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David Furst: This is All Of It. I'm David Furst in for Alison Stewart. Thanks for spending part of your day with us. On today's show, we'll talk about how to get ready to host some memorable holiday gatherings this season. Juliana Hatfield joins us to talk about her new album of ELO covers and New Yorker staff cartoonist Emily Flake is here to talk about her new project, Joke in a Box. That's the plan. So let's get started "Wait Wait...Don’t Tell Me," host Peter Sagal.

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David Furst: We'll kick off the show with a limerick. When the news seems to never abate and there's simply too much on our plate take a break from the blues with a quiz on the news. It's 25 years of-- Listeners if you said wait, wait as in Wait Wait...Don’t Tell Me the NPR news quiz you would be right because the Chicago-based weekend show has been gracing the public radio airwaves for 25 years now.

Amazing, and longtime host Peter Sagal has been there from the beginning. He was a panelist for most of the show's early run from January to May of 1998, at which point he took up the role as host and he never left it. The show is on the road now. Yes, it hits Carnegie Hall tonight at 7:00 PM. It is also back there tomorrow. You can find a few last-minute tickets at WNYC org/events. Joining us now to talk about making public radio's most popular news quiz please welcome Peter Sagal. Hello.

Peter Sagal: Hello, David. How are you?

David Furst: Listeners, if you are a Wait Wait...Don’t Tell Me fan, we can take your calls and questions for host Peter Sagal at 212-433-9692 that's 212-433-WNYC and you can also text that number. Peter Sagal, you're back in New York doing another live show at Carnegie Hall tonight and tomorrow night. It seems like you're your regulars there now, but when the show launched 25 years ago, did you picture multiple nights at Carnegie Hall and 25 years of great radio for that matter?

Peter Sagal: Only in my deepest anxiety nightmares did I ever imagine that I would be standing on the stage of Carnegie Hall attempting to entertain the audience therein. In a weird way, it's both a dream and a nightmare come true. No, in fact when the show first began I was living in New York in Brooklyn in Park Slope and NYC, bless your heart, like many stations across this country was not broadcasting it yet.

I remember having to listen through this primitive internet audio method to some station that did. It was like listening to Samizdat radio in the Soviet Union as I tried to get the signal in my little apartment in Brooklyn and now look, we're a holiday tradition in New York City. Who knew?

David Furst: It's amazing and now when you stand you talked about it being your deep anxiety nightmares. Now when you stand on the stage at Carnegie Hall, how does it feel?

Peter Sagal: Still a little surreal. I have to admit. Keep in mind that I'm somebody with no musical talent whatsoever. I always imagine as soon as the show begins it's like security will come out of the stage and say there's been a terrible mistake. But no, it's great. This is I think the fourth or fifth, I don't know what you want to call it, residency or visit to Carnegie Hall we've done. I remember our first was in 2008. It seemed impossible then, it still seems now.

I think we've even become as I said, sort of a holiday tradition and I will only believe it when like there's some Hallmark-type movie in which a family goes to New York for Christmas and part of the fun romantic things they do in addition to the Rockefeller Center Christmas tree and the Rockettes is they come and see Wait Wait at Carnegie Hall. We become a sort of hoary New York cliche tradition that no native would actually be caught dead doing. That's my ambition.

David Furst: Hallmark if you're listening, there's the free idea, and if you're out doing those visits right now, there's something to do tonight at Carnegie Hall. I'm sure there are plenty of challenges involved but what is fun about taking the show on the road?

Peter Sagal: I am and I was when this whole thing began as you say, almost at this point 26 years ago which is even crazier than 25 by a factor of one, I was a theater guy. I was a playwright. That's what I was doing in New York and trying to advance my career. I'm a live theater person and to me, it's it's always about stepping up on stage, whatever stage it might be, and never knowing exactly what's going to happen.

