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PODCAST

Famous and Gravy

Wondery | 14th Street Studios

We explore the lives of notable people who’ve just died—celebrities, icons, cultural figures—and asks what their stories can teach us about ourselves. It’s part obituary podcast, part biography, and part existential detective work.Think you know everything about some of modern history’s most recognizable figures? We’re Amit and Michael, two pop culture enthusiasts who upend your assumptions about the iconic and the famous. Because that’s where you find the “gravy” – the rich, flavorful sauce

history

All Episodes

64:37

Dame Detective (Angela Lansbury)

Famous and Gravy ·

2023/10/18

She once said “I wasn’t very good at being a starlet. I didn’t want to pose for cheesecake photos and that kind of thing.” She received two Oscar nominations before the age of 25. In the mid 1950s she found herself cast as either of two types: as she put it, “bitches on wheels and people’s mothers.” She was nominated for a Tony award at age 83, a testament to her extraordinary stamina and range. She captured the biggest audience of her career in the 1980s and 90s, when she played the role of mystery

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67:18

Geto Man (Bushwick Bill)

Famous and Gravy ·

2023/10/04

He was born in Kingston, Jamaica but spent much of his childhood in Brooklyn. In the late 1980s, the influential music producer Rick Rubin signed his group. In 1991, he had an early brush with death when he was shot in the right eye. He was born with dwarfism and stood approximately 3 feet 8 inches tall. He was a member of the Houston-based rap group the Geto Boys, who’s biggest singles were ”Mind Playing Tricks on Me“ and “Damn It Feels Good To Be A Gangsta”. Today’s dead celebrity is Bushwick

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61:13

Two Ticket Holder (Eddie Money)

Famous and Gravy ·

2023/09/20

He was the son of a police officer, and he was headed for that career himself when he dropped out of the New York Police Academy to move to San Francisco in pursuit of rock stardom – which he found in 1978. He struggled with drugs in the early 1980s, but he staged several comebacks, and found hits later that decade. He and his family had been the focus of a reality television show on AXS TV. His birth name was Edward Mahoney. His hits include “Baby Hold On” and “Two Tickets to Paradise.” Today’s

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62:03

Best in Show (Fred Willard)

Famous and Gravy ·

2023/09/06

Over the years he was a favorite among real-life talk-show hosts, making at least 50 guest appearances on “The Tonight Show.” He made an art of playing characters who are “gloriously out of their depth.” He appeared in more than 700 films and television movies and episodes over a half-century. He was nominated for Emmys for his roles on “Modern Family” and “Everybody Loves Raymond.” He was a frequent collaborator with the director Christopher Guest with iconic performances in ‘Waiting for Guffman,’

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69:44

Cool Hand Dylan (Luke Perry)

Famous and Gravy ·

2023/08/23

Before his breakout, his main credits had been a handful of soap operas. His mega-stardom was unexpected. He starred opposite Alyson Hannigan in a 2004 stage version of “When Harry Met Sally”. In recent years, he made dozens of television appearances, including regular roles on the HBO prison drama “Oz” and the crime drama “Riverdale.” His looks were often compared to James Dean. He played Dylan McKay, a bad-boy teenager who struggled with alcoholism on the hit TV show Beverly Hills 90201. Today’s

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67:22

Sleepless Sally (Nora Ephron)

Famous and Gravy ·

2023/08/09

In the summer of 1961 she was a summer intern in the Kennedy White House; she once said she was probably the only intern that President Kennedy had never hit on. Her second husband was the Watergate journalist Carl Bernstein. She was a journalist, a blogger, an essayist, a novelist, a playwright, an Oscar-nominated screenwriter and a movie director — a rarity in a film industry whose directorial ranks were and continue to be dominated by men. Her box-office successes included “You’ve Got Mail” ,

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68:50

Pure Imagination (Gene Wilder)

Famous and Gravy ·

2023/07/26

He was an accomplished stage actor as well as a screenwriter, a novelist and the director of four movies in which he starred. He made his movie debut in 1967 in the celebrated crime drama, “Bonnie and Clyde.” He had haunted blue eyes and an empathy born of his own history of psychic distress. His rule for comedy was simple: Don’t try to make it funny; try to make it real. “I’m an actor, not a clown,” he said more than once. In 1971, he was nominated for a Golden Globe for his performance as the

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74:05

Secret Chord (Leonard Cohen)

Famous and Gravy ·

2023/07/12

He was an unlikely and reluctant pop star, if in fact he ever was one. In the 1960s, he lived in a house on the Greek island of Hydra, where he wrote a pair of novels. He was 33 when his first record was released in 1967. In the early 1970s, his record company concocted an advertising campaign where they called him “the master of erotic despair.” Around 1994, he abandoned his music career and moved to Mt. Baldy monastery, where he was ordained a Buddhist monk. His best-known song, a majestic and

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71:04

Heartwarming Humor (Louie Anderson)

Famous and Gravy ·

2023/06/28

This person died in 2022 at age 68. His act fit comfortably into the category of “family entertainment.” He had a self-deprecating style that won him legions of fans, among them Johnny Carson, whose early support catapulted him to stardom. He had roles in “Ferris Bueller’s Day Off” and “Coming to America”. He hosted “Family Feud” for three seasons. He was nominated 3 times for a supporting actor Emmy, which he won in 2016. His comedy routine often centered around jokes about his own weight, which

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94:13

Electric Vanities (Tom Wolfe)

