Showing results by author "Terry Gross" in All Categories

Directors Chris and Paul Weitz on this edition of Fresh Air. Their new film, About a Boy, is based on the novel by Nick Hornby and plays in theaters now. The Weitz brothers, born to fashion designer John Weitz and Oscar nominated actress Susan Kohner, first became famous for directing the 1999 teen comedy, American Pie. They also wrote the screenplay for the animated movie Antz and directed the Chris Rock movie Down to Earth.

Political columnist David Newman and punk singer Gino Yevdjevich on this edition of Fresh Air. David Newman is a political columnist for the Jerusalem Post. He is also chairman of the department of politics and government at Ben Gurion University of the Negev and editor of the International Journal of Geopolitics. He'll discuss the history of the Jewish settlements in the West Bank and Gaza. He's written about the settlements in The New York Times.

Country singer/songwriter Jim Lauderdale, music director Charles Hazlewood, and South African singers Sandnile Kamle and Pualine Malefane. Jim Lauderdale's been called the "not-so missing link between soul and country." His songs have been recorded by Vince Gill, George Strait, the Dixie Chicks, Shelby Lynne, and many others. But he's also recorded over a dozen of his own solo albums and has sung background vocals on more than 40 albums.

Producers/writers/directors Justine Shapiro and B.Z. Goldberg and writer Noelle Howey on this edition of Fresh Air. Justine Shapiro and B.Z. Goldberg's new documentary film Promises takes a look at the Palestinian-Israeli conflict thru the eyes of seven children living in or near Jerusalem. It was filmed between 1997 and the summer of 2000. Shapiro grew up in Berkeley, California and hosts and co-writes the award-winning travel series, Lonely Planet.

Journalist Scott Anderson on this edition of Fresh Air. Anderson traveled with a platoon of elite Israeli commandos into the West Bank and wrote about it in the article "An Impossible Occupation" which was the cover story of last Sunday's New York Times Magazine. (Broadcast Date: May 16, 2002)

Spanish and Portuguese professor Maria Rose Menocal and writer, musician, and broadcaster Jamie Bernstein Thomas on this edition of Fresh Air. Maria Rose Menocal is a R. Selden Rose Professor of Spanish and Portuguese and Director of the Whitney Humanities Center at Yale University. She is also the author of the new book: The Ornament of the World: How Muslims, Jews, and Christians created a culture of tolerance in Medieval Spain.

Writer Michael Chabon on this edition of Fresh Air. Chabon just won a year 2000 Pulitzer Prize for his novel The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier and Clay. His other books include The Mysteries of Pittsburgh and a collection of stories called Werewolves in Their Youth. Last year, his book Wonder Boys was adapted into a film starring Michael Douglas. He has also written for many publications including The New Yorker, Harpers, and Esquire.

Mexican Filmmaker Alejandro Gonzales Inarritu and writer Paul Robeson, Jr., on this edition of Fresh Air. Inarritu's debut film, Amores Perros, has just been released in the US to critical acclaim. The film follows the lives of three groups of people whose human relationships parallel the relationships they have with their dogs. Released in Los Angeles theaters in April, the movie was nominated for an Oscar in the category of Best Foreign Language Film.

Film director Joel Schumacher and actor Greg Kinnear on this edition of Fresh Air. Joel Schumacher's films include St. Elmo's Fire, The Client, A Time to Kill, and Batman Forever. His latest film, Tigerland, is now out on video. It's about a group of army recruits in training who are about to be shipped off to Vietnam. The film was made on a low budget in 28 days, on 16 millimeter film and mostly with hand-held cameras.

Writer Benson Bobrick on this edition of Fresh Air. He's the author of the recently published Wide as the Waters: The Story of the English Bible and the Revolution It Inspired. The book chronicles the difficulties scholars had in translating the Bible into English - efforts that culminated in the King James Version.

