{{infobox radio show |show name

This American Life |image This American Life logo.svg |imagesize |caption |other_names ''Your Radio Playhouse'' |format Radio short stories and essays |runtime c. 60 minutes |country United States |language English |home_station WBEZ |syndicates Public Radio International, Showtime, CBC Radio One (Canada) |television ''This American Life'' |presenter Ira Glass |creator Ira GlassTorey Malatia |writer Various |director |senior_editor |editor |producer Alex BlumbergJane FeltesSarah KoenigLisa PollakAlissa ShippJulie SnyderNancy UpdikeBen CalhounJonathan Menjivar |exec_producer Ira Glass |narrated Ira Glass |rec_location Chicago, Illinois (1995–2007), New York City, New York (2007–present) |first_aired November 17, 1995 |last_aired present |num_episodes 443 |audio_format Stereo |opentheme |othertheme "Rumble" |endtheme |website thisamericanlife.org |podcast TAL Podcast }}

''This American Life'' (''TAL'') is a weekly hour-long radio program produced by WBEZ and hosted by Ira Glass. It is distributed by Public Radio International on PRI affiliate stations and is also available as a free weekly podcast. Primarily a journalistic non-fiction program, it has also featured essays, memoirs, field recordings, short fiction, and found footage. The first episode aired on November 17, 1995, under the show's original title, ''Your Radio Playhouse''.

A television program of the same name and basic structure of the radio program ran for two seasons on the Showtime cable network between June 2007 and May 2008. The program featured Ira Glass as the host and executive producer. In September 2009, it was reported that Glass and the other creators of the show had "asked to be taken off TV", due to the difficult schedule required to create the show.

Format

Each week's show loosely centers on a particular theme. The theme of the show is explored in several "acts," usually two to five. On occasion, an entire program will consist of a single act. A notable exception was the show "20 Acts in 60 Minutes," which broke the normal convention by presenting twenty acts in one hour. Each act is produced using a combination of staff and freelance contributors. Programs usually begin with a short station identification by Glass who then introduces a segment related to the theme which precedes act one. The segment will then lead into the presentation of the theme for that week's show. Generally he will mention the number of acts and something about their content, ranging from just the title to a general description.

Content varies widely by episode, and stories are often told as first-person narratives. The mood of the show ranges from gloomy to ironic, from thought-provoking to humorous. The show often addresses current events, such as Hurricane Katrina in "After the Flood." Listeners may be introduced to novel subjects and issues as well, since the program covers fringe groups within the USA as well as international matters. Often ''This American Life'' features stories which explore aspects of human nature, such as "Kid Logic," which presented pieces on reasoning of children.

The end credits of each show are read by Ira Glass, and include a sound clip extracted out of context from some portion of that show, which Glass humorously attributes to WBEZ general manager Torey Malatia.

Glass has stated that he is contractually obligated to mention both station WBEZ and distributor PRI three times in the course of the show.

History

Radio

Ira Glass, the creator of ''This American Life,'' has served as producer and host since its November 17, 1995 debut. The show's first year was produced on a budget that was tight even by U.S. public radio standards. A budget of US$243,000 covered an outfitted studio, marketing costs, purchased satellite time, and paid for four full-time staffers and various freelance writers and reporters. National syndication began in June 1996 when Public Radio International formed a distribution partnership with the program. It now airs on 509 PRI affiliate stations in the United States reaching an estimated 1.7 million listeners each week. The show is also carried on XM Satellite Radio over the Public Radio International block on the XM Public Radio channel. The show is also consistently rated as the 1st or 2nd most downloaded podcast on iTunes for each week.

Originally titled ''Your Radio Playhouse,'' the show's name was changed beginning with the March 21, 1996 episode. The reference to each segment of the show as an "act" is a holdover from its original "playhouse theme." This American Life, or ''TAL'', helped launch the literary careers of many including contributing editor Sarah Vowell and essayists David Rakoff and David Sedaris.

In January 2011, the series was picked up by CBC Radio One in Canada. The program is shortened slightly for the Canadian broadcast to allow for a five-minute newscast at the top of the hour, although this is partly made up for by the removal of mid-program breaks, most of the production credits (apart from that of Malatia), and underwriting announcements (CBC's radio services being fully commercial-free, except when contractually or legally required).

Television

Discussions of a television adaptation of ''TAL'' date back to at least 1999. In January 2006, Showtime announced it had greenlighted six episodes of a new series based on ''TAL''. The announcement noted that each half-hour episode "will be hosted by Ira Glass and will explore a single theme or topic through the unique juxtaposition of first-person storytelling and whimsical narrative."