I've been told that the appeal of our show is that it sounds genuinely spontaneous and unpredictable. That's because it's genuinely spontaneous and unpredictable. To me, I love that both thrill and terror of putting on a show in that classic Mickey Rooney My uncle's got a Barn kind of way. For some reason when you're at Carnegie Hall a place like that or some of the other amazing and improbable venues we've been able to play around the country like Tanglewood or the War Memorial Opera House in San Francisco or once even Red Rocks outside Denver, the stakes are higher and the rewards when it all goes well are even greater.

David Furst: I hate to even ask this. First of all, I have to mention the show is at 7:30 tonight.

Peter Sagal: It is.

David Furst: I think I said seven o'clock, but it's at 7:30.

Peter Sagal: 7:30.

David Furst: Do you have any horror stories, guests not showing up, power outages, audience uprisings?

Peter Sagal: I'm trying to think. We've been very, very lucky over the years. Part of our luck, I think, is we build chaos into the show. Usually, something goes terribly wrong that's part of the thrill, but we've been very, very lucky. We've had guests cancel. We've had planes canceled but things tend to work out for us. One great story and this happened in New York and it might be one of my favorite moments if not the favorite moment we've ever done, it happened a few years ago.

We came to New York, we were doing our show at that time over in Brooklyn at the Brooklyn Academy of Music and we had a guest and that guest canceled the day of the show. A very prominent person and she was not going to do the show. We happened to know, fortunate for us, Stephen Colbert. Our producer gave Stephen a call and said, "Stephen we just had--" This was the day of the show, "We just had a last-minute cancellation. Would you come over and be a fill-in?"

Stephen said yes, he'd be happy to do that as long as we A, did not tell him who he was filling in for and B, asked him the same questions we had prepared for that guest. We did, so we asked Stephen Colbert all the questions that we had prepared to ask Lena Dunham and it was truly again, one of the great moments. I guess God smiles upon fools and public radio comedy quizzes because it all in the end worked out.

David Furst: An amazing story. If you would like to join this conversation, here's that phone number once again, 212-433-9692. That's 212-433-WNYC. Let's take a call right now. This is Anastasia in West Orange, New Jersey. Welcome to All Of It.

Anastasia: Hi there. Thank you so much for taking my call. I'm first of all so excited to be talking to Peter Sagal and even more excited that I'm going to be at the show this evening with a couple of friends.

Peter Sagal: How awesome.

Anastasia: Yes, so actually just answered my question with Stephen Colbert. I was going to ask you were there any particular not my job participants that stand out to you because I have a couple of favorites.

Peter Sagal: You want to know the good ones or the bad ones? Fortunately, there are very few bad ones, but they did stick in my mind. Well, tell me who your favorites have been. I'm curious.

Anastasia: I absolutely loved your show with Secretary of State Antony Blinken last year.

Peter Sagal: That was delightful.

Anastasia: I thought he was just a wonderful straight man and his answers and his delivery were just-- I listened to it several times and committed it to memory. That's how crazy I am about your show. I also loved Elizabeth Warren.

Peter Sagal: Yes, sadly I wasn't able to talk to her. I was away for a family emergency but yes. One of the nice things about our show if I may is that we often as you just mentioned, talk to very prominent people in the news who are known for broadly speaking one thing, being Secretary of State and we like the opportunity to bring out some other aspects of them to a lot of times their sense of humor.

In a weird way, it's a public service because I mean these people are often in the times we live somewhat divisive, you either hate them or you love them. After they appear in our show you can continue to hate or love them but at least you're hating or loving a human being. I will say that with Secretary of State Blinken who was gracious and fun sadly the radio listeners missed the best thing about it, which is when I asked him if part of his job is to go around and reassure foreign leaders that the bad man won't be back.

He did not say anything in response to that comment but he did give me a look that has burned into my soul I wish I could share with America.

David Furst: Anastasia, thank you so much for that call. Let's hear from John calling from Long Island. Welcome to All Of It.

John: Yes. Thanks for taking my call. Peter, I was a former. I'm sorry I haven't caught up. How the heck are you these days?

Peter Sagal: I'm okay. Thank you.

