A Prairie Home Companion is a live radio
variety show created and hosted by
Garrison Keillor. The show runs two
hours on Saturdays from 6 to 8 p.m
Eastern Time, and 5 to 7 p.m.
Central Time, and usually originates from
the Fitzgerald
Theater
in Saint Paul, Minnesota
, although it is frequently taken on the
road. A Prairie Home Companion is known for its
musical guests, especially folk and traditional musicians,
tongue-in-cheek
radio drama, and
Keillor's
comedic storytelling segment,
"News from
Lake Wobegon".
The radio program inspired a 2006
film of the same name,
directed by
Robert Altman and
featuring Keillor,
Lily Tomlin,
Meryl Streep,
Lindsay
Lohan,
Tommy Lee Jones and
Kevin Kline.
It is produced by Prairie Home Productions and distributed by
American Public Media, and is
most often heard on
public radio
stations in the United States. The show has a long history,
existing in a similar form as far back as 1974, and borrowing the
name from a radio program in existence in 1969.
The program was named
after the Prairie Home Cemetery in Moorhead, Minnesota
, located next to Concordia
College
.
History
The earliest radio program to have this name bears little
resemblance to what is currently heard on Saturday evenings.
A
Prairie Home Companion was originally a morning show running
from 6 to 9 a.m. on Minnesota Public Radio.
After
researching the Grand Ole
Opry
for an article, Keillor became interested in doing
a variety show on the radio. On 6 July 1974, the first live
broadcast of
A Prairie Home Companion took place.
That show
was broadcast from St. Paul in the Janet Wallace Auditorium of
Macalester
College
. Twelve audience members turned out, mostly
children. The second episode featured the first performance on the
show by
Butch Thompson, who became
house
pianist. Thompson stayed with the
program until 1986, and still frequently performs on the
show.
In 1978,
the show moved into the World Theater in St. Paul, which was
renovated in 1986 and renamed the Fitzgerald Theater in 1994. This is the same location that the
program uses today.
A Prairie Home Companion at the
Minnesota State Fair.
The show went off the air in 1987, and Keillor married and spent
some time abroad during the following two years. For a brief time,
the show was replaced—both on the air and in the World Theater—by
Good Evening,
a live variety show designed by ex-
Prairie Home and
All Things Considered
staffers to retain the audience Keillor cultivated over the years.
Many stations opted instead to continue
APHC repeats in
its traditional Saturday time slot.
In 1989,
Keillor returned to radio with The American Radio Company of
the Air (renamed Garrison Keillor's American Radio
Company in its second season), broadcast originally from the
Brooklyn Academy
of Music
. The new program was a slightly revised
format, with sketches and musical guests reflecting a more New York
sensibility, rather than the country and folk music predominant in
APHC. Also, while Keillor still sang and delivered a
regular monologue on
American Radio Company, Lake Wobegon
was initially downplayed, as he felt it was "cruel" to talk to a
Brooklyn audience about life in a small town. During this period,
Keillor revived the full
APHC format only for "annual
farewell performances". In the fall of 1992, Keillor returned to
the World Theater with
ARC for the majority of the season,
and the next year, the program officially reverted to the
A
Prairie Home Companion name and format.
While many of the episodes originate from St. Paul, the show often
travels to other cities around the U.S. and overseas for its live
weekly broadcasts.
Common road venues include The Town Hall in New York City, Tanglewood
in Lenox, Massachusetts
, Wolf Trap
in Vienna, Virginia
, Ryman
Auditorium
in Nashville,
Tennessee
, the Greek Theater
in Los
Angeles
, and the State Theater in Minneapolis
. There is also a show each year at the
Minnesota
State Fair
.
The show was originally distributed nationally by Minnesota Public
Radio in association with
Public Radio International. Its
current distributor is Minnesota Public Radio's distribution unit,
American Public Media.
