Backstage with Sohma Rae Hathaway + Jaimie Pyle
The spotlight usually lands on the entertainers. This week, we’re heading backstage.
Late Nights With… has introduced the musicians, comedians, and cultural icons being interpreted for Artists + Entertainers — inspired by TIME Magazine’s 100 most influential people of the 20th century.
But behind every portrait is an artist making choices, studying expressions, listening closely, and deciding what influence looks like on canvas.
Tonight, we’re pulling back the curtain…
Sohma Rae Hathaway
Painting Lucille Ball & Aretha Franklin
Sohma doesn’t just paint portraits — she paints light.
Often described as a painter of luminescence, she weaves allegory into nature and captures character through rich, kaleidoscopic color. She even developed her own mixed media technique — Sohmatic Revealism — a layered process that feels part alchemy, part precise repetition.
Humor was a healing force in her own life, which made Lucille Ball a natural subject. Music has always been personal, too — she loves to sing — and painting Aretha while her voice fills the room feels like more than just research.
Sohma has studied Lucy’s expressions, read biographies, watched documentaries, and immersed herself in Aretha’s music while painting. Through these portraits, she hopes viewers walk away with more emotion, more understanding — and most of all, gratitude.
Jaimie Pyle
Painting Louis Armstrong
Jaimie’s creative life hasn’t followed a straight line — and that’s part of what makes it meaningful.
A multi-medium artist, she’s worked in pottery, screen-printing, watercolor, acrylic, tapestry dyeing, and even sewing her own designs. For years, raising children and serving in a civil service career took center stage. Now retired, this project marks her return to painting — a reawakening of a long-held passion.
She’s deeply intrigued by people’s life and love stories, which made Louis Armstrong an easy choice. His journey — from poverty and brutal racism to global influence — carries both brilliance and resilience.
Jaimie has researched his life, listened to his music, and studied photos and film capturing his love of performing. Her portrait will feature Armstrong with his horn, surrounded by spiraling words that reflect the development of his gifts and life journey — a visual story within the image.
She hopes viewers recognize not just the music they love, but the strength behind it.
Two artists.
Three entertainers.
Two very different paths to the same stage.
You’ll see their portraits — along with 17 others — May 1–3, 2026!
Because influence doesn’t only sit under the spotlight. Sometimes it’s backstage, shaping what the world sees next.
