Thao Nguyen
Page, Blind Boys, Piaf
Youth isn’t wasted on the young. Ellen Page, the 21 year-old star of the hit movie “Juno,” put in everything she had after landing her dream role as a smart, savvy, pregnant teen. And 23-year-old indie-rocker Thao Nguyen tells us how spending her teen years working at her mom’s laundromat honed her guitar skills. All […]
Ellison, Thao, Fallingwater
People with something to prove. Author Harlan Ellison makes the case that he’s heir to Poe, Kafka, and Borges. We visit indie rocker Thao Nguyen in her mother’s laundromat. Miranda July reads her short story, “This Person.” And hear why a Frank Lloyd Wright masterpiece failed to start a revolution.
Gary Shteyngart & Amanda Palmer
Kurt Andersen talks to Gary Shteyngart about his new novel Super Sad True Love Story. It’s a dystopian, social media-plagued epic that reads like a hilarious 1984. An 11-year-old from Rhode Island becomes an international pop star by continuing the musical traditions of his Cape Verdean heritage. And Amanda Palmer of the band Dresden Dolls […]
Oscar’s Youngest Nominee & Macklemore’s Thrift Shop
Benh Zeitlin, the director of Beasts of the Southern Wild, tells Kurt Andersen about his Oscar-nominated debut film, an apocalyptic fairytale set in Louisiana with a six-year-old hero. We visit indie rocker Thao Nguyen in her mother’s laundromat. Plus, the rapper Macklemore says homophobia in hip-hop is so over. (Segments in this week’s show were […]