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Bill Cosby

William Henry (Bill) Cosby Jr. (born July 12, 1937) is an American stand-up comedian, actor, musician, and author. His start in stand-up comedy began at the hungry i in San Francisco; he then landed a starring role in the 1960s television show I Spy. He was also a regular on the children's television series The Electric Company during the show's first two seasons.

Using the Fat Albert character developed during his stand-up routines, Cosby created, produced, and hosted the animated comedy television series Fat Albert and the Cosby Kids, a show that ran from 1972 to 1985, centering on a group of young friends growing up in an urban area. Throughout the 1970s, Cosby starred in a number of films, and he occasionally returned to film later in his career. He attended Temple University in the 1960s and received his bachelor's degree there in 1971. In 1973, he received a master's degree from the University of Massachusetts, and in 1976, he earned his Doctor of Education degree, also from UMass. His dissertation discussed the use of Fat Albert and the Cosby Kids as a teaching tool in elementary schools.

Beginning in the 1980s, Cosby produced and starred in a television sitcom, The Cosby Show, which aired from 1984 to 1992 and was rated as the number one show in America for five years, 1984 through 1989. The sitcom highlighted the experiences and growth of an affluent African-American family. Cosby produced the Cosby Show spin-off sitcom A Different World, which aired from 1987 to 1993, starred in The Cosby Mysteries from 1994 to 1995, starred in the sitcom Cosby from 1996 to 2000; and hosted Kids Say the Darndest Things for two seasons, from 1998 to 2000.

Cosby has been the subject of sexual assault allegations, the earliest of which date back decades; those allegations did not become highly publicized until 2014. More than sixty women have accused him of rape, drug facilitated sexual assault, sexual battery, child sexual abuse, and sexual misconduct. The earliest alleged incidents took place in the mid-1960s and the most recent in 2008. He has denied the allegations, but numerous related lawsuits are still pending against Cosby. Most of the acts alleged by his accusers fall outside the statutes of limitations for criminal legal proceedings, but one notable case went to trial in Montgomery County, Pennsylvania after he was charged with three felony counts of aggravated indecent assault. He surrendered to authorities on December 30, 2015, and was released on $1 million bail. Cosby's trial started on June 5, 2017 and ended in mistrial on June 17. Cosby is scheduled to be re-tried on November 6, 2017.

Early life

Cosby was born on July 12, 1937 in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. He is one of four sons of Anna Pearl (née Hite), a maid, and William Henry Cosby Sr., who served as a mess steward in the U.S. Navy. During much of Cosby's early childhood, his father was away in the U.S. Armed Forces, spending several years serving in the theater of war in World War II. As a student, he described himself as a class clown. Cosby was the captain of both the baseball team and the track and field team at Mary Channing Wister Public School in Philadelphia, as well as the class president. Early on, though, teachers noted his propensity for clowning around rather than studying. At FitzSimons Junior High School, Cosby began acting in plays as well as continuing his devotion to playing sports.

Cosby went on to Philadelphia's Central High School, a magnet and academically rigorous college prep school where he played football, basketball, baseball, and ran track. In addition, Cosby was working before and after school, selling produce, shining shoes, and stocking shelves at a supermarket to help support his family. He transferred to Germantown High School, but failed the tenth grade. Instead of repeating, he got a job as an apprentice at a shoe repair shop, which he liked, but could not see himself doing the rest of his life.

In 1956, Cosby enlisted in the Navy and served at the Marine Corps Base Quantico, Virginia, Naval Station Argentia, Newfoundland and at the Bethesda Naval Hospital in Maryland. During his four years in the Navy, Cosby served as a Hospital Corpsman working in physical therapy with Navy and Marine Corps personnel injured during the Korean War.

He earned his high school equivalency diploma via correspondence courses and was awarded a track and field scholarship to Temple University in 1961. At Temple, he studied physical education while he ran track and played fullback on the college's football team. As Cosby progressed through his undergraduate studies, he continued to hone his talent for humor, joking with fellow enlistees in the service and then with college friends. When he began bartending at a Philadelphia club to earn money, he became more aware of his ability to make people laugh. After entertaining his customers with humor and seeing his tips increase, he proceeded to take his talent to the stage.

Stand-up career

Cosby left Temple to pursue a career in comedy. He lined up standup jobs at clubs in Philadelphia and then in New York City, where he appeared at The Gaslight Cafe beginning in 1961. He booked dates in cities such as Chicago, Las Vegas, San Francisco, and Washington, D.C. In the summer of 1963, he received national exposure on NBC's The Tonight Show. This led to a recording contract with Warner Bros. Records, who, in 1964, released his debut LP Bill Cosby Is a Very Funny Fellow...Right!, the first of a series of comedy albums. His album To Russell, My Brother, Whom I Slept With was number 1 on Spin Magazines list of "The 40 Greatest Comedy Albums of All Time", calling it "stand-up comedy's masterpiece".

While many comics of the time were using the growing freedom of that decade to explore material that was controversial and sometimes risqué, Cosby was making his reputation with humorous recollections of his childhood. Many Americans wondered about the absence of race as a topic in Cosby's stories. As Cosby's success grew he had to defend his choice of material regularly; as he argued, "A white person listens to my act and he laughs and he thinks, 'Yeah, that's the way I see it too.' Okay. He's white. I'm Negro. And we both see things the same way. That must mean that we are alike. Right? So I figure this way I'm doing as much for good race relations as the next guy."

In 1983, he released the concert film Bill Cosby: Himself; it is widely regarded as "the greatest comedy concert film ever". Younger, well-established comics like Jerry Seinfeld have credited Cosby as an innovator both as a practitioner of the genre of standup comedy, but also as a person who paved the way for comics to break into sitcom television. Seinfeld said of Cosby: "He opened a door for all of us, for all of the networks to even consider that this was a way to create a character, was to take someone who can hold an audience just by being up there and telling their story. He created that. He created the whole idea of taking a quote-unquote 'comic' and developing a TV show just from a persona that you see onstage." Comedian Larry Wilmore also saw a connection between Bill Cosby: Himself and the later success of The Cosby Show, saying: "It's clear that the concert is the template for The Cosby Show."

Cosby performed his first TV standup special in 30 years, "Bill Cosby: Far From Finished", on Comedy Central on November 23, 2013. Cosby's last show of the "Far From Finished" tour was performed at the Cobb Energy Performing Arts Centre in Atlanta, Georgia on May 2, 2015.

In 2014, Cosby was set to release his new stand-up special Bill Cosby 77 on Netflix. The release of the film was cancelled due to allegations of sexual assault.

Acting career

I Spy

In 1965, Cosby was cast alongside Robert Culp in the I Spy espionage adventure series on NBC. I Spy became the first weekly dramatic television series to feature an African-American in a starring role. At first, Cosby and NBC executives were concerned that some affiliates might be unwilling to carry the series. At the beginning of the 1965 season, four stations declined the show; they were in Georgia, Florida, and Alabama. Viewers were taken with the show's exotic locales and the authentic chemistry between the stars, and it became one of the ratings hits of that television season. I Spy finished among the twenty most-watched shows that year, and Cosby would be honored with three consecutive Emmy Awards for Outstanding Lead Actor in a Drama Series. When accepting his third Emmy for the show, Cosby told the audience: "Let the message be known to bigots and racists that they don’t count!"

During the series run, Cosby continued to do stand-up comedy performances and recorded a half-dozen record albums for Warner Bros. Records. He also began to dabble in singing, recording Silver Throat: Bill Cosby Sings in 1967.

In June 1968, Billboard reported that Cosby had turned down a five-year, US$3.5 million contract renewal offer and would leave the label in August that year to record for his own record label.

In July 1968, Cosby narrated "Black History: Lost, Stolen, or Strayed", a CBS documentary addressing the representation of blacks in popular culture. Andy Rooney wrote the Emmy awarded script for Bill Cosby to read. Michael Eric Dyson said it was one of "the rare exceptions when Cosby took off the gloves and blinders, to discuss race in public with candor and discernment." Due to its popularity and controversial nature, it was rebroadcast less than a month later.

Tetragrammaton Records was a division of the Campbell, Silver, Cosby (CSC) Corporation, the Los Angeles-based production company founded by Cosby, his manager Roy Silver, and filmmaker Bruce Post Campbell. It produced films as well as records, including Cosby's television specials, the Fat Albert cartoon special and series and several motion pictures. CSC hired Artie Mogull as President of the label and Tetragrammaton was fairly active during 1968–69 (its most successful signing was British heavy rock band Deep Purple) but it quickly went into the red and ceased trading during 1970.

Fat Albert, The Bill Cosby Show, and the 1970s

Cosby pursued a variety of additional television projects and appeared as a regular guest host on The Tonight Show and as the star of an annual special for NBC. In 1969, he returned with another series, The Bill Cosby Show, a situation comedy that ran for two seasons. Cosby played a physical education teacher at a Los Angeles high school. While only a modest critical success, the show was a ratings hit, finishing eleventh in its first season. Cosby was lauded for using African-American performers such as Lillian Randolph, Moms Mabley, and Rex Ingram as characters. According to commentary on the Season 1 DVDs for the show, Cosby was at odds with NBC over his refusal to include a laugh track in the show (he felt that viewers had the ability to find humor for themselves when watching a TV show).

After The Bill Cosby Show left the air, Cosby resumed his formal education. He began graduate work at the University of Massachusetts. For the PBS series The Electric Company, Cosby recorded several segments teaching reading skills to young children.

In 1972, Cosby received an MA from the University of Massachusetts and was also back in prime time with a variety series, The New Bill Cosby Show. However, this time he met with poor ratings, and the show lasted only a season. More successful was a Saturday morning show, Fat Albert and the Cosby Kids, hosted by Cosby and based on his own childhood. That series ran from 1972 to 1979, and as The New Fat Albert Show in 1979 and The Adventures of Fat Albert and the Cosby Kids in 1984. Cosby wrote a dissertation on it, "An Integration of the Visual Media Via 'Fat Albert And The Cosby Kids' Into the Elementary School Curriculum as a Teaching Aid and Vehicle to Achieve Increased Learning", as partial fulfillment of obtaining his 1976 doctorate in education, also from the University of Massachusetts. Subsequently, Temple University, where Cosby had begun but never finished his undergraduate studies, would grant him his bachelor's degree on the basis of "life experience."

