Transcripts For CSPAN2 Mo Rocca Mobituaries 20240713

Redeeming and welcome to the National Archives im david i am the archivist of the United States and im least that you are joining us for tonights program whether youre here in the theater or joining us on facebook over youtube and a special welcome to our cspan audience. Before we hear from mo rocca i would like to hear you about two other programs coming appear in the theater. On tuesday november 12 at noon Richard Brooke kaiser will tell us about his new book give me liberty, the history of americas exceptional idea. Which examines 12 documents. On thursday november 14 at 730 we will host a veterans tribute world war ii soldier, photograph or target first with the u. S. Army signal corps, photo collection at the National Archives, offer of the new book with aftershock of the human toll of war and will join historians for discussion of the wellknown images of the war and to keep informed about these events and others throughout the year check our website, archives. Gov or sign up to the table outside the theater to receive email updates and you also find information about other National Archive programs and activities and another way to get more involved with the National Archives is to become a member of the National Archives foundation. It supports our education and outreach activities and there is a little member of the board of the National Archives foundation sitting in the middle of the theater. Nice to seebe you. Check out their website, archive foundation. Org or to learn more about them into join online in a littleknown secret that i tell everyone no one has ever been turned down for membership in the National Archive foundation. [laughter] some people think of an archive of a place for dead things. Writers who have not spent much time in fall back on adjectives whsuch as dusty, musty or crumbling much to the agitation of archivist and preservation tofessionals even those who are familiar with archives may see the riches are buried. Rather than being custodians of lifeless remnants of history archives are filled with many lives, the billions of pages in her care contain stories of those famous and ordinary people who intersected with recorded history. She discovers the stories and Breathes New Life into them and send them out into the world. With mobituaries he takes a fresh look at the lives of men and women in those wellknown and provided and shared their stories with a new audience. She is a correspondent for the sunday morning host of the henry florida Innovation Nation and host and creator of the Cooking Channel my grandmothers ravioli and i just watched three videos of grandmothers making ravioli and check it out, it is wonderful, absolutely wonderful. [laughter] you talk to a frequent panelist in the weekly show and he began his career in tv as a writer and producer for the Emmy Awardwinning pbs childrens series which fund and spent four seasons as a correspondent on thefos daily show. As an actor he started on broadway in the annual spelling bee which i saw and the author of the president pets in the role in the president ial decisionmaking. [laughter] no comment. She is a National Correspondent for cbs morning where she reports from everything from arts and culture to politics and foreign policy. Before joining cbse sunday morning in the cbs news chief correspondent for four years and spent a decade as cbs news chief while correspondent preach she went Nine National emmy awards and received an award presented by the congressional radio and Television Correspondents association and the star award from american women in radio and television. In radio and t. Please welcome mo rocca and rita braver. [applause] thank you. Can you believe they are doing this on a friday night . After this, go get a life. This this is what passes upwi for wild. We both grew up. So we know and its just such a pleasure to interview mo. I should say up front its likely to be a hostile interview. If that is what you are here for i hate to disappoint you. We will get to this great book acalled mobituaries, very clever. But i think you are here in part because you want to know about mo rocca the man. [applause] you grew up in washington outside of the city. I grew up in bethesda. Suburban kid. Thats right. I was a city kid. Thats right, i took the bus. What were you like as a kid . Was i shut in for lot of it. I watched a lot of tv and by the age of nine i memorized the tv guide, granted this was pre cable so there were not that many channels but i loved tv until my parents basically threw me into the backyard because they said you got to get outside and you need to get some light it i guess the woman across the street thought they had only two children when they had three children. They really thought my little brother, larry, said [inaudible] and then i spent time in the backyard teaching myself gymnastics as one does so [laughter] you went to georgetown prep. You may have heard of it. The same school as Supreme Court Justice Kavanaugh went to and i wondered if your experience was similar to his there . [laughter] i will say that during my confirmation hearings it got contentious and it never went to the full senate but i had a great time in my school. I get it. What i mean is i loved my teachers and im very grateful that my parents sent me to georgetown prep. Adequate experience. [laughter] i wish i could tell you something about my book that would make headlines here but nothing to report. [inaudible] if you want to go in that direction, we could do that but no. Theater program was not great bread i will tell you that. Ive been told its