There's a lot going on right now. Mounting economic inequality, threats to democracy, environmental disaster, the sour stench of chaos in the air. I'm Brooke Gladstone, host of WNYC's On the Media. Want to understand the reasons and the meanings of the narratives that led us here and maybe how to head them off at the pass? That's on the media's specialty. Take a listen wherever you get your podcasts.
good morning i'm jane paulie and this is sunday morning on this final weekend of the month march madness remains in full swing after today's games the ncaa men's basketball tournament will be down to the final four for decades across america filling out a bracket before the tournament starts has been a wildly popular way for fans to get a piece of the action but as our ted koppel will explain that's no longer the only game in town
Placing a bet on the outcome of a game is one thing, but with the help of artificial intelligence and an iPhone, You can now bet on every play. You can bet on the speed of a pitch, a possession in a basketball game. Sports have become the equivalent of a nonstop slot machine. Which is why some of the next bets are being placed on the outcome of the next point. in a ping-pong match in the Czech Republic. That's ahead on Sunday morning.
As the saying goes, you never want to meet your heroes. But don't tell that to music superstar Brandi Carlile, who grew up idolizing Elton John and is now collaborating with him. They are talking with Tracy Smith. Elton John says his new album with Brandi Carlile is one of the best things he's ever done and one of the hardest. I wanted to quit. You did want to quit? I did want to quit, yeah.
But she helped him stick with it, just like she always dreamed she would. I've been in a band with him since I was 13. He just only found out. Elton and Brandy, later on Sunday Morning. Lee Cowan this morning gets personal with Maria Shriver, who's revealing herself like never before. You'll meet her inner poet. For much of my life, I was really tough on myself. I was hard. I had a really hard inner critic. I pushed myself relentlessly. But then, Maria Shriver says, she started writing poetry.
Let's see how the universe responds when I pull back the curtain on my soul. Yeah, let's see. A personal peek into Maria Schreiber, the poet. Ahead on Sunday Morning. Among the Washington institutions President Trump is remaking from the top down is the Kennedy Center. Our colleague, Nora O'Donnell. assesses the impact mo rocca heads to broadway for a look at the show death becomes her the latest and a growing trend of movies adapted for the stage
plus faith salee with thoughts about all those corporate buzzwords in the workplace and more on this sunday morning for the 30th of march 2025. we'll be back after this March Madness is in full swing, which means plenty of competition, school pride, and increasingly gambling.
senior contributor ted koppel explores another kind of march madness the growing legal phenomenon of sports betting There they were in June of 1990, some of the grand poobahs of professional sports testifying before a Senate subcommittee on the dangers of legalized gambling. Nothing has done more to despoil the games Americans play and watch than widespread gambling on them. Paul Tagliabue was commissioner of the National Football League.
Here's how he summed up his mission before the committee. To protect the integrity and the character of our games. Legalized gambling and professional sports were once regarded as a deadly combination to be avoided. At all costs. But that was then. Oh, what's up? This is now. When you got overs and unders, we're in it every time they throw the ball, kick the ball, dribble the ball. Maybe it's not even a ball.
Who needs a ball? That's Wayne Gretzky off the ice. This is the ultimate quarterback roundtable. I think I know why we're here. What? Quarterback? High school? Just one among many superstars promoting sports betting. It all changed with the 2018 Supreme Court decision, moving what was once largely limited to Las Vegas directly to the phone in your pocket. So far, 39 states and Washington, D.C. have legalized sports gambling. These few days of March Madness...
are expected to produce more than $3 billion worth of wagers. The NCAA is sufficiently concerned about players' safety It's taken out ads warning losing gamblers not to harass the players. Only a loser would harass college athletes after losing a bet. That's because you can now bet on essentially anything that may happen in the course of the men's and women's basketball tournaments. She'll heave at the buzzer. She got it!
We now have accessible on every phone, computer, and tablet betting on every single micro event in every sporting event. conceivable. Online sports gambling is a fundamentally different and more dangerous product than ever could have been imagined. Harry Levent has been warning about what he sees as a growing public health crisis.
