Late Show Vocab | Terry Gross

From the trusted team behind 48 Hours, welcome to Case by Case, your weekly update on the biggest true crime stories unfolding right now. Nick Ryder remains in custody without bail. Luigi Mangione accused of stalking and gunning down United Healthcare CEO Brian Thompson. From high-profile trials and stunning evidence to major breaks in cold cases, we'll follow it all Case by Case. Follow and listen to 48 Hours, Case by Case, wherever you get your podcasts. Hi Becca. Hi Stephen. How's it going? You beat me this time? I did. Yeah, yeah. You gotta go for that brass ring. Yeah, catch up on the podcast if you haven't tuned in this week and you'll get the joke. By the way, when I say go for the brass ring, do you know what that means? I don't know what that means. Oh, this is okay. But you have you heard the term before? You gotta go for the brass ring. I've heard you say it. Yeah. You've heard me say it? You're saying it. Oh my god, I'm giving you 19th century entertainment references. Go for the brass ring or reach for the brass ring is that marigold rounds used to have an additional game. Oh. Is that you'd be on the marigold round but on there'd be a little arm on the outside of the marigold on a post and there'd be a little a little rack and on the rack were a series of brass rings and the rack had a little roll to it. So one the brass rings roll down. So one of them would be at the end of the little rack and you could stick your finger through it and pull it off off a little all little spring system. And then the other next brass ring would roll down and it was will you dare as you go around to lean off your horse like a trick rider and reach out and grab that brass ring. Oh, cool. So it's it's putting a little extra effort in taking a little risk. What you get is the brass ring and I think you could I think it was sort of thing like you turned in the brass ring for like a cupid doll or something like that. Yeah. And you like you reach to the brass ring so you could get your girl who's riding on the next horse over you get her you know that was it reach for the brass ring. Why are they not around anymore? Too many probably insurance. Bloody noses or something. Probably insurance people fell off. Do you know I love merry-go-round? It's a big thing about me. I love I love a good merry-go-round. Wow. I have this idea that I'm trying to do where I'm trying to create. I'm not an influencer by any means but I think it'd be really funny. You're by some means you're an influencer. To be a merry-go-round influencer and the the account would be merry-go-around-the-world. America around the world. And that there's a lot of beautiful old merry-go-rounds around. There's one in Central Park. The one in Brooklyn. Good one in Brooklyn. There's my favorite merry-go-round in the world is on West Riverside Park up uptown much uptown. I did a tip-to-tip where I went from the top tip of Manhattan to the bottom tip and I encountered it by chance but there's a- That must have been wild for you to just come around the corner and see a merry-go-round. To see a merry-go-round but and yet there she was but this is an amazing merry-go-round. What do you love about it? This artist in New York I'm forgetting his name right now and I apologize for that I'll pull it in the description but he did a lot of art for Sesame Street and he was asked by the city of New York to create a merry-go-round for this park that they were building and he would go into public schools in Harlem and say oh we're going to make a merry-go-round together you're going to doodle me your like dream merry-go-round animal that you want to ride. And so these little kids like kindergarten first grade through these goofy little doodles of animals like you know those seeing like the way a kid draws a horse it's just a glob with a smiley face on it and then he created those perfectly to become plexiglass sculptures that you can then ride and then there's a little like the signature of the kid is like inscribed in the wood beneath it and there's a little picture of what the original doodle was and all the kids who got a merry-go-round creature on the merry-go-round has like a lifetime pass to write it whenever it's so cool I'll show you pictures later. How old is it? It's from the 90s I think so it's not that old. Wow these kids could be yeah have kids of their own. Yeah no definitely but it's a really beautiful thing and a great mix of you know art you know children of the city and the government coming together to make something fun. Do you know like history of merry-go-rounds or anything like that? Well I'm learning now the brass ring I got now I know a little bit more but I don't know that much of the history of merry-go-round. Merry-go-round horses like sometimes you'll see them in antique stores something just like an old merry-go-round horse with the pole still sticking through it like people use as like an end table or something like that. They often have a like a frantic look on their faces like kind of like a scary like eyes rolled back like mouth open like horses like galloping for mad like that. Yeah yeah I don't know I wonder if there was ever a point where it was real horses going. Sometimes they go up and down and sometimes they don't. Yeah I like the up and down ones. The posting ones the posting ones are nice. Yeah yeah but I highly recommend that yeah that piece of the piece of New York history go up to see the merry-go-round sometime but um anyways we have