John: I just wanted to thank you for all New Yorkers. Your voice imparts so much energy, and it's smart and it's funny. I don't think you get enough credit for that. I still have Carl Kasell's voice on my answering machine.

Peter Sagal: Oh, that's lovely. I love the fact-- First of all, thank you. Secondly, as somebody from New Jersey, all I've ever wanted to be is to be acclaimed in New York. Thank you for making my life's dreams come true. Carl Kasell, of course, long-time listeners will remember, Carl was our original judge and scorekeeper. He was a dear friend of mine, obviously.

Sadly, we lost him a few years ago, but it makes me really happy that all around the country, and for all I know the world, his voice lives on, on voicemail messages, or even, dare I say, answering machines, these antiques that are now kept in places of honor because Carl's on it.

It's an odd legacy, but it's a good one and I'm happy to hear it. We've been playing every now and then old shows. Whenever I hear his voice, it makes me happy. He was a lovely, lovely gentleman, and I'm very glad we were able to give him that amazing second career as a comedian.

David Furst: That's a great comment. Thank you for that call. I second that notion of your voice, the energy that you bring to the performance is such a huge part of what's happening, and the way it all works and the way everyone else who's working with you gets inspired by your energy. Yes, let's mention for a moment, Carl Kasell and the great Bill Kurtis, who is your current announcer.

Peter Sagal: Yes. Bill is-- Again, we can go back to the extraordinary and unearned good fortune of playing in Carnegie Hall. I don't know, whatever I did to be partnered with two such amazing gentlemen. Bill Kurtis, as most people know, was and is a legend of broadcasting. He-- and I'm going to stand by this was the real model for Ron Burgundy in Anchorman. Other local anchormen might claim it, but they only asked Bill to narrate the movie, right?

David Furst: That's right.

Peter Sagal: I get to work with him every day, or once a week. He's also become a close friend. It's just amazing. In a weird way, through these guys, we've become knitted into American broadcasting, which again, is so nuts and strange. I will tell you one thing I've discovered in my years of doing this, you take somebody like Bill Kurtis, many people who I'm sure you know and work with who are known for being serious news people, what they all really want is to be funny in exactly the same way that funny people just want to be taken seriously. It's just a fact of life, and it's a pleasure to be able to provide that to these gentlemen.

David Furst: Again, it is going to be happening live tonight at Carnegie Hall at 7:30. If you want to join this conversation, 212-433-9692, 212-433-9692. We'll get to another call in just a second here. Peter, I have a very short New Jersey quiz for you.

Peter Sagal: Oh, please.

David Furst: Okay. I graduated from a New Jersey high school whose teams are known as The Highlanders.

Peter Sagal: Hey.

David Furst: Can you name that school?

Peter Sagal: Dare it. Was it-- Could it possibly be Governor Livingston High School in Berkeley Heights, New Jersey, my proud alma mater?

David Furst: Yes.

Peter Sagal: Back in my day, it was known as Governor Livingston Regional High School.

David Furst: Governor Livingston Regional High School. Exactly. That's what it was known in my day as well, and yes.

Peter Sagal: Oh, my gosh. When did you graduate from our mutual school?

David Furst: 1986.

Peter Sagal: 1986. Wait a minute, we were there almost at the same time because I was--

David Furst: Really?

Peter Sagal: No. I was class of '83. I'm an old man.

David Furst: [laughs] The Berkeley Heights listeners are really getting into this.

Peter Sagal: I know. They're just going nuts. I'd like to think that back at Governor Livingston High School, there is by now a plaque over the locker that I was most often stuffed into.

David Furst: [laughs] A very proud plaque.

Peter Sagal: I hope they're proud of me, yes.

David Furst: Speaking of New Jersey, let's hear from someone calling in from New Jersey. This is Patrick in New Jersey. Good afternoon. Thanks for joining us.

Patrick: [unintelligible 00:14:29].

David Furst: Patrick, are you there? Did we lose Patrick?

Peter Sagal: Maybe he's just shy. That's very typical of New Jerseyans, as you know.