better now. Lets talk about that for a second because it is clear that you have a passion for aging movie stars, broadway shows and u. S. President s. Yes, i do. And you honed those things aing appear. I wonder it seems to me that growing up in washington a taste for politics, you get it if only by osmosis. Ive always thought i wonder if the gates of the white house are the equivalent of what it would be like for a kid growing up in la outside paramount studioscs that there is may be its not a little bit of magic but an interest in it so do you feel like you could be connected to its growing up . I do thank you feel that way. The president , chief executive, is almost like the above the title movie star in a way and the taste for old movies came from my mother. I had older parents and my mother does not like to hear that but its true. I always like that. I always liked that my friends parents were boomers, baby boomers, but my parents proceeded that and so i grew up watching a lot of blackandwhite old movies with my father and i remember the old bio graft theater, remember that . [applause] yeah, when grace kelly died i remember i said to my father, pop, who was she or i wanted to know more about her and the bio graph and i know my memory is not play tricks on me but the very next day they played to catch a thief. They were able to respond that quickly. He took me down to see to catch a thief with cary grant and grace kelly. That is where the old movies what was the third thing . It was 80 movie stars which was part of that so you went on to harvard and you were the president of [inaudible] i went to school in boston, i should say. Its usually i went to school in boston. But you are president of [inaudible] and performed on stage frequently in drag and so the question is because i know thats a highly sought after thing to do at harvard and the question is what did you get from that . What did you learn from that . The hasty pudding show is pretty much all student run and one year i cowrote the musical and acted in it all four years. Ive seen the video and you can find it online and you should. It does not translate well on video just like theater looks ghastly. Me, as a woman, is ghastly. [laughter] because it was a student run it really was like lets put on a show. We had to do it and then there was professionals involved but we hired them and you know, it was all Box Office Revenue that pay for it so we had to aid not, as they say in theater, to make each week of the run and it was incredibly creative experience. Harvard at least then had a fairly small conservative curriculum and you couldnt major in drama and i think it was just as well that that is where i put my energies. But you sing and you dance and you appeared and sometimes still do in professional productions you were in greece, insouth pacific. Did you thank you have a careeri in showbiz . Yesdi and i know that you hed all your accolades, rita, as a journalist and some journalists dont love hearing this but i still do consider myself in showbiz meaning that i think interviewing and doing stories on cbs sunday morning, i think of it on a continuum with performing on stage and writin writing i wrote for kids tv show called wishbone and i think its all performative, not as in makebelieve because just like in any acting there is truth, the best acting is truthful but when i am interviewing someone i like to think of myself and my goal is to be best supporting actor, not costar but so i think. I am trying. [laughter] but you know what im saying,geo engage with an audience is creating relationships. I will jump ahead because i found myself wondering if i was looking at this wonderful resume of yours which i know about but i was thinking about coming here to talk to you that because you have these talents and why does someone like you, who could do so many other things, wanted job mine when that is about all i can do . [laughter] i cant do anything else. Why . I dont think its preeninge to say that were on a pretty great tv show and it is like going back to college and taking only electives and which i really wish i had done the first time around. One week its, foron me it could be in for you, peace about the history of the pencil and the next week its the assassination of president garfield and the next week im profiling missy gaynor. Im doing a piece on snails right now for our annual food show. Better you than me. [laughter] they are actually kind of cute when you see them up close. But eating them great protein source. The escargot youre getting had long been dead and are that makes it better. [laughter] [inaudible conversations] but no, when i was little i liked the variety packs of cereal. I did not like the big box andou that is how i feel about subject matter, frosted flakes, sugar smacks, froot loops. You are funny, do you have o take it down when youre doing a piece . Do have to say i really have to behave myself because i will be on National Television . Yes, yes, i think so. Different pieces call for different, i dont know, i mean, i just try to stay in the mome moment. I mean, i will say this that i had a vocal coach, not a voice teacher, she was helping with me auditions when i went to [inaudible] to audition for musicals and i was doing or singing a song from how to succeed in business without really trying and i was being character he and it was the second lead role which i play it the company way and wherever the company puts me i willco stay so the scheming number two in the show and this vocal coach turned to me in the middle of it and looked at me and i will never forget this and she said, be easy to take. [laughter] i