The Creative Spark

The Creative Spark

Conversations that provide insight, empowerment and tools to help others live their best creative life! In each episode host G. Brian Benson strives to have an organic chat with authors, entrepreneurs, artists, athletes, and actors, sharing their inspirational stories, strategies and wisdom that helped propel them to their own unique version of creative success. Brian, an observer of life, loves to share his curiosity and love of learning by means of insightful discussions. The process of learning how to find the joy and peace of mind that comes with stepping into one’s own skin, and going beyond anything one may have thought previously possible are just some of the take aways we hope you will have from The Creative Spark. It’s the place where creatives meet! Host - G. Brian Benson www.gbrianbenson.com Produced - Casey Jarombek Brought to you by Reawaken Media

Episodes

October 1, 2025 54 mins
Today's guest, London Garcia is an actor who has done it all in Hollywood. Stand up and sketch comedy, singer, radio host, red carpet interviewer and now award-winning actress.

Recently London made the decision to set everything else aside and focus primarily on acting and dive deeper into classes and training. Slowly but surely, things started to gain traction as London would book roles in a number of shows including...
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Today's guest, Sean Bennett is a writer, workshop host, and retreat organizer based in Nottingham and London. As a former copywriter and copyeditor for Oxford University Press, he brings a creative, editorial eye to other people's work, usually in the context of the London-based creative writing community he leads, called A Write & A Pint. He has a passion for all literature, but most specifically, existential, modern, pos...
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Today's guest, Jed Doherty is the host of the incredibly popular and award-winning podcast called Reading with Your Kids. Reading with Your Kids helps families grow closer through reading. The podcast was also an iHeartRadio Best Kids & Family Award Nominee.

For over 35 years, Jed has also been delighting students and educators across the United States, the Caribbean and Central America. His one-man show blends am...
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Episode 205 - Guest Ben Orlando
 
Today's episode is a bit of a re-direct from most episodes. Usually, I am the one asking the questions and directing the flow with my guest. This time, I decided to share a chat I had with a really interesting fellow named Ben Orlando who reached out to me to chat about our shared love of baseball and some of the unique experiences I have had through the years. Ben is quite the accompl...
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Brenda Adelman is an award-winning actor, speaker, the recipient of a Hero of Forgiveness award from the Hawaii International Forgiveness Project & has been interviewed on over 200 media outlets including NPR, Fox TV & CBS. She runs Forgiveness and Freedom Coaching and is also the founder of Your Story Made Simple.

She’s performed her critically acclaimed one-woman show, My Brooklyn Hamlet, for over 12,000 peo...
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Episode 203 - Guest Diane Foy

Ready to slide into the spotlight with the impact (and income) to match? Then you should know Diane Foy, the creator of the Superfan Attraction Method.

During her 2 decades in arts and entertainment PR, Diane represented talents such as Jane’s Addiction’s Perry Farrell, South Africa’s The Parlotones, and One Day at a Times’s Mackenzie Phillips, and Pretty Little Liars Tyler Blac...
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Episode 202 - Jeffrey Weissman is an actor’s actor. He would have been going by horseback or wagon from town to town before the advent of film and television, reciting Shakespeare or performing plays in small towns all over the countryside. 

He acts, produces, writes, and directs, and has worked with legendary film actors such as Clint Eastwood and Michael J. Fox. Jeffrey has over 100 theater stage credits and over 80...
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Ep. 201 - My guest this week is Emily Otteson, an incredibly talented artist, songwriter, and entertainer from Nashville, TN. 

Her voice is unique, almost angelic at times and her choice of melodic improvisations make her stand out and allow her to claim her own place in a town known for great singers. Her laugh is contagious and her personality shines through whether she's singing or connecting with her audience. 
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Ep. 115  -My guest this week is Mike "Smidi" Smith, an award-winning songwriter, musician, mixer, producer and record label owner who now has a media branch that is beginning to produced TV and Film projects. 

He is an Emmy, Clio and Addy Award winner who has written and produced songs that have sold over 14 million copies worldwide including multiple #1 songs, albums and top ten hits.  Smith has worked with G...
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Ep. 114  -My guest this week is Erin Gavin, a Scottish actress, singer, entrepreneur and keynote speaker.