a little game that we like to play here in the Lecho Pod Show that I call Lecho Vocab. Yes. Which is that Steven and a lot of people on the show we develop a shorthand we have a lot of sayings that we are like sort of insider lingo that we say all the time but then when I think about it I'm not sure what some of it means they have great back stories and I like asking Steven what they mean and this today I hopefully I'll hopefully I'll know the meaning of this. This is a phrase you say all the time and I don't know the back story of it or even really what it means. Okay. The knack. I know the band the knack but the knack I obviously my shirona. Mm-hmm. Being that big hit. I don't know why I started doing it here but on uh when I'm reading the intros in rehearsal I go through the entire script and you know some of it is quite meaningful. I have to understand what the setups are. I have to did I really understand the news story that we're making our jokes about that day. Does this punch line work? What's the order? There's a lot of decisions to be made about on the fly and I'm giving notes on the fly and I'm asking questions and I'm hitting research. I'm asking graphics. I'm I'm I'm I'm questioning what our take is. Like is that really what we want to say? Is that what's that about that joke and um but then I have to read everything that's in the prompter just to make sure everything's properly in the prompter and I have to read the guest intros and when we get to the band if there's a band I tend to not say the name of the band. I tend to say you know uh making their late night debut with the album last night won two Grammys you know uh please welcome the knack because the knack were big when I was young and um so that's one reason and another reason is when I was young and on tour with Second City there was a guy named Scott Almond and Scott Almond knew a lot about a lot of bands a lot of obscure bands but also just a lot of general bands and we were doing like a newspaper quiz one day about like like great hits of the 70s or something like that I forgot what it was and there was some really difficult trivia question as we're we know they burn a lot of time in the van looking for a lot this is before the internet friends this is before cell phones friends yeah you know so it was books and magazines and newspapers and he uh had was very confident that he had the answer to whoever what the answer this band was and he reached for us he goes he goes no wait and he reaches his fist forward like does that fist pump thing where you pull your fist down like you're like you're like clenched and he goes the knack and it could not have been not the knack more it was like Stevie Wonder or something like who wrote who wrote do I do you know the knack and uh we made so much fun of his commitment that it was the knack yeah that um it never it never left me and the people one person was in the car paul danella one of the producer he was in the car the van when that happened and he could confirm this I don't know if you do ever ever do fact checking on these podcasts but he could confirm that's where the knack comes from okay cool great backstory best to you uh scott omen wherever you may roam these days uh and he uh scott also had a really good way he'd shut down anyone else's idea about what an answer for something would be he would go no no no he had this very way of talking like this oh chicago no chicago no no no so he's like no no no I got it the knack and it was not the knack and so in my mind why waste my time saying you know cigarettes whatever like whoever the band you know charlie xx no the knack every band to me every band who's ever come on the show in my mind is the knack awesome yeah except the knack who we've never had who we've never had and I don't think I don't think they're all still with us unfortunately yeah it's too bad um okay great story and you do that it's an okay story you do that with um well this is a little bit different but in the script the writers are instructed to never write I'm your host Stephen Colbert right the script always says I'm Stephen Colbert right why why is that I know but in the script you always say in the script in the prompter and on the script always said welcome to the late show I'm Stephen Colbert uh and I think the very first night maybe I want to welcome to the late show I'm your host Stephen Colbert but it said I'm Stephen Colbert and after that I was like okay I'll just say I'm your host Stephen Colbert because I like the formality I like I like something so in a way comedy is essentially low rent and there's something very um uh a little formal about welcome to the late show I'm your host Stephen Colbert and instead of I'm Stephen Colbert I'm your host Stephen Colbert much more like a matriot like I'm taking you to a nice table or something like that because of that or like welcome to the party the sort of thing yeah and um because I think of it as like welcoming people to a party and uh I don't know I just I get stuck in my head that certain things become ritual and it's important to me that that it never say I'm your host Stephen Colbert in the prompter that I only say I'm Stephen Colbert and then I will add your host and there's some it's some handshake I have with the script that I don't have to say every word that's up there and I don't have to say exactly the way that's in the prompter and so that I start off the show knowing that I know something the audience doesn't know about me reading the