Wait Wait … Don’t Tell Me! host Peter Sagal isn’t afraid to play favorites when it comes to Illinois State University’s long roster of celebrity alumni, including Jane Lynch, Laurie Metcalf, John Malkovich, Sean Hayes and Craig Robinson.
His favorite right now is Brendan Hunt, who plays Coach Beard on the Apple TV series Ted Lasso. But that’s just because Hunt has agreed to join Sagal during a live episode of Wait Wait that will be taped Nov. 12 at ISU’s Braden Auditorium. Hunt is an ISU theatre grad from 1996.
“We wanted an esteemed graduate, and we got one,” Sagal said.
Hunt will be the guest for “Not My Job,” a recurring bit on NPR’s popular news quiz show. He’ll be joined by panelists Paula Poundstone, Shane O’Neill and Adam Burke. Tickets are now available.
Wait Wait normally tapes in Chicago but does several road shows every year. This will be the first time they’ve come to Normal.
“It’s always so exciting to me that people I don’t know are excited to see us. So there’s always a thrill, even decades into doing it,” Sagal said on WGLT's Sound Ideas.
The Normal taping will air on NPR stations across the country just a few days later. The audience will get to see how the sausage gets made.
“We normally record about 90 minutes of material that gets cut down to the 48 minutes or so you hear [on the radio]. And this time it’ll be even longer because Paula Poundstone will be with us,” Sagal joked. “And if you’ve never seen Paula, she has a tendency to go on, brilliantly, amazingly, delightfully, but at some length. So I guarantee anybody who comes will be getting more than their money’s worth because Paula Poundstone will be there.”
It will be Sagal’s first trip to Bloomington-Normal. “I say that not with pride, but with shame,” Sagal mused.
Sagal’s ears perked up when told about Constitution Trail, the 50+ mile trail system that snakes through the community. Sagal is an avid runner and wrote a memoir about it, called The Incomplete Book of Running.
“I’ve gotten to the point where if I don’t go for a run at least every other day I start to feel really weird and off and cranky,” Sagal said. “We public radio nerds have a tendency to live in our heads. I think it’s really important, maybe even more so for those of us who do spend so much time in our heads, to get into our body. To run. To move. To do something physical on a regular basis just to remind ourselves that yes, there’s something below the neck that we need to pay attention to.”
So if you’re out on Constitution Trail on Nov. 12 and hear a very recognizable voice telling you he’s passing on your left, that might just be Sagal.
Sagal said his voice doesn’t get recognized as often as you might think, and “frankly it happens no more than I prefer.”
“Nobody expects a voice that they are familiar with from their radio to come out of a face in front of them. It’s just not something people connect to,” Sagal said. “Everybody has an idea of what I look like [based on my voice]. And I can promise you all that I don’t look like that.”
Aside from his signature quick wit, another Sagal trademark is how he says “This is NPR” at the very end of each Wait Wait episode. It’s big and boastful and a bit of a departure from the more subdued voices you normally hear on public radio.
Sagal told WGLT he says it like that in part because it reflects his own joy about being on NPR. He was a fan and listener first before he became one of its most well-known voices.
“Yes, there’s pride. But there’s also kind of amazement to it like, here I am! This is NPR! This is NPR? It is! Oh my gosh, look at me. It’s that voice of a fan more than employee coming out.”
Peter Sagal and the Wait Wait team bring their live show to Normal on Nov. 12, hosted at ISU’s Braden Auditorium. Tickets are now available. If you have any suggestions for what Sagal and the team do in Normal [other than their show], you can contact them at NPR.org.