For budgetary reasons, Ira Glass and four of the radio show's producers left Chicago for New York, where Showtime is headquartered. In January 2007, it was announced that Glass had completed production on the show's first season, with the first episode set to premiere on March 22. ''TAL'' has a contract for a total of 30 shows over the next four years. Writers for the show include Chris Ware, Ira Glass, and Haruki Murakami. In September 2009, Glass announced that he and the other creators of the show had "asked to be taken off TV," largely in part to the difficult schedule required to produce a television program. He went on to state that the show is officially "on hiatus," but would like to do a television special at some point in the future.

Film

Stories from TAL have been used as the basis of movie scripts. In 2002 the show signed a six-figure deal with Warner Bros. giving the studio two years of "first-look" rights to its hundreds of past and future stories. One film to have apparently emerged from the deal is ''Unaccompanied Minors'', a 2006 film directed by Paul Feig and reportedly based on "In The Event of An Emergency, Put Your Sister in an Upright Position" from "Babysitting." In June 2008, Spike Lee bought the movie rights to Ronald Mallett's memoir, whose story was featured in the episode "My Brilliant Plan."

Potential Warner Bros films from ''TAL'' episodes include "Niagara," which explored the town of Niagara Falls, New York, after those who sought to exploit the tourism and hydroelectrical opportunities of the area left; "Wonder Woman" (from the episode "Superpowers"), the story of an adolescent who took steps to become the superhero she dreamed of being, well into adulthood; and "Act V," about the last act of Hamlet as staged by inmates from a maximum security prison as part of Prison Performing Arts Adult Theatre Projects. Paramount Pictures and Broadway Video are in production on ''Curly Oxide and Vic Thrill'', a film based on the ''TAL'' story in the episode "My Experimental Phase."

''This American Life'''s 168th episode, "The Fix Is In," inspired screen writer Scott Burns to adapt Kurt Eichenwald's book about business executive and FBI informant Mark Whitacre, titled ''The Informant'', into a major motion picture. The film was directed by Steven Soderbergh and stars Matt Damon. Ira Glass has stated that the radio show has no financial stake in the film, but noted that he appreciated how well the movie stuck to the original facts.

Live tours

''This American Life'' has taken the radio show on the road three times since 2000; material recorded on each of the three tours has been edited into an episode which aired on the radio shortly after the tour. Other episodes include segments recorded live.

"Birthdays, Anniversaries and Milestones", recorded in December 2000 in Boston (Berklee Performance Center), New York, Chicago (Merle Reskin Theatre), and Los Angeles. Performers included Sarah Vowell, Russell Banks, David Rakoff, Ian Brown, and OK Go.

"Lost in America", recorded in May 2003 in Boston, Washington, D.C., Portland, Denver, and Chicago. Performers included Sarah Vowell, Davy Rothbart, and Jonathan Goldstein. Jon Langford of the Mekons led the "Lost in America House Band" during the show.

"What I Learned from Television", recorded in February and March, 2007 in New York City (February 26 at Avery Fisher Hall, Lincoln Center); Boston (February 27 at the Boston Opera House); Minneapolis (February 28 at the Orpheum Theatre); Chicago (March 1 at the Chicago Theatre); Seattle (March 7 at the Paramount Theatre); and Los Angeles (March 12 at Royce Hall, UCLA). Directed by Jane Feltes, performers on this tour included David Rakoff, Sarah Vowell, John Hodgman, Dan Savage, Jonathan Goldstein, and Chris Wilcha. In New York, Boston, Seattle, Chicago, and Minneapolis, Mates of State were the house band, while in Los Angeles, OK Go performed between acts.

"Music Lessons", recorded at the Yerba Buena Center for the Arts in San Francisco during the 1998 Public Radio Conference in San Francisco. Performers include Sarah Vowell, David Sedaris and Anne Lamott. Music includes elementary school students from the San Francisco Unified School District as well as "Eyes on the Sparrow" with Renola Garrison vocals and Anne Jefferson on piano.

"Advice", recorded in 1999 in Seattle and at HBO's U.S. Comedy Arts Festival in Aspen. Performers include Sarah Vowell, Dan Savage, and Cheryl Trykv with music from the Black Cat Orchestra.