script is that I'm not entirely reading the script I'm reading an impression of the script totally yeah that's beautiful I love that I always love that um but it's funny you picked up on like have I said that out loud I well I look at the script every single day it's my job and I also listen to the taping every single day and I'm just this does not match up no it never matches up there's one day when we did write I'm your host Stephen Corer and you said delete that you said they can't say that I remember that really specifically and I think you gave a similar reason to it but I mean not so in depth but you were just like I like to remind myself to add that yeah it's it's it's up to me to not be a slave to the prompter that like the prompter and I are having this conversation yeah I'm not and it's not dictating it to me yeah I mean largely but not yeah yeah we put a lot of thought into the words we do we do and you do especially more than anyone else and then the important thing is to look like you haven't put a lot of thought in the words yes exactly keep it conversational it's very important to remember to say a lot of the script not looking at the camera yeah so it doesn't look like you're reading yeah yeah and speaking of conversational hosts you know who we have today on the podcast John Oliver no we have the amazing Terry Gross Terry gross not for the faint of heart to interview Terry Gross because you will find yourself being interviewed by Terry Gross and she does do that to you she does she interviews me in the last few minutes of this it becomes her interviewing me oh Terry the best she's so cool she's so great I admire her so much and I enjoy like first time I went on Terry gross's show fresh air I was still at the Daily Show and I enjoyed the interview so much that I thought I mean she kind of gave me the ability to be interviewed by being the first person to really interview me yeah because I went oh that's a that's how open you can be with someone or that's that's she she set the table for me in an interesting way for every interview after that because she interviewed one of the she was one of the earliest in-depth interviews that I did and that she took interest in me even though it was a correspondent I didn't I didn't have a project or anything she just want to talk to me which is fantastic and you know when we first came over to do this show we didn't really know how to do the show and I thought well I'm definitely not going to do Terry gross until I know exactly what I'm doing and why I'm doing it and what I want to be saying and what my intention is and all that kind of stuff I'm not going to go talk to Terry now until I really figure it out and so nine and a half years go by or something and every night put out our cookbook um does this taste funny it's still available you go get it and uh I said in the interview and I said now Terry I don't know if I've I don't think I've been on your show since the show started since the late show started and she said are you are you joking I said no have I been on she goes you've been on three times before and I guess what that says to me is that unlike the old show where it came out of the box exactly as I intended and it kind of we built on it but it came kind of snapped together out of the box this one even once we kind of knew what we wanted to do it's always been changing I've always been in a relationship with the show of wondering whether there's something else I could do what is there's a different way to interview somebody is there's something else we could do in the second act is a how should cold opens be what's what's the handshake with the audience at the top of the monologue how long should the monologue be what's the mix of like politics and other things god can we possibly get away from washington today all those conversations that like there are musical guests comedy guests variety guests sketches all these things there's because this is really a variety show more than that other thing was a satire there's a variety show I've constantly been questioning its form yeah it's so rather or rather my my part in the form of what I can add to it yeah and so it actually kind of seemed like me I had that I hadn't landed on it enough to go talk to Terry about it yeah and and there's nothing to do with her my enjoyment of her I just it just struck me at that moment oh I'm I'm still in my mind nine and a half years in going oh what do I want this to be yeah and that's kind of beautiful it's been a working progress the whole time you know so Terry Terry I love Terry and she also when she's interviewing someone you know she read the whole book you know you know she watched the whole movie and she's talking to you I know it's infuriating all right so this is Terry gross this is an extended interview with her more extended than was on the thing more extended than was on the thing yeah it's a great interview you guys had a great time so this is Terry gross in her leather jacket on the late show pod show thanks Becca thanks even welcome back to the late show ladies and gentlemen my next guest has been the award-winning host of npr's fresh air for 50 years please welcome back to the late show Terry gross thank you Terry it's good to see you again it's great to see you I listened to your show all the time and I listened to your show all the time too uh you were 24 years old when you started hosting fresh air 50 years ago there you are fantastic do you I'm asking for a friend do you recommend