ABOUT THE TAO OF LLOYD
The Tao of Lloyd is a weekly podcast and an evolving solo theatrical work, with its world premiere at the Edinburgh Festival Fringe in August 2026
What if Lloyd Dobler from Say Anything grew up, got political, and invited you on a spiritual quest?
Lloyd Dobler returns. Still refusing to buy, sell, or process anything, the boombox romantic from Say Anything is now a middle aged zen punk dissident offering a kinda-sorta guided meditations to help us survive late stage everything.
Broadcasting from the burned-out cassette deck of the multiverse like a record melting in a microwave of manifest destiny, the Tao of Lloyd duct tapes ancient spiritual wisdom to the collapse of the American empire—with deep gratitude and zero credentials—like a sticky note that says: Be kind. Rewind. Revolt.
For this calm-but-unruly listening experience, there is no enlightenment required. Just presence, humor, and a refusal to confuse compliance with wisdom.
New episodes every Tuesday.
Season 2 takes one chapter of the Tao Te Ching at a time and uses it as a spiritual Molotov cocktail tossed through the Overton Window, so the inevitability of late-stage everything reveals itself as just another fiction. A story we don’t have to keep telling.
Season 1 unfolded as a ten-episode arc exploring quitting, refusal, and spiritual resistance in the Trump 2.0 era, laying the groundwork for the longer Tao-by-Tao journey that follows.
ABOUT THE CREATOR
The Tao of Lloyd is written, voiced, and produced by Dennis Trainor Jr., a Boston-based actor, writer, and producer with an activist background.
His documentary about Occupy Wall Street, American Autumn, was praised by The New York Times as “calm and smart, offsetting its stridency with discussion, music, even humor, while issuing a call to arms.”
He is also the writer and performer of the Edinburgh Fringe hit Manifest Destiny’s Child, which The Scotsman called “a refreshingly self-aware and honest perspective,” noted for blending political satire with deep cultural critique.
As an actor, recent credits include Loyd in JOB; Henry Wilcox in The Inheritance (Elliot Norton Award winner for Outstanding Ensemble and Outstanding Production); and Mr. Daldry in In the Next Room (or The Vibrator Play) —all at SpeakEasy Stage. Other recent work includes How I Learned to Drive (Elliot Norton Award nominee – Outstanding Lead Actor); Macbeth, Let the Right One In, and The Merchant of Venice with Actors’ Shakespeare Project; and The Comedy of Errors and The Taming of the Shrew with Shakespeare & Company. Additional appearances include New Rep, Gloucester Stage, Company One, Lyric Stage, Soho Rep, The Flea, and The Kraine.