Kevin Bacon has launched a new podcast titled Six Degrees with Kevin Bacon with iHeartMedia. The podcast focuses on celebrity interviews differently by focusing on charitable causes dear to the guests, including climate change, justice reform, and youth mental health. In the inaugural episode, Bacon spoke with actor Mark Ruffalo about The Solutions Project, an organization advocating for renewable energy.
The podcast is produced in collaboration with Six Degrees, a charity founded by Bacon in 2007, which provides basic necessities and supports youth programs. The name of both the organization and the podcast references the “Six Degrees of Kevin Bacon” game. Upcoming guests include Matthew McConaughey, Idina Menzel, and Penn Badgley. Each guest will promote a different charity and join a representative from the organization to delve into its mission.
The first episode was recorded before the SAG-AFTRA strike began in early July. Bacon and his wife, Kyra Sedgwick, have actively participated in the strike, calling for a new contract between the guild and the Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Producers.
“This podcast peels back the layers for fans and shows them another side of their favorite stars while honoring the real heroes — the people on the ground making a difference,” said Bacon. “It provides my guests with a platform to talk about the real-world issues that keep them awake at night.”
It is heartwarming to know that there are people who can make a difference. As one of those people who are on the ground (one of many) who are caring for the children who are left because their parents don’t know how or care to bring their children up. I am a grandmother raising my 2 grandchildren. For all of us doing this we deserve acknowledgment. Especially when your only income is Social security! It will get worse w/o abortion rights.
This is a great idea and will endear a lot of celebrities to the media.
I remember back in 1989 when I was doing a daily program on an all-Talk station which consisted of three or four short interviews per hour that i had the opportunity to interview Dennis Weaver, who was at the time heading up a charity called “L.I.F.E. – Love Is Feeding Everyone” which focused on getting hot meals and basic grocery staples to families that lacked the income to properly provide for their children. Weaver was currently in a starring role on the ill-fated (one season) nighttime soap “Emerald Point NAS” and of course was well-known as Sam McCloud from the NBC Mystery Movie of a decade earlier (and before that, as Chester on “Gunsmoke”). At the appointed hour, I called him at his beach house in Malibu, and when I introduced him I referenced all of the above show biz credits, then announced that those would be my last mentions of his celebrity status because “he is with us this morning to talk about something much more important.”
It was a great interview (especially since it was something like 7:30 in the morning) and when I got off the air he called me on the station business line to thank me for devoting the entire interview to L.I.F.E., and he also told me that “if anyone cancels on you at the last minute, you have my home phone number … wake me up and I’ll fill in for you.”
I got to meet him in person a few weeks later and when we were introduced he was incredibly enthusiastic, saying how happy he was to “finally meet you in person!” as if I was the celebrity and not him. You get these people who are well known for their work in the entertainment field to talk about the side projects that mean so much to them as humanitarians and they’re your friends forever!