Bullseye with Jesse Thorn
Bullseye from NPR is your curated guide to culture. Jesse Thorn hosts in-depth interviews with brilliant creators, culture picks from our favorite critics and irreverent original comedy. Bullseye has been featured in Time, The New York Times, GQ and McSweeney's, which called it "the kind of show people listen to in a more perfect world." (Formerly known as The Sound of Young America.)

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Syndication

We’re celebrating the season with our annual Bullseye Halloween Spectacular. We kick things off with an in-depth, funny conversation with R.L. Stine, creator of the Goosebumps series. Stine talks about how he got into writing, how he comes up with titles and why he wishes he never dreamed up an evil ventriloquist dummy. We’ll hear about the craziest day in the wild, storied career of drag queen Monét X Change (Ru Paul’s Drag Race, Hulu’s Huluween Dragstravaganza). Also, an interview with Ana Fabrega, star and co-creator of the great TV series Los Espookys.


The Song That Changed My Life is a segment that gives a chance for musicians and artists to tell us about the song that made them who they are. This week, we talked to Lil’ Mike and Funny Bone, a rap duo from Oklahoma City. Mike and Bone are brothers who got their big break in 2013 when they made an appearance on America’s Got Talent. And they are truly unique – they’re both members of the Pawnee tribe, both stand a little over 4 feet tall, and they perform Christian rap. Mike and Bone are also actors who appear on FX’s Reservation Dogs. When we asked about the song that changed their life, they enthusiastically agreed on a mutual favorite.


For over twenty years, Steve-O has performed on Jackass in all its iterations. He’s done stunts on the original TV show, the movies and the spinoffs. He’s risked life and limb, suffered countless serious injuries and in doing so made millions of people laugh and gasp. Recently, he’s reunited with the Jackass crew for their latest film: Jackass Forever. He also has a new memoir out called: A Hard Kick in the Nuts: What I’ve Learned From a Lifetime of Terrible Decisions. Steve-O joins the show to chat about his new memoir and his work in Jackass over the years. He also talks about whether or not going sober has affected the work he does on screen with Jackass. Plus, he shares what it was like performing in a circus on a cruise ship.


Tom Scott is a rapper from New Zealand’s underground hip-hop scene. He’s been rapping for over a decade now. He grew up in Auckland – the biggest city in a very small country. In 2018, Tom released an amazing, beautiful album under the name Avantdale Bowling Club. On the record, he reflects on his roots. His childhood. The friendships he’s lost. The places he’s been. His family. It’s an intimate hip hop record with jazz instrumentation. Tom recently released Trees, a follow up to the self-titled debut album. We’re taking a moment to revisit our conversation with Tom from 2019. Tom explains what it’s like to write an album that brings back somber memories, and why he felt it was important to use original jazz songs, rather than jazz samples.


Before John David Washington was an actor, he was lacing up the pads every week for a career in professional football. It seems fitting, then, that when he took up acting, his breakthrough role was the portrayal of an NFL player on HBO’s Ballers . Washington has since gone onto play a bunch of other big parts since Ballers. He has since had a lead part in Spike Lee’s BlacKkKlansman and a role in the brand new mystery comedy Amsterdam, which just hit theaters. In 2019, he joined us to chat about the many times he had to audition for his role on Ballers. Plus, what it was like to get a stunning offer for his role in BlacKkKlansman via a text message from Spike Lee.


Hua Hsu is a staff writer for The New Yorker. He’s written profiles and reviews of artists like Bjork, bell hooks, and Sandra Oh. He’s also a professor of English at Bard College, with a passion for elevating underappreciated talent in literature. His new book, Stay True, is an intimate and probing memoir. In Stay True, Hsu looks back on his early twenties, when he was an undergrad at University of California, Berkeley. Stay True is about the most intimate relationships that defined his adolescence and young adulthood. Hua Hsu shares how writing this book reflected and refracted his relationship with his own American-ness.


Bonnie Raitt is a legend. Now in her 70’s, she’s still touring, still shredding and still writing songs. She’s been recording music for over 50 years and she’s won ten Grammys. Bonnie’s also been in the rock and roll hall of fame for over two decades. Earlier this year she released Just Like That. Her eighteenth full length studio album. Our correspondent Ray Suarez talked with Bonnie about the new album. She gets into coming into her own as an artist, playing through the pandemic and getting back on the road. Plus, she’ll talk about her longtime friend and collaborator John Prine, and what it was like performing his music after his death in 2020. Bonnie is on the road now, check out her tour dates here.