Growing up, David Lee wanted to be the Chinese George Clooney. Today, he’s the president and general manager of Milwaukee NPR. He sits down with WTMJ’s Libby Collins to discuss how he ended up in Milwaukee, the trials and tribulations of working as a screenwriter, the tremendous impact that public radio has had on his life, and much, much more. It’s all ahead on this exciting edition of WTMJ Conversations. Listen in the player above.
A partial transcript is provided below, courtesy of eCourt Reporters.
LIBBY COLLINS: The interesting thing about being in the creative arts is it’s a passion.
DAVID LEE: Yeah.
LIBBY COLLINS: You have to have it, you gotta have that fire.
DAVID LEE: Yeah.
LIBBY COLLINS: And you want it so much, and then finally you grow up a little bit and you think, I can’t really make much of a living doing this.
What was the moment when you decided, okay, this is going to be it, I’ve got to change careers?
DAVID LEE: I had written a TV show that was making the rounds at, like, major cable networks, and my producing partner and I were very excited about one in particular. And when I was on my honeymoon in Greece, I got an email from him saying that this network said no and wouldn’t move on with this project. That was probably the first moment where I felt that, because this was a show and an idea that had been sitting with me for years and years and years and years. And my ex-wife now had asked me at the time, “What do you want to say with your work?”
And my answer was, “I don’t really know, but I know that whatever it is, it’s in this piece.”