Maya sits down with Jerry Slaff, a playwright and and a writer who stutters, for a conversation about voice, craft, and the lifelong arc from fear to freedom. Jerry first reached out to Proud Stutter back in December 2021, writing, “once a stutterer, always a stutterer… if people don’t like my speech, that’s their problem.” We revisit that email and trace how age, practice, and community reshaped his relationship to speaking, onstage, at work, and in everyday life.

Jerry reflects on building a career that demanded communication, from press briefings, talkbacks, to cold reads, and how stuttering shows up differently across contexts (ease during prepared talkbacks vs. blocks in table reads). We explore his love of radio storytelling, the writers who formed his ear for dialogue, and his new creative chapters: a two-hander play set in 1950s America and a novel that includes a 12-year-old character who stutters. Along the way, we talk representation (what lands, what harms), allyship across disability communities, and the simple rule that guides him now: “Not caring is a great freedom.”

Mentioned

• A recent documentary about Marlee Matlin that sparked a cross-disability allyship convo
• Lies (Jerry's play)
• Film IG: @saintstephenfilm - following helps us show funders there’s a community behind the story.
• Event recap & donation links

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Big thanks to Proud Stutter's recurring supporters: Jennifer Bolen, Jerry Slaff, Josh Compton, Pablo Meza, Matt Didisheim, Alexandra Mosby, Ingo Helbig, Jonathan Reiss, Jason Smith, Paige McGill, Wayne Engebretson, Swathy Manavalan, and Martha Horrocks.

Learn more about Proud Stutter's impact campaign for its film project at proudstutter.org/impact

If you can become a monthly donor at $10 or more, we’ll give you access to ad-free episodes and bonus Proud Stutter+ content as a token of our thanks! Make your tax deductible gift here.

Proud Stutter is proudly fiscally sponsored by Independent Arts & Media.

Want to lean more about what Proud Stutter has to offer? Sign up here to stay in the loop and take advantage of our upcoming events, actions, and educational materials.

Maya sits down with Ina Lalich, a San Francisco–raised, multilingual woman who stutters, for a conversation about language, identity, and learning to take up space. Ina describes growing up between Serbian/Croatian and English (with a later detour through French), and how her fluency shifted across languages over time -- sometimes finding relief in Belgrade, later feeling the opposite. She talks about the “different mind” each language gives her, and how writing her college essay on stuttering helped her claim it as strength: creativity, precision, and deep empathy.

Now a user researcher at Quizlet who records herself for work, Ina shares what it’s like to interview strangers daily, rewind the tapes, and still choose presence over perfection. We hear candid stories --from a CEO mistaking a block for a bad internet connection to educating someone who mimicked her speech -- and the simple rule that guides her: if she stays calm, others learn to, too. The episode explores womanhood and stuttering, resisting infantilization, the “good pain vs. injury pain” metaphor she borrows from gymnastics, and a curiosity about ASL as another doorway into voice and belonging.

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🎟 Get tickets for a community art and film event sponsored by Proud Stutter on October 9 in San Francisco

Read about our latest film update here.

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Big thanks to Proud Stutter's recurring supporters: Jennifer Bolen, Jerry Slaff, Josh Compton, Pablo Meza, Matt Didisheim, Alexandra Mosby, Ingo Helbig, Jonathan Reiss, Jason Smith, Paige McGill, Wayne Engebretson, Swathy Manavalan, and Martha Horrocks.

Learn more about Proud Stutter's impact campaign for its film project at proudstutter.org/impact

If you can become a monthly donor at $10 or more, we’ll give you access to ad-free episodes and bonus Proud Stutter+ content as a token of our thanks! Make your tax deductible gift here.

Proud Stutter is proudly fiscally sponsored by Independent Arts & Media.

Want to lean more about what Proud Stutter has to offer? Sign up here to stay in the loop and take advantage of our upcoming events, actions, and educational materials.

Filmmaker and stuttering ally Andy Phillips joins Maya to mark the 10-year anniversary of his short film WORDS, a story born from two loves: New Orleans and spoken-word poetry. Andy shares how a friend who stutters, late-night script pages in a dreaded Shakespeare class, and a chance connection to a Lower Ninth Ward community center shaped the film’s heartbeat. A tour with neighborhood elder “Mr. Robert,” the Katrina watermark still visible on walls, inspired the opening poem and grounded the story in place and resilience. Andy also talks about researching stuttering to avoid tired stereotypes and building an indie crew through tiny miracles that kept showing up, sometimes literally with a Steadicam. A decade later, WORDS still ripples through his life, even guiding his path into podcast producing.

You can watch WORDS here.

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🎟 Get tickets for a community art and film event sponsored by Proud Stutter on October 9 in San Francisco

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U.S.-based writer with a finished script/pilot/play featuring disabled characters? Apply to 1IN4 Writers by Oct 20, 2025 for mentorship, industry relationships, and a $20K unrestricted grant.

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Big thanks to Proud Stutter's recurring supporters: Jennifer Bolen, Jerry Slaff, Josh Compton, Pablo Meza, Matt Didisheim, Alexandra Mosby, Ingo Helbig, Jonathan Reiss, Jason Smith, Paige McGill, Wayne Engebretson, Swathy Manavalan, and Martha Horrocks.

Learn more about Proud Stutter's impact campaign for its film project at proudstutter.org/impact

If you can become a monthly donor at $10 or more, we’ll give you access to ad-free episodes and bonus Proud Stutter+ content as a token of our thanks! Make your tax deductible gift here.

Proud Stutter is proudly fiscally sponsored by Independent Arts & Media.

Want to lean more about what Proud Stutter has to offer? Sign up here to stay in the loop and take advantage of our upcoming events, actions, and educational materials.