Terry Gross

Twenty-five years after its debut, the dystopian-future classic Blade Runner has been released on DVD in a re-edited version called Blade Runner: The Final Cut. Director Ridley Scott talks about that release, as well as about his most recent film, American Gangster.

A Baptist deacon, R&B drummer and former gospel-music editor for Billboard magazine, Robert Darden is also a journalism professor at Baylor University, where he runs the Black Gospel Music Restoration Project . He'll play some rare recordings for us.

Bettye LaVette recorded her first hit, "My Man — He's a Lovin' Man," at the age of 16. She toured with Ben E. King, Barbara Lynn and Otis Redding. And now she's being crowned the Comeback Queen for her recent albums, I've Got My Own Hell to Raise, which came out in 2005, and her recent The Scene of the Crime. LaVette recorded The Scene of the Crime at FAME Studios in Muscle Shoals, Ala., with the Southern rock band Drive-By Truckers and the legendary session musician and songwriter Spooner Oldham.

The late George Crile, a producer for CBS' 60 Minutes, wrote the book that inspired the new film Charlie Wilson's War. It's the story of an East Texas congressman who, with help from a CIA operative, steered money and arms to Afghan mujahedeen fighting against the Soviet invasion. Later in this segment: A chat with Charlie Wilson, who's since retired and gone to work as a lobbyist.

Richard Zanuck grew up on movies — literally. The son of legendary producer Darryl F. Zanuck, who founded and ran Twentieth Century Fox studios in Hollywood's golden era, he became an Oscar-winning producer himself. His latest project: Sweeney Todd, the big-screen version of the legendary Stephen Sondheim musical. Zanuck's credits include Driving Miss Daisy, Jaws, Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid, The Verdict Rules of Engagement, and many more. Besides which, "I can mention a lot of pictures I'm unhappy about," he tells Terry Gross.

Pakistani journalist Ahmed Rashid, a regular Fresh Air guest, joins us again to assess recent developments in his home country and to preview the upcoming election there. Born in Lahore and based in Pakistan, Rashid has written for The Washington Post, the International Herald Tribune, London's Daily Telegraph and other publications. He's also the author of several best-selling books.

Drummer Levon Helm once backed Bob Dylan and sang with Van Morrison. Now, 30 years after The Band split up — and 10 years after he was diagnosed with throat cancer — Helm is putting out a solo album. The Washington Post has called Dirt Farmer "an exquisitely unvarnished monument to Americana from a man whose keening, lyrical vocals have become synonymous with it."

After former NPR reporter Sarah Chayes reported on the fall of the Taliban in 2001, she decided to stay in Afghanistan as the country was being rebuilt. In 2005, she established the Arghand Cooperative, a business that sells local products for use in perfumes, soaps and food. The author of The Punishment of Virtue: Inside Afghanistan After the Taliban, Chayes wrote about her experiences starting the cooperative and selling beauty products in December's Atlantic Monthly.

After a car accident, a 27-year-old man emerges from a coma with a rare neurological disorder. He can recall most everything about his life, but he believes his family members and closest friends are imposters. Richard Powers' The Echo Maker won the National Book Award for fiction in 2006; it's newly out in paperback. (This interview first aired on Dec. 12, 2006.)