Midday

It's time for another visit with Midday theater critic J. Wynn Rousuck, who joins us each week with her reviews of Maryland;s regional stage. Today she tells us about The Legend of Georgia McBride, playwright Matthew Lopez's quirky, tuneful 2014 comedy about show biz & social norms, now on stage at The Maryland Ensemble Theatre in Frederick, Maryland.

Directed by MET's Associate Artistic Director, Julie Herber, the play features cast members Steve Cairns, Eric Jones, Ray Hatch, Michael Mattox, and Jeremy Myers.

The Legend of Georgia McBride continues at The Maryland Ensemble Theatre in Frederick through June 12. Follow the links above for show details and ticketing information.

Email us at [email protected], tweet us: @MiddayWYPR, or call us at 410-662-8780.

And now, a conversation about a guy that back in the day in Baltimore, struggled, scraped and faked his way through school, fought at the drop of a hat, and found himself on the opposite side of legal more than a few times. He was far and away the least likely to succeed. But succeed he did.

Leonard "Boogie" Weinglass was a charmer, a delinquent, a star athlete, a gambler, a partier and a patron. He was a Diner guy, immortalized in Barry Levinson’s classic movie. He was a salesman with a knack for fashion and food who became one of the most successful and transformative figures in American retail.

He founded the Merry Go Round chain of clothing stores, which grew to include 1,500 stores and 15,000 employees. He transformed the fashion industry. And he has lived one of the wildest lives you can imagine.

Tom's guest is Michael Olesker. He has written a terrific new book about Boogie Weinglass. It’s called Boogie: Life on a Merry-Go-Round.

Mike will be talking about it at The Ivy Bookshop tonight and Boogie Weinglass, who recently celebrated his 80th birthday, will be there to join in the conversation. Follow the link for event details.

Mike Olesker joins us now on the phone...

Email us at [email protected], tweet us: @MiddayWYPR, or call us at 410-662-8780.

We begin today with some breaking news that will alter the media landscape in the Baltimore metro area. WYPR and the Baltimore Banner, a multi-platform news organization that is expected to begin publishing this summer, announced this morning that the two organizations have entered into a joint operating agreement.

LaFontaine Oliver, the president of the Your Public Radio Corporation and the General Manager of WYPR, joins Tom now from WYPR's Studio B.

Email us at [email protected], tweet us: @MiddayWYPR, or call us at 410-662-8780.

We open this part of the show with the music of the composer and performer Dan Deacon: a track called Sat by a Tree from his 2020 album, Mystic Familiar. Deacon is one of dozens of Baltimore musicians featured in a new film about the Baltimore music scene that is receiving its world premiere Thursday night at the Charles Theater here in Baltimore.

It’s called Do Whatever You Want All the Time: The Baltimore Music Scene 2005-2020. Tom's next guests are the creative spirits behind this great project: Sam Sessa, the Baltimore Music & Community Engagement Manager and host of Baltimore Hit Parade at WYPR's sister station, WTMD, and Julia Golonka, a filmmaker and co-producer of the movie.

There will be free public screenings at 7pm this Thursday at the Charles Theatre, and at 6 pm & 7:30 pm on June 23 at Maryland Art Place.

Sam Sessa and Julia Golonka join us on Zoom from the studios of WTMD.

Email us at [email protected], tweet us: @MiddayWYPR, or call us at 410-662-8780.

It's Midday with the Mayor, another in Tom Hall's series of monthly conversations with Baltimore City Mayor Brandon Scott about key issues facing the city.

With the national spotlight shining on Baltimore in this Preakness Week, City Hall is rocked by yet another ethics controversy, as the city's Ethics Board ruled that City Council President Nick Mosby violated ethics rules on campaign solicitations. Tom asks the mayor about that ruling, plus: new initiatives on SMART policing; drawing new police-district boundaries; allocating $8 million in federal funds to help curb the city's gun violence; redevelopment progress at Pimlico; and the latest data on how many city employees have been fully vaccinated against COVID-19.

Mayor Brandon Scott joins us on Zoom from City Hall.You're welcome to join the conversation: call 410.662.8780. Email: [email protected]. Tweet us: @MiddayWYPR.

Email us at [email protected], tweet us: @MiddayWYPR, or call us at 410-662-8780.

Tom's guest today is John Waters. He’s the director of 16 films, a visual artist with museum shows to his credit, a spoken word artist who performs in venues around the world, an actor, and a pitchman for haute couture. He is also a Son of Baltimore and one of America’s most original and enduring voices in the arts, with a deep artistic palette.

His early films in the 1970s — Multiple Maniacs, Pink Flamingos and Female Trouble — earned him monikers like “The King of Sleaze,” “The Pope of Trash,” “The Duke of Dirt,” and the classic, “Prince of Puke.”

It should also be noted, BTW, that when it comes to names, the French Government calls him "an Officer of the Order of Arts and Letters."

His visual art has been featured in museum shows, he’s been nominated for a Grammy and his 1988 film, Hairspray, was adapted as a musical that won 8 Tony Awards.

As an actor, he has a role in this season of The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel, and he will be touring his stand-up show in the fall.

Waters is the author of several books of non-fiction, including his memoir, Mr. Know It All, a road trip diary called Carsick, and his compendium of profiles of people who have influenced his work, Role Models.His non-fiction commentary is fascinating, funny, insightful and often a bit outrageous.

Waters's latest book is his first novel, a book that dials up the outrageousness in a big, wild way. His protagonist is as despicable as they come, and the entourage of people in her orbit are as odd as anyone we encountered in the cult classic movies John Waters made more than 50 years ago.

The novel is called Liarmouth, which Waters describes as a “feel-bad romance.”

