Dutch National Opera Le Nozze Di Figaro
Total Page:16
File Type:pdf, Size:1020Kb
Gary Cooper The Irresistible A New Documentary by Julia and Clara Kuperberg Maria Cooper Janis, Cooper's daughter, INTERNATIONAL Poorhouse opens up to talk about the acting career of her father Newsletter No48 April - September 2019 AMERICAN TAP A uniquely American story that illustrates the vibrant and powerful nature of a cultural melting pot “At a time when America is ivy films struggling with its cultural identity 2 - when anti-immigrant and nativist sentiment boils over into outright racism and xenophobia - we are compelled to look inward to unpack what it means to be American.” Mark Wilkinson Mark Wilkinson Fights of Nations AMERICAN TAP Performers include Jason Samuel Smith and This documentary by William Henry Lane aka Master Juba, Aida Mark Wilkinson traces Overton Walker, Bill Bojangles Robinson, John W Bubbles, Baby Laurence, Chuck Green, tap dancing from The Copasetics, Gregory Hines, Savion Glover, Ginger Rogers, Anne Miller, Vera its origins, through Ellen and Eleanor Powell. Tap dance experts its evolution, to the and historians round off this entertaining and As we dig into the heritage of American instructive documentary. current form. It is a tap dancing, we discover that elements of our history which have the potential to tear us directed by Mark Wilkinson uniquely American apart - the stigma of slavery and the friction produced by Annunziata Gianzero story that illustrates caused by immigration - are the same forces for Ivy Films Inc. which bind us together and fuel our dynamic the vibrant and society. This shared experience is the cultural running time 58' and 88' Shot in HD fire that forged the art form of tap dancing. powerful nature of We uncover the co-evolution that tap dance our cultural melting shares with jazz music - back to the African slaves and the “ring shout”. We follow and pot. The examination substantiate the importance of the Irish immigrants and their particular form of reveals and informs percussive dance, the Jig. The story carries us through the distorted world of the minstrel many of the very basic show, Vaudeville and onto Broadway at a time concepts and current when tap was the dominant dance form in American culture. That height of popularity is themes of American followed by collapse during the Second World War and its rebirth with Gregory Hines and cultural consciousness. Savion Glover. Ayodele © Patrick Randak Newsletter No48 April - September 2019 wichita films Gary with his personal 16mm camera 3 Gary with Frank Capra Starring in High Noon Gary Cooper The Irresistible Born into a highly respected family, both character he played was real and she quotes directed by Julia & Clara Kuperberg his parents had emigrated from England and her father as saying: “If I know who this person settled in Montana where his father served as is I don't have to act”. And indeed actor John produced by Wichita Films Supreme Court Judge, Gary Cooper learnt to Barrymore once said of him: “This fellow is the running time 52' Shot in HD love the outdoor life, horse riding, fishing and world's greatest actor. He does without effort hunting on the family ranch. When the family what the rest of us spend our lives trying to learn York and his second with High Noon playing moved to Los Angeles Cooper, who wanted to – namely to be natural”. And he achieved this Marshall Will Kane. When producer Stanley go to art school, ended up performing stunts by an uncanny ability to project his personality Kramer wanted to withdraw Carl Foreman's and acting in Cowboy Films and Westerners. onto the character he played. We hear that name as screenwriter from the High Noon His break-through came with Wings which Cooper was David O. Selznick’s first choice credits, because he had been a member of the laid the foundation of his career as the for the part of Rhett Butler in Gone With the Communist Party, Gary Cooper threatened “American hero” and sex symbol for three Wind, a part Cooper turned down because he to walk off the film if Foreman's name wasn´t or four decades. His first talkieThe Virginian didn't think it was right for him. And Cooper put back. When Cooper began to portray consolidated this image. Julia and Clara said of himself “later when I saw Clark Gable real people like Sergeant York or Lou Gehrig Kuperberg had the good luck to persuade play the role to perfection, I knew I was right.” in The Pride of the Yankees he spent a lot of Cooper's daughter, Maria Cooper Janis, to Film historians Marc Wanamaker and Joseph time researching their lives and, in the case of talk about the acting career of her father who McBride comment on the carefully chosen Gehrig, also made himself familiar with baseball. did his own research on “who that man was film clips and paint a picture of the actor and Gehrig's famous farewell