can remember the moment and i dont want to name herbert actually i will name her. She was a wanted vocal coach and she didnt know which was doing, annie lebeau and she said they will get it. You dont have to cram it down their throats. They will get it. Im still working on that. [laughter] it was a great piece of advice like be easy to take with the audience a smart and they will gget it. Dont try so hard. I think when you are in an interview and invested in its and you are immersed in it that comes naturally. So, under the auspices of sunday morning and cbs you started a podcast called mobituaries. I remember when you told me about this and i said you see dead people. [laughter] im glad you didntu say mobituaries, is this just off you want to complain about. [laughter] thats what my friend bill said to me. I always wondered if you just thought of the title first and then you had to do something with it. [laughter] no, thats funny. Mo is a very convenient name for Different Things so i mean, thank god my parents didnt amy cecil because that would not work. Obituaries are profiles of people and it is endlessly refillable and there are so many possibilities. And then i thought and hit on mobituaries. I cant even remember what the working title was at first. Well, i am sure that everyone who is here because you listened to a mobituaries but we will get ready to look at one on video. We will look at one and this is one that i loved when he first did it because i did not know anything about it but this is a piece about the original siamese twins. I think we are ready for the video. Lets get it going. This week on mobituaries. The original siamese twins, known what the brothers were born in siam, now thailand in 1811 connected at the sternum by a 4inch long ban of flesh. At the age of 17 they set sail for america and became two of the first celebrities of the 19th century. They would have beencars celebrity whatever, people magazine. They are in early version of ultimately what would become known as a freak show, traveling freak show. [inaudible] how did they learn to do a back flip . But it is when they settled in the mountains of North Carolina that the story really interesting. They did not want to put the rest of their lives on display. They were normal, young men who wanted to have a family. The twins married two sisters in between them bothered 21 children. The outhouse is downhill so its obviously gone. Do we know what the outhouse look like . We know it was a two homer. [laughter] it was built for the twins. I meet some of the descendents of the twins who reunite every year in North Carolina to celebrate their legacy. [inaudible] todays family members tell me their ancestors extraordinary tail of great encourage. They are the ultimate immigration story. E america was always the beginning of the place where someone could come and build a successful life. They came here with nothing. [applause] so, i learned so much from that. I remember when it ran first. How did you decide to do that . In the book and in the podcast for each topic could be something to trust my instinct and for something for it to be something about either personal attachment to our general incitement. When i was little there were three things that i think would always excite me or get my attention, quicksand, tarantulas or hearing about and joined twins. Im serious, if you heard about the birth of them you would want to see them. I think theres something in us hardwired in us of curiosity about that unusual some of us. [laughter] right, but with the podcast my mother said she wasnt sure if she wanted to listen to it d and im glad she really endedp liking it. I love their story because they sere essentially indentured servants. How did you find out about them to know to do this . How did i find out about them . I found out about the reunion that takes place every year, the family reunion. I thought it sounded interesting and so we looked into it and then started reading [inaudible] the scholar, author of peter in that preview. I read a summary of his book and i also found it intriguing, by the way, that there from North Carolina or which is where they settled there which is the home of Andy Griffith which is the model for mayberry and mayberry is seen as a quintessential american story but i think they are the quintessential american story because they come over, immigrants, indentured servants and they win their freedom. They are pull yourself up by your bootstraps, that some of the first entertainers in america and they settle down against all odds and mary sisters and have all these children and then they owned slaves. That was the part oftl the story that you are with them, youre with them and then its like you hit a brick wall and you think, oh, i wanted to love you completely and yet, it makes it a more important story and i think it makes it more american story. The good, the bad and the ugly, all of it. Do you generally thinknk onef the [inaudible] in term of a tv story first or podcast that you turn into a tv story . Doesnt have a a podcast. It is something that will be satisfying at 30, 40 or maybe even 50 minutes. Some have been close to an hour and interestingly the longer ones have done better. I know we are in a culture where we think oh my god, no one has Attention Spans and every thing has to be really short but its iobeen hard to need the first season the three most popular ones were the three longest. Well, do you have a process for building a podcast that you do each time or is there a kind of way of doing it or does it change it has changed from, its a very small team, at this point [inaudible] is