Terry Gross

Tom Perrotta is the author of "Election: The Novel" which the new film "Election" is based upon. The book is set in a New Jersey high school amidst a hotbed of political activity: students are voting for their school president. earlier books, The Wishbones (1997), and, Bad Haircut (1994), were in similar fashion observing the agonies of growing up in suburban New Jersey.

Staff writer for The Times of London, Eve Ann Prentice. She's been visiting the Balkans regularly since her first assignment there in 1978. She's reported on wars in Bosnia and Croatia. She and other journalists recently made a trip into Kosovo, led by pro-Serbian French philosopher Daniel Schiffer. During the trip, in southwest Kosovo, their party was hit by NATO bombing. Their driver and interpreter was killed in the raid.

Editor of The Wall Street Journal Europe, Frederick Kempe. As a journalist, he's covered Germany for over twenty years, and is also the son of German immigrants. His new book "Father/land: A Personal Search for the New Germany" (Putnam) is his exploration into his family's past in Germany, and an analysis of Germany today.

Teenage gay rights activist Michael Bisogno (bis-SOYN-yo) talks about being the victim of gay-bashing in New Jersey. Bisogno who served as co-president of his school's Gay-Straight Alliance group was brutally assaulted by 15 of his fellow high school students. Following his recovery, Bisogno later filed charges and is now an advocate fighting against hate-crimes.

Gay rights activist Kelli Peterson talks about her controversial efforts to a gay and lesbian support group in her high school. She is the subject of the recent film "Out of the Past" which received the 1998 Sundance Film Festival's Audience Award for "Best Documentary." Peterson's effort was suppressed by the School board and the Utah legislature which passed a law banning all extra-curricular clubs in schools. THIS INTERVIEW CONTINUES INTO THE SECOND HALF OF THE SHOW.

Actor and now author Bill Murray. He's co-written the new book "Cinderella Story : My Life in Golf." with George Peper. Cinderella Story is really two books. The first is a string of anecdotes about Murray's club-wielding adventures with a number of celebrities including: Jack Nicklaus, John Denver, Clint Eastwood, and Hunter Thompson. The book is also an autobiography of a kid who started out caddying for 60 cents a half-hour with his brothers.

Singer Mel Torme died Saturday at age 73 of complications from a stroke. We'll hear an interview Terry Gross did with Mel in 1988. For more than 50 years, Torme was one of most accomplished and versatile pop and jazz singers. Known for years as "The Velvet Fog," Born Melvin Howard Torme to Russian-Jewish immigrants in Chicago on Sept. 13, 1925, Torme first made his reputation in the Big Band era as a songwriter, arranger, drummer and singer. He later sang in MGM musicals.

Actor Kevin Spacey He has been nominated for a Tony Award for "Best Performance by Leading Actor in a Play." in "The Iceman Cometh" Kevin Spacey made his Broadway debut opposite Liv Ullman in Ibsen’s Ghosts His breakthrough came as Jamie Tyrone, Jr., with Jack Lemmon in the 1986 Broadway and London production of Eugene O’Neill’s Long Day’s Journey into Night.

Stage actress and acting teacher Uta Hagen. She's taught acting for more than 40 years. She is considered one of the most important acting teachers in America. This Sunday, she will receive a lifetime achievement Tony award. She taught such actors as Jason Robards, Jack Lemmon, Sigourney Weaver, Matthew Broderick and the late Geraldine Page. Her first book about acting, "Respect for Acting" was published in 1973 and is still in print.

The Governor of Minnesota Jesse Ventura. He's got a new memoir called, "I Ain't Got Time to Bleed: Reworking the Body Politic from the Bottom Up." (Villard).