Also, during the 1970s, Cosby and other African-American actors, including Sidney Poitier, joined forces to make some successful comedy films that countered the violent "blaxploitation" films of the era. Uptown Saturday Night (1974) and Let's Do It Again (1975) were generally praised, but much of Cosby's film work has fallen flat. Mother, Jugs & Speed (1976), co-starring Raquel Welch and Harvey Keitel; A Piece of the Action, with Poitier; and California Suite, a compilation of four Neil Simon plays, were all panned. In addition, Cos(1976) an hour-long variety show featuring puppets, sketches, and musical numbers, was canceled within a year. It was during this season that ABC decided to take advantage of this phase of Cosby's career by associating with Filmation (producers of Fat Albert) in creating live-action segments starring Cosby for the 1964/1971 animated film Journey Back to Oz, which made its network premiere on Christmas 1976, and aired, subsequently, in syndication. Cosby was also a regular on children's public television programs starting in the 1970s, hosting the "Picture Pages" segments that lasted into the early 1980s.

The Cosby Show and the 1980s

Cosby's greatest television success came in September 1984 with the debut of The Cosby Show. Cosby is an advocate for humor that is family-oriented. While working on The Cosby Show he held creative control, co-produced the series and involved himself in every aspect of production. Plots were often based on ideas that Cosby suggested while in meetings with the writing staff. The show had parallels to Cosby's actual family life: like the characters Cliff and Clair Huxtable, Cosby and his wife Camille were college educated, financially successful, and had five children. On the show, Cosby played the role of an obstetrician.

Much of the material from the pilot and first season of The Cosby Show was taken from his video Bill Cosby: Himself, released in 1983. The series was an immediate success, debuting near the top of the ratings and staying there for most of its long run.

In 1987, Cosby attempted to return to film with the spy spoof Leonard Part 6. Although Cosby himself was producer and wrote the story, he realized during production that the film was not going to be what he wanted and publicly denounced it, warning audiences to stay away.

1990s and 2000s

After The Cosby Show went off the air in 1992, Cosby embarked on a number of other projects, including a revival of the classic Groucho Marx game show You Bet Your Life (1992–93) along with the TV-movie I Spy Returns (1994) and The Cosby Mysteries (1994). In the mid-1990s, he appeared as a detective in black-and-white film noir-themed commercials for Turner Classic Movies. He made appearances in three more films: Ghost Dad (1990), The Meteor Man (1993), and Jack (1996). In addition, he was interviewed in Spike Lee's 4 Little Girls (1997), a documentary about the 1963 racist bombing of a church in Birmingham, Alabama.

Also in 1996, he started up a new show for CBS, Cosby, again co-starring Phylicia Rashād, his onscreen wife on The Cosby Show. Cosby co-produced the show for Carsey-Werner Productions. It centered on Cosby as Hilton Lucas, an iconoclastic senior citizen who tries to find a new job after being downsized and, in the meantime, gets on his wife's nerves. Madeline Kahn costarred as Rashād's goofy business partner Pauline. Cosby was hired by CBS to be the official spokesman of the WWJ-TV during an advertising campaign from 1995 to 1998. Cosby hosted a CBS special, Kids Say the Darndest Things on February 6, 1995, which was followed after as a full season show, with Cosby as host, from January 9, 1998, to June 23, 2000. After four seasons, Cosby was canceled. Its last episode aired April 28, 2000. Kids Say the Darndest Things was terminated the same year.

A series for preschoolers, Little Bill, made its debut on Nickelodeon in 1999. The network renewed the popular program in November 2000. In 2001, Cosby's agenda included the publication of a new book, as well as delivering the commencement addresses at Morris Brown College, Ohio State University, and at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute. Also that year, he signed a deal with 20th Century Fox to develop a live-action feature film centering on the popular Fat Albert character from his 1970s cartoon series. Fat Albert was released in theaters in December 2004. In May 2007, he spoke at the commencement of High Point University.

In the summer of 2009, Cosby hosted a comedy gala at Montreal's Just for Laughs, which is the largest comedy festival in the world.

2010s

Cosby received the National Football Foundation's Gold Medal in 2010

A new NBC show, that was scheduled for summer or autumn 2015, created by Mike O'Malley and Mike Sikowitz and to have been produced by The Cosby Show's Tom Werner, was set to feature Cosby as Jonathan Franklin, the patriarch of a multi-generational family. On November 19, 2014, NBC scrapped Cosby's new show after accusations that he sexually assaulted women resurfaced.

Reruns of The Cosby Show have been canceled as a result of the sexual assault allegations against Cosby. On November 19, 2014, TV Land and NBC both ended their relationships with Cosby: TV Land announced that it was pulling reruns from its schedule and also removing clips of the show from its website. In December 2014, the Magic Johnson-owned Aspire removed the series from its lineup. In July 2015, broadcast network Bounce TV pulled reruns, and BET's Centric (another Viacom unit) stopped airing reruns. The show is still available on Hulu Plus.

In late 2014, Creative Artists Agency, Cosby's agency since 2012, dropped him as a client.

Sexual assault convictions

Cosby has been the subject of highly publicized sexual assault allegations. The earliest incidents allegedly took place in the mid-1960s. Numerous women have accused Cosby of rape, drug facilitated sexual assault, sexual battery, child sexual abuse, and sexual misconduct. In October 2014, comedian Hannibal Buress played a comedy routine that alluded to Cosby's covert sexual misbehavior. The routine went viral, which caused assault allegations against Cosby to become more public. Many additional claims were made after that date. The dates of the alleged incidents span from 1965 to 2008 across ten U.S. states and one Canadian province.

Cosby has repeatedly denied the allegations and maintained his innocence. In November 2014, he responded to a question about the allegations and said: "I don't talk about it". In past interviews that were made public, Cosby declined to discuss the accusations. However, he told Florida Today, "people shouldn't have to go through that and shouldn't answer to innuendos". In May 2015 he said, "I have been in this business 52 years and I've never seen anything like this. Reality is a situation and I can't speak."

In the wake of the allegations, numerous organizations have severed ties with Cosby, and honors and titles that were previously awarded to him have been revoked. Reruns of The Cosby Show and other shows featuring Cosby have also been pulled from syndication by many organizations. Twenty-five colleges and universities have rescinded his honorary degrees. In an attempt to explain the backlash against Cosby, Adweek reporter Jason Lynch noted that the "media landscape has changed considerably—and has now been joined by the far-less-forgiving social media arena".

Due to a delay in reporting the crimes, most of the alleged acts fall outside the statutes of limitations for criminal prosecution, but criminal charges have been filed against Cosby in one case and numerous civil lawsuits have been brought against him. As of November 2015, eight related civil suits were active against Cosby. High-profile attorney Gloria Allred is representing 33 of the alleged victims. In July 2015, some of the court records from Andrea Constand's 2005 civil suit against Cosby were unsealed and released to the public. The full transcript of his deposition was also released to the media by a court reporting service. In his testimony, Cosby admitted to casual sex, involving the recreational use of the sedative methaqualone (Quaaludes), with a series of young women, and acknowledged that his dispensing the prescription drug was illegal.

In December 2015, three Class II felony charges of aggravated indecent assault were filed against Cosby in Montgomery County, Pennsylvania, based on allegations by Constand concerning incidents in January 2004. Cosby's first trial, in June 2017, ended in a mistrial. In a retrial by a jury, he was found guilty on April 26, 2018, of three counts of aggravated indecent assault.

Political views

Cosby received an award at the celebration of the 50th anniversary commemoration of the Brown v. Board of Education ruling—a ruling of the U.S. Supreme Court that outlawed racial segregation in schools. A little later in May 2004, he made public remarks that were critical of African Americans who put higher priorities on sports, fashion, and "acting hard" than on education, self-respect, and self-improvement. He pleaded for African-American families to educate their children on the many different aspects of American culture.

In the "Pound Cake" speech, Cosby asked that African-American parents teach their children better morals at a younger age. As reported in The Washington Times, Cosby "told reporters during a special session of the Congressional Black Caucus Foundation’s 34th annual legislative conference" that "Parenting needs to come to the forefront. If you need help and you don't know how to parent, we want to be able to reach out and touch you." Richard Leiby of The Washington Post reported, "Bill Cosby was anything but politically correct in his remarks Monday night at a Constitution Hall bash commemorating the 50th anniversary of the Brown v. Board of Education decision."

Cosby again came under sharp criticism and was again largely unapologetic for his stance when he made similar remarks during a speech at a July 1 meeting commemorating the anniversary of Brown v. Board of Education. During that speech, he admonished apathetic blacks for not assisting or concerning themselves with the individuals who are involved with crime or have counter-productive aspirations. He further described those who needed attention as blacks who "had forgotten the sacrifices of those in the Civil Rights Movement."

In 2005, Georgetown University sociology professor Michael Eric Dyson wrote a book, Is Bill Cosby Right? Or Has the Black Middle Class Lost Its Mind? In the book, Dyson wrote that Cosby was overlooking larger social factors that reinforce poverty and associated crime; factors such as deteriorating schools, stagnating wages, dramatic shifts in the economy, offshoring and downsizing, chronic underemployment, and job and capital flight. Dyson suggested that Cosby's comments "betray classist, elitist viewpoints rooted in generational warfare."

Cornel West defended Cosby and his remarks, saying, "he's speaking out of great compassion and trying to get folk to get on the right track, 'cause we've got some brothers and sisters who are not doing the right things, just like in times in our own lives, we don't do the right thing... He is trying to speak honestly and freely and lovingly, and I think that's a very positive thing."

