Elizabeth Blair
Elizabeth Blair is a Peabody Award-winning senior producer/reporter on the Arts Desk of NPR News.
Blair produces, edits, and reports arts and cultural segments for NPR's Morning Edition, All Things Considered, and Weekend Edition. In this position, she has reported on a range of topics from arts funding to the MeToo movement. She has profiled renowned artists such as Yayoi Kusama and Mikhail Baryshnikov, explored how old women are represented in fairy tales, and reported the origins of the children's classic Curious George. Among her all-time favorite interviews are actors Octavia Spencer and Andy Serkis, comedians Bill Burr and Hari Kondabolu, the rapper K'Naan, and Cookie Monster (in character).
Blair has overseen several, large-scale series including The NPR 100, which explored landmark musical works of the 20th Century, and In Character, which probed the origins of iconic American fictional characters. Along with her colleagues on the Arts Desk and at NPR Music, Blair curated American Anthem, a major series exploring the origins of songs that uplift, rouse, and unite people around a common theme.
Blair's work has received several honors, including two Peabody Awards and a Gracie. She previously lived in Paris, France, where she co-produced Le Jazz Club From Paris with Dee Dee Bridgewater, and the monthly magazine Postcard From Paris.
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The Roots drummer, DJ and cookbook author isn't letting a pandemic slow him down — he's still performing on The Tonight Show, and now he's hosting a virtual potluck dinner party on the Food Network.
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Little Richard was an explosive performer who inspired generations of musicians from Otis Redding to The Beatles to David Bowie. He died Saturday morning.
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Hollywood stars, Jews and non-Jews, celebrated Passover by streaming a Seder online Saturday night. It raised some $2 million for the CDC Foundation's Emergency Response Fund to battle COVID-19.
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The grant, thought to be the largest-ever from a philanthropic institution for poetry, will enable the academy to fund its Poets Laureate Fellowship program for the next three years.
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Lehrer chronicled such weighty events as John F. Kennedy's assassination and the 1973 Senate Watergate hearings. For years, he and lifelong friend Robert MacNeil co-anchored The MacNeil/Lehrer Report.
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Chief Justice John Roberts trotted out an obscure term during impeachment proceedings yesterday; here's what it means.
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When a teacher suggested Gina Yashere become an actor, her mom said: "Actor? No, no, no. You can act like a doctor when you become a doctor." Yashere is now a co-creator of Bob Hearts Abishola.
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All Things Considered's Best of 2019 lists are going highly specific. Up next: the best bits from stand-up comedy specials, from Best Joke about the Immigrant Experience to Best Bit about Pregnancy.
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"Fiction is life with the dull bits left out." That is just one of the many clever observations of the writer, TV host and cultural critic Clive James. He died Sunday in Cambridge, England.
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Sarah Silverman, Tiffany Haddish and Jon Stewart were among the comedians who honored Chappelle as he received the annual American humor award in a music-filled ceremony at the Kennedy Center.
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The head of The Walt Disney Co. has a new book, The Ride of a Lifetime. It's a memoir of what he has learned in 15 years there — encompassing the purchases of Pixar, Lucasfilm and 21st Century Fox.
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The lead singer of The Cars — the offbeat Boston rock band that became a mainstay of radio in the 1980s — died Sunday afternoon in Manhattan.