERYTHING.

My Dad happen to be home that day, and being the great father he was, he went to try to help me out. Now my Dad is someone who does not get emotional in anything, except when Tom Brady made his Super Bowl 51 comeback. He was emotional in there with me, it was a tough moment because he too saw that this is everything his son wanted.

I was thinking to myself as I was sitting there with my Dad. That this isn’t suppose to happen…… I felt like everything I worked for meant nothing and by not getting the tonight show, I am not meant for this profession. The only profession I care about doing, is working in show business and that because I didn’t reach my goal, I failed.

I was supposed to get this and I was gonna have this story to inspire everyone and show people that your dreams really can come true if you work at them. I was supposed to have all this clout from working on this show and I thought my resume would be set and it would be easy to get a job out of college, that I would have a great chance to be an NBC Page from doing this internship. I was supposed to get all this attention from people and they would like me more. This was the chance to prove all my haters wrong and all the people who doubted me would shut up now because I got the greatest internship in the world. This was all supposed to happen, but it didn’t.

After a few minutes, I told him I would be alright, just wanted some time on my own. So he left and I stayed on the rock for a few minutes, still trying to process what the hell happened. I remembered, I cant be destroyed like this forever, so I needed something to at least get my mind off this very sad event.

I thought to myself, who is the person or what is the show that can truly make me happy no matter what? The first person that came to my mind was Conan.

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I grabbed my iPad, removed The Tonight Show screensaver I had and replaced it was a Conan one and then for legitimately the rest of the day, I watched Conan O’Brein clips on YouTube. I was laughing, I was having a good time, I was completely distracted from the miserable morning I had all from watching Conan. I watched all his bits, remotes, monologues and interviews. I was truly at peace watching him and this show was starting to heal me emotionally.

Sure, I am not the only person who would watch a show like Conan or whatever program helps someone who was in a dark place to help them feel better. But what watching the Conan show did for me was help me realize that things were going to be ok. Life goes on and what doesn’t kill us, makes us stronger and we are able to overcome some of our biggest obstacles as long as we still have Passion for what we strive to be. Conan was also another person where The Tonight Show broke his heart and if he was able to overcome such a crushing defeat, I can do the same thing.

Sure, I was very upset that I needed to keep interviewing and there were other people who were hired over me that I was cynical toward. I use to think those people who got the job were privileged people who got in because of nepotism or a better school name. (I remember reading somewhere that David Letterman’s EP’s daughter was a tonight show intern and I had extreme envy) But I learned that I just cant do that and be mad them, I cant hold a grudge, or be cynical, it is immature and it wont get me anywhere, I need to bounce back from this.

I do believe to this day and probably for the rest of my life that the show did the wrong thing by passing me. I will never understand or agree why they didn’t over me an internship and I know Jimmy didn’t make the decision himself, but in the end, they did what they felt was right for the show, even if I disagree with it, I still need to respect it and move on. Its simply the right thing to do. I still have immense Passion for TV production and have been fortunate to get a lot of experience at other places like MTV, Nick, Sirius XM, and a Casting Internship. I still believe I will have some sort of influence in my industry and I will have a steady career in it, its only a matter of time.

All I can do is move on, learn from this experience and grow from it. Though this was a painful experience, it helped shaped me into a becoming a better man and I was able to learn that I can bounce back from this, even if I just come short of my dreams. Overcoming that obstacle might even be better than getting a Tonight Show internship and I really mean that.

I spent the rest of the summer interviewing for more internships around New York. I had A LOT of internship interviews, a lot of them came up short, but I wasn’t fazed from it. I actually didn’t get hired by time I had to move on to campus for my senior year, so that kind of bummed me out, but at least there were people in Hartford who were great to be around that I was coming back to.

I moved into an on-campus apartment with my fraternity brothers, I remember moving my stuff in and a network at the very last minute asked me if I wanted to interview for an internship that would start that next week. I immediately said yes. I borrowed my roommates suit that didn’t fit me and conduct a Skype interview with a hiring manger in my room.

After that, a few hours later, I was sitting at the student union hanging out with one of my best friends Brad, I looked at my phone and I got this email.

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Just as Conan was able to bounce back by working for Turner at TBS, I was able to bounce back by working for Turner at CNN. I was a Talent and Development Intern that Fall for CNN and I had an absolute blast. That was such a great time. Everything wound up working out.

At CNN, I was able to learn valuable skills, such as learning how to evaluate a pitch for series properly, was able to do research for upcoming CNN series and documentaries, I got to be around amazing CNN talent as a talent intern such as Anderson Cooper, Wolf Blitzer, Chris Cuomo, Lisa Ling, Van Jones, and the late Anthony Bourdain. Also, being at CNN during the Presidential Election and the aftermath of the election is a blog within itself. I can’t wait to tell my kids what it was like to work at CNN when Donald Trump was elected President of The United States.

I was also able to get a great reference and mentor from working at CNN who wrote me a great letter of recommendation which lead to me getting my Casting Internship in April 2018. I still wound up working for a live talk show anyways a year later when working at MTV for TRL.

This was some time in my life. Even if I think The Tonight Show made the wrong decision passing on me and I didn’t exactly get the result I wanted, but the amount of growth I was able to get from this was a priceless. I really believe for the rest of my life. When it comes to rejection, I will be able to bounce back from anything and stay calm in tense situations and STILL come out on top from it.

Thank you Conan, for helping me get through one of the toughest experiences of my life. I will forever be grateful to you for your comedy to help me through such a challenging time. I hope that someday you will find out about this story and that it will show you how much your work really touches people.

As a wise man once said; “Nobody in life gets exactly what they thought they were going to get. But if you work really hard and you’re kind, amazing things will happen.”

Contact Info:

• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/productiveconversationspodcast/
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/matt.brown.1401933
• Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/matthew-brown-62b91b99/
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• Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCLxvpKAxi2lcpHXNEDHYc9Q
• Other: LinkTree- https://linktr.ee/productiveconversations Apple Pod- https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/productive-conversations-with-matt-brown/id1535871441 Spotify- https://open.spotify.com/show/7qCsxuzYYoeqALrWu4x4Kb TikTok- https://www.tiktok.com/@productiveconversations?lang=en

Image Credits
All photos credited to Matt Brown