1on1 With Jon Evans

Jerrod Mustaf played against the best basketball talent in the world. The Whiteville, NC native was a first-round NBA draft pick, and made it all the way to the finals, before taking his game overseas and winning a pair of championships in international leagues. Since then, as the CEO and Executive Director of the Take Charge Program his father founded, Mustaf has spent decades creating programs that combine sports and life skills to benefit young men and women.

Nina de Gramont’s career as a published author began in 2001 with Of Cats and Men. The UNCW professor’s ninth book, The Christie Affair, has made her a ‘best-selling author’. De Gramont’s fictional novel of Agatha Christie’s famous 11-day disappearance landed on the New York Times’ list shortly after its’ release, thanks in part to being chosen for Academy Award-winning actress Reese Witherspoon’s Book Club. De Gramont talks about having to keep that secret, the pressure of her follow-up, and the joys of teaching the next generation of writers.

REO Speedwagon has sold more than 40 million records since its’ debut in 1971, and Kevin Cronin has been the front man for the past 45 years. After a mandatory, unscheduled hiatus from touring because of the pandemic, Cronin and the band are ‘Back on the Road Again’ in 2022, with live shows packed with fan favorites, while the singer-songwriter also finishes writing a book about his career.

Brantley Gilbert has toured with some of the biggest names in country music. The rock star has hundreds of sold-out shows and more than a half-dozen #1 records to his credit. But, like many singer-songwriters, the pandemic has kept the self-proclaimed ‘road dog’ from performing live as often as he wanted. In our conversation, Gilbert talks about getting back out on tour in 2022, the love-letter he wrote to his wife and daughter, and the first time he ever picked up a guitar.

At just 13-years-old, Carson Holmes experienced what he now calls a “life-changing” event. He auditioned for and got the part of Three Langmore on the Netflix series Ozark, which has become one of the streaming service’s biggest hits. The Wilmington actor talks about working alongside the award-winning cast, the scripts his parents wouldn’t let him read, and the cliffhangers still ahead for fans of the show.

Michelle Li is an excellent journalist. Several Murrow and Emmy awards are proof of her skills. But nothing in her two decades of television news could have prepared Michelle for the racist voicemail a viewer left her on New Year’s Day. By gracefully sharing her pain, and letting the world hear the viewer’s rant, Michelle started a conversation about race and discrimination against Asian Americans that has turned into the positive #veryasian movement.

The fifth season of the award-winning “1on1 with Jon Evans” podcast is in the books. Season five featured interviews with authors, actors, athletes, directors, television personalities, comedians and newsmakers with ties to southeastern North Carolina. This end-of-the-year compilation features several of the most interesting excerpts from some of the year’s conversations.

Reporters Nick Ochsner and Michael Graff covered the 2018 election fraud scandal in North Carolina’s Ninth Congressional District for different news organizations. The more time they spent in Bladen County, uncovering networks and identifying individuals working to influence elections, the more they realized politics in this rural county has its’ own set of rules. Their book The Vote Collectors is a deep dive into how it worked and nearly won a seat in Congress.

Wiley Cash’s fourth novel, When Ghosts Come Home, represents several firsts in the New York Times best-selling author’s career. He’s crafted a murder-mystery and set it along the coast of his native North Carolina. Despite the mid-1980s timeframe, Cash’s characters deal with many of the same social issues making today’s headlines, while they work to exorcise the ghosts of their past. It’s an engaging story that will make readers think, with an ending that turns on the answer to a simple question.

Meredith Viera’s current project, the Fox-syndicated game show 25 Words or Less is now in its’ third season and seen on television stations across the country. It’s another success in Viera’s award-winning career that began in local radio more than four decades ago, and has taken her around the world to cover the biggest stories and newsmakers.

They came out of Chicago and put the city’s name at the top of the music charts, where it stayed for decades. Trumpet player Lee Loughnane is one of three founding members of Chicago still touring with the rock and roll band 52 years after releasing their first album in 1969. Now back on the road after a pandemic-forced break, Loughnane talks about the excitement of performing live, what fans can expect to hear at the shows, and why he has no plans to stop playing any time soon.

Actress Yaya DaCosta left NBC’s Chicago Med after six seasons to play the lead character of Angela Vaughn in Our Kind of People. The new Fox show, which shoots in Wilmington, NC, is inspired by Lawrence Otis Graham’s bestseller that goes inside America’s Black Upper Class. DaCosta talks about the importance of the show, what drew her to the project, and how her experience in Reality TV nearly sidetracked her acting career.

Dr. Muneeb Shah has had a meteoric rise to social media stardom. The fourth-year Dermatology Resident in Wilmington, NC posted his first TikTok video about skin care on May 1, 2020, and now has more than ten million followers. Dr. Shah’s videos on TikTok, Instagram and YouTube have more than three billion views. This is the story of how he became one of the most influential voices in the field of dermatology and the world of social media, and how serious he takes that role.  

John Maginnes accomplished his dream of becoming a pro golfer, playing on the PGA Tour for a decade and competing alongside some of the biggest names in the sport like Tiger Woods and Nick Faldo. But when an injury presented an opportunity, Maginnes grabbed it. Now, as a host, analyst and on-course reporter on Sirius XM PGA Tour Radio, Maginnes still makes a living in the game he loves, while also enjoying a second chance at being a Dad.  

Jay Leno and Kevin Eubanks are working together again on television. Leno is rebooting the comedy show You Bet Your Life, and he wanted Eubanks to co-host. Their relationship goes back to the early 90s, when Leno took over as host of The Tonight Show and Eubanks became the bandleader. The two friends talk about what fans can expect to see when the new show airs in September. 

Brad Thor tried once to launch a writing career, and it didn’t work. When the pieces started falling into place to give him a second chance, he jumped at it, and is now a #1 bestselling author of 21 thrillers, selling tens of millions of books around the world.  Brad joins WECT’s Jon Evans to talk about the idea behind his new Scot Harvath book “Black Ice”, the gamble of killing-off familiar characters, and getting the call to help prevent future terror attacks against the United States.

Kathy Reichs’ new book, The Bone Code, is the 20th in her bestselling Bones series that features forensic anthropologist Temperance Brennan. It’s a murder-mystery ‘ripped from the headlines’ that takes Tempe back to an unsolved case from her past. Reichs has also co-authored the young adult Virals books, and produced episodes of the long-running Bones television series, entertaining millions of fans since her debut in 1997.

Jack Carr spent two decades on the front lines of America’s war on terrorism. The former Navy Seal sniper and Special Operations Commander transitioned into a second career, and is now a New York Times bestselling author. While crafting novels like The Devil’s Hand, which keep readers riveted, Carr supports organizations that help other veterans begin and succeed in their post-military lives. 

Hannah Black and Megan Petersen have taken different roads to their place in the film industry. Once their paths converged in an acting class, it set off a chain of creative events that resulted in the award-winning independent film, Drought. The co-creators, co-directors and co-stars talk about the project’s long road from start to finish, the messages they wanted to convey, and the one word not contained in their vocabularies.

Drew and Owen Scheid play two of the central characters in the award-winning independent film Drought, now streaming on Amazon Prime. While Drew has more acting experience, Drought marks Owen’s film debut, playing a young man on the autism spectrum who is fascinated with weather and storm chasing. The two brothers talk about the messages the movie conveys, overcoming a hurricane interruption, and working together on-screen for the first time.