If you’re a news junkie — or maybe just news curious, we’ve got your weekly dose of Connecticut politics, tackling everything from tax cuts to human composting. Amplifying important local and national voices, The Wheelhouse walks listeners through the most important political stories of the week. You’ll hear from well-known political reporters, academics, and local journalists across Connecticut’s 169 cities and towns.
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WNPR Podcasts
The Colin McEnroe Show is public radio’s most eclectic, eccentric weekday program. The best way to understand us is through the subjects we tackle: Neanderthals, tambourines, handshakes, the Iliad, snacks, ringtones, punk rock, Occam’s razor, Rasputin, houseflies, zippers. Are you sensing a pattern? If so, you should probably be in treatment. On Fridays, we try to stop thinking about what kind of ringtones Neanderthals would want to have and convene a panel called The Nose for an informal ro ...
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Each weekday at 3:00 pm on WNPR radio, Faith serves up a tasty "60-Second Food Schmooze" with hot tips, recommendations, recipes and more.
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As non-profit journalism organizations, Connecticut Public Radio and the Connecticut Mirror share an objective — to educate the people of our state about how their government works, what it means to function in a democratic society, and the importance of understanding both their rights — and their responsibilities — as citizens.
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Nobody likes termites. They get into the wood in our homes and can lead to infuriating and expensive repairs. What’s to like? It turns out, there’s a lot to like about termites. Scientists study how they build their mounds for clues to solving some of the world’s most pressing problems, like mitigating the effects of drought, building colonies on M…
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All calls: Do you mind if I borrow your linen closet?
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49:00We’ve been doing these shows where we don’t book any guests, where we fill the hour with your calls. And your calls have been interesting and surprising and amusing. This hour, the conversation winds around to thunderstorms and lightning, squirrels, the band (and word) Enigma, trains … Anything. (Seemingly) everything. These shows are fun for us, a…
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The Nose looks at ‘Superman’ and Stephen Colbert
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49:00Thursday night, CBS announced that it is cancelling its flagship late night show, The Late Show with Stephen Colbert, after next season, in May, 2026. CBS says this is “purely a financial decision.” At the same time, The Late Show has the largest audience in American late night TV by a pretty wide margin. In any case, The Late Show with Stephen Col…
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‘Murder in the Dollhouse’: Jennifer Dulos and our fascination with true crime
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49:00On the morning of May 24, 2019, Jennifer Dulos dropped her kids off at New Canaan Country School. And then minutes later, she vanished. Her presumed murder quickly became a national story. This hour, Wall Street Journal columnist Rich Cohen joins us to talk about his new book, Murder in the Dollhouse: The Jennifer Dulos Story. Plus: a look at our o…
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The secret language of animals and how we're learning to understand it
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50:00Do you ever wish you could have a conversation with your pet, or the bird outside your window? This hour, we learn about how animals communicate with one another, how we communicate with them, and what this can teach us about human language. Plus, some pet owners are turning to soundboards to communicate with their pets. We'll talk with a researche…
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Breaking down the future of CT’s social safety net following passage of Trump’s ‘big beautiful bill’
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49:00President Donald Trump’s massive tax-and-spending package is officially the law. The legislation provides tax cuts for some Americans. But it could raise costs for some of the country’s poorest households. That’s due to reductions in Medicaid and food assistance. The legislation Republicans are calling the “big beautiful bill" seeks to cut Medicaid…
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Eventually the world will end. Why can't we stop imagining it?
