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but vote Democrat, and don’t fit
the conservative view. I think it’s
the right wing that has declared
political war on this country, and
has been fairly successful.
EW: Can you explain a little about
this red and blue state divide in the
US? Is the polarization more pro-
nounced than in the past?
GK: I don’t think the red state-
blue state is all that important.
Some states have a clear political
history, but these things change.
I object to the characterization of
people by their politics. Most of my
friends are Democrats but I know
lots of Republicans. I don’t confuse
politics with character.
EW: I read your review of the
book American Vertigo in The New
York Times. You seem to be point-
ing out that after touring America,
the French writer Bernard-Henri
Levy misinterprets much of what
he sees, and by focusing on iconic
images and places, misrepresents
the US in the book. You’ve had
the opportunity to interact with
Americans from across the coun-
try while traveling for your show.
Where would you go to get a true
sense of the US?
GK: I think you would get a
better picture, a more interest-
ing picture, than Levy did if you
traveled by happenstance – if you
simply wandered and went where
impulse took you. This would be a
much more interesting book than
setting out to see cartoon aspects of
the country. Dealey Plaza in Dallas
holds a certain morbid fascination
for everybody (as does the lap danc-
er in Vegas, the Hollywood movie
star…) but we shouldn’t confuse
it with the country we live in. It’s
a small piece of American history.
But my main objection was that
it was hugely pretentious, and the
style was maddening to read.
EW: What are some of the biggest
misconceptions that Europeans
have of America?
GK: I’m not in as close touch
with Europe as I used to be. I
used to live in Copenhagen. When I
lived there, and that was some time
ago, I think the view of America
was mostly from television, so they
thought of us as being illiterate,
uninterested in books, obsessed
with sex and pornography and
obesity and guns. They thought of
us as dominated by fundamental-
ist, apocalyptic evangelists. They
didn’t see the diversity of the US. I
remember some wouldn’t come to
America because they assumed that
the moment they stepped foot in
New York they would be shot.
But Danes are a traveling people.
The ones who really had an appre-
ciation for America were the ones
who had gotten in a car and just
driven. They stayed off the freeways
and drove through the little towns
and made their way across the coun-
try. They fell in love with southern
towns with flowers and honeysuck-
les, and people with good manners.
They fell in love with the West, the
desert, the real desert – not Vegas
but the real desert – and the high
plains of Wyoming. They fell in
love with California. Anybody can
fall in love with California. They
came and they saw this enormous,
complicated and, on the whole,
very welcoming country.
EW: Your show is based out of
small-town Minnesota, and your
reverence for the area. The Midwest
is not exactly the hotbed of enter-
tainment. What is so special about
Minnesota?
GK: It’s where my friends are. It’s
where I grew up. My family is from
here. That would be enough. But
beyond that, my wife and I and my
little girl who is eight have made a
nice life. She’s in a school she loves.
She takes swimming lessons. And
she has little friends that live next
door. And when your child has this
idyllic life, you wouldn’t dream of
interrupting it. When your child is
perfectly happy you just want to let
her be perfectly happy.
EW: Radio stations across the coun-
try all play from the same program-
ming lists, be they rock, country or
pop. Where does all this uniformity
come from, and does it hurt radio?
GK: Yes, it’s sort of destroying
it. It comes from the fact that the
government abandoned the idea of
limiting the number of stations you
could own, so the conglomerates, of
which Clear Channel is the biggest,
have sucked up stations like a big
vacuum cleaner. The commercial
community radio stations, those
that would broadcast your appeal
for a lost dog, or community events
like a high school basketball game,
have died out, but public radio has
moved into the areas that these sta-
tions once occupied. Clearly, free
enterprise doesn’t serve the local
community very well. But with the
decline has come a boom with pub-
lic radio and wonderful things are
beginning to happen.
EW: What do you get from a good
radio show that you don’t get from
any other media?
GK: Radio can travel around
with you. Lots of people listen to it
in their cars or their kitchen while
they are doing other things. It’s a
companion you don’t really have to
focus on. Our show is a bit different.
People might sit down and listen to
it but they can also wander to and
from it. Radio has a closeness that
TV doesn’t really have. [Movies]
have a tremendous power to draw
people into another reality. I think
radio has that same power. It’s pos-
sible to feel this closeness to some-
body on the radio. With television
there’s a wall, and very few people
break through it.
EW: Is radio still the theater of the
mind?
GK: There’s a guy who does
a late night show in Minnesota.
Tommy Mischke. He’s amazing to
listen to. He has the wherewithal
to go off on these long, stream-of-
consciousness riffs. He hardly plays
music at all, takes very few phone
calls, but he’s somebody who has
the power to go into a trance and
talk. That’s a powerful thing in
radio. You can’t do it in TV where
everything is closely controlled. I
guess with movies you can. I think
Altman has that improvisatory, seat-
of-the-pants style, but it’s really pos-
sible in radio. And people remem-
ber when you do it. That’s the real
power of radio. It’s so memorable.
You remember what you hear. a
Tickets for “A Prairie Home Companion”, and other
events associated with the Reykjavík Arts Festival, can be
purchased online by logging on to www.artfest.is
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