doing a show for 50 years well the good thing about it is longevity sure yeah and I haven't had to move you know I've stayed in one place for the 50 years because the show moved it went from a local show to a national show to more stations our staff has evolved over the years different people so many great people I've worked with so always at why I started at the npr affiliate on the university of buffalo station oh wow this was an affiliate right there this is buffalo we're going to college I know but right there in buffalo I'm right on the college campus yeah yeah that's why I started oh that's fantastic yeah did you were you what did you always want to do radio did you always have an affiliation for it I love radio because you know I lived in a small apartment in Brooklyn she said bag I don't hear any applause for she said bag and you know I had a small bedroom it was small with me and my brother and my parents and the radio was the reach outside I didn't have a tv in my room certainly didn't have a computer they didn't exist yet and so I put the transistor radio under my pillow at night not every night but frequently so I had it from your parents to hide from my parents because it was like bedtime right now what were you listening to um well rock and roll oh yeah leather jacket leather there you go do you get recognized by your voice because I I of course I could pick you out in a minute um only in embarrassing situations such as such as early on when I started hosting fresh air I needed to buy a car and so I went to the Toyota place and the salesman there said I and I had the radio on because I wanted to test the speakers and he said oh there's a lady on in the afternoon it was really annoying and I said oh that would be me and he said I'm never going to sell a car now I ended up buying it from him I mean well gave me a decent price it was conveniently located so yeah so uh approximately I know you have to ballpark it how many interviews have you done in the last 50 years um I'm told I think that it's somewhere between like 15 000 or 18 000 I didn't count wow wow and and you you are you are one of the frequent guests on our show oh really yes because we love you oh well I love being on the first time I got to be on I was still on the daily show I didn't even have my own gig I couldn't believe I got asked to do I was so nervous and I had such a good time and we talked about this day in God yes we did we talked about this day in God exactly and your thoughts about the Catholic Church and sort of the differentiation between the individuation of the American ideal and the homogeneity of a Catholic dogma yes and I you schooled me very well well what have you learned about people after 15 000 long conversations like that a fair amount of artists and writers who I've interviewed were sick a lot during childhood and kind of uh cooped up at home were you were you cooped up at home this child no I felt cooped up but I wasn't literally cooped up oh okay but I found that a lot of um you know artists and writers they're forced to stay home and they kind of busy themselves writing or watching a lot of tv and realizing oh I'd love to act you know and um it's nice to know that because the worst things in your life can have a payoff sometimes if you're really lucky yeah um although I don't believe every problem is really a gift you know I don't I don't buy that yeah this cancer is making me a better person no I don't buy that either yeah I don't buy that either I'm sorry I pounded your table I won't need it much longer now in July sorry about that in July Republicans in Congress cut 1.1 billion dollars in funding from the Corporation for Public Broadcasting and on Monday on Monday the Corporation for Public Broadcasting voted to dissolve and as someone who's worked in public radio for their whole career what role did the cpb play in in you starting this life huge when I started at the college station it was there was an npr affiliate at that time you had to have I think like five full paid staff members in order to qualify for funding because there are only five full-time paid staff members there were like about a hundred volunteers and that's how I was able to get started as a volunteer and on the other end when our show went from a local show to a national one financially it could not possibly have happened without a major grant from the cpb to do all the things that we needed to do and I think it was worth their investment I mean the show has endured so yeah it wouldn't happen without the cpb thank you I was so sorry to hear last April about the death of your husband thank you Francis Davis and that about two weeks later you remembered him with a tribute on fresh air why did you choose to share that with the audience a few reasons one is that he had been a jazz contributor to our show he'd been a jazz critic on our show and it was local and then for the first couple of months maybe he was doing it on the national show until he felt like I'm not really a radio person I'm really more of a writer so I felt like he's still part of the fresh air family but I also felt while I was like in that really early stage of grieving that before coming back I had to explain what I had just been through and also I wanted to share a piece of him so I did it I didn't say like we had such a great love let me share some of our memories together it was like this is what he did he was a music critic mostly jazz so I'm going to play some of the music that he loved and