Gossip about cultural figures comes with clicks on a keyboard, but the information is not always true. “A funny thing happens when people become super famous,” say the journalists Kai Wright and Emmanuel Dzotsi. “They get so well known that they seem like caricatures of themselves—flattened into memes and scandals, or into a single, defining image.” Wright and Dzotsi have created a new podcast that delves into the BBC’s archival coverage of prominent people. This is not biography à la Wikipedia. Each week covers one figure—the poignant and unknown stories in their life and the reason they matter in the broader sphere of culture. The first episode follows the career of Jane Fonda, her evolution from sex-symbol to serious actress, from firebrand political activist to fitness personality to writer. —Maggie Turner