EXPLORE MORE
Denée Benton on centering Black women in HBO's 'The Gilded Age'
The actress seems to have a cosmic connection to the 1800s.
Listen to previous shows
-
July 10, 2024 - Quilling, the Boston Ballet, and Joyce Kulhawik
Quilling is the ancient art of coiling long strips of paper around a needle–or going back to its namesake– around a quill. In a twist of fate, Huong Wolf has ended up on a mission to keep this tradition alive. Today she and her husband run the Framingham-based business, Quilling Card, a fair trade company that sells handcrafted cards–and now handcrafted art. She joins The Culture Show to talk about the history of quilling and what it means to bring it into these times. From there, Boston Ballet, by way of a 360 dome, has created a portable portal to dance that’s making its way through Massachusetts. Ming Min Hui, the Executive Director of Boston Ballet, joins The Culture Show to talk about its upcoming appearances at Tanglewood and Woods Hole.Finally, it’s still Shark Week on the Discovery Channel, which means it’s still Jump the Shark Week on The Culture Show – if you think we’ve jumped the shark, Culture Show contributor Joyce Kulhawik is bringing her life boat and her list of what she thinks has just gone too far. -
July 9, 2024 - Art prescriptions, Shark Week, and Pedro Alonzo
What is a prescription for anxiety or isolation that doesn't need FDA approval and won’t get churned through big pharma to drive up prices? Art and culture.Known as “social prescriptions,” there is a growing movement of physicians writing out prescriptions for dance classes, nature walks or a trip to the museum as a way to help treat mental and behavioral health concerns.Now Massachusetts is the first in the nation to have a statewide program. Michael J. Bobbitt, Executive director of the Massachusetts Cultural Council and Dr. Priscilla Wang, Associate Medical Director of Primary Care Health Equity at Mass General Brigham join The Culture Show to talk about this new initiative.From there, It’s still “Shark Week” on the Discovery Channel, which means it’s still “Jump the Shark Week” on The Culture Show, where we look at what in the zeitgeist has gone the way of the Fonz on water skis. Today Culture Show co-host James Bennett II joins us for his list of things that have gone too far.Finally independent curator and Culture Show Curator Pedro Alozno joins us to talk about the latest exhibition he’s curated, “The Objects We Choose,” at the Tanya Bonakdar Gallery in New York. -
July 8, 2024 - Ben Shattuck, jumping the shark, and Shakespeare on the Common
Ben Shattuck’s latest book, “The History of Sound: Stories” is a collection of interconnected stories that examine the lives and landscapes of New England where Shattuck spans centuries in these haunting and often humorous stories. He joins “The Culture Show” ahead of his event at Harvard Book Store.And, it might be “Shark Week” on the Discovery Channel, but on The Culture Show, it’s “Jumping the Shark Week” where we ask: what in the zeitgeist has gone the way of the Fonz when he took that fateful jump? Culture Show co-host Edgar B. Herwick III joins us for his take.Finally, “The Winter’s Tale.” Shakespeare’s parable of human failings and forgiveness comes to life next week at the Parkman Bandstand by way of Commonwealth Shakespeare Company’s annual –and FREE–Shakespeare on The Common. Bryn Boice, Commonwealth Shakespeare Company’s Associate Artistic Director, and actor Nael Nacer join The Culture Show for a preview. -
July 5, 2024 - Fat Ham and The Shark Is Broken
Today on The Culture Show, The play “Fat Ham.” It’s a modern-day adaptation of Shakespeare’s Hamlet, where the court of Denmark is transported to a backyard barbecue in the South, but the most radical change is the sublimation of Shakespeare’s epic tragedy into an uproarious comedy. Playwright James Ijames won a Pulitzer for Fat Ham in 2022. We caught up with him when Fat Ham was onstage in Boston. From there, a behind-the-scenes look at the making of Jaws and the turbulence on the set, from the actors feuding with one another to a mechanical shark that was more blundering than plundering. The actor Robert Shaw, who played Quint , a world-weary shark hunter, used to bring his son Ian to the set of Jaws. In an epic and oedipal twist, Ian Shaw played his dad in the “Shark is Broken,” a play that he also co-wrote. Ian Shaw joins The Culture Show to talk about the making of Jaws and the play that it inspired. -
July 4, 2024 - The Boston Tea Party, AJ Jacobs, and LexSeeHer
Coming up on The Culture Show….We are steeped in American history, starting with the Boston Tea Party. Fed up with the tyranny of taxation without representation, American colonists took matters into their own hands–literally: tossing three shiploads of tea into Boston Harbor. The theatrics alone made it one of THE most celebrated rebellions. But to understand the true ideals and motivations behind it, we turn to the Massachusetts Historical Society.And in his latest book, writer AJ Jacobs documents living as closely to the original meaning of the Constitution as possible, which includes carrying a musket, and personally delivering a list of grievances to Congress. Although his constitutional immersion is humorous, Jacobs is not in this just for the laughs. He finds a nation losing its hold on the values implicit in the constitution: responsibility, community and civic engagement. Finally, sisters are doing it for themselves. As America prepares to celebrate the 250th Anniversary of the American Revolution, Lexington, Massachusetts is telling a story about the women who were a part of this history but were forgotten or erased and never celebrated. Hence, the monument “Something is Being Done.” Jared Bowen talks to Meredith Bergmann, the acclaimed Massachusetts sculptor who created this monument and Jessie Steigerwald, president of LexSeeHer, Inc.
