Listen to the Evocative Poems That Inspired the Hit Television Show Mad Men, Available as an Audio Collection for the First Time

Audible Studios, a production arm of Audible.com, today announced the release of writer, director and producer Matthew Weiner’s narration of Frank O’Hara’s pioneering poetry collection Lunch Poems, first published in 1964. Weiner, who has cited Lunch Poems as a tremendous influence on his creative approach to the award-winning Mad Men, now adds his own voice to O’Hara’s distinctive verse with this Audible performance, exactly nine years after the show’s premiere. This bewitching new recording is now available for download at audible.com/LunchPoems.

“When I was asked to read Lunch Poems it scared me, because I love Frank O’Hara’s voice and didn’t want mine to get in the way,” said Weiner. “His work became a part of Mad Men not only as a touchstone of the period, but more importantly, it supported my emotional purpose for the show, which was to say that our inner lives are timeless. Getting a chance to live in his work this way by reading it out loud made me appreciate the joy and pain that he seems to effortlessly capture. Of course, as a writer, it is a gift to truly experience the construction of someone’s work this way and, as a person, it made me miss him and wish we could go and grab a bite.”

“At Audible, we strive to attract creatives of all stripes to the art of audio performance,” said Audible EVP and Publisher Beth Anderson. “Matthew Weiner’s interpretation underscores how personal and intimate an audio performance can be, and how tightly it can connect with a creator’s larger artistic vision.”

With a 30-day membership trial at Audible, new listeners can enjoy any one audiobook, including this performance of Lunch Poems, free.

In addition to Weiner, among the acclaimed performers who have narrated works of literature for Audible are Maggie Gyllenhaal, Lily Collins, Thandie Newton, Emma Thompson, Rosamund Pike, Dan Stevens, James Franco, Jesse Eisenberg, Kate Winslet and Tim Robbins. In 2013, Audible Studios won its first Grammy Award, for its production of Janis Ian’s memoir Society’s Child, and also won the Audie Award for Audiobook of the Year, for Colin Firth’s performance of Graham Greene’s The End of the Affair.

Audible, the world’s largest seller and producer of downloadable audiobooks and other spoken-word content, invented and commercialized the first digital audio player in 1997, and has since been at the forefront of the explosively growing audiobook download segment. In 2015, Audible members downloaded an average of more than 17 books over the course of the year. Two thirds of new Audible members are first-time audiobook buyers.

ABOUT AUDIBLE, INC.

Audible, Inc., an Amazon.com, Inc. subsidiary (NASDAQ:AMZN), is the leading provider of premium digital spoken audio information and entertainment, offering customers a new way to enhance and enrich their lives every day. Audible was created to unleash the emotive music in language and the habituating power and utility of verbal expression. Audible content includes more than 300,000 audio programs from leading audiobook publishers, broadcasters, entertainers, magazine and newspaper publishers, and business information providers. Audible is also the preeminent provider of spoken-word audio products for Apple’s iTunes Store.

Audible.comEsther Bochner, 973-820-0781bochnere@audible.com

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