the main producer and is fantastic i work very closely with her. But i think weve been trying after we lay down a few interviews to decide what is the central question that will be answered. Esth Audrey Hepburn, for instance, i knew id couple of different personal connections. I had worked at macys at Herald Square and 92 when she walked by mike counter and the floor fell silent and people were like oh my god, its Audrey Hepburn. Even if you had cell phones would not have children hand in front of her face. You kneww not to the do that. I noticed with the rise of social media that she was trending regularly and i thought what it is about her, can we answer that question that why she, who was a big star, her career was only about 14 years long and there were other stars that were bigger than she was who arent renumbered in the same way and who dont persist. It was that dress and that breakfast at tiffanys. I think it is in the eyes but theres a yearning and gratitude and her two sons told me they said, it was almost starting [inaudible] it gave her this quality that punches through and the screen and studios try to imitate her but on other actresses who are beautiful and talented and they did not have the same effect. I was going to wait and do this little later in the conversation but one of the clips that we have actually pertains to that, Audrey Hepburn mo but. I think if video people are ready we could roll that second clip. Do we think . [laughter] there we go. Were you aware the day of your inauguration Audrey Hepburn died . No. You did not know that . No. Look, was a very busy time. You drove her down and she did not even get on the front page but she got a little box, Audrey Hepburn is dead. She was only 63. Are over that. A rumor how young i thought she was but i did not think about it. They put her back here. She was amazing. I loved her. I loved roman holiday. I loved breakfast at tiffanys. I loved sabrina. I like the remake. [inaudible] [laughter] thats what i love about these because you have the story about Audrey Hepburn and suddenly there popped up bill clinton. The book is full of these wonderful little surprises and so besides being all these interesting stories about interesting people its a weird tour through mo roccas mind and is probably the reason i liked it so much and theres a whole section in the book that is so great about people who coincidentally died on the same day. Would you give me some examples . Jim henson and sammy davis junior died at the same day, too much talent on what date that shouldve spread it out by a day and gone their own news cycle. That was unfortunate. Mahatma gandhi and Orville Wright died on the same day and obviously Mahatma Gandhi it was one year after independence from the british from the empire and it was an assassination so there was a banner headline. Overall right live 45 years after past the First Successful flight so is down below the polls. On that buddha cello and Margaret Thatcher died on the i you know, they both had very eventful lives and i like to imagine it was a freaky friday sort of thing. Nv where they switched places and it was Maggie Thatcher stars in how to stuff a wild bikini which is an actual title of a annette buna tello movie. Orson welles and youll brenner. That is a interesting youll brenner as died of lung cancer and taped a message to people and antismoking message so i think that was a fairly new thing back then to do that and so his death dominated, not that its a competition but it kind of is. [laughter] that happened fg. Recently with [inaudible] and ross perot died on the same day. And Michael Jackson and farrah fawcett. Poor farah. And i had to do it shows you how we work in our programs i got the farah obit to do for sunday morning but others got four or five other people did Michael Jackson story. But thank god you are doing that because farah was great. I have this theory that i think that people, audiences are smart and can see into a person if they have been in the public eye for long enough and i think there was a reason that farrah fawcett, we liked her long after her pinup days. There was something decent about her and the way she dealt with her cancer at the end and you know, and cutting off her hair in public and she could have hidden away and obviously, Michael Jackson, was a bigger ryory but farrah i wanted to give her love. But we knew farrah had been sick and with Michael Jackson it was a surprise. Right, exactly. We jumped ahead so i didnt get to ask you the question i wanted to but the big question about this book because ive said what i have thought about it but you tell us a little bit about why you decided to write the book as a people who will read it give us a sense of whats in it. Well, its a different kind of death. I wanted to, i wanted the book, i try and all my pieces and rita, i bet you do this to to balance the protein with the carbs. I think i wanted the fun and that is the sugary stuff but the the substanceis and it will surprise you so that theei chapter about the death of sitcom characters is really fun and a ride through your favorite Chuck Cunningham and opies mother who was dead before the Service Started but also makes you think about the suspension of disbelief. I have everything from the death of the fantastic which is the death of the belief in dragons and i have everything a calm cane i agree, he is also in the book, death of a forgotten founding father, a very underrated founding father and i found a parenthetical that mentioned that in 1735 the swedish botanist went to homburg which was then an independent city state, now part of germany, for an