The Sound of Pride: Stonewall at 50 WNYC

The 20 years since Matthew Shepard's death have been transformative for his mother, Judy. Plus: we talk to Samira Wiley, who appeared in an anniversary production of The Laramie Project.
— Judy Shepard is president of the Matthew Shepard Foundation.
— Moisés Kaufman is founder and artistic director of the Tectonic Theater Project; he co-wrote and directed the play The Laramie Project.
— Samira Wiley is an actor best known for her work on Orange is the New Black and The Handmaid’s Tale.
— You can stream the film version of The Laramie Project on HBO.
— Special thanks to Christina Russo and Maxim Ibadov.
Original music by Jeremy Bloom with additional music by Alexander Overington ("Inter C") and Broke For Free ("The Great").
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"Jewel's Catch One," a new documentary from C. Fitz, explores the legacy of America's oldest black-owned disco club, as well as the life of businesswoman and activist Jewel Thais-Williams. For four decades, Jewel provided safe spaces in Los Angeles for the black, L.G.B.T.Q., and AIDS-impacted communities. The club closed in 2015. The film was recently acquired by Ava DuVernay's grassroots distribution company, ARRAY.
Thais-Williams and Fitz join the program to discuss the film and what Jewel's nightclub meant for Los Angeles's marginalized communities at the height of the AIDS crisis.
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Alaska Thunderfuck 5000, winner of RuPaul's Drag Race All Stars Season 2, joins Phoebe to chat about the early years in drag, subverting norms and — porn. Plus, Phoebe visits Lululemon!
Watch the best of Alaska on RuPaul's Drag Race All Stars
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Even after "Don't Ask, Don't Tell" was repealed, the military wasn't an easy place to be out.
Audrey Quinn

, a WNYC health reporter, reported and produced this story.Special thanks to Alex Wagner, Tarak Shah, Todd Breasseale, and Sue Fulton.All season we'll be reporting stories about being out at work. Tell us yours at

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Episode scoring by Jeremy Bloom and Isaac Jones with additional music by Andy G. Cohen ("A Perceptible Shift"), Kevin MacLeod ("Dances and Dames," "Faster Does It," and "I Knew a Guy"), Anamorphic Orchestra ("Creature Comforts" and "Taking Dark Matter Lightly"), the U.S. Army Band ("To The Color"), and the U.S. Army Old Guard Fife & Drum Corps ("Soldier's Farewell").
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Edmund White has been a central figure in gay fiction since the nineteen-seventies. His trio of autobiographical novels captured decades of gay experience and the glory days of pre-AIDS gay culture. Now seventy-six, White says that “gay life has changed so much and as a novelist, the aesthetic has changed.” He talks to his former student, The New Yorker’s Joshua Rothman, and reads from his new novel, “Our Young Man.”
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Fifty years after the Stonewall Uprising, we look at what happened that night, through the voices of people who were there. WNYC's Jennifer Vanasco says that Stonewall — a filthy dive bar — was a most unlikely setting for the start of a crusade.