Digital cinema

On May 1, 2008, ''This American Life'' was the first major public media program to use digital cinema, distributing a one hour long program titled ''This American Life – Live!'' to select cinemas. PRI originally conceived of the idea to serve stations around the country. ''This American Life Live!'' was presented exclusively in select theatres by National CineMedia's (NCM) Fathom, in partnership with BY Experience and Chicago Public Radio, and in association with Public Radio International.

On April 23, 2009, ''This American Life'' broadcasted a second theater event. This program is entitled ''This American Life – Live! Returning to the Scene of the Crime''. Contributors included Mike Birbiglia, Starlee Kine, Dan Savage, David Rakoff, and Joss Whedon.

Podcast

From 1998–2005, ''This American Life'' could be accessed online in two formats: A free RealAudio stream available from the official show website, and a DRM encrypted download available through Audible.com, which charged $4 per episode. In early 2006, the show began to offer MP3 copies of each episode, which could be streamed from the show's website using a proprietary Flash player. While users were not given a direct link to the streaming MP3 files, it was possible for savvy users to save these files to their computer for later playing.

Since October 2006, ''This American Life'' has offered a free podcast feed to the public. Under this arrangement, each show is made available to podcast subscribers on the Monday following its national broadcast. After seven days, the link to the MP3 is removed from the podcast feed. Older shows can be streamed online via the show's website, or purchased from Apple's iTunes store for $0.95 per episode.

Since the move to MP3 files in 2006, the show has relied on an extremely lightweight Digital Rights Management system, based on security through obscurity and legal threats. While the show episodes are removed from the podcast RSS feed after a week, they remain on ''This American Life'''s server, accessible to anyone who knows the predictable location. On at least three different occasions, Internet users have created their own unofficial podcast feeds, deep linking to the MP3 files located on the ''This American Life'' webserver. In all three instances, the podcast feeds were removed from the Internet once representatives from Public Radio International contacted the individuals responsible for creating the feeds.

According to statements made during fund-drives, the show is downloaded by more than 400,000 people each week. These millions of downloads consume significant amounts of bandwidth, which costs the show $130,000 per year. The show has inserted a number of requests for financial assistance into the beginning of podcast episodes, requesting help, in order to pay for the bandwidth costs.

Response

Early response to ''This American Life'' was largely positive. In 1998, ''Mother Jones'' magazine called the program "hip—as well as intensely literary and surprisingly irreverent."

Awards

WBEZ-FM received a Peabody Award in 1996 and again in 2006 for ''TAL'', for a show which "captures contemporary culture in fresh and inventive ways that mirror the diversity and eccentricities of its subjects" and "weav[es] original monologues, mini-dramas, original fiction, traditional radio documentaries and original radio dramas into an instructional and entertaining tapestry."

George Foster Peabody Award

2008 WBEZ-FM Chicago and National Public Radio, News Division for ''The Giant Pool of Money''

2006 WBEZ-FM Chicago

1996 Ira Glass, Peter Clowney, Alix Spiegel, Nancy Updike, and Dolores Wilber, WBEZ-FM Chicago, for ''This American Life.''

Third Coast International Audio Festival

2001 Susan Burton ''Best New Artist award'' for act 1, ''Tornado Prom'' from episode 186, "Prom".

2002 Jonathan Goldstein, Alex Blumberg and Ira Glass: ''Best Documentary Gold Award'' for act 3, ''Yes, There is a Baby'' from episode 175, "Babysitting".

2003, Susan Burton and Hyder Akbar, ''Best Documentary Silver Award'' for episode 230, "Come Back to Afghanistan".

Livingston Award

2002 Alix Spiegel: ''National Reporting'' for episode 204, "81 Words".

Scripps Howard Foundation

2004 Nancy Updike: ''Jack R. Howard Award'' for episode 266, "I'm From the Private Sector and I'm Here to Help".

Edward R. Murrow Award

2005 Nancy Updike: for ''News Documentary'' for episode 266, "I'm From the Private Sector and I'm Here to Help".

Alfred I. duPont–Columbia University Award

2007 Alix Spiegel: for "Which One of These is Not Like the Others?" for episode 322, "Shouting Across the Divide".

New York Festivals Award

2007 Trey Kay & Lu Olkowski: "Best Human Interest Story" for act 2, "I'm Not a Doctor, but I Play One at the Holiday Inn" from episode 321, "Sink or Swim".

