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“What does it mean to be a storyteller in 2026?”
That was the big question posed at Sundance’s Variety & Audible Cocktails & Conversations panel. Brent Lang, Variety‘s Executive Editor, led a discussion that included Tony and Grammy award-winning actor, rapper, writer and producer Daveed Diggs, comedian and actress Iliza Shlesinger and Marshall Lewy, Audible’s head of regional content in North America.
While there’s not one simple answer, the panel provided keen insight into the modern landscape of storytelling. Diggs, for instance, spoke to the need for empathy and connection through storytelling, especially as many people in society are going through a difficult time.
“It’s a time of great opportunity, and in other ways it feels very heavy,” Diggs said. “There’s a lot of weight on the shoulders of storytellers right now, because there are so many. I think we’re at an empathy deficit, and that’s kind of our thing; it’s what we do. It feels like we are needed right now. Sometimes when people need me, I really don’t show up. I get stressed out. It’s a stressful time to be a storyteller, but also, I think, when you can get over yourself and lean into it, it’s a really important time. It’s nice to feel needed, even though I wish it were better.”
Shlesinger was honest about the challenge of being open and authentic as a storyteller.
“I think we’re all so scared,” she said. “For a long time, regardless of how you lean politically, whatever baggage you’re carrying, whatever you represent, there’s a fear that you’ll be judged, canceled, cast out. Everybody’s got their weight that they carry. I think it takes a lot of guts to be authentic and own your story. Sometimes you’re like, ‘I don’t have something as traumatic, or I don’t have a family story like that, or I didn’t have this or that.’ To decide that you don’t matter and your story doesn’t matter because it isn’t the same as someone else’s that might be lauded … perhaps if you feel that way, you shouldn’t try. Artists are those who dare to try and have the balls to say, ‘My voice matters. My story is just as valid.'”
Lewy discussed the importance of specificity in storytelling and how that can, in fact, make the experience more universal.
“Being here at Sundance and just thinking about what an incredible legacy this festival has and how it started and how it is a corrective to a lot of things that are going on … I think for me, it’s the specificity of telling a story and how the more specific you are, the more universal it becomes, regardless of what it’s about,” Lewy says. “In 2026, when we’re struggling to connect and understand each other, you go deep, you have courage, you tell your story, and then people will relate. It doesn’t matter if it’s about a girl in Gaza halfway around the world, or it’s the town you grew up in: That is, to me, the power of storytelling.”
Watch the entire conversation above.
English (US) ·