The Cancer Mavericks: A History of Survivorship

Back when doctors didn’t even say the word “cancer” out loud, let alone tell patients they had it, survivorship wasn’t a movement. It wasn’t even an idea. It was shame, silence, and stigma.

In this premiere episode, host Matthew Zachary kicks off The Cancer Mavericks with a gut-punch history of how cancer was once portrayed in media—if it was portrayed at all. From 1940s radio dramas and Bette Davis deathbed scenes to 1990s...

Before Facebook groups, Slack channels, and TikTok cancer diaries, connecting as a survivor meant classified ads, rotary phones, and maybe a mimeograph machine if you were lucky.

In Episode Two, The Cancer Mavericks rewinds to the 1970s and '80s—when the War on Cancer was flooding labs with cash, but survivors were left wondering: what now? There were no after-plans. No safety nets. You got treated (if you could), you survi...

What happens when a street-smart surgeon and a no-BS survivor team up to change the rules of cancer care—forever?

In this episode, we meet two people who took radically different paths to the same goal: making survivorship a right, not a privilege.

Dr. Harold Freeman was a breast cancer surgeon at Harlem Hospital in the 1970s, where he saw poor Black women dying—not from advanced disease, but from late diagnoses, insurance r...

What if surviving cancer was just the beginning of the real fight?

In this episode, we dig into the dirty little secret of cancer care: post-treatment survivorship is often a medical no-man’s-land. Once the last scan is clean and the bell is rung, patients are left to figure out what “getting back to normal” even means—if that’s possible at all.

We hear from patients and pioneers who pulled back the curtain on life after can...

For decades, cancer care had a massive blind spot: young adults.

If you were diagnosed between the ages of 15 and 39, you were basically invisible—too old for pediatrics, too young for geriatrics, and completely off the radar of clinical trials, support systems, and survivorship planning.

In this episode, Matthew Zachary introduces the origin story of the AYA (Adolescent and Young Adult) cancer movement—and how a pissed-off ...

What happens when Hollywood gets cancer—and decides to do something about it?

In this episode, we explore the power and pitfalls of celebrity advocacy in the cancer world. When Katie Couric got a colonoscopy on live TV, it wasn’t just a media stunt—it led to a 20% spike in screenings. That moment became known as the Katie Couric Effect, and it proved something: when a household name says, “get screened,” people actually lis...

Cancer hits hard. But it hits some communities harder. Not because of biology—but because of broken systems, baked-in bias, and willful neglect.

In this episode, The Cancer Mavericks zooms in on cancer disparities—how race, income, geography, and history shape who gets diagnosed early, who gets treated properly, and who gets left behind. This isn’t a new problem. It’s a crisis that's been ignored for decades.

We meet Mary Lo...

This is the finale—but it’s not the end.

In this final chapter of The Cancer Mavericks, we connect the past to the present—and hand the mic to the next generation. The episode weaves together legacy and momentum, spotlighting the bridge between the trailblazers who fought to be heard and the advocates now rising with new tools, new platforms, and a louder voice than ever before.

We hear from Dr. Lisa Richardson at the CDC, D...

Before there was a series, a movement, or a name—there was this conversation.

In this special bonus episode, Matthew Zachary rewinds to what could’ve been the pilot for The Cancer Mavericks: a raw, funny, and unexpectedly deep conversation with his mom, Roz Greenzweig. A retired educator and lifelong cinephile, Roz doesn’t just remember every classic cancer movie ever made—she lived through one when her 21-year-old son was ...