In August 2021, David Owen of The New Yorker published an article that declared WPKN-FM in Bridgeport to be “the greatest radio station in the world.” It was a highly subjective opinion, of course, but Owen”™s celebration of the community-supported station”™s free-form programming made a cogent argument about how this eclectic station was able to maintain its originality and spirit during a time when too much of radio broadcasting has become stale and predictable.
Filmmaker Cob Carlson expanded on Owen”™s article with his new documentary “The Greatest Radio Station” in the world. Carlson grew up in Fairfield and volunteered at WPKN in the 1980s before he relocated to Boston in 1991.
“Six years ago, I had to come down to Fairfield to take care of my elderly dad and I got reacquainted with the station and met the new general manager, Steve Di Costanzo,” Carlson recalled. “He found out I worked in film and said, ”˜Oh, why don”™t you do a documentary on the station?”™”
Carlson had just completed a documentary on golf course architect Donald Ross and felt he wasn”™t ready “to do another labor-of-love kind of no-budget film.” But in 2019, Ross began teaching film at Eastern Connecticut State University in Willimantic and reconnected with Di Costanzo to start a film about the station.
Carlson stated that the title “The Greatest Radio Station in the World” was not an exaggeration.
“It”™s the fact that they allow their programmers to have complete freedom in their programming,” he explained. “There are no programming mandates that they have to play certain genres and music or kinds of songs. Free-form radio is an incredibly rare thing these days, and they”™re able to pull it off with many programmers who are experts in the field of music that they”™re playing.”
Work on “The Greatest Radio Station in the World” was hamstrung when the Covid-19 pandemic delayed Carlson from on-location shoots and in-person interviews. Another obstacle to overcome involved footage and interviews relating to the station”™s early years ”” it launched in 1963 as the University of Bridgeport”™s campus station and later became a community station following a tumultuous relationship with the university. While still photographs and newspaper copy surrounding the station”™s early years existed, Carlson was initially hampered by the lack of film footage tracing WPKN”™s roots.
However, a University of Bridgeport graduate named Bryan Konefsky ”” who later became an experimental filmmaker and a cinema studies professor at the University of New Mexico ”” had begun his own documentary on WPKN in the mid-1990s but never finished the work.
“He saved this footage,” said Carlson, noting that much of it filled in the gaps he faced in creating the new film. “He shot it on Super VHS and he gave it all to me to use in my film, which was great.”
“The Greatest Radio Station in the World” had its first Connecticut screening on June 25 at Bridgeport”™s Bijou Theatre, and another local screening is planned for July 23 at the Klein Auditorium as part of the Bridgeport Film Festival. Carlson has entered the film in other festivals. However, he insisted that he was not interested in turning the film into a box office hit.
“I don”™t care really about making money,” Carlson said. “This was another labor of love. I did it as a legacy film for the station, but I would like to get eyeballs on it and I”™ve just begun my work trying to get it on one of the major streaming platforms.”
