LeVar Burton
LeVar Burton is an American actor, presenter, director, producer, and author best known for the TV miniseries Roots and the children’s show Reading Rainbow. He also hosts the podcast LeVar Burton Reads.
Guest Appearances
March 3, 2020
After wondering what a water-cooler chat would be like, Nicole & Sasheer are joined by LeVar Burton and Stephanie Cozart Burton for another round of Besting Each Other! First, Stephanie shares about how she pursued LeVar, getting drunk in Mexico, her Skinny Pop popcorn obsession, and LeVar’s sleep moaning. Then, LeVar spills the parts of their story that Stephanie left out, how he almost became a priest, their journey to parenthood, and how there are too many Amazon packages at their home. Reunited, they discuss their expectations for marriage, deal-breakers, and who really breaks down all the Amazon boxes.
Email or call Nicole & Sasheer with your friendship questions at:
(424) 645-7003
October 28, 2019
Actor, director and author LeVar Burton joins Andy Richter to talk about transplanting from West Germany to Sacramento, getting cast in Roots right out of college, and engaging kids with literature on Reading Rainbow. Plus, LeVar discusses his work on Star Trek: The Next Generation, his podcast LeVar Burton Reads, and the one piece of advice he’d offer his younger self.
This episode is sponsored by Betterhelp (www.betterhelp.com/threequestions code: THREEQUESTIONS) and Bombas (www.bombas.com/threequestions).
October 14, 2018
Books: they’re almost definitely supposed to do something besides decorate wall space. After all, there’s a whole class about them every year in school. Also various scientific studies say our brains get concrete benefits from reading the written word. But what do we gain when that word is read to us? What do we gain when we let a writer’s meaning reach us like never before? And what happens to society itself when literature takes on the role of prototyping our future?
On this week’s episode of The Cracked Podcast, Alex Schmidt sits down with the one and only LeVar Burton, host of the incredible ‘LeVar Burton Reads’ podcast. If you’ve watched TV in the last 40 years, LeVar’s gotten you excited about books directly (‘Reading Rainbow’), indirectly (the original ‘Roots’ TV adaptation), and science fictionally (decades of ‘Star Trek’ acting and directing). Today he and Alex explore how the world’s reacted to LeVar’s unique literary mission. They’ll also walk through a history of science fiction prototyping, the near future of ‘Trek’ storytelling, and what literacy can do for all our futures if we let it.
Footnotes: http://www.cracked.com/podcast/levar-burton-reading-sci-fi-where-weE28099re-headed-next/
August 7, 2018
Actor and activist LeVar Burton (LeVar Burton Reads, Star Trek: The Next Generation, Reading Rainbow) joins Andrew and Tawny to discuss if it’s racist to use the word “ghetto” when referring to cheaply made things, if a caller should step in and say something to his co-workers for mocking a fellow co-worker’s accent, and more. As always, leave us a message about anything you think is racist at (323) 389-RACE.
February 11, 2018
Paul F. Tompkins lovingly welcomes all back to Spontaneanation! This time out, Paul’s special guest is LeVar Burton of LeVar Burton Reads, Reading Rainbow, Roots, and Star Trek: The Next Generation! LeVar chats about what he thinks of Lyft drivers, witnessing a couple having sex as he was scuba diving, and being caught in a series of rapids in South-Central Africa. Then, they are joined by improvisers Zeke Nicholson, Ronnie Adrian, and Laci Mosley, to improvise a story set in Schenectady, NY. And as always, Eban (only the best) Schletter scores it all on piano!
This episode is brought to you by Squarespace (www.squarespace.com code: PFT).