George Polk Award 2008 Alex Blumberg and Adam Davidson: "Best Radio Reporting" for episode 355 "The Giant Pool of Money

In other media

''This American Life'' was referenced in the television series ''The O.C.'', prompting the character Summer to respond, ''"Is that that show by those hipster know-it-alls who talk about how fascinating ordinary people are?"'' and, with a dismissive snort, ''"Gawd!"'' This reference was itself repeated in a segment of the 2007 Live Tour episode, when Glass, a self-confessed shameless fan of the teen soap opera, described his experience responding to the aforementioned line.

''The Onion'', a parody newspaper, published a satirical story on April 20, 2007, entitled "''This American Life'' Completes Documentation Of Liberal, Upper-Middle-Class Existence". The average age of ''This American Life'' listeners is 47.

In the 22nd season premiere of ''The Simpsons'' episode of "Elementary School Musical" Lisa makes mention of the show.

Music

Episodes of TAL are accompanied by music, in the form of interludes between acts (credited in the episode guide for each show), and incidental background music during acts. Background music is typically not credited, but provides important thematic emphasis.

Some songs and artists that have played a role in TAL background music include the following.

Key themes

"The Rules of Personal Space", "Many Different Hats", "The Beautiful People", "Lullaby Lost" from the album ''Extra: in the Background of a Dream'' by Bobby Johnston

"Catalog and Classify" from the album ''Tiger Banana'' by Mark Robinson

"Talisman" from the album ''Moon Safari'' by Air

"Highschool Lover", "Dirty Trip" and "Ghost Song" from the album ''The Virgin Suicides: Original Soundtrack'' by Air

"kt" from the album ''Haralambos'' by Bexar Bexar

"Whipping the Horse's Eyes" from the album ''Feast of Wire'' by Calexico

"So What" from the album ''Kind of Blue'' by Miles Davis

"Carpathian Ridge" and "Did You Know Him" from the album ''Donnie Darko: Original Soundtrack'' by Michael Andrews

"Changeling", "Midnight in a Perfect World" and "Stem/Long Stem" from the album ''Endtroducing'' by DJ Shadow

"Paul's Dance" from the album ''Penguin Cafe Orchestra'' by Penguin Cafe Orchestra

"Sketch" and "Perpetuum Mobile" from the album ''Signs of Life'' by Penguin Cafe Orchestra

"Kyoko's House: Stage Blood is not Enough" from the ''Mishima: A Life in Four Chapters'' soundtrack by Philip Glass

"Metamorphosis I" and "Japura River" performed by ''Uakti'' on the ''Philip Glass'' album ''Aguas Da Amazonia''

"Still Dre" from the album ''2001 Instrumental'' by Dr. Dre

"Namaste" and "Groove Holmes" from the album ''Check Your Head'' by Beastie Boys

"Flight of the Cosmic Hippo" from the album ''Flight of the Cosmic Hippo'' by Bela Fleck and the Flecktones

"The Chase" by Portastatic

"Viva Tirado, Pt. 1" from the album "Viva El Chicano!" by El Chicano

"Big Calm" from the album "Big Calm" by Morcheeba

"Rumble" by Link Wray

"Evil vs. Good" from the album The Ghost of Fashion by Clem Snide

"Get Your Truck" from the album ''Flirt: Original Soundtrack'' by Hal Hartley

"Yèkèrmo Sèw (A Man of Experience and Wisdom)" by The Ethiopiques

"Indie Rock Spock Ears" by Dianogah

"Tune Down" from the album Sticks by Chris Joss

"My Sweet Potato" by Booker T. & the M.G.'s

"Theme from the Graffiti Artist" by Kid Loco

"This Could Be Beautiful" by Metronomy

Recurring themes

"Alone in Kyoto" from the albums ''Lost in Translation: Original Soundtrack'' and "Talkie Walkie" by Air

"Bathing Blossom" from the album ''Secretary: Original Soundtrack'' by Angelo Badalamenti

"In Particular" from the album ''Melody Of Certain Damaged Lemons'' by Blonde Redhead

"Untitled III (Remix)" from the album ''Even My Sure Things Fall Through'' by Calexico

"Close To Me" from the album ''The Head on the Door'' by The Cure

"Strange Bath", "Cubes", "You Learn", and "Coincidences" from the album ''I ♥ Huckabees: Original Soundtrack'' by Jon Brion

"Theme" and "Phone Call" from the album ''Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind: Original Soundtrack'' by Jon Brion

"The Beast" from the album ''Mulholland Drive: Original Soundtrack'' by Milt Buckner

"Dreams" and "Lux Aeterna" from the album ''Requiem for a Dream: Original Soundtrack'' by Clint Mansell, as performed by Kronos Quartet

"All that you give" from the album ''Every Day'' by Cinematic Orchestra

"Drunken Tune" from the album ''Man with a Movie Camera'' by Cinematic Orchestra

"Diabolus" from the album ''Motion'' by Cinematic Orchestra.

