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James Dyson takes on Google with £5m investment in domestic robots
http://www.prisonplanet.com/wp-content/plugins/wp-print/images/printer_famfamfam.gif
Charles Arthur
London Guardian
February 9, 2014
Sir James Dyson is taking on the might of Google by investing £5m in a British university to develop a new generation of “intelligent domestic robots”.
The company best known for its cyclone-power vacuum cleaners is putting the money into a new laboratory at Imperial College London, which has begun hiring up to 15 scientists who will work on developing robot vision systems that could be used in devices such as robot-controlled vacuum cleaners – a longstanding ambition of Dyson himself.
Dyson said the plan was to create “practical everyday technologies that will make our lives easier”.
The move could put Dyson into a position where it is directly challenging Google, which has recently acquired eight robotics companies, including Boston Dynamics, which has made self-controlling robots for the US military. In January it also spent £400m acquiring DeepMind Technologies, a London-based startup focusing on artificial intelligence.
This article was posted: Sunday, February 9, 2014 at 7:38 am
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Life smells like violets and vanilla for Mary-Kate and Ashley Olsen. The twin sisters are launching two fragrances for women, Nirvana White and Nirvana Black, through their Elizabeth and James brand. The two scents will be sold at Sephora in December.
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Statement says actor’s TV schedule isn’t allowing him to adequately prepare for role of Christian Grey.
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Sandra Bullock stuns on the cover of Vogue’s October issue. On the inside of the magazine, she gives an open and honest interview about the highs and lows of her life since the demise of her marriage to Jesse James. “We’re all where we’re supposed to be,” she says of her painful divorce. “I am exactly where I want to be now. You can’t go backward. I’m not going backward. I’m grateful that I’m here, blessed to have what I have. Nobody can be prepared for anything.” Sandy also chats about how she was able to keep the adoption of her son Louis at the time a secret!
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At a May 29 status conference related to the controversial estate of music legend James Brown, Judge Doyet Early of Aiken vowed to rule the proceedings with a “firm hand.”
The first test of that firmness may be whether he appoints three trustees for the estate, as mandated by the will and trust documents of James Brown–or whether Judge Early allows current trustee Russell Bauknight to serve as sole trustee.
On Sept. 4 five applicants were interviewed by Judge Early for fiduciary positions with the estate. During the interview of Bauknight, a Columbia CPA, he announced he will refuse to serve if other fiduciaries are appointed.
In May the Supreme Court overturned a 2009 settlement deal by former Attorney General (AG) Henry McMaster, and the James Brown estate was remanded to Judge Early for further proceedings. In the Supreme Court opinion, Judge Early was directed to “appoint fiduciaries … in accordance with the provisions for succession outlined in Brown’s trust and estate documents.”
Brown’s estate documents require the appointment of three trustees to manage his music empire for the benefit of the “I Feel Good” Trust, an education charity for needy children in South Carolina and Georgia. Also to be funded by the music empire was a $ 2 million education trust for some of Brown’s grandchildren.
The McMaster deal gave away over half of Brown’s world-wide music empire to those Brown had excluded from inheriting it—and gave to the Attorney General the power of appointing trustees. Instead of the three trustees required by Brown’s estate documents, McMaster appointed only Bauknight, who served almost four years “at the pleasure” of McMaster and current AG Alan Wilson. On May 8 the Supreme Court voided Bauknight’s appointment but allowed him to re-apply.
During the Sept. 4 hearing in Columbia, Bauknight announced he would refuse to serve as a co-fiduciary. He said, “I’ve done a very good job with the team I’ve put together…for this estate and trust, it’s not appropriate to appoint other fiduciaries at this time.”
During his interview, Bauknight listed 27 things he had accomplished to improve the assets of the estate. He then said he would determine when the time was right to transition to three fiduciaries, and he would bring to the Court a plan for that transition.
In addition to Bauknight, Judge Early interviewed four other applicants for positions with the James Brown estate–one with a Newberry connection.
*Neal Dickert, Augusta attorney and former judge, practices law in both South Carolina and Georgia, the two states Brown intended to benefit from his charity. As both attorney and judge, Dickert has handled many will challenges. He said that based on his reading of the Supreme Court opinion, the estate needs action regarding the validity of the will, the issue of whether Brown was married, and the question of paternity. “If the Court thinks I can help, I’d be willing to do whatever I can to assist,” he said. Dickert has written for the Continuing Legal Education program in Georgia and is a member of the Georgia Academy of Mediators and Arbitrators. He is a native of Newberry, South Carolina.
