S5.E14 ∙ Opera Books

A fierce rivalry between two professional sports bettors has dire consequences.

Shakespeare's Heroes and Villains is a journey through Shakespeare's most notorious villains with Steven Berkoff as your informed and entertaining tour guide. From the "genius" villain that is Richard III to the "wannabe" villain, Macbeth, to the "student" villain Hamlet, Berkoff portrays each of these and then goes on to analyse and discuss their motivation and what influences their decisions.

What is it like to be 'white' in a 'black' society? How does it feel to be a member of one of the most hyper-visible and yet invisible groups of people?

Every year, a Kurdish family leaves Gaziantep (Anatolia) to work on the land near Ankara. This thankless life of seasonal labor turns upside down when the eldest son falls in love.

Wheelchair bound, without a larynx, and diagnosed with a life-threatening aortic aneurysm, Dr. Sharadkumar Dicksheet now lives only (and barely) so he can travel to India to perform free operations in marathon-like surgery sessions where up to 700 children receive treatment for their cleft lips and other deformities. Although Dicksheet survives off of social security while living in his Brooklyn apartment, his life is drastically different in India where the eight-time Nobel Prize nominee is treated like a living god. FLYING ON ONE ENGINE shows how this quirky, funny, and sometimes difficult character overcomes his own ailments by curing others.

Once upon a time, in the oldest, the deepest and the purest lake, a lake where dangers wait for you just around the corner, a miracle happened. In a small snow cave, a small but curious and brave nevertheless baby seal Uma was born. A long-distanced journey to the unknown Ushkany Islands is ahead of her. A journey full of threats and miracle rescues, the one she has to make on her own. Will the mighty lake Baikal help Uma to reach her destination and see those cherished islands?