"Numbers 1-4" and "Telephone and Rubber Band" from the album ''Penguin Cafe Orchestra'' by Penguin Cafe Orchestra

"Penguin Cafe Single" from the album ''Music from the Penguin Cafe'' by Penguin Cafe Orchestra

"Music For A Found Harmonium" from the album ''Broadcasting from Home'' by Penguin Cafe Orchestra

"A Grand Love Theme", "The Bootleggers" and "Alone Again So" from the album ''A Grand Love Story'' by Kid Loco

"Lakara" from the album ''Karlshorst'' by Kinn

"Buried at Sea" from the album ''One Step Ahead of the Spider'' by MC 900 Ft. Jesus

"Scrapping and Yelling" by Mark Mothersbaugh from the album ''Royal Tenenbaums: Original Soundtrack''

"Turquoise Hexagon Sun" from the album ''Music Has the Right to Children'' by Boards of Canada

"Laura's Theme" from the album ''Brick: Original Motion Picture Soundtrack'' by Nathan Johnson

"Sleepless" from the album ''Distance'' by Marconi Union

"Green Arrow" from the album ''I Can Hear the Heart Beating as One'' by Yo La Tengo

"Peter and Sylvie" from the album ''Me and You and Everyone We Know (Original Score)'' by Michael Andrews

"Coffaro's Theme" from the album ''Bill Frisell Quartet'' by Bill Frisell

"Dogs We Thought We Knew" from the album "Music for the radio program This American Life" by The Scott Fields Ensemble

"Strange People Live Next Door" from the album "Music for the radio program This American Life" by The Scott Fields Ensemble

"Deep Blue Day" from the album ''Apollo: Atmospheres and Soundtracks'' by Brian Eno

"Autopilot" from the album ''The Problem With Me'' by Seam

"Acolyte of the Flux" from the album ''Angels In America (Music From The HBO Film)'' by Thomas Newman

"6 Ghosts I", "9 Ghosts I", "12 Ghosts II" and "13 Ghosts II" from the album ''Ghosts I–IV'' by Nine Inch Nails

"Wally, Egon, & Modells in The Studio" from the album ''Music for Egon Schiele'' by Rachel's

"Tenuous Gears" from the album ''Micalavera'' by Damiak

"Shatter" from the album ''Exile in Guyville'' by Liz Phair

"Christmas Steps" from the album ''Come On Die Young'' by Mogwai

"Day Trip" from the album ''Chomp Samba'' by Amon Tobin

"Trespasser" by Bad Medicine

"5-4=Unity" by Pavement

"Who Am I" by Peace Orchestra

"Painted Sun in Abstract" by Trent Reznor and Atticus Ross

"Sad Bowels" from the album "Two Weeks Notice Original Soundtrack"

"Did This Really Happen?" from the album ''21 Grams (Soundtrack)'' by Gustavo Santaolalla

Other media

Some of the show's episodes are accompanied by multimedia downloads available on ''This American Life'''s website. One notable mention is a remake of the Elton John song "Rocket Man" that was produced for episode 223, "Classifieds", and released as an MP3. The song was performed by a "one day band" composed of musicians looking for work in the classifieds. The band, consisting of various performers (one played a Theremin), met and practiced for only one day before recording the song.

Three 2-disc CD sets collecting some of the producers' favorite acts have been released: ''Lies, Sissies, and Fiascoes: The Best of This American Life'' was released on May 4, 1999; ''Crimebusters + Crossed Wires: Stories from This American Life'' was released on November 11, 2003; and ''Stories of Hope and Fear'' was released on November 7, 2006.

A 32-page comic book, ''Radio: An Illustrated Guide'' (ISBN 0-9679671-0-4), documents how an episode of TAL is put together. It was drawn by cartoonist Jessica Abel, written by Abel and Glass, and first published in 1999.