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50:00Earlier this year, the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists moved the Doomsday Clock closer to midnight. The end of the world has been something humans have been preoccupied with for a very long time. This hour, we talk about how we imagine the world ending, and what it says about us. GUESTS: Dorian Lynskey: Journalist and author of multiple books, mo…
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All calls: The first rule about invisible rabbits is you do not talk about invisible rabbits
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49:00We’ve been doing these shows where we don’t book any guests, where we fill the hour with your calls. And your calls have been interesting and surprising and amusing. This hour, the conversation winds around to Squid Game, the routinization of protests, the elusive Jeffrey Epstein report, 9/11 and the movies Fight Club and Breakfast at Tiffany’s and…
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Alive and well in our imaginations: Dinosaurs in pop culture
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49:00We think of dinosaurs as figures from science, from history, from the fossil record. But if I say “Tyrannosaurus rex,” do you picture bones arranged in a museum — or do you picture that one scene in Jurassic Park? The more you think about it, the more you realize that your whole real concept of dinosaurs comes from movies and TV and kids’ books and…
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Alissa Wilkinson on Joan Didion, Hollywood, and American mythmaking
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49:00This hour, author and film critic Alissa Wilkinson joins us to talk about Joan Didion, Hollywood, and how we make sense of our politics. GUEST: Alissa Wilkinson: Movie critic at The New York Times. Her latest book is We Tell Ourselves Stories: Joan Didion and the American Dream Machine Support the show: http://www.wnpr.org/donate See omnystudio.com…
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Nothing lasts forever, except maybe Stoicism
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49:00Lately the ancient philosophy of Stoicism is having a bit of a resurgence. This hour we learn about the philosophy, why people are drawn to it, and how to live like a Stoic. Plus, we look at how Stoicism appears in music. GUESTS: Massimo Pigliucci: The K.D. Irani Professor of Philosophy at the City College of New York. He is the author of books inc…
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CT Gov. Ned Lamont addresses controversial housing veto, shares thoughts on running for a third term
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49:00Connecticut lawmakers passed some of the most ambitious housing legislation in years this session. The bill looked to address affordable housing, zoning and parking. But then, Gov. Ned Lamont vetoed it. The Democrat is now inviting lawmakers to make a new proposal, which he hopes to pass it later this year in a special session. Today on The Wheelho…
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I’ve had some well-documented trouble with our neighborhood squirrels over the last few winters. It could be that most homeowners in the Northeast and beyond feel like they’ve had some sort of conflict with the local squirrels. But we maybe misunderstand squirrels. Their seemingly scattershot behaviors actually suggest a fascinating intelligence an…
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All calls: Bug poop and happy elks hold the world together
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49:00We’ve been doing these shows where we don’t book any guests, where we fill the hour with your calls. And your calls have been interesting and surprising and amusing. This hour, the conversation winds around to aggressive grills on cars, wrong-way drivers on Connecticut highways, the composer Lili Boulanger, voting rights for permanent residents, th…
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The Nose looks at ‘Ironheart’ and The New York Times’ best 100 movies of the century list
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49:59Ironheart is a new miniseries from Marvel Television. It is the 28th (not a typo) TV series in the Marvel Cinematic Universe, and it concludes Phase Five of the MCU after six movies and eight series. Ironheart is set about six months after the events of Black Panther: Wakanda Forever, which came out in 2022, but which is set in the spring of 2025 —…
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The story of book chapters, one page at a time
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50:00This hour we take a look at the history and evolution of chapters, and discuss how they impact our reading experiences. GUESTS: Nicholas Dames: Professor in the Department of English and Comparative Literature at Columbia University, where he studies the history and theory of the novel. His new book is The Chapter: A Segmented History from Antiquit…
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All calls: Are you car shopping in an animated movie?
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49:01We’ve been doing these shows where we don’t book any guests, where we fill the hour with your calls. And your calls have been interesting and surprising and amusing. These shows are fun for us, and they seem to be fun for you, too. So we did another one. This week's topics include Trump's Policy Bill, video game soundtracks, mortality, the WNBA, an…
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Socrates' lessons on life, death, and conversation with Agnes Callard
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49:00This hour, philosopher Agnes Callard joins us to talk about her latest book, Open Socrates: The Case for a Philosophical Life. GUEST: Agnes Callard: Associate Professor of Philosophy at The University of Chicago and author of Open Socrates: The Case for a Philosophical Life If you or someone you know is in crisis, call or text the 988 Suicide & Cri…
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‘A kind of musical Mark Twain’: A look at Randy Newman
