Finding the Next Terry Gross with Daniel Oppenheimer

Summary

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The Gist – Finding the Next Terry Gross with Daniel Oppenheimer

Podcast: The Gist
Host: Mike Pesca (Peach Fish Productions)
Guest: Daniel Oppenheimer
Date: December 13, 2025

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Episode Overview

In this lively and thought-provoking episode, Mike Pesca sits down with writer and podcaster Daniel Oppenheimer to tackle the looming question: “Who should succeed Terry Gross as host of NPR’s Fresh Air?” The conversation delves into what sets a great interviewer apart, why not every celebrity or even every journalist is suited for the job, and whether the kind of authentic, searching interviews Gross pioneered can or should be replicated. Along the way, Pesca and Oppenheimer name potential successors, critique some notable podcast hosts, and offer sharp insights into the craft of interviewing itself. The episode is rich with behind-the-scenes radio knowledge, podcast industry dynamics, and candid, sometimes funny, self-assessments by Pesca about his own interviewing style and ambitions.

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Key Discussion Points and Insights

1. Why Terry Gross Is So Good (08:35–10:00)

• Universal Admiration & Unmatched Skill: Both host and guest agree Gross is the gold standard for interviewers, even calling criticism of her as eccentric as calling The Beatles overrated.
• “Her greatness sometimes gets in the way of the interview…” (09:32, Mike Pesca): Pesca notes that Gross’s reputation can sometimes overshadow her guests.
• Insider Stories: Pesca shares details from his time at NPR, such as being able to listen in on the raw, unedited Fresh Air interviews—offering unique insights into her process.

“She’ll ask many preambulatory questions. ‘Is okay if I ask this?’... She taught me a lot about interviewing, and a lot about when I do the kind of interview I do where things can be cut. It’s a very specific kind of interview.” (10:30, Mike Pesca)

2. What Makes a Great Interviewer? (13:10–14:34)

• Emphasis on letting the guest reveal themselves rather than centering the host.
• Contrast drawn between journalists and celebrities as hosts: Journalists (especially those experienced in print) bring an investigative rigor, whereas many celebrity podcasts offer style over substance.

“Their job is professional interviewer. Not guy who starred in Arrested Development who also knows a bunch of people who can be interviewed.” (12:50, Mike Pesca)

• On Ross Douthat’s Interviewing: Pesca and Oppenheimer discuss Douthat’s standout episode with Curtis Yarvin, praising Douthat for letting Yarvin "have enough rope" to reveal his own flaws (14:06–14:43).

3. The Art of the Interview: Preparation and Authenticity (15:45–19:44)

• The Magic Behind Terry: Gross’s method is characterized by preparing deeply and constructing the interview in real time—many threads are tested and ruthlessly edited.

“You come away with every chunk—even the ones that don’t work—were given the best chance... and could be incorporated into the rest of the interview.” (17:44, Mike Pesca)

• Preparation vs. Performativity: Comparisons are drawn with podcasts like those by Sam Sanders and Sam Fragoso, with Pesca and Oppenheimer critiquing "performative" styles that lack authentic engagement.
• Marc Maron: Praised by Pesca for his preparation (contrary to popular belief), particularly with guests he's interested in.

4. Who Should Succeed Terry Gross? Pesca’s Shortlist (19:46–33:42)

American Hosts

• Colin McEnroe (WNPR Hartford): Pesca calls him the current best daily radio host (19:46).
• Sam Sanders: Noted for his cultural fluency and personal style, though Pesca finds his presentation somewhat “calculated” (20:42).
• Margaret Brennan (Face the Nation): Praised for her pointed, non-performative questioning (22:44).
• Sam Fragoso: A self-referential interviewer with “transferable skills” but maybe too introspective for Fresh Air (23:23).
• David Marchese (NYT Culture): Excellent print interviewer, capable on audio; known for deep preparation, even if some interviews (Vince Vaughn) were controversial (28:46–29:29).
• Elvis Mitchell (The Treatment): Renowned for insightful, mind-blowing questions (30:10–31:05).

  “At one point, Dave Chappelle kind of breaks character...and says, ‘Elvis Mitchell, you just blew my mind.’” (31:05, Mike Pesca)

• Mike Birbiglia: Stand-up comedian and director noted for thoughtful conversations with comedians that go beyond the usual "craft talk" (31:43–32:53).

Non-Americans

• Helen Lewis: British journalist and podcaster, called a “great talker and a great writer,” especially on political language (33:16–33:42).
• John Ronson: British journalist and documentarian with a distinctive, honest approach—“a little off-kilter” but capable of extracting candor from unusual guests (33:43–34:43).

5. The Celebrity Host Problem (12:19–13:10)

• Strong distaste for minimally-prepared, celebrity-hosted podcasts, exemplified by SmartLess:

"They're terrible... Their shtick is they don't prepare, but... it’s not so spontaneously delightful that it gets over that gigantic flaw.” (12:19, Mike Pesca)

6. The Pros and Cons of Pesca as Host (34:55–38:12)

• Strengths: Good listening, real-time engagement, ability to elicit genuinely new responses.
• Weaknesses: May take the interview into niche territory that’s less accessible for the general Fresh Air audience (41:18–41:24).

“If I bring the Fresh Air audience an interview with the director of the Amanda Knox story and we spend 15 minutes on FOIA...I don't know how many people will [enjoy that].” (41:18, Mike Pesca)

• He admits his tastes might be “self-limiting” but believes in differentiating with depth rather than formula.

7. Balancing Audience Needs with Interviewer Curiosity (37:54–42:22)

• The challenge of not boring yourself as an interviewer vs. serving a mass audience who want familiar content.

“I struggle with that in my own interviewing because I'm just so easily bored... but that's not most listeners.” (38:12, Daniel Oppenheimer)

• Recognition that interviewers can serve as audience proxies but must balance novelty with the need to provide some expected context.

8. Memorable Interview Experiences & Self-Critique (42:40–44:30)

• Pesca shares highlights where high-profile or resistant guests opened up (“interviewers’ thrill”).
• Critiques the sometimes limited inquiry on the political side of Fresh Air (“A+” for culture, “B+” for hard news).

