I Couldn’t Throw It Out

Helen Keller’s friend, Hitler’s defier, Woody Allen’s teacher – the dancer who jolted America with moves you now see on TV, movies and music videos told me great tales in 1989.

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As Dustin Hoffman, Andy Warhol, and Robert De Niro watched, did I ruin Bill Murray's night at the 1982 post-screening party? Former SNL writer Tom Gammill helps us decide.

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With help from They Might Be Giants' John Flansburgh, it's time to toss treasures that I saved after writing the band's first 1985 review in People Magazine.

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Hear the 1984 interview tape with this random trio: REO Speedwagon's Kevin Cronin, painter Jean-Michel Basquiat, and Gong Show host Chuck Barris

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A 45-year-old tape recording about family ancestry leads to revelations about a kidnapped rabbi, a Johnstown drowning, two horrible car accidents, and connections to a hay barn in Lithuania, the New …

In 1983, 16-year-old Kiefer Sutherland met me in Nova Scotia to discuss his first big movie role.  Hear how he felt about actor dad Donald -- and how I messed up my People Magazine story.

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When my wife Cindy's health declined after two kidney transplants, how would she find a third organ donor? 

The answer -- which involves my 33-year error -- could make you believe in miracles. And it…

At 20, my wife Cindy thought she was about to die.  Following a lupus diagnosis at 15, her kidneys had shut down in a way that seemed fatal.  But after devastating years on dialysis, many near-death …

Rap mogul Eazy-E's death from AIDS complications in 1995 was a shock. Hear reactions at the time from  Wu-Tang's Method Man and others. Plus, hear my 1992 talk with Eazy while driving in Compton duri…

Compton's rap mogul and NWA founder Eazy-E hanging out with me? Unlikely. But it happened in 1991 when I interviewed him for my 1992 book Break It Down: The Inside Story from the New Leaders of Rap.

H…

When bestselling spy novelist Joseph Kanon was a book publisher and I was his assistant, I secretly sent out letters in which I pretended to be the boss. Until the Brooke Shields incident. Listen as …

Broadway?  Movies?  TV? That's nuthin'.  Stage and screen actress Donna Murphy first found fame on the high school literary magazine staff with Michael and Sally.  Listen in as they read poems by Don…

When 19-year-old Jennifer Beals enrolled at Yale – after starring in 1983's Flashdance -- she couldn't escape a People Magazine interview in which I tried to impress her with my academic credentials.…

In 1985, Joni Mitchell gave me a multi-hour interview for People Magazine about flunking high school, Woodstock, Bob Dylan, her Chelsea apartment, poetry, painting, and much more -- which you'll hear…

It ain't gonna be easy to throw out never-shared interviews with Joni Mitchell, Kiefer Sutherland, Eazy-E, and many others. That's the challenge coming up on I Couldn't Throw It Out.

For decades, Mich…

When I interviewed Joni Mitchell for People Magazine in 1985, some of her best tales were the longer ones. Hear a few of them, including how she met Jimi Hendrix, why Jack Nicholson missed his cameo …

In the first episode of our podcast, my co-host Sally Libby and I try to figure out why I -- and others -- feel the urge to save things.

And then, sob, she makes me use the shredder.

I know Sally's rig…