Before we sat down to do this interview, I looked on my phone. You can bet on ping pong from the Czech Republic on an average Wednesday morning. I'm not really placing a bet on the game, am I? You're placing a bet on a micro-event within the game. You could do it within 15 seconds. Tell me what that micro-event is. The result of every point in a ping-pong contest between two players no one's ever heard of.
That's what younger and younger people are betting on. I'm not trying to beat anybody. I'm trying to make it safe. Levant learned his lessons the hard way. He's a recovering gambling addict. Gambling addiction took my mind, my soul, body, and conscience. You were a lawyer. I'm a disbarred lawyer. He had been stealing from his clients to cover his gambling debts.
Levant caught a break with a sympathetic judge who, recognizing his addiction, placed me on probation for eight years and ordered me to continue my treatment and said, This doesn't have to be the end. You can do something with this one day. People are getting hurt. He's now a licensed therapist treating other gambling addicts. It's an expanding universe, he says.
Close to $150 billion worth of legal sports bets placed last year alone. Hey, you people of legal betting age. The industry's best customers are young men. A Siena College Research Institute poll shows that almost half of men between the ages of 18 and 49 have an active online sports betting account. That actually raises an interesting question. In theory, you have to be 21. In theory. However... I know a lot of people that are under the age of 18.
They're 16, 15, and they're openly in school talking about all the wagers they got. That's Sean, Andrew, and Brian. No last names here. They are... Recovering Gambling Addicts in Treatment with Harry LeVant. How did they do that? Parents' information. Siblings. Usually it's a social security number. It might be a driver's license. Then they're taking on that identity.
A lot of underage betting is happening on illegal or unregulated sites, but the legal sites haven't solved the problem either. Show me. And gambling addiction at any age, as Sean recalls, can be devastated. This was my bed. When I was in the teeth of it, it's all that mattered. My marriage didn't matter. My job didn't matter.
My daughters didn't matter. Gambling was the only thing that mattered. Sound familiar? Yes, sir. Winning was nice, losing less so, but what counted was the action. Live betting online. Anytime, anywhere. Automatic. Algorithmic, powered by machine learning and AI. There's always something to bet on. I found out some cricket matches are three days because I bet on one. Same, dude. I was waiting for it to end. I did the same thing? Yeah.
I've had my phone in the shower with me multiple times. I got a waterproof case on my phone just so I could go in the shower. I did. With the live betting, there's no casual person betting on every play. That's where I... go that it's catered to the gambling addict. What all three men describe is an addiction every bit is all-consuming as drug addiction, and even more consequential.
One in five problem gamblers will attempt suicide. That's the highest rate of any addiction. You considered suicide? Yes, sir. I... I was gonna give it a shot. I was calm about it. I accepted it. I wanted... To do it, I personally had a letter written out. So, yes, it was... gonna happen and thankfully my dad called the authorities up here. And just before I could end my life, I got a knock on the door.
The American Gaming Association, the industry's trade group, declined our request for an interview, but in a statement said it encourages responsible gambling. allowing bettors to set limits on their wages, deposits, and playing time. We're placing money lines in real time. The sportsbooks offer the number for a problem gambling helpline.
And if you look carefully, it's right there at the bottom of this ad promoting gambling. Here's the harsh reality. The biggest losers are some of the sportsbook's best customers. The companies are enjoyable entertainment for an overwhelming majority of people. But their business model, over 80% of their profits are made from the 15% of people.
who are gambling the most. This Sunday is all win and no risk. Which is why Harry Levant says the gambling industry encourages players to keep going with so-called bonus bets. Bet $5 and get $150 in bonus bets guaranteed. Including what's known as a reload bonus. When a person's account has gone to zero, the gambling companies offer them, if you read the deposit right now, we'll give you 50% additional credits to continue gambling. You've already lost money.
Put more money in and we'll give you some credits to chase your losses. It's called a reload bonus. A reload bonus. They seem very sinister. They seem very purposeful. They seem designed to keep you in action. I had a patient once refer to Reload Bonuses as the neighborhood dope dealer giving me $10 extra in my bag because they knew I was a little down and out that week. If your bet doesn't win, at least it didn't cost you anything.