“I might give an A minus to B plus to when she gets on a New Yorker writer...I don't think...she doesn’t push back.” (43:51, Mike Pesca)

9. Meeting Terry Gross and Final Reflections (44:30–46:54)

• Pesca shares his embarrassment after asking Gross to have him on Fresh Air (“I felt really embarrassed afterwards.”) (44:31)
• Reflects on career hopes and the reality of being an everyday podcaster.
• Pesca’s final picks for a sudden vacancy: “I'd call Colin [McEnroe]... and if it was Hail Mary...Helen [Lewis] or John [Ronson]” (46:31).

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Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• On the value of in-depth preparation:
  “She is so good. And I do, by the way, think her current co-host is not nearly as good. I will say generously and maybe leave it at that...” (08:35, Mike Pesca)

• On letting guests speak for themselves:
  “It wasn’t about Ross saying, ‘Here, let me tell you my thoughts.’ It was about Ross letting Yarvin very much tell the audience who he really is. That’s one of the main things you want an interviewer to do.” (14:10, Mike Pesca)

• On listener expectations and interview innovation:
  “On Fresh air, the idea is this is your first listen. Most of our listeners over the air, half of them have never listened to a podcast...They listen to Fresh Air to hear an interview about Amanda Knox, and that is the one interview they’re gonna hear.” (41:24, Mike Pesca)

• On interviewing itself:
  “Listening to all the other interviews they’ve given and knowing what they’re going to say...you’re not looking to poke a hole, but you’re looking to ask the follow up question that none of those hosts did ask...” (36:49, Mike Pesca)

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Timestamps for Important Segments

• [08:13] – Kickoff: “Who should be Terry Gross’s successor?”
• [10:30] – Peek behind the scenes of Gross’s interviewing process.
• [12:19] – Critique of celebrity-hosted podcasts.
• [14:10] – Why letting the guest lead matters.
• [15:45] – Lessons from uncut Fresh Air interviews.
• [19:46] – Pesca’s shortlist: American candidates.
• [22:44] – Network TV interviewers: strengths and weaknesses.
• [28:46] – Print journalists as interviewers: The David Marchese example.
• [30:10] – Why Elvis Mitchell stands out.
• [33:16] – Helen Lewis and John Ronson as “wildcard” successors.
• [34:55] – Pesca’s self-assessment.
• [38:12] – Serving the audience vs. innovation.
• [41:18] – The niche vs. mass appeal challenge.
• [44:31] – The awkwardness of meeting Terry Gross.
• [46:31] – Final picks: who should step in “tomorrow.”

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Conclusion

This episode offers a candid, nuanced, and often witty examination of what it takes to be a great interviewer—and a fitting successor to Terry Gross. Pesca’s shortlist ranges from old-school American radio hosts to British intellectuals, but throughout, he keeps the focus on authenticity, deep preparation, and a genuine curiosity about the guest over showmanship or celebrity. The episode is essential listening or reading for podcast fans and aspiring interviewers, blending industry wisdom, personal anecdotes, and critical takes on today’s audio culture.

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Transcript

[Mike Pesca]

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[Daniel Oppenheimer]

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[Mike Pesca]

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[Mike Pesca]

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[Daniel Oppenheimer]

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[Mike Pesca]

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[Daniel Oppenheimer]

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[Mike Pesca]

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[Mike Pesca]

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[Daniel Oppenheimer]

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[Mike Pesca]

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[Daniel Oppenheimer]

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[Mike Pesca]

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[Daniel Oppenheimer]

Mike Pesca welcome to Eminent Americans. You're hereby anointed an Eminent American by the power vested in me by the city of New York, where I lived for five years before. Like everybody else who lives in New York when they're in their 20s, I.

[Mike Pesca]

Count the glance of the virtual sword on each shoulder. I assumed I felt it when you said it. I felt it touching. So thank you.

[Daniel Oppenheimer]

So I asked you on to talk about who should be the successor to Terry Gross on Fresh air. I'm curious, when I asked you that or to the extent you've thought about it at all, what direction did it push you? Was it who should be next? Was it what's interesting about Terry? Was it something about npr? I've gotten all kinds of different visceral responses to the question.

[Mike Pesca]

Yeah. So first of all, I love Terry Gross and I love FRESH air. I think when you said it, you didn't have the pause. She's great. It's not perhaps a bold statement to make, but these days when you say the obvious conventional wisdom, maybe with slightly more conviction, and no, you're not going to get any credit for it. Maybe there is credit. She is so good. And I do, by the way, think her current co host is not nearly as good. I will say generously and maybe leave it at that, unless you want to get into it.

[Daniel Oppenheimer]

She's just high level NPR generic. That's my sense of her, which is like nothing particularly distinctive. She's a pro. But like if the goal in imagining a successor is that the person b in Terry's league in one way or another, a distinctive presence in our sort of cultural landscape, she just doesn't meet that bar. She's perfectly fine as, as is Dave Davies, who is, you know, the longtime occasional substitute host. But she's no, she's no Mike Pesca. She's no Mark Oppenheimer.

[Mike Pesca]

