Joe Mitchell, a New Yorker staff writer, meets Joe Gould, a charismatic Greenwich Village character, who is writing an oral history of the world by recording conversations he's overheard. Mitchell is captivated by Gould's Harvard background and writes a piece about him, bringing him local fame and an invitation to join a poetry club. Despite Gould's prickly personality, the two Joes maintain a complex relationship until Gould's death, when Mitchell reveals a shocking secret.
Joe Gould's Secret
In 1940s New York City, a journalist stumbles upon an enigmatic figure gathering a vast Oral History of the World by secretly recording conversations from everyday life.