Leonard Lopate at Large on WBAI Radio in New York

(1/4/21) It's impossible to understand the last 75 years of American history without understanding the bond between American presidents and British prime ministers. FDR, of course, had Churchill. JFK famously had Macmillan, his consigliere during the Cuban Missile Crisis. Reagan found his ideological soulmate in Thatcher and George W. Bush found his fellow believer, in religion and in war, in Tony Blair. Ian Buruma’s latest book The Churchill Complex: The Curse of Being Special, from Winston and FDR to Trump and Brexit is more than just a reflection on the weight of Churchill's legacy but a look at how the destinies of the US and the UK are intrinsically linked. Join us for a hard look at the special relationship between our two nations in this installment of Leonard Lopate at Large on WBAI.

(12/22/20) You’ve heard of a staycation, but how about a quarantini and some contact-free delivery in the bubble with your quaranteam? In this installment of Leonard Lopate at Large on WBAI, our favorite language experts and regular contributors to the show Kathryn and Ross Petras discuss the new words that have developed during the pandemic as we head into a holiday season like none before it.

(12/21/20) The holidays can be a stressful time for a cat. From new strange people and packages showing up in their domicile to their beloved humans disappearing for days (or even weeks) at a time, there are a plenty of things that can cause feline anxiety as we all participate in end-of-the-year festivities of one type or another. In this installment of Leonard Lopate at Large on WBAI we welcome veterinary experts Drs. Debra F. Horwitz and Carlo Siracusa’s, the authors of Decoding Your Cat: The Ultimate Experts Explain Common Cat Behaviors and Reveal How to Prevent or Change Unwanted Ones, back to the show for another round of Everything You Ever Wanted To Know About Your Cat: holiday edition.

(12/17/20) Investigative journalist Bob Hennelly’s writing has appeared in the New York Times, Slate, the Village Voice, the Christian Science Monitor, the Miami Herald, the Detroit Free Press along with dozens of other magazines and newspapers. He also has had an esteemed career in radio from his reporting for NPR to his tenure as WBAI’s general manager. With the coronavirus surging around the country and around the world as the first round of vaccinations begins, Bob looks at the state of the response locally and nationally in his latest appearance on Leonard Lopate at Large on WBAI.

(12/16/20) In 2010, Kevin Systrom and Mike Krieger released a photo-sharing app called Instagram, with one simple but irresistible feature; it would make anything you captured look more beautiful. In less than two years, it caught Facebook’s attention. Mark Zuckerberg bought the company for a historic $1 billion when Instagram had only 13 employees. Drawing on unprecedented access with the founders of Instagram, as well as influencers like Anna Wintour and Kris Jenner, Bloomberg News social media reporter Sarah Frier’s new book No Filter: The Inside Story of Instagram explores how the company has changed the way we eat, travel, communicate and present ourselves to the world. Join us for a look at the battle within tech companies for their most valuable commodity—your attention in this installment of Leonard Lopate at Large on WBAI.

(12/14/20)Since their discovery more than 160 years ago, Neanderthals have only gained importance in most anthropologists’ perception of early humans. In her new book Kindred: Neanderthal Life, Love, Death and Art, Dr. Rebecca Wragg Sykes shoves aside clichés of rag-clad brutes in an icy wasteland to reveal curious, clever connoisseurs of the world in their time, technologically inventive and ecologically adaptable. Join us for a reconsideration of 300,000 years of humankind in this installment of Leonard Lopate at Large on WBAI.

(12/11/20) The United States has been in a constant state of war since 2001. However, this is not quite as significant when you consider that the United States has been at war or invaded other countries almost every year since our founding in 1776. In his latest book, The United States of War: A Global History of America's Endless Conflicts, from Columbus to the Islamic State, professor of political anthropology at American University David Vine traces this pattern of bloody conflict from Columbus’s 1494 arrival in Guantanamo Bay through the 250-year international expansion of the US empire. Join us for a look at our nation’s many wars, in this installment of Leonard Lopate at Large on WBAI.

(12/8/20)Billie Holiday, one of the greatest vocalists of all time, was always controversial—a proud black woman who preferred white audiences, an exploited artist and a violent drug addict, a loyal friend and a vindictive lover, a blues singer who didn’t sing the blues. Featuring unseen interview footage from Charles Mingus, Sarah Vaughan, Tony Bennett, Count Basie and even the FBI agents who arrested her, director James Erskine’s new documentary Billie aims to discover who this jazz icon really was. In this installment of Leonard Lopate at Large on WBAI, the film’s executive producer and executor of the late singer’s estate Michele Smith joins James for a new look at the legacy of Billie Holiday.

(12/4/20)Filmed in Wuhan, China by an independent crew, the MTV Documentary Films release 76 Days chronicles the city’s 76-day lockdown for COVID-19. Directed by Hao Wu and two China-based journalists, Weixi Chen and a third filmmaker (known only as Anonymous) the film looks at the local struggles faced by the residents of Wuhan in the earliest days of the coronavirus outbreak. In this installment of Leonard Lopate at Large on WBAI, Hao Wu discusses what we can learn from the first people to cope with this terrible pandemic.

(12/3/20) The confounding 2017 murder of North Korean leader Kim Jong Un’s brother Kim Jong Nam in a Malaysian airport sparked an international investigation at the heart of the new Ryan White documentary Assassins. The film focuses on on the two women on trial for the killing—one from rural Indonesia and the other from Vietnam. Who are they? Fierce assassins or pawns in a twisted game of cloak and dagger being played at the highest levels of government? Go beyond the headlines for a look behind one of the strangest political assassinations in modern history in this installment of Leonard Lopate at Large on WBAI.