David Furst: [laughs] Yes, very typical of New Jerseyans. Let's move on to see if we can go to Richard calling in Westchester. Richard, are you with us? This is All Of It here on WNYC.

Richard: Hello. Yes. I'd like to ask Peter Sagal a question.

Peter Sagal: Sure.

Richard: As it happens, within the past year or so, I read a book review of yours in The New York Times book section, and I thought it was absolutely brilliant. I think your writing is just-- it's witty and it's clever and it's graceful and it's spectacular. I'm wondering if you've published any collection of anything, reviews, book reviews, essays or memoirs, or whatever.

Peter Sagal: Thank you. You're very kind. I've been doing some writing of late for The New York Times Book Review, for The Atlantic Magazine, for Chicago Magazine, for whomever. I can do it because there's more to me than dad jokes. In response to your question, I am proud to tell you and happy to tell you that I've written two books both of which are still in print and are available for your holiday gifting purchases. One is called The Book of Vice, the other is called The Incomplete Book of Running.

There's something about me, I can't title the book without the word Book in it. I'm too literal. They're out there and they've been both well received. I think if you like my writing in short bits, you'll like it in longer bits, just by the usual law of writing. They're out there. I hope people enjoy them. People tell me that they do. Thank you so much for reading.

David Furst: Richard, thank you so much for that call. We're going to have to take a very short break here. You're listening to All Of It on WNYC. Wait Wait...Don’t Tell Me is happening live tonight at Carnegie Hall, the live taping. We'll be back with more with Peter Sagal in just a moment.

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David Furst: You're listening to All Of It here on WNYC. I'm David Furst in for Alison Stewart. We are here with Wait Wait...Don’t Tell Me host Peter Sagal. If you would like to join this conversation, the number to call is 212-433-9692. That's 212-433-9692. Peter, I can't wait to hear what you're going to be talking about with all the news this week on the show. A bull on the tracks today in New York. That seems like a story that might get your attention. [chuckles]

Peter Sagal: It might. I'm proud as a fellow New Jerseyan, me and that bull. We just will not be held back.

David Furst: [laughs] Let's get to another call right now. This is Jen in Astoria. Hello. Welcome to All Of It.

Jen: Hello. I am full-on geeking out right now because I have David Furst and Peter Sagal on the same call.

Peter Sagal: Wow.

Jen: I'm not quite sure what to do with myself because--

Peter Sagal: Hold on. Tell us--

Jen: Wait Wait...Don’t Tell Me. [laughs]

Peter Sagal: Tell us which one you like more. I think that's my first question.

Jen: That is so mean.

Peter Sagal: I know.

David Furst: So mean.

Peter Sagal: I know.

Jen: [laughs] I like you both equally for different reasons.

David Furst: Oh, my goodness.

Jen: [laughs] Wait Wait...Don’t Tell Me is my Saturday morning ritual with my coffee. I put any calls-- I just send them direct to voicemail so that I can listen. One of these days it's my hope to be on the Limerick Challenge because I'm really good at it when I have the privacy of my own home to get everything right in. I could go on forever about all the things I love about Wait Wait but I particularly love in the spirit of the season, Peter, how generous you are with Negin regardless of how she answers any question, particularly at the end.

You're always so kind and your laughter is just such an uplifting sound to start the weekend. Thank you. David, same to you in terms of thanks for being a weekend warrior for WNYC.

David Furst: Thank you very much. Peter, yes.

Peter Sagal: That's very nice. I will say that the Listener Limerick Challenge is harder than it appears. It's one thing to be doing it in the privacy of your own home, and you're shouting the obvious answer at the idiot who's trying to do it on the air. Yes, come on the air with us. Do it in front of however many hundreds or even thousands of people who are listening to you do it in our theater and see what happens to your brain. It generally freezes up like an old Buick with no motor oil. It's quite terrifying, I'm told.