*David Sojourner, Columbia attorney, was asked by Bauknight to become involved in the Brown estate after Bauknight’s attorneys advised him of a possible conflict of interest. Sojourner has agreed to accept a position with the estate under two conditions: his work would be limited to defending the estate plan, and his firm would be retained to do the legal work on that matter. “I have no interest in being a full trustee,” he said.
*William “Bill” Grooms, Columbia CPA, said his years of experience with the IRS and his expertise in taxation would be helpful to the estate. “I have a high opinion of Russell Bauknight and his skills. It would be my pleasure to work with Russell Bauknight.”
*Scott Keniley, Atlanta attorney, was elected to the Board of Governors for the Recording Academy (Grammy) and serves on its education committee. He has expertise in entertainment law and intellectual property, and he said he could help to protect the music assets—and to maximize their growth. He said, “I like the concept that this was left to education… it could be the greatest education bequest of all time.”
Judge Early said attorneys may file objections to any applicant within 10 days, and he will make a decision within 20 days. A sixth applicant, Rev. Larry Fryer of Augusta, Ga., will be interviewed Sept. 11.
The McMaster deal was appealed to the Supreme Court by former trustees, Adele Pope of Newberry and Robert Buchanan of Aiken. Since Bauknight’s appointment, he has aggressively advanced the interests of those who challenged Brown’s estate plan.
Bauknight sued the former trustees who appealed the McMaster settlement deal. He asked the Court not to lift gag orders on a document that could disprove the claim of Brown’s companion to be his wife. Also, he asked to intervene in Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) lawsuits to prevent the release of public documents: the contingency fee contract under which former trustees were sued; the Legacy Trust as created by McMaster; and documents that set the at-death valuation of Brown’s estate at $ 4.7 million.
James Brown’s estate earned $ 10 million in 2011, the last year for which Bauknight filed an accounting, according to previous filings. All fiduciaries before Bauknight valued Brown’s music empire at between $ 80 and $ 100 million, and shortly before the McMaster deal was struck, a $ 100 million offer was made on the music assets.
In overturning the McMaster settlement, the Supreme Court returned the James Brown estate case to Judge Early for further proceedings. At the May 29 status conference, attended by over 50 attorneys and interested parties, Judge Early read excerpts from the Supreme Court decision, which described the McMaster settlement deal as a “dismemberment” of Brown’s estate plan.
Judge Early then vowed he would manage the proceedings with a “firm hand,” requiring high standards of proof for all claims and following the “roadmap” provided by the Supreme Court.
Actor James Marsden had less than two weeks to prepare for his role as JFK in “The Butler,” he told New York Magazine:
Since you were a last-minute add, how much time did you have to prep?
It was a week and a half, which is not a lot of time to go in and play John Kennedy. So I immersed myself in whatever book I could read, I listened to his speeches over and over again, because the first thing that popped up in my mind was, “Don’t screw up the accent!” So I had my sights set on that. And it wasn’t a long shoot — it was like a week — so I let that kind of be my guide. I knew some stuff about Kennedy, my father is a big Kennedy buff, so he helped fill me in as well. Definitely a crash course, but it was great……
What kind of direction did [director] Lee [Daniels] give?
Lee said, “We’ve seen the Kennedys be gallant and composed, and seen him be the smartest guy in the room. We’ve seen the movie stars and we know about the infidelity, but what have we not seen?” And he allowed Minka [Kelly] and I, with him and the writers as well, to explore: What would their arguments be like? The two of them in the bedroom in the White House, what would they be arguing about? What would that look like?
“The Butler” hits theatres on Aug. 16.
Read more about: The Butler
LONDON |
LONDON (Reuters) – A watch adapted for the fictional British spy 007 in the James Bond movies sold for nearly 104,000 pounds ($ 160,000) at a pop culture auction on Wednesday after being bought, strapless, at car boot sale for 25 pounds.
The Breitling Top Time, worn by actor Sean Connery during 007′s mission to find stolen atomic bombs the 1965 movie “Thunderball”, was estimated to sell for between 40,000 and 60,000 pounds.
Auction house Christie’s said this was the first watch to be modified by the Q branch in the Bond movies and was equipped with a “Geiger counter” to help the suave secret agent detect the emission of nuclear radiation in the film.
Made by Breitling in 1962, it was adapted by the James Bond art department and was the only example produced for the movie, a Christie’s spokeswoman said.
She was unable to give details on the vendor or purchaser of the watch that was one of 252 lots at the auction house’s pop culture sale.