I think I think Dave Davies is pretty good. And his sports interviews for that, which is what I did for a long time for npr, are well pitched to the NPR audience who might not know sports. But he also and this is one, one of the two things I always tried to do was talk to an audience who doesn't know sports, which are most people. But also if a sports person were listening, they wouldn't feel insulted. They wouldn't feel held by the hand. They'd get a lot out of it. So compliments to Dave. I think he does a good job. And they have a great staff and like the average age of or the average tenure of the staff is probably a quarter of a decade by now. So they do, they do coach up and also edit so that anyone, everyone will sound pretty good but this is, you're right, tough shoes to fill. A friend of mine from high school was a guy named. Still is a guy named Jay Fiedler, and he was the successor to Dan Marino as quarterback for the Miami Dolphins. So, like, it's not as impossible a job as that. And you probably take a few, a few fewer headshots as host of Fresh Air. Fresh Air. But yeah, it's a tough one. So Terry's great. You know, her greatness sometimes gets in the way of the interview. So I'll tell you a little behind the scenes tidbit. I worked out of the NPR bureau for eight years maybe, and there was a dial on the desk such that you could listen to what was going on in all the studios. So Terry Gross would get people in and I would listen to the Raw interview. And sometimes I would do that just because, oh, I love this guest. I want to hear what Steve Martin has to say and I want to hear all of it. Sometimes I did it just, oh, why not pick up some tricks from Terry Gross? And so I did. And she, she taught me a lot about interviewing and a lot about when I do the kind of interview I do where, you know, things can be cut. It's a very specific kind of interview. And the skill set really does allow you to. A lot of interviews are taped, but they're. The ideal is live to tape. And so when you watch a late night talk show, which are, I guess, aren't trying to be some great interviews, they really want to do it live to tape. Terry does not want to do it live to tape. And she'll ask many preambulatory questions. Is okay if I asked this? Is it okay if I asked this this way? You know what, let's go back and redo that. And so I don't do that as much, but it was an education learning that. So, yeah, Terry is great. And what I thought about is whoever we think should be the replacement, it's very important they not be famous outside the world of interviewing. I'm very, I get very upset when I look at the Spotify and iTunes charts and it's a bunch of people who are given credit for hosting good talk shows. And maybe they do. I'm going to try to think of a celebrity. You know what I think? Julia Louis Dreyfus, I was going to.

[Daniel Oppenheimer]

Say, let's just, let's just name names because I'm not as, I mean, I'm thinking if I know, does Alec Baldwin, he had a podcast, maybe still does. He was good.

[Mike Pesca]

Yeah. I mean, he's still going.

[Daniel Oppenheimer]

Smart list, guys.

[Mike Pesca]

Here's the thing. So they're terrible. I mean, I will say it. They're never going to invite me on the show. And I kind of love them all. In acting or even a personality standpoint, that show is terrible to me. And I know you could say, well, the shtick is they don't prepare, but okay, as an audience member just listening to a show where the hosts are unprepared and it's not so spontaneously delightful that it gets over that gigantic flaw in the middle of the show. So, yes, that to me is the epitome of the talk show hosted by a celebrity, where maybe the celebrity brings a Rolodex. Certainly does, but nothing else. So I think we need to reclaim the idea of this person who is hosting one of the most listened to interview shows. Their job is professional interviewer. Not guy who started Arrested Development, who also knows a bunch of people who can be interviewed.

[Daniel Oppenheimer]

Where would you cut that? Because when I was talking to Mark earlier, you know, the person we ended up talking about a fair amount as a potential successor was Ross Douthat. So Ross is not a professional interviewer in the sense that you are. Nor is he, you know, Jason Bateman or something like that. I mean, he's in that kind. He's a journalist. Right. So he's done a lot of interviewing. He's not a radio audio native. Guy, like, does he. Is that type of person acceptable?

[Mike Pesca]

Oh, yes. I'm talking about the literal celebrity, the actor, the comedian, the person who probably hasn't thought about the craft of interviewing journalists. And a few on my list will be journalists. They come to it with a great skill set when it comes to eliciting information. So print journalists are ideal. I'm glad you talked about Ross. It's an interesting show.

[Daniel Oppenheimer]

You mean his, what's it called? Interesting Times. Right?

[Mike Pesca]

Yeah.

[Daniel Oppenheimer]

I don't think it's quite found its groove yet. It's new.

[Mike Pesca]

Yeah. But his Curtis Yarvin was great. Greatest contribution to the Curtis Yarvin oeuvre.

[Daniel Oppenheimer]

I agree. Why do you? I have my reason for why it was great. But tell me why you think it was great.

[Mike Pesca]

Because it wasn't about Ross saying, here, let me tell you my thoughts. It was about Ross letting Yarvin very much tell the audience who he really is. That's one of the main things you want an interviewer to do.

[Daniel Oppenheimer]

Yeah.

[Mike Pesca]

So we learn from the guest in a way we wouldn't have, either by explicit questions or construction of the interview or where you lead them, the interviewee reveals themselves.

[Daniel Oppenheimer]

I agree. And I'm not sure if you drew this further sort of significance from it. I thought he did that and essentially it was giving him enough rope to hang himself.

[Mike Pesca]

That was what it was.

[Daniel Oppenheimer]

Okay. Not that that was necessarily Ross's intention, but it was just. I got to the end of that and I was like, this is the fucking guy who we have been so upset about. Like, this guy's a fool. Like, this guy is a kind of lightweight who hasn't really thought through all of his premises, who hasn't faced enough criticism. But that. That all happened by Ross, just kind of, as you said, just like letting him go. Right. And like laying the table for him.

[Mike Pesca]

And I think. I think Curtis is a particularly unimpressive arguer and interviewer, and I've seen him in debates, so that's going to happen. And I bet Ross's plan was to allow that to happen now when he interviews Peter Thiel. And if you and Mark talked about Ross extensively and he wasn't on my list as someone who would fit into the Fresh Air slot. Peter Thiel smarter and comes across better in interviews, but a version of that, at least we now understand who Peter Thiel is and we understand that his priorities do not match the priorities or worldview of us. 90 something percent of us, I think, thanks to Ross. Yeah.

[Daniel Oppenheimer]

So you listen to the sort of uncut Terry Gross interviews, and is it like an hour and a half or 45 minutes or something like that?

[Mike Pesca]

Yes.

[Daniel Oppenheimer]

What strikes you, looking back on that, that somebody who just listened to the polished, edited version just simply wouldn't either wouldn't know about Terry or just wouldn't understand about the craft of her interviewing.

[Mike Pesca]

Lots of avenues that she might have foreseen only have a 40% chance of success. So I don't think she's taken wild, deep shots. Right. Hail Marys, but very much. You could see that she was constructing the interview. Let's see where this goes. Let's see where that goes. And when it doesn't go anywhere, it's not that big a deal. Also, every once in a while, an interview will air where the raw one was long and not bad.