Format
Each show opens with the
Spencer
Williams composition "
Tishomingo
Blues" as the theme song, but with lyrics written especially
for
A Prairie Home Companion. Before 1987, the show's
theme was Keillor's singing of the
Hank
Snow hit "Hello Love".
Music is a strong feature of the program; the show is a significant
outlet for
American folk music
of many genres, especially
country,
bluegrass,
blues and
gospel, but the
show also has guest performers from a wide variety of other styles
of music including
classical and
opera and from a number of different countries.
Chet Atkins, noted country musician and
former record company executive, appeared many times on the show,
as have singer-songwriters
Mark
Knopfler (
lead guitarist and
frontman of the bands
Dire Straits and the
Notting Hillbillies), and
Jeff Lang. Folk/gospel duo
Robin and Linda Williams have been
regular guests since 1976, and often join with Keillor and
Jearlyn Steele to form "The Hopeful Gospel
Quartet".
Peter Ostroushko,
Greg Brown,
Jean Redpath and
Prudence Johnson, among others, were
recurring guests on the program in the period between 1974 and
1987.
Greetings from members of the audience (which are frequently
humorous) to friends and family at home are read each week by
Keillor just after the show's
intermission at the top of the second
hour.
Features
The Rhubarb Sisters singing on A
Prairie Home Companion.
Radio comedy
skits featuring Keillor and the
ensemble are performed, such as the satirical "
Guy Noir,
Private
Eye", which pokes fun at
film noir
(gumshoe detective films) and
radio
dramas. Guy Noir's popularity is such that the first few notes
of the theme, or the first lines of the announcer's introduction
("A dark night in a city that knows how to keep its secrets...")
often draw applause and cheers from the theatre audience. A 2006
Guy Noir skit about
Tourette
syndrome, titled "Broadway Tourette's", prompted a press
release from the
Tourette
Syndrome Association. Also regularly featured are the
adventures of Dusty and Lefty, "The Lives of the Cowboys." In these
skits, Dusty (played by Tim Russell) is a rough and tumble
stereotypical cowboy, while Lefty (played by Keillor) is his
sensitive counterpart.
One of the show's best known features is Keillor's
News
from Lake Wobegon, a weekly story-telling monologue,
claiming to be a report from Keillor's fictitious hometown of
Lake Wobegon, "the little town that
time forgot and the decades cannot improve ... where all the women
are strong, all the men are good-looking, and all the children are
above average." The opening words of the monologue usually do not
change: "Well, it's been a quiet week in Lake Wobegon, Minnesota,
my hometown, out on the edge of the prairie." Keillor often pokes
fun at the large Scandinavian-American community in the northern
parts of the Midwest, with Minnesota being a primary example, and
many of his fictional characters have names that reflect this. The
News from Lake Wobegon does not have a set structure, but often
features recurring characters and places, such as the Chatterbox
Café, the Sidetrack Tap, Pastor Inqvist of the Lake Wobegon
Lutheran Church, Father Emil of Our
Lady of Perpetual Responsibility
Roman Catholic Church (a parody of
Our Lady of Perpetual
Help), the Lake Wobegon Whippets sports teams, various members
of the Bunsen and Krebsbach families, and an assortment of nearby
"
Norwegian bachelor farmers." The
monologue usually runs more than 10 minutes.
Once a year the program runs a special "joke show", which generally
includes the Lake Wobegon monologue and musical acts, but any other
skits are replaced by the performers taking turns telling jokes.
Humorists such as
Paula Poundstone
and
Roy Blount Jr. often make guest
appearances on those shows.
"Sponsors"
The show is "sponsored" by the fictitious product "Powdermilk
Biscuits", whose slogan is "Made from whole wheat raised in the
rich bottomlands of the Lake Wobegon river valley by Norwegian
bachelor farmers; so you know they're not only good for you, but
also pure ... mostly", which "give shy people the strength to get
up and do what needs to be done. Heavens they're tasty and
expeditious." Powdermilk Biscuits has its own theme song, sung by
Keillor every week.
Sign for a fictional sponsor.
