Randy Cohen

In 40 years leading Evidence, the dance company he founded, Ron Brown faced plenty of obstacles. “They tell you you can’t, but I’m telling you, I’m from New York: yes, you can.” Listen: personplacething.org

Ron Brown, founder of Evidence, a dance company celebrating its 40th anniversary, is not ready to retire. “You don’t stop; you keep doing what it is you have to do.” Exhausting, in the best possible way. Listen: personplacething.org

There’ve been famous fatal mishaps with stage sets. Has designer Santo Loquasto ever killed a dancer with his sets or costumes? “I didn’t kill them, but they felt I was coming close.” The lively—and deadly—arts. Listen: personplacething.org

Every theater troupe has its sensibility, says set and costume designer Santo Loquasto. “Steppenwolf turns out to be an incredibly goyishe company; I didn’t know that.” Listen: personplacething.org

Playful is good, but we shouldn't have to wait 9 minutes for the train.

As students, architects Jessie Reiser and Nanako Umemoto dreaded the teaching methods at Cooper Union. “They weren’t only critiquing the design, they were critiquing your being.” Apparently it’s improved. Listen: personplacething.org

When architects Jessie Reiser and Nanako Umemoto were students at Cooper Union, there was a designated Crying Staircase. “After you finished talking to teachers, you just ran to it.” Architectural education, old style. Listen: personplacething.org

Preservationist Anthony Woods warns: “The effort by the National Parks Service to cleanse their sites of anything that doesn’t tell a wonderful warm story of America is a great threat to history.” Listen: personplacething.org

Preservationist Anthony Woods: “Landmarks law is written not just to protect architecturally significant buildings, but historically and culturally significant buildings.” When big things happen in small buildings. Listen: personplacething.org

Preservationist Anthony Woods admires Albert Bard, the father of New York’s landmarks protection law, he tells ‪@NYpresArchive.bsky.social‬.“Bard would be horrified by the state of New York today.” Listen: https://personplacething.org‬‬‬‬‬‬‬‬‬‬‬‬

Playwright Will Power remembers gunplay at the local health food store over raw milk. “Back then, to be a health food person, it was like a kind of a revolutionary type thing.” Listen: personplacething.org

When playwright Will Power’s grandfather faced a tough decision, he knew who to talk to. “He went to seek the advice of Paul Robeson.” Of course he did. Who wouldn’t? Listen: personplacething.org

Playwright Will Power is both happy and sad that healthy food is increasingly available. “Whole Foods opened on 125th and Lennox. 125th and Lennox! That’s like sacred ground.” Listen: personplacething.org

Activist Nilka Martell and her neighbors, amateurs all, have an ingenious plan to cap the vile Cross Bronx Expressway, “We’re so used to hearing no, so alright say no, I’m not going away.” Listen: personplacething.org

Activist Nilka Martell helped revive the Bronx River. Now she faces her greatest challenge: “the thorn in my side, the Cross Bronx Expressway.” Listen: personplacething.org

“I don’t necessarily believe that art can be evaluated by beauty/truth,” says M. C. Kinniburgh. Seems pretty good to me, but I’m old and will soon be dead. Listen: personplacething.org

“I surf. I am always in the waves. And you can’t surf Hamlet,” says M. C. Kinniburgh, a criticism that dogged Shakespeare throughout his career. Listen: personplacething.org

Michael McClure read his poems to lions at the San Francisco Zoo, “an incredible exchange of energy across species,” says M. C. Kinniburgh. An exchange of energy across species more often involves one eating the other. Listen: personplacething.org

Massimo and Lella Vignelli trained as architects but went on to design everything except buildings: maps, type, housewares. “I think of their product designs as an architecture in miniature,” says their son Luca. Listen: personplacething.org

Massimo and Lella Vignelli designed, well, everything—graphics, houseware, furniture. “They were great designers,” says their son Luca, “but they never considered themselves artists.” Hear why: personplacething.org

The ‪@mta.info‬ has revised and reintroduced the glorious 1972 Vignelli subway map. “It was a diagram, it wasn’t a map,” says their son, Luca. He’s right. Listen: https://personplacething.org‬‬‬‬‬‬‬

Janis Siegel won 10 Grammies with Manhattan Transfer, but she tells ‪@TheVillageTrip.bsky.social‬‬,“I was not going to be a singer at all, actually; I was going to be a nurse.” The road taken! Listen: https://personplacething.org‬‬‬‬‬‬‬‬‬‬‬‬‬‬‬‬‬

Celebrated for her singing with Manhattan Transfer, Janis Siegel tells ‪@TheVillageTrip.bsky.social‬‬ she identifies as a Brooklynite: “Brooklyn makes you resilient, I think, and prepares you for the world.” Listen: https://personplacething.org‬‬‬‬‬‬‬‬‬‬‬‬‬

As a young singer, Janis Siegel learned from her elders, she tells ‪@TheVillageTrip.bsky.social‬‬.We opened for Big Mama Thornton. That’s how I learned to drink bourbon.” Listen: https://personplacething.org‬‬‬‬‬‬‬‬‬‬‬‬

Jamie Bernstein tells great stories about her father, Leonard. She tells ‪@TheVillageTrip.bsky.social‬, “Sometimes, when I was really little, I didn’t understand a word of what he was talking about.” She’s come far. Listen: https://personplacething.org‬‬‬‬

Jamie Bernstein defends her father, Leonard’s, use of twelve-tone music. I demur. She tells @TheVillageTrip.bsky.social‬: “You’ll have to talk to Mr. Schoenberg about that.” Listen: personplacething.org

He's an admirable guy. Here's a more personal conversation with him: personplacething.org/544-jonathan...

Journalist ‪@JonathanCapehart.bsky.social‬ is liberal in his politics, conservative in his dress. “I love a good wild outfit, on someone else.” Listen: https://personplacething.org‬‬‬‬‬‬‬‬‬‬‬‬‬‬‬‬‬‬‬

Journalist ‪@JonathanCapehart.bsky.social‬ proposed marriage “in a country where I learned what it meant to be loved, and to love.” Make up your own Trump joke, then hear where: https://personplacething.org‬‬‬‬‬‬‬‬‬‬‬‬‬‬‬‬‬‬

As a kid, drummer Bobby Sanabria heard Tito Puente play in front of the Melrose Projects in the Bronx: “And I freaked out, and I said, oh my god!” The making of a musician. Listen: personplacething.org