Who’s Who
Get to know the Says You! team.
Get to know the Says You! team.
Following Dave Zobel‘s seven-year stint as a writer for public radio’s
The Loh Down on Science, he joined Says You! last year as co-script writer alongside Nat Segaloff. As we say here at Says You!, “Genius don’t cost extra” — Dave is a science humorist and active alum of Caltech. For much of 2016, Dave was on tour for his most recent book, The Science of TV’s The Big Bang Theory. Dave serves on the board of the LA nonprofit T4T.org (Trash for Teaching), which rescues factory discards and turns them teaching kits for science and arts education.
Gregg Porter, the weekend voice of Seattle’s KUOW, steps up to the lectern as the host of Says You! where a dream has become reality. Richard Sher often claimed the first vision for Says You! came to him at Sandy Bradley’s Potluck – a live, national performance show produced by none other than Gregg. A long-time member of the public-radio world, Gregg always believed he’d find an outlet for his knowledge of all things random; at Says You! we think he’s found his calling.
Gregg Porter is not only a longtime fan of Says You!, but also a producer of jazz and Hawaiian albums, a musician, radio-theater actor and director, collector of far too many records and CDs, and still has the dictionary his grandmother gave him when he was seven years old. We welcome him to Says You!…where Potluck brings fate to the table, and dreams come true.
With the personal motto “Genius don’t cost extra,” Richard Sher produced and hosted Says You! What he would charge for is his work as president and founder of Pipit & Finch, a marketing and media development company with clients such as CBS/Westinghouse, Hearst Broadcasting and National Public Radio. In his spare time, he trained Otto, his palindromic pup, and desperately pumped friends and strangers alike for words and definitions. With more than 30 years experience in broadcast production, programming, media development and marketing, Richard almost didn’t work in radio. He started out as an optician. Really. We couldn’t see it either.
Click here to read or listen to a tribute
honoring the memory of Richard.
Flash Wiley is a graduate of the United States Air Force Academy, a Fulbright Scholar and a former Air Force captain. He also received a master’s in public policy from Harvard’s Kennedy School of Government and his law degree from Harvard Law School. But all this pales in comparison to his status as Boston’s self-proclaimed ‘best over-60 power forward.’ Flash and Richard first met – actually collided – on the basketball court where a significant respect was found for each other’s love of gamesmanship. Currently a prominent figure in the legal community, Flash is extensively involved in Boston civic and charitable activities, including tenure as Chairman of the Board of the Greater Boston Chamber of Commerce. Still, it’s his appearances on Says You! that earn him the most recognition among game-players and word-a-philes nationwide.
An award-winning producer of both independent documentaries and syndicated programs, Garland Waller is the Director of the TV Graduate Program at Boston University’s College of Communication. More to the point, she is fiendishly literate, with an all-out infectious laugh and a sharp wit that never cuts anyone because she’s a Quaker. Richard always said that the elegant repartee between Garland and her husband, Barry Nolan, reminded him of the graceful partnership of Ginger Rogers and Fred Astaire.
Lenore Shannon‘s life-long love of words and games hit its stride when she dropped to one knee and proposed to her now-husband after he was able to beat her at Scrabble. Lenore, a native Bostonian, is a fine-tuned fashionista who loves to design and re-design expensive houses. A study in contradictions, she’s a high-level physician recruiter with a passion for The Three Stooges. “Calling Dr. Howard, Dr. Fine, Dr. Howard!”
tribulationsofpaulette.com
Although actor Tom Kemp is a Long Island native, you may think of him as a Bostonian, given his roles in films such as Shutter Island, The Departed, Mystic River, and Gone Baby Gone…as well as a turn as Whitey Bulger in “Unsolved Mysteries.” Yet versatility is his stock in trade. Proficient in bodysurfing, squash, and accents such as BBC and Cockney, he is also lead singer with an R & B group – The Basics. Clearly, this Tom Kemp is not to be confused with the political theorist and Marxist economic historian of the same name…despite the fact that our Tom played Che Guevara early in his career.
How does the principal flautist of the Mexico City Symphony find his way to a barn in Lincoln, Massachusetts? Such was Antonio’s journey from musical virtuoso to Says You! Major Domo. Faced with engineering a show often interrupted by passing locomotives and bovine bellowing, he managed to give the show its clear and distinct sound and never miss a muttered musing or whispered witticism. A graduate of McGill University and producer of CD’s for labels worldwide – Antonio is a master engineer, editor, and recording genius. And some day we hope he’ll be proud enough of his contribution to our show… to put it on his resume.
Nat Segaloff is the author of numerous books and monographs including biographies of Arthur Penn, William Friedkin, Paul Mazursky, John Milius, and Stirling Silliphant. His latest book is the memoir, Screen Saver: Private Stories of Public Hollywood, available from the usual sources. His biography of speculative fiction writer Harlan Ellison will be published in 2017.
Philip Salkind has finally parlayed his unbelievable mastery of the arcane into a paying gig. He first met Richard across the bar at a health club restaurant where Phil, an underemployed musician, was slinging chardonnay and the occasional carrot juice while dazzling patrons with his television game show prowess. Quick to notice talent in the raw and on the the cheap, Richard hired Phil and thus began a collaboration that defines creative tension to this day. At present, during extended periods of hiatus from the Says You! juggernaut, he labors in the grove of telecommunications technology, building devices that are designed to locate his stock options.