As rain whipped the park across the street, Garry Trudeau told me, “Writing cartoons is a very solitary profession, a very monastic existence.” The first major biography of this shy man is coming very soon. www.chicagotribune.com/2026/05/12/c...

Joining Studs Terkel, Gwendolyn Brooks, Scott Turow, Stuart Dybek, Sara Paretsky, and other powerful writers, Patti Smith, born during a Chicago blizzard, will become a Harold Washington Literary Award. www.chicagotribune.com/2026/05/12/p...

@KoganAfterHours 5-7 pm Sunday @WGNRadio Happy Mothers Day, and we have food writer Maggie Hennessey on local scene and new book, “The Hamburger Bible", Don Goodwin, aka the famous “Spider Dan” who 45 years ago climbed the Hancock and Sears Tower and has a new book, “Untethered.”

@KoganAfterHours 5-7 pm Sunday @WGNRadio Happy Mothers Day, and we have food writer Maggie Hennessey on local scene and new book, “The Hamburger Bible", Don Goodwin, aka the famous “Spider Dan” who 45 years ago climbed the Hancock and Sears Tower and has a new book, “Untethered.”

The hottest game in town is mahjong. Not quite up there with pickleball or online gambling but just look around and you’ll see it being played in libraries and senior living facilities, in some of the hippest bars and restaurants… all over. www.chicagotribune.com/2026/05/07/m...

The night after Geraldo "met" Capone he went to a bar and “ordered a bottle of Cuervo and tried to forget.” He then "slept like a dead man" but awoke to surprisingly good news: The show had set a new bar as the highest rated syndicated show in TV history. www.chicagotribune.com/2026/05/05/a...

@After Hours with Rick Kogan 5-7 Sunday WGN Radio brings you photographer Larry Tuckman on “Chicago’s Uptown”; Alyssa Gross on mahjong @themahjongsociety.com; correspondent Candace Jordan ; Liz Garibay to talk about the “Brewing the Revolution” event and beer in general beerculturecenter.org

Arsenio's story--filled with people like Prince, Bill Clinton, Whitney Houston--compels a look at the fading of the once powerful late night TV world, as Colbert is leaving soon and the Jimmys face an uncertain future. But once upon a time... www.chicagotribune.com/2026/04/29/a...

Arsenio's story--filled with people like Prince, Bill Clinton, Whitney Houston--compels a look at the fading of the once powerful late night TV world, as Colbert is leaving soon and the Jimmys face an uncertain future. But once upon a time... www.chicagotribune.com/2026/04/29/a...

One of Charles Manson’s prosecuting attorneys thinks we are attracted to killers because “People in the United States like to be scared sometimes.” The Gilgo Beach monster has two new TV shows-one that focuses on his victims. www.chicagotribune.com/2026/04/28/r...

@KoganAfterHours 5-7 Sunday @wgnradio.bsky.social has Paula Froehle on DOC10 fest doc10.org; Jim Fitzpatrick on his book, “The Intersection"; Phil Donlon on “The Gilgo Beach Murders”; Neal Samors/Eric Brodsky on “Corner Beef on Rye: Remembering Chicago’s Jewish Delicatessens.”

All in the family, as Mary Jo's and Butch McGuire's grandkids open a new saloon on a famously boozy block of Lincoln Ave. With food and music and the desire to honor the the family legacy. Stop in for a drink. www.chicagotribune.com/2026/04/22/m...

All in the family, as Mary Jo's and Butch McGuire's grandkids open a new saloon on a famously boozy block of Lincoln Ave. With food and music and the desire to honor the the family legacy. Stop in for a drink. www.chicagotribune.com/2026/04/22/m...

Want to know more about "Saturday Night Live" creator and boss Lorne Michaels? The new movie "Lorne" tries, with the help of Steve Martin, Tina Fey, Paul Simon, Bill Hader and others. You'll get a lot of enjoyable clips but the man remains elusive. www.chicagotribune.com/2026/04/21/l...

Is it possible for one film festival to have movies about Salman Rushdie, Girl Scouts, Norman Lear, Billie Jean King, Black soldiers in Vietnam and others? Yes it is and it's @doc10filmfest coming soon to Davis Theater and Siskel Film Center. www.chicagotribune.com/2026/04/15/d...

Have a kid who plays soccer? You might want to read of one family's travels in "Soccer Dad," a mad trip but also an enjoyable one, into “the byzantine levels of youth soccer in the city and suburbs.” www.chicagotribune.com/2026/04/14/s...