Remembering the Bay of Pigs invasion on this edition of Fresh Air. April 17th marks the 40th anniversary of the Bay of Pigs invasion, in which Cuban exiles trained by the CIA unsuccessfully tried to invade Cuba and overthrow Castro. Peter Kornbluh of the National Security Archives edited the new book Bay of Pigs Declassified. Among the documents released is the agency's post-mortem on the disastrous invasion, written after a six-month investigation.

African novelist and chemist Emmanuel Dongala on this edition of Fresh Air. He was born in the Congo Republic, was educated in the US, and left the Congo with the outbreak of civil war in 1997. Two of his novels have just been translated to English: Little Boys Come from the Stars and The Fires of Origins. With the help of writers Philip Roth and William Styron, Dongala now has a visiting professorship in chemistry at Simon's Rock of Bard College in Massachusetts.

Journalists Lou Michel and Dan Herbeck and veteran broadcaster and executive producer of 60 Minutes, Don Hewitt, on this edition of Fresh Air. Michel and Herbeck are staff writers for The Buffalo News. The two have collaborated on the new book American Terrorist: Timothy McVeigh & the Oklahoma City Bombing. Michel lived 20 minutes away from McVeigh's father, and over time, he developed a relationship with the elder McVeigh, which in turn helped him gain access to his son.

Presidential historian Michael Beschloss on this archive edition of Fresh Air. His new book is called Reaching for Glory: The Secret Lyndon Johnson Tapes, 1964-1965. It is Beschloss's second volume on the LBJ tapes. Beschloss will talk about the tapes, and we will hear excerpts, including some recordings of conversations about Vietnam, Civil Rights, and with Jackie Kennedy. Beschloss has written five previous books on American presidents.

Neal Conan, host of NPR's Talk of the Nation, on this edition of Fresh Air. During the summer of 2000, Conan took a hiatus from his duties at NPR to follow the fortunes of the Aberdeen Arsenal, a minor league baseball team. He was pursuing a lifelong dream: to become a baseball announcer. He writes about it in his new book: Play by Play: Baseball, Radio and Life in the Last Chance League. (Broadcast Date: May 8, 2002)

The 10th anniversary of the use of ground forces during the Gulf War on this edition of Fresh Air. NPR's Neal Conan talks with two former lieutenants who were tank platoon leaders with the 24th Infantry Division: Alex Verdon and Greg Downey. The two were just out of college and leading platoons for the first time. They tell their story in the new book, The Eyes of Orion.

Journalist Anne Nivat is the Moscow correspondent for the French paper Liberation. Two years ago, after the Russians denied her press access to Chechnya, she disguised herself as a Chechen peasant woman and snuck across the border. For six months, she followed the war, traveling with the underground rebels and staying with families. Her reports were published in Liberation. Her new memoir is Chienne De Guerre: A Woman Reporter Behind the Lines of the War in Chechnya.

Director, co-writer Stacy Peralta on this edition of Fresh Air. Stacy Peralta directed the documentary Dogtown and Z-Boys. The film is about the community of skateboarders in California in the 1970s who originated extreme skateboarding. They did so in rundown urban beach neighborhood near Santa Monica and Venice called Dogtown. They became international stars. Peralta was one of the Z-boys and is considered one of the founding fathers of modern skateboarding.

Journalist John Burns and Mexican film director Alfonso Cuaron on this edition of Fresh Air. John Burns is the Islamabad Bureau Chief for the New York Times. He will talk about reporting on Pakistan and Afghanistan. In the past, Burns has been posted in China, Bosnia, South Africa, and Russia. He has won two Pulitzer Prizes, one of them in 1997, for his reporting on the Taliban.

Actor Jared Harris and writer James Sallis on this edition of Fresh Air. The son of actor Richard Harris, Jared has acted in theater and on the big screen. He's appeared in movies like I Shot Andy Warhol, Happiness, Sunday, Smoke, and VH1's Two of Us in which he plays Beatle John Lennon. He talks to us today about his newest movie called Shadow Magic, which is set in China. Harris plays the man that brought the motion picture projector to China.