And for what the industry describes as its most loyal players, they offer VIP programs. Andrew had his own VIP host. So what they tell you it's for is to make your... gambling experience better. In reality, if I went a day without depositing or playing, I would get a text or an email. And what would the email say? Where have you been? Here's a profit boost or bonus that you can use to get you back in the game is the one they love to say. The best was we missed you.
We missed you, absolutely. The gambling industry says only 1% of adult Americans have a severe gambling problem. That may be a low estimate, but even 1% represents 2.5 million American adults. We end where we began, back in 1990, with Steven Greenberg, who was then Deputy Commissioner of Baseball.
before a Senate subcommittee. When gambling is permitted on team sports, winning the bet may become more important than winning the game. 35 years ago, they were looking into the dangers of what might happen. Today, hundreds of billions of dollars later, the evidence is all around us. There's a lot going on right now. Mounting economic inequality, threats to democracy, environmental disaster, the sour stench of chaos in the air.
I'm Brooke Gladstone, host of WNYC's On the Media. Want to understand the reasons and the meanings of the narratives that led us here? And maybe how to head them off at the pass? That's on the media's specialty. Take a listen wherever you get your podcasts. for decades maria shriver has lived her life squarely in the public eye but now she's revealing herself in ways we've never seen before we get chapter and verse from our lee cowan
You're kind of a Californian girl, though. I always say I'm going home to Washington, or I'm going home to the Cape, or I'm going home to Boston. So, I don't know. I'm a little bit of everything. You might know Maria Shriver because of her famous family. or because of her famous former husband. Maybe you know her as First Lady of California, a network news journalist, or a women's health advocate. In fact, you may think you know all about Maria Shriver. But you don't, she says.
Because until recently, she didn't even know who she was herself. I got separated and I found myself in my mid-50s thinking like, okay, what do I do now? Where am I going? Who am I? And I just sat down and looked out the window and started writing. And out it came. What came out? Poetry. They are everywhere, the fragments of me. in the closet, in the drawer, in the ceiling looking down. The fragments of me are all over the land.
People say, like, oh, poetry, don't, you know, I don't know about poetry. And I'm like, why not? Just give it a chance. I Am Maria, out this week, is an unflinchingly public account of a very private journey. Reading it. I almost felt like at some moments I was like intruding in your innermost thoughts. It's a pretty vulnerable thing to put that all out there. Yeah. It is. And I'm scared about it a little bit. Yeah. You begin talking about your…
as a child your life kind of in the Kennedy shadow, that being Maria was kind of Kennedy adjacent. I, you know, didn't want to go through my life being asked which Kennedy I was. I wanted to figure out who I was aside from the hair and the teeth that everybody just kept pointing to. She was just 12 when her uncle, Robert F. Kennedy, was gunned down.
She was even younger when her other uncle, President John F. Kennedy, was assassinated in Dallas. I grew up with that city being like, whoa. That word pulls the trigger. Ripped through my house like the wind. I said, one day I'll go to you. Yell at the air, at the building, at anyone who was there. Years passed. The pain didn't. It wasn't something that anybody really talked about, so I just didn't talk about it either.
Nobody asked how you were doing? Not that I'm aware of. I grew up in a family that soldiered on. And I think there's a lot that's admirable about that. But I think there's a lot that… then you never get to know about yourself. It seems as if before she was running through the forest of her big life, and now at age 69, she's stopping at individual trees. Moments, she writes.
You look at those moments like little stones. You turn them upside down and right side up. You stare at them. Look for what you saw and what you missed. One of those stones glittered with Hollywood magic. Her marriage to Arnold Schwarzenegger, later California's governor. I had been with Arnold since I was 21. I had gone straight from my parents to him.
Years later, though, that once glittering stone pulled her underwater when the two divorced. Shame filled my body. Humiliation filled my soul. Every inch of my being crumbled. And that's where she says she'll leave it. I don't believe in kind of...