Staff

Current production staff

Host

Ira Glass

Senior Producer

Julie Snyder

Producers

Alex Blumberg

Jane Feltes

Sarah Koenig

Lisa Pollak

Robyn Semien

Alissa Shipp

Ben Calhoun

Jonathan Menjivar

Nancy Updike

Contributing editors

Susan Burton

Jonathan Goldstein

Jack Hitt

Sarah Vowell

Production Manager

Seth Lind

Music Supervisor

Jane Feltes

Music Consultant

Jessica Hopper

Web Manager

Adrianne Mathiowetz

Intern

Other contributors

Jay Allison

Shalom Auslander

Mike Birbiglia

Scott Carrier

Dan Collison

Adam Davidson

David Ellis Dickerson

"Dishwasher" Pete Jordan

Jeff Dorchen

Susan Drury

Erin Einhorn

Dave Hill

John Hodgman

Kevin Kelly

Starlee Kine

Alex Kotlowitz

Chuck Klosterman

Jon Langford

Michael Lewis

Sandra Tsing Loh

Ian Lynam

Brett Martin

Mortified

Chris Neary

Heather O'Neill

Beau O'Reilly

David Rakoff

Jon Ronson

Davy Rothbart

Dan Savage

David Sedaris

David Segal

Curtis Sittenfeld

Karen Sosnoski

Julia Sweeney

Cheryl Trykv

David Wilcox

References

External links

Official website

Category:Audio podcasts Category:Peabody Award winning radio programs Category:Public Radio International programs Category:Radio in Chicago, Illinois Category:Documentary radio programs Category:1995 establishments Category:CBC Radio One programs Category:Australian Broadcasting Corporation radio programmes

de:This American Life

name	American Life
type	Album
artist	Madonna
cover	AmericanLife2003.png
alt	Bust of a serious woman, who looks forward. Her hair is black and is straight. She wear a black beret and a black jacket half-open. Over her left eyebrow are two pictures, painted in red. The top looks like a weapon, while the second looks like a bazooka. Behind her, upper left, three black lines are seen. On them, appreciate thinner lines. Beside, four black stars are on them. Below her, the words "Madonna" and "American Life" are written in capital letters in red color.
border	yes
released	April 22, 2003
recorded	June 2002—January 2003
genre	Pop, electronica, rock, dance-pop
length	49:39
label	Maverick, Warner Bros.
producer	Madonna, Mirwais Ahmadzaï, Mark "Spike" Stent
reviews
last album	''GHV2''(2001)
this album	''American Life''(2003)
next album	''Remixed & Revisited''(2003)
misc	}}

''American Life'' is the ninth studio album by American singer-songwriter Madonna. It was released on April 22, 2003 by Maverick Records and distributed by Warner Bros. Records. The album produced in its entirety by Madonna and Mirwais Ahmadzaï featured references to many parts of American culture. The album is considered a concept album, with recurring themes of "American Dream" and "materialism". Furthermore, the themes reject the reputation Madonna held in the 1980s with her worldwide hit "Material Girl". Essentially composed of pop, electronica, rock and dance-pop music, critics also noted influences of acoustic music on tracks such as "X-Static Process" and "Intervention". The album also featured her 2002 James Bond theme "Die Another Day" from the film of the same name.

In the United States and in the United Kingdom the album debuted at number one. It was nominated for two Grammys at the 46th Grammy Awards. The record was the world's 32nd-best-selling album in 2003. The Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA) and British Phonographic Industry (BPI) both certified it platinum in recognition of one million shipments in the US, and three hundred thousand shipments in the UK, respectively. It is the second Madonna Album to have a Parental Advisory sticker, after ''Erotica''. Generally critic opinion was mixed with responses noting the "warmer sounds" as well as several critics noting the "innovation" at a time of R&B; dominance, but general responses calling the record uninspired and uninteresting.

Four singles were released from the album. The first, the title track was released to a mixed critical reception with ''Blender'' naming it as the ninth worst song of all time. A controversial music video was pulled after scenes of war and violence were criticized which led to an edited version being released, charting at number 37 in the US elsewhere it entered the top ten in most countries placing at number two in the UK. The second "Hollywood" became her first to miss out on the ''Billboard'' Hot 100. A music video directed by Jean-Baptiste Mondino was subject of a lawsuit for plagiarism from French fashion photographer Guy Bourdin. The third "Nothing Fails" featured a lack of promotion resulting in a poor commercial performance, topping the charts in Spain, it once again missed out on the ''Billboard'' Hot 100. The final "Love Profusion" featured a music video directed by Luc Besson but once again failed commercially charting poorly in most countries whilst once again topping the Spanish Singles Chart.