Among the many other items sold were Bob Dylan lyrics for an unreleased song and actress Elizabeth Taylor’s first wedding dress, which she wore as an 18-year-old when she married Conrad Hilton Junior in 1950 in one of the social events of that year attended by over 700 guests.
“The dress symbolizes one of the most iconic off-screen moments of ‘Golden Age Hollywood’,” Christie’s said in a statement.
The dress sold for nearly 122,000 pounds after an estimated sale price of 30,000 to 50,000 pounds.
(Reporting by Belinda Goldsmith, editing by Paul Casciato)
This is a rush transcript. Copy may not be in its final form.
JUAN GONZALEZ: We end today’s show with a look at a lesser-known side of a well-known actor James Gandolfini. Celebrated for his role as mob boss Tony Soprano on the hit TV series, “The Sopranos,” he died Wednesday the age of 51. He was vacationing with his family in Italy when he died of a possible heart attack. The coverage of his death has focused mainly on his portrayal as Tony Soprano, a role that earned him three Emmys. He’s also been recognized for his roles in films including, Get Shorty, Killing them Softly, and Zero Dark Thirty, about the hunt for Osama bin Laden. In a statement, Sopranos creator, David Chase, called James Gandolfini “One of the greatest actors of this or any time.”
AMY GOODMAN: But, the news coverage has mentioned little about the more political side of James Gandolfini’s work. In New York City he was a beloved figure not only because of his acting on the stage and screen, but also because of his major support for community media. And while his fictional roles have received wide acclaim, he has received less attention for his leading roles in two documentaries about the ravages of war on U.S. soldiers. In 2010 he produced the HBO film, “Wartorn: 1861-2010″ about post-traumatic stress disorder from the Civil War to Iraq and Afghanistan. He also conducted a series of in-depth interviews with U.S. soldiers wounded in the Iraq war for 2007 HBO film called, “Alive Day Memories: Home From Iraq.” the film centers on the idea that the soldiers remember two key dates in their lives — their birthday and they’re alive day, the day when they narrowly escaped a violent death. This is the trailer for the film.
JAMES GANDOLFINI: Mike, I’m right in front of you, it’s Jim Gandolfini.
SOLDIER: Hi, how you doing, Sir?
JAMES GANDOLFINI: How are you? It’s good to see you again.
SOLDIER: Great. How you doing?
JAMES GANDOLFINI: Why did you join the Army?
SOLDIER: I wanted to go and protect the nation and defend it protect it and punish those who seek to destroy it.
JAMES GANDOLFINI: Everyone I’ve talked to know the exact date when they’ve been hit.
SOLDIER: It was one of those nights in the desert. I will never forget it.
SOLDIER: I had my left hand on the steering wheel. I was smoking and then the bomb went off.
SOLDIER: All I heard was screaming and everything went black.
AMY GOODMAN: That was the trailer for the HBO film, “Alive Day Memories: Home From Iraq.” produced by James Gandolfini. For more we’re joined here in New York by the film’s co-directors, Jon Alpert and Matt O’Neill. They also co-directed, “Wartorn: 1861-2010.” They work together at New York’s Downtown Community Television, a community media center based in Chinatown where we also worked until we moved to our new studios. It’s where James Gandolfini was a board member. Jon Alpert is the founder and Executive Director of DCTV. This year Jon and Matt were nominated for an Oscar for their short film “Redemption,” about bottle and can collectors in New York City. Their other honors over the years include four Emmys for the 2006 film “Baghdad ER.” We welcome you both back to Democracy Now! Jon, talk about James Gandolfini. He was a friend of yours, and was a board member of DCTV and he did your films.
JON ALPERT: He was a friend to many people. I think if you could just sort of crystallize him, he sort of believed in nobody left behind. He did not leave his high school friends behind or his college friends behind he didn’t leave the soldiers behind. He did not leave people with learning disabilities — didn’t leave them behind, didn’t leave me behind. Any time he came to town, the phone would ring. Democracy Now! and DCTV used to be neighbors. We’re, what 20 blocks away, and we consider each other friends, but we don’t call each other up. We work, we’re in our own little world. Jim’s world was really big. He made sure that he never forgot anybody. When you were his friend, you were always his friend.
JUAN GONZALEZ: How did he get involved with DCTV to begin with? Because, obviously, it’s a — the commercial acting world is somewhat removed from documentaries and community media.
