Arts

After more than 40 years away, Bette Midler is returning to Broadway. She's playing legendary Hollywood agent Sue Mengers in a riotous solo show titled I'll Eat You Last.

On-air challenge: Every answer is a familiar two-word phrase or name with the initials "J.R."

Last week's challenge from listener Sandy Weisz: Take a common English word. Write it in capital letters. Move the first letter to the end and rotate it 90 degrees. You'll get a new word that is pronounced exactly the same as the first word. What words are these?

Answer: Won, one; wry, rye

Winner: Ben Austin of Dobbs Ferry, N.Y.

Back in the early 1990s, Melinda French was a rising star at a software company when the boss asked her out on a date. This was complicated because he was her boss, and frankly, he was kind of a nerd. But they fell in love and got married, and decided to raise a family, retire from the business, and in their spare time give away more money to charity than anyone else in the history of the world.

This segment was originally broadcast on Feb. 08, 2013.

A shorter version of this segment was originally broadcast on Feb. 14, 2013.

Since Al Gore's term as the 45th vice president of the United States ended in 2001, he has starred in an Oscar-winning documentary, won a Grammy Award and received the Nobel Peace Prize. But obviously he won't be satisfied until he wins the NPR news quiz, so we've invited him to play a game called "Maybe you can beat Bill Clinton at this."

This segment was originally broadcast on March 8, 2013.

Arne Duncan is President Obama's secretary of education, and if, while he's on this show, a disaster befalls the president, the vice president, the speaker of the House and every other member of the Cabinet except Veterans Affairs and Homeland Security, he would be president.

This segment was originally broadcast on Jan. 11, 2013.

Transcript

SCOTT SIMON, HOST:

April is National Poetry Month and to celebrate, WEEKEND EDITION is talking with younger poets about their experience with poetry and why they still feel it's important in our everyday lives.

When Superstorm Sandy hit New York City last fall, the publisher Farrar, Straus and Giroux, like most everything else, totally shut down. It was a week before power returned to FSG, according to Brian Gittis, a senior publicist. When he got back to his office, he began sorting through galleys — advance copies of books. And one of them caught him off guard.

Its cover had an illustration of the Manhattan skyline half-submerged in water.

"It was definitely sort of a Twilight Zone moment," Gittis recalls.

So let's speak candidly for a moment.

This is not an ordinary day. It has not been an ordinary week. We taped this week's podcast on Monday at 6:00 p.m., in the first hours of coverage of the bombings in Boston. We are posting it on Friday, in the first hours of coverage of a series of events that currently have many of our good pals — and many of our listeners — "sheltering in place" at home.

Transcript

MICHEL MARTIN, HOST:

And now the latest in our series, Muses and Metaphor. We've been celebrating National Poetry Month by hearing your tweet poems. Those are poems of 140 characters. We just talked about how complicated and charged the issue of immigration is, but for listener Su Layug, her immigrant story is all about - well, stories.

Transcript

OPHIRA EISENBERG, HOST:

On our stage right now, we have Lauren Weisskirk and Stefan Salva Cruz ready for our next game.

(APPLAUSE)

STEFAN SALVA CRUZ: Hello, Ophira.

EISENBERG: Hello, Stefan. Hello, Lauren. Stefan, do you have a favorite fruit?

CRUZ: Fruit?

EISENBERG: Fruit, yeah.

CRUZ: Orange.

EISENBERG: It's an odd question, right?

CRUZ: Oh, absolutely.

EISENBERG: Orange.

CRUZ: Yeah.

EISENBERG: I like orange too. That's a good one. Lauren, favorite fruit?

Transcript

OPHIRA EISENBERG, HOST:

Now, we're going to crown this week's grand champion. Let's bring back, from Six Degrees of Francis Bacon, Christy O'Neill.

(APPLAUSE)

EISENBERG: From This That or the Other: Sarah Bouboulis. From Bust a Cap: Darla Gutierrez. From Fruit Salad: Lauren Weisskirk. And from Just Do It: Andrew Sommerfeld.

(APPLAUSE)

EISENBERG: I'm going to ask our puzzle guru Art Chung to take us out.