[Daniel Oppenheimer]

Yeah.

[Mike Pesca]

In fact, pretty good. I remember there was a Drew Barrymore interview, and so much of it was Drew Barrymore just being so effusive in her praise with Terry Gross. She seemed very like a very nice person who is very happy to be talking to Terry Gross. And that all went away. And I don't know what remained and this wasn't a Drew Barrymore look back on her life. She was talking about a specific project. But it was one of those half interviews that was paired with another half interview when it finally aired. So they add it pretty ruthlessly. Another very important thing to know, which wouldn't surprise you, but that's how it goes.

[Daniel Oppenheimer]

Is there a way in which Terry, I mean, somebody who achieves that level of success and has that kind of discipline, I take it as a given that there's a kind of iron core of maybe ambition is the wrong word, but there's an iron core of sort of command and decisiveness or something like that. And I'm wondering if that's evident in the sort of. In the uncut version or if in fact, even in all of these interactions when she's sort of controlling the interview, she's just such an adept of kind of, you know, softly engaging with people that you don't. That doesn't come through.

[Mike Pesca]

Right. So what you don't get is helter skelter approach where maybe some good drips and drabs can be cobbled together. You definitely don't come away with this. You come away with every chunk. Even the ones that don't work were given the best chance to work stand up on their own, could be incorporated into the rest of the interview. And I don't know if there's. Oh, she's very. By the way, she's like a 411 Jewish woman from Brooklyn. So as far as I can tell, the actuarial table say they live to be about 115. These are the most resilient people on Earth.

[Daniel Oppenheimer]

She's got 30 years left on her run.

[Mike Pesca]

Yeah. These are the people that will be returning a somewhat stale babka well into their 90s.

[Daniel Oppenheimer]

Right.

[Mike Pesca]

So I think she. She may be in that chair for a long time. I don't know that you can make the case. Well, if we had to run the experiment 20 times, would Terry Gross achieve these levels of stardom? I think that there are many things that have to go right. And I think what she is is a very competent, very intelligent person who grew into the job. Who knows a couple of has a couple of north stars and big ones are be unbelievably familiar with the text. So she reads everything and sees everything and it comes across. And by the way, you know who's a pretty good interviewer who always does that and isn't in my nomination list, but he's leaving the world of podcasts is Marc Maron. Marc Maron always engages with the subject, have critiques of him, which is especially when he talks to other comics, brings it around himself. There's a lot of soothing of the Marc Maron ego that must go on. But compliments to that.

[Daniel Oppenheimer]

But I thought Marin was notoriously unprepared. Doesn't he sometimes just kind of like riff through the Wikipedia page in real time?

[Mike Pesca]

I have heard him almost always talk about the project that the person is reading or promoting and then other projects. I went. I guess it depends on his level of interest. But I've heard him go back and talk about past projects that bigger name guests are ones that he's interested in. I do generally give him compliments for that.

[Daniel Oppenheimer]

Let's get to your list. Let's see what you got.

[Mike Pesca]

All right, so I think the best, the guy who runs the best daily radio show in America is a guy named Colin McEnroe, WNPR at Hartford, Connecticut. He's in his 60s, I think, but his shows are great. Now, a daily show, a daily calling show is a different skill set. But Sam Sanders is someone in the NPR universe who I know they like.

[Daniel Oppenheimer]

They don't know who that is. Who is that?

[Mike Pesca]

Sam hosted a show called I think It's Been a Minute, which still exists. And then he went to host a culture show from Vulture. The economics of that weren't good. And now he still hosts a show. He's an npr, likes us. He's a gay black man. He's very personable. He knows culture well, younger culture. So I would say that if they were to tap someone, it would not surprise me at all if he would be on the list.

[Daniel Oppenheimer]

Does he have like, whatever it is Terry has, Does he have some version of that, that magic?

[Mike Pesca]

I like Sam very much personally, and he's very smart and very skilled and has skills that a lot of other people don't. To me, a lot of his presentation comes across as a little, I don't want to say affected, but calculated. And I can kind of hear the seems. He'll do a reaction. He'll vocalize a reaction that I don't in a Michael Barbara way. Who's that, by the way? I think. Great interviewer.

[Daniel Oppenheimer]

Oh, I forgot about Dan.

[Mike Pesca]

I think that. I think the shtick is quite apparent now. And I don't think Terry does that.

[Daniel Oppenheimer]

I was thinking about that. Mark and I were talking about, do you know this guy Sam Fragoso, who has a podcast on 6th on my list? Okay. You know, and I have very mixed feelings about him, but I was listening to one he did with Seth Rogen. And I say mixed feelings because. And some of it may be growing into the role. Sometimes it was like there was that performative quality. Because the thing about Terry is, and who knows, maybe if I listen to like deep cut, old school Terry, you would notice this. Like it always feels totally authentic. It never feels performative in that way. And I think that's, that's just key to good audio. Right. Is not feeling like you. You're too aware of how the thing that you're about to do may come across to your listeners or something like that.

[Mike Pesca]

I mean, key to good audio is you and I listen to it or define it. But look at the list. Look at what is, what are the popular talk shows. And I'm not even talking about shows that are just meant to be funny. Shows that where the host would say, what I want to do is just what you said. I want to get to the deep truths of the guest. And there's so much clearer performativity.

[Daniel Oppenheimer]

Yes. But we don't respect that, you and.

[Mike Pesca]

I. I think it's good for entertainment value. It's not going to get you to replace Terry Gross.

[Daniel Oppenheimer]

So Sam Sanders, Colin McEnroe, who's three.

[Mike Pesca]

I know this isn't ranked in order of anything, but I just wanted to say this is someone who would not do the job because she's not mostly culture. But of the big time network TV questioners, I think Margaret Brennan is the best.

[Daniel Oppenheimer]

I don't even know who that is. I'm so out of the loop.

[Mike Pesca]

Host of Face the Nation Prepared comes across well as pointed questions, is not so performative as if I may critique Kristen Welker who always have the same question. But will you rule it out? But will you rule it out? I mean, it's just like trying to engage in a meaningless political gotcha. And you know, I think that, I think that most of the people who host the Sunday shows do a fairly decent job. I used to think Chris Wallace was very good.