exhibition of a seven headed hydra. Everyone in europe was talking about this 700 hydra in 1735, it was like a picasso show at moma, it was a mob scene. He showed up there and went this is not a 700 hydra but snake skins and sewn with a weasel skull and feet and monkey got and its not real. He said god would not create a creature with more s than one hd which, now im thinking but anyway [laughter] the body just like that, very soon after this belief that people have had for melania that dragons and creatures like dragons were real was dispelled. I thought that deserves a mobituaries, a commemoration, that moment. The book is how many of those things that are in the book and i are things that youve done podcasts on and how many are things that may be your thinking about doing podcasts on or never going to do podcasts on . Let me tell you, 75 of the book is all new material and its not in a podcast. [laughter] it is so much that i almost had to write my own mobituaries. You say in the book that you are kind of sad that you cant write a moment about Barbra Streisand because she still alive. She is immortal. Do you ever find yourself thinking, i cant wait for that person to die . No, not barbara, never barbara. No, have i thought about people good mobituaries . Like you are interviewing someone [inaudible conversations] no, i mean, there are people ive interviewed that when the time comes i think it would be an honor to commemorate a person like that and putting it as nicely as i can but because i love the person or thing a person has an extraordinary story. Do you ever start to do a moment on someone and i think weve all done this with people that you think this person willu make a great profile or great mobit and then you find out its not that interesting anyway and you put it aside try to think o how you can do this later . This wasnt because she was an interesting because she is but i have this idea and i cannot quite execute it which is about nelly blythe, the great [inaudible] who wrote ten days in a madhouse and went to what is now thailand in the east river. One of my inspirations. Oh, okay. I will get you to ghostwrite it then. But i had this idea that could be written as a screenplay treatment and play with the different forms and it did not quite work and but i if there is a sequel i would like to do that because her story is amazing and then i think based on jules burns 80 days around the world she then be that and went around the world and actually beat it. She was an extraordinary finge finger and she was a woman got to be a journalist. And its extraordinary that there is not that to me as total oscar baby. I want to do a whole section on roles that will win you and oscar. [inaudible] is someone like that to. You reference tom hanks and i had thought since we are here in the National Archives and our mutual friend, peggy noonan, who had advance copy of the book said be sure to ask mo about tom hanks. Most of us heard about tom pain as we were studying American History of the writer of common sense but what happened to him after words was actually news to me even though it happened 200 years ago so talk about that one because the substance of it is so fascinating. Tom paine wrote common sense which was published about six months before the declaration of independence and it really galvanized marshall colonists to support a break with a crown and common sense, even more than that, before common sense the colonists viewed themselves as marylanders, new yorkers, they did not see themselves as americans. American was also a derogatory term. He rebranded it with common sense. So, its also the way he wrote it most of the country was what the future country was a little illiterate at that point and it was meant to be read out loud and it sold they are bearing estimates on it but its a pretty safe bet to say that based on thema preparation of te time its the most biggest selling american publication in history and yet when he died only six people showed up at his funeral and three were the housekeeper and her two children and the obituary at the time was a paltry of the tweet read apart, he lived long, done some good and much harm. In the book i give sort of pr advice on how he could have been a firsttier founding father. One of the things he did was when he went over to support the french revolution and was thrown in jail because he was a man of such conviction he was against Capital Punishment and the jacobins love that guillotine. Cutting off heads with their real crispy efficiency. He was thrown into jail and they other Founding Fathers wanted nothing to do with him and did not help them so he wrote an open letter trashing George Washington and then wrote age of reason where he refuted the divinity of christ. Father of his country, son of god, you got to know your audience. [laughter] he was alienating everybody, even though most of the Founding Fathers were deists, as he was an agreed with him. But what i found, talking to one of his great biographers, a lot of he had one setting. He was a revolutionary. The other Founding Fathers were revolutionaries who became statesmen, who eventually worked the georgetown Cocktail Party circuit. He had one setting. He is the guy at dinner where you just want to say okay, i get o , can we not talk about the issues. Can we just give it a rest. Lets talk about reality tv for ten minutes. He was incapable of that. Ultimately i dont think he would have cared that he wasnt a firsttier founding father, which is the beauty of tom payne. So many stories like that in the book about people where you either care about didnt know things about or people which is