Society & Culture

Torn, who died Tuesday, won an Emmy Award for playing the gruff producer Artie on The Larry Sanders Show. In 1994, he told Fresh Air that he based his character on Johnny Carson's long time producer.

Sarah Jessica Parker has spent much of her acting career exploring what it means to be in a relationship — and to be single. In the HBO series Sex and the City, which ran from 1998 until 2004, she played Carrie Bradshaw, a single writer chronicling her experiences with the Manhattan dating scene. Now, in the HBO comedy series, Divorce, she stars as Frances, a mother of two navigating the dissolution of her marriage.

Linguist Geoff Nunberg considers the word 'algorithm.'

The remarkable story of the first all-female crew to compete in an around-the world sailing race. In 1989, 26 year old skipper Tracy Edwards set out on what was an unthinkable journey for a woman - to sail the 33,000 mile Whitbread Around the World Race. Her story and that of her crew is told in the documentary 'Maiden.'

At the height of America's Jim Crow era, Taylor broke barriers by becoming the country's fastest and most famous cyclist. Michael Kranish tells his story in the new book, The World's Fastest Man.

The classically-trained British actor plays a ruthless hedge-fund manager on Billions, which recently ended its fourth season. Lewis describes his character as "the embodiment of the American dream."

Commentator Zahra Noorbakhsh remembers when a personal crisis and a tragedy across the world coincided and how community and ritual helped her through.

HBO's Deadwood: The Movie picks up where the TV series ended in 2006. Olyphant and Milch spoke to Fresh Air about the series in separate interviews, originally broadcast in 2011 and 2005.

Lizzo is rapper and singer and her new album is her star-making break-thru. She also plays flute, is a self-proclaimed big girl, a feminist, and a lot of fun to talk to.

While caring for her mother, who had dementia, bioethicist Tia Powell began imagining a different way to approach the disease. Her new book looks at long-term care options and end-of-life decisions.

John Waters reflects on his morbid fascinations as a boy, and what it's like to be an aging rebel. He has a new memoir.

In the second half of our two-part interview, Stern talks about his 2017 cancer scare, his thoughts on retirement and his mother's depression. His new book is Howard Stern Comes Again.

Looking back on his early career, Howard Stern remembers being "petrified" that he wasn't going to be able to make a living. "All the sexual antics, the religious antics, the race antics — everything that I talked about, every outrageous thing that I did — was to entertain my audience and grow my audience," he says. "Whether you liked it or not, or the person down the street liked it or not — I didn't care as long as I kept growing that audience."

A conversation with journalist Rachel Louise Snyder, author of the book 'No Visible Bruises' and Suzanne Dubus who is CEO of a domestic violence crisis center that pioneered a new approach to protecting women in danger of being murdered.

Singleton, who died April 29, spoke to Fresh Air in 1991 about his semi-autobiographical movie, which centered on kids growing up surrounded by drug addiction and gang violence in South Central L.A.

When New York Times media columnist David Carr died suddenly of previously undiagnosed lung cancer in 2015, he left behind a legacy as a journalist, a mentor and a father.

In 2015, a woman named Dee Dee Blanchard was found stabbed to death in the Missouri home she shared with her teenage daughter, Gypsy Rose.

Linguist Geoff Nunberg considers the word 'socialism" which has gone from the fringes of American political discourse to the forefront of the national conversation.

Woods' recent Masters title follows a 10-year drought of major tournament victories. Jeff Benedict, co-author of Tiger Woods, says: "What we're seeing now is someone who loves what he's doing."

Ray Romano's comedy special, Right Here, Around the Corner, is now streaming on Netflix. He spoke to Fresh Air in 2016 about the story behind the title of his hit sit-com Everybody Loves Raymond.