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Fresh Air Weekend: Actor Andie MacDowell; Novelist Gary Shteyngart

Andie MacDowell says her experience with her own mother's mental illness informs her portrayal of Paula in the Netflix series <em>Maid.</em>
Ricardo Hubbs
/
Netflix
Andie MacDowell says her experience with her own mother's mental illness informs her portrayal of Paula in the Netflix series Maid.

Fresh Air Weekend highlights some of the best interviews and reviews from past weeks, and new program elements specially paced for weekends. Our weekend show emphasizes interviews with writers, filmmakers, actors and musicians, and often includes excerpts from live in-studio concerts. This week:

Andie MacDowell draws from the chaos and darkness of her childhood for 'Maid': MacDowell grew up with a mother who was mentally ill and addicted to alcohol. "Understanding the complexity of mental illness was something that I'm versed in," she says.

Louise Erdrich's disquieting new novel will keep you on your toes: Set in a haunted Minneapolis bookshop over the course of one very momentous year, The Sentence is an ambitious novel, featuring a sinister ghost, a country in tumult and Erdrich's own shifting style.

How Gary Shteyngart's pandemic pod inspired a novel about friendship: Our Country Friends is about the trysts and betrayals that occur within a group of friends during the pandemic. It's an exaggerated version of Shteyngart's own COVID experience.

You can listen to the original interviews and review here:

Andie MacDowell draws from the chaos and darkness of her childhood for 'Maid'

Louise Erdrich's disquieting new novel will keep you on your toes

How Gary Shteyngart's pandemic pod inspired a novel about friendship

Copyright 2021 Fresh Air. To see more, visit Fresh Air.

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SOMOS CONNECTICUT es una iniciativa de Connecticut Public, la emisora local de NPR y PBS del estado, que busca elevar nuestras historias latinas y expandir programación que alza y informa nuestras comunidades latinas locales. Visita CTPublic.org/latino para más reportajes y recursos. Para noticias, suscríbase a nuestro boletín informativo en ctpublic.org/newsletters.

Federal funding is gone.

Congress has eliminated all funding for public media.

That means $2.1 million per year that Connecticut Public relied on to deliver you news, information, and entertainment programs you enjoyed is gone.

The future of public media is in your hands.

All donations are appreciated, but we ask in this moment you consider starting a monthly gift as a Sustainer to help replace what’s been lost.