Growing up in the Bronx as the only child of an academic and a real estate broker, actor Kerry Washington remembers her family had two cars and a dishwasher in their apartment — which meant, "in my neighborhood, in my context, we were rich."
The Russian poet Joseph Brodsky once said that prison is a lack of space counterbalanced by a surplus of time. Our current lockdown can't be compared to being locked up, but with so much surplus time on our hands, many of us are eager for stories that will help us escape endless thoughts of COVID-19. Here are three that did that for me: Unorthodox, Baghdad Central, and Abigail.
Pizzarelli, who died April 1 of COVID-19, played with Benny Goodman, Frank Sinatra, Tony Bennett and Rosemary Clooney, among others. He spoke to Fresh Air in '92 and again, with his son John, in '06.
Schlesinger, who died April 1 of COVID-19, won three Emmy Awards for his songs for the TV series Crazy Ex-Girlfriend. He spoke to Fresh Air with bandmate Chris Collingwood in 1999.
Fresh Air celebrates Ellis Marsalis, who died April 1 of COVID-19, by listening back to interviews with two of his sons. Branford spoke of his father in 2002; Wynton's interview is from 1994.
For more than two decades, trauma surgeon David Nott spent several weeks each year volunteering in some of the world's most dangerous conflict zones, including Syria, Afghanistan, Congo, Iraq, Yemen and Sarajevo. Now he's in London, applying some of what he learned in war zones and disaster areas as he treats patients with COVID-19.
Two years ago, science writer Ed Yong wrote an article for The Atlantic in which he warned that a new global pandemic was inevitable — and that the world would be unprepared for it when it arrived. Now, with the outbreak of COVID-19, much of what Yong warned about in his reporting has come true.
Bart Ehrman says the ideas of eternal rewards and punishments aren't found in the Old Testament or in the teachings of Jesus. His new book is Heaven and Hell: A History of the Afterlife.
In The Splendid And The Vile, author Erik Larson details the British prime minister's first year in office, during which England endured a Nazi bombing campaign that killed more than 44,000 civilians.
It's hard to focus right now. So recommending a book can seem, well, out-of-touch. Unless, that is, the recommendation is for a novel that's so absorbing, so fully realized that it draws you out of your own constricted situation and expands your sense of possibilities. For me, over the past 10 days or so, the novel that's performed that act of deliverance has been The Glass Hotel, by Emily St. John Mandel.
McNally, who died March 24 due to complications related to COVID-19, won Tony awards for Love! Valour! Compassion!, Kiss of the Spider Woman, Ragtime and Master Class. Originally broadcast June 1993.
Benjamin Wittes says Trump has changed the presidency fundamentally — and we're seeing the impact during the COVID-19 pandemic. He is the author, with Susan Hennessey, of Unmaking the Presidency.
Parker's breezy new album, which mixes live music with vintage synthesizers, draws on R&B, early hip-hop, droning electronica, jazz-funk, Afropop and flailing '60s-rock solos.
Apocalyptic novelist Max Brooks is something of an expert on planning for pandemics and other disasters. The author, whose books include World War Z, Germ Warfare and the forthcoming Devolution, has toured the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and has reviewed government response plans related to various emergency situations — all in the course of research.
Concert halls and music venues around the world have been shuttered due to the outbreak of the COVID-19 pandemic, but before closing its doors, the Philadelphia Orchestra gave one last performance on March 12 — to an empty concert hall. Conductor Yannick Nézet-Séguin describes the experience of playing in a vacant hall and hearing silence at the end of each piece. And we listen to a 2019 interview with Yannick.
In his new book, Let the People Pick the President, Jesse Wegman makes a case for abolishing the Electoral College. He notes that the winner-takes-all model means that millions of voters become irrelevant to a presidential election that is often decided by voters in key "battleground" states.
Hulu's new eight-part series uses the fraught encounter between two families — one well-off and white, one bohemian and black — to raise tricky questions about race and social class.
Azaria has voiced dozens of Simpsons' characters, starting with Mo the bartender. In the IFC comedy series Brockmire he plays a troubled baseball announcer who always speaks in his broadcaster voice.
BTS' new record features songs that vary from grandly dramatic to impishly playful. The album's been a near-instant hit, selling over 2 million copies in its first two hours of release in South Korea.
