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Selected Shorts
On this episode, we celebrate Memorial Day. Host Meg Wolitzer presents two stories that feature men in uniform, codes of honor, and how conflicts can sometimes lead to connection. Maile Meloy’s “Red,” performed by Keith Szarabajka, takes place in London during the Blitz, where a man and woman find a rare moment of peace. In Kurt Vonnegut’s “The Cruise of the Jolly Roger,” a retired army man searches for the next chapter in his life. The reader is Teagle F. Bougere. We also hear Vonnegut’s “Letter Home,” written to his family after being a prisoner-of-war. It’s read by Jordan Klepper.
Teagle F. Bougere recently portrayed James Baldwin in The American Vicarious production of Debate: Baldwin vs. Buckley, in New York City and London. He co-starred with Catherine Zeta-Jones in the television series Queen America. Bougere's Broadway credits include The Crucible, A Raisin in the Sun, and The Tempest. He was featured in The Public Theater’s productions of Socrates and the much acclaimed production of Coriolanus in Central Park. His most recent New York stage appearance was the world premiere of The New Englanders at Manhattan Theater Club. Additional theater credits include Is God Is at SoHo Rep, Beast in the Jungle, the title role in the stage adaptation of Ralph Ellison’s novel Invisible Man at The Court Theater in Chicago, The Studio Theatre in Washington, D.C., and The Huntington in Boston, Julius Caesar and Cymbeline for The Public Theater in Central Park, A Soldier’s Play at Second Stage, A Fair Country at Lincoln Center, Last Dance for Sybil (with Ruby Dee) at the New Federal Theatre, An Iliad (one-man show) at the Pittsburgh Public Theater, and Joe Turner’s Come and Gone and Blue Door at Berkeley Rep. His film and television credits include Hill ’n’ Gully, The Path, The Mist, Good Friday, Conviction, Cosby, The Job, Third Watch, Murder in Black and White, A Night at the Museum, The Imposters, The Pelican Brief, Two Weeks Notice, What the Deaf Man Heard, and Bull, as well as seven episodes for the Law & Order franchise.
Jordan Klepper is perhaps best known for his work as a correspondent on The Daily Show and his Emmy-nominated comedy specials focusing on the political world. His recent special covering democracy in Hungary garnered him a Walter Cronkite Award for Excellence in TV Political Journalism. He is an alumnus of the improv troupes The Second City and Upright Citizens Brigade. He and his wife, Laura Grey, are co-creators of short films including TMI, a featured short at the Slamdance Film Festival, and Peepers, which premiered at South By Southwest, among others. On Comedy Central he hosted The Opposition with Jordan Klepper, as well as the doc-series Klepper, the award winning podcast "Jordan Klepper Fingers The Conspiracy" and continues to do segments on The Daily Show with “Jordan Klepper Fingers the Pulse.”
Maile Meloy is the author of the novels Liars and Saints, A Family Daughter, and Do Not Become Alarmed, the short-story collections Half in Love and Both Ways Is the Only Way I Want It, and a middle-grade trilogy that begins with The Apothecary. She has received the PEN/Malamud Award, the E. B. White Award, and a Guggenheim Fellowship.
Keith Szarabajka’s extensive film and television career includes The Equalizer, Profit, The X-Files, Becker, Star Trek: Voyager, Star Trek: Enterprise, Charmed, Roswell, 24, Max Steel, The Inside, Law & Order, Babylon 5, Angel, Golden Years, Argo, and Supernatural. Szarabajka has contributed his voice to nearly 100 video games and numerous audio books, notably Fierce Invalids Home from Hot Climates by Tom Robbins, for which he won the 2001 Audie Award; Fear Nothing and Seize the Night by Dean Koontz; several roles in a Grammy-nominated audio dramatization of The Maltese Falcon; Rising Sun by Michael Crichton; Nelson Algren's Walk on the Wild Side; and The Mark of Zorro opposite Val Kilmer. Recent film and television appearances include 9-1-1, The Big Rant, and Encounter.
Kurt Vonnegut (1922 – 2007) was one of the grandmasters of modern American letters. Called by TheNew York Times "the counterculture's novelist," his works guided a generation through the miasma of war and greed that was life in the US in the second half of the twentieth century. Vonnegut rose to prominence with the publication of Cat's Cradle in 1963. Several modern classics, including God Bless You, Mr. Rosewater; Slaughterhouse-Five; and Breakfast of Champions soon followed. Vonnegut’s letters, essays, and short stories have been anthologized in dozens of collections, including A Man Without a Country, Kurt Vonnegut: Letters, and Complete Stories.
Meg Wolitzer is the New York Times bestselling author of The Female Persuasion, The Interestings, The Ten-Year Nap, and The Wife, which was adapted to film in 2018, starring Glenn Close and Jonathan Pryce. She was the guest editor of The Best American Short Stories 2017, and has also published books for young readers, mostly recently a picture book, Millions of Maxes. Wolitzer is a faculty member in the MFA program at Stony Brook Southampton, where she co-founded and co-directs BookEnds, a one-year, non-credit intensive in the novel.
CREDITS
"Cruise of The Jolly Roger" by Kurt Vonnegut, currently collected in Bagombo Snuff Box. Copyright © 1999 by Kurt Vonnegut, Jr., used by permission of The Wylie Agency, LLC.
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