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50:00Randy Newman has been nominated for 22 Academy Awards (he’s won twice), for 23 Grammy Awards (seven wins), and for three Primetime Emmy Awards (and he won all three). Bruce Springsteen has called him “our great master of American song and storytelling.” Jackson Browne says Randy Newman is “the foremost satirist of our times.” And the composer John …
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When you think of the Vikings, you probably picture a bearded man wearing a horned hat, pillaging on a Viking ship. But that's far from the whole story. This hour is all about the everyday lives of the Vikings with historian Eleanor Barraclough, from their homes and hair to their myths and music. GUEST: Eleanor Barraclough: Historian, writer, and b…
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Puerto Rican music and politics are tightly linked. A new Yale course on Bad Bunny explores why
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48:58This fall, students at Yale University will take a course called “Bad Bunny: Musical Aesthetics and Politics.” Bad Bunny, born on the island of Puerto Rico as Benito Antonio Martínez Ocasio, isn’t the first Latino musician to weave activism into his work. Regarding the Yale class, Bad Bunny told Rolling Stone magazine “I have in the back of my mind…
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Our relationship with rest is changing, and it’s about time
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49:00This hour is all about the importance of rest, and how to rest well. Plus, we'll talk about the role of rest in religion, and look at the history of "the rest cure" in medicine. GUESTS: Alex Soojung-Kim Pang: Author of Rest: Why You Get More Done When You Work Less, and Shorter: Work Better, Smarter, and Less—Here's How among other books Kristen Lu…
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This hour: the art of the epigraph. We talk with writers about how they pick the quotes that open their books, what epigraphs can do well, how the business of epigraphs works, and what epigraphs mean for readers. Plus, a look at how some movies use epigraphs. GUESTS: David Edelstein: America’s Greatest Living Film Critic Tajja Isen: A contributing …
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All calls: Why don’t people say ‘you’re welcome’ anymore? Good question
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48:57We’ve been doing these shows where we don’t book any guests, where we fill the hour with your calls. And your calls have been interesting and surprising and amusing. This hour, the conversation winds around to the U.S. bombing Iran and Iran’s retaliation in Qatar, the Democratic primary in New York City, the possible decline of “you’re welcome,” a …
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Live from Watkinson: The legacy of Brian Wilson
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42:00Brian Wilson was a singer, songwriter, record producer, and a founding member of The Beach Boys. He’s thought of as one of the great geniuses of pop music, and he’s been called the poet laureate of summer. Wilson died June 11 at 82. On February 1, 2017, we went to Watkinson School in Hartford and put on a show, on stage in front of a live audience,…
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Exploring astrology: Do stars really impact us?
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42:00Humans have always been interested in the sky, and astrology has been used as a tool for people in power for a long time. During times of stress, interest in astrology increases. But why are we so interested in something that is not considered a science? This hour, a look at the history of astrology, its relationship with astronomy, and the reasons…
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The past and present of beach segregation in Connecticut
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41:00Connecticut has hundreds of miles of shoreline, extending from Greenwich in the west to Stonington in the east. Many of these coastal communities have found ways to exclude certain people. There’s actually a long history of segregation on our shores, dating back decades. This hour, we’ll look at past and present beach access in Connecticut. Plus, w…
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You want me to eat what?! An examination of disgust
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42:00Okay, this show comes with a trigger warning. We talk about things people eat, and some of those things are not for the squeamish. This hour, a look at disgust — and, specifically, how our reflexive disgust response may get in the way of things we probably need to think about doing. During the next century, the human race probably needs to eat more…
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Perfectionism is on the rise among young people. This hour, we look at the impact of perfectionism on mental health and how to deal with perfectionist tendencies. Plus: what the self-help industry can tell us about our interest in perfection. GUESTS: Thomas Curran: Assistant professor of psychological and behavioral science at the London School of …
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The Nose says goodbye to Brian Wilson and looks at ‘The Phoenician Scheme’
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48:57The pop music genius Brian Wilson, a founding member of The Beach Boys, died on June 11. The Nose says goodbye. And: Wes Anderson has written and directed 12 feature films. The Nose has covered at least four of them plus his set of Roald Dahl shorts. So this hour, a look at Wes Anderson’s latest, The Phoenician Scheme, in all its twee, symmetrical,…
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Listen live Thursday at 1 p.m. We’ve done a version of this show every single year since 2013. And we did it in 2011. We probably even did one in 2010. (We just can’t prove it.) So it’s a bit of a tradition. It’s a tradition that … makes some people angry, we realize. And that has a lot to do with how we define the term “song of the summer.” We use…
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The animating power of rivers with writer Robert Macfarlane