[Daniel Oppenheimer]

I never liked Tim Russert. I always felt there was some version of that. It just actually wasn't that interesting. It was just you said this and now you're saying the opposite. And I'm going to show you the clip. I don't know. I know people love Tim Russert. I, I never, I never got to.

[Mike Pesca]

Get a lot of. He was highly lauded for just reading the person's words back to them. So we said Sam Frozo, who I just put out there because he is a person who he has a background, I think doing documentary films. But if the ideal is someone who is a professional interviewer, he is doing it. I think the skills would be transferable. I think it's a little too. I think his interviews are a little too moist, self referential. You always know what Sam Fragoso means. I think the. The demands of just the media today are he got into it with David Mamet and all the incentives are to do it. But my ideal is back with quote unquote the rest of my conversation with someone like that. You want him. You'd want the guests to just kill themselves more projects.

[Daniel Oppenheimer]

Guys, thanks for helping me carry my Christmas tree.

[Mike Pesca]

Zoe, this thing weighs a ton.

[Daniel Oppenheimer]

Drew Ski.

[Mike Pesca]

Live with your legs, man.

[Daniel Oppenheimer]

Santa.

[Mike Pesca]

Santa, did you get my letter? He's talking to you, Bridges. I'm not.

[Daniel Oppenheimer]

Of course he did.

[Mike Pesca]

Right, Santa, you know my elf Drew Ski here, he handles the nice list. An elf. I'm six three. What everyone wants is iPhone six and at T Mobile. You can get it on them. That center stage front camera is amazing for group selfies. Right, Mrs. Claus?

[Daniel Oppenheimer]

I'm Mrs. Claus's much younger sister. And AT T mobile there's no trade in needed when you switch. So you can keep your old phone or give it as a gift. And the best part, you can make the switch to T mobile from your phone in just 15 minutes.

[Mike Pesca]

Guys, my side of the tree is slipping.

[Daniel Oppenheimer]

Kimber, the holidays are better.

[Mike Pesca]

AT T Mobile switch in just 15 minutes and get iPhone 7 on us with no trade in needed. And now T mobile is available in U S cellular stores with 24 month bill credits for well qualified customers plus tax and $35 device connection charge credit and imbalance due if you pay off earlier. Cancel Finance Agreement 256Gates830 eligible for it in a new line 100 plus a month plan with auto pay plus taxes fees required. Check out 15 minutes or less per line. Visit t mobile.com AI agents are everywhere. Automating tasks and making decisions at machine speed. But agents make mistakes. Just one rogue agent can do big damage before you even notice. Rubrik Agent cloud is the only platform that helps you monitor agents, set guardrails and rewind mistakes so you can unleash agents, not risk. Accelerate your AI [e-mail] that's R U B R I K.com we rejoin now me talking to Daniel Oppenheimer. The full show and this is part two of his Terry Gross project. The full show has this Part two of the Terry Gross project has his brother Mark, who's a great, smart guy, has Jesse Adams, who writes as the Ivy Exile. He has been a past guest on Not Even Mad. And part one of this.

[Daniel Oppenheimer]

You should go.

[Mike Pesca]

You should check it out. Has Jason Thurkill and a couple of women who have been on this show. And I have enormous respect for Sarah Heppala and Megan down, great interviewers, both talking about Terry Gris.

[Daniel Oppenheimer]

Have you ever had a Gene Simmons or a. What, the famous kind of radio.

[Mike Pesca]

The walkout.

[Daniel Oppenheimer]

Walkout. Or just if not a walkout, a conversation that got hostile, sort of emotionally hostile?

[Mike Pesca]

Yes, I mean, I've done a few. I recently did one with a documentarian who did a podcast called Camp Shame about a fat camp called Camp Shane. And I gave it enough room for her to talk about what I liked about the podcast, which was it was a really interesting story of a fat camp, which is a real thing and a very poorly run fat camp. But then in the. And I'm sorry if I'm saying fat camp in your audience, like, why did they say fat camp? Because that's what the camps call themselves.

[Daniel Oppenheimer]

Yeah.

[Mike Pesca]

But then we got into kind of a proxy debate about the ideology, which is a rigid ideology of the fat acceptance movement. And also, I think, you know, a really inaccurate one in the Maha truthiness. Non. Grounded in scientific reality.

[Daniel Oppenheimer]

You mean they would say things like, there's no such thing as an unhealthy weight or. Yeah, that kind of thing. Yeah.

[Mike Pesca]

Yeah. And she was citing some statistics about the health of sumo wrestlers. And I came back with her with Sumo wrestlers do die 20 years earlier. And it was tense and my audience was a little bit split. Whenever I do it with a female guest, there's some portion of the audience who doesn't like me, quote, unquote, beating up on a woman. So that was the. That was the most contentious.

[Daniel Oppenheimer]

Did you feel like you handled it well in retrospect?

[Mike Pesca]

Yeah, I was really. I was really proud of that because I thought that I made all my points. And it's not that I don't care if the audience quote, unquote likes me, but it's a consideration way down the line. I know that if I present myself in a way that it's quote unquote, un quote unquote, quote unquote unlikable, I've done something wrong.

[Daniel Oppenheimer]

Yeah, but did she know you were going to be opposite, somewhat oppositional?

[Mike Pesca]

No, she did not. But I told her in the beginning, I'm like, look, I really like it, but I do want to get into. Shouldn't know how much I would want to get into some of the ideology behind the fat acceptance movement. And so she wasn't ready for a debate. I mean that when the interview started and before it rolled, I told her that, but we didn't book it with that in mind. But I still think she. She probably thought she came across well because she said things she believed in a way that wasn't edited. There were no traps in there.

[Daniel Oppenheimer]

You have more people on your list?

[Mike Pesca]

I have a couple more Americans. David, Mara, Casey.

[Daniel Oppenheimer]

Oh, yeah. Oh yeah.

