In her classic '60s documentary, Shirley Clarke profiles a loquacious 33-year-old gay hustler who dreams of having a nightclub act. Her subject could hardly be more complex — and in examining him, she raises important questions about the relationship between fact and fiction.
Since a garment factory collapsed last month in Dhaka, killing more than 400 people, ethical fashion has been in the spotlight. Elizabeth Cline, author of Overdressed: The Shockingly High Price of Cheap Fashion, explains the economy that created this tragedy and what we can do to fix it.
Adrian Raine argues that violent behavior has biological roots just like depression or schizophrenia. This raises questions about treatment, accountability and punishment, including the death penalty.
Jeff Nichols and Ramin Bahrani made names with small, low-budget movies: Nichols with Take Shelter and Bahrani with Man Push Cart. Both have now directed big-budget films with big stars: Nichols' Mud features Matthew McConaughey, and Bahrani's At Any Price stars Dennis Quaid and Zac Efron.
The New York Times reporter talks about spending much of the past year with rebels in Syria. Chivers is also the author of The Gun, about how the AK-47 has defined modern warfare.
The comedian turned his life around when he started "WTF with Marc Maron" out of his garage in 2009. He has parlayed the popularity of the podcast into a new television show called Maron, based on his life, as well as a new memoir.
The country singer, known for "He Stopped Loving Her Today" and many other hits, died Friday at age 81. Fresh Air remembers Jones with excerpts from a 1996 conversation with Terry Gross about his autobiography, his addictions and his perspective on his celebrated but troubled marriage to Tammy Wynette.
After more than a week of gruesome media coverage, linguist Geoff Nunberg takes a close look at the words we use to describe events that mesmerize and horrify, that sensitize and desensitize, that transfix and repel us at the same time.
The creator of the acclaimed AMC series talks about his protagonist -- Don Draper -- as an aging existentialist looking for meaning in a chaotic world. He says the show's sixth season, set in 1968, is situated in that historical meaning for a reason: to reflect a traumatic passage in Don's life.
Ken Kalfus' new novel about an astronomer obsessed with attracting the attention of Martians appears at first to be an homage to the scientific romances of H.G. Wells and the lost-world sagas of H. Rider Haggard. As the novel develops, however, it unique social commentaries emerge.
The best-selling author and humorist has kept journals for 36 years. Those diaries have been the jumping-diff point for the personal essays that appear in his collections, including Me Talk Pretty One Day and now Let's Explore Diabetes With Owls.
A new six-episode drama for the Sundance Channel follows a man who, after 19 years in prison, is exonerated by DNA evidence and returns to his family. Critic David Bianculli says it's a unique show, and a memorable one.
Joseph Kosinski's sci-fi adventure, starring Tom Cruise, is the most incoherent piece of storytelling since John Travolta's Battlefield Earth. It had critic David Edelstein crying, "What? What?" over the din of the explosions.
Animals and humans have a lot in common, including some health problems that plague them. In her book Zoobiquity, Dr. Barbara Patterson-Horowitz explores how studying animal illness -- from cancer to sexual dysfunction -- can help us better understand human health.
Author Dennis Lehane talks with Fresh Air's Terry Gross about his New York Times op-ed, "Messing with the Wrong City," which expressed his love for his hometown.
Charles Sennott, vice president, executive editor and co-founder of GlobalPost, talks with Fresh Air's Terry Gross about the ongoing manhunt in Boston.
In a new documentary premiering on HBO, the journalist explores the life of his friend, the war photographer Tim Hetherington. The two collaborated on the 2010 documentary Restrepo, and Junger was profoundly changed after Hetherington was killed by shrapnel in Libya in 2011.
In a cover story for The New Republic, journalist Jonathan Cohn examines the conundrum of day care in the United States. "On the one hand," he says, "improving the quality of child care ... is going to take more money. On the other hand, it already costs more than many families can pay."
