Matthew’s ashes. A family comes together.




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Every summer for the past seven decades, 50 high school seniors—one from every state—descend on Mobile, Alabama to take part in one of the country’s most lucrative scholarship competitions for teen girls. 

The Competition takes you behind the scenes of the Distinguished Young Women (DYW) program, and follows seven girls as they experience the highs and lows of competing for two weeks, away from home and under the most high-stress circumstances. Some girls enter for the money, some for prestige. All of them are used to being the best and the brightest. But only one will walk away with the top prize.

Host Shima Oliaee (Dolly Parton’s America, Pink Card) was Nevada’s contestant in 2001. More than 20 years later, she returns to Alabama as a judge. What can two weeks with 50 of the country’s most ambitious teens tell us about girlhood in America?

Listen to The Competition on the Wondery App or wherever you get your podcasts. You can binge all episodes early and ad-free right now on Wondery+. Join Wondery+ in the Wondery App or on Apple Podcasts. Start your free trial by visiting Wondery.fm/TheCompetition_ now.  

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Introducing: The Competition 

Part 7 — Return

A marriage ends. A son runs away.


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Part 6 — Dreams

Two siblings. Years of unasked questions.

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Part 5 — Sister, Brother

A father becomes a hero. A trip to Matthew’s childhood home.
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Part 4 — The Hijacking

Matthew goes on the run. A pattern emerges.





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Part 3 — Cindy

A life in the theater, a pet monkey, and a new understanding of Matthew.





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Part 2 — Jenny

A strange man arrives in a small town.



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Part 1 — The Box

Hysterical investigates a mysterious illness that spreads among a group of high school girls in upstate New York. What is causing their sudden, often violent symptoms? Is there something in the water or inside the school? Or is it “all in their head?” The series examines the outbreak in LeRoy, NY, believed by some to be the most severe case of mass hysteria since the Salem Witch Trials. In his search for answers, Dan Taberski (9/12, Missing Richard Simmons, Running from Cops) explores other seemingly inexplicable events of the last few years – CIA officers being crippled with nausea and vertigo; cops OD'ing from exposure to fentanyl – and discovers they’re far more connected than we realize.

From Wondery and Pineapple Street Studios, this 7-part series forces us to grapple with the mysteries of our own minds, and reckon with a contagion that we thought was long dead, but may be the defining disorder of our time.

Follow Hysterical on the Wondery App or wherever you get your podcasts. You can binge all episodes of Hysterical early and ad-free right now by joining Wondery+ at Wondery.fm/Hysterical_PSS. 
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Listen Now: Hysterical

When Matthew MaGill died alone in the woods on the Florida-Georgia border, he left behind a box filled with the artifacts of an incredible life: from Broadway in the 1970s, to a 747 hijacking, to the culture of drugs and luxury cars in 1980s Florida. A series of coincidences leads reporter Eric Mennel to the box, sending him on a five-year search to understand the truth about its owner. But as Mennel learns who Matthew McGill really was, he is confronted with questions about his own life, his own mistakes, and his own family secrets. Launching April 13th from Pineapple Street Studios.
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