Elizabeth Blair
Elizabeth Blair is a Peabody Award-winning senior producer/reporter on the Arts Desk of NPR News.
Blair produces, edits, and reports arts and cultural segments for NPR's Morning Edition, All Things Considered, and Weekend Edition. In this position, she has reported on a range of topics from arts funding to the MeToo movement. She has profiled renowned artists such as Yayoi Kusama and Mikhail Baryshnikov, explored how old women are represented in fairy tales, and reported the origins of the children's classic Curious George. Among her all-time favorite interviews are actors Octavia Spencer and Andy Serkis, comedians Bill Burr and Hari Kondabolu, the rapper K'Naan, and Cookie Monster (in character).
Blair has overseen several, large-scale series including The NPR 100, which explored landmark musical works of the 20th Century, and In Character, which probed the origins of iconic American fictional characters. Along with her colleagues on the Arts Desk and at NPR Music, Blair curated American Anthem, a major series exploring the origins of songs that uplift, rouse, and unite people around a common theme.
Blair's work has received several honors, including two Peabody Awards and a Gracie. She previously lived in Paris, France, where she co-produced Le Jazz Club From Paris with Dee Dee Bridgewater, and the monthly magazine Postcard From Paris.
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From AI research to historical preservation, programs funded by grants from the National Endowment for the Humanities reach every corner of the U.S. Now the government has terminated those grants. -
From taking over the Kennedy Center to halting federal funding of DEI programs, President Trump's actions have had a tremendous impact on artists, audiences and arts institutions.
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Comedian Conan O'Brien received the Mark Twain Prize at the Kennedy Center on Sunday night, which David Letterman called "the most entertaining gathering of the resistance ever." -
The layoffs come after 200 Sesame Workshop employees announced they want to form a union. -
The wordless film follows animals forging an unlikely friendship as they fight to survive a natural disaster. But scary flood scenes and existential themes may be a bit much for the youngest viewers. -
Sarah Silverman's musical "The Bedwetter" is largely autobiographical but she says its themes of self-awareness and taking care of one another are especially important right now.
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For its 50th anniversary, Saturday Night Live has a weekend of live events starring cast members, musicians and celebrities. -
MAX will no longer distribute new episodes of "Sesame Street" after 2025.
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The stars came out to celebrate this year's Kennedy Center Honorees: Bonnie Raitt, the Grateful Dead, Arturo Sandoval, Francis Ford Coppola and The Apollo. The Honors broadcast on CBS on Dec. 22.
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A Danish museum has agreed to return the bronze head of a Roman Emperor to Turkey. The sculpture was among thousands of artifacts looted from Turkey and sold to American and European museums. (This story first aired on All Things Considered on Dec. 3, 2024.)