@KoganAfterHours 5-7 pm Sunday @WGNRadio has @CandidCandace on singer Yasmin Levy; producer Mary Bonnett/director Richard Shavin on “The Official Biography,” with Gary Houston; singer Libby York's Ella Fitzgerald b-day at Winter's; @LeahEskin on her novel "Like Wafers in Honey."

Tiger and Phil aren't playing in the Masters but Joe Riley is, hitting 400 yard drives using ancient clubs at Augusta in a spectacular, exciting novel, "All Carry," by longtime sportswriter and ESPN star Gene Wojciechowski www.chicagotribune.com/2026/04/08/c...

With strong Chicago connections--Jeff Tweedy, Bob Odenkirk and former Sun-Times Pulitzer Prize-winning TV critic Ron Powers and his family--documentary “No One Cares About Crazy People” is a powerful "call to arms," Saturday at Film Row Cinema. www.chicagotribune.com/2026/04/07/n...

With strong Chicago connections--Jeff Tweedy, Bob Odenkirk and former Sun-Times Pulitzer Prize-winning TV critic Ron Powers and his family--documentary “No One Cares About Crazy People” is a powerful "call to arms," Saturday at Film Row Cinema. www.chicagotribune.com/2026/04/07/n...

Basketball break over, @KoganAfterHours back in business 5-7 pm Sunday @wgnradio.bsky.social with Gene Wojciechowski on his terrific golf novel, “All Carry”; one and only Candace Jordan on city life @candidcandace;David Murray on his book, “Soccer Dad.” Listen in.

The Lincoln Academy, born in part by an Audio-Animatronic replica of Abe at the NYC World's Fair in 1964, welcomes a new gang of achievers who join such others as Mike Royko, Walter Payton, Hilary Clinton, Mahalia Jackson and Jack Benny www.chicagotribune.com/2026/04/01/i...

The dinosaurs are coming! The dinosaurs are coming and other creative pranks from the lively, nutty April Fools' Days of the past, including a baseball pitcher who could throw 168 mph and the return of Richard Nixon www.chicagotribune.com/2026/03/31/a...

One of the seven mansions still standing on Lake Shore Drive, the Blair Mansion echoes a bygone time but also represents, optimistically, a splendid future, with these two people making it happen. just as they created the nearby Astor Club. www.chicagotribune.com/2026/03/25/a...

A new book takes you behind the glitz and into “a freewheeling community of motion picture technicians and into a wild, pre-gentrified, dangerous era. From "The Exorcist" to "The Godfather" and about 50 other movies I know you've seen. www.chicagotribune.com/2026/03/24/c...

A new book takes you behind the glitz and into “a freewheeling community of motion picture technicians and into a wild, pre-gentrified, dangerous era. From "The Exorcist" to "The Godfather" and about 50 other movies I know you've seen. www.chicagotribune.com/2026/03/24/c...

Newcity is a survivor and happily, creatively so. Its 40th anniversary issue is its biggest yet. It can now be found all over the Midwest and there's a new outpost in Brazil. What's the secret? Reading this may give you a clue. www.chicagotribune.com/2026/03/18/n...

Newcity is a survivor and happily, creatively so. Its 40th anniversary issue is its biggest yet. It can now be found all over the Midwest and there's a new outpost in Brazil. What's the secret? Reading this may give you a clue. www.chicagotribune.com/2026/03/18/n...

Mike Royko called Rupert Murdoch "The Alien" when he came here to buy the Sun-Times in 1984 and in a new four-part documentary you can learn why his children might call him "Daddy Dearest." He made them all billionaire-rich but at a heavy emotional price. www.chicagotribune.com/2026/03/17/d...

Mike Royko called Rupert Murdoch "The Alien" when he came here to buy the Sun-Times in 1984 and in a new four-part documentary you can learn why his children might call him "Daddy Dearest." He made them all billionaire-rich but at a heavy emotional price. www.chicagotribune.com/2026/03/17/d...

A love story for the ages takes to the stage, featuring letter-writing lovers, rollicking 1920s Chicago, Fanny Brice, Carl Sandburg, Clarence Darrow, the Dill Pickle Club, sex, politics, a pet kangaroo and more. www.chicagotribune.com/2026/03/11/c...

A love story for the ages takes to the stage, featuring letter-writing lovers, rollicking 1920s Chicago, Fanny Brice, Carl Sandburg, Clarence Darrow, the Dill Pickle Club, sex, politics, a pet kangaroo and more. www.chicagotribune.com/2026/03/11/c...

The life and work of artist Jack Simmerling is celebrated in a wonderful exhibition. As he once told me "I have always been drawn to the past, to preserving it,” and he did so in thousands of colorful and heartfelt ways. www.chicagotribune.com/2026/03/10/j...

