Critic Ken Tucker reviews the home video release of The Great Ziegfeld, a biopic about the famed impresario. The film won the Academy Award for Best Picture, an honor Tucker says was undeserved. Yet the film is fun, despite some slow moments, and paints a clear picture of a bygone era of of Hollywood.
In her new book, By Hands Now Known, Margaret Burnham reports on little-known cases of racial violence in the Jim Crow era, including crimes that went unreported and murderers who were never punished.
Film critic David Edelstein reviews the new comedy Casa de mi Padre, starring Will Ferrell. It's a Spanish-language American film created in the style of a telenovela.
Professor of Religious Studies at Indiana University Mary Jo Weaver. Her previous book is "Springs of Water in a Dry Land: Spiritual Survival for Catholic Women Today," (Beacon) about women who are Catholic and feminist. Her book, "New Catholic Women: A Contemporary Challenge to Traditional Religious Authority," (Indiana University Press) has a new 10th anniversary edition. Weaver's latest book (edited with R. Scott Appleby) "Being Right: Conservative Catholics in America" is a collection of essays (Indiana University Press).
John Lasseter, chief creative executive of Pixar, Inc, talks about the animation company's new feature film, Cars. Lasseter is a founding member of Pixar and served as director and animator of the feature films Toy Story, its sequel and A Bug's Life.
Joshua Quitner and Michelle Slatalla are authors of "Speeding The Net: The Inside Story of Netscape and How It Challenged Microsoft." (Atlantic Monthly Press) Quittner is the computer columnist for Time magazine and an assistant managing editor at Time Inc's on-line site Pathfinder. Slatalla writes a technology column for The New York Times. They have also collaborated on the books: "Masters of Deception," "Flame War," "Mother's Day," and "Shoo-Fly Pie to Die."
Language critic Geoffrey Nunberg talks about the accuracy of automatic grammar checkers included with computer word processing programs like Microsoft Word.
Stephen Schiff reviews "Hero," directed by Stephen Frears and starring Dustin Hoffman, Joan Cusack, Geena Davis, and Andy Garcia. It's got a twisting plot reminiscent of films from the 1930s and '40s.
The next installment of the Harry Potter series comes out tomorrow. Book Critic Maureen Corrigan reviews the Harry Potter books and the hype around them.
Classical music critic Lloyd Schwartz reviews original cast albums of Broadway musicals that have just been reissued. They include “Finian’s Rainbow,” “The Pajama Game,” “Bye Bye Birdie,” and “Kismit” (all on Sony) and “Guys and Dolls” (on Decca).
More and more state and local governments have approved casino gambling in order to generate new jobs and tax revenue. But does it work? Economist Richard McGowan outlines why states are turning to gambling to solve their fiscal crises -- and now upping the ante even more.
Author Charles Ardai is founder of Hard Case Crime, a publishing group that reprints classic crime fiction and publishes new pulp fiction in paperback editions. Ardai, who writes under the pen name Richard Aleas, has won the Edgar Award for mystery writing.
This week, we're listening back to some favorite Fresh Air interviews from the past decade. Russell sang tracks from her solo album, Strictly Romancin', during this 2012 interview and performance.
Gallagher was court martialed for shooting at civilians from a sniper's post and murdering a defenseless captive in Iraq. New York Times correspondent David Philipps chronicles the case in Alpha.
Rock historian Ed Ward profiles The Velvet Underground. Sponsored by Andy Warhol, the band was a favorite of the jet-set crowd but reviled by the hippie culture that couldn't comprehend their music. The band featured Lou Reed and violist John Cale. Their best known songs include "Waiting for the Man," "Heroin" and "Sister Ray."
A new, 10-part miniseries follows the exploits of the Russian empress who rose to power in a coup against her own husband. The Great is shrewdly entertaining — if not exactly historically accurate.
