Best Of: Rosie Perez / Stephen Merchant

Fresh Air

NPR

Tv & Film, Arts, Society & Culture, Books

4.4 • 34.4K Ratings

🗓️ 14 May 2022

⏱️ 49 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

Rosie Perez was a dancer on Soul Train, the choreographer for "the Fly Girls," the dancers on the sketch comedy show In Living Color, and she did the now-famous dance in the opening credit sequence of Spike Lee's Do the Right Thing. She's now co-starring in the HBO max series The Flight Attendant. We'll talk about her career and how she managed to become so successful after having been raised as a ward of the state in St. Joseph's Catholic Home for Children in New York, and later in foster care.

Maureen Corrigan reviews Hernan Diaz's new novel, Trust.

Also, we speak with comedian, writer, director and actor Stephen Merchant. With Ricky Gervais, he co-created the British comedy The Office. He has a new comedy thriller series called The Outlaws.

Transcript

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0:00.0	From W.H.Y. Y. in Philadelphia, this is Fresh Air Weekend.
0:04.0	I'm Sam Brigger, Infateri Gross.
0:06.4	Today, Rosie Perez.
0:08.4	She was a dancer on Soul Train, the choreographer for the sketch comedy show in Living Color.
0:14.2	She did the now-famous dance in the opening credit sequence of Do The Right Thing,
0:18.2	and co-starred opposite Spike Lee.
0:20.3	She's now co-starring in the HBO Max series The Fly Detented.
0:24.1	She'll talk about her career and how she managed to become so successful
0:28.2	after having been raised as a ward of the state in St. Joseph's Catholic home for children in New York,
0:33.6	and later in foster care.
0:35.9	Also, we'll speak with comedian, writer, director, and actor Steven Merchant.
0:40.2	With Ricky Jervais, he co-created the British comedy The Office.
0:43.9	He has a new comedy thriller series called The Outlaws.
0:47.2	And Marine Corrigan will review Arnon Diaz's new novel, Trust.
0:52.3	Terry has today's first interview.
0:54.2	I'll let her introduce it.
0:56.6	My guest is the Emmy and Oscar-nominated actor Rosie Perez.
1:00.9	She started her performing career as a dancer.
1:03.1	When she was 19, she was dancing at a club with her friends
1:06.4	when a talent scout from Soul Train noticed her and invited her to dance on the show.
1:11.1	She brought her style of hip-hop dancing to Soul Train
1:14.0	at a time before hip-hop had entered the mainstream.
	...

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