United States: Science-cum-comedy show

MARGARET GELLER IS describing how, as part of her work at the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics, she studies how binary stars occasionally leave the galaxy. œThat seems rude, interrupts a professional comedian seated nearby. This intriguing scenario did not happen at a dinner party, or on a train whose passengers are eavesdropping on one another. It featured in a new comedy show gaining popularity across the US which attempts to communicate complex academic research to a broader audience, live and through podcasts. The idea came to Chris Duffy, the show™s creator and host, while he was commuting on a bus between the campuses of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and Harvard University. œI thought, someone on this bus is going to win a Nobel prize, but I™ll never get to talk to them about it, or even understand it, Duffy says. œI wish there was a way for me to get to meet them. Using comedy to do that was the next epiphany. As a comedian, Duffy says œit always felt like I would have people listening to me, and I would make them laugh. But what did they leave with? It seemed like a wasted opportunity. The result is You™re the Expert, which makes celebrities of good-natured scholars who trade barbs with comedians and engage in games and sketches to explain what they do, and how. Although it™s meant to be funny ” Duffy asked Dr. Geller, for example, whether the five honorary doctorates she has received make her regret having worked so hard for the real one, and whether some people ask her for make-up advice when they learn she is a cosmologist ” the show is part of an international trend to help make complex academic concepts more accessible to lay people. œPeople don™t actually know what is going on in science, and as a result of that they don™t understand science as being necessary, and they don™t really trust (it), explains Duffy. œYou™re the Expert, he adds, œis satisfying comedy, but on the kind of intellectually stimulating topics that people actually learn something from. It™s probably the oldest comedy dynamic in the book: the straight man and the comedian. Academics are clearly happy to take part. œIt™s fun, it™s good-spirited, there™s nothing low-minded or mean about it, says Richard Weissbourd, a lecturer at the Harvard Graduate School of Education, who was also a guest. œThere™s too much of a history of academics talking only to each other, he added. Erica Reisman, an audience member who has attended the show several times, says it has helped her understand what scientists do œin an unintimidating way, so you don™t feel stupid. œIn the end, you realise it™s not so hard to understand, she says. Bonus bonanzas BY MANY MEASURES, Michael Crow is one of America™s most successful university presidents. The high-profile head of Arizona State University has tripled the public university™s research income, constructed several new buildings on its sprawling campus outside Phoenix, established more than a dozen…