May 18, 2007
Alan Berliner is a filmmaker and an insomniac. He says he does his best work and feels most alive late at night. His new film, Wide Awake, is part-insomnia diary and part-therapy session. It airs this week on HBO. Kurt Andersen drops in on Berliner at his studio in the middle of the night.
Janna Levin is a physicist who spends her days chasing down the mysteries of the universe, like chaos theory and black holes. Her book A Madman Dreams of Turing Machines combines the tricky worlds of mathematical theory and historical fiction. And it just won her the PEN/Robert Bingham fellowship for best debut novel of 2006. Kurt asks Janna about what novels can do that science can't.
Paul Francke, who plays bass, is finishing up seminary outside of Washington, DC. Isol, who sings vocals, is a children's book author and illustrator from Buenos Aires. The unlikely pair made Alsace Lorraine's new album Dark One, without ever meeting face to face. This special Studio 360 set marks the first time they've ever performed live together.
Folk-rocker Michelle Shocked is a kind of a godmother to a young generation of singer-songwriters. For her, sleepless nights are sometimes the only way to write a song -- so she keeps a guitar right beside her bed. Produced by Trey Kay.
Sherman Alexie stays up all night too. The author of The Lone Ranger and Tonto Fistfight in Heaven and the new novel Flight says it all started when he was a kid when he would stay up waiting for his father to come home. Produced by Trey Kay.
Studio 360 is a co-production of
Public
Radio International and
WNYC New York Public Radio, and is funded in part by
Ken and Lucy Lehman, the
National Endowment for the Arts, the Lily Auchincloss Foundation, and
DK Eyewitness Travel. Studio 360's American Icons series is supported in part by the
National Endowment for the Humanities. Our series on creativity and science is supported in part by the
Alfred P. Sloan Foundation. Our series on Underground Heroes is supported in part by the New York State Music Fund, established by the New York State Attorney General at Rockefeller Philanthropy Advisors. 