more interesting people you never knew that you cared about but mo, you make us care about them in the podcast. Did i makeg, you care about Lawrence Welk . I watched Lawrence Welkk as a child with my grandmother and did the poco with my sister while my grandmother applauded so yeah. It was touching. He was a bad ass. So many great people. What you hope readers get from this . I hope that readers will be delighted because delightful is the kind of word my father loved to use and its a great word and not used enough and not enough important is placed on it or value is given to it. I hope that people are delighted by it and have fun with it and i hope that topics that seem heavy and are important like the black congressman of reconstruction, the pocket of history that has been forgotten, that it will go down easy and wont seem like we are learning about reconstruction and sitting in the classroom. I like to take on challenging topics and make them go down easy. I like to take topics that seem like they will be fun and busy make you go wow, i did not y expect to choke up over the story of billy carter, to say. Ive been gratified and i was the first podcast in the Second Season and it is out now and i talked to president jimmy carter about billy and it is a poignant story. Its also a funny story but its also a poignant story. When i saw the story and read it i kept thinking of how when i worked as a producer behind the heenes and when you go to set up shop billy was always dropping by our trailer with the sixpack of beer, even before he had [inaudible] so yeah, he just wanted to hang out with. And what was his personality like . He was both complementary of jimmy and always very happy to put jimmy down a little bit. Really . B yeah, honestly, ive interviewed president carter and it would not have occurred to me to do a story about billy now and its worth reading. You will learn things like mo has been to tgi fridays on five continents. Is that true . [laughter] i tweeted that out and oh god, was i violating news standards . [inaudible] we will let you dedicate our new antarctica and tgi fridays. To while you are writing this because again, you talk about the journalism and the personal side and i loved all these personal asides in the book but i wondered why you decided to include them because in many ways this book is journalistic and we have or frequently and pleasurably, i would say, disrupted by your musings on whoever you might be writing these about. I had notot really thought about it felt like the right thing to do. It felt like if i wanted to share my perspective in any of my stories and judiciously, because it is a history book, it seemed like the right way to do it and make it i mean, i think that the quote from sunday in the park with george, everything you do let it come from you then it will be new. I thoughtev the story of elizabh taylor and her advocacy on behalf of People Living and dying with aids has been told so why am i telling it but im telling it because its me. Say the name of the chapter it is people who celebrities who put their butts on the line but i wanted to talk about celebrities who put their lives on the line like Marlene Dietrich. [laughter] but yeah, Marlene Dietrich story is a great one. I remember the screens are but also did but her life on the line. That was one i did not know. We will go to questions in a minute but you say in the intro to the book that almost everyone eventually ends up forgotten. I know where you got it from. I gottu it from you basicall. [laughter] yeah, well you but you can extend that. I thank you forou this becaue rita is in the introduction to the book because in 2002, i think, you interviewed nora efron about a musical called imaginary friends which was wesed on the story the rivalry between Mary Mccarthy and lillian [inaudible] and i remember this piece and you say into nora in the middle of the peace how do you want to be remembered and she laughed and said remembered, these two women were incredibly famous and they had been gone for ten, 12 years and no one news who they are. She said i dont expect to be remembered at all. Cut to last year when i was working on the podcast for Audrey Hepburn, episode for Audrey Hepburn, i wanted to useh a piece of an interview i had done with nora efron where she had this great story about edith and Audrey Hepburn and its a small group of people to work on the podcast but all the people under the age of 35 really smart people, with smart, had no idea who nora efron was and shed only been dead for about five years. So, everyone is forgotten and i find that liberating. [laughter] you are doing your job to revive some of these great figures. I hope. And to make us care about things that you have this weird ability to make us care about things that we never thought we would care about. I never thought i would care about [inaudible] or Something Like that. I mean, especially with the people, maybe not so much with the things but prussia and the Station Wagon. Which have so much in common. [laughter] i know. It would be difficult to be auto found bismarck writing the Station Wagon but that is why its called the [inaudible] because of the spiky helmet. I tried also and i realized and thought about this with billy carter to be compassionate with the past and to cut the past some slack because i think theres a tendency to disqualify people from the past and i talked to heres a name drop and im happy to do with [inaudible] for a piece that will air soon, preempted on the east coast a few weeks ago but Doris Goodwin said she lit up when i brought this upee and she said my god, r should have allowed