Talking behind other people's backs in public has just never been my jam. And I'm in a good place with Arnold, and that's really important to me. I usually stand in the back because I come here a little late. I'm not always the first person in the pew. It's been here at St. Monica Catholic Church in Los Angeles, where her faith has gotten her through many a challenge. I've yelled at God.
I don't know anybody who hasn't, you know, so then I just take my focus off him and move to Mary. She minored in theology at Georgetown and actually considered being a nun. Then I heard that, you know, they didn't have sex and they had to take a vow of poverty. I'm like, I'm out. She eventually landed in the secular world of journalism. First, here at CBS.
And I'm Maria Shriver. Today is Thursday, April 3rd. Then later at NBC. We will have those stories and of course a lot more here on Sunday today. It was high profile. In the late 80s, there weren't a lot of female news anchors. Certainly not pregnant ones. And I was anchoring with Gareth Utley, a steam journalist, and he had never sat next to somebody who was throwing up during commercial breaks. And he was just like, you know, kind of like...
She forged ahead in a man's world, much the way she says her mother, Eunice Kennedy Shriver, tried to do as well. She was formidable. She was fierce. Yet she grew up in a family where the men were the focus and they were the first row, so to speak. Got a sense that you just didn't feel like you were kind of seen Truthfully I guess yeah, I don't think I think my mother, you know was
focused on her work. She was focused on her brothers. I have no doubt she loved me. I have no doubt she wanted to push me 24-7, and she did. Did that experience change the way? You decided to be a mom? Oh yeah, 100%. My door was always open. I just hope that my kids know that they... War makes me cry, but, you know, the priority of my life. I hung with them and I had time with them and time for them. Eunice Shriver died in 2009.
Her father, Sergeant Shriver, just a few years later, after a long battle with Alzheimer's. Ever since, Shriver, who grew up in Camelot, found that that disease... was the dragon she wanted to slay. Every 66 seconds, another brain will develop Alzheimer's disease, and two-thirds of those brains belong to women.
She founded the Women's Alzheimer's Movement at the Cleveland Clinic. So let's come together and do this for every single woman. And push the Biden administration for a comprehensive plan to fund research. into all kinds of women's health issues. We... as half the population deserve answers, not just on Alzheimer's, but on endometriosis, on menopause, on migraines, on osteoporosis, on MS.
She has used her public voice for all kinds of causes all her life. But her poetry, she says, is her private voice. And this time, Maria Shriver's cause is herself. Life hasn't turned out exactly the way I thought but I sit here today in love with my life, deeply grateful. I'm at peace.
And I really spent a lot of years not at peace. Some people would say, who know me? Well, you're not at peace. You're restless and you're driven and all that sort of stuff. But I'm really content with my life and I'm proud of myself finally. That's the question I'm most afraid of One that asks me That's Meryl Streep in the film Death Becomes Her. An updated theatrical version of the movie is now on Broadway.
which, as Mo Rocca explains, is one of the latest examples of a relatively new trend, from screen to stage. The 1992 cult film Death Becomes Her. About the intense rivalry of two women and their quest for eternal youth is notable both for its oscar-winning visual effects and its cast of A-listers. Okay, so Meryl Streep, Goldie Hawn, Isabella Rossellini. I mean, these are three...
Up and comers. I'm sorry, who? There were our understudies in our previous Broadway shows, yeah. In fact, these are three of the stars of the Broadway musical version of Death Becomes Her. You could get really hung up on the fact that some of the greatest actresses of all time played our roles. Meghan Hilty inhabits the Meryl Streep role of Madeline Ashton, an actress of a certain age. But the thing is, we're not recreating their performances. We're recreating this story.
