Terrence Mcnally Podcast

Aired: 7/21/13 This week we'll spend the hour with RAFE ESQUITH, who's been teaching fifth graders in LA's Hobart Elementary public school for nearly thirty years. Now a teacher of teachers, he recently returned from doing that in China. I first learned of Rafe's work in 2005, when POV the PBS film series pitched me a documentary, THE HOBART SHAKESPEARIANS, about the full Shakespeare productions that his students - most from families where English is not the primary language - perform each year. The film was directed by MEL STUART, a wonderful director of at least two landmark films - the 1971 Willy Wonka & the Chocolate Factory with Gene Wilder and 1973's WATTSTAX concert film of funky music and Black Power. Mel Stuart passed away a little less than a year ago. And he is missed. In September 2005, introducing my interview with Rafe and Mel about the film , I said this: Documentaries may be giving us what we hunger for. March of the Penguins, Mad Hot Ballroom and The Hobart Shakespeareans are documentaries