speech at Yankee he was going to portray”. You believed the man who got his first Oscar with Sergeant Stadium on July 4th 1939, before 62,000 fans, ending with “today I consider myself the luckiest Gary with his wife Rocky and daughter man on the face of the earth” Maria at Snow Valley Idaho, 1949 , was the highlight of Gary Cooper's acting career. His friendship with Frank Capra resulted in Mister Deeds Goes to Town and Meet John Doe in which Cooper added a new type of hero to his repertoire, the champion of the common man. Walking the countryside, fishing and hunting with Hemingway who drew on Cooper's image in creating Robert Jordan in his novel For Whom the Bell Tolls gave the actor another of those typical Cooper roles of playing a “rugged individualist”. Of his later films, Love in the Afternoon brings a touch of nostalgia with the aging Gary Cooper falling in love with young Audrey Hepburn. The filmmakers end on a moving scene when Cooper's friend James Stewart receives an honorary Oscar on behalf of the dying Gary Cooper and makes an emotional speech that sums up the personality of the actor. Newsletter No48 April - September 2019 4 tom zubrycki ABLAZE Photo © National Film & Sound Archive Imagine Australia today with no Indigenous cultures, languages and communities! This would be our present reality if the Australian government's racial policies of the 1950s and 60s were enforced unopposed. It took one man and a band of courageous activists to stand up to them. Tiriki Onus Bill Onus at an Aboriginal Rights March Tiriki Onus sets out to uncover the indigenous filmmaker and television host were to stop Bill's rising international influence and mystery surrounding a 70 year old silent all used in the service of winning racial equality fame. Filmmakers Alec Morgan and Tiriki Onus movie believed to be made by his grandfather and justice. It is little known that Bill generated tell a compelling story of passionate belief and William “Bill” Onus. Bill Onus, a Yorta Yorta/ international support for the Aboriginal rights cultural resilience through never before seen Wiradjuri man from Victoria is a truly heroic movement. Music stars like Harry Belafonte archive footage, reimagined events, animation cultural and political figure who revived his visited him and Paul Robeson earned an ASIO and eyewitness accounts. people's culture in the 1940s and ignited a file after he spoke out for equality in Australia. citizen's rights movement that would, against As Tiriki Onus journeys across the continent directed by Alec Morgan considerable odds, change the course of and pieces together clues to the film's origins, history. His enormous talents as entertainer, he unearths dark intrigues that shape the story produced by Tom Zubrycki entrepreneur, theatre impresario, the first into a real-life thriller about a murky campaign running time 90' Shot in HD Newsletter No48 April - September 2019 Corte Battera tico film5 Corte Battera - directed by Erica Rossi The Caring City produced by Tico Film running time 86' Shot in HD Plinio Roberto Maurizio Access to health care is not the same for themselves and bring their attention to the lives thanks to a new public health project in everyone: the conditions of life affect the real of the people they care about, without seeing the neighbourhood, for Plinio, Roberto and possibility that a person has to heal and be them only through the lens of a disease.” Maurizio new and unexpected opportunities cured. The idea that the health of people is Corte Battera - The Caring City tells the story are opening up. Following the daily work of also affected by their emotional and relational about a suburb like we have seen many, in Monica, the leader of the project and of the well-being is a concept that is as simple and which loneliness and fragility make life more volunteers working alongside her, we discover intuitive as it is innovative and revolutionary in difficult: Plinio, an elderly hypochaondriac Monicathat 'healthcare’ in this case means creating its implications. Public health implemented in pianist, does not want to leave the house relationships, getting to know people and their Corte Battera is a project that has no equal in anymore; Roberto faces the consequences needs, being together and sharing everyday Italy and most probably in Europe, but despite of a serious stroke; Maurizio pays the problems. this is now risking to be suppressed because it price of a past life of substance abuse, but does not follow the rules of the Italian public health system. Hence the urgency of showing this approach and its practical implications. “Only after I decided to be there with them”, says director Erika Pelli, “have I really been able to understand the extend of what I was observing: the human and structural investment here in place goes well beyond good practice of health here in the area.