David Furst: [laughs] Quite terrifying especially live on stage at Carnegie Hall. I would imagine the pressure, yes. Let's get to another-- Thank you so much for those very kind words by the way. Thank you very much for that call. I have to confess, Peter, when you finish the show and you always finish with this very loud rousing, "This is NPR." I can't help doing the same thing [unintelligible 00:19:23].

Peter Sagal: It's become my trademark completely unintentionally. I have no idea how that started. I do it. I sometimes think people only come just to hear me do it in person.

David Furst: It has to. The show's not finished until that happens.

Peter Sagal: Until I say it, yes.

David Furst: Let's get to another call. This is Cedric in New Jersey. I think I was saying your name incorrectly previously. Cedric, thank you for joining us on All Of It.

Cedric: Thank you. This is wonderful. I can tell you which one of you I like more.

David Furst: Oh, boy.

Peter Sagal: We're waiting.

David Furst: We're we're terrified.

Cedric: [laughs] Well, David, you're here all the time. Peter's exotic.

Peter Sagal: There you go, man. I'm sorry David.

David Furst: Got to go with the exotic, yes.

Peter Sagal: It's just the familiarity.

David Furst: Did you have a question?

Cedric: No, I just had a comment.

Peter Sagal: Thank you for your honesty.

Cedric: You guys have helped through a lot of dark times, you definitely helped me out when I was lonely. This show is on my bucket list. I would love to be on that show eventually if I do enough good stuff.

Peter Sagal: We are a reward for good deeds much like entry into heaven so keep it up. Thank you so much for saying that. I do not want to diminish it in any way when I say I hear that a lot, that people let me know, sometimes privately, sometimes in a venue like this, that our show got them through hard times. I cannot tell you how much that means to me because what are we doing out here, we're doing our jobs, we're trying to make stuff in the world that has value, we're trying to get through the days, sometimes difficult times ourselves.

To know that the work that you do actually helps people on an individual basis, maybe it doesn't cure world hunger or bring world peace, but it gets them through the day that might otherwise be hard to get to, it lightens the load, just for an hour is in the end a pretty great thing to be able to do. I will tell everybody quite sincerely that it's not just all of you who are listening, especially during the pandemic, for goodness sake, but not exclusively then.

To be able to do the show, to be able to get up and have a purpose and say, okay, we're going to do this. As opposed to sitting around and scrolling and contemplating the bleakness out there really was a great, great help to me personally, to my friends with whom I do the show. We remain as grateful as some of you are for the opportunity to be on the air with it.

David Furst: Thank you so much for that great comment. Picking up on that thread a little it feels like, Peter that the news has gotten so relentlessly dark.

Peter Sagal: You think?

David Furst: Yes. We have wars going on, political instability at home and abroad. How do you do it? How do you produce a comedy show based on the news these days? Are there some things that you just won't touch?

Peter Sagal: Oh, there obviously are a lot of things we won't touch. For example, you probably haven't heard us say much at all about the terrible things happening in the Middle East right now, for the obvious reasons, there's not a lot, if anything that's funny about it, and we wouldn't dare to suggest there is. Sometimes it's hard. Sometimes, the main news of the story are either bleak or tragic or terrifying or sometimes, and this is also a problem really angering.

I personally, this is not true of everybody in my business, but I find it very hard to be funny when I'm angry so I try to avoid things that make me angry and there are a lot of things like that. We see our mission really, ultimately, over the years to give people a break from, I don't know how you want to put it, from the seriousness that is both endemic in the world and also sometimes on public radio.

We just don't do our best to find the things that are genuinely funny or sometimes, when forced, we will find the funny underlying layer, you peel away the first layers of grit and roastness and you find something bright and funny, and certainly under it like a brightly colored bug under a log, if you will. That's part of the mission. There are other shows, I think, in our business, who really take on the news in a straightforward way, who will say, "This terrible thing happened, and we're going to condemn it."

We have come to believe that there's enough of that in the world and our purpose is to be ultimately silly in the face of a lot of seriousness. As you've heard, I think from some of the people who've called in that I think is appreciated.