In a 2008 interview, Cosby mentioned Atlanta; Chicago; Detroit; Oakland, California; Philadelphia; and Springfield, Massachusetts among the cities where crime was high and young African-American men were being murdered and jailed in disproportionate numbers. Cosby stood his ground against criticism and affirmed that African-American parents were continuing to fail to inculcate proper standards of moral behavior.

Cosby has also been vocally critical of conservative Republican politicians in regard to their views on socioeconomic and racial issues. In a 2013 CNN interview regarding voting rights, Cosby stated "this Republican Party is not the Republican Party of 1863, of Abraham Lincoln, abolitionists and slavery, is not good. I think it's important for us to look at the underlying part of it. What is the value of it? Is it that some people are angry because my people no longer want to work for free?"

Personal life

Cosby married Camille Olivia Hanks on January 25, 1964. Together, they had five children, Erika, Erinn, Ensa, Evin, and Ennis; the names of the children are a good example of alliteration. Their only son, Ennis, was murdered on January 16, 1997, while changing a flat tire on the side of Interstate 405 in Los Angeles. The Cosbys have three grandchildren.

Cosby is a Protestant. He maintains homes in Shelburne, Massachusetts, and Cheltenham, Pennsylvania.

Cosby hosted the Los Angeles Playboy Jazz Festival from 1979 to 2012 (George Lopez has hosted the event since then). Known as a jazz drummer, he can also be seen playing bass guitar with Jerry Lewis and Sammy Davis, Jr. on Hugh Hefner's 1970s talk show. His story, "The Regular Way", was featured in Playboy's December 1968 issue. Cosby has become an active member of The Jazz Foundation of America. Cosby became involved with the foundation in 2004. For several years, he has been a featured host for its annual benefit, A Great Night in Harlem, at the Apollo Theater in New York City. Cosby has stated many times in his stand-up shows that "kids these days don't know what the jazz is all about".

Cosby and his wife have collected over 300 works of African American art since 1967. The works went on display in "Conversations", an exhibit at the National Museum of African Art in 2014. The show became controversial for mounting as sexual assault allegations against Cosby became prominent.

Cosby is a supporter of his alma mater, Temple University, particularly its men's basketball team, whose games Cosby frequently attended prior to his arrest. He is also a member of the Omega Psi Phi fraternity; he was initiated in the fraternity's Beta Alpha Alpha graduate chapter in White Plains, New York, in 1988.

In 2016, Cosby's attorneys reported that the comedian is now legally blind. In an April 2017 interview with the National Newspaper Publishers Association (an interview he only agreed to do as long as the NNPA portrayed him in a positive light), both Cosby and a former publicist of his confirmed this, noting he lost his sight at some point in 2015.

Autumn Jackson extortion trial

During Autumn Jackson's extortion trial in July 1997, Cosby testified that he made private payments to Shawn Upshaw, a woman who had briefly been his lover in Las Vegas during the early 1970s. Upshaw later told Cosby that he was the father of her daughter, Autumn Jackson. Cosby denies being the father and said that he gave Upshaw a total of about $100,000 because he did not want her to publicly reveal the affair. Twenty-two-year-old Autumn Jackson was sentenced to 26 months in jail for trying to extort US$40 million from Cosby. In the trial and subsequent appeal, the courts held that Jackson's belief that she was Cosby's child—even if sincere—was irrelevant to the question of her guilt. The courts stated that the mere fact that she was Cosby's child would not have entitled her to the $40 million she demanded, and therefore the demand was extortionate, whether or not she believed herself to be Cosby's daughter. Although both Jackson and Cosby stated at various times that they were willing to undergo DNA testing to determine Jackson's paternity, the two sides never reached an agreement as to when and how to perform the test. After Jackson's conviction, Cosby provided a blood sample for testing, but Jackson refused to participate until after her sentencing.

Awards and honors

1998: Received the Kennedy Center Honor.

2002: The scholar Molefi Kete Asante included him in his book The 100 Greatest African Americans.

2005: In a British poll broadcast on Channel 4 to find the Comedian's Comedian, he was voted among the top-50 comedy acts ever by fellow comedians and comedy insiders.

2009: Presented with the 12th annual Mark Twain Prize for American Humor.

2010: Received the Lone Sailor Award by the United States Navy Memorial.

Emmys

Outstanding Continued Performance by an Actor in a Leading Role in a Dramatic Series – Primetime Emmys 1966 I Spy – Alexander Scott 1967 I Spy – Alexander Scott 1968 I Spy – Alexander Scott Outstanding Variety Or Musical Program – Primetime Emmys 1969 The Bill Cosby Special

Grammys

Best Comedy Performance – Grammy Awards 1965 I Started Out as a Child 1966 Why Is There Air? 1967 Wonderfulness 1968 Revenge 1969 To Russell, My Brother, Whom I Slept With 1970 Sports 1987 Those of You with or Without Children, You'll Understand Best Recording for Children – Grammy Awards 1971 The Electric Company – Cast member 1972 Bill Cosby Talks to Kids About Drugs

Honorary degrees

Cosby has been awarded at least 57 honorary degrees since 1985 (some have been revoked; see next section):

Honorary Doctor of Laws from the University of Pennsylvania, 1990. He also served as the commencement speaker in May 1997.

Honorary Doctor of Fine Arts degree from the University of Southern California, May 8, 1998.

Honorary Doctorate from Colgate University, May 22, 1999; he was also the keynote speaker for the commencement ceremony.

Honorary Doctorate from Amherst College, May 1999. (Doctor of Humane Letters, honoris causa)

Honorary Degree from Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, 2001

Honorary Degree from the University of Cincinnati in 2001.

Honorary Doctorate from Paine College in 2003.

Honorary Degree in 2003 from Sisseton Wahpeton College for his contributions to minority education.

Honorary Doctorate from West Chester University of Pennsylvania during the 2003 graduation ceremony.

Honorary Doctor of Humane Letters degree from Yale University, May 26, 2003.

Honorary Doctor of Music degree from Berklee College of Music, May 8, 2004. Cosby was also the host of the school's 60th Anniversary Concert in January 2006.

Honorary Doctor of Humane Letters degree from Carnegie Mellon University, May 20, 2007; he was also the keynote speaker for the commencement ceremony.

Honorary Doctor of Humane Letters degree from Virginia Commonwealth University, December 5, 2008.

Following numerous allegations of sexual assault made against Cosby, a number of his awards were revoked:

Revoked Honorary degrees

Awarded Honorary Doctor of Letters degree from Brown University, May 1985. Degree rescinded September 2015.

Awarded Honorary Doctor of Laws degree from Lehigh University, May 1987. Degree rescinded February 2016.

Awarded Honorary Doctor of Letters degree from California State Polytechnic University, Pomona, 1992. Degree rescinded November 2015.

Awarded Honorary Doctor of Humane Letters degree from Swarthmore College, 1995. Degree rescinded December 2015.

Awarded Honorary Doctor of Fine Arts from the University of Connecticut, and served as the commencement speaker May 18, 1996. Degree rescinded June 2016.

Awarded Honorary Doctor of Arts degree from Tufts University, 2000. Degree rescinded October 2015.

Awarded Honorary Doctorate from Goucher College, 2001. Degree rescinded October 2015.

Awarded Honorary Doctor of Fine Arts from Fordham University in 2001. Degree rescinded September 2015.

Awarded Honorary Doctor of Humane Letters degree from Haverford College, May 2002. Degree rescinded February 2016.

Awarded Honorary Doctorate from Drew University during the May 2002 graduation ceremony. Degree rescinded October 2015.

Awarded Honorary Doctor of Humane Letters degree from Baylor University, September 4, 2003, at the "Spirit Rally" for the Baylor and Central Texas communities. Degree rescinded October 2015.

Awarded Honorary Doctor of Humane Letters degree from Wilkes University, May 2004. Degree rescinded October 2015.

Awarded Honorary Doctor of Humane Letters degree from Oberlin College, May 1, 2010. Degree rescinded December 2015.

Awarded Honorary Chief Petty Officer (Hospital Corpsman) in the United States Navy in 2011. The Navy revoked this award on December 4, 2014.

Awarded Honorary Doctor of Fine Arts degree from The University of San Francisco, May 18, 2012. Degree rescinded September 2015.

Awarded Honorary Doctor of Letters degree from Marquette University, May 19, 2013. Rescinded September 2015.

Awarded Honorary Doctor of Humane Letters degree from Boston University, May 18, 2014. Degree rescinded December 2015.

Awarded Honorary Doctor of Humane Letters degree from University of Missouri-Columbia, 1990. Degree rescinded June 2017.

