The Wire Podcasts

Nina Noble and friends accepting the Emmy for Outstanding Miniseries for HBO's The Corner in 2000.  She is on far left.

I have major sympathy for Nina Noble.  We share a job title (okay, well her title has the fancy 'Executive' in front of it) and people are constantly asking me "What does a producer DO?"  I imagine she gets the same question.  I always like to answer, "I do all the work" and then flash a smile.  If Marc is around, I will usually add jokingly, "...and he gets all the glory." (Fair enough, really, considering he also has to bear the brunt of all the criticism!)

But seriously, Nina Noble had a gigantic job as Executive Producer of The Wire.  From convincing the Port of Baltimore to let them shoot scenes on location to keeping track of the hundreds of characters David Simon and the other writers created, it's a wonder she didn't burn out long ago.  But as she told Marc when she sat down for an interview about the experience of working on The Wire, this is the only job she is suited for.

Click here to stream the interview.  Right click here and select "Save Target As" in order to download this onto your computer.  Want to get this in iTunes?  Instructions are below, just click "Read More". Running time is 40:20.

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External Links

• David Simon: The Wire Exit Interview from Baltimore City Paper
• Bittersweet Work of Wrapping 'Wire' from The New York Times
• What Does a Producer Do?by Marshall Persinger
• Nina Noble from Internet Movie Database

I have a lot of friends from out of town who love The Wire.  I always kind of feel sorry for them because I feel like they aren't getting the whole picture.  Only someone really familiar with Baltimore can get all the inside jokes, references, and cameos that pepper the series.  But sometimes the reference is arcane enough that not even Baltimoreans quite get what they are looking at.  For example, how many people know that the soup kitchen Bubbles worked at in season five is a real place?

My co-producer Justin brought that up, and we decided that it would make a great podcast to go down and talk to the people who run that soup kitchen and learn about their experience being featured on The Wire.  Their names are Brendan Walsh and Willa Bickham.  They play themselves on television (well, sort of...listen to the podcast to find out more!) They are wonderful people and they have a lot of great things to say about Baltimore, social justice issues, and of course, The Wire.

Click here to stream the interview.  Right click here and select "Save Target As" to download the entire feature as an MP3. The running time is 17:29.  Read the transcript here.

Click "Read More" for a slideshow of pictures from Viva House as well as other resources.

[slideshow id=1441151880764082155&w=426&h=320]

This is a selection of images taken at Viva House in West Baltimore.  Move your cursor over the pictures for captions.

• Baltimore's Viva House from America, The National Catholic Weekly
• Mildred and Me , from Laura Lippman.com-Laura writes about her experience volunteering at Viva House.
• Diary: Entry 5 from Slate.com-Laura Lippman writes again about Viva House.
• Best Free Food: Viva House from Best of Baltimore 2006 by Baltimore City Paper

Want to get in touch with Viva House?  Write to them at

Viva House Catholic Worker

26 S. Mount Street. Baltimore, MD 21223.

Call: 410-233-0488

We're back again today with another fantastic interview for you.  Last week Marc sat down with Robert Chew, the Baltimore native who has portrayed the east Baltimore drug lord Proposition Joe for the past several years on the hit HBO series The Wire.  Prop Joe, as he came to be known, was an iconic figure that represented a time in Baltimore where the drug trade was less violent and bloody, when word was bond, and "The Game" was something very different than what it is today.

Click here to steam that interview.  Or, right click here and choose "Save Target As."  Running time is 34 minutes.  You can read the transcript here.

Click read more for interviews and resources.

• Robert Chew on the Internet Movie Database
• The Arena Players Youtheatre
• An Interview with Prop Joeon The FADER
• Back to School from Baltimore City Paper-this article goes in-depth regarding the coaching Chew provided to the four young men who starred in season four.
• The TV Club talks about Prop Joe's fate (spoiler alert!) on Slate.com
• Wire Watch from Time Magazine (spoiler alert!)

 Our Wire podcast series continues with a forty minute interview with David Simon!  Sunday is getting closer.  In the meantime, hear what The Wire's creator has to say about the show.  Click here for the complete audio interview (you can also right click and choose "Save Target As" to save the MP3 so you can put it on a cd or portable MP3 player.)  Click here to read the transcript.

Choice quotes:

"The Wire to me is one of the funniest shows about the decline of the American empire that’s ever been written."

"Politically, I am a pessimist at this point.  I don’t believe we can actually even recognize our fundamental problems, much less begin to address them.  And that is what the last season of The Wire was about...I’d love The Wire to be wrong about everything.  This is not a gleeful pessimism, it’s a worried pessimism.  And if The Wire is wrong, nobody will be happier than me."

"Every single drama that is offered up for popular entertainment is on some level a political or cultural form of pornography, and I’m tired of it and it bores the hell out of me."

"I apparently am the angriest man in television, which, I take that as a vague manner of praise, but I think it’s rather faint.  The second angriest man in television, I believe, is by a kidney shaped pool with his cellphone in Bel Air somewhere, and he’s screaming because he doesn’t have enough points on the DVD’s."

Here are just a few of the thousands of interviews with and articles about David Simon.

• Stealing Life: The Crusader behind The Wire in the New Yorker, October 22nd, 2008.
• Interview: Talking With the Creator of One of T.V.'s Best and Smartest Shows in Rolling Stone, September 25th, 2005.
• Under the Wire from Baltimore City Paper, May 28th 2003
• Q&A David Simonin Undercover Black Man (blog), January 22nd, 2007.
• Exclusive Q&A with David Simonfrom The Wire on HBO (fansite), August 16th 2006
• 'The Wire's' David Simon from Fresh Air from WHYY, September 23rd, 2004

Check back tomorrow for the next installment in The CEM Wire podcast series, an interview with Robert Chew, the actor who portrays Prop Joe!  Much more to come as well, including an interview with Andre Royo, pictured above with David Simon.

Want to set up ITUNES to automatically download these for you?  Launch ITUNES.  Go to the toolbar, and click on ADVANCED.  Then, click "Subscribe to podcast feed."  In the box that comes up, paste http://www.switchpod.com/users/cem/feed.xml.  If you have any problems, email me at Jes.Phillips@gmail.com.

Ed Burns on the set of The Wire

As we promised last week, this week we are bringing you a series of interviews with folks from the hit HBO series The Wire.  The series finale of this show is airing on March 9th.  Marc is a huge fan of the program, and we know a lot of you are as well.   So for our first podcast series we decided to concentrate on this television show and talk to writers, producers, actors, security guards and crew to ask them about their experiences in making The Wire.  We wanted to find out what they think the message of the show is.  What does it have to teach us about urban America?  What lessons can we learn from the five seasons? 

We began with a quick conversation with Ed Burns, a writer and co-producer.  He is a former Baltimore City Cop and Baltimore City public school teacher.  Those experiences deeply informed the script of The Wire.  His real life experiences often found their way onto the screen. 

Click here to hear that interview, or right click and choose "Save Target As" which will save it as an MP3 file on your computer. Running time is 15:20. Read the transcript here.

Tomorrow, we'll bring you a conversation with series creator David Simon.  Later in the week, you'll hear from the actors who play Lester Freamon, Prop Joe, Bubbles, and more.  Stay tuned, and let us know what you think.

-Jessica

Click "Read More" for links to articles, interviews and more.

• HBO: The Wire: Interview: Ed Burns
• Ed Burns on Fresh Air in November 2006
• The Ethical Scumbag (blog) interviews Ed Burns
• Edutopia: Edward Burns: Bringing Education Reality to TV
• The Wire Links (blog) Links to articles and info on THE WIRE