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49:00What would it mean if we treated rivers as alive? That's the question that nature writer Robert Macfarlane wrestles with in his new book. What would happen if we took that aliveness seriously? How would we know what a river would want? Who would speak for it? These are questions that communities around the world are dealing with as they work to fig…
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That’s a wrap: CT lawmakers react to 2025’s legislative session
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49:02Connecticut lawmakers recently cemented their priorities for the next two years with final passage of a $55.8 billion budget. At the end of the 2025 legislative session, they were able to find money for Medicaid programs and invest in our children’s future, especially young children. But some – mainly the minority in the state legislature – say tha…
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We're reading fewer books. That's not good
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50:00This hour, we take stock of what it's like to read as an adult, and discuss why some Americans, including college students, are reading fewer books. We'll talk about how technology has impacted how we read. And we'll celebrate the practice of reading. GUESTS: Rose Horowitch: Assistant editor at The Atlantic Maryanne Wolf: Permanent member of the Po…
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We’ve been doing these shows where we don’t book any guests, where we fill the hour with your calls. And your calls have been interesting and surprising and amusing. This hour, the conversation winds around the "dumbing down" of the arts, the way people pronounce "to," reading in the bathroom, the evolution of language, the Declaration of Independe…
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The Nose looks at ‘Dept. Q’ and ‘Pee-wee as Himself’
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49:00Dept. Q is a new Scottish detective mystery series on Netflix and created by Scott Frank and Chandi Lakhani based on the book series by Jussi Adler-Olsen. It stars Matthew Goode as DCI Carl Morck, a wounded and unpleasant, but fairly brilliant, detective. The supporting cast includes Chloe Pirrie, Jamie Sives, Mark Bonnar, and Kelly Macdonald. And:…
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This show isn’t waterproof, but your raincoat might be: The history of waterproofing our tech and everyday products
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49:00Have you ever broken your phone or computer by dropping it in water or spilling a drink on it? This hour, we discuss the relationship between the ever-present technologies in our lives and the liquids that surround us. We'll learn about how waterproofing works, and what all of this can tell us about consumer responsibility and the role of technolog…
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From totes to Birkins, handbags hold the keys to the world (along with your wallet and phone)
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49:00For many of us, handbags are an essential part of our lives. They allow us to leave the house with everything we need, and they also can be another place to show off our status or style. This hour, we look at the evolution of the handbag. We'll talk about famous "It Bags", how handbags contributed to human development, and the impact of the Walmart…
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The 2025 CT legislative session wraps today. Will the guardrails hold?
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49:01The 2025 legislative session in Connecticut started with lawmakers facing an uncertain future clouded by potential federal funding cuts. The end of the session is nigh in Connecticut. Amid these murky days, we know that local lawmakers have taken drastic measures to shore up state Medicaid funding. But how far are they willing to go to secure a new…
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Touch, grip, read, dance, gesture — what can’t they do? Our fingers are so vital to our everyday life, sometimes it seems they have minds of their own. This hour, a look at the hidden language of finger gestures, the future of Braille, and the joys and challenges of animating fingers for the movies. GUESTS: Kensy Cooperrider: Cognitive scientist, w…
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We’ve been doing these shows where we don’t book any guests, where we fill the hour with your calls. And your calls have been interesting and surprising and amusing. This hour, the conversation winds around to our tribute to Jill Sobule, spotted lanternflies, The Monkees, the provision in the tax bill that would weaken the courts, cardboard boxes, …
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Note: This episode contains strong language. Griffin Dunne is Jack Goodman in John Landis’ classic horror-comedy An American Werewolf in London and Paul Hackett in Martin Scorsese’s After Hours and Loudon Trout in the Madonna-starring screwball comedy Who’s That Girl. He’s Uncle Nicky on This Is Us and Professor Dudenoff on Only Murders in the Buil…
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There are thought to be about 17 million living flies for every human alive on Earth. They’re predators and parasites and pests, but they’re pollinators too. They help us solve crimes, heal wounds, and understand genetics and evolution. And they literally help at least one artist paint his paintings. Also this hour: A look at David Cronenberg’s 198…
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How robots, and our attitudes toward them, have evolved
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50:00What counts as a robot? This hour, a look at what robots are and the latest in robot technology. Plus, how robots were used and thought about in medieval times and Ancient Greece and the role of robots in science fiction. GUESTS: Chris Atkeson: Professor at the Robotics Institute and the Human-Computer Interaction Institute at Carnegie Mellon Unive…
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