Videogum » Ira Glass

This American Daily Show

Gabe — Fri, 05 Nov 2010 17:15:44 +0000

David Sedaris was the interview guest on last night’s the Daily Show, which also included a new John Hodgman segment featuring a guest appearance by Ira Glass. This isn’t everyone’s thing, but to the people for whom this is a thing, it is very much A THING.

Stephen Colbert Interviews Car Talk‘s Ira Glass

Gabe — Thu, 23 Apr 2009 11:00:21 +0000

Tonight, Ira Glass and his This American Life cohort will be putting on a special live show at NYU’s Skirball Center, which will be simulcast to 400 movie theaters around the country. They did a similar event last year. Borat says, success! Check your local listings, or whatever. But in the run-up to tonight’s event, Ira made an appearance on last night’s Colbert Report, and it provided a powerful and necessary reminder:

NPR jokes are the best jokes.

Seriously, there is nothing funnier than putting kombucha sipping fundraiser tote bag carrying liberals who cut out pictures of Toyota Priuses for their “dream file” in their ergonomic, macrobiotic, carbon footprintless place. Especially if you are one, because then you get all of the references.

This American Life To Introduce Sluts And Cash Prizes Next Season

Gabe — Mon, 09 Jun 2008 16:20:30 +0000

The season finale of This American Life nailed it last night. In the hour-long episode, they found seven people all named John Smith but at different stages in their life, and then stitched their stories together to create a single life, sort of. There was the little boy John Smith, and the 20-something line cook John Smith, and the X-Box developer John Smith, and the middle-aged father of a Marine John Smith, and the old John Smith who worked at the information booth at the airport. Of course, as we all know, everyone named John Smith is white, so it just makes sense that there weren’t any blacks or Hispanics or Asians in the episode. But hollow criticisms of racial prejudice aside, this was high class television.

It touched on some of the basic elements that make up life in America: illness, soldiers, parenthood, truck stops, Halloween costumes, retirement, death, X-Box, science fairs, and mustache maintenance. You should check it out on DVD or iTunes if/when it’s available on DVD or iTunes. It was smartly put together and beautifully photographed, which probably means the next season will just be strippers competing for the opportunity to fuck Ira Glass. I’m not sure television can stand to bear the weight of quality. You had me going for a moment there, Hollywood.

This American Life Cannot Do It Alone

Gabe — Mon, 05 May 2008 12:18:20 +0000

Man, This American Life wasted no time going for the heartstrings in their debut episode last night, telling the story of Mike, a young man with Spinal Muscular Atrophy, which has left him bed-ridden and incapable of speech. There are a lot of diseases out there with debilitating effects, but this one is particularly visual. Mike’s body looks formless, like the life has been sucked out of it. But he’s mentally intact, and vibrant. Also, he has a girlfriend.

There are plenty of grudges one could hold against This American Life. That it feels decidedly bourgeois and twee, or that it hits a very limited range of emotional points and sticks to a particular kind of American Life. But they do it so well. And I think that regardless of whether or not the television show renders the radio program irrelevant, they’re putting this out at a crucial time. There’s just so much bullshit programming these days, and not just reality TV, but news programming and dramas and sitcoms as well. And I’m not saying that television was ever better. It was always mostly terrible. I think that if you looked at the history of the medium, we’re probably at its apogee right now. Actually, no, I take that back. We were at the apogee about two years ago, when The Wire and Sopranos and Arrested Development were still on the air. But the point is, I’m not decrying some kind of slip in quality, what I’m decrying is a hesitancy on the part of television to tell meaningful stories. Maybe instead of feeling frustrated with the limitations of This American Life, we should admire it for where it succeeds, and take it as a cue to create other great shows that fill in the gaps that it can’t.

Also, while we’re at it, Entertainment, please create a The Best Show on WFMU TV TV show, thanks.

This American Life Live

Gabe — Fri, 02 May 2008 11:14:03 +0000

In order to promote the second season of their TV show, This American Life put together a live event last night at NYU’s Skirball Center for the Performing Arts, which was simulcast (I’m a professional writer about media now) to more than 300 movie theaters around the country. I’m told it was similar to the touring live show TAL has done in the past, with maybe a little bit more video clips thrown in. I have never been to one of the touring live shows, so I will simply accept this description to be accurate.

First of all, NPR fans need to work harder. I’m sorry, you guys, but as someone who loves NPR just as much as the next latte drinking anti-prison gay agenda Julia Butterfly, we live in America and it’s time to start acting like it. Case in point: before the show started there was a homemade pre-show Movie Quiz style game of hangman projected on the screen. The clue was “He is usually the answer to the movie quiz jumble:” and the letters were WHATTEM YEGACCHOMUN. The woman behind me said proudly “Well it’s Matthew something.” Go back to Russia, Communists.

This American Life Season 2, Hopefully With More Weiners

Gabe — Thu, 01 May 2008 15:13:27 +0000

The new season of This American Life‘s TV iteration starts this Sunday, May 4th, on Showtime at 10PM. That’s a lot of facts. Here’s a a lot of trailer:

~~How mad is Erroll Morris that he never thought of making a TV show? He’s so mad. “Ooooh, if only I were smarter!” That’s what Erroll Morris says to himself in the darkness of a lonely night.~~ I’m excited for the second season, are you? I thought the first season was really good, especially for a first season. First seasons are usually pretty rough (look how far we’ve come from the Two and a Half Men of 2003 to the Two and a Half Men of today!) There are a bunch more teaser clips (a bunch=4, that’s just science) over at the show’s homepage. After the jump, my favorite piece from last season.