Old school football fans often complain about celebrations after touchdowns grumbling “act like you have been there before.” The COVID-19 pandemic has altered how the legal system administers justice. Seasoned trial attorneys who are poised and confident in front of judges and jurors are learning how to present evidence via Zoom. Lawyers are forced to act like they have been there before while navigating unchartered waters. As more and more arguments and trials are conducted via Zoom, trial lawyers need to ditch their playbooks and concentrate on what works during a pandemic. Lawyers are understandably concerned with effectively keeping the interest of jurors miles away on the other side of a computer screen. Lawyers need to think outside the box and elicit the assistance of people with a broader set of skills. In EPISODE 11: Acting like we have done this before: Advocacy via Zoom, award-winning actor/producer Tom Procida (Double Sky Films) discusses technical aspects of effective communication via the “big screen” and provides tips about sound, posture, wardrobe, framing and more.
Lawyers are storytellers and Tom shares some basic tips with podcast host, national mediator, Steve Schulwolf. Steve and Tom trade notes about techniques for objectively assessing the effectiveness of a narrative. In some ways, a mediator serves the role as an objective film critic in assisting parties in assessing the strengths and weaknesses of their respective cases. No stone is left unturned as the two discuss whether cavemen embellished their stories and what we can learn from Aristotle and Chekov. This episode is so intense it needed a safe word. Tune in here to learn to learn more.
Steve Schulwolf is available to mediate legal disputes and Tom Procida can assist attorneys with the technical/staging end of their Zoom presentations.