EXPLORE MORE
The 25-hour Moby Dick Marathon sails on in New Bedford
Every winter, thousands of fans descend on the New Bedford Whaling Museum to hear the novel out loud.
Listen to previous shows
-
June 2, 2026 - Patti Smith, a new translation of "The Odyssey," and three-time U.S. Poet Laureate Robert Pinsky
Patti Smith, National Book Award–winning author of “Just Kids,” joins The Culture Show to discuss her latest memoir, “Bread of Angels.” The book traces her imaginative postwar childhood, her life with Fred “Sonic” Smith, and the years of loss and renewal that shaped her return to writing and performance. Daniel Mendelsohn—Charles Ranlett Flint Professor of Humanities at Bard College, and frequent contributor of essays to The New Yorker and The New York Review of Books where he is Editor-at-Large—discusses his new translation of Homer's “The Odyssey.” Three-time U.S. Poet Laureate Robert Pinsky joins The Culture Show to talk about retiring from Boston University where he has been a professor since 1989. -
June 1, 2026 - Ethan Hawke, Anthony Amore, and "Dorie's Anytime Cakes"
Ethan Hawke has built one of the most varied careers in contemporary film, spanning Hollywood classics like Dead Poets Society and Training Day, as well as independent films such as Before Sunrise and Boyhood. He’s also an accomplished novelist, screenwriter, producer, and filmmaker. He joined us ahead of receiving the 2025 Coolidge Corner Theatre Award.Few people know more about art theft than Anthony Amore. As Director of Security and Chief Investigator at Boston’s Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum, he’s spent decades pursuing the truth behind its legendary 1990 heist. His new book, “The Rembrandt Heist: The Story of a Criminal Genius, a Stolen Masterpiece, and an Enigmatic Friendship,” revisits another one of Boston’s great art crimes — the 1975 theft of a Rembrandt from the MFA — and the larger-than-life thief who pulled it off, Myles Connor.And five-time James Beard Award winner Dorie Greenspan brings sweetness (and some savoriness) to the everyday with her new cookbook “Dorie’s Anytime Cakes” — filled with loaves, Bundts and snackable slices. -
May 29, 2026 - Bobbi Brown, Donnie Wahlberg, and Chef Aidan McGee
Bobbi Brown built a beauty empire on simplicity and self-expression. She joins The Culture Show to talk about her new book “Still Bobbi,” where she lays bare her lessons for reinvention, resilience, and redefining beauty on her own terms.From there, actor, singer and entrepreneur Donnie Wahlberg. Familiar to millions as “Blue Bloods’” Detective Danny Reagan, he spent fourteen seasons solving crimes in New York City. Now Danny Reagan is back — but this time, he’s doing it Boston-style. “Blue Bloods” followed a multi-generational law-enforcement family. In "Boston Blue," Wahlberg once again steps into Reagan’s shoes — this time moving the New York detective to Wahlberg’s own hometown. He joins The Culture Show to talk about a new chapter in the “Blue Bloods” universe and about his homecoming. Finally, McGonagle’s Pub landed a spot on “The New York Times” list of America’s best restaurants, making it the first Irish pub to get this national recognition. Chef Aidan McGee joins The Culture Show to talk about how he is reimagining pub fare. Aidan McGee is the chef patron of The Dubliner and McGonagle's Pu -
May 28, 2026 - Live from New York: Derrick Adams and Melissa Errico's Back to Barbara
Artist Derrick Adams joins us to discuss Derrick Adams: View Master, his first major museum survey, now on view at the Institute of Contemporary Art. The exhibition brings together more than 100 works from the past 25 years — paintings, sculpture, collage, video, performance and public projects — celebrating Black life, leisure and everyday joy. To learn more go here.Tony Award nominee Melissa Errico joins us to talk about Back to Barbra, her new cabaret show with pianist and music director Billy Stritch at 54 Below. A follow-up to The Streisand Effect, the show returns to Barbra Streisand’s music as a conversation about influence, performance and how one singer makes another icon’s songs her own. To learn more go here. Tickets for the May 29 livestream are available here. -
May 27, 2026 - Live from New York City: Marc Shaiman and Steve Locke
Today on The Culture Show, we're joined by Marc Shaiman, the award-winning composer and lyricist whose work runs from When Harry Met Sally and Sleepless in Seattle to Hairspray, Smash and Mary Poppins Returns, joins us with his new memoir, Never Mind the Happy. Before the Tonys, the Oscars and the Broadway openings, he was a teenager haunting community theaters, a young musician swept into Bette Midler’s world, and creating a career that would move through the devastation of AIDS, the machinery of Hollywood and the bruising, and thrilling business of making musicals. On June 9th, he'll be at Broadway in Worcester for "An Evening with Mark Shaiman." For tickets and more information, click here.Then artist Steve Locke joins us with his first career monograph,I Said What I Said, a new book featuring three decades of work in painting, sculpture and public art. From portraiture to public memory, Locke’s work confronts race, desire, and history — and asks what America is willing to look at.
