Terry Gross

Infobox Radio Presenter
name = Terry Gross

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caption = Terry Gross at the Georgia Tech FERST Center for the Arts, in Atlanta, November 2006.
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birthdate = 1951
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show = Fresh Air
station = WHYY-FM, NPR
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web = [http://freshair.npr.org/ Official Website]

Terry Gross (born 1951) is the host and co-executive producer of "Fresh Air", an interview format radio show produced by WHYY-FM in Philadelphia and distributed throughout the United States by National Public Radio. Gross has won praise over the years for her low-key and friendly yet often probing interview style and for the diversity of her guests. She has a reputation for researching her guests' entire lives and asking them about lesser known aspects of their early careers.cite news | author=Lori Leibovich | title=Turning the Tables on Terry Gross: "Salon" Gets Personal With NPR'S Maestro of Conversation | url=http://www.salon.com/mwt/feature/1998/06/cov_22feature.html | work=Salon | date=22 June 1998 | accessdate=2008-01-17]

Biography

Gross grew up in Sheepshead Bay, Brooklyn, New York. She earned a Bachelor's degree in English and a M.Ed. in communications from the State University of New York at Buffalo. She began a teaching career, but said that she was "totally unequipped" for the job, and was fired after only six weeks.cite web | title=Terry Gross: Producer and Host of National Public Radio’s 'Fresh Air' - Biography | url=http://www.lectures.org/gross.html | publisher=Seattle Arts and Lectures | date=2001 | accessdate=2008-01-17] She began her radio career in 1973 at WBFO, a public radio station in Buffalo, New York, where she had been volunteering. In 1975 she moved to WHYY-FM in Philadelphia to host and produce "Fresh Air", which was a local interview program at the time. In 1985, "Fresh Air with Terry Gross" went national, being distributed weekly by NPR. It became a daily program two years later.

Gross is married to Francis Davis, jazz critic of the "Village Voice". The couple have no children. In an interview with B.D. Wong, Gross said this is a deliberate choice on their part. [cite interview | subject=B.D. Wong | interviewer=Terry Gross | url=http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=1295057 | format=Audio | program=Fresh Air | callsign=NPR; WHYY | date=11 June 2003 | accessdate=2008-09-03] Because of her short haircut and the number of guests from arts and entertainment (some of whom are gay), Gross said in the introduction to "All I Did Was Ask: Conversations With Writers, Actors, Musicians, and Artists" that she is sometimes asked whether she is gay, including one memorable instance where a guest at a social occasion informed her mother-in-law of such a speculation. [cite book | last=Gross | first=Terry | year=2004 | title=All I Did Was Ask: Conversations with Writers, Actors, Musicians, and Artists | url=http://www.bookreporter.com/reviews2/1401300103-excerpt.asp | location=New York | publisher=Hyperion | isbn=1401300103] In her interview with Rubin "Hurricane" Carter, she mentioned that at one time she lived in a commune.

Interview style

The "San Francisco Chronicle" wrote that Gross's interviews are "a remarkable blend of empathy, warmth, genuine curiosity, and sharp intelligence." [cite web | title=Inside WBUR: Terry Gross | url=http://www.wbur.org/inside/personality/detail6527.asp | publisher=WBUR | date=3 June 2007 | accessdate=2008-01-17] Gross prides herself on preparation; prior to interviewing guests, she reads their books, watches their movies, and/or listens to their CDs. The "Boston Phoenix" opined that "Terry Gross…is almost certainly the best cultural interviewer in America, and one of the best all-around interviewers, period. Her smart, thoughtful questioning pushes her guests in unlikely directions. Her interviews are revelatory in a way other people's seldom are." On the other hand, in a famousFact|date=October 2008 essay, [http://www.centerforbookculture.org/context/no9/white.html] Dead link|date=August 2008 Illinois State University professor Curtis White criticizedFact|date=October 2008 Gross and her show as the "prime example" of a typeSpecify|date=October 2008 of rot in American culture and intellectual life.

Gross treats different guests differently, depending on a variety of factors. She is often more challenging with political figures than with people in the arts, who may be less prepared for such interviews and less prone to expressing themselves in canned "sound-bites."

Clashes with guests

Gross has drawn added public attention following some occasions when she has clashed with her guests, including these:

*A February 4 2002, interview with rock star Gene Simmons, who at one point said, "If you want to welcome me with open arms, I'm afraid you're also going to have to welcome me with open legs," to which Gross replied, "That's a really obnoxious thing to say." Unlike most "Fresh Air" guests, Simmons refused to grant permission for the interview to be made available online. However, the interview appears in "All I Did Was Ask", and unauthorized transcripts and audio of the complete original exist. [cite web | author=Terry Gross | url=http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=1137499 | title=Leader and Bassist of the Band Kiss, Gene Simmons| work=Fresh Air | publisher=NPR; WHYY | date=4 February 2002 | accessdate=2008-01-17] [cite interview | subject=Gene Simmons | interviewer=Terry Gross | type= | url=http://www.rof.net/wp/carriep/TERRYGRO.HTM | format=Transcript | program=Fresh Air | callsign=NPR; WHYY | date=4 February 2002 | accessdate=2008-01-17] [cite interview | subject=Gene Simmons | interviewer=Terry Gross | url=http://erim.net/archives/gene-simmons-and-terry-gross-interview | format=Audio | program=Fresh Air | callsign=NPR; WHYY | date=4 February 2002 | accessdate=2008-01-17]
*An October 8 2003, interview with Fox News television host Bill O'Reilly, who walked out of the interview because of what he considered her biased questions, creating a media controversy fed by the ongoing presidential campaign. Toward the end of the interview, O'Reilly asked Gross if she had been as tough on Al Franken, who had appeared on the program two weeks before O'Reilly, as she had been with O'Reilly. Gross responded, "No, I wasn't…we had a different interview." [cite interview | subject=Bill O'Reilly | interviewer=Terry Gross | url=http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=1459090 | format=Audio | program=Fresh Air | callsign=NPR; WHYY | date=8 October 2003 | accessdate=2008-01-17] Gross was later criticised by then NPR ombudsman Jeffrey Dvorkin for "an interview that was, in the end, unfair to O'Reilly." [cite web | author=Jeffrey A. Dvorkin | title=Gross vs. O'Reilly: Culture Clash on NPR | url=http://www.npr.org/yourturn/ombudsman/2003/031015.html | publisher=National Public Radio | date=15 October 2003 | accessdate=2008-01-17] Dvorkin described Gross's interviewing tactic of reading a critical quote of O'Reilly after he had walked out of the room as "unethical and unfair."cite interview | subject=Jeffrey A. Dvorkin | interviewer=Brooke Gladstone and Mike Pesca | url=http://www.onthemedia.org/transcripts/transcripts_062306_c.html | format=Audio/Transcript | program=On the Media | callsign=NPR; WNYC | date=23 June 2006| accessdate=2008-01-17] Gross was later supported by an NPR colleague, Mike Pesca, who contended that O'Reilly did, in fact, have the opportunity to respond to a criticism that Gross read to O'Reilly leveled by "People Magazine" but that he defaulted by prematurely abandoning the interview. On September 24, 2004, Gross and O'Reilly met again on O'Reilly's television show in which Gross assured O'Reilly "that no matter what you ask me, I'm staying for the entire interview." [cite interview | subject=Terry Gross | interviewer=Bill O'Reilly | url=http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,133177,00.html | format=TV | program=The O'Reilly Factor | callsign=Fox News | date=24 September 2003 | accessdate=2008-03-19]
*A February 9 2005, interview of Lynne Cheney, conservative author and wife of vice president Dick Cheney. The initial focus of the interview was on Cheney's latest history book, but Gross moved on to questions about Cheney's lesbian daughter Mary and her opinion of the Bush administration's opposition to gay marriage. [cite interview | subject=Lynne Cheney | interviewer=Terry Gross | url=http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=4492285 | format=Audio | program=Fresh Air | callsign=NPR; WHYY | date=9 February 2005 | accessdate=2008-01-17] Cheney declined to comment on her daughter's sexuality, but repeatedly stated her opposition to a constitutional amendment banning gay marriage, which was being endorsed by President Bush. Cheney declined to discuss the matter further. Later, when Gross brought the interview back to issues of gay rights, Cheney again refused to comment. According to producers, Cheney had been warned that she would be asked about politics and current events. [cite web | author=Jeffrey A. Dvorkin | title=A Week of Insults on NPR | url=http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=4500501 | publisher=NPR | date=15 February 2005| accessdate=2008-01-17]

Awards

*1981 Corporation for Public Broadcasting Award for "Best Live Radio Program,"
*1987 Ohio State Award
*1993 Peabody Award
*1999 The Foundation of American Women In Radio and Television's Gracie Allen Award
*2003 CPB Edward R. Murrow Award [cite press release | title=CPB Names Terry Gross 2003 Murrow Award Recipient | url=http://www.cpb.org/pressroom/release.php?prn=318 | publisher=Corporation for Public Broadcasting | date=16 May 2003 | accessdate=2008-01-17]
*2007 Literarian Award, National Book Foundation
*2008 WHYY National Book Foundation Literarian Award for Outstanding Service to the American Literary Community

Bibliography

*cite book | last=Gross | first=Terry | year=2004 | title=All I Did Was Ask: Conversations with Writers, Actors, Musicians, and Artists | location=New York | publisher=Hyperion | isbn=1401300103

Audio collections

*(1998) "Fresh Air: On Stage & Screen" (cassette)
*(2000) "Fresh Air on Stage and Screen Vol 2" (CD)
*(2004) "Fresh Air Laughs with Terry Gross [UNABRIDGED] " (CD)

References

External links

* [http://www.npr.org/about/people/bios/tgross.html NPR biography]
* [http://www.npr.org/rss/podcast/podcast_detail.php?siteId=7060034 Podcasts available at NPR.org]
* [http://freshair.npr.org/ Fresh Air from WHYY (Official Website)]
* [http://www.audible.com/freshair Fresh Air @ Audible.com]
* [http://www.publicradiofan.com/cgi-bin/program.pl?programid=17 Streaming audio schedule]
* Audio - [http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=1459090 October 8, 2003 interview with Bill O'Reilly]
* Audio - [http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=4492285 February 9, 2005 interview with Lynne Cheney]