Michelle Williams of Destiny's Child takes on the role of a mysterious sorceress, played by Isabella Rossellini in the movie. She's actually come to see it, right? She did come to see it. What was that like? I did not know that I would feel kind of like one of those wobbly things at the car dealer. My body just kind of... left itself. It's been fun, but we got to go. I think I'm done better. And two time Tony nominee Jennifer Smart.
in the role of helen sharp played by goldie hahn believes the movie is a natural as a broadway musical the dark humor in the show lends itself to a musical because it's very dramatic. The movie's dramatic, and so it's perfect for stage. It's almost operatic. It's so heightened that it's perfect fodder for a musical. Director Christopher Gatelli knew that a successful transfer to the stage meant translating memorable moments from the movie.
Like the spectacular tumble Meryl Streep takes down an ornate staircase. We spent weeks in a room with a staircase. throwing mannequins down the stairs, throwing balls with hair down the stairs, throwing, like, if you could throw it down a flight of stairs, we literally did it. the solution a fall guy in this case an olympic gymnast does the stunt for hilti it really excited me because
He does this feat every night, no wires. It's literally like a human going down the staircase, kind of free fall. Judging from its response, the audience relishes being in on the joke.
It feels like an ocean of waves of laughter. Most of those huge waves are in response to how things have been translated from the movie to the stage. I think it's a laughter of respect that we got... it right like they were probably wondering how are they going to do that and we did yeah drink that potion and you'll never grow even one day older Death Becomes Her is just the latest in a long line of Hollywood movies turned into Broadway musicals.
But the traffic used to move in the opposite direction. Plays like The Philadelphia Story. Please don't go, Mr. Conner. As a writer, this ought to be right up your street. Don't miss a word. And stage musicals like The Sound of Music were turned into hit movies. Back then, movies were rarely turned into Broadway shows. I think Broadway felt that the Hollywood source material was second rate, that it was kind of low rent and not really worthy of the theater on Broadway.
Lawrence Maslon is a professor in the graduate acting program at New York University. That started to change in the 50s when you had better movies, frankly, in the 40s. And one of the first... Broadway musicals based on a screenplay is Silk Stockings, which is based on Billy Wilder's Ninotchka. That's not too shabby a movie. Still, if a movie made it to Broadway, most likely its title did not. For example, the film All About Eve became the musical Applause.
Then along came Disney, with movie titles that were major draws for theatergoers, and a trickle of Hollywood to Broadway adaptations became a roar. The Lion King, when it opened, was such a theatrical reinvention of something that it captures the imagination to this day. I mean, I have to say, I nominate the Lion King adaptation as...
the biggest risky move and one that just paid off. You know, the proof is in the pudding because the film of Lion King, since it's been released, has made slightly under a billion dollars worldwide. The stage version, which is making money even as you and I are talking, has made more than $12 billion. The Lion King illustrated how finding the perfect balance between the familiar and new is essential.
The Addams Family was a musical a few years back. What's more well known about The Addams Family than their signature song? And they purposely, when they started in Chicago, didn't want to use it. They were like, no, we're our own thing. And people started like... walking away in intermission with these long faces. And I completely get it. Had I been in the audience without that, I would have rioted. Right, right. For the record, yes, the producers ended up adding the theme.
In the case of Death Becomes Her, a story about aging that hasn't aged well, some rewrites were in order. In the movie, Streep's and Han's characters rip each other new ones in pursuit of a slouch played by Bruce Willis. I will not speak to you till you put your head on straight.
I think a staged version of Death Becomes Her allows the creative team to take somewhat dated, misogynistic material and cut and paste it or tailor it a little bit so that it's palatable. Mo, I really should push you if we're getting off. Jennifer Simard and Megan Hilty believed that focusing on their characters' friendship was key.
If you just hate someone, you cut them out. Yeah, what is that phrase? The opposite of love is not hate, it's indifference. And we are not indifferent to one another. And ultimately, we do discover how much we love each other. The formula seems to be working. michelle williams can sense it from the stage during the opening number i love feeling the energy of the audience and i'm able to go back and tell people it's a good one it's a good one we've got a good one
This morning, Nora O'Donnell takes a closer look at those sweeping changes afoot for a storied Washington institution. So you want a little picture like this? President Trump is taking center stage at the Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts. We're going to make a lot of changes, including the seats, the decor, pretty much everything. It needs a lot of work.