Promotion for the album took place in a small promotional tour between April and May 2003 before she ventured upon her sixth concert tour, the Re-Invention World Tour. The tour was divided into five segments: French Baroque-Marie Antionette Revival, Military-Army, Circus-Cabaret, Acoustic and Scottish-Tribal, gaining positive responses controversy arose over a statement by recording artist Elton John after he stated she was lip-synching. The tour was chronicled in a documentary titled ''I'm Going to Tell You a Secret''. A CD+DVD was also released along with the film. At the 2003 MTV Video Music Awards Madonna performed alongside artists; Britney Spears, Christina Aguilera and Missy Elliot in a medley of, "Like a Virgin" and "Hollywood" and engaged in open-mouth kissing with Aguilera and Spears gaining great controversy and publicity.

Background

''American Life'' became Madonna's final studio album with Maverick Records, and marked the end of an eleven-year recording history with the label. In an interview with VH1 Madonna discussed her motivations behind the record discussing her 20 years in the industry and stating that "material things" were unimportant and she also stated, "I look back at the 20 years behind me and I realized that a lot of things that I'd valued weren't important" in response to the non-materialistic themes of the record. The album is Madonna's second album to bear a "Parental Advisory" label, due the strong profanity used in the title song. The only other albums to do so being 1992's ''Erotica'' (due the sexually explicit content), and 2007's ''The Confessions Tour'' (due live performances of "Live to Tell"). On December 9, 2003, Warner Music France released a box set version containing both the album and the remix collection ''Remixed & Revisited'' in a cardboard sleeve entitled ''Édition Spéciale 2CDs: American Life + Remixed & Revisited''. To counter illegal Internet downloads of the album's songs both before and after the album's release, Madonna's associates created a number of false song files of similar length and size. Some of these files delivered a brief message from Madonna saying "What the fuck do you think you're doing?" followed by minutes of silence. Madonna's website hacker add a message appearing on the Main Page, saying "This is what the fuck I think I'm doing..." followed by download links for each of the album's songs. The website was closed after the attack for about 15 hours.

The album has been deemed by some as a concept album featuring political themes based around the United States. Whilst talking to MTV she discussed the political themes within the record saying; "I feel like America has changed over the years and that a lot of our values seem to be materially oriented and so superficial. And we all seem to be obsessed with fame just for the sake of fame, no matter what — sell your soul to the devil if that's what it takes. And we're also completely obsessed with the way we look. And I bought into a lot of that, so a lot of the record, especially the first three songs are just like, "What was I thinking?"". After being asked by John Norris of MTV he discussed the first three tracks as a trilogy discussing things she wishes to put behind her, in response Madonna stated "I think they're an extension of "American Life." They're examining things I valued and things I found myself worrying about, caring too much about, and realizing that those things aren't important and wanting to get out from underneath that cloud, the world of illusion." Madonna discussed the materialistic themes of the record and her personal encounters which have led to the composition with MTV saying:

"Who better to say those things don't matter than somebody who's experienced them? [People may say], "How can you say they don't matter? How can you say that money won't bring you happiness if you don't have a lot of money? How can you say that fame and fortune are not a guarantee for happiness and joy and fulfillment in your life?" You have to have that experience to know. 'Cause you have all those things, I've had all those things, and I've had nothing but chaos around me. So I'm just sharing what I know with the world. 'Cause I do think that we've become completely consumed with being rich and famous, our society has. And I just want to tell people, take it from me, I have all those things and none of them ever brought me one minute of happiness."

Development

The album was mostly composed and entirely produced by Madonna and Mirwais Ahmadzaï. Both had previously collaborated on Madonna's studio album ''Music'', Madonna discussed Ahmadzaï's influence and production style saying "Mirwais is a very unique individual. His influence on me obviously was very big, he's a great musician and great guitar player. He can also program syntheshizers and create the most amazing futuristic sounds on the computer. He's a sort of genius, experimenting and I'm lucky to be there." Madonna started recording the album in late 2001, after filming the movie ''Swept Away''. The album was written and recorded over one and a half years, becoming her longest production on a studio album. Recording of the album was finished in London and Los Angeles in late 2002. Madonna discussed the recording of the title track stating that the producer Mirwais had encouraged her to rap spontaneously and that the rap sequence featured in the title track was composed using the materialistic objects that she herself had been using. Rooksby author of the ''Complete Guide to the Music of Madonna'' stated that a recurring theme of the record production was the dry and blunt lyrics, in an interview with ''Q'' Madonna said, "I've had twenty years of fame and fortune, and I feel that I have the right to an opinion on what is said, and what isn't".