JON ALPERT: Through working on the documentaries, we all showed a respect for the soldiers, horror at the cost of the wars. He worked really hard on those documentaries. The interesting thing about documentaries, in their essence, they show war in all its terror. They are antiwar films. The army has embraced these films and shows him to every single soldier that comes into the army. It was a really constructive series of documentaries. He came to DCTV — he especially liked our high school kids. He bought them all cameras this Christmas so they could tell their stories. We didn’t have money for cameras. Jim bought the cameras.
AMY GOODMAN: I want to go to one of Jim Gandolfini’s interviews with “Alive Day Memories: Home From Iraq.” He’s speaking with First Lieutenant Dawn Halfaker, who lost an arm in Iraq.
FIRST LT. DAWN HALFAKER: When I came back, a lot of people would ask me, well, what do — how do you feel about this? Do you ever think you’ll get married? Do you ever think you’ll have a boyfriend? Do you ever think you’ll have kids? I did not know the answers to all those questions, but as I go through life, I am learning that it has nothing to do with whether or not I’m amputee. Do I wonder if I ever my kid, if I ever have a kid, do I wonder if they’ll love me for who I am? I hope so.
JAMES GANDOLFINI: What were you just thinking about?
FIRST LT. DAWN HALFAKER: The reality of, will I be able to raise a kid? I won’t be able to pick up my son or daughter with two arms. I won’t. But, I just, I hope they still love me, and I hope I will still be a good parent. What can you do?
JAMES GANDOLFINI: Well, if it matters, I think you’re going to be a wonderful parent.
AMY GOODMAN: That’s Jim Gandolfini speaking with First Lt. Dawn Halfaker. Matt O’Neill.
MATTHEW O’NEILL: I think when you see that when he asks Dawn, Dawn, what are you thinking, after that long pause, I think is an example of why he connected to people. He listened so carefully to what the soldiers were saying. He paid attention to what we were talking about, about documentaries or about friendship. And he treated everyone with respect and warmth. I think, when you said the political side of Jim, I was thinking about these interviews, and it was not political in the traditional sense of the word, but he wanted people to hear the stories that he heard. He was inspired by what they said. He was inspired by the fact that he had never heard the stories before. He did USO tours and came back saying, why is nobody talking about these soldiers lives? How can I help tell these stories. You see in that film, in that clip there, about all you ever see of him in the film is the back of his head, because he wanted the cameras focused and the spotlight focused on other people.
JUAN GONZALEZ: That’s one of the things I wanted to raise; how little he felt the need to be seen in the films or even to raise long questions of the film.
MATTHEW O’NEILL: It was always about them. I remember when we were doing press for the film out in Los Angeles and the press would be saying, JIm, Jim, or, James, James, Mr. Gandolfini! And he would always grab one of the soldiers and say, don’t talk to me, talk to them, it’s about them, it’s not about me. I got nothing to say. He lent his energy and his warmth and his compassion to these stories that were not being heard. It was a real gift everyone.
AMY GOODMAN: Let’s go to a clip from the HBO documentary, “Wartorn: 1861-2010″ of James Gandolfini interviewing two members of the Louisiana National Guard at Camps Slayer in Iraq. The soldiers are Sergeant John Wesley Mathews and Sergeant First Class Jonathan Deshotels.
SGT. JOHN WESLEY MATHEWS: It’s hard to be taught to do what we do. It’s combat arms, and then they expect you to just turn it off. That is a hard thing about being in the guard, is that you go back and they expect you to just to just get back in society.
JAMES GANDOLFINI: Who is they?
SGT FIRST CLASS JONATHAN DESHOTELS: Family, friends, whoever else.
SGT. JOHN WESLEY MATHEWS: …and the Army. In early April of 2006 is really when I hit rock bottom. I actually contemplated suicide for a while. It had really got to the point where I did not know what it was. Mentally I did not know where I was. I was lost. I really felt like I was feeling my way with my hands in the dark.
SGT FIRST CLASS JONATHAN DESHOTELS: It’s like you just can’t get straight. You just can’t get yourself right. And no matter what you do —
JAMES GANDOLFINI: You mean, talking to other people, talking to each other, there’s nothing that helps?
SGT FIRST CLASS JONATHAN DESHOTELS: You just can’t figure yourself out.
SGT. JOHN WESLEY MATHEWS: It will tear you apart. It will tear your life apart. And many a soldier has met an end at his own hand or at a bottle because they didn’t know to do.
AMY GOODMAN: The documentary “Wartorn.” The voice in the distance was Jim Gandolfini.