Wikipedia

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Just last year, Delhi Crime, a Netflix drama series based on the real rape and murder of a 23-year-old student in India’s capital, won an international Emmy. Start of a new era The arrival of Amazon (AMZN) and Netflix in India has been a boon to directors and writers like Narain, who had long languished on the fringes of Bollywood — an industry often accused of nepotism. Several filmmakers told CNN Business they thought the international streaming services introduced a degree of professionalism. “I co-directed a film called ‘House Arrest,’ which was released on Netflix in 2019, and everyone on set was thrilled just because they were getting paid on time,” said Samit Basu, novelist and filmmaker. He added that the culture changed to one where rigorous research and development were commonplace. “A lot of book rights were auctioned and writers’ rooms started happening,” Basu added. “Earlier, people in the film industry hardly ever read books.” More importantly, these companies made it possible for storytellers to explore subjects that had previously been untouched. Bollywood films are hamstrung by the Central Board of Film Certification, which forces filmmakers to remove everything from kisses and swear words to shots of drug abuse — once even from a film about drug abuse. Indian TV, which is also regulated by the government, is dominated by often regressive stories about housewives and mothers-in-law. Streaming content broke that mold because it was, until recently, unregulated by the government. “Sacred Games,” Netflix’s first original series in the country, shocked Indian viewers by casting well-known actors in a show that liberally made use of abusive language, violence and nudity. The program was compared to “Narcos,” Netflix’s hit American drama about Colombian cocaine kingpin Pablo Escobar. Amazon’s first series in the country, meanwhile, was “Inside Edge” — a show about the dark underbelly of cricket, a sport that is worshipped in India. Both “Inside Edge and “Sacred Games” were nominated for International Emmy awards. Several other shows on the platforms have also taken an unflinching look at subjects ranging from politics to female sexuality, which Bollywood and Indian TV have typically shied away from. “I am glad I did my film for Netflix because they did not dilute anything,” said Narain, referring to her project “Guilty.” When a kiss offends Politically-fueled uproar over shows on these international video platforms isn’t new. “Sacred Games,” which was released in 2018, managed to offend lawmakers from Modi’s Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) and the opposition Congress Party. In 2019, a politician from the BJP filed a police complaint against the creator of the show for a “scene which disrespects Sikh religious symbol Kada.” But lately, the political and public outrage has reached a crescendo. Netflix faced boycott calls in November over “A Suitable Boy,” an adaptation of the award-winning novel of the same name by author Vikram Seth. Some viewers and BJP politicians were angered by a scene that depicts a Hindu man and a Muslim woman kissing in a temple, which led to complaints against Netflix executives. The company did not respond to CNN Business’s request for an update on these complaints. In January, Amazon’s political drama “Tandav” — which has been likened to the Netflix series “House of Cards” — faced a backlash from politicians who said they complained to the police about the company and the show’s creators for depicting Hindu Gods in a derogatory way. Aparna Purohit, the Head of India Originals at Amazon Prime Video, was questioned by police for several hours. Both Amazon and the show’s creators issued an apology. “We respect our viewers’ diverse beliefs and apologize unconditionally,” Amazon said in a statement. That same month, an Indian journalist filed a police complaint against Amazon’s crime series “Mirzapur” for “showing the city of Mirzapur in a bad light,” according to media reports. And this month, the National Commission for the Protection of Child Rights asked Netflix to stop streaming “Bombay Begums,” a drama about five ambitious women, because of its “inappropriate portrayal” of children, who were shown sniffing cocaine. The government has also taken official action to rein in streaming services and the content they provide. Last November, the Information and Broadcasting Ministry brought the previously unregulated services within its scope. Three months later, the government announced new rules for online content, including a requirement for video platforms to classify their content into age-based categories. They also have to appoint a “grievance redressal officer” in India who has to address every complaint made against the company within 15 days. While activists have criticized these rules, the government said the video streaming services must be “responsible and accountable” for their content. “India is tolerant and will remain tolerant,” India’s technology minister Ravi Shankar Prasad said on Thursday. “But the limits of tolerance and standards of tolerance should not be judged on the creating freedom or abuse of a particular producer of an OTT platform.” The new rules do not explicitly ban any type of content — but the vague scope of the regulations is also exactly why filmmakers who spoke to CNN Business were troubled. A wide range of topics have already been targeted with complaints and outrage, leaving creators second-guessing and self-censoring. “In India, anyone can have a problem with anything. In India, people confuse what a character is saying with what the writer believes,” said Sumit Purohit, who wrote for “Inside Edge” and “Scam 1992,” a web series on Sony’s streaming service SonyLiv. “How can you make a series like the ‘Mindhunter’ here?” he asked, referring to a Netflix show about serial killers. Purohit also described the impact of self-censorship on a writer, saying that it “makes you angry, frustrated,” because “that is not how any art is created.” The backlash from all sides — politicians, journalists, national agencies and even regular citizens — is hard for American services to fight in India, a key overseas market, as they are wary of getting on the wrong side of the government. Netflix CEO Reed Hastings said in 2018 his “next 100 million” users would come from India. In Dec 2019, he said his company would spend 30 billion rupees ($413 million) on original content over the next two years in India. And, Amazon’s Jeff Bezos has said that “it [Prime Video] is doing well everywhere but there’s nowhere it is doing better than in India.” A chilling effect There are already some signs that the industry might be regressing. Earlier this month, Reuters reported, citing unnamed sources, that “companies like Amazon’s Prime Video and Netflix are inspecting planned shows and scripts, with some even deleting scenes that could be controversial.” A few days later, the Indian financial newspaper Mint reported, citing anonymous sources, that Amazon had canceled the second season of the crime series “Paatal Lok,” which was praised for its portrayal of corruption and caste discrimination. Amazon and Netflix declined to comment on the reports. “Nothing that has politics in it is being touched [commissioned] right now,” said Josy Joseph, an investigative journalist whose media platform is collaborating with the creator of “Sacred Games” to make a series about Tihar Jail, India’s largest prison. “There is a massive depression that has set into the creative minds of Mumbai,” he said. “They are scared and writers are winding down to mediocrity. They are going back to telling saas-bahu stories or conservative romance.” (Saas-bahu means “mother-in-law and daughter-in-law” in Hindi.) While production isn’t slowing down — Netflix has announced 40 new shows and movies from India — Basu worries that production houses in the future may go for content that is “unambiguously safe” and “assumes that the audience’s intelligence is zero.” Just weeks after Prime Video executive Purohit was questioned by police, the platform announced it would produce its first film in Bollywood, the stronghold of traditional Indian movie making. “Ram Setu” will “highlight our Indian heritage,” said Vijay Subramanium, the head of content at Amazon Prime Video India, in a statement. Some filmmakers are less pessimistic about their creative freedom. Karan Anshuman, one of the creators of “Mirzapur” and “Inside Edge,” said he felt it was “too early to react” to the heightened scrutiny, adding that he would rather “wait and watch.” But film writer Arpita Chatterjee, said it is too late to rein in the Indian filmmaking community now. “We can’t just go back 20 years,” Chatterjee said. “The world is at a different place and storytellers are at a different place. You can’t just put the genie back in the bottle.” Source link Orbem News #Amazon #daring #Fear #filmmakers #gave #Hope #Indian #Netflix #turning

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dipulb3 · 4 years ago

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Netflix and Amazon gave daring Indian filmmakers hope. Now that's turning to fear

New Post has been published on https://appradab.com/netflix-and-amazon-gave-daring-indian-filmmakers-hope-now-thats-turning-to-fear/

Netflix and Amazon gave daring Indian filmmakers hope. Now that's turning to fear

Even with two major, critically acclaimed films under her belt — “Kal: Yesterday and Tomorrow,” a thriller she wrote and directed, and “Hazaaron Khwaishein Aisi,” a political drama that won Bollywood’s equivalent of an Academy Award — the work just wouldn’t come.

Since then, the Mumbai-based filmmaker says she has “been inundated with work.” Her film “Guilty” — a social issues drama about a rape investigation — was released by the streaming giant in 2020. In the same year, Disney+ Hotstar released her 8-part comedy series “Hundred.”

Now, increasing government scrutiny of these more provocative projects and other groundbreaking stories is worrying Narain and many other creators in Mumbai, the home of India’s film industry.

Original shows on Amazon Prime and Netflix have lately drawn ire from Indian politicians and regular citizens who consider these films and TV shows insensitive to cultural and religious beliefs.

Police complaints have also piled up against creators and company executives, and some of the offenses they have been accused of — including committing “deliberate or malicious acts, intended to outrage religious feelings” — carry prison terms of up to three years, a fine, or both. And, in recent months, Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s government has announced new rules and guidelines for streaming services, though no explicit bans on particular themes.

India’s creative community now fears that streaming services may buckle under the pressure, and refrain from touching stories that are even remotely controversial. It’s a troubling sign for an industry that had just begun experimenting with new forms of storytelling and producing shows capable of worldwide appeal. Just last year, Delhi Crime, a Netflix drama series based on the real rape and murder of a 23-year-old student in India’s capital, won an international Emmy.

Start of a new era

The arrival of Amazon (AMZN) and Netflix in India has been a boon to directors and writers like Narain, who had long languished on the fringes of Bollywood — an industry often accused of nepotism. Several filmmakers told Appradab Business they thought the international streaming services introduced a degree of professionalism.

“I co-directed a film called ‘House Arrest,’ which was released on Netflix in 2019, and everyone on set was thrilled just because they were getting paid on time,” said Samit Basu, novelist and filmmaker. He added that the culture changed to one where rigorous research and development were commonplace.

“A lot of book rights were auctioned and writers’ rooms started happening,” Basu added. “Earlier, people in the film industry hardly ever read books.”

More importantly, these companies made it possible for storytellers to explore subjects that had previously been untouched.

Bollywood films are hamstrung by the Central Board of Film Certification, which forces filmmakers to remove everything from kisses and swear words to shots of drug abuse — once even from a film about drug abuse. Indian TV, which is also regulated by the government, is dominated by often regressive stories about housewives and mothers-in-law.

Streaming content broke that mold because it was, until recently, unregulated by the government. “Sacred Games,” Netflix’s first original series in the country, shocked Indian viewers by casting well-known actors in a show that liberally made use of abusive language, violence and nudity. The program was compared to “Narcos,” Netflix’s hit American drama about Colombian cocaine kingpin Pablo Escobar.

Amazon’s first series in the country, meanwhile, was “Inside Edge” — a show about the dark underbelly of cricket, a sport that is worshipped in India. Both “Inside Edge and “Sacred Games” were nominated for International Emmy awards.

Several other shows on the platforms have also taken an unflinching look at subjects ranging from politics to female sexuality, which Bollywood and Indian TV have typically shied away from. “I am glad I did my film for Netflix because they did not dilute anything,” said Narain, referring to her project “Guilty.”

When a kiss offends

Politically-fueled uproar over shows on these international video platforms isn’t new. “Sacred Games,” which was released in 2018, managed to offend lawmakers from Modi’s Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) and the opposition Congress Party. In 2019, a politician from the BJP filed a police complaint against the creator of the show for a “scene which disrespects Sikh religious symbol Kada.”

But lately, the political and public outrage has reached a crescendo.

Netflix faced boycott calls in November over “A Suitable Boy,” an adaptation of the award-winning novel of the same name by author Vikram Seth. Some viewers and BJP politicians were angered by a scene that depicts a Hindu man and a Muslim woman kissing in a temple, which led to complaints against Netflix executives. The company did not respond to Appradab Business’s request for an update on these complaints.

