The Culture Show Podcast

On this edition of The Culture Show, Co-host Callie Crossley and contributors Lisa Simmons, and James Sullivan go over the week’s top arts and culture headlines. Lisa Simmons is the Artistic and Executive Director of the Roxbury International Film Festival and program manager at Mass Cultural Council. James Sullivan is a journalist and author specializing in popular culture and Americana. He’s also on the Emerson faculty.

Political strategist Sarah Longwell, CEO and publisher of The Bulwarkand host of The Focus Group podcast, joins Jared to discuss How to Eat an Elephant: One Voter at a Time, drawing on years of focus groups to examine persuasion, voters and political change.  BONUS: If you want even more Sarah Longwell, earlier this year she was in Cambridge at First Parish Church in conversation with Bill Kristol as part of a Harvard Book Store event. It's a great discussion, which  you can watch on the GBH Forum Network's Youtube channel.

Author Gish Jen discusses her novel, “Bad Bad Girl.” In this witty and deeply personal work, Jen blends fiction and autobiography to imagine her mother’s life and explore the distance between them — uncovering how storytelling can bridge what family history leaves unsaid. “Bad Bad Girl” is now out in paperback.

Finally travel writer Kiernan Schmitt takes us on a Halloween-inspired journey through the hidden and haunting corners of the city. His book “Secret Boston: An Unusual Guide”uncovers the eerie and unexpected — from ghostly convents to abandoned zoos and the bizarre sculpture garden known as Ponyhenge. Schmitt, who co-hosts the travel podcast “Out of Office,” returns to the show to reveal the stories and curiosities hiding in plain sight.

For this month’s Wednesday Watch Party, Jared Bowen, Callie Crossley and Joyce Kulhawik revisit Disney’s 1993 comedy  Hocus Pocus. Bette Midler, Sarah Jessica Parker and Kathy Najimy conjure up a wicked brew of sorcery and high camp. It was a box-office flop that rose from the grave to become a Halloween hit. We’re dusting off the broomsticks (and vacuum) and asking: Thirty-three years later, is Hocus Pocus still a Halloween treat, or is nostalgia playing tricks on us? 

Callie Crossley is a Culture Show co-host and host of Under the Radar with Callie Crossley;  Joyce Kulhawik is a Culture Show Contributor, an Emmy Award-winning arts and entertainment critic, president of the Boston Theatre Critics Association, and you can find her reviews at joyceschoices.com.

Can artificial intelligence transform society without putting our jobs, privacy, and safety at risk? Aaron Tang, constitutional law professor at UC Davis and moderator of PBS's Breaking the Deadlock, joins us to discuss the latest episode, AI: Who's in Control?, premiering October 27.

Operatic tenor, conductor, and founder of the American Spiritual Ensemble, Everett McCorvey has dedicated his career to preserving and celebrating America's musical heritage. As Music Worcester's artist-in-residence, he'll lead concerts celebrating Gershwin and Ellington on November 1 and featuring Margaret Bonds and Beethoven on November 6.

Halloween transforms Greater Boston's neighborhoods into an open-air exhibition of public art. Multidisciplinary artist, award-winning photographer, and Culture Show contributor Julia Swanson, creator of The Art Walk Project, explores the creativity behind the season's spooky spectacles and how this could be the most democratic expression of public art.

Matthew Aucoin, the MacArthur Fellow and composer, explores mortality, technology and a planet in distress in his vocal symphony Music for New Bodies. Its first studio recording arrives October 30, ahead of a November 6 Boston Modern Orchestra Project concert featuring his music.

Donna Ferrato, the pioneering photographer, has spent five decades documenting women's lives, from domestic violence to sexual freedom. Her work is on view in Donna Ferrato: “Living with the Enemy” and the Power of Women at the MFA through February 28, 2027.

Amy Hwang, an award-winning New Yorker cartoonist, discusses Women Laughing, a documentary exploring the women who transformed the magazine's humor. The film screens tonight at MassArt, followed by a conversation with Hwang and filmmaker Liza Donnelly.

This week on The Culture Show, Jared Bowen is joined by Culture Show Culture Show contributors Joyce Kulhawik and  Lisa Simmons. Joyce Kulhawik is an Emmy-award winning arts and entertainment reporter and President of the Boston Theatre Critics Association. You can find her reviews on Joyce’s Choices. Lisa Simmons  is Artistic and Executive Director of the Roxbury International Film Festival and program manager at Mass Cultural Council.

Bill Barclay, founder and artistic director of Concert Theatre Works, discusses The Chevalier, his musical play about Joseph Bologne, the celebrated 18th-century composer and fencer whose life unfolded against the upheaval of the French Revolution. Featuring the Chamber Orchestra of Boston and musicians from Project STEP, the production comes to Emmanuel Church October 24–25 at 7 p.m.

Sarah Trad, author of A House in the Lebanese Mountains: Recipes and Stories from Beit Trad, explores Lebanese cuisine, family traditions and the restoration of her ancestral home into a guesthouse. She joins chef Ana Sortun for a book event and tasting at Sofra Bakery and Cafe in Allston on October 22 at 6:30 p.m.

Michael Cyril Creighton, known for Only Murders in the Building, discusses his unconventional acting career and the award-winning comedy web series Jack in a Box, inspired by his years working in a theater box office. The Emerson College alumnus returns for a master class moderated by Jared Bowen on October 22 at 6:30 p.m. at the Paramount Center.

Mary Grant, president of Massachusetts College of Art and Design, joins us for her monthly “AI: Actual Intelligence” segment, sharing original, algorithm-free insights and observations.

-Brendan Kenney, founder and music director of the Firebird Pops Orchestra, previews Disney’s Hocus Pocus in Concert Live to Film. The orchestra will perform John Debney’s score live alongside a screening of the Halloween classic on Saturday, October 24, at 8 p.m. at Veterans Memorial Auditorium in Wakefield.

Artist, illustrator and costume designer Bill Crisafi introduces his debut graphic novel, The Glam Reaper’s Guide to Slaying: Life Lessons for Rebellious Souls, a darkly comic exploration of self-acceptance through horror, folklore and drag. Crisafi will appear at the Salem Night Faire October 23–24 and sign books at Eric Lesh Gallery in Provincetown on October 30.

Hank Azaria, Emmy Award-winning actor, comedian and voice artist, has spent decades creating characters on The Simpsons. Now he’s taking on another unmistakable voice: Bruce Springsteen. Azaria tells us how a surprise performance at his 60th birthday grew into Hank Azaria and the EZ Street Band, a full-fledged Springsteen celebration benefiting his Four Through Nine Foundation. The band performs at The Sinclair in Cambridge on October 21.

Vanessa Bumpus, director of exhibits at the Museum of Worcester, explores the story of Worcester-born artist Harvey Ball, who created the iconic Smiley Face in 1963 for just $45. The museum’s newly expanded exhibition, The Smile Gallery: An American Icon, traces how his simple drawing became a universal symbol, appearing everywhere from T-shirts and bumper stickers to pop culture and digital communication.

Today on The Culture Show:

Imari Paris Jeffries of Embrace Boston on personal and collective memory, from Día de los Muertos to the dangers of forgetting or rewriting history.

Tony Award-winning Laura Benanti on Nobody Cares, her new one-woman comedy about Broadway, motherhood, marriage and people-pleasing, coming to the Huntington October 22–25. For more information, go here.

Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum curator Diana Seave Greenwald on The Book of Esther in the Age of Rembrandt and how a biblical heroine captured the imagination of Dutch artists. For more information, go here.