He's directing many of those changes as the new chairman of the board. Out are all of President Joe Biden's appointees, replaced with Trump allies. It is a very big part of the fabric. of Washington, D.C. And we're going to make our capital great again, just like we're going to make our country great again. The Trump White House says an overhaul is needed because the Marquis Arts Center is, quote, woke. Is the Kennedy Center broke? The Kennedy Center has the most complicated financial model.
And that is true of every nonprofit arts organization. We did a lot of really great things that I really love. Last month, Deborah Rutter was fired as president of the Kennedy Center after serving for more than a decade. The institution has a budget of $268 million, with $43 million from the federal government. In 2023, it had a $6 million surplus. Is the Kennedy Center supposed to be a...
money-making, profitable enterprise? Right. We're a non-profit organization. The answer is no. It's not intended to make money. Its budget comes mostly from donations. Billionaire businessman and former chairman David Rubenstein has given more than $100 million. He, too, was fired last month. To have us both leaving at the same time does cause me some worry because of the sense of understanding of structure, decision-making, how we go about interpreting our mission, all of those kinds of things.
Art knows no national boundaries. The Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts was founded in 1971 as a national cultural center and memorial to President John F. Kennedy. Its annual honors ceremony, which airs on CBS, features the best in music, theater, And dance. But now conservatives charge it's too liberal. Highlighting three drag events last year.
Was it a mistake to host drag shows? I don't think so. I believe that everybody in America has the opportunity to be seen and to be seen at your National Cultural Center. The shows that he's referring to... are three of the 2,000 performances that take place at the Kennedy Center. What do you think the focus on those three shows was about? I cannot actually imagine. Drag has been around for centuries. Shakespeare performed in drag. The original Shakespeare. President Trump...
Boycotted the Kennedy Center Honors during his first term after criticism from honorees like Norman Lear. So what does the new chairman have planned now? In audio obtained by Sunday morning, he suggests... A new host. A king of ratings, right? Whether we like it or not, that king of ratings. So if I was the host of the honors, and we'll go slightly more conservative if you don't mind with some of the people. What kind of people?
does President Trump want to honor? Oh, they were mentioning a list of people. I remember the name of Parvarotti. I remember the name of Andre Bocelli. They wanted to do something about Elvis Presley. Paolo Zampoli, longtime friend of the president, has been on the board since 2020. What kind of ideas do you have to make the Kennedy Center better?
Well, we're in the Potomac River. We could have a little marina where in the weekend boats can come there. Nice cafes, nice location where they can spend the weekend there and make it like a destination. Other things that I suggested is that... to branch franchises around the world. Another idea? sending art to the International Space Station. My idea was to have not Michelangelo, not Picasso, but living contemporary artists to create a very small piece of art. One can be displayed inside the...
One can be thrown in LEO, low orbit, that can circulate in the orbit and one can be auctioned on the ground of the Kennedy Center because they need to raise money. There are some artists who feel like they won't be welcome at the Kennedy Center. Artists who are gay or lesbian, LGBTQ.
I don't think the press have anything against this kind of people. I don't understand what this distinct inclusion or this walk like this. The Kennedy Center is acceptable for everybody and has to represent the agenda of America. Not everyone agrees. One thing you won't see is the musical Hamilton. Producers canceled shows after President Trump became chairman. I never liked Hamilton very much and I never liked it. There have been several other high profile cancellations and resignations.
The vice president was even booed at a recent performance. You were a part of the Kennedy Center leadership during the first Trump administration. That's right. And was there any involvement in politics then? I never saw anything like this, no. This is new and it was quite sudden.
Musician Ben Folds is among those who resigned after serving as the artistic advisor of the National Symphony Orchestra, part of the Kennedy Center. Let's say I get in an artist that has different views than the president. Do they feel safe being themselves? Do they feel safe saying what they believe? They're not political shows, but you can express what you'd like to. And you think that's no longer the case? Well, I suspect it's no longer the case. There is an instinct.
an authoritarian instinct that is true in all authoritarian times in history. Take control of the culture, take control of the arts early on. We reached out to the White House and Kennedy Center for this story. No one responded to our request for interviews. What's the hardest part about all this? I think... The sting is the disregard for expertise and experience. And we were working towards something extraordinary. Now, Deborah Rutter says...
