Making

Shonda Rhimes has been called TV’s greatest. With groundbreaking shows like Grey’s Anatomy, Scandal and How to Get Away with Murder, she became one of the most powerful showrunners in Hollywood history. But, the battle to Hollywood’s highest echelons wasn’t a joyride for a Black woman from Chicagoland. Hear from mentors, colleagues and cultural commentators on how the queen of television came to be.

Jordan Peele is responsible for modern classics in the horror genre, including the films Us, Nope and the Oscar-winning Get Out. Before all that, he was a self-described nerd. He majored in puppetry in college before dropping out with his friend Rebecca Drysdale to pursue a career in comedy. Hear from Drysdale, Peele’s early collaborator Brendan Hunt and cultural critic Aisha Harris about Jordan Peele’s rise to comedic and horror genius.

Part 1: Touch the sky. Before becoming a cultural lightning rod, Kanye West was a self-confident teenager, handing out mixtapes on the South and West sides of Chicago. In the first episode of our two-part podcast series, we track Kanye’s meteoric rise from uncredited producer to headlining star. Making tells the story of a different, iconic figure every episode. Subscribe and don’t miss an episode.

Part 2: It all falls down. Ye becomes a mouthpiece for the more sinister parts of American society. In the second episode of our two-part podcast series, hear from friends, journalists, activists, fans (and former fans) on Ye’s second act, from superstar status to cultural pariah. Making tells the story of a different, iconic figure every episode. Subscribe and don’t miss an episode.

Robyn Rihanna Fenty was just a 15 year-old student in Barbados when she showed up late for her audition with record producer Evan Rogers. Fortunately, her tardiness didn’t matter. She crushed it. “I just heard something really unique and special in her vocals, even though they were raw,” Rogers said on Making. “It was just one of those moments where I think I have something really special here...

When Ida B. Wells was just 21 years old, authorities kicked her off a train for sitting in the all-white “ladies’ car.” She sued. She wrote about the experience in her local church newspaper. “I felt that one had better die fighting against injustice than to die like a dog or a rat in a trap,” she said later. Wells would soon become one of America’s greatest journalism pioneers. After the lynching of her close friend, she investigated the prevalence of lynchings across the American South...

Jesse Owens’ four gold medals at the 1936 Olympics in Berlin is the stuff of legend. “A man who's a second class citizen at home, son of a sharecropper, grandson of slaves, going over to Hitler's Germany,” explained ESPN reporter Jeremy Schaap on Making. “And he rose to the occasion in a way that embodies true greatness.” But Owens’ journey from Alabama to Ohio to Germany and back again was filled with many highs and lows...

Frederick Douglass’ journey out of slavery and into the most powerful rooms in the country is a story of tenacity, luck and self-liberation. Hear the story of his improbable rise with Douglass’ great-great-great-grandson, Ken Morris; Douglass’ Pulitzer-prize-winning biographer, David Blight, and Emmy-award winning actor Jeffrey Wright, who’s lent his voice to Douglass for HBO and Apple Books. "He's a founding father of the American conscious.” Wright says of Douglass on Making...

When RuPaul’s mother was pregnant, she went to a psychic who said RuPaul would be famous. That psychic was right. With Emmys, Tonys and 14 studio albums, RuPaul Andre Charles has become the world’s most famous drag queen. But before superstardom, Ru was just a kid in the big city, go-go dancing to make ends meet. “None of us had any money back then. We were all shopping at thrift stores,” said friend and legendary drag queen Lady Bunny. “We were all kind of artsy-fartsy bums...

Perhaps best known for her seminal autobiography I Know Why The Caged Bird Sings, Maya Angelou is one of the most celebrated literary minds in history, whose poetry and prose has touched generations of readers. But before Caged Bird, Angelou danced and sang on and off Broadway, earned the moniker “Miss Calypso” in the 1950s, called dozens of American cities and African nations home, and even became the first Black woman to work as a cable car conductor in San Francisco...