D.C. Radio Host Focuses On His Guests ‘Derek Mcginty Show’ Popular Site For Promoting Authors, Politicians

Derek McGinty is a study in grays, charcoal grays to be exact: gray polo sweater, dark gray pants, gray beard peeking through dark brown skin even at 10 o’clock on a Thursday morning.

But there is nothing gray about McGinty’s “Derek McGinty Show” on public radio, one of the liveliest, most sought-after venues to promote books - and points of view - in the nation’s capital.

McGinty is the host of a two-hour, five-day-a-week show on WAMU-FM that presents an eclectic mix of guests ranging from the political and theatrical to the downright irreverent. They have included Vice President Al Gore and House Speaker Newt Gingrich, the rap performer Ice-T, the musician Wynton Marsalis and the actors Stockard Channing and Leslie Nielsen.

“Derek really studies,” said Marcus Rosenbaum, an editor and writer and former producer of “Talk of the Nation” on National Public Radio. “He works really hard. He’s personable and smart and interested in other people’s ideas.”

“He was very well prepared,” said Michele Slung, a writer, editor and anthologist, who was a recent guest on the show. “At the same time, he was in no way a person seeking controversy. The show is not about Derek McGinty. It’s about the guests.”

When he is not interviewing an author or a politician, McGinty opens the microphone to callers to his show. His aim, he said, is dispensing information and talking, both seriously and lightheartedly, about things that interest his listeners and relate to their lives.

Nat Hentoff, the media critic for The Village Voice, once suggested in a column that McGinty’s show should be national because “his questions get to the root of controversy, and callers know he wants to hear what they say rather than revel in how nastily he can dismiss them.”

But for now, McGinty said he is satisfied with his show.