Podcast Episodes
Back to Search7316: Auguste Rodin — The Sculptor Accused of Casting from Living Bodies | pplpod
Episode 7316
Auguste Rodin sculpted The Age of Bronze with such anatomical precision that critics accused him of cheating — casting the figure directly from a liv…
4 days, 2 hours ago
7314: Fred Astaire — The Perfectionist Who Made the Impossible Look Effortless | pplpod
Episode 7314
Fred Astaire's first screen test produced the verdict: "Can't act. Slightly bald. Can dance a little." He spent the next forty years proving that wro…
4 days, 2 hours ago
7311: Stevie Wonder — The Blind Prodigy Who Hijacked the Motown Machine | pplpod
Episode 7311
Stevie Wonder signed with Motown at eleven, scored his first hit at thirteen, and spent the next decade watching the label control his money, his son…
4 days, 2 hours ago
7312: Rick Wright — The Fired Pink Floyd Keyboardist Who Outearned the Whole Band | pplpod
Episode 7312
Rick Wright was fired from Pink Floyd by Roger Waters during the recording of The Wall, then rehired as a salaried session musician for the subsequen…
4 days, 2 hours ago
7309: Peter Paul Rubens — The Artist Who Was Also a Diplomat and a Spy | pplpod
Episode 7309
Peter Paul Rubens ran the most productive painting workshop in Europe, negotiated peace treaties between warring nations, and gathered intelligence f…
4 days, 2 hours ago
7308: Olivier Messiaen — The Theology of Joy from a Nazi Prison Camp | pplpod
Episode 7308
Olivier Messiaen composed the Quartet for the End of Time in a German prisoner-of-war camp and premiered it for four hundred freezing inmates in Janu…
4 days, 2 hours ago
7310: Pieter Bruegel the Elder — The Radical Decision to Paint Ordinary People | pplpod
Episode 7310
Pieter Bruegel the Elder chose to paint peasants, children, and village festivals at a time when respectable artists painted gods, saints, and kings.…
4 days, 2 hours ago
7305: Mark Rothko — The Seagram Rebellion and the Painter Who Refused to Decorate | pplpod
Episode 7305
Mark Rothko accepted a commission to paint murals for the Four Seasons restaurant in the Seagram Building, then returned the money and kept the paint…
4 days, 2 hours ago
7307: Norman Mailer — Pulitzer Prizes, Penknives, and the Ego That Consumed American Letters | pplpod
Episode 7307
Norman Mailer won two Pulitzer Prizes, ran for mayor of New York, stabbed his wife with a penknife at a party, and spent fifty years picking fights w…
4 days, 2 hours ago
7306: Neil Young — The Deliberate Crash into the Ditch That Defined a Career | pplpod
Episode 7306
Neil Young followed the massive commercial success of Harvest by recording three albums so raw and abrasive that critics called them the "Ditch Trilo…
4 days, 2 hours ago