Nick Digilio
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| Nick Digilio | |
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| Born | July 6, 1965 |
| Show | The Nick Digilio Show |
| Station(s) | 720 AM |
| Network(s) | WGN Radio |
| Time slot | Friday 11pm-2am, Saturday 9pm-1am, Sunday 11pm-2am (Central Time) |
| Country | USA |
| Spouse(s) | Heather Digilio (5/16/09 - present) |
Nick Digilio (born July 6, 1965) is a movie critic and radio personality. He is the host of an award-winning radio program[1] on WGN Radio in Chicago, and is a frequent fill-in host for WGN.
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[edit] Life
Digilio grew up about five blocks away from Wrigley Field in Chicago, Illinois. He attended Luther North High School and graduated in 1983.[2] He also attended Columbia College where he studied film.[2] He recently moved from Andersonville to the Albany Park neighborhood of Chicago. Digilio is a playwright, theater director and actor, and a former member of The Factory Theater.
[edit] Radio career
Digilio began reviewing movies on the WGN Roy Leonard Show in 1985.[3] His contributions to Roy's program led WGN Radio management to decide that he'd be a good permanent addition to the station. He soon became a regular on other WGN Radio programs including Steve King and Johnnie Putman's program. He gained a reputation for his alternative and controversial play and movie reviews. For instance, he applauds the movies Critters, Friday the 13th Part 5, Joe Dirt, and Freddy Got Fingered, while he dislikes Titanic and The Dark Knight.[4] Digilio reviews all the new films and makes DVD recommendations on his own show.
For several years, Digilio co-hosted a weekend late-night radio program on WGN with Garry Lee Wright and on May 31, 1998[2], he began hosting his own program called Nick at Night. On February 10, 2006, Digilio's program's name was changed to "The Nick Digilio Show" to correspond with a move from late-nights to prime time on Saturday night and not-so-late nights on Friday and Sunday nights. The Nick Digilio Show can currently be heard on WGN Radio in Chicago (720 AM) where Digilio discusses popular culture, current events, all things Chicago, and other hot topics including why the McRib is the greatest sandwich McDonald’s ever produced, and the fact that there actually once was vegetable flavored Jell-O.
The current producer of The Nick Digilio Show is Andy "The Count" Hermann.[5] Mike "Broham" Stephen used to produce Digilio's Sunday night program. Both "Broham" and "The Count" (a nickname given to Andy after he provided the voice of a card dealer in an episode of The Twilight Zone Radio Dramas) currently manage the Nick D. Producers' Blog on the WGN Radio website, and are behind a radio program and podcast called Outside the Loop RADIO: Chicago's Almost Above-Ground Audio Magazine (aired on WLUW).
Listeners who have viewed some of Nick's photos on his WGN web page have compared his face to the late pitchmen, Billy Mays; this analogy saddens Nick.
[edit] Current and former radio segments
(Alphabetically)
- "Anti-Valentine's Day"
- "Celebrity News/Gossip"
- "Drunks in the News"
- "Free For All"-callers talk about topic of their choice
- "Halloween Spooktacular Spectacular"
- "Nick Out of Context"
- "Nick D. Show Songs"
- "The Pat and Ron Show Highlight Reel"-a review of clips of the wacky things said during the coverage of Chicago Cubs baseball games.
- "Paula Cooper's Rock Alert"
- "The Secret History of Chicago Music"
- "The Three's Company Throwdown"-a trivia contest featuring show producer Andy Hermann whose obsession with and encyclopedic knowledge of Three's Company is, frankly, frightening.
- "The Wisdom of Ted Nugent"-funny excerpts from Nugent's book, Ted, White, and Blue: The Nugent Manifesto
- "Twitter Topic"-Fans post a topic on the social networking site Twitter and Digilio will pick one and talk about it the first half hour of his Friday night show
- "Yahoo! Buzz Search Top 10"
[edit] Frequent callers and contributors
- Larry from Aurora- Larry, a former professional wrestler, has an uncanny ability of calling Digilio whenever he is on the air.
- Natural Mike and his male nurse
- Steve Krakow- every Sunday calls in for his "Secret History of Chicago Music" segment
- Laser- a frequent contributor to the "Pat and Ron Show Highlight Reel".
[edit] Running gags
- Every once in a while, Digilio plays a recording of Keri Russell, who was on Spike O'Dell's show, saying "Hi, I'm Keri Russell and I LOOOOOOOOVE Nick's radio show!"
- Every once in a while, Digilio mentions Liam Neeson needing to throat punch someone.
- In response to things Digilio or the staff might like, radio-appropriate clips of Christian Bale's on-set Terminator: Salvation rant against the director of photography on the film are played, especially the quote "Ooooh, good for you!!".
- Digilio frequently asserts that every segment of his show will "make your pants fall off", which annoys some listeners.
- During the "Pat and Ron Highlight Reel" segment, Digilio assigns celebrity names to the people who contribute.
- Digilio claims to be one of the only people to do a Terry Thomas impression.
[edit] References
- ^ The Nick Digilio Show podcast wins a Silver Dome Award from the Illinois Broadcasters Association
- ^ a b c Digilio, Nick. "Nick Digilio Facebook Page" (in English). Info tab. http://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=506018870&ref=ts#/profile.php?id=506018870&v=info&viewas=573525989. Retrieved on 2009-04-11.
- ^ "Nick Digilio" (in English). http://www.wgnradio.com/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=20994&Itemid=165. Retrieved on 2009-04-05.
- ^ "WGN's Nick Digilio HATES 'The Dark Knight?!'" (in English). mjleshock. July 18, 2008. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A-Br_wc8mNc. Retrieved on 2009-04-05.
- ^ "Andy Hermann (aka "The Count")" (in English). http://wgnradio.com/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=31454&Itemid=380. Retrieved on 2009-04-09.