JON ALPERT: But, it wasn’t distant from people because everybody thought that they knew him. He was sitting in your living room every Sunday night, and he was part of your family. He spent more time with you than your cousins. It was instant recognition. So, people were ready to talk and share intimate things with him and that was an extraordinary gift that he brought to these documentaries.
JUAN GONZALEZ: And his involvement with Downtown Community Television? As a board member, was he frequently in The Firehouse?
MATTHEW O’NEILL: He came by The Firehouse whenever he was in town. He continued to work in documentary’s. He stayed involved in our lives the same way he stayed involved in the soldiers’ lives. We’ve had so many of the people from “Wartorn” and from “Alive Day Memories” reach out to us as they mourn. He gave these men and women his cellphone number. He was a super big movie star and they stayed in touch with him for years because he lent that intimate connection and kept up with it.
AMY GOODMAN: Last comment, Jon Alpert?
JON ALPERT: We’re in the middle of a documentary that he was producing about people with learning disabilities. It’s another cause that he felt very strongly about, again, nobody left behind. The kids who were pushed into the back of the classroom, he felt that wasn’t right. He knew that if they had the right educational opportunity they could blossom, and he wanted everybody in the country to think about that. I would also like the Democracy Now! community not only to think about Jim, but also another documentary filmmaker, Saul Landau. He’s a friend of ours, and we need to send him our best wishes. He is a really good guy.
AMY GOODMAN: That’s right, all the best to Saul. You can go to our website, democracynow.org, to see our interviews with Saul Landau who is battling cancer right now. I want to thank you both for being with us and all of the work that you do. Jon Alpert and Matt O’Neill who co directed, “Wartorn: 1861-2010″ and “Alive Day Memories: Home From Iraq.” They were were both produced by James Gandolfini. That does it for our show. A very fond farewell to our video production fellow Nemo Allen. We thank you, Nemo, for your persistence, for your dedication and wish you the very best in your journey to Colombia and beyond. You will always be with us.
This is a rush transcript. Copy may not be in its final form.
JUAN GONZALEZ: We end today’s show with a look at a lesser-known side of a well-known actor James Gandolfini. Celebrated for his role as mob boss Tony Soprano on the hit TV series, “The Sopranos,” he died Wednesday the age of 51. He was vacationing with his family in Italy when he died of a possible heart attack. The coverage of his death has focused mainly on his portrayal as Tony Soprano, a role that earned him three Emmys. He’s also been recognized for his roles in films including, Get Shorty, Killing them Softly, and Zero Dark Thirty, about the hunt for Osama bin Laden. In a statement, Sopranos creator, David Chase, called James Gandolfini “One of the greatest actors of this or any time.”
AMY GOODMAN: But, the news coverage has mentioned little about the more political side of James Gandolfini’s work. In New York City he was a beloved figure not only because of his acting on the stage and screen, but also because of his major support for community media. And while his fictional roles have received wide acclaim, he has received less attention for his leading roles in two documentaries about the ravages of war on U.S. soldiers. In 2010 he produced the HBO film, “Wartorn: 1861-2010″ about post-traumatic stress disorder from the Civil War to Iraq and Afghanistan. He also conducted a series of in-depth interviews with U.S. soldiers wounded in the Iraq war for 2007 HBO film called, “Alive Day Memories: Home From Iraq.” the film centers on the idea that the soldiers remember two key dates in their lives — their birthday and they’re alive day, the day when they narrowly escaped a violent death. This is the trailer for the film.
JAMES GANDOLFINI: Mike, I’m right in front of you, it’s Jim Gandolfini.
SOLDIER: Hi, how you doing, Sir?
JAMES GANDOLFINI: How are you? It’s good to see you again.
SOLDIER: Great. How you doing?
JAMES GANDOLFINI: Why did you join the Army?
SOLDIER: I wanted to go and protect the nation and defend it protect it and punish those who seek to destroy it.
JAMES GANDOLFINI: Everyone I’ve talked to know the exact date when they’ve been hit.
SOLDIER: It was one of those nights in the desert. I will never forget it.
SOLDIER: I had my left hand on the steering wheel. I was smoking and then the bomb went off.
SOLDIER: All I heard was screaming and everything went black.