Other original "sponsors" have included
- The Sidetrack Tap
- Mournful Oatmeal ("Calvinism in a
box")
- Raw Bits breakfast cereal
- Jack's Auto Repair and Jack's Warm Car Service
- Midwestern Discount Store
- The Bon Marché Beauty Salon
- Bertha's Kitty Boutique (having locations in
the "Dales" shopping centers: "Roy'n'Dale, Airedale
, Teasdale, Chippendale, Mondale, and
all the other fine shopping centers.")
- The Fearmonger's Shop, a purveyor of security devices for the
perpetually paranoid
- Guy's Shoes ("Guy's steel-toed shoes—so even when you strike
out (ping!) you can walk away", also the purveyor of Guy's All-Star
Shoes, the Converse-like sponsor of
the Shoe Band)
- Ralph's Pretty Good Grocery ("If you can't find it at Ralph's,
you can probably get along without it"), the inspiration of the
name of the Pretty Good Privacy
cryptographic software. (Ralphs Grocery Co.
is the name of a real chain of markets in Southern California. It
is not clear whether this coincidence has had any legal
repercussions.)
- Be-Bop-A-Re-Bop Rhubarb Pie and Be-Bop-A-Re-Bop Frozen Rhubarb
Pie Filling. ("One little thing can revive a guy, and that is a
piece of rhubarb pie / Serve it up, nice
and hot / Maybe things aren't as bad as you thought. Momma's little
baby loves rhubarb rhubarb, Be-Bop-A-Re-Bop Rhubarb Pie" — to the
tune of "Shortnin' Bread". This is
usually sung following a sound-effect-enhanced tale of woe and
immediately followed by "Wouldn't this be a great time for a piece
of rhubarb pie? Yes, nothing gets the taste of shame and
humiliation out of your mouth quite like Be-Bop-A-Re-Bop Rhubarb
Pie."
- Monback Moving & Storage (a mover is heard directing a
moving truck as a backup alarm can be heard beeping: "Monback ...
Monback ... (crunch) That's good.")
- Rent-a-Raptor (Rid your home of mice, rabbits, squirrels, and
pesky boyfriends)
- Fritz Electronics ("Where everything you need is on the
Fritz")
- Bob's Bank ("Save at the sign of the sock.", "Neither a
borrower nor a lender be.")
- The recurring segment "The Lives of the Cowboys" normally has
its own, Western-themed sponsors, such as Prairie Dog Granola Bars
("healthier than chewing tobacco and you don't have to spit").
Other recurring bits on the show include fictional commercials,
including those for The Catchup Advisory Board (its name being a
compromise between the two common spellings for the condiment:
"catsup" and "ketchup"), which proclaims the good news about the
condiment's "natural mellowing agents" after a short skit of the
sufferings of a middle-aged couple, the American
Duct Tape Council, Marvin and Mavis Smiley
seasonal
bluegrass albums, Fred
Farrell Animal Calls, the Professional Organization of
English Major (P.O.E.M.), Earl's Academy of
Accents, the Federation of Associated Organizations, the American
Society of Sound Effects Specialists, and the Café Boeuf, a
snobbish French restaurant in Lake Wobegon.
In-joke references are also sprinkled through the
show, such as "Piscacadawadaquoddymoggin", a made-up word that's
been used both for places and for people's names. The components of
this made-up word are portions of place names in the New England
region of the United States, most of them in the state of
Maine.
Alterations
While much of the show is directed toward
radio comedy, a portion of the show is usually
devoted to some more sentimental and sometimes dark stories put
together by Keillor and others. The program occasionally features
political satire. At the beginning of June 5 2004 show (which was
broadcast from Meadowbrook U.S.
Cellular Pavilion in Gilford
, New
Hampshire
), Keillor
announced that former U.S.