In January, Amazon’s political drama “Tandav” — which has been likened to the Netflix series “House of Cards” — faced a backlash from politicians who said they complained to the police about the company and the show’s creators for depicting Hindu Gods in a derogatory way. Aparna Purohit, the Head of India Originals at Amazon Prime Video, was questioned by police for several hours.

Both Amazon and the show’s creators issued an apology. “We respect our viewers’ diverse beliefs and apologize unconditionally,” Amazon said in a statement.

That same month, an Indian journalist filed a police complaint against Amazon’s crime series “Mirzapur” for “showing the city of Mirzapur in a bad light,” according to media reports. And this month, the National Commission for the Protection of Child Rights asked Netflix to stop streaming “Bombay Begums,” a drama about five ambitious women, because of its “inappropriate portrayal” of children, who were shown sniffing cocaine.

The government has also taken official action to rein in streaming services and the content they provide. Last November, the Information and Broadcasting Ministry brought the previously unregulated services within its scope.

Three months later, the government announced new rules for online content, including a requirement for video platforms to classify their content into age-based categories. They also have to appoint a “grievance redressal officer” in India who has to address every complaint made against the company within 15 days.

While activists have criticized these rules, the government said the video streaming services must be “responsible and accountable” for their content.

“India is tolerant and will remain tolerant,” India’s technology minister Ravi Shankar Prasad said on Thursday. “But the limits of tolerance and standards of tolerance should not be judged on the creating freedom or abuse of a particular producer of an OTT platform.”

The new rules do not explicitly ban any type of content — but the vague scope of the regulations is also exactly why filmmakers who spoke to Appradab Business were troubled. A wide range of topics have already been targeted with complaints and outrage, leaving creators second-guessing and self-censoring.

“In India, anyone can have a problem with anything. In India, people confuse what a character is saying with what the writer believes,” said Sumit Purohit, who wrote for “Inside Edge” and “Scam 1992,” a web series on Sony’s streaming service SonyLiv. “How can you make a series like the ‘Mindhunter’ here?” he asked, referring to a Netflix show about serial killers.

Purohit also described the impact of self-censorship on a writer, saying that it “makes you angry, frustrated,” because “that is not how any art is created.”

The backlash from all sides — politicians, journalists, national agencies and even regular citizens — is hard for American services to fight in India, a key overseas market, as they are wary of getting on the wrong side of the government.

Netflix CEO Reed Hastings said in 2018 his “next 100 million” users would come from India. In Dec 2019, he said his company would spend 30 billion rupees ($413 million) on original content over the next two years in India. And, Amazon’s Jeff Bezos has said that “it [Prime Video] is doing well everywhere but there’s nowhere it is doing better than in India.”

A chilling effect

There are already some signs that the industry might be regressing. Earlier this month, Reuters reported, citing unnamed sources, that “companies like Amazon’s Prime Video and Netflix are inspecting planned shows and scripts, with some even deleting scenes that could be controversial.”

A few days later, the Indian financial newspaper Mint reported, citing anonymous sources, that Amazon had canceled the second season of the crime series “Paatal Lok,” which was praised for its portrayal of corruption and caste discrimination.

Amazon and Netflix declined to comment on the reports.

“Nothing that has politics in it is being touched [commissioned] right now,” said Josy Joseph, an investigative journalist whose media platform is collaborating with the creator of “Sacred Games” to make a series about Tihar Jail, India’s largest prison.

“There is a massive depression that has set into the creative minds of Mumbai,” he said. “They are scared and writers are winding down to mediocrity. They are going back to telling saas-bahu stories or conservative romance.” (Saas-bahu means “mother-in-law and daughter-in-law” in Hindi.)

While production isn’t slowing down — Netflix has announced 40 new shows and movies from India — Basu worries that production houses in the future may go for content that is “unambiguously safe” and “assumes that the audience’s intelligence is zero.”

Just weeks after Prime Video executive Purohit was questioned by police, the platform announced it would produce its first film in Bollywood, the stronghold of traditional Indian movie making. “Ram Setu” will “highlight our Indian heritage,” said Vijay Subramanium, the head of content at Amazon Prime Video India, in a statement.

Some filmmakers are less pessimistic about their creative freedom.

Karan Anshuman, one of the creators of “Mirzapur” and “Inside Edge,” said he felt it was “too early to react” to the heightened scrutiny, adding that he would rather “wait and watch.”

But film writer Arpita Chatterjee, said it is too late to rein in the Indian filmmaking community now.

“We can’t just go back 20 years,” Chatterjee said. “The world is at a different place and storytellers are at a different place. You can’t just put the genie back in the bottle.”

0 notes

greatamericansatan · 8 years ago

Text

Edgie Comics: on TV

Content Warning: Statutory Rape, Homophobia, Biphobia, Eating Disorders, Fatphobia, let me know if u think I should mention anything else…

Social justice score: 1 out of 5

So Archie Comics got hella weird in the Nü Millennium, with attempts at maintaining relevance by reaching different audiences. One of those tacks was to make a series of serious adult-ish comics with edgy elements written by Mark Waid. Now adult-ish edgy Archie is on The CW and to kill a minute I’m watching the first episode. Thoughts as they come… 1) They open with a mystery about a wet dead teen in a forested town with secrets, so Twin Peaks is being explicitly homaged. We’ll see how that goes. The editing, pace, and pretty much everything is too modern TV to evoke David Lynch, but whatever. Total ripoffs are embarrassing.

2) They say Cole Sprouse – who is I guess a disney expat / internet celeb – is pushing to have his character be asexual, as he is in current comic canon (which itself is very consistent with the character over the years spurning love for cheeseburgers). So coo, but then, I’ve heard rumor Sprouse is a crappy dude, so ehhhhh. As I mentioned he’s playing Jughead here, and in a move that surprised me, he’s acting as the Doogie Howseresque laptop-typing narrator of the show.

3) Betty’s gay best friend type espied Archie’s new hot bod from the house across the way and was like, hubba hubba. Gay lust is edgy. But at the same time, he described Arch as “swell,” not “swole.” So they’re mixing the edge with the faux-retro cheese. Another Twin Peaks point.

heyoooooo!

4) LUKE PERRY AS ARCHIE’S DAD!?! I love it. He has aged into Bryan Cranston, but without current success adding “importance” to the performance.

5) Hey Reggie is Asian. And a beefy all-American jock jerkbro, so getting away from the usual stereotypes in at least one department. Cool.

6) Oh so gay best friend is the gay character from Archie Comics circa now, named Kevin Keller. And they hung a lampshade on the trope. No escaping stereotypes for this lone homosexual.

7) The Pussycats are all black girls. Hello there. Kinda sassy, not sure if that’s canon or stereotypes. Either way, shutting down the intruding white boy, so good job. Sugar Sugar sucks anyhow. (I think the actor playing Arch is a wee bit Maori but not sure, nonetheless he’s white in this story.)

8) Holy shit. Sexy Miss Grundy?!?!? This might be the case in the comics too, I never read them. Only caught a bit of press. Well, it’s statutory rape time, whatever the case. Hooray?

9) Mädchen Amick’s name in credits? Also we’re just now seeing credits? Ah, she was Betty’s mom, didn’t recognize. Well, Twin Peaks point three.

10) Luke Perry again, boy, he seems as smoked out as he did in Buffy the Vampire Slayer. So chill. And yet, we’re probably supposed to buy him pooping on Archie’s dream of playing shitty pop songs, instead of being more like Tommy Chong letting Rae Dawn be in all the movies.

just add weed

11) Oh god no, it’s the actual songs they’re doing for Archie. Coming soon to a Starbucks near you. x_X bleeeeah

12) GBF: “Is cheerleading still a thing?” Cheerleader: “Is being the gay best friend still a thing?” Oh, sick burn. Homophobia is totally equivalent to mocking school clubs. Plus the lampshading wasn’t even working the moment the character appeared, now it’s totally shot to hell. You don’t get to call your own writing sucky preemptively to hope the audience won’t criticize it.

13) Was the cheerleader implying Betty’s meal of a muffin, an apple, some vague leaf, and water might make her too fat to cheerlead? Good times. Even from a character we’re clearly not supposed to like, I don’t accept this. For now tho, I feel like I can press on. For the sake of this review. I did, after all, finish the second season of The Strain.

Yes. She was saying she was too fat. And how to help her feel better? To say, oh no you aren’t fat. Because being fat is inherently bad, rather than something that only sucks because of diet industry moolah-fueled fatphobia saturating our culture. That’s what I want to think about during my entertainments.

14) Veronica calls Betty “queen bae of the strive hive.” I have to admit, I never watched the recent teen shows like Glee and what-have-you, but this seems a bit much. First hint of bisexualities on show tho?

15) Fuccck more Archie moaning musics with sexy Grundy listening in the sexfully dimmed music hall. But she seems reticent. No statutory rape for you today, Mr. Andrews. Oh, it’s time for murder mystery stuff. Didn’t see that coming.

16) Oh and now the edgy girl on girl kiss from the trailers for the show. And the context? This makes negative ten thousand sense. It’s offensive and foolish as hell. So Veronica’s bisexuality is just for show, great, that isn’t a biphobic trope against women or anything. My dude points out this writing would make sense in the context of a porno, if not anywhere else.

something foolish and offensive happened

17) This Mean Girls stuff isn’t really for me, so I don’t feel qualified to comment. Though it seems like they’re kinda rushing the development here, and will pay for it with filler episodes later in the season.

18) This polyamory tease will not last.

19) After school specialing across the universe. The more u know, the more u grow.

20) In this scene with Arch & Dad, did Arch just imply losing his virginity to statutory rapist made him a manly musical brooder?

21) Luke Perry defied expectations to be the understanding dad what tells u to follow ur star but with the great power-great responsibility Uncle Ben undercurrent. He will be the show’s conscience, won’t he?

22) “This post-James Franco world”… Veronica is kinda fun. I dunno.

23) Salacious gay biz must be mentioned but not seen. It’s only 2017. We’re not ready yet. Maybe when the world is on fire and we get a Movida Madrileña as the Trump dynasty begins to decay.

