Jeffrey Goldberg and David Plotz were online on March 6 to chat about The Wire. Read the transcript.
Dear David and Jeffrey,
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StumbleUponOK, so nothing's going to eliminate the Wire withdrawal we're all feeling. But here's a way to take the edge off—settle down for several hours with the show's actors and writers.
If there's one institution that comes close to Slate in its obsessive Wire-phila, it's public radio. The show's cast and creators have become staples on the member-supported airwaves. Fresh Air listeners who don't happen to watch The Wire must be incredibly bored with all these gushing interviews, chewing over every minute detail of plot and character. To them I say, tough luck: Go rent the damn DVDs, like your tiresome friend has been nagging you to do since Season 3, and revisit this post when you're as hooked as the rest of us.
For us fans, the public-radio archives hold many must-listen gems. Below is a list of my favorites. Hearing the laconic baritone of Marlo Stanfield on WNYC gave me an icy thrill. (OK, so it's really an interview with Jamie Hector, who plays Marlo, but who cares—that voice!) And you truly must hear the fantastic exit interview with series creator David Simon by über-fan Terry Gross from a few days ago. Also below are discussions with Bubbles, Bunk, Chris, Lester, Snoop, co-executive producer Ed Burns, writers George Pelacanos and Richard Price, and the show's music supervisor, Blake Leyh.
You can listen to all the interviews online, and where available I've included a link for downloading an MP3 version:
Series creator David Simon and co-executive producer Ed Burns take calls about the Wire finale on NPR's Talk of the Nation (March 10, 2008):
Online
David Simon on NPR's Fresh Air With Terry Gross (March 6, 2008):
Online | Download
Gbenga Akinnagbe (Chris Partlow), Jamie Hector (Marlo Stanfield), Clarke Peters (Lester Freamon), and music supervisor Blake Leyh on WNYC's The Leonard Lopate Show (Jan. 30, 2008):
Online | Download
Michael K. Williams (Omar) on Fresh Air With Terry Gross (Jan. 22, 2008):
Online | Download
Wendell Pierce (William "Bunk" Moreland) and Andre Royo (Bubbles) on PRI's The Sound of Young America (Jan. 7, 2008):
Online | Download
Felicia Pearson ("Snoop") on WNYC's The Brian Lehrer Show (Dec. 14, 2007):
Online | Download
Ed Burns on NPR's Fresh Air With Terry Gross (Nov. 22, 2006):
Online
David Simon and writer George Pelacanos on Fresh Air (Sep. 23, 2004):
Online
RELATED:
Wire writer Richard Price talks about his new novel, Lush Life, (and about writing for the series, starting at 16:25) on Fresh Air (March 5, 2008):
Online | Download
Video of David Simon speaking at Loyola College on the "End of the American Empire" (2007):
Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3
Wire writer George Pelacanos on PRI's The Sound of Young America (March 25, 2006—interview begins at 28:37):
Download
Print interview with Robert Chew (Proposition Joe) at the Fader.
Print interview with Lester, Bubbles, Daniels, Kima, Marlo, Omar, and Bunk from the Los Angeles Times (note to the Times: Seriously, you couldn't have posted the audio or video of this amazing gathering?).
Best,
Andy
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Remarks from the Fray:
I hope Goldberg and Plotz move on to discussing the idea that the press is complicit in allowing the inner-city (especially black inner-city) to decay by not paying attention to the problems that caused its sharp decline. Maybe newsroom characters feel cliched, but shouldn't we discuss how they enter into the "War on Drugs"?
--tsell89
(To reply, click here.)
So far as we've seen most of the newspapermen are indeed stock characters, but that's nothing to worry about. Except for a few leads each season, very few characters have conflicting motives. Think Clay Davis, Mayor Royce, Herc, Horse, Burrell, Rawles, Weebay, Chris Partlow, Snoop, the school administrators, even Marlo.
The strength of the show isn't in the complexity of the characters; it's in the multi-layered coherent vision, the way these somewhat two-dimensional characters all affect one another. Granted, that's a formula for pedagogy, but what saves the show (and not only saves it but really does make it the best show ever) is the one thing that fools everyone into thinking that Snoop, with her paucity of lines and sole motivation of kill-everyone-Marlo-tells-me-to, is a great character -- namely, style.
All the characters have great style, great lines. It's what makes the show fun as well as edifying. And from what I can tell, the newspapermen are going to have as much style as anyone. "Stay hungry. Good things come... when they come." C'mon.
--jamessal
(To reply, click here.)
I don't doubt that the busyness of the first episode had a lot to do with the retards at HBO deciding to cut the Wire from 13 episodes to 10 for its final season but I know Simon will make it work in spite of his bosses stupidity.
As far as Jeffrey's weak defense of the Sopranos, give it up man. The show lost its way after 3 seasons, so the claim that the Sopranos was on longer is not much of an excuse. Of course it is probably true that the Sopranos was a victim of its own massive popularity, while the Wire has been able to stay on course precisely because nobody was watching. Maybe if David Simon had gotten all the money and all the ball licking from critics that David Chase received he would have turned into a hack writer as well.
--sir biff
(To reply, click here.)
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