HEATHER McKINNEY

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Meet Heather McKinney of Sinisterhood in East Dallas

Heather McKinney

Today we’d like to introduce you to Heather McKinney.

Thanks for sharing your story with us Heather. So, let’s start at the beginning and we can move on from there.
I have been writing and performing comedy for over 12 years, both in Dallas and Chicago. I grew up in Mesquite and went to undergrad in Chicago where I fell in love with comedy and began performing professionally. In 2011, I moved back to Dallas to attend law school and have now been practicing law for the past four years. When I found Dallas Comedy House in 2016, it reignited my love for comedy and performing. That is where I started back with improv but have now branched out to storytelling and stand up.

Christie Wallace and I met at Dallas Comedy House and discovered we had a mutual love for true crime. In addition to discussing the more macabre things in life, we also just made each other laugh. Turning on mics and pressing record seemed like the natural next step. Plus, she brings in a unique perspective with her degree in psychology and her experience as a new mom. That along with my background as a lawyer made us feel like we had something unique to add to the comedy podcast landscape. That’s how Sinisterhood was born. We discuss crimes, cults, and supernatural occurrences, but always derive humor from our own lives while respecting the stories we tell.

Great, so let’s dig a little deeper into the story – has it been an easy path overall and if not, what were the challenges you’ve had to overcome?
We had some early issues with show formatting and audio quality. The more research we did helped us discover what worked and what didn’t. Now, we record in a dedicated studio room and have Christie’s husband, Tommy, edit our shows. After doing this many episodes, we have found our groove and our unique voices.

Please tell us about Sinisterhood – what should we know?
Sinisterhood is not your average true crime podcast. We bring extensive research, legal expertise, vulnerability and a lot of humor to the otherwise dark subject matter. Some of our best episodes are where we dig into the justice system and how certain information is portrayed in the media versus the courtroom. We take any chance we get to explain legal concepts or rules of evidence because sometimes a trial comes down to the exclusion of some piece of evidence or a technicality. That type of nuance doesn’t always get picked up in the headlines, so we like to give all sides of a story. We hit the iTunes Top 10 Comedy Podcast list in November 2018, just six months after starting and hit 1,000,000 downloads when the show was less than 10 months old. We have also garnered some local and national press, from Good Morning Texas to Vulture and the AV Club. I am incredibly proud of those milestones, but I am most proud of how we interact with our listeners through social media and the Patreon platform.

Is there a characteristic or quality that you feel is essential to success?
The chemistry between my co-host, Christie, and I is the key to our success. I am so grateful to do this show with someone like Christie. She has an eye for great storytelling and always makes sure anything that goes into the show is completely source-checked. My personality can tend toward off-the-rails and off-topic, so it is awesome having her to keep me on track. Her personality and the humor she brings to the show always makes me laugh, so I know the listeners love it, too. We laugh the most at each other and genuinely love spending time together. I think that joy comes through when you listen.

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