24) Spin the bottle to “ride the ginger stallion.” Sounds legit. Carry on.

25) Arch & Veronica in the closet. As they stand so close, things heatin’ up, she ends up looking cross-eyed and I wonder, does that happen to everyone when they try to make eye contact at close range?

26) Oh god we looped back to Sprousehead at the all nite diner. Narration again. Lay it on me, guy… Nope. Nothing of interest happened.

27) This big Archie Betty sad scene is what it is. She’s doing a good enough job of acting, he’s losing points because he has to be too manly to express big feels. “Yr 2 good 4 me” that’s some tired biz. Don’t hate yourself because you’re a rape victim, Archie. That’s my generous interpretation of his act here. I find Betty has a kinda cute nerd voice, didn’t really notice it before. Maybe it gets more charming with snotty tear time.

29) Jug narration continues beyond his scene. We did get the excuse for it – he’s novelizing the town’s dramas. But how does he know everything? French fry-based divination? Potatomancy?

jughead jones, potatomancer

30) A little hint of gay cocks that must forever be blocked, and a body is found to bring the show to a close. Mysteries! People standing around! Look at each other meaningfully. You know you wanna watch a season of this…

In the end, I only watched it because Archie Comics are a weird-ass American institution. Their mere continued existence at the supermarket checkout stand amuses me. As for the show? Arch looks too damn square-jawed and is too manly to show believable emotions. Stephen Amell on The Arrow is similarly the least expressive character on his show and still more believable than Arch.

The Archie/Veronica/Betty drama so far doesn’t seem too mean-spirited or egregiously sexist, might be the best thing on the show. They center the shared coming of age stories theme and it works fine, just not my thing. Anyone who saw the trailer and imagined you might see ladies lovin’ ladies should give it a hard pass. Even if they do tease with that later in the season, there’s no way they’ll stay with it, given the history of the characters.

As for the Twin Peaks homage, if you want the candy-coated parody of the visual style plus only the soap opera elements of the plot, you’re in luck. Otherwise, nuh. And for the show in its own right? I saw nothing to keep me around. The gay stuff is a side joke / tease job that will yield absolutely nothing of importance in the long run. I’m not that into soap operas with no fantasy, scifi, action, or horror element. I’ve never watched The OC, Party of Five, Beverly Hills 90210, etc. If any of you have more experience with that genre and saw this show, what did you think of it?

#riverdale #review #social justice analysis #from the desk of great american satan #tw: rape #tw: fatphobia #tw: eating disorders #tw: homophobia #tw: biphobia

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starringemiliaclarke · 7 years ago

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Press: Game of Thrones: How They Make the World’s Most Popular Show

TIME – The battle for Westeros may be won or lost on the back of a lime green mechanical bull.

That’s what it looks like on a January Monday in Belfast, as Game of Thrones films its seventh season here. Certainly no one believes the dragons that have thrilled viewers of HBO’s hit series exist in any real sense. And yet it’s still somewhat surprising to see the British actor Emilia Clarke, who plays exiled queen Daenerys, straddling the “buck” on a soundstage at Titanic Studios, a film complex named after this city’s other famously massive export.

The machine under Clarke looks like a big pommel horse and moves in sync with a computer animation of what will become a dragon. Clarke doesn’t talk much between takes. Over and over, a wind gun blasts her with just enough force to make me worry about the integrity of her ash blond wig. (Its particular color is the result of 2½ months’ worth of testing and seven prototypes, according to the show’s hair designer.) Over and over, Clarke stares down at a masking-tape mark on the floor the instant episode director Alan Taylor shouts, “Now!” Nearby, several visual-effects supervisors watch on monitors.

Clarke and I talk in her trailer before she heads to the soundstage, at the beginning of what is to be a long week inhabiting a now iconic character. Behind the scenes it’s more toil than triumph, though. The show’s first season ended with Daenerys’ hatching three baby dragons, each the size of a Pomeranian. They’ve since grown to the size of a 747. “I’m 5-ft.-nothing, I’m a little girl,” she says. “They’re like, ‘Emilia, climb those stairs, get on that huge thing, we’ll harness you in, and then you’ll go crazy.’ And you’re like, ‘Hey, everybody! Now who’s shorty?!’”

She has reason to feel powerful. On July 16, Clarke and the rest of the cast will begin bringing Thrones in for a landing with the first of its final 13 episodes (seven to air this summer, six to come later). Thrones, a scrappy upstart launched by two TV novices in 2011, will finish its run as the biggest and most popular show in the world. An average of more than 23 million Americans watched each episode last season when platforms like streaming and video on demand are accounted for. And since it’s the most pirated show ever, millions more watch it in ways unaccounted for. Thrones, which holds the record for most Emmys ever won by a prime-time series, airs in more than 170 countries. It’s the farthest-reaching show out there—not to mention the most obsessed-about.

People talk about living in a golden age of TV ushered in by hit dramas like The Sopranos, Mad Men and Breaking Bad. All had precisely honed insights about the nature of humanity and of evil that remade expectations of what TV could do. But that period ended around the time Breaking Bad went off the air in 2013. We’re in what came next: an unprecedented glut of programming, with streaming services like Netflix, Amazon and Hulu jumping into an ever-more-crowded fray. Now, there’s a prestige show for every conceivable viewer, which means smaller audiences and fewer truly original stories.

Except for Thrones, which merges the psychological complexity of the best TV with old-school Hollywood grandeur. You liked shows with one antihero? Well, Thrones has five Tony Sopranos building their empires on blood, five Walter Whites discovering just how far they’ll go to win, five Don Drapers unapologetic in their narcissism. Oh, and they’re all living out their drama against the most breathtaking vistas not of this world.

The phenomenon is fueled by a massive worldwide apparatus that, in a typical 10-episode season, generates the equivalent of five big-budget, feature-length movies. Even as the series has grown in every conceivable way over the years—it shoots around the globe; each episode now boasts a budget of at least $10 million—it remains animated by one simple question: Who will win the game in the end? And if Thrones has taught us anything, it’s that every reign has to end sometime.

1. the fiction

It all started with a book. In 1996, George R.R. Martin published A Game of Thrones, the first novel in his A Song of Ice and Fire series. (Back then, he conceived of it as a trilogy. Today, five of the planned seven volumes have been published.) As a writer for shows like CBS’s The Twilight Zone and Beauty and the Beast in the late ’80s, Martin had been frustrated by the limits of TV. He decided that turning to prose meant writing something “as big as my imagination.” Martin recalls telling himself, “I’m going to have all the characters I want, and gigantic castles, and dragons, and dire wolves, and hundreds of years of history, and a really complex plot. And it’s fine because it’s a book. It’s essentially unfilmable.”

The books became a hit, especially after 1999’s A Clash of Kings and A Storm of Swords a year later. Martin, who writes from his home in Santa Fe, N.M., was compared to The Lord of the Rings author J.R.R. Tolkien. Like Tolkien’s Middle-earth, Martin’s Westeros is a land with a distinctive set of rules. First, magic is real. Second, winter is coming. Seasons can last for years at a time, and as the series begins, a long summer is ending. Third, no one is safe. New religions are in conflict with the old, rival houses have designs on the capital’s Iron Throne, and an undead army is pushing against the boundary of civilization, known as the Wall.

Thrones’ vast number of clans includes the wealthy and louche Lannisters, including incestuous twins Cersei and Jaime. She is the queen by marriage; he helped ensure her ascendancy through violence. Their brother Tyrion, an “imp” of short stature, is perhaps the most astute student of power. Then there are the Starks, led by duty-bound Ned. His children Robb, Sansa, Arya, Bran, Rickon and “bastard” Jon Snow will be scattered throughout the realm’s Seven Kingdoms. Daenerys is a Targaryen, an overthrown family that also—surprise—has a claim to the throne. Soon enough, Thrones devolves into an all-out melee that makes the Wars of the Roses look like Family Feud.

In the wake of director Peter Jackson’s early-2000s film trilogy of Tolkien’s masterpiece, Martin was courted by producers to turn his books into “the next Lord of the Rings franchise.” But the Thrones story was too big, and would-be collaborators suggested cutting it to focus solely on Daenerys or Snow, for instance. Martin turned them all down. His story’s expansiveness was the point.

Two middleweight novelists, David Benioff and D.B. Weiss, had come to a similar conclusion and obtained Martin’s blessing at what the author calls “that famous lunch that turned into a dinner, because we were there for four or five hours” in 2006. The two writers thought Thrones could only be made as a premium-cable drama, and they walked into HBO’s office with an ambitious pitch to do so that year. “They were talking about this series of books I’d never heard of,” says Carolyn Strauss, head of HBO’s entertainment division at the time. “[I was] somebody who looked around the theater in Lord of the Rings, at all of those rapt faces, and I am just not on this particular ferry … I thought, This sounds interesting. Who knows? It could be a big show.”

HBO bought the idea and handed the reins to Benioff and Weiss, making them showrunners who’d never run a show before. Benioff was best known for having adapted his novel The 25th Hour into a screenplay directed by Spike Lee. Weiss had a novel to his credit too. The two had met in a literature program in Dublin in 1995 and later reconnected in the States. “I decided I wanted to write a screenplay,” Benioff told Vanity Fair in 2014. “I’d never written a script before, and I didn’t know how to do it, so I asked [Weiss] if he would write one with me, because he had written a bunch already.” It never got made.

The Thrones pilot, shot in 2009, got off to a rocky start. Benioff and Weiss misjudged how much planning it would take to bring Martin’s fantasy to life. To portray a White Walker—mystic creatures from the North—they simply stuck an actor in a green-screen getup and hoped to figure it out later. “You can maybe do that if you’re making Avatar,” says Weiss. “But we need to know what the creatures look like before we turn on the camera.” They also had trouble portraying Martin’s nuanced characters. “Our friends—really smart, savvy writers—didn’t [realize] Jaime and Cersei were brother and sister,” says Benioff of the ill-fated first cut. Ultimately, they reshot the pilot.