The life and work of artist Jack Simmerling is celebrated in a wonderful exhibition. As he once told me "I have always been drawn to the past, to preserving it,” and he did so in thousands of colorful and heartfelt ways. www.chicagotribune.com/2026/03/10/j...

No one is immortal, but two music-makers originally from Scotland--John Ballantyne and Gus Noble--bring John Prine, Steve Goodman and Kris Kristofferson back to vibrant musical life in "Chicago 1971." www.chicagotribune.com/2026/03/04/c...

A new book, “Sirens in the Loop: A History of the City News Bureau of Chicago,” gives you a raucous story. Like a massive high school yearbook, it's peppered with the names of kids-who-made-good: Mike Royko, Seymour Hersch, Pam Zekman, even Kurt Vonnegut www.chicagotribune.com/2026/03/03/s...

Billy Branch is a harmonica playing, singing giant in the blues world, a contemporary of his pal Buddy Guy. Hard to believe that when he came here for college, he had “zero knowledge of the blues, and I mean zero.” It's quite a story. www.chicagotribune.com/2026/02/25/c...

The Irish are coming. The Irish are coming. Mark Howard comes back home, and his innovative, artistic, exciting Trinity Irish dancers kick things off, so to speak, Saturday night at the Auditorium. www.chicagotribune.com/2026/02/24/s...

After Hours with Rick Kogan 5-7 pm Sunday WGN Radio brings you actor Phil Donlon on St. Baldrick's Foundation; John Ballantyne and Gus Noble of Crazy Heart on "Chicago 1971” March 15 Old Town School of Folk Music; bluesman Billy Branch on career and latest CD, “The Blues is My Biography."

The Drinking & Writing gang once gave us a look at what it takes to have a drink at every tavern on Western Avenue and now returns with an inventive new show, a musical based on a woman encountered in a dream. www.chicagotribune.com/2026/02/18/d...

The Reader Lives! with new owners and a lively new issue. But for those of us of a certain age, a stunning new book captures how important and entertaining and illuminating and fun the Reader's first 50-years were. Where did you find your first apartment? www.chicagotribune.com/2026/02/17/c...

The Reader Lives! with new owners and a lively new issue. But for those of us of a certain age, a stunning new book captures how important and entertaining and illuminating and fun the Reader's first 50-years were. Where did you find your first apartment? www.chicagotribune.com/2026/02/17/c...

The Reader Lives! with new owners and a lively new issue. But for those of us of a certain age, a stunning new book captures how important and entertaining and illuminating and fun the Reader's first 50-years were. Where did you find your first apartment? www.chicagotribune.com/2026/02/17/c...

The Reader Lives! with new owners and a lively new issue. But for those of us of a certain age, a stunning new book captures how important and entertaining and illuminating and fun the Reader's first 50-years were. Where did you find your first apartment? www.chicagotribune.com/2026/02/17/c...

@KoganAfterHours 5-7 pm Sunday @WGNRadio has Paul Teodo storytelling at Carnivale, with Susana Mendoza/Arny Granat, @carnivalechicago; new Drinking & Writing @SmallBeer show @Neo_Futurists; Mark Jacob, author of a “Free Chicago: 50 Years of the Reader.” chicagoreader.com

Nancy Hays is bringing the amazing, inspiring, exciting story of America's greatest jockey, a Black man named Isaac Burns Murphy, back to life in a new book, a show in Highland Park and, maybe one day a movie. www.chicagotribune.com/2026/02/11/b...

Gone to soon at 75, but what a life Boz O'Brien had and shared with anyone who ever walked into his Reilly's Daughter, filled with fun and food and music and memories for a few generations and still in the family. www.chicagotribune.com/2026/02/10/b...

After Hours with Rick Kogan returns, Sunday on WGN Radio 4:30ish until 7 p.m, with bluesman Billy Branch; John Davies on movie “Phunny Business”; John Holden on Edgewater’s theater history; correspondent Candace Jordan of party/social scene; Nancy Hays on book/show about famous Black jockey.

He was known as the 'Frugal Gourmet' and pioneered the food-on-TV revolution. But Jeff Smith had dark sides. Sometimes drunk on air and accused of having sex with teenage boys, his career crashed in 1997 and a new documentary has the sad story. www.chicagotribune.com/2026/02/04/f...

For decades the three major networks had a monopoly on news. That has been broken for keeps and new guy Tony Dokoupil is making an awkward start in the CBS anchorman chair once held by "the most trusted man in America." www.chicagotribune.com/2026/02/03/c...