The Soyuz Files
What if America lost the Space Race?
The West
Show overview
The Soyuz Files has published 6 episodes during 2016. That works out to roughly 2 hours of audio in total. Releases follow a near-daily cadence.
Episodes typically run ten to twenty minutes — most land between 13 min and 17 min — and the run-time is fairly consistent across the catalogue. It is catalogued as a EN-language Arts show.
The catalogue appears to be on hiatus or wound down — the most recent episode landed 9.9 years ago, with no new episodes in over a year. Published by The West.
From the publisher
The Soviet Union has won the Space Race and American astronauts never landed on the Moon. Told through radio news broadcasts in 1968 and 1969, The Soyuz Files takes you from the skyscrapers of Manhattan to the spires of the Kremlin. Join investigative journalist Jack Schechter as he gets swept up in the intrigue of two rocket scientists, a Soviet diplomat, and the lies that hold everything together. Presented by The West, an LA-based multimedia storytelling collective. See more of our work on the stage and screen at thewest.la
Latest Episodes
S1 Ep 1Part 1 – “The Space Race” – Nov. 1, 1968
Breaking news! The United States has lost the Space Race to the Soviet Union. On October 31, 1968, Americans received transmissions from Cosmonauts on the Lunar surface. Jack Schechter, host of WNYX's news program The Friday Review brings on Natalia Gromyko, Soviet diplomat, to discuss what this means for geopolitics and the future of the Cold War. Presented by The West, an LA-based multimedia storytelling collective. See more of our work on the stage and screen at thewest.la
S1 Ep 2Part 2 – “Cosmonauts at the White House” – Mar. 7, 1969
The Cosmonauts who landed on the Moon finish their world tour with a White House dinner. On the other side of the Iron Curtain, a Soviet rocket scientist named Nikolai has been sending postcards to Jacob, an American working at NASA. He brings the postcards to Jack at The Friday Review to find out why Nikolai has disappeared. Presented by The West, an LA-based multimedia storytelling collective. See more of our work on the stage and screen at thewest.la
S1 Ep 3Part 3 – “The Land of Righteousness” – Mar. 14, 1969
Jack seeks Natalia's help in locating Nikolai, but she has a word of warning to share with the idealistic journalist. Meanwhile, in the midst of the dismantling of NASA's Apollo Program, the Nixon administration doubles down on defense. Presented by The West, an LA-based multimedia storytelling collective. See more of our work on the stage and screen at thewest.la
S1 Ep 4Part 4 – “To Moscow” – Mar. 21, 1969
Broadcast from the snowy streets of Moscow, Jack teams up with Igor, a Soviet journalist, to try and locate Nikolai. What they find instead is even more troubling: a ransacked home, Moscow police hot on their tail, and a deepening of Cold War paranoia. Presented by The West, an LA-based multimedia storytelling collective. See more of our work on the stage and screen at thewest.la
S1 Ep 5Part 5 – “Diogenes Will Know” – Apr. 4, 1969
"Diogenes will know." "Not enough." The cryptic notes Nikolai left in the margin of a top secret document take Jack from Moscow to the Cosmodrome itself, halfway across the continent, to investigate the Soviet Space Program from within. Presented by The West, an LA-based multimedia storytelling collective. See more of our work on the stage and screen at thewest.la
S1 Ep 6Part 6 – “Tribunal” – July 18, 1969
Four months after the world learned the truth of the Soviet Moon landing, Jack returns to The Friday Review following his leave of absence to file one last report amid growing global conflict. Presented by The West, an LA-based multimedia storytelling collective. See more of our work on the stage and screen at thewest.la