Actor Jerry Adler. He's a former Broadway producer, director and stage manager who took up acting at the age of 62. He worked on over 53 Broadway shows before moving to L.A. where he staged managed a soap opera. On a hunch, a friend, who was casting a film, brought Adler in to read. That resulted in his first appearance as an actor in the film noir thriller, "The Public Eye." Since then, Adler has acted in a number of television shows. He's now starring in the new Woody Allen film, "Manhattan Murder Mystery." (Interview by Marty Moss-Coane)
The Staircase details the workings of a justice system filled with pricey lawyers, ambitious district attorneys, bickering experts and appeals to a jury's cultural biases that may have nothing to do with the evidence or even the case at hand.
Film critic Stephen Schiff reviews John Boorman's new movie, "Where the Heart Is." It's a farce about three rich kids forced by their father to make it on their own. It stars Dabney Coleman, Uma Thurman, Joanna Cassidy, Crispin Glover, and Christopher Plummer. Boorman's earlier films include "Deliverance," "The Emerald Forest," and "Hope and Glory."
Carlo Bonini, investigative reporter for the Rome newspaper La Repubblica, broke the story about an Italian intelligence agency's involvement in forging documents saying that Iraq secured uranium from Niger. Those documents helped the White House make the case for invading Iraq. Bonini's new book is Collusion: International Espionage and the War on Terror.
Rock historian Ed Ward plays us some tracks from the "Million Dollar Quartet" sessions. It was an early 60s recording date at the Sun Studios in Memphis, featuring Elvis Presley, Jerry Lee Lewis, Carl Perkins, and Johnny Cash.
Lexicographers know they're in the hot seat as they confront the changing use of the word "marriage." Linguist Geoff Nunberg says the key to getting the new definition right is to crisply describe everything that's in the category and nothing that isn't.
McPherson never thought he'd make a Christmas album. Then, he says, "I got a bug in my ear." He and his band perform live in studio from Socks, and McPherson talks about growing up on a cattle farm.
Screenwriter/actress Polly Draper and jazz pianist Michael Wolff have co-produced “The Tic Code.” The new film is about a mother and her son, a musical prodigy with Tourette’s syndrome. The syndrome is a nervous disorder that produces uncontrollable facial tics and jerky muscular spasms, as well as causing strange noises to be emitted from those who have the disorder. Polly Draper wrote the film based on the life of her husband, Michael Wolff.
Singer, songwriter and guitarist Carl Perkins died yesterday at the age of 65. He died of complications from a series of strokes. Perkins is the pioneer of a style of music called Rockabilly, which is described as "a country man's song with a black man's rhythm." He's the man who wrote "Blue Suede Shoes," the hit song sung by Elvis Presley which became the first Sun label record to sell over a million copies.
He has died at age 73. Wilson won the Pulitzer Prize for his play, "Talley's Folly." He wrote 17 full length plays and 30 one acts. Titles include "The Hot L Baltimore," "Burn This," "Fifth of July" and "Redwood Curtain," which had just come out when Terry spoke to Wilson in 1992. Wilson was one of the founders of The Circle Repertory Company in New York. He was nominated for Tony Awards for "Angels Fall," "Talley's Folly" and "Fifth of July." (REBROADCAST. ORIGINAL AIRDATE: 3/13/92)
Journalist Alex Perry wrote the new e-book The Hunt for Boko Haram: Investigating the Terror Tearing Nigeria Apart. He says Boko Haram doesn't have logical reasons for the atrocious acts it commits.
Neurologist William Langston. His work plunged him into a medical mystery, and a hot political controversy about the ethics of medicine. In 1982 Langston was called in to examine a number of "frozen" patients, young men and women in the San Francisco Bay Area who suddenly could neither move or speak, though conscious. Langston recognized the signs of Parkinson's disease, and determined that these patients had all used the same batch of tainted heroin. Langston prescribed L-dopa, a treatment for Parkinson's which only provided short-term relief.
Kin: Songs By Mary Karr and Rodney Crowell is a new collaboration between Karr, the bestselling author and poet, and the maverick singer-songwriter. Together, they've written 10 songs, which are performed on the album by a variety of singers, including Norah Jones, Rosanne Cash and Emmylou Harris.
Doc Watson, who was called "a living national treasure" for his virtuoso flat-picking and his repertoire of traditional folk and bluegrass tunes, has died. He was 89. Fresh Air remembers the blind guitar and banjo player with excerpts from a 1988 interview.
The movie is loud and obvious, but it's not a desecration of F. Scott Fitzgerald's 1925 masterpiece. Baz Luhrmann's interpretation of The Great Gatsby is more like a cartoony Broadway musical version of Gatsby in which no one, alas, sings.
Jerry Strahan is the author of the memoir "Managing Ignatius: The Lunacy of Lucky Dogs and Life in the Quarter" (Louisiana State University) about his 20 years managing Lucky Dogs, Inc., a fleet of hot dog carts in New Orleans, French Quarter. Strahan writes that he works among panhandlers, prostitutes, pimps, con artists, drifters, transvestites, and more.
Journalist and professor of environmental studies Donella Meadows. Twenty years ago she co-authored the book, "The Limits to Growth." The book used a computer model to project the impact of growth on the environment. It caused a sensation because of it's eco-gloom and helped spur the environmental movement. Now in the authors' sequel, "Beyond the Limits," they argue that we have shot past the earth's limited resources but that we are in a better position to avoid global economic collapse because of new technical possibilities.
Anita Hill has written a book entitled "Speaking Truth to Power," (Doubleday) a reflection on the events surrounding the Hill-Thomas hearings of the fall of 1991. Hill addresses her difficult overnight transformation into a public figure, as well as the way her case has affected women and the work world as a whole. Hill is currently working on another book about sexual harassment, and lectures on civil rights and sexual harassment in the workplace.
Commentator Patsy McLaughlin (mc-LOFF-lin) reflects on advertising's "Breck" girl becoming the "Breck" woman. McLaughlin will speak with this year's Breck model, Pamela Chew.
Actor Michael J. Fox. He got his start on the hit TV show "Family Ties." He went on to star in a number of films, including the "Back to the Future" series. He's also starred in "Casualties of War," and "Doc Hollywood." His latest project is called "For Love or Money," a comedy about a concierge who's trying to raise money to run his own luxury hotel.