When Benioff and Weiss look back at that first season, they see plenty to nitpick. Their fealty to Martin’s text, for example, made Peter Dinklage’s Tyrion “Eminem blond,” per Benioff. (His hair was later darkened.) Still, the elements that have made the show a monster success were there—and audiences (3 million for Thrones’ first season finale) picked up on them. Arguably the most groundbreaking element was a willingness to ruthlessly murder its stars. Ned Stark, the moral center of Season 1, portrayed by the show’s then most famous cast member (Sean Bean, who starred in The Lord of the Rings), is shockingly beheaded in the second-to-last episode. By the third season’s “Red Wedding,” a far more gruesome culling, the show had accrued enough fans to send the Internet into full on freak-out mode.

Thrones had by then become the pacesetter for all of TV in its willingness to forgo a simple happy ending in favor of delivering pleasure through brutality. Even if you don’t watch, Thrones’ characters and catchphrases have permeated the culture (the apparent death of Snow was an international trending topic all summer in 2015). Saturday Night Live, The Simpsons and The Tonight Show have lampooned the show. And the recent South Korean presidential election was called on a national news network with depictions of the candidates duking it out for control of the Iron Throne.

2. the production

Wandering around the Belfast set, the scope and the orderliness of the enterprise is staggering. The wights, zombie-like creatures with spookily pale faces and dressed in ragged furs, form a tidy line as they wait to grab breakfast burritos. Outside the stage door, a few smoke cigarettes, careful not to ash on their worn-in tunics. “At first we had a season with one big event, then we had a season with two big events, now we have a season where every episode is a big event,” says Joe Bauer, the show’s VFX supervisor. Bauer and VFX producer Steve Kullback oversee a group of 14 FX shops from New Zealand to Germany that work on the show almost continuously.

One of those big events this season is a battle whose sheer scope, even before being cut together with the show’s typical brio, dazzled me. In order to get on set, I agreed not to divulge the players or what’s at stake. (Thrones has been promising this clash all along, and when the time comes, the Internet will melt.) It will be all the more impressive knowing that the cast and crew were shot through with a frigid North Atlantic wind that whipped everyone during filming and sent them all flying to the coffee cart during resets. (The cold, a prosthetic artist tells me, is at least good for keeping the makeup on.)

The setting is as grand as the action. The battle was filmed in what was once a Belfast quarry, drained, flattened out with 11,000 square meters of concrete and painted over with a camouflage effect—all of which took six months and required special ecological surveys. This kind of mountain moving, or leveling, is par for the course for Thrones.

Each season starts with producers Christopher Newman and Bernadette Caulfield circulating a plot outline on a color-coded spreadsheet, dictating what will be shot by the show’s two simultaneous camera units, which can splinter into as many as four. It’s perpetually subject to change, given the complications of a television show this ambitious—over seven seasons they’ve shot in Croatia, Spain, Iceland, Malta, Morocco and Canada as well as locations around Northern Ireland. While I’m in Belfast, my plan to watch Jon Snow in action is canceled because of inclement weather (that same wind) that makes filming from a drone hazardous. At this point, Caulfield will grab onto any small comfort. “Now the dragon doesn’t get any bigger,” she says, “so we know that much.”

Another breakdown goes out to department heads, and a massive global triage begins. Costumer Michele Clapton, for example, begins figuring out if she’ll have to dress any new characters or armies and then sets out on the most complex work. “I know that Daenerys’ dresses will take the longest,” she says. Each look, no matter the character, may take as many as four craftspeople to bead, stitch and—if there’s meant to be wear and tear—break down. Deborah Riley, the production designer, begins looking for references to new locations in the outline. Tommy Dunne, the weapons master, starts forging gear for the season’s big battles. “My big thing is the numbers,” he says. “I hope they won’t frighten me.” He made 200 shields and 250 spears for last season’s epic Battle of the Bastards.

Benioff’s and Weiss’s jobs amount to maintaining constant conversation with numerous producers. The pair are usually in Belfast for about six months a year. Wherever in the world they happen to be, they get daily video from the shoots and field an endless stream of emails from staff on location. During my visit, wolves described in the script as “skinny and mangy” showed up to the shoot looking fluffy and lustrous. Around the world, new message notifications lit up smartphone screens.

When Benioff and Weiss aren’t shooting, they’re writing. And when they aren’t shooting or writing—which happens rarely—they’re promoting. The two make a complementary pair. Benioff, who wears his hair in a Morrissey quiff, is the more sardonic one. Weiss, with silver rings in his ears, is nerdier and given to hyperbole. They say they’re still having fun making Thrones, despite the stakes, and still regularly find themselves surprised by its scale. Weiss recalls seeing the buck Clarke rides to simulate Daenerys’ dragons for the first time: “We knew it would be a mechanical bull. We didn’t know it would be 40 ft. in the air and six degrees of motion with cameras that swirl.” Says Benioff: “It’s like the thing NASA built to train the astronauts.”

Despite nonstop production, Weiss says, “There’s still a kid-in-a-candy-shop feel. You’re going to look at the armor, crazy-amazing dresses—gowns Michele is making—then you’re going to look at the swords, then watch pre-vis cartoons of the scenes that will be shot and you’re weighing in on shot selection. Every one of these things is something we’ve been fascinated with in our own way since we were kids.”

“Especially dresses,” cracks Benioff. Weiss adds, “Especially the gowns.”

3. the players

The first few seasons’ worth of swordplay and gowns turned the show’s cast into recognizable stars. But it’s the complexity of their characters, revealed over time, that made them into icons. “My friends always say to me, ‘It’s like you’re two different people. I see articles about you in BuzzFeed’—but then they see my Facebook posts,” says Maisie Williams, who plays the tomboy turned angel of vengeance Arya Stark. Williams was two days past her 14th birthday when the show debuted. There’s TV-star famous, after all, and then there’s some-percentage-of-23-million-people-has-been-actively-rooting-for-you-to-kill-off-your-co-stars-for-six-years famous.

Thrones’ story doesn’t ask its actors to break bad or good, and viewers stay tuned in large part because of the characters’ moral mutability. Consider Cersei, played by Lena Headey, who is either a monster or a victim. The character has become more popular with fans even as she’s wrought greater carnage, including blowing up a building full of people last season. “At the beginning, people were like, ‘Oh my God, you’re such a bitch!’” she says. “What’s moving is that people love her now and want to be on her team.” That Headey, a Brit, uses an exaggerated American accent as she delivers the harsher interpretation of her work is revealing of nothing, or a lot.

She’s thought through every element of her character, though, including the incestuous relationship with Jaime that provided the show its first narrative jolt. “I love to talk about all of it,” she says, citing her frequent emails to Benioff and Weiss. “Cersei’s always wanted to be him. Therefore, for her, that relationship is completion. There’s been an envy, because he was born with privilege just for being a man. I think their love was built on respect.”

Nikolaj Coster-Waldau, the Danish actor who plays Jaime, is a bit less excited to discuss the subject. “I’ve never really gone too deep into the whole sister-brother thing because I can’t use that information. I have to look at her as the woman he loves and desires. Lena’s a very good actress, and that’s kind of what carries the whole thing.” He adds, “I have two older sisters. I do not want to go there. It’s just too weird.”

Even a character like Jon Snow, as close to a pure hero as possible as Season 7 begins, has outgrown the box he originally came in. Snow, an illegitimate child never embraced by his father’s wife, is a James Dean daydream of Sir Walter Scott. “I made mistakes and felt that he wasn’t interesting enough,” says Kit Harington of the way he’s played Snow. We’re in a Belfast hotel bar, and Harington is squeezing in a coffee before he makes an evening showing of Manchester by the Sea. “That sounds weird, but I’ve never been quite content with him. Maybe that’s what makes him him. That angst.” His character has been slowly absorbing lessons about duty and power—and “this year there is this huge seismic shift where all of what he’s learned over the years, suddenly …” Harington trails off. “He’s still the same Jon, but he grows up.”

Dinklage, too, found in Tyrion a character who surpassed his expectations. The actor says he’d never read fantasy beyond The Lord of the Rings. “That’s the part of the bookstore I don’t really gravitate toward,” he says. “This was the first time in this genre that somebody my size was an actually multidimensional being, flesh and blood without the really long beard, without the pointy shoes, without the asexuality.”

Thrones catapulted Dinklage, the only American in the main cast, from a well-regarded film and theater actor to among the most-recognized actors on earth in part because the asexuality is quite absent. Tyrion thirsts for wine, sex and, crucially, love and respect. As the offspring of a wealthy and powerful family, the first two are easy to come by. The latter not so much. “He covers it up with alcohol, he covers it up with humor, he does his best to maintain a modicum of sanity and he perseveres,” says Dinklage. “He’s still alive. Anyone who’s still alive on our show is pretty smart.”

Indeed, with just 13 episodes left, everything is possible—alliance, demise or coronation. “Every season I go to the last page of the last episode and go backward,” says Dinklage. “I don’t do that with books, but I can’t crack open page one of Episode 1 not knowing if I’m dead or not.”

4. the drama

The size of Thrones’ controversies have, at times, been as large as its following. Its reliance on female nudity, especially Daenerys’, was an early flash point. “I don’t have any qualms saying to anyone it was not the most enjoyable experience. How could it be?” says Clarke. “I don’t know how many actresses enjoy doing that part of it.” That aspect of the role has faded as Daenerys found paths to power beyond her sexuality. This evolution from a passive naïf into a holy terror who rules by the fealty of her subjects is what has earned Daenerys, according to Clarke, the audience’s loyalty. “People wouldn’t give two sh-ts about Daenerys if you didn’t see her suffer,” she says.

More controversial still has been the prevalence of sexual violence. Many of the major female characters have been assaulted onscreen. In a 2015 sequence, Sansa, the Stark daughter played by Sophie Turner, was raped by her husband. According to the logic of the show, the plot gave her character a reason to seek revenge and power of her own. It nonetheless generated substantial blowback online and clearly turned some fans away from the series for good. “This was the trending topic on Twitter, and it makes you wonder, when it happens in real life, why isn’t it a trending topic every time?” says Turner, who is 21. “This was a fictional character, and I got to walk away from it unscathed … Let’s take that discussion and that dialogue and use it to help people who are going through that in their everyday lives. Stop making it such a taboo, and make it a discussion.”

