Segments by Date

(1.) Journalist BURKARD BILGER is a staff writer for The New Yorker. In a new article titled The Tick That Hunts Down its Hosts, Including Us, he reports on what we know about how the tick operates, how it has multiplied and vastly extended its territory and how it affects the people it feeds on, and the latest ideas about how to limit the infestation and treat people with alpha gal syndrome which the tick causes. BILGER is also the author of the 2023 book Fatherland, about his German grandfather, who joined the Nazi Party, but worked with the French resistance.

ISAAC BUTLER is the author of The Perfect Moment: God, Sex, Art, and the Birth of America's Culture Wars. It focuses on the religious right attacks on certain books, art and film of the 70’s, 80’s and 90’s. His previous books The World Only Spins Forward - about the play Angels in America. And The Method, about the history of the acting technique known as the method. We recorded the interview last Thursday. (THIS INTERVIEW CONTINUES INTO THE SECOND HALF OF THE SHOW).

Enter Me

(1.) Tennis champions CHRIS EVERT and MARTINA NAVRATILOVA. The new documentary Chris and Martina the Final Set is about their friendship, their tennis rivalry, and having cancer at the same time in the 2020’s. It's on Netflix. They were in remission when the interview was couple of weeks ago. But last week, Evert disclosed she’d just been diagnosed with a recurrence of ovarian cancer. (THIS INTERVIEW CONTINUES INTO THE SECOND HALF OF THE SHOW).

David Bianculli offers an appreciation, then we listen back to a '06 interview with Burrows, who died June 19. He directed over 1,000 sitcom episodes, co-created Cheers and chose the cast for Friends.

In the new comedy "The Invite," Seth Rogen and Olivia Wilde play a San Francisco couple who spend an evening getting to know their upstairs neighbors, played by Penelope Cruz and Edward Norton. It's Wilde's third directorial effort after her earlier films, "Booksmart," and "Don't Worry Darling." "The Invite" opens in theaters this week. Our film critic Justin Chang has this review.

Smith's new show is about her great-great-grandfather, a free Black man who reburied the Union dead at Gettysburg and prepared the ground for Lincoln's most famous speech.

Each sketch of HBO's seven-part comedy series, Life, Larry and the Pursuit of Unhappiness: An Almost History of America, starts with historical fact — then veers wildly, and enjoyably, off the rails.

Masculinism is a belief that feminism emasculates men, and men should be in control while women stay at home raising children. The Atlantic writer Helen Lewis says the movement is becoming mainstream.

Actor Wendell Pierce. Over a career spanning four decades, he's played some of the most memorable characters on television - Detective Bunk Moreland on HBO's "The Wire," the trombone player Antoine Batiste in "Treme." And in 2022, he became the first Black actor to play Willy Loman in "Death Of A Salesman" on Broadway. He's currently starring as Captain Wagner on the CBS series "Elsbeth," is back as a CIA officer, James Greer, in "Jack Ryan: Ghost War" and in the final season of "Raising Kanan" on Starz.

Our guest today is actor and transgender activist Laverne Cox.

Ibrahim, who died June 15, left South Africa in 1962 and lived in exile in the U.S. and Europe for many years. Kevin Whitehead offers an appreciation, and we listen to Terry Gross' 1989 interview.

In Savings and Trust, historian Justene Hill Edwards tells the story of the Freedman's Bank, which was created for formerly enslaved people following the Civil War. Originally broadcast Nov. 7, 2024.

Ali Siddiq's new special is called "My Father."

Justin Chang is a critic for The New Yorker. He reviewed "Toy Story 5."

New Yorker writer Ben Taub says while the idea of acquiring Greenland is out of the headlines, it hasn't been dropped. Taub describes how Trump's ongoing efforts have broken the trust of our allies.

A new Prime Video series imagines Spiderman as a gumshoe of the 1930s — but with superpowers. Spider-Noir represents one of the boldest performances of Nicolas Cage's entire risk-taking career.

Jesse Wegman's book tells the story of James Wilson, a largely forgotten founding father who lived a colorful life and died as a Supreme Court justice on the run from the law and creditors.

For our book critic, Maureen Corrigan, summer reading sometimes means catching up on the books she missed earlier in the year. Here's her short roundup of some spring books.

Eddie Glaude Jr., author of "America, U.S.A.: How Race Shadows The Nation's Anniversaries."