AMY GOODMAN: That was the trailer for the HBO film, “Alive Day Memories: Home From Iraq.” produced by James Gandolfini. For more we’re joined here in New York by the film’s co-directors, Jon Alpert and Matt O’Neill. They also co-directed, “Wartorn: 1861-2010.” They work together at New York’s Downtown Community Television, a community media center based in Chinatown where we also worked until we moved to our new studios. It’s where James Gandolfini was a board member. Jon Alpert is the founder and Executive Director of DCTV. This year Jon and Matt were nominated for an Oscar for their short film “Redemption,” about bottle and can collectors in New York City. Their other honors over the years include four Emmys for the 2006 film “Baghdad ER.” We welcome you both back to Democracy Now! Jon, talk about James Gandolfini. He was a friend of yours, and was a board member of DCTV and he did your films.
JON ALPERT: He was a friend to many people. I think if you could just sort of crystallize him, he sort of believed in nobody left behind. He did not leave his high school friends behind or his college friends behind he didn’t leave the soldiers behind. He did not leave people with learning disabilities — didn’t leave them behind, didn’t leave me behind. Any time he came to town, the phone would ring. Democracy Now! and DCTV used to be neighbors. We’re, what 20 blocks away, and we consider each other friends, but we don’t call each other up. We work, we’re in our own little world. Jim’s world was really big. He made sure that he never forgot anybody. When you were his friend, you were always his friend.
JUAN GONZALEZ: How did he get involved with DCTV to begin with? Because, obviously, it’s a — the commercial acting world is somewhat removed from documentaries and community media.
JON ALPERT: Through working on the documentaries, we all showed a respect for the soldiers, horror at the cost of the wars. He worked really hard on those documentaries. The interesting thing about documentaries, in their essence, they show war in all its terror. They are antiwar films. The army has embraced these films and shows him to every single soldier that comes into the army. It was a really constructive series of documentaries. He came to DCTV — he especially liked our high school kids. He bought them all cameras this Christmas so they could tell their stories. We didn’t have money for cameras. Jim bought the cameras.
AMY GOODMAN: I want to go to one of Jim Gandolfini’s interviews with “Alive Day Memories: Home From Iraq.” He’s speaking with First Lieutenant Dawn Halfaker, who lost an arm in Iraq.
FIRST LT. DAWN HALFAKER: When I came back, a lot of people would ask me, well, what do — how do you feel about this? Do you ever think you’ll get married? Do you ever think you’ll have a boyfriend? Do you ever think you’ll have kids? I did not know the answers to all those questions, but as I go through life, I am learning that it has nothing to do with whether or not I’m amputee. Do I wonder if I ever my kid, if I ever have a kid, do I wonder if they’ll love me for who I am? I hope so.
JAMES GANDOLFINI: What were you just thinking about?
FIRST LT. DAWN HALFAKER: The reality of, will I be able to raise a kid? I won’t be able to pick up my son or daughter with two arms. I won’t. But, I just, I hope they still love me, and I hope I will still be a good parent. What can you do?
JAMES GANDOLFINI: Well, if it matters, I think you’re going to be a wonderful parent.
AMY GOODMAN: That’s Jim Gandolfini speaking with First Lt. Dawn Halfaker. Matt O’Neill.
MATTHEW O’NEILL: I think when you see that when he asks Dawn, Dawn, what are you thinking, after that long pause, I think is an example of why he connected to people. He listened so carefully to what the soldiers were saying. He paid attention to what we were talking about, about documentaries or about friendship. And he treated everyone with respect and warmth. I think, when you said the political side of Jim, I was thinking about these interviews, and it was not political in the traditional sense of the word, but he wanted people to hear the stories that he heard. He was inspired by what they said. He was inspired by the fact that he had never heard the stories before. He did USO tours and came back saying, why is nobody talking about these soldiers lives? How can I help tell these stories. You see in that film, in that clip there, about all you ever see of him in the film is the back of his head, because he wanted the cameras focused and the spotlight focused on other people.
JUAN GONZALEZ: That’s one of the things I wanted to raise; how little he felt the need to be seen in the films or even to raise long questions of the film.
MATTHEW O’NEILL: It was always about them. I remember when we were doing press for the film out in Los Angeles and the press would be saying, JIm, Jim, or, James, James, Mr. Gandolfini! And he would always grab one of the soldiers and say, don’t talk to me, talk to them, it’s about them, it’s not about me. I got nothing to say. He lent his energy and his warmth and his compassion to these stories that were not being heard. It was a real gift everyone.
AMY GOODMAN: Let’s go to a clip from the HBO documentary, “Wartorn: 1861-2010″ of James Gandolfini interviewing two members of the Louisiana National Guard at Camps Slayer in Iraq. The soldiers are Sergeant John Wesley Mathews and Sergeant First Class Jonathan Deshotels.
