Tony Kushner Sits Down with WNYC News to Discuss Roy Cohn, Donald Trump, and the 2016 Election

Angels in America is considered by many to be the seminal play on America at the end of the twentieth century-not the least of which because it features the historic lawyer Roy Cohn. Cohn, who served as Joseph McCarthy's chief counsel during the Senator's Communist witch hunt that terrorized many in the artistic community and provided the inspiration for Arthur Miller's The Crucible. Cohn also served as the attorney for high-level members of the mafia, and, perhaps most relevant to today's current political environment, worked as Donald Trump's lawyer during the 1970s and 1980s.

This week, Angels in America playwright Tony Kushner say down with WNYC News to discuss his most infamous character, the connections to Donald Trump, and the 2016 election. Check out audio of the interview below!

In addition to Angels in America, Tony Kushner's other plays include: A Bright Room Called Day; Angels In America, Parts One and Two; Slavs!; Homebody/Kabul and Caroline, or Change. His adaptations include Corneille's The Illusion, S.Y. Ansky's The Dybbuk, and Brecht's The Good Person of Sezuan and Mother Courage and Her Children (Public Theater). Kushner's films include Angels In America, directed by Mike Nichols and Munich, directed by Steven Spielberg. His books include Brundibar, illustrations by Maurice Sendak; The Art of Maurice Sendak, 1980 to the Present; and Wrestling With Zion: Progressive Jewish-American Responses to the Palestinian/Israeli Conflict (co-edited with Alisa Solomon). Kushner has received the Pulitzer Prize, an Emmy Award, an Oscar nomination, two Tony Awards, three Obie Awards, an Olivier Award, two Evening Standard Awards, and is the first recipient of the Steinberg Distinguished Playwright Award.