Tag Archives: Maya Angelou

Gael Garcia Bernal to Portray Salvador Dali in New Podcast “Playboy Interview”

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Gael Garcia Bernal’s art is about to imitate art life…

The 42-year-old Mexican actor and producer is joining a slew of stars who’ll portray famous figures across history in a new podcast series from Playboy and Audio Up.

Gael García Bernal

The two companies are launching Playboy Interview, an audio series that features teleplay-style re-enactments of the most iconic Playboy interview conversations.

In addition to Garcia Bernal, other stars set to take part in the program are Rosanna Arquette, Taye Diggs, Maya Hawke, Shea Whigham, Michael Shannon, Kevin Corrigan and Gina Gershon.

The series, which is set to debut in September, will see Arquette voice feminist pioneer Betty Friedan, Diggs will portray Muhammad Ali, Garcia Bernal plays Salvador Dali, Shannon is Tennessee Williams, Shea Whigham is John Wayne, Maya Hawke is Helen Gurley Brown, Kevin Corrigan is Frank Sinatra and Gina Gershon is Oriana Fallaci.

The first two episodes will feature “conversations” with Friedan and Ali.

The series is based on the classic Playboy Interview, which started in 1962 with Alex Haley’s conversation with Miles Davis and has run for more than 500 interviews including the likes of Martin Luther King Jr., Malcolm X, Fidel Castro, Bob Dylan, John Lennon and Yoko Ono, Steve Jobs, Whoopi Goldberg and Maya Angelou.

“Working on the Playboy Interview was an incredible experience,” said Maya Hawke, who also portrays Ayn Rand in the second season, which is likely to launch in early 2022. “I got the rare opportunity to portray two of history’s most influential, controversial, and complicated women. I was allowed to inhabit the characters rather than being asked to impersonate them, which left me thinking about their respective perspectives for weeks after. And I felt inspired. Even if I don’t agree with them about everything, or anything – their strength, persistence, and insistence on being exactly who they are has reminded me to be exactly who I am.”

“Playboy is culturally iconic for many reasons, but their in-depth interviews and journalistic integrity is a large part of what has made the publication so cool,” said Gina Gershon. “I was so happy to work on a project that celebrates Playboy’s historic interviews with so many incredible individuals. I’ve always been fascinated by Oriana Fallaci, and was so excited to be able to take part in bringing her interviews to life. It was so much fun to explore this remarkable woman and share her point of view with the world.”

“We couldn’t be more excited to unveil the first season of the Playboy Interview podcast,” added Rachel Webber, Chief Brand Officer at PLBY Group and producer of the series. “Audio is the perfect format for these intimate and revealing conversations. Each brilliant performance by this incredible cast gives you chills, making you feel like you’re right there in the room as history unfolds.”

“This podcast is the culmination of a personal journey for me having spent seven years as Playboy’s editorial director,” added Audio Up’s Chief Creative Officer Jimmy Jellinek, who adapted, produced and directed all 10 episodes of season one. “Thanks to the explosion of audio as a medium, today we’re able to reintroduce these incredible conversations to a new generation. I have long thought the Playboy Interview would lend itself perfectly to formats off the page. In my wildest dreams I didn’t anticipate that something this magical would be the result.”

“We’ve paired the greatest conversations of the 20th century with the greatest actors of the 21st. Audio Up is in the business of pushing the boundaries of audio entertainment and this project exemplifies that mission in every way,” said Audio Up founder and Chief Executive Officer Jared Gutstadt.

Blanco Named 2013 Presidential Inauguration Poet

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Richard Blanco is about to have a presidential experience…

The 44-year-old Cuban American writer has landed the role of a lifetime, 2013 presidential inauguration poet.

richard-blanco

Blanco, the 44-year-old son of Cuban exiles, will join the ranks of legends like Maya Angelou and Robert Frost.

“I’m beside myself, bestowed with this great honor, brimming over with excitement, awe, and gratitude,” Blanco said in a statement released by the inaugural committee.

“In many ways, this is the very stuff of the American Dream, which underlies so much of my work and my life’s story —America’s story, really. I am thrilled by the thought of coming together during this great occasion to celebrate our country and its people through the power of poetry.”

Blanco‘s selection as the poet of President Barack Obama’s inauguration ceremony marks several firsts. He’s the first Hispanic, gay and the youngest person to be chosen as the inaugural poet.

Blanco’s selection also comes on the heels of last week’s announcement that Vice President Joseph Biden had chosen Supreme Court Justice Sonia Sotomayor, the first Latina to serve on the high court, to swear him in at the inauguration.

Sotomayor is the first Hispanic to swear in a president or vice president.

“I’m honored that Richard Blanco will join me and Vice President Biden at our second Inaugural,” Obama said, according to the committee statement.

“His contributions to the fields of poetry and the arts have already paved a path forward for future generations of writers. Richard’s writing will be wonderfully fitting for an Inaugural that will celebrate the strength of the American people and our nation’s great diversity,” Obama added.

Blanco’s works explore his family’s exile from their native country and “the intersection of his cultural identities as a Cuban-American gay man,” the inaugural planners said.

Blanco was born in Spain to a mother who worked as a bank teller and a father who was a bookkeeper.

The New York Times said in a story about the poet that he was named after Richard Nixon, admired by Blanco’s father because of the Republican president’s strong opposition to Cuban leader Fidel Castro.

Blanco moved to New York City with his parents when he was an infant, and then moved to Miami, where he was raised and educated. He worked as a consultant engineer while he pursued his poetry, and in 1999 joined the creative writing faculty at Central Connecticut State University until 2001. He later taught in various places, including American and Georgetown universities.

The inaugural committee noted that “Blanco’s career as an English-language Latino poet gained momentum when his first collection, City of a Hundred Fires, won the Agnes Lynch Starrett Poetry Prize from the University of Pittsburgh.”

His second book of poetry, Directions to The Beach of the Dead, won the PEN American Center Beyond.