[Mike Pesca]

New York Times culture. He did an interview. He did. The Cameron Crowe one is up. It's really good. All of his interviews are, I think, really good.

[Daniel Oppenheimer]

The print interviews that they run in the magazine, which obviously highly edited down, are great. And he's obviously amazing at that. I haven't listened to enough of the, the audio, the actual podcast versions of him to know how good he is or isn't at that.

[Mike Pesca]

He is good. He does his research. He did one with Vince Vaughn. Do you remember this? Where it took place over several iterations.

[Daniel Oppenheimer]

And he never got Vaughn to lock in, did he? Like that? Wasn't that a weird one? I'm trying to remember. That was a very.

[Mike Pesca]

He was criticized, I think from a journalistic standard, but I thought it was interesting. He revealed of himself some, I don't know, deaths of friends of his and people, I think criticized. I might be getting the criticism wrong, but it was something about how he was manipulative or he came out swinging with Vaughn, maybe a little like the David Mamet one. I can't interview Vince Vaughn without holding him to task about being a Trump guy, if that's indeed what he is. And Vince Vaughn didn't quite take the bait, but I think he's a good interviewer. The last two American ones are. I don't know and I haven't listened to the treatment in a while, but I always thought Elvis Mitchell did such a good job. Did you listen to that show?

[Daniel Oppenheimer]

I mean, I've read Mitchell, you know, when he was the film critic for the Times. I'm trying to think if I ever listened to the show, was it just an interview show?

[Mike Pesca]

Yeah, it was, I think out of kcrw. And after he was bounced from the Times critic spot, that became his full time job. But also he was a consultant with some of the studios. I just thought he has great questions. At one point he did a great Ron Howard interview and at one point he interviewed. He did a couple of good interviews with. He did great interview with Chris Rock did a great interview with Dave Chappelle. At one point, Dave Chappelle kind of breaks character, just breaks fourth wall and say, elvis Mitchell, you just blew my mind. It was great. I told Elvis would also come into the NPR studio. And I said, you should do a promo where you just cut together people saying Elvis. That was a great question because they say that all the time. They said it to Terry too, but she would cut it out.

[Daniel Oppenheimer]

Yeah.

[Mike Pesca]

The other one is Mike Birbiglia does an interview with comedians, which a lot of people do with Mike Pesca does. I do an interview show called Funny you should mention. And my point there is to try to talk to comedians who are making a point. You know, comedians as the new philosophers or comedians as an Op Ed page, kind of, you know, talk to them as one would an op ed writer. So Roy Wood Jr. Was good at that. Other guys like TJ Miller, very hard to pin down, like pinning down a cloud. So he's not going to essentially buy into my thesis. But I told Mike and you know, he's going to come on the show and we've talked about this format. I'm like, you do it best.

[Daniel Oppenheimer]

What is it he's doing? Are they talking craft? What are they doing?

[Mike Pesca]

What's everything? Sometimes he has a personal relationship with them, sometimes they talk. He talks about how to punch up a joke. He talks about how to make your Persona come through more. It is notable that I think it was last year of the three or four shows nominated for. For Emmy Awards in standup, so one person shows that went on to be considered more than just standup comedy, but qualified for this. He directed three out of four of them. He directed Alex Edelman's show that won the Tony. He directed. Yeah. He directs most of the really great stand up specials.

[Daniel Oppenheimer]

Yeah.

[Mike Pesca]

And his own one man show. One man shows are great and he understands that really well. He also directs and writes narrative film and he's working on a really interesting one now. He worked on one about when he was an improviser called. It was with Keegan, Michael Key and Chris Gethard was in it. That was a great one. I think he would do well talking to all manner of cultural people, but I definitely know with comedy he's great.

[Daniel Oppenheimer]

And you have some non Americans, I'm assuming you have non Americans.

[Mike Pesca]

Yeah, I think Helen Lewis. Do you know Helen Lewis?

[Daniel Oppenheimer]

Is she the one? There's two Helens. There's like Pluckrose and Lewis. Is she the one who writes for the Atlantic? Sometimes she does.

[Mike Pesca]

There's also Shaw, who writes for the New York Times.

[Daniel Oppenheimer]

There's the Helens. There's the Jonathan's shade height. There's some other Jonathan's too. There's the, I guess there's the Helens too. Yeah. This is Helen Lewis. Okay. Yeah. Does she do, does she have a podcast or does she do.

[Mike Pesca]

She has a great podcast with Armando Iannucci. Oh, where they talk about, it's a BBC show, I gotta say. She carries them and they talk about political language. And she's such a great talker and a great writer and a great thinker. And sometimes she comes in and co hosts a show I love with two friends of mine named Blocked and reported. Oh, yeah, and she's the best. She's the best co host of that show. She'd be great.

[Daniel Oppenheimer]

That's interesting. I have to listen to her.

[Mike Pesca]

And here is my, here's my dark horse. That would be very polarizing. John Ronson.

[Daniel Oppenheimer]

Yeah, I just know him as a guest on some of the, like he's on Fifth Column sometimes. I think he's been, I mean, he's done the circuit as a guest. He's charming.

[Mike Pesca]

Yeah. He's done a few BBC series. He's done a two part, it's two seasons of a show called Things Fell Apart, just kind of about cultural pressures and how crazy we went in 2020 and things like that. But he's really good at asking questions and getting things out of people and getting radical jailed leaders of separatist movements to be honest with him, but also talking to cultural people. He's, you know, he's a little off kilter. He's a little, he talks in a way that's not just English but a little bit slow. But that would be an interesting experiment. I don't know if the answer is he should replace Terry Gross. I know the answer is I'd like to hear him host a talk show.

[Daniel Oppenheimer]

So my last set of questions is, and I want you to do an honest self assessment here, an honest audit of your own strengths and weaknesses. What are the pros and cons of Mike Pesca as the successor to Terry Gross on Fresh Air?

[Mike Pesca]

Oh, there are just way too many cons. Pros are. I, I think I would routinely every show ask a question or get an answer even more importantly that hadn't been answered before. And I am, and I am a good listener and in the moment, which is the most important skill and will ask the question based on what the guest just said, not based on what I'm going to, you know, have to get to on my list something the.

