I know that everyone who listens to radio creates you in a visual image that they need you to have. Whatever that is, I thought, let them have it. Let me be who the listener needs me to be and let me not contradict that with the reality of my photograph and risk disappointing them.

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Difficult interviews
Gross has drawn added public attention following some occasions when interviews have taken a confrontational turn. Gross lives in Philadelphia. The couple have no children.

She has a reputation for researching her guests' work largely the night before an interview often asking them unexpected questions about their early careers. Gross has won praise over the years for her low-key and friendly yet often probing interview style and for the diversity of her guests.