As a child and teen actress, Erin had numerous roles in theater and in UK television series. After moving to Los Angeles, she continued to find success in films, theater and television. In 2014 Erin played for the first time, the role of Marilyn Monroe in the stage play, Marilyn: My Secret at the Macha Thea...
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Episode 113 - If you are a big sports fan like myself, you will definitely recognize this week’s guest Kevin Negandhi.  He is everywhere on ESPN.  He’s an anchor on SportsCenter, he also covers ESPN College Football on ABC.  He’s hosted Baseball Tonight, College Football Live and Outside the Lines.  He has also been a fill-in anchor on NFL Live and First Take.  He has also hosted the Rose Parade, Special Olympic World Games an...
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Episode 112.   Growing up in Oklahoma, my next guest Whitney Reynolds always knew that she wanted to have her own television show. As a child, she started interviewing her friends with a makeshift microphone in her living room. During her adolescence, her family's difficult personal journey gave her the desire to share delicate stories that must be told. At the age of 23, her childhood dream became her adult mission and her ta...
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Episode 111 - Samba Schutte is a Dutch-Mauritanian actor, comedian and writer who was born in the Sahara Desert and grew up in Ethiopia until the age of 18. He's currently starring in the HBO Max pirate comedy "Our Flag Means Death" alongside Taika Waititi, Fred Armisen and Rhys Darby. He starred as the first Ethiopian character on an American sitcom - Hakim - on the NBC sitcom Sunnyside, alongside Kal Penn. Schutte is also kn...
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Episode 110.   Guest Nita Sweeney is an award-winning wellness author of the running and mental health memoir, Depression Hates a Moving Target: How Running with My Dog Brought Me Back from the Brink and co-creator of the writing journal, You Should be Writing: A Journal of Inspiration & Instruction to Keep Your Pen Moving.

She is also a certified meditation leader, mental health advocate, ultra-marathoner and for...
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Episode 109 - Matteo Esposito is an autistic playwright and disability arts advocate from Oakville, Ontario. He has been wanting to write, produce and direct plays all his life. He got his start as a member of West End Studio Theatre in Oakville, working on props and was the assistant set designer for award-winning set designer Dr. Jane Coryell. And from there his inspiration and writing talent grew.  "Moon Child" is his lates...
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Episode 108.   Guest Tanmaya Bingham is an award-winning painter whose drawings and paintings are a direct reflection of her fascination with the human condition and have been exhibiting both nationally and internationally in places such as Santa Fe, New York City, Sydney, Hong Kong and Berlin and have been featured in publications such as Hi-Fructose and Vogue.

She has also studied painting and art history in Florenc...
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Episode 107 -Blake Robbins is an award-winning actor, writer and director. In 2012, after years in front of the camera in such notable tv shows and movies as Oz, Sons of Anarchy, The Office, and Firefly, he stepped behind it to write, direct, produce and act in his feature film debut The Sublime and Beautiful, which world premiered at the 20th annual Slamdance Film Festival in 2014 and enjoyed a very successful film fest...
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Episode 106 - Jamie Whitmore raced as a professional Xterra Athlete (swim, mtn. bike, run) for 7 years winning 37 races, 1 World Championship, 6 US Championships and 2 European Tour Titles!  After being diagnosed with cancer in 2008 and a paralysis of most of her left leg, she began a second career as a US Paralympic Cyclist where she competed in both the 2016 Rio and 2020 Tokyo Paralympic games.  At the Rio games, Jamie won a...
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Episode 105 -Michael Bentt is one of the most highly decorated amateur boxers in US history and in 1993 defeated Tommy Morrison with a first round knockout to win the WBO Heavyweight Boxing Championship. He also survived an abusive father, a suicidal experience and 4 days in a coma with swelling on his brain after his last fight. Post boxing, Michael tapped into his creative side and began writing, directing and acting in such...
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Episode 104 - Guest Derek Vanderhorst is a film and documentary supervising sound editor and Americana Music Artist. Derek has worked on some of the biggest films of the last two decades including No Country for Old Men and Hidden Figures, and Derek’s first solo album Wildflower launched this past November.  In addition to being an incredibly creative person, Derek has a very inspirational story to share that played a driving ...
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