[Daniel Oppenheimer]

Guest hadn't said before, which is in a sense the Holy Grail. I'm not sure if that's the right word, but I've thought about this a lot whenever I'm interviewing, and I'm pretty new to this, whenever I'm interviewing someone who's done a lot of these or if, you know they're doing the circuit cause they have a book out. I'm sure you're haunted by this too, which is, you know, if you do some homework and you listen to some other interviews, you know, we all ask them the same questions, right? And if they're experienced, they often kind of have a automatic thing they go into. It's charming. They have their good, well constructed answers and anecdotes and things like that. And so that challenge of like getting somebody to say something that they've never said before. I remember when Maron interviewed, there was a real drama to it in a sense, when he interviewed Bruce Springsteen. My experience of it as a listener was Marin. And I think he was really good at this was like coming at him from all these different angles to try and get him out of the. Bruce Springsteen's been interviewed so many times and he's for good reason, so protected and so careful. And it was like. And I think he did, and you.

[Mike Pesca]

Know, at the drop of the hat, he could give a minute, 15 minute soliloquy that could slot right into the bridge of Kitty's back or whatever, right?

[Daniel Oppenheimer]

So like. And I think he did, I think he got him out of that. But I've thought about that. Like, what is the. When you say, you know, that you would get that out of somebody, is it just the listening? Is it just the listening to what they're saying and looking for opportunities or sort of pockets of energy or tension, is that, Is that the trick? What's the. Is it prep? I don't know.

[Mike Pesca]

Those are the two things. And listening to all the other interviews they've given and knowing what they're going to say and even said I've heard in other interviews, you say, and then as a listener, as a critical thinker, you're not looking to poke a hole, but you're looking to ask the follow up question that none of those hosts did ask or whatever is implied. And then if you just listen to what they say and they lead you down a certain path and you ask questions based on that, you get good stuff. This derails the direction of an interview. So if you're hosting an NPR show and you have. Even if it's not a live interview, that's its own thing. Even if ideally you're doing an interview that'll air in three days and you know you have a seven minute slot, you don't want to do that. You definitely don't want to do that too early because you'll screw up the entire production team. And seven minutes really isn't so much that you're going to be able to go down these unexplored byways and mine some gold.

[Daniel Oppenheimer]

So, yeah, and I think even with whatever it was, the 40 minutes that, that Terry had for Fresh Air, there's like probably like 33 minutes of that. That kind of has to be in there. Right.

[Mike Pesca]

If you're interviewing, that's the other thing. When you and I say we want to get something new, like, is that selfish? Or how much are we serving the audience? Will the audience have heard three minutes with this person? I mean, there's a reason why it's the five W's and the who, what, when and where, and you don't want to be the most cliched and maybe the bed. This is the argument.

[Daniel Oppenheimer]

I struggle with that in my own interviewing because I'm just so easily bored and I just don't want to listen to somebody talk about something that I've heard them say in other interviews or that I know that I'm going to say. And so then I'm doing a disservice to the listener because 99% of them don't have in their head the kind of battery of answers that that person gives. And I mean, even to the point of like, you know, I don't want them to tell me about a book that I've already read. Right. That they wrote. It's like, well, I already know what the book is about.

[Mike Pesca]

Yes, but you're a proxy for the audience. You have to be.

[Daniel Oppenheimer]

Yeah, right, but I, but I, it's tough because I sort of vacillate and there's probably some relatively happy medium. It's like, on the one hand, I don't want to, I don't want to bore myself and I probably, the audience probably suffers for that. On the other hand, there's a lot of people like us who listen to a lot of these things and know a lot of stuff like that. And what that means is, like, there's a lot of podcasts that just bore the shit out of me because I know, I already know. Like, I know what, that I know what you're going to ask I know what that person's going to say. And like 85% of this interview, like, I don't need to listen to because it. And so for me, that particular kind of consumer, they're doing a disservice to me because they're. I just don't want to listen to that stuff. I know already, but that's not most listeners.

[Mike Pesca]

Right. And I also think in the ecosystem of today, your instinct is the right one in that they'll be able to get this. So many other places to this differentiate yourself. You should not ask them about the book that you already know about. I was interviewing the showrunner of the new Amanda Knox series on Hulu and I had this was this helped the interview. I'd already interviewed Amanda Knox and we haven't played it yet. We're gonna play that beforehand. So interesting questions for Amanda Knox, but you also get the broad strokes of what happened. And so the director of the series really could just concentrate. There was kind of a gift on the specific directorial choices of how she presented different things. So we didn't even have to do the exposition of. And then when the body was found and then the prosecutor, who is also the investigator, charged her with whatever and she was in jail with however many years and it was good. And at one point, the showrunner who impressed me, she was, she had worked on this Is Us, that NBC show. She said, you know, and I was, I had listened to hours of tape and read hours of transcript. And what I found was. And because I was listening, I said, wait, wait a minute. Did you acquire this through whatever the Italian version of freedom of the press is? And we got into a little bit of the intricacies of how one would find out about the Italian investigation system. Now, I know that she hadn't talked about that with anyone else because everyone else doing a Hulu interview about Amanda knocking is, well, was she really guilty? And isn't it bad that a woman comes across and is deemed a murderer because she giggles a little? So in the, if you ask me, what are my strengths and weaknesses, if I bring you, if I bring the Fresh Air audience an interview with the director of the Amanda Knox story and we spend 15 minutes on FOIA, the Italian version of FOIA. I don't know how many people will.

[Daniel Oppenheimer]

Yeah, right. I love that stuff. But it is self limiting, right? I mean, it's niche, right?

[Mike Pesca]

It's niche and it plays well against the backdrop of. You can hear these people everywhere else on Fresh air. The idea is this is your first listen. Most of our listeners over the air, half of them have never listened to a podcast. They listen to Fresh Air to hear an interview about Amanda Knox. And that is the one interview they're gonna hear.