David Furst: Such an incredible show and it's amazing that it is 25 years old now. If you want to join the conversation, here's the number again, 212-433-9692 and Wait Wait...Don’t Tell Me is taping live tonight at Carnegie Hall tomorrow night as well, 7:30 PM. Let's hear from Gregory in Brooklyn. Welcome to All Of It.

Gregory: Hey, thanks for taking my call. A couple of years ago, I made a very bold decision to start a business in the live entertainment industry in the middle of COVID. One of the things I did to get by was I was telemarketing for the Baltimore Symphony. I would dial hundreds of numbers over the course of an hour and I had at least a few times come across people whose voicemail messages have been created by Peter Sagal.

One of them I recall it said like, "This is Peter Sagal, and this is Bob's phone, but you might think he won on Wait Wait... Don’t Tell Me, but actually, he's blackmailing me into doing this." My question for you, Peter is, was it actually blackmail? How many of these messages have you left or created for people blackmail?

Peter Sagal: Wait a minute? That guy didn't tell you what he had on me, right? Because that was the deal. No, basically, I should warn everybody that if you choose me to record your voicemail my message as people know if they win on our show, they can choose anybody from the show they want and people often submit a script. I am a little, I don't know, shall we say stubborn and will sometimes not do what I am told.

I probably came up with that off the moment and I will say, well, I once got to appear with the Baltimore Symphony, which was another highlight of my very odd life. I narrated an opera for them once, and it was an absolute delight. Thank you for getting people to support the Baltimore Symphony. I'm a big fan of theirs.

David Furst: That's amazing. I think we have time for one more call. Let's see. Oh, who should we hear from? There's a lot of people on the line right now. Let's see here is Eunice with us from Connecticut. Eunice, are you there? Welcome to All Of It. Hello.

Eunice: Hi. Can you hear me?

David Furst: Yes, we can hear you. Do you have a question for Peter?

Eunice: I do. Hi, Peter.

Peter Sagal: Hi Eunice.

Eunice: I actually have tickets for tonight's taping and I was wondering if it would be a good idea for me to bring my 10-year-old daughter. She's a huge fan of the show.

Peter Sagal: Well, first of all, that's delightful to hear. Secondly, we do have a lot of children who are fans of the show, which makes me very happy because when I was a child of 10, I probably would've been a fan of this show as well, if you know what I mean. I'm glad that we're encouraging nerds out there to listen to when they're stuffed into a locker. This is what I'll say, the show that we record is very much the same as the one you hear.

However, sometimes things come up in our live taping because it is improvisational,because our panelists are not scripted, because a lot of the times the conversation that we did script goes off the rails, there can be, not X rated maybe R. If you're ready for your daughter to maybe ask you one or two odd questions on the drive back to Connecticut, I think you'll be fine, but there's certainly no reason why she wouldn't enjoy it as much as she hopefully does when she's listening at home.

David Furst: Well, thank you so much for that call. As we're just wrapping up Peter, any quick tease about what you're planning for the Carnegie Hall show tonight?

Peter Sagal: It will be crazy as usual tonight and I think if there are tickets available and people want to come, you can hear tonight. We have a fabulous panel, and I'm going to dig it out in a second. Tonight our guest is Bethenny Frankel famous for Real Housewives and Skinny Girl and all kinds of other crazy things. Tomorrow night we'll be talking to the amazing Rachel Maddow, which will be really something. She's a hero of mine so I'm excited about that.

Tonight our panelists Thursday night, Josh Gamblin, Helen Hung, and Alzo Slade, and tomorrow and also our panel of Karen Qi and [unintelligible 00:28:34] is back and Tom Papa. All the shows should be awesome. We have no idea what's going to happen with any of these people and that is part of the thrill.

David Furst: Part of the thrill and it was a thrill to have you on with us today on All Of It. Peter Sagal, thank you so much for joining us today. Yes, Carnegie Hall tonight at 7:30. You can find a few last-minute tickets at wnyc.org/events. Peter Sagal, thanks again.

Peter Sagal: Thank you, David. Take care.

 

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