Desert Island Discs

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BBC Radio 4 FM

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Castaway guests share the soundtrack of their lives.

Eight tracks, a book and a luxury: what would you take to a desert island? Guests share the soundtrack of their lives.

BBC Radio 4 LW

Desert Island Discs: Wendell Pierce, actor

Wendell Pierce, actor

BBC Radio 4 - Desert Island Discs, Wendell Pierce, actor

Wendell Pierce, actor, shares the soundtrack of his life with Lauren Laverne.

Wendell Pierce, actor, shares the eight tracks, book and luxury he would want to take with him if cast away to a desert island. With Lauren Laverne.

Wendell Pierce is an American actor best known for his role as Bunk Moreland in the television series The Wire. Since the series ended in 2008, he has made around 40 film and television appearances, including Treme, Selma and the legal drama Suits, in which he played Robert Zane, the father of Rachel Zane, played by Meghan Markle.  His theatre credits range from The Cherry Orchard to Death of a Salesman.  

Born in 1963, the youngest of three sons, Wendell grew up in the Pontchartrain Park area of New Orleans, which was the first middle-class African-American suburban-style development in the city. He graduated from the prestigious Juilliard School in New York and his career got off to a flying start with a small part opposite Tom Hanks in a film called The Money Pit. He hasn’t been out of work since. 

In 2005, Hurricane Katrina destroyed Wendell’s childhood home in New Orleans and he was instrumental in rebuilding his parents’ house in Pontchartrain Park. He also built 40 new homes and staged a production of Waiting for Godot on an empty street corner in one of the most devastated districts of the city. 

He is currently reprising his role as Willy Loman in Death of a Salesman on stage in London.  

DISC ONE: Jim Henson - Bein' Green (Featuring Kermit The Frog)
DISC TWO: Wynton Marsalis - Green Chimneys
DISC THREE: Funkadelic - One Nation Under a Groove (Part 1)
DISC FOUR:  Mahalia Jackson - Take My Hand, Precious Lord
DISC FIVE: Joni Mitchell - Both Sides Now
DISC SIX:  Solomon Burke - Don't Give Up on Me
DISC SEVEN: Aaron Copland - Appalachian Spring (Doppio Movimento), performed by New York Philharmonic
DISC EIGHT: John Coltrane - A Love Supreme Part I: Acknowledgement
 
BOOK CHOICE:  The Omni-americans: Black Experience And American Culture by Albert Murray.
LUXURY ITEM:  A multi-burner barbecue grill
CASTAWAY'S CHOICE:  Take My Hand, Precious Lord by Mahalia Jackson

Presenter: Lauren Laverne
Producer:  Cathy Drysdale

Intelligent speech, the most insightful journalism, the wittiest comedy, the most fascinating features and the most compelling drama and readings anywhere in UK radio.

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