Benioff and Weiss claim to have seen no other possible outcome for a character stranded in a marriage to a psychopath, in a skewed version of feudal society. “It might not be our world,” says Benioff, “but it’s still the same basic power dynamic between men and women in this medieval world. This is what we believed was going to happen.” Adds Weiss: “We talked about, is there any other way she could possibly avoid this fate that doesn’t seem fake, where she uses her pluck to save herself at the last? There was no version of that that didn’t seem completely horrible.”

Even if Benioff and Weiss don’t always admit it, the show has changed. Scenes in which exposition is delivered in one brothel or another, for example, have been pared back. It’s at moments like these that the success of Thrones seems a precariously struck balance, thriving on a willingness to shock but always risking going too far.

5. the end of the end

Benioff and Weiss claim to have sworn off reading commentary about the show, good or bad. When I visit them in Los Angeles in March, they’re writing the next and final season. I peek into a fridge in a lounge area in their offices, a room dominated by a Thrones-branded pinball machine Weiss proudly points out, to find three cases of beer with Westeros-themed labels, low-calorie ranch dressing and yellow mustard. At this point, they have full outlines of the final six episodes. In fact, they’ve been working on the very last episode, possibly the most anticipated finale since Hawkeye left Korea. “We know what happens in each scene,” says Weiss.

The fact that they know is remarkable considering the show will reach its conclusion long before the books. The last new Thrones novel came out in 2011, the year the show began. The author describes his next installment, the sixth of seven, as “massively late.” “The journey is an adventure,” says Martin, who, at 68, has fought criticism that he won’t finish the books. “There’s always that process of discovery for me.” But with young, and rapidly maturing, actors under contract and a community of artisans awaiting marching orders in Belfast, the show can’t wait.

Benioff and Weiss always knew this would happen. So they met with the novelist in 2013, between Seasons 2 and 3, to sketch out what Martin calls “the ultimate developments” after the books and show diverge. The upshot, they say, is that the two can coexist. “Certain things that we learned from George way back then are going to happen on the show, but certain things won’t,” says Benioff. “And there’s certain things where George didn’t know what was going to happen, so we’re going to find them out for the first time too.”

In preparation for Season 7, Benioff and Weiss have gotten more possessive. That has further fueled fans’ curiosity even as it has created security challenges. In the run-up to Season 6, paparazzi shots of Harington—and his distinctive in-character hairdo—in Belfast tipped the Internet off that Jon Snow wasn’t, in fact, as dead as he’d seemed the season before. “Look at how difficult it is to protect information in this age,” says Benioff. “The CIA can’t do it. The NSA can’t do it. What chance do we have?”

It’s also changed the on-set dynamic. Coster-Waldau says Benioff and Weiss have “become much more protective over the story and script. I think they feel this is truly theirs now, and it’s not to be tampered with. I’ve just sensed this last season that this is their baby: ‘Just say the words as they’re written, and shut up.’”

Then there’s the end of the end, the finale likely to air next year or the year after. Benioff and Weiss are not writing the Thrones spin-off projects HBO revealed this year that could explore other parts of Westerosi history—some, all or none of which may end up on air. In the meantime, they claim not to be worrying about the public’s reaction to their ending. (Benioff says that when it comes to endgame stress, “medication helps.”) Weiss says, “I’m not saying we don’t think about it.” He pauses. “The best way to go about it is to focus on what’s on the desk in front of you, or what sword is being put in front of you, or the fight that is being choreographed in front of you.”

What’s currently before them seems like plenty. When I first met Clarke in Belfast, she was shooting on the back of a dragon. When I leave a week later, she’s still at it. “Thirty seconds of screen time and she’s been here for 16 days,” the episode’s director, Taylor, remarks at one point. Later on, I’d remember this moment of exhaustion when Weiss described seeing the buck for the first time. He went on to add, “It probably feels a bit less amazing to Emilia, who sits on it for eight hours a day, six weeks in a row, getting blasted with water and fake snow and whatever else they decide to chuck at her through the fans.” The table with the espresso machine—just beyond Clarke’s line of sight—is well trafficked.

Clarke doesn’t seem bothered, though, smiling and chatting with the crew from atop the buck. As the state-of-the-art hydraulics move her into position, her posture shifts from millennial slump to ramrod straight. In an instant, she converts herself into the ruler of the fictional space around her. On cue, she looks over her shoulder with a face of marble. She casts into an imagined world some emotion known only to her. She’s gazing into a future that, in the flickering moments that the story remains a secret, only she can see.

Press: Game of Thrones: How They Make the World’s Most Popular Show was originally published on Enchanting Emilia Clarke

#emilia clarke #game of thrones #game of thrones cast #GOT cast #daenerys targaryen #me before you #terminator

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yasbxxgie · 8 years ago

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Combine youth, empathy, alienation, and love of performance and you get a drama major. Glover went to college at New York’s Tisch School of the Arts, where he joined an improv comedy group. When Tina Fey saw some of the short videos Glover made there, she hired him to write for her popular TV show 30 Rock. He had never written for television; he was 23 years old.“I decided I wanted to write for television because of Tina,” Glover says. “She was always so happy, and I was like, I want to be happy like that too.”

It worked. He was happy. He did stand-up, made funny sketch comedy videos on YouTube, wrote for 30 Rock for three seasons, and eventually joined the cast of the cult-hit sitcom Community, playing the young, earnest, deeply nerdy Troy—the only mostly normal person (a plumber messiah, but still). It was starting to seem like Glover could make a career out of that kind of code switch, an African American cast before a mostly white audience.

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Glover also wanted to explore what it’s like to be young, talented, and black in the South. He had in mind two other African American–led TV programs, from the comedians Bernie Mac and Dave Chappelle. “Those shows were so honest and so true,” Glover says. “Bernie Mac had a sister who was a crack addict on the show. It wasn’t funny, but it was real.”

To the FX network, Glover pitched the idea of a black Ivy League dropout who returns to Atlanta and begins managing his drug-dealing cousin’s fledging rap career. It’d have drama, comedy, and music but also deal with issues like mass incarceration, poverty, drug use, and fatherhood in the black community. “We like to sit down with artists a few times and listen to what they say about their project,” says John Landgraf, president and general manager of FX. “With Donald, he didn’t always articulate his vision in a way that we could see it, but his passions and ambition were clear. So we felt confident in the story he wanted to tell and how he wanted to tell it.” The challenge would be in getting the language and tone of the show right. Mess that up and Atlanta would be considered irrelevant or—worse—totally wack. Glover solved the problem in a way that is, in retrospect, obvious but practically unheard of in Hollywood: an all-black writing team, which included a few names that had never written a script for television before. “It wasn’t a conscious decision, really,” Glover says. “I knew I wanted people with similar experiences who understood the language and the mindset of the characters and their environment.”

Still, television is an industry that has only recently begun to acknowledge the need for diversity in front of the camera,much less behind it. “Listen, even BET wouldn’t have given him that much freedom,” says one television and film executive.“An all-black writers’ room is one thing, but for me it’s the number of writers who hadn’t written on a show before at all. Most networks aren’t going to take that chance.”

And it’s true, says Udeorji—one of the writers—that other networks didn’t really get the concept. But even though there were times when FX wasn’t exactly sure where Glover’s team was headed, the network let them go there. “Donald’s a rapper who has unique experience, because he worked with Tina Fey and that crew early on. That gave him a lot of clout with the network,” Udeorji says. “He showed us the ropes of character development and story structure and took the leadership role in the room, and then we just let the ideas out.”

That dynamic has led to some genre-breaking storytelling. Atlanta is a half-hour comedy about black people that makes no extra effort to explain black people to its viewers. You either get it or you don’t. One episode, “Value,” spends an entire scene at a dinner with Van (ex-girlfriend of Earn, Glover’s character) and her best friend. It’s 10 minutes of the most nuanced dialog seen on television between two women of color as they land brutally honest viewpoints on each other’s complicated lives. “That scene blew me away,” said Cheo Hodari Coker, a longtime TV writer who runs the Netflix show Luke Cage. “You never see that amount of time given to straight dialog. It was so real, like you were eavesdropping on someone’s conversation. That’s good television.”

The crew even contributed visual flair. “I like it when black people are hit with a certain light, like purple,” Glover says. So he and Murai started experimenting.“It just felt good to play around with the look of the show.”

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Dave Chappelle walked away from his wildly popular eponymous show on Comedy Central (and the $50 million that came with it) in 2005. He was arguably at the peak of his success, but the mercurial comedian had begun to feel that white audiences were laughing at his sketches and jokes about black people without absorbing them, without picking up the social message.Glover has made himself a student of Chappelle’s, including trying to understand that specific kind of disconnect with the audience. “On some level, the situation Dave faced is probably already happening,” Glover says. “But that’s why it’s so good to have a room filled with people who understand what you’re trying to do. You’ve got to have someone willing to say ‘I don’t enjoy that.’ That makes you step back and rethink when someone says that shit doesn’t work.”

The parallel to Chappelle isn’t a perfect one. Both are influential African American comedians, but their MOs aren’t equivalent. Glover is much younger and fundamentally a well-adjusted, middle-class kid. When he performs, he’s not drawing from anger or a tough childhood. He’s connecting to a wider emotional spectrum, and that seems to give him a broader performance palette. Even Chappelle—a fan of Glover’s—acknowledges the differences. “I can’t keep up with all the shit he’s doing, but it’s all damn good. That he can do it all blows me away,” Chappelle says. “But my show was a sketch show, and Donald’s is more of a regular sitcom. And then we’re in a different time. Race is more nuanced today, and that helps the message. It’s been 10 years.”

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#magazine-25.02 #donald glover #atlanta fx #tina fey #30 rock #wired #dave chappelle #bernie mac #comedy #black comedy #sitcom #sitcoms #tv #television

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orbemnews · 4 years ago

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