John Waters joins Tom on our digital line from his home in Baltimore.

You are welcome to join us as well. Call: 410.662.8780. Email: [email protected]. Tweet: @MiddayWYPR

A word about our conversation today: the book has more than a few explicit sexual references, and we will likely refer to a few of them…

Email us at [email protected], tweet us: @MiddayWYPR, or call us at 410-662-8780.

Today on Midday, it’s another installment in our series of Conversations with the Candidates: 2022. Tom's guest is Jon Baron, who is running in the Democratic primary for Maryland Governor.

Mr. Baron has experience in both government and the nonprofit sector. Before running for Governor, he was the Vice President of Evidence Based Policy for Arnold Ventures, which describes itself as a non-partisan philanthropic organization that works in criminal justice, education, health and public finance. Before that, Mr. Baron served as the President of the Coalition for Evidence Based Policy, an organization he founded in 2001. He also served on a Presidential Commission, in various roles at the Department of Defense, and as the lead staffer for the House Committee on Small Business.

Mr. Baron is a graduate of Rice University. He holds a Master’s Degree from Princeton and a Law degree from the Yale Law School. He is 58 years old. He and his wife Jessica have lived in Montgomery County for 24 years. They are the parents of two grown children.

This is Mr. Baron’s first campaign for elective office. He has chosen Natalie Williams, the Senior Director of Public Affairs at the Maryland Business Roundtable for Education, as his Lt. Governor running mate.

Jon Baron joins us on our digital line from Bethesda.

Email us at [email protected], tweet us: @MiddayWYPR, or call us at 410-662-8780.

(This conversation first aired on December 8, 2021)

The House Select Committee investigating the insurrection at the US Capitol on January 6, 2021 has interviewed hundreds of witnesses and made several criminal referrals to the US Justice Department for witnesses who have refused to appear before the Committee. Meanwhile, hundreds of rioters have been indicted and many imprisoned for their role in the attempt to subvert democracy.

A federal jury in Charlottesville, Virginia, found 12 individuals and five organizations liable for $26 million in damages stemming from the Unite the Right Rally in 2017.

Did the mob that stormed the US Capitol simply coalesce around the fantasy that the election was stolen from Donald Trump?

What effect do monetary verdicts and criminal penalties have on the neo Nazi and White supremacist organizations that are behind this tragic deadly violence?

Can the roots of the violence be traced back to rage about government that began in the 1970s?

Today, we'll listen back to a conversation Tom had back in December, 2021, with Dr. Kathleen Belew. She’s an assistant professor of history at the University of Chicago, where she is also the faculty affiliate at the Center for the Study of Race, Politics and Culture. She is the author of Bring the War Home: The White Power Movement and Paramilitary America.

And along with Ramón Gutiérrez, she is the editor of, and contributor to, a new collection of essays called A Field Guide to White Supremacy, in which she and other leading scholars explore how different forms of White supremacy and hatred manifest in events like those that took place on January 6th, and extend to domestic partner violence, homophobia, transphobia, Islamophobia, anti-immigration, and anti-Semitism. The authors chronicle how hate groups have moved from the fringe to the mainstream in America, and they send a clear warning that the violence we’ve seen in recent years may well be repeated.

Kathleen Belew joined us on our digital line from Chicago.

(Because this conversation is recorded, we can't take any call or comments today.)

Email us at [email protected], tweet us: @MiddayWYPR, or call us at 410-662-8780.

(This program first aired on January 12, 2022)

Back in January of this year, President Joe Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris traveled to Atlanta to speak about the importance of voting rights, and the need for federal legislation to overcome the dozens of state laws that have been enacted and the hundreds of laws that are being considered to restrict voting.

Before the President spoke, Vice President Kamala Harris advocated for an end to the filibuster that might clear the path for the passage of the John Lewis Voting Rights Advancement Act and the Freedom to Vote Act. And then, President Biden also called for changes to the filibuster that would make passage of the voting rights legislation possible. That was the first time he had taken that position publicly. It’s a position that is not shared by at least two members of the Democratic caucus: Senator Joe Manchin, and Sen. Kyrsten Sinema.

The war in Ukraine, soaring inflation and other issues have for the moment overwhelmed the policy agenda of the Admininistration. Voting rights appear to have taken a back seat.

Today on Midday, we revisit a conversation about an important and often overlooked dimension in the history of voting rights: the long fight for Black women’s suffrage. Tom's guest is the acclaimed legal and cultural historian, Martha S. Jones. She has written a broad, insightful survey of the unsung heroes of the movement for equality, a movement that started two centuries ago, and which included scores of remarkable women whose importance and impact are made clear by Dr. Jones’ compelling narrative.

The book is called Vanguard: How Black Women Broke Barriers, Won the Vote, and Insisted on Equality for All.

Dr. Martha S. Jones joined us for the hour on Zoom from her home in Baltimore.

Email us at [email protected], tweet us: @MiddayWYPR, or call us at 410-662-8780.

It's time for another visit with Midday theater critic J. Wynn Rousuck, who joins Tom each week with her reviews of the regional stage. In keeping with today's housing theme, she spotlights Dream Hou$e, playwright Eliana Pipes' energetic satire about how two LatinX sisters deal with cultural assimilation, capitalism, and the American home-ownership dream, now running at Baltimore Center Stage.

The world-premiere production, staged in partnership with Atlanta's Alliance Theatre and New Haven's Long Wharf Theatre, is directed at Center Stage by Laurie Woolery.

Dream Hou$e continues at Baltimore Center Stage through this Sunday, May 15. Follow the theater link for showtimes and ticketing information.

Email us at [email protected], tweet us: @MiddayWYPR, or call us at 410-662-8780.