848; 05 Wesley Willis' Art on Display at Dominican; 06 Remembering Dennis Letts; 01 'Public Official A' Revealed; 02 Michael Reese to Close?; 03 A Blogger's Cancer Journey: Part 19; 04 Jonathan Miller Reviews 'Still Life'
- Episode
- 848
- Segment
- 06 Remembering Dennis Letts
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- 01 'Public Official A' Revealed
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- 02 Michael Reese to Close?
- Producing Organization
- WBEZ
- Contributing Organization
- WBEZ (Chicago, Illinois)
- AAPB ID
- cpb-aacip/50-35t76n1s
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- 05 Wesley Willis was a prolific songwriter and visual artist who at his peak appeared on the Howard Stern show and MTV. But Willis first got attention for his pen-and-ink drawings large views of Chicagos lakefront, skyline and Dan Ryan expressway. He was diagnosed with schizophrenia in the late 80s, but that didnt stop him from making music and art. Now, four-and-a-half years after his death, a documentary and two exhibits are chronicling the life and work of Wesley Willis. Eight Forty-Eight's Alison Cuddy recently spoke with Paul Young, co-director of the Young Fox Gallery in Michigan City, Indiana. His gallerys exhibit, Sixty Drawings, along with Drawn By Wesley Willis, an exhibit on display at Dominican University in River Forest, both draw from Youngs personal collection. Young says Williss imagination and love of architecture inspired many of his drawings.
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- 06 The community of Chicago stage performers lost a patriarch this weekend. Steppenwolf Theater actor Dennis Letts died of cancer Friday at the age of 73. A longtime college professor of literature in Oklahoma, Letts started acting professionally just a little more than 20 years ago. Despite his late start, Letts appeared in more than 40 television and film productions over his during the course of his career. But his final role came on stage, first at Steppenwolf, and then on Broadway, in his son Tracy Lettss hit play August: Osage County. Speaking with Eight Forty-Eight's Steve Edwards in 2007, Tracy Letts said the production brought the father-son relationship full circle. Dennis Letts had been diagnosed with lung cancer in September 2007 before the play began its New York run. He chose to push on through eight performances a week, until just weeks before his death. He was 73 years old when he died Friday. A memorial service will be held Thursday in Oklahoma.
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- Episode
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- 01 Yesterday, court documents in a federal corruption case revealed the real name behind a much-discussed alias: Public Official A is Illinois Governor Rod Blagojevich. Prosecutors say he benefited from an alleged kickback scheme organized by indicted fundraiser Tony Rezko. Blagojevich was widely thought to be the anonymous official noted in Rezkos indictment, though the governor has long denied it. Chicago Public Radio political reporter Ben Calhoun is with us now to help weigh the implications of this news, and to update us on another political tangle this one at the Cook County building.
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- 02 As Cook County officials struggle to balance the books, the clock is ticking on another local institution. Michael Reese Hospital's time could be up in mere months. The city of Chicago has moved to buy up the hospitals prized land, just south of McCormick Place. That space could wind up as part of a potential Olympic Village. Yesterday, Crains Chicago Business reported that employees have been told they must be out of their current digs by years end. Eight Forty-Eight's medical contributor Dr. Quentin Young has watched the hospital evolve over many yearsever since he joined its staff back in 1952.
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- 03 In just over a year, S.L. Wisenberg went from having an abnormal mammogram to having one of her breasts removed. Then came chemo and losing her hair. But in her online journal about life with breast cancer, she interjects lots of humor into what otherwise is a pretty terrifying ordeal. This concludes our series of excerpts from S.L. Wisenbergs blog about life with breast cancer. Wisenberg is the author of an essay collection, Holocaust Girls: History, Memory and Other Obsessions, and a book of short stories, The Sweetheart Is In. And shes in talks with a publisher to turn her cancer blog into a book.
