Webby Awards Submission: Martinis & Murder Podcast

Martinis & Murder (listen here) is Oxygen’s weekly true crime podcast hosted by Daryn Carp and John Thrasher. From serial killers (Ed Kemper) to mysterious cases (Lisa Lam) to both little-known (Skylar Neese) and infamous murder cases (Jodi Arias), hosts John and Daryn break down one murder per episode, making heavy subject matter a little more palatable by not pretending to check their senses of humor at the door. Freshly shaken martinis also help, as does the occasional quip by producer Matt the Bartender, who remains anonymous.

As part of Oxygen Media’s rebrand to a full-time true crime network, Oxygen’s digital team launched the weekly podcast to connect with general true crime fans, and particularly our largely female demographic who have cut the cable chord, introducing them to our brand. As The New York Times noted:

“When Oxygen, the television network for women, rebranded itself as a true crime channel last year, it leaned into TV’s time-tested approach: a focus on gruesome and mysterious killings, disproportionately involving white female victims and sensationalized by self-serious narrators. But Oxygen also began experimenting with a new way to cover those crimes. It started a comedy podcast, “Martinis & Murder,” in which the two hosts get tipsy on homicide-themed cocktails, audibly squirm over the gory details, make catty judgments about the suspects’ life choices and use particulars of the crimes as setups for sarcastic jokes… At first blush, this approach to covering murder can seem a little tactless. I mean: People died! But especially for women, humor has emerged as an easy coping mechanism for relentlessly being told by pop culture that they’re probably going to be raped and murdered by a stranger, as ludicrous as that is.”

Launched in January, 2017 with no paid media support, the podcast quickly made the “New & Noteworthy” section of iTunes, peaking at #57 on the iTunes’ chart of the Top 100 Podcasts in the U.S. The podcast has grown organically, from less than 250,000 streams a month at the start of 2018 to more than half a million streams a month.

Episodes are editorialized in articles on Oxygen.com’s Martinis & Murder vertical, and cocktail recipe videos are created for fans who want to pair a thematic drink while listening to episodes. Both Oxygen’s social media accounts as well as accounts specific to Martinis & Murder regularly engage fans, including Instagram, Facebook and Twitter.

Spending hours on research per case with the help of a pool of writers and researchers, John and Daryn not only tell the narrative of each murder but also delve into compelling and little- known facts about the lives of each killer and victim. What was the motivation? Was the killer a psychopath or a sane person who simply snapped? What was the impact on the victim’s family, friends and community?

 Over the course of the podcast’s first year, Martinis & Murder has interviewed a number of personalities relevant to the true crime space, including Dateline correspondent Keith Morrison, victim Natalee Holloway’s father, broadcast journalist Soledad O’Brien, Mary Jo Buttafuoco, and the filmmakers who created the Netflix documentary “Who Took Johnny?