Author Mo Willems on Inspiring Young Readers Through Interactive Stories

KQED's Forum

KQED

News Commentary, News, Politics

4.2 • 727 Ratings

🗓️ 13 January 2026

⏱️ 53 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

You may know Mo Willems from his books about “The Pigeon” – who asks, pleads, even demands to do things like drive a school bus. Or from unlikely best friends “Elephant & Piggie,” who will soon have their own Paramount+ streaming series. We talk with the acclaimed children’s book author about his approach to involving and inspiring children with interactive stories, and his latest projects — including two upcoming stage performances at San Francisco’s comedy festival, Sketchfest. Mo Willems has two upcoming stage performances at San Francisco’s comedy festival, Sketchfest, at 11 a.m. and 2 p.m. on Sunday, Jan. 18. Tickets can be found here. Guests: Mo Willems, children's book author Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Transcript

Click on a timestamp to play from that location

0:00.0	Support for KQED podcasts comes from Landmark College, offering executive function support and social coaching for neurodivergent individuals at the Bay Area Success Center. Learn more at landmark.edu slash success center.
0:16.2	Industry leaders are transforming business with AWS AI.
0:20.8	From Phillips advancing patient care to smarter
0:23.9	auto design and games that evolve in real time.
0:27.9	AWS AI is how innovation happens every day.
0:32.3	From KQED.
0:34.9	Welcome to Forum.
0:36.4	I'm Mina Kim.
0:40.9	The first kid's book I ever read by Mo Willems was Canuffle Bunny after my daughter was born. All about how little Trixie leaves her beloved
0:46.2	bunny stuffy at the laundromat and cannot tell her oblivious dad about it because she can't talk
0:52.2	yet. So instead, she balls, goes boneless until they arrive
0:57.4	home and Trixie's mom immediately realizes the bunny toy is missing. The delightful story made me go
1:04.4	in search of more Willem's books, and there are a lot of them. You may know about the pigeon
1:10.2	who wants to drive the bus or does
1:12.4	not want to take a bath, about best friends, elephant and piggy, or the naked mole rat who just
1:18.6	wants to get dressed. Willems has also taken his stories to the stage and screen with two
1:24.5	performances Sunday at SF Sketchfest and a Paramount Plus series
1:28.7	slated for later this year. So listeners, do you have a favorite Mo Willem's story?
1:33.6	Mo, wonderful to have you on Forum. Welcome.
1:36.3	I mean, it's really great to be here.
1:38.4	Yeah, I mentioned Cunuffle Bunny, not only because it was my introduction to the Willem's universe.
1:46.2	And incidentally, my daughter was actually very attached to a bunny toy at that time. Excellent. But also because it's characteristic
	...

Please login to see the full transcript.

Previous episode | Next episode

Disclaimer: The podcast and artwork embedded on this page are from KQED, and are the property of its owner and not affiliated with or endorsed by Tapesearch.

Generated transcripts are the property of KQED and are distributed freely under the Fair Use doctrine. Transcripts generated by Tapesearch are not guaranteed to be accurate.