[Daniel Oppenheimer]

Yeah. And I would say there's an awful lot of people. And I mean, we're all like this in some sense. Like, I didn't. Haven't watched all three seasons of Reacher because I'm like compelled to always seek, you know, non formulaic content. Right. Where a lot of people who are consuming that particular kind of stuff, they actually want what's expected. Right. And they want a sort of confirmation of their worldview. I don't happen to in this space, but certainly I do in lots of other spaces. So I'm not. I'm not critical of the instinct, but I was gonna say, even if it's. Even if it's not totally novel to you, I think there's a lot of people who are perfectly happy to listen to Terry ask the expected questions of someone and get the expected answers. It's sort of soothing and affirming and pleasurable food.

[Mike Pesca]

There's that. But also realize that if a different interviewer, if someone on the junket did that, the person answering the question would be so bored by then, or so uninterested in asking the local Akron. Answering the question when Terry asks it, because it's Terry and she earns it. People do bring their A game.

[Daniel Oppenheimer]

Yes. What's an interview for you where you felt like you had that just kind of like interviewers thrill were you just like, you got them going and you could just tell they enjoyed it. It was some famous person who just was like, you know, barely. You knew you from Adam. You were on the sort of, you know, their publicist had set it up for them. They just thought it was gonna be another boring one. And then they're like, oh, this guy, I find him interesting. I'd like to, you know, I could imagine having a drink with him. You know what I mean? I know you know what I mean. Yeah.

[Mike Pesca]

Chris and Paul Weitz of Murderbot and also of American Pie and also of, like, weird things where they didn't always work together. And they did say they knew me to butter me up maybe, but it was great. And we went in all these crazy directions. And then I indulged myself with, what about this theory? What about that theory? But they seemed thrilled to play that game. So. Yeah, that's always thrilling when that happens. I will say this hasn't come up before, but I was just thinking about it. I would give an A plus to generally Terry's culture interviews. I think I might give an A minus to B plus to when she gets on a New Yorker writer to talk about the latest in immigration news or the latest Trump initiative in that it's never bad.

[Daniel Oppenheimer]

Yeah.

[Mike Pesca]

And I'm always 100% sure the writer comes away saying, well, that was the best interview I'm going to do about this or more people will have heard that than read my story. But I don't think I know she doesn't push back. I mean, maybe once in a while. And it won't come across as pushback, it will come across as strengthening the thesis. And so there is another thing that I'm always going to do which is to push back. Especially these days. A lot of, I think, you know, we could talk magazines all day, but to me, the New Yorker has gone down a couple rungs in terms of go to gold standard. And I think the Atlantic has taken its place, actually.

[Daniel Oppenheimer]

Have you ever met Terry?

[Mike Pesca]

Yes. And she was very nice to me and claimed that she loves my stuff when I was a sports reporter. And I said, oh, you should have me on the show sometime. But that's not what they do. And I felt like really embarrassed afterwards. Very embarrassed.

[Daniel Oppenheimer]

That's why I wanted to do the show for another 30 years because I can hold on to the hope of being interviewed by Terry, which you put.

[Mike Pesca]

Out cultural products where it's possible. I is just a sports reporter who. What I'm gonna come on and talk about the Ravens run game.

[Daniel Oppenheimer]

Surely you have. Maybe not. Surely. Do you not have like a, you know, whether it's a kind of limited edition podcast series or a documentary or a show. Do you have any irons in that fire? Are you all audio?

[Mike Pesca]

Well, I did write a book about sports what ifs and I did have a few long term series. But the thing about the everyday show is whatever ambitions that you have other than the everyday show and I have, I'm putting out a substack of sort of a news rundown called the Gist List. I'm doing that every day as well. People could subscribe to that on this very, very platform. You know, that takes a fair bit of time. And then I mentioned I have the other podcasts that aren't the Gist funny you should mention. And I do a debate one called Not Even Mad. So none of these would get me interviewed by Terry Gross. I don't think.

[Daniel Oppenheimer]

Well, don't give up hope.

[Mike Pesca]

Mike Pesca, you write the Gist List. Tell me what you thought of this funny article out of Akron.

[Daniel Oppenheimer]

We're young yet. Maybe we'll get on to whoever her successors thing. Well, Mike, I really appreciate it. It was nice to meet you. I think you undersell your potential as potential successor to Terry. And you know, I mean just this is the, you know, I don't know if there's any NPR producers listening to this, but you know, this is your opportunity to just like let them know that you're available for the job. We're all, we're all fucking available for the job, right?

[Mike Pesca]

Listen, if NPR producers are listening, all they're hearing is mic noise. They can't not hear the banging on the mics that the two of us have done a couple times. That's all they hear.

[Daniel Oppenheimer]

That's going to give me a complex. I'm trying to think of who's your number one. You didn't actually say you had like 10 or 12 people.

[Mike Pesca]

Look, it's like, look, we need to do this tomorrow. Terry's out returning that babka. I'd call Colin. He could step right in and do it. And then if it was Hail Mary, hey, let's just try the wildest idea. And the wilder it is, the more we'll pay you. I would maybe ask Helen or John to do it. An English person.

[Daniel Oppenheimer]

Okay, I like that. That would work well for NPR, let's be honest.

[Mike Pesca]

You get the 20% benefit of the accent. And that's it for today's show. The gist is produced by Cory Wara with Leah Yan as our production coordinator and Jeff Craig running our socials and Michelle Pesca as. COO is how you pronounce it. Thanks for listening. Marketing is hard, but I'll tell you a little secret. It doesn't have to be. Let me point something out. You're listening to a podcast right now and it's great. You love the host. You seek it out and download it. You listen to it while driving, working out, cooking, even going to the bathroom. Podcasts are a pretty close companion.

[Daniel Oppenheimer]

And this is a podcast ad.

[Mike Pesca]

Did I get your attention? You can reach great listeners like yourself with podcast advertising from Libsyn Ads. Choose from hundreds of top podcasts offering host endorsements or run a pre produced ad like this one across thousands of shows. To reach your target audience in their favorite podcasts with Libsyn Ads, go to libsyn ads.com that's lib s y n ads.com today.