Famous and Gravy ·

2023/06/14

This person died in 2018 at age 88. When he graduated college in 1951 he had enough skill as a baseball player to earn a tryout with the New York Giants. He earned his PhD in American Studies from Yale in 1957. Beginning in the 1960s he helped create the enormously influential hybrid of fiction techniques into non-fiction known as the New Journalism. He was instantly recognizable as he strolled down Madison Avenue — a tall, slender, blue-eyed, boyish-looking man in his spotless three-piece white

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70:44

Goofball Stud (Bill Paxton)

Famous and Gravy ·

2023/05/31

This person died 2017, age 61. He was described as good-natured in assessing his status in Hollywood. In a 1998 interview he said, “I haven’t had a role that’s propelled me into major stardom. I’ve had roles that put me on the playing field.” From 2006 to 2011, he played the lead role of Bill Henrickson on the HBO show Big Love. Early in his career, he had small parts in “The Terminator” and “Aliens”, both directed by James Cameron. He played a car salesman who cheated Jamie Lee Curtis’s character

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80:08

Golden Rose (Betty White)

Famous and Gravy ·

2023/05/17

This person died in 2021, age 99. During World War II she drove a truck delivering soap, toothpaste and candy to soldiers. She began her career in radio by saying one word - “Parkay” - on a popular comedy show. In the early 1960s she was best known as a busy freelance guest with game shows as her specialty. She had a longstanding interest in animal welfare. Her television career spanned seven decades and she holds the “Guinness World Record” as the longest ever for a female entertainer. One of her

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75:43

Hammer Time (Hank Aaron)

Famous and Gravy ·

2023/05/03

This person died 2021 age 86. He was routinely brilliant, performing with seemingly effortless grace. He did not enjoy the idolatry accorded to his contemporaries. He grew up in Alabama amid rigid segregation, and he faced abuse from the stands while playing in the South as a minor leaguer. He was voted an All-Star in all but his first and last seasons, and he won three Gold Glove awards. The San Francisco Giants’ Barry Bonds surpassed his home run record in August 2007. In the 1974 season, he

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69:13

What About Bob (Bob Dole)

Famous and Gravy ·

2023/04/19

This person died 2021, age 98. He was a star athlete who lettered in football, basketball and track. He came home from the war in Europe in a body cast, mostly paralyzed, and spent 39 months under intense care. He was a key figure behind the landmark Americans With Disabilities Act of 1990. He starred in commercials for Visa in 1997, Viagra in 1998, and for Pepsi in 2001. During the 1996 presidential election, he often lapsed into legislative lingo and referred to himself in the third person

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79:10

Proud Mary (Mary Tyler Moore)

Famous and Gravy ·

2023/04/05

This person died in 2017 at age 80. At age 17, she was hired to appear in a series of commercials for Hotpoint appliances. In 1980 she won a Golden Globe, and she was nominated for an Academy Award. In 1984, She entered the Betty Ford Center for treatment. She was a key inspiration for forming the character of Liz Lemon – the television writer portrayed by Tina Fey on the sitcom “30 Rock.” Her 1970s self-titled TV show was a balm to widespread anxieties about women in the workforce. Her character

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72:45

Love and OJ Jokes (Norm Macdonald)

Famous and Gravy ·

2023/03/22

This person died in 2021, age 61. His brother Neil once told a reporter that he almost joined the newspaper business as a young man, but that he had deliberately botched an interview. By 1984, he spent four months opening for the comedian Sam Kinison. His sense of humor sometimes got him in hot water. A 2018 article about him said “The dedicated fan will identify two patterns in his television work: It is invariably funny, and it is invariably canceled.” He became familiar to millions as the Weekend

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88:21

Rebel Rebel (David Bowie)

Famous and Gravy ·

2023/03/08

This person died 2016, age 69. He suffered a blow in a teenage brawl that caused his left pupil to be permanently dilated. He experimented with startling transformations, often playing up an androgynous image. In the 1980s he had a Broadway run in the demanding title role of “The Elephant Man.” His son is a director best known for the 2009 film “Moon” starring Sam Rockwell. He was the Thin White Duke, Aladdin Sane, Major Tom, and Ziggy Stardust. Today’s dead celebrity is David Bowie. Famous & Gravy

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70:36

Inner Soprano (James Gandolfini)

Famous and Gravy ·

2023/02/22

This person died in 2013. His father was an immigrant who held a number of jobs, including janitor, bricklayer and mason. His mother was a high school cafeteria chef. He attended Rutgers University, graduating with a degree in communications. He drove a delivery truck, managed nightclubs and tended bar in Manhattan before becoming interested in acting at age 25. Throughout the 90s he had an impressive list of character-acting credits, but he was largely unknown until David Chase cast him in the role

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70:02

Poetic Justice (Maya Angelou)

Famous and Gravy ·

2023/02/08

This person died in 2014 at age 86. She was a Tony-nominated stage actress, and a calypso dancer for a period of time.. In 2011 she was awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom. She was a college professor and a ubiquitous presence on the lecture circuit, and also made several appearances on Sesame Street. Throughout her writing, she explored the concepts of personal identity and resilience through the multifaceted lens of race, sex, family, community and the collective past. In 1969 she published

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69:46

Game Changer (John Madden)

Famous and Gravy ·

2023/01/25

This person died in 2021, age 85. He had an irrepressible way, and a distinctive voice. Fox snagged him in the mid-1990s to establish credibility. His Electronic Arts video game evolved into a cultural phenomenon. His influence, steeped in everyman sensibilities, made the NFL. more interesting, more relevant and more fun for over 40 years. Today’s dead celebrity is John Madden. Famous & Gravy is created and co-hosted by Amit Kapoor and Michael Osborne. This episode was produced by Jacob Weiss. For

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122 results

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