8: The Genie Is Out

Extreme: Muscle Men

In the wake of the steroid ring’s downfall, the headline-grabbing prosecutions combine with sports scandals and anxieties about steroids making it into high school locker rooms. Lawmakers decide to take action. The Steroid Control Act of 1990, spearheaded by none other than then-Senator Joe Biden, promises to deal with steroids once and for all.

But the USA already had a taste of what it felt like to get ripped - really ripped. And it’s hard to stuff the genie back in the bottle once it weighs 240 pounds of pure muscle.

Today, as millions of Americans take steroids with the aim of bulking up, host Natalia Mehlman Petrzela reckons with the enduring legacy of the steroid ring, and an era which transformed our ideas about fitness and beauty.

Featuring former bodybuilders William Dillon, Shawn Ray and Sandra Blackie; Mike Zumpano, co-author of The Underground Steroid Handbook; Professor of Sports Studies at Stirling College-Chengdu University, Daniel Rosenke; Dr Harrison Pope, Professor of Psychiatry at Harvard Medical School; and Daniel Supnick, a former special agent with the US Customs Service.

Presenter and Executive Producer: Natalia Mehlman Petrzela Producer: Caroline Thornham Assistant Producer: Mohamed Ahmed Editor: Katherine Godfrey Production Manager: Cheree Houston Sound Design and Mix by Daniel Kempson Original Music by SilverHawk, aka Cyrille Poirier Executive Producer: Max O’Brien Commissioning Editor: Dan Clarke

A Novel production for BBC Radio 4

Featuring clips from: Nightline, ABC Special for Monday, Nov 20, 1989 - ABC Olympic Games History, Seoul 1988 - BBC Senator Joe Biden remarks on Democratic Anti-Drug Legislation, July 31 1989 - C-Span House Session, September 22, 1988 - C-Span Interview with Philip Halpern - Professor Daniel Rosenke

Episodes are released weekly on Mondays. If you’re in the UK, you can listen to the latest episode, a week early, first on BBC Sounds https://bbc.in/3ybDcHO