SGT. JOHN WESLEY MATHEWS: It’s hard to be taught to do what we do. It’s combat arms, and then they expect you to just turn it off. That is a hard thing about being in the guard, is that you go back and they expect you to just to just get back in society.
JAMES GANDOLFINI: Who is they?
SGT FIRST CLASS JONATHAN DESHOTELS: Family, friends, whoever else.
SGT. JOHN WESLEY MATHEWS: …and the Army. In early April of 2006 is really when I hit rock bottom. I actually contemplated suicide for a while. It had really got to the point where I did not know what it was. Mentally I did not know where I was. I was lost. I really felt like I was feeling my way with my hands in the dark.
SGT FIRST CLASS JONATHAN DESHOTELS: It’s like you just can’t get straight. You just can’t get yourself right. And no matter what you do —
JAMES GANDOLFINI: You mean, talking to other people, talking to each other, there’s nothing that helps?
SGT FIRST CLASS JONATHAN DESHOTELS: You just can’t figure yourself out.
SGT. JOHN WESLEY MATHEWS: It will tear you apart. It will tear your life apart. And many a soldier has met an end at his own hand or at a bottle because they didn’t know to do.
AMY GOODMAN: The documentary “Wartorn.” The voice in the distance was Jim Gandolfini.
JON ALPERT: But, it wasn’t distant from people because everybody thought that they knew him. He was sitting in your living room every Sunday night, and he was part of your family. He spent more time with you than your cousins. It was instant recognition. So, people were ready to talk and share intimate things with him and that was an extraordinary gift that he brought to these documentaries.
JUAN GONZALEZ: And his involvement with Downtown Community Television? As a board member, was he frequently in The Firehouse?
MATTHEW O’NEILL: He came by The Firehouse whenever he was in town. He continued to work in documentary’s. He stayed involved in our lives the same way he stayed involved in the soldiers’ lives. We’ve had so many of the people from “Wartorn” and from “Alive Day Memories” reach out to us as they mourn. He gave these men and women his cellphone number. He was a super big movie star and they stayed in touch with him for years because he lent that intimate connection and kept up with it.
AMY GOODMAN: Last comment, Jon Alpert?
JON ALPERT: We’re in the middle of a documentary that he was producing about people with learning disabilities. It’s another cause that he felt very strongly about, again, nobody left behind. The kids who were pushed into the back of the classroom, he felt that wasn’t right. He knew that if they had the right educational opportunity they could blossom, and he wanted everybody in the country to think about that. I would also like the Democracy Now! community not only to think about Jim, but also another documentary filmmaker, Saul Landau. He’s a friend of ours, and we need to send him our best wishes. He is a really good guy.
AMY GOODMAN: That’s right, all the best to Saul. You can go to our website, democracynow.org, to see our interviews with Saul Landau who is battling cancer right now. I want to thank you both for being with us and all of the work that you do. Jon Alpert and Matt O’Neill who co directed, “Wartorn: 1861-2010″ and “Alive Day Memories: Home From Iraq.” They were were both produced by James Gandolfini. That does it for our show. A very fond farewell to our video production fellow Nemo Allen. We thank you, Nemo, for your persistence, for your dedication and wish you the very best in your journey to Colombia and beyond. You will always be with us.
James Gandolfini, the celebrated actor best known for his role as mob boss Tony Soprano on the hit TV series, “The Sopranos,” died Wednesday at the age of 51. While coverage of his death has focused mainly on his acting career, little has been mentioned about the more political side of his work. In New York City, he was a beloved figure not only because of his acting on the stage and screen, but also because of his major support for community media and producing documentaries critical of war. In 2010, he produced the HBO film “Wartorn: 1861-2010″ about post-traumatic stress disorder from the Civil War to Iraq and Afghanistan. He also conducted a series of in-depth interviews with U.S. soldiers wounded in the Iraq War for a 2007 HBO film, “Alive Day Memories: Home From Iraq.” We speak to the films’ co-directors, Jon Alpert and Matthew O’Neill.
DR. JAMES PETERSON: “The point of the matter in terms of political coalitions, he doesn’t need a large percentage of white working-class voters, right. The future of politics for the Democratic Party is about siphoning off a smaller percentage of that voting populace to expand the coalition that Obama had in place for his reelection.” (Hardball, June 6, 2013)
Hiroyuki Ito for The New York Times
James Levine conducted the Met Orchestra on Sunday.