more jewish refugees in the country that internment of japanese americans was a terrible thing but he brought us through world war ii brought us to the Great Depression and she said this similar things about abraham lincoln. My error on the side of generous and i think maybe that is also the influence of sunday morning on our colleague and mary lou teal and [inaudible] also and of course he did but mary lou i did not get to meet him but mary lou said that charles said its okay to like the person you are interviewing and i feel like all the people in this book. Thats sunday morning and we can do that. Well, we have this great audience and i promise to take some of your we have a microphone so the only thing i will ask is if you come up with questions not speeches. Ea [applause] i love questions. Please, i love questions. Come on. Someone is making his way out. While he makes his way out i will ask you a quick one and then everybody asks you, in this book we obviously know you have a soft spot for Audrey Hepburn but is that your favorite . Is that my favorite . Its one of my favorites but gosh, there was a lot i love telling the story of herberts hoovers pre presidency and John Quincy Adams post presidency because they both have lackluster terms in office but had extraordinary lives on either side so i love doing th that. Start over here. Speaking of charles [inaudible] i was thinking of him as you were talking and i thought that would be a great opportunity for you to go crosscountry and interview people and is that anything you would consider doing especially with her history like grandmothers ravioli and other things you done . I think it would be great idea and i drive. [laughter] [applause] that was the missing link. My impression is from the way you were describing your child is that you seem to be more of an indoors kind of guy and watched a lot of tv and how did you come out of that and feel comfortable performing in front of people . Atlo i mean, i think i always had an impulse to perform. Im sure my teachers or my fifthgrade teacher is here, i think. Are you here . She is, there she is. [applause] anyway, i was in the [inaudible] and so i always she could vouch for this but i would call a performance another would call it disruption. [laughter] maybe it was my sugary cereal but yeah, im glad unfortunate my parents encouraged me to perform and i started doing local theater here in the dc area with something called the ebethesda academy of performing arts and that really took energe and the large amounts of energy i had and channeled it in a productive way. It was an extraordinary putting on shows and performing and i performed at the post Office Pavilion which is no longer the post Office Pavilion when i first [inaudible conversations] okay, i performed there for its inaugural in the mid 80sic in a sequence. Those tapes have been burned. [laughter] as a former teacher and as a retired teacher i hat off to y you. [applause] im interested in your Research Process and your sourcing of materials. In terms of the Research Process i assume the journalism side of you is trained you to work on deadline but i would think the actor side of you makes you get lost in these characters and hoe do you balance that to get the product out . There were a lot of youtube poles i i will tell you that ani went down and you know, i think theres a story that sticks in my mind that i think rodgers an hammerstein when they working on the canaanite that Oscar Hammerstein was over researching and getting so involved in history of the port of siam and that Richard Rogers had to start iahim so i keep that in mind and try not to go too deeply in and so i would oscillate between the substantive history part and the more personal side and then figure out what i needed and if i would to do this again and if i had the opportunity i would try to identify what two takeaways are early so that it doesnt sprawl out of control but that was a challenge. Reader, my speech will be less than 20 minutes. My guess tonight was not able to make it but i was asked to add ask you, mo. There is a story in mobituaries about a relative of yours and a trump that we should hear about tonight. The feedback i got broughtt tes to my eyes so maybe you could share a part of that with us. Well, as i wrote this book and worked on the podcast and i mentioned the word delightful before, a word ofte my father ud a lot i found that so many of the things i wanted to write about and talk about were things that i inherited from him and an affection for them and even more than that thought what would he, i lost my father in 2004 and what would he think about these stories and what he like them and its a pretty great motivation and worked for me. Then on fathers day i sat down and started writing about him and i wrote about that at the age of 50 in 1979 for christmas my mother went down to a pawn shop in dc with her mother who was visiting from columbia and my mother is colombian and my mother bought my father a trump with my father had played trump a little bit as a kid but life intervened and started a business and got married and had three sons andte he longed to py the trump again and he regretted stopping and he had only played it for short time when he was a kid growing up in a factory town in massachusetts. And i can remember on that Christmas Morning when my father opened up the case he was so excited and every weekday morning my father would play in the cellar in our house and a split level bethesda and would play scales and had tapes on the wall with xerox sheets that were telling you how to improve your [inaudible] which is how the trumpeters