The Wire

Here's a podcast of a panel discussion between four people who played integral, yet completely different, roles in creating the world of The Wire.  Listen to writer Bill Zorzi, executive producer Nina Noble, actor Chad Coleman, who played "Cutty," the gangster turned boxing coach/youth mentor/ladies' man, and Clark Johnson.  Clark played the city editor Gus in the last season, and directed a few episodes of The Wire, including the pilot and the finale.  The conversation, hosted by Marc Steiner, took place in front of a few hundred people at the Baltimore Museum of Industry on April 30, 2008 at the opening of their new exhibit "Local Scenes on the Silver Screen: featuring The Wire."

Don't have time to listen to the podcast right now?  Click here to read the transcript.

From Left: Bill Zorzi, Chad Coleman, Marc Steiner, Nina Noble, and Clark Johnson.  Photo credit: mojo40Design of Precise Management Company.

The stories of poet George Evans, who served as an Air Force medic and who was the first soldier to defeat his court marshal, in a tale that could come straight out of the movie and TV series, MASH. And then we hear the story of Lynda Van Devanter, who was a surgical nurse in 1969 and 70, whose memoir and life story inspired the TV hit series, China Beach.

Nina Noble, Executive Producer for The Wire, spent the past several years doing all the behind the scenes work that is required for a successful show. She joined Marc to share her stories and experiences from the past few years.

Major Bunny Colvin was a featured character in season three when he took it upon himself to drastically change drug policy in West Baltimore. He was portrayed by Bob Wisdom, who found time to get on the phone with Marc and discuss the role.

Bubbles is my favorite character on The Wire. I remember hearing an interview with David Simon before the fifth season premiered in which he promised that at least one character would experience a happy ending and total redemption by the end of the series.

In an interview conducted at his Baltimore rowhome, Clarke Peters talks with Marc about the experience of spending the past several years portraying the intellectual cop, Detective Lester Freamon.

A soup kitchen featured in the final season is actually a real place-and a rather special one. Marc visits Viva House, a Catholic Worker soup kitchen on the west side of Baltimore.

Baltimore-based actor Robert Chew stopped by the studios to talk with Marc about the character Proposition Joe, the east side drug kingpin on The Wire that Robert spent the past several years portraying. They also discussed Chew's experience as an acting coach to the four young boys who were featured in season four.

David Simon is the creator of The Wire. He was a Baltimore Sun police reporter when he took a year off to write the book Homicide: A Year on the Killing Streets, the book that inspired the hitr NBC show Homicide: Life on the Streets, for which he was a writer and producer. His next project was a book and subsequent six part HBO miniseries called The Corner.

Marc Steiner talks with Ed Burns, a former Baltimore City cop and public school teacher. Ed is a writer and producer for The Wire, and also co-wrote The Corner: A Year in the Life of an Inner City Neighborhood with David Simon.