On Sunday afternoon Mr. Levine, one of the greatest living American conductors and a musician who has defined the Metropolitan Opera for more than 40 years, cruised onto the stage of Carnegie Hall in a motorized wheelchair and conducted the Met Orchestra in a substantial program, his first performance anywhere in more than two years. The audience, which packed the house, stood almost in sync to give him a hearty welcoming ovation.
The podium area was enclosed on three sides with painted wood panels that fit the design of Carnegie Hall interiors. Behind the panels, a rising platform lifted his chair. His entrance was choreographed so that after facing the audience, blowing kisses and waving his hands, Mr. Levine was able to turn his chair around and get to work in just over a minute. Then he led a serene, poised and glowing account of the Prelude to Act I of Wagner’s “Lohengrin.”
So he really is back. This was Mr. Levine at his best. There are still big questions hovering over the Met about whether he can fulfill the duties of music director, which remains his title. But this was a day to celebrate his return and bask in his musical glory.
After years of spinal problems, shoulder injuries and multiple operations, it seemed very possible that Mr. Levine might never return to performing. In a recent interview with the mezzo-soprano Marilyn Horne on WQXR radio, Mr. Levine, reflecting on his health troubles, said his lowest point came in August 2011, when during a vacation he fell and incurred another serious back injury. “A year ago,” he said, “I couldn’t really move my legs, and a few months before that I couldn’t feel anything in them.” It took him quite a while, he added, to even think of whether he would conduct again.
Many New Yorkers were asking the same question, but the audience seemed riveted by Mr. Levine’s performance, a watershed moment in New York’s musical life this year.
On this afternoon, he came across as a conductor with something to prove. Wagner has long been a Levine specialty, and there could not have been a more revealing work to open this momentous performance than the Prelude to “Lohengrin.”
He looked physically up to the task. He showed flexibility in his upper body, as he has described in recent interviews. He seemed comfortable waving his arms and giving emphatic cues. Mr. Levine was actually bouncing around on the chair, smiling at the musicians, sometimes singing the music audibly and looking altogether unrestrained.
After the Wagner, as he tried to turn his chair around to face the audience, Mr. Levine seemed to have some trouble with controlling it. A cellist and a violinist from the orchestra, looking concerned, got up to help him. But he managed, and rotated the chair fully around. Still, this little hitch suggested how unusual it is for a conductor to have to work out such matters.
He stayed in place as a piano was rolled out — conductors normally head for the wings — and the stage was set up for the next work, Beethoven’s Piano Concerto No. 4 in G, with the Russian virtuoso Evgeny Kissin as soloist.
Mr. Kissin, who hails from a Russian Romantic heritage, has a different musical orientation from Mr. Levine, a direct, no-nonsense interpreter with a keen intellectual understanding of music. Yet Mr. Levine has great feeling for the authenticity of national traditions and is clearly in awe of Mr. Kissin’s artistry.
On Sunday Mr. Kissin’s playing was elegant, impeccable and beautifully colored. Now and then he took rhythmic liberties, as is his way, stretching phrases for expressive effect. But Mr. Levine was there to support and, in a way, caress Mr. Kissin’s playing. And the structural rigor and rhythmic bite of Mr. Kissin’s performance had to have come, at least in part, from Mr. Levine’s example.
The second half was devoted to Schubert’s magisterial Ninth Symphony. This piece was the major work that Mr. Levine conducted on his New York Philharmonic debut program in 1972. Reviewing that performance, the New York Times critic Harold C. Schonberg said that Mr. Levine came out “short, pudgy, behaired, exuding confidence” and “showed that the confidence was not misplaced.” He concluded that Mr. Levine is “a young conductor with a great deal of skill and sensitivity and there is no reason he should not develop into one of the majors.” Talk about an astute prediction.
Mr. Levine excelled in this demanding Schubert work. The performance lasted about 50 minutes and, if anything, his energy increased as it went on. The first movement was grand and stately and exciting. Here was a Schubert Ninth without a real slow movement because Mr. Levine set a walking, almost urgent tempo in the Andante and held it. The scherzo was at once buoyant and incisive. And the finale, which can seem repetitive, was thrilling, played with momentum and restlessness, yet without any loss of grandeur, clarity and musical architecture.
Mr. Levine’s return was a triumph. Where this leaves the Met, though, is still not clear. He is scheduled to conduct extensive runs of three operas next season, which is a lot more demanding than one of the orchestra’s thrice-yearly concerts at Carnegie Hall.
But you have to admire the pluck and determination he has shown in this remarkable comeback.
