Cross-eyed (can't drive, can't read unless the type's two inches from his nose), balding, and tall with a bumbling gait, he is far from the polished media persona we're used to. "Hi, hi, hi." You'd never know this man was once so shy he agreed to go to a party only if he could stand next to the host all evening. Michael Silverblatt is bobbing about the Los Angeles Times Book Awards ceremony like a birthday boy ready for cake. This year punk-rock icon Henry Rollins signed on to host a show. KCRW's signature show, Which Way, L.A.?, hit the ground running with marathon coverage of the 1992 L.A.
It was the first to broadcast This American Life outside of Ira Glass's home station in Chicago. KCRW produces more nationally syndicated programs than any other single independent station. Seymour has since turned KCRW into one powerhouse of a public radio station: 550,000 local listeners and more than 50,000 subscribers. Seymour says, "You have such great opportunity when you're in such desperate straits." Spoken like a true Bronx native. By the time general manager Ruth Seymour took over in the mid-'70s, it had the oldest transmitter west of the Mississippi, a tiny broadcast range, and an annual budget bottleneck of $10,000. Santa Monica College started the station after World War II as a training facility for veterans.
That's KCRW for you-a stranger could wander in off the street, like what she hears, and accept an invitation to listen. Later I learn that the room was the master control booth, and the announcer was in the middle of a broadcast. I'm early to the station on a Saturday morning, navigating gray basement halls with red doors, hopelessly lost until I catch the wings of the writer Scott Carrier's voice emanating from a room in the back, where a man stooped over some papers invites me to sit down.
#KCRW BOOKWORM HOW TO#
If you listen, if you try, if you open up your ears, mind, and heart, there are people around who will show you how to be-how to live in the world in all its strife, sorrow, and ineffable beauty. But overhead, a blue sky to break your heart, and due west, the silver promise of ocean. To L.A.-land of black Porsches, palm trees like showgirls, and raging rivers of traffic. Kristy Davis meets the man behind the mike. Name any writer you've ever wanted to meet, and chances are Michael Silverblatt has interviewed them on his weekly public radio show-a mad tea party of talk that's been going strong for the past 20 years.
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