- Description
- 04 The Sixth Generation of Chinese filmmakers is an underground movement that defies sanctions by the government. By necessity, they do their work quickly and on the cheap. The films often take on a documentary feel, but that description just scratches the surface. Jia zhang-ke is one of the movements leading figures. His film Still Life was released in 2006, but only now is it hitting Chicago screens. Eight Forty-Eights film critic Jonathan Miller has this review. Still Life is currently showing at the Music Box Theatre. Jia Zhankes film Still Life takes place in the shadow of Chinas Three Rivers Gorge hydroelectric project. From Sun YatSen early in the 20th century through Mao Zedong, a desire has taken shape to harness the flooding of the Yangtze River; in 1994, construction on the project began. When finished, it will be the worlds largest electricity-generating plant. When an incidental character in Jias film, a technocrat, boasts of his latest accomplishment, a dazzling bridge that cost 240 million, his companion complements him for making Chairman Maos dream of taming the Yangtze a reality. The subtext suggests that where communism may have failed, state-run capitalism will triumph. Three Rivers is a site where humanitys struggle for mastery over nature is taking place on an epic scale. With such a grand setting one might expect a dramatic epic. But as its title suggests Still Life finds its focus at a different scale. Human nature is also at stake in the project. Coal miner Han Sanming arrives in Fengjie, returning after a sixteen-year absence. Hes come in search of his wife. Locating her seems a simple thing when he starts: he has an address, and remembers the neighborhood. But the Three Rivers Project has intervened. The city is one gigantic demolition site and, as Jia shows evidence of lives hastily abandoned, it comes to seem a slow-motion Pompeii without visible corpses. A recurring image tells the story in short: red lines painted on walls and signs warn of high water marks to come. Yet everyday life goes on beneath these marks, lived under the prospect of certain inundation. The mortality of buildings and neighborhoods comes across poignantly. Jia makes it clear: money is in the air in China. Jia places money in the frame directly and indirectly, and as the story proceeds, it acquires different nuances. Corruption, opportunism, and violence leave their mark in every corner. When Sanming arrives in Fengjie, a dockside gang hazes him. Sanming is forced to watch an act by a conjurer who uses sleight-of-hand to transmute Chinese Yuan first to Euros and then to Dollars. You need dollars to ride the boat, he declares. This boat may be the one you need to stow away on to emigrate or it may be the one afloat on the rising tide of state-controlled capitalism, plying the waters of the Three Rivers Gorge. Responding to the shakedown, Sanming shows considerable aplomb and moves on intact. He has things of value other than money in his sights. Its the values of these thingsrelations, emotions, personal histories, aspirationsto which Jia gives dramatic weight. Subtle threads link Sanmings story to the search of Shen Hong, a nurse, for her husband Guo Bin. Shes been married to him a brief two years, though theyve lived apart. Spans of time and durations of commitment come into relief against the backdrop of the Three Gorges mega-machine....
- Media type
- Sound
- Credits
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Distributor: WBEZ
Producing Organization: WBEZ
Production Unit: 848
- AAPB Contributor Holdings
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Chicago Public Radio (WBEZ-FM) and Vocalo.org
Identifier: 20575 (WBEZ)
Format: Data CD: CD-R
Generation: Master
Duration: 01:00:00?
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- Citations
- Chicago: “848; 05 Wesley Willis' Art on Display at Dominican; 06 Remembering Dennis Letts; 01 'Public Official A' Revealed; 02 Michael Reese to Close?; 03 A Blogger's Cancer Journey: Part 19; 04 Jonathan Miller Reviews 'Still Life',” WBEZ, American Archive of Public Broadcasting (GBH and the Library of Congress), Boston, MA and Washington, DC, accessed April 24, 2025, http://americanarchive.org/catalog/cpb-aacip-50-35t76n1s.
- MLA: “848; 05 Wesley Willis' Art on Display at Dominican; 06 Remembering Dennis Letts; 01 'Public Official A' Revealed; 02 Michael Reese to Close?; 03 A Blogger's Cancer Journey: Part 19; 04 Jonathan Miller Reviews 'Still Life'.” WBEZ, American Archive of Public Broadcasting (GBH and the Library of Congress), Boston, MA and Washington, DC. Web. April 24, 2025. <http://americanarchive.org/catalog/cpb-aacip-50-35t76n1s>.
- APA: 848; 05 Wesley Willis' Art on Display at Dominican; 06 Remembering Dennis Letts; 01 'Public Official A' Revealed; 02 Michael Reese to Close?; 03 A Blogger's Cancer Journey: Part 19; 04 Jonathan Miller Reviews 'Still Life'. Boston, MA: WBEZ, American Archive of Public Broadcasting (GBH and the Library of Congress), Boston, MA and Washington, DC. Retrieved from http://americanarchive.org/catalog/cpb-aacip-50-35t76n1s