President Ronald Reagan had died. A member of the
audience hooted and cheered loudly. But Keillor, a staunch
Democrat, gave the Republican Reagan a warm tribute in the form of
a gospel song. Similarly, in a 2002 show airing the weekend
following the death of Senator
Paul
Wellstone, Keillor changed up the format of the show, starting
off the show with Wellstone's favorite segment, Guy Noir, skipping
even the usual theme song for the show.
Cast
In addition to Garrison Keillor, several other performers
frequently appear on
A Prairie Home Companion:
Gary Raynor and Rich Dworsky.
Featured Members of
Guy's All-Star Shoe Band:
Sound effects artists:
Actors:
During its season as
The American Radio Company of the
Air,
Bob Elliott was a
regular cast member. In the 1990s before Russell,
Bill Perry and
Walter
Bobbie were actors.
Ivy Austin was a
regular contributing comedienne and vocalist in the early 90's.
Also,
Erica Rhodes occasionally joins
the company.
Broadcast information
The show is distributed by
Minnesota Public Radio's distribution
arm,
American Public Media, to
more than 500
public radio stations in
the United States as well as other outlets. Approximately 3.9
million U.S. listeners tune in each week. The program is also
carried around the world by the American
Armed Forces Radio Network as
well as
America One.
Sirius XM Satellite Radio carries
the show via its
XM Public Radio and
NPR Now channels.
Radio New Zealand
National carries it from time to time.
In Europe, the show is currently broadcast by WRN Europe on Sundays
at 1100 UTC.
NPR Worldwide, NPR's international
radio channel, also broadcasts the full show at 1200 CET on the
Hotbird satellite.
An
alternative edition of the show is broadcast in the UK by BBC Radio 7, in Ireland
by RTÉ Radio 1, and
on Australia's ABC Radio National
under the name Garrison Keillor's Radio
Show. This version of the show runs for
approximately one hour and features the News from Lake Wobegon and
selected musical acts and comedy sketches. Unlike
A Prairie
Home Companion there are no station breaks. There are also no
underwriting credits, as the BBC and ABC do not use
underwriting as a means of funding
broadcasts (RTÉ does, normally, but still broadcasts the same
version of the show). However, some of the program's fictional
sponsors are credited at the start of the show.
The current and many past shows can also be listened to for free as
audio stream. They can be found in the archive section at the
show's
website.
"The News From Lake Wobegon" is also available as a free weekly
podcast.
Film
Released on 9 June 2006, a film about the radio show written by and
starring Keillor began filming on 9 June 2005. It also stars
Kevin Kline,
John C. Reilly,
Meryl Streep,
Lindsay Lohan,
Lily
Tomlin,
Maya Rudolph,
Woody Harrelson,
Virginia Madsen,
Tommy Lee Jones, and
L.Q. Jones.
Robert Altman directed the film, which is a
fictional representation of
behind-the-scenes activities on
a long-running radio show that has unexpectedly been
cancelled.
The film does not follow the precise format of the radio show,
notably excluding any reference to Lake Wobegon.
LP/CD Releases
- A Prairie Home Album [LP]
(Minnesota Educational Radio)
- Pretty Good Jokes [2 CD]
(2000, HighBridge Audio)
- Gospel Birds and other Stories of Lake Wobegon, as Heard Live
on Broadcasts of A Prairie Home Companion [2 CD] (1985, HighBridge
Company)
- Garrison Keillor and the Hopeful Gospel Quartet (1992,
Sony)
- Lake Wobegon Loyalty Days (1993, EMI)
- Garrison Keillor's Comedy Theater: More Songs and Sketches from
A Prairie Home Companion [3 CD] (1996, HighBridge Company)
- A Prairie Home Companion Anniversary Album: The First Five
Years [2 cassettes] (1988, PHC, Inc.)
- Shaking The Blues Away, Rob Fisher and The Coffee Club
Orchestra with Garrison Keillor (1992, Angel Records in association
with EMI Records Ltd.)
- A Prairie Home Companion: English Majors: A Comedy Collection
for the Highly Literate [2 CD] (2008, HighBridge Company)
References
External links
Wikis
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