She hopes the institution's founding message isn't forgotten. I often go back to Eisenhower's words and then Kennedy's words to think about, who are we? What do we do? We believe that all of Americans should be seen and should feel welcome at the Kennedy Center. Here's Faith Saley with the latest buzz from the American workplace. Hey team, huddle up. I want to leverage this platform and give an ROI on your time.
corporate buzzwords. We hate them. They're a pain point, but they never get downsized. Now, I'm not here to suggest we onboard a holistic paradigm shift in business jargon. I mean, we can't boil the ocean, but we can go for some low-hanging f- root. Buzzwords are meant to pack pithy meaning, to be dense, dense.
Let's put a pin in that. We'll circle back to it. Corporate cheerleaders want you to think buzzwords create a culture of inclusion. A flexicon to show off teen spirit. Flexicon is a buzzword I just made up and wanted to run up the flagpole. But studies have... shown that using jargon impedes trust. Like when HR informs us our company is smart-sizing.
How dense do you think we are? You're firing us! Gen Zers are especially vulnerable. They've grown up getting instant answers from Siri. But workplace culture isn't Googleable, so young employees may lean in to buzzwords. and cling to them like corporate life rafts. In fact, research has shown that employees who feel like they're lower status tend to use more jargon.
And who can blame you for feeling insecure if you get layered? That's when your company slips someone in above you, like their long underwear and your flesh that's no longer fit to be exposed. There's jargon that won't die, like synergy, but New words buzz all the time. Sorry, I'll never get granular enough to learn what a distributed cloud is. Just sounds like lousy weather. Look.
Here's some radical candor. I suspect buzzwords are really about people using poetry to distract from the fact that all they're doing is trying to make money. Because that's all most buzzwords are. Metaphors. Idea showers. Growth hacks. Figures of speech. Disruptive action item. Just speak real human people words. If you love metaphors so much, read poems. There's some really good ones to unpack. I mean, Shakespeare was a thought leader, and he didn't even future-proof his content. Just...
Compare your boss to a summer's day and she'll get rid of all that layering. It's a musical collaboration more than three decades in the making. Sir Elton John and Brandi Carlile now performing together and talking about it with Tracy Smith. Sir Elton John has millions of fans all over the world, but few of them as devoted as a young girl who first heard his music more than 30 years ago.
In 1992, Brandi Marie Carlyle was a kid living in a single-wide trailer in rural Washington state. And to her, Elton John was everything. Young Brandy collected everything about him she could get her hands on. Records. The thing I love about this album is the orchestration. Photos. One time me and my brother got in a massive fight. Look what he did.
Even an Elton John book she borrowed 33 years ago and kept. I just looked. The date is still on here. Boulevard Park Library, May 10, 1992. Wow. It's all timestamp. They're going to have to come and get it. Of course, Lil Brandy is now music superstar Brandy Carlyle. But to a young girl coming of age and struggling with her own sexuality, Elton John was a flicker of hope in a confusing world.
She loved him and said so in writing. This is an entire page covered front to back and it says nothing but I love Elton John. How old do you think you were? 11, 12. It's insane. Look at it now. I just can't believe what happened in my life to get me to where I am now. It's such a strange thing. It makes you wonder. It just makes you wonder. I do love Elton John. As a kid, she never dreamed she'd actually get to meet him one day. But sometimes dreams have a funny way of coming true.
Ladies and gentlemen, Brandi Carlile! Now they're not only friends, but collaborators. It's much too late. It started a few years back when Brandy wrote to Elton Out of the Blue and asked him to play piano on her new record. Long story short, he said yes, and they grew to be the best of friends, appearing together. performing together, even vacationing together with their families. Elton John and David Furnish who were married in 2014 have two kids, Zachary and Elijah.