then read some of his writing that reveals something about the music that he loved and that felt so right to me and it also gave me not only an opportunity but an excuse and a deadline to immerse myself in his writing some people find their loved ones in their clothes or you know special possessions I find my husband in his books it can be hard to it can be hard to look directly at your grief and was was that a way is that a lens through which allowed you to look at your grief yeah and and to look fully at him because the writing really was him he didn't write much personally but it was him it was the sensibility it was his language I fell in love with his writing at about the same time I fell in love with his writing first and I fell in love with him in the in the just 10 months since your your husband passed have there been any old interviews that have come back to you that you have turned to that have special meaning for you now yes I interviewed Maury Sendak close to the same time I think that you interviewed him I think you went to his home yeah he was no longer mobile he was no longer to get out of the house so he had come out with his first children's book in years and I thought I had been interviewing him since probably the late 1970s and I thought this is a good opportunity to call more reason basically just give him a shout and say congratulations on the new book but he ended up knowing that he was close to death and really wanting to talk about it so he just started talking about how he had lost his brother he lost his two best friends and but life was beautiful he still had Bach to listen to he still had the trees to look out the window and he'll be crying to the grave you know because he wanted to live longer and and it was just so beautiful and he ended the interview by saying live your life live your life live your life and I've repeated that to myself so many times over the years including when Francis died because it was also a way of saying keep living you've had this terrible loss you're still alive you know so live it feel what you're feeling and make the most of what you have and that there was a great tape loop to have it's supposed to oh no yeah well you know one of the whole and Stephen I know you as a child you lost your father and two brothers in a plane crash I did yes and I've been thinking about the difference between sudden unexpected tragic death like that and my experience with my husband going through like five years of watching him because he had emphysema and because he had Parkinson's watch him slowly just lose inch by inch parts of himself and parts of his ability to live his life yeah yeah there are people experience grief in in many different ways it affects their lives in different ways at different times of their lives how they approach it is so different for for each person there's a commonality to it which I think is unavoidable to eventually look at it that's all grief is almost something that is outside of you and comes to you like people often use the phrase like uh there's an old phrase like visited by grief and and it's as if grief is something that comes and sits with you and you can decide whether to hold its hand I literally felt like I had a visitation um after he died I don't know if you've had dreams like this but I dream that he came back and we were walking into the bedroom together because it was bedtime and I said to him because I thought it was real you know I didn't realize I was dreaming and I said to him well how am I talking to you you're not here and then he just vanished it's kind of like in a movie when somebody like turns into a ghost and they kind of there's a fade and suddenly they're gone and I thought like did I chase him away by saying you're not really here I think that those dreams are not uncommon for people I know many people have told me stories like that I've had the same experience myself oh yeah um uh when my mother died I remember having a very vivid dream we're at Union Station in DC which is where I was born where she had me not in Union Station in DC and and I walked there and then she said all my brothers and sisters and there's my mother in her big winter jacket and she turned around there she was the mother I remember my whole life and I said mom you're alive I must be dreaming and she said oh good is the only way they'll stay awake and that was it wow how did you interpret that uh that um um the messages that we get internally from our loved ones our ways for us to be aware of the world and how we feel about it or that our dreams tell us things about ourselves that we cannot in waking life admit to ourselves right we can feel things in our dreams we can know things about ourselves that we can't know in waking life and I don't mean prophetically or that there's some astral plane from what these messages come we talk to ourselves in our dreams and we wake up to certain feelings in our dreams that's that's what I think it meant do you think she was also telling you to live your life to stay awake I think that's a completely valid interpretation 100% a matter of fact I'm grateful for that interpretation thank you oh thank you yeah Harry oh thank you so much I'm so so sorry that you can talk on the phone new episodes of fresh air on npr every weekday terry gross everybody thank you for listening to the late show pod show with Steve and Colbert just one more thing if you want to see more of me come to the late show youtube channel for more clips and exposures