Former Bron Exec Anjay Nagpal Launches Podcast Network Entropy Media With 5 Shows Including ‘Brokers, Bagmen & Moles’

Peter White
·4 min read

EXCLUSIVE: Anjay Nagpal, who was formerly Chief Content Officer at Bron Studios, is moving in to the world of podcasts.

Nagpal, who worked on movies including Greyhound, Bombshell and The Good Liar, has launched Entropy Media with plans to launch five investigative, narrative non-fiction series this year.

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First out of the gate is Brokers, Bagmen, and Moles. Premiering on April 26, the series starts on the Chicago trading floor of the 1980s — a workplace unlike any we know today — as the FBI mounts one of the most expensive, elaborate undercover investigations in its history. The goal: to catch brokers allegedly stealing millions of dollars from their customers. Was it a massive success that reformed our financial markets – or a huge flop costing taxpayers millions of dollars?

Chicago native and former derivatives trader, Nagpal hosts and produces this 12-part series, which was produced in association with Stretch Productions’ Tim Hendricks and Kevin “Stretch” Huff, who also star in the podcast.

Others include Game Plan, Spying on Mickey, Life Sentence and Adapting Kurt.

Game Plan tells the story of an American athlete wrongfully imprisoned in China, and a team of strangers working to bring him home. Host Matt Liston and the man at the center of the story – Wendell Brown – recount the events of 2016 when Brown is assaulted at a party in the Yuzhong District, and then imprisoned for assault. The Detroit football legend is there to teach his beloved sport to youth and winds up in a Chinese prison for years before a group of strangers around the world rally behind him.

Spying on Mickey is the wild story of David Rupert, a low-profile trucker and failed professional wrestler who couldn’t seem to find major success at any of his ventures. So how did he become one of the most successful spies in the history of MI5 and the FBI – even infiltrating and taking down the militant Irish guerilla group the Real IRA, without even being Irish.

Chicago Sun-Times reporters Bob Herguth and Abdon Pallasch will introduce listeners to Rupert who has a story so outrageous the FBI threw up roadblocks to Herguth and Pallasch’s early attempts at a book on it. The series includes audio from Rupert directly, serving as the backbone to the show.

Later this year come Life Sentence and Adapting Kurt.

In Life Sentence, Danny Gold digs into one of the most powerful and under-the-radar mob families. Frank Balistrieri ruled the Milwaukee mafia for 35 years. Instead of raising his sons to be gangsters, they became lawyers, which came in handy considering Frank was indicted 11 times on organized crime charges. With the help of Frank’s son, John, the show uncovers the truth of the Balistrieri reign. With audio from more than 200 tapes of insider conversations, Gold will give listeners an inside take on what it was like growing up in the mob.

Adapting Kurt sees Kurt Calabrese set the record straight about his high-stakes family drama. For most of his life, Kurt was stuck in the middle of a deadly family feud. After years of abuse, his brother decides to rat out their father, the most violent mobster in Chicago. The result is Operation Family Secrets, a landmark FBI investigation that helped bring down the last great American crime syndicate: the 100-year-old Chicago Outfit.

Nagpal left Bron Studios in 2020, where he managed the development, production, financing, and sales of feature films. He also recently produced Monkey Man, starring and directed by Dev Patel, which will debut on Netflix in 2023. Prior to Bron, he ran Focus World, a division of Focus Features, that included direct-to-consumer films from the likes of Jon Watts (Spiderman: No Way Home), Julia Ducourneau (Titane), as well as veteran filmmakers including Stephen Daldry, David Cronenberg and Ti West.

“We believe in a quality-over-quantity business strategy, bringing never-before-told stories with rich archival material and thoughtful, high-quality sound design to listeners,” said Anjay Nagpal. “At Entropy Media, we’re focused on good stories with captivating characters, twists and turns, and compelling audio where fascinating subcultures are revealed.”

Listen to the trailer here.

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