Brandi Carlile and Catherine Shepard wed in 2012, and they have two kids, Evangeline and Elijah. And now the two legends are about to release an album they made together. It's Brandi Carlile's eighth studio album and Elton John's 33rd. They recorded it here at Sunset Sound in Hollywood. So you two have sung together before, but why'd you decide to do an entire album?
She's someone I wanted to work with for so long because I know how great she is, I know her voice is, and I know what she's capable of, and I wanted to push her more, and I wanted her to push me more. So I wanted to make a record that was full of energy. and great songs and it turned out really brilliantly. There were cameras in the studio to capture all the highs and a few of the lows. Why'd you decide to let cameras in?
I didn't even think of them being there. Yeah, I never saw one. It was never a conscious thing that they were there. I haven't really seen the footage, but a lot of people say it's really, really very moving. And a lot of my behavior is not so moving. It got tense at times, but for Brandy, it was still the greatest show on earth. It really felt like I was watching Mozart, or like one of the great composers.
stream of consciousness through their entire body create music in a way that I've never seen. And I was so close. I was like, I had a front row seat. This is one of the greatest musical experiences of my life. This never happened to me in my whole career. The fact that Elton got through the recording process at all is remarkable.
For the past year, he's been fighting a severe eye infection that's left him nearly blind. But he says that, all things considered, he's doing all right. Medically, I'm fit as I've ever been. I have checkups every month. But the eyesight thing is a bit of a bind because I haven't been able to watch anything for about seven months. I haven't been able to read. I haven't been able to watch television or anything. But you know what? I've come to the conclusion that
If we can't find a solution to it, and this is what it's like for the rest of my life, then I'm okay. I can still play the piano, I can still sing, which is a gift. My life is fantastic. It's still the greatest gift that anyone could have. When this old world is done with me When I close my eyes These days, Elton John, who turned 78 this past week, is counting his blessings. But the final track on the album really struck a nerve. When this old world is done with me.
co-written by longtime collaborator Bernie Taupin. I know you were emotional in the studio singing that. What got to you about that? Well, I started singing and I thought the verse was really beautiful.
But then I had no idea what was coming. And when I got to the chorus, I realized what was coming. And I just broke down. And I sobbed and I sobbed and I sobbed because it's about... my death basically and when you get to my age and a certain age you think about mortality because I want to spend so much time with my children and David and my friends that you want every single moment to count and so this was a song about
I don't want to die, I want to be with my children, I want to be with David forever. And so it really, it really got to me. Return me to the tide Elton John might be a global superstar, but there's no doubt where his heart is. Is there something that you're most proud of? Yeah, my kids and my husband. That's it. All I want on my gravestone is he was a great dad. Nothing to do with music. He was a great dad. That's all I care about.
Their new album drops this week, and for Brandy, it's still a little hard to believe. Do you feel like sometimes you're just having an out-of-body experience? Yeah, it's so weird. Is it not? It's brilliant. Like, it's a wonderful thing. I hope everybody can take. some hope and beauty and mysticism from the fact that this happened. If it could happen to 11-year-old single-wide mobile home Brandi Carlile, it could really happen to anyone.
What does it cost to buy a soul bag when you die? What are the angels gonna do? Turns out these two friends don't just lean on each other. They push each other to new heights. The title track of their album is Who Believes in Angels? But maybe Elton John and Brandi Carlile are angels for each other. god it was a challenge but that's what life's all about if you don't have a challenge at 76 then
Never give up. Never coast. There are so many artists that coast. They don't make new songs. They just go around and play their hits like I did. I didn't want to do it with this record. I want a new start. I want a fresh start. And she gave it to me. Thank you for listening. Please join us when our trumpet sounds again next Sunday morning. There's a lot going on right now. Mounting economic inequality, threats to democracy, environmental disaster, the sour stench of chaos in the air.
I'm Brooke Gladstone, host of WNYC's On the Media. Want to understand the reasons and the meanings of the narratives that led us here? And maybe how to head them off at the pass? That's on the media's specialty. Take a listen wherever you get your podcasts.