lips form around the mouthpiece and its really hard and then at night for an hour every night he would playwa excd land jazz and i would put on metal rollerskates that could go over your sneakers and i would skate around and there was a poll so i could grab the poll when i skated by and spent like i was doing a sow cow. [laughter] and the dryer and my mother will not like me saying this but the dryer had crept out in the late 70s or something so we would line dryer close which would make it fun because my father would played the saints go marching in and i would be skating and out of towels and sheets. When in my father did not think he was going to get a record contract and do not think he would be playing at clubs in new orleans or new york but he was doing it because he loved it and he loved it so much and it was an act of faith and of love and it made a big impact on me. Yeah, so, after i finished writing at my editor said that should be the finalal mobituaries in the book and i made that the dedication of the book and yet, my father was not a cynical person and had a real sense of the romance of life and i know he would have loved sunday morning. I know he wouldve loved that i was on it because he had that same kind of wonderment of what will it be this week and i think that was a real gift for me. Is there anybody, i have 1 million questions but i will repeat it if you want [inaudible] [inaudible question] wait, wait, dont tell me is an npr news quiz comedy show that has been on for 21 years and hosted by my friend, peter [inaudible] who does [applause] who is the fred astaire of public radio because he makes whathg is hard look easy. Its really hard what heak does. There are a panel of guests each week and im frequently one of them sounding off about the news and about the big headlines the small and theres i and not afraid to look silly. Which is really, really important because i thank you know you have to be willing to knife to fall on your face and when we go there you say what is on your mind and you dont go in with a pair of jokes because what makes it work is its what youre joking with friends. So, i dont really prepare much at all. We had to write a little thing called the [inaudible] which is a fun thing so that has occurred ahead of time and we write them on our own. But that show was important for me because it made me calm around with sounding like myself. S this book is also, you know, over time and im sure you feel this way and you learn to trust your own instincts. I would hope that if i am interested in something and execute while the audience will be interested in that. If im not interested in it and i will not be able to full you. Similar to that in wait, wait, dont tell me. I tried to sound like someone else and i did not like the sound of my own voice. Then i let go of that and i had a better time and i got more laughs. Theres a lesson in that. Yes, sir. From what i heard it seems that the people you write about are people that you appreciate in some way, artistic or for some quality they have. Is there anyone about where you started writing facing someone you like and you learn Something Like what you learn about the [inaudible] brothers, the Chinese Brothers that ended u up owned that the slaves. Have you learn something about someone that you thought this is just too terrible and im going to not write about this person . That did not happen but there were people that early on i thought this person might be or people might have ace of the mental attachment to this person but then i was told that they were either not that interesting or awful. [laughter] i hate to look, dead people i highly recommend writing about dead people. There are so easy to deal with. They dont have publicists or tsndlers while, some of them do but im careful about trashing the ones that but there were a couple i thought this person will note be great. We are almost out of time but this nice lady i think will be our last question. It better be good. [laughter] student pressure is on. Were talking about how inspirational these people were the writing mobituaries and i cannot help but wonder and big about wishbone and would you consider doing a tv show similar to wishbone about some of these mold but so you could read your audience and they would have a lot to learn about these people as well. Wishbone was a Pbs Television series in the mid 90s and im proud of it and i thought what you are and ask have you considered doing a mobituaries for wishbone the dog and in fact, we did start one on the podcast side for the dog that played wishbone and i do want to animal stars, i mean, people have a huge attachment to them so yes, mow bits for kids, that might be a little bit tricky. You might have to im writing about some of the who went away for a long time. [laughter] hell be back. The good news is you can go out and buy this book and you can tune into a podcast and you can watch one of his 30, 40 Television Programs he works for and hear him on the radio so tonight we have had just a little tiny smidgen of then wonder of mo mo rocca. Thank you. [applause] the house rules kitty is meeting later today. Members are expected to talk about the establishment of a coronavirus select committee. Watch the rules Committee Live starting at 5 00 p. M. Eastern on cspan2. You are watching a special edition of book tv airing now through the week while numbers of congress are in their districts due to the pandemic. Tonight, the digital world. First, the future of success is right in his book, the American Dream is not dead. Timothy carney on alienated america looking how the market dream is less attainable