During the time of the production Madonna learned to play the guitar and she stated, "Now that I've learned to play the guitar I don't always depend on the help of other people." In an interview with ''Q Magazine'' Madonna discussed the relationship she developed during the production of the album with executive producer Ahmadzaï discussing intimidation being a possible factor due to her "iconic" status, she stated "I don’t say to anyone, Are you intimidated by me? [...] Obviously, if you feel comfortable with me I can feel it. We can have a chat and a laugh, but I’ve never sat down with someone I wanted to work with and not got along with them. William Orbit was very nervous when I met him, dropping things all over the place, but I found that really endearing. I don’t dwell on it."

Artwork

French design team M/M Paris (Michael Amzalag and Mathias Augustyniak) were responsible for the artwork of ''American Life''. The duo are best known for their collaborations with musicians. One of the first rumored titles of the album was ''Ein Sof'', which Madonna had mentioned in an interview with Larry King in October 2002, during the promotion for ''Swept Away''. In mid-January 2003, in Los Angeles, the photo shoot for the album was done by photographer Craig McDean. McDean had already worked with Madonna for the portfolio for ''Vanity Fair'' magazine in October 2002; this work had a military theme, with Madonna posing in dark greens and blacks, combat boots, and holding guns. Her hair was dyed dark brown, and on the cover of the album, Madonna is wearing a beret and is almost a copy of the famous image of Che Guevara. In an interview to the Italian version of TV show ''Top of the Pops'' she said that the choice to emulate Che's image was because she likes what he represents and was feeling revolutionary when she wrote the album. Also, a cause of the paramilitary theme, the dyed hair and the artistic composition, was compared with Patty Hearst.

Music, structure and lyrics

"American Life", the title track is the first featured on the record. Starting with Madonna's voice multi-tracked questioning, "Am I gonna be a star", "should I change my name", the lyrics then develop into what Rikky Rooksby of ''The Complete Guide to the Music of Madonna'' states is a complaint about modern-day life. The lyrics accompany a "punchy octave synth figure" synchronized with a drum and bass beat. "American Life" features violent transitions, the repeated acoustic guitar riff "adds a touch of pathos" until after three minutes Madonna performs a rap naming the people whom are working for her. The second single and track "Hollywood" is introduced with sounds of tweeting birds before an acoustic guitar starts a four chord sequence that has been compared of that of the band Red Hot Chilli Peppers. The texture grows as drums and synths until after a minute the instrumental is pulled leaving just Madonna's vocals and the acoustic guitar accompaniment. The final sequence is another rap part, as is featured in the first song with the repeated phrase "Push the button". Lyrically like the first track it discusses American culture and greed focusing on Hollywood as a place of stars and illusory dreams. "I'm So Stupid" is the third track on the record, an introduction with a two-chord electric guitar leads to a minor drum beat, with the guitar later changing to a three-chord chord. The chord scheme throughout is generally minor. At the 2:15 mark different pitched synths change manically, the synths are treated with fx but towards the end the synths become less prominent as the guitars become the main focus. Lyrically the song expresses disillusionment with Madonna singing "I used to live in a fuzzy dream" proclaiming that once she was "stupider than stupid" before stating "Everybody's stupid" towards the end of the song. Track four "Love Profusion" starts with another acoustic guitar introduction, rhythm is produced by a bass drum with synth-strings added later in the song. Vocally the line "I got you under my skin" is repeated, whilst a male voice acts as the backing for the track whilst the final words "feel good" are performed with no backing instrumental.

"Nobody Knows Me" is the fifth track, featuring vocoder treated vocals the song is accompanied by bleeping synths and a heavy drum part. The title is repeated throughout the song as she references "social disease" which is also repeated. A recurring theme to the record is the acoustic guitar introduction to a song which is yet again featured in the sixth track "Nothing Fails". The guitar is accompanied by a "light" drum section and low-pitched vocals from Madonna, the song also features a cello in the first part of the song. Lyrically the song discusses a lover who is the one, and how their meeting was not just chance, a reference to the "tree of life" is made during the song as Madonna states "I'm not religious" but she wishes to pray. Acoustic guitars introduce another track on the album, a repeated concept throughout, the seventh track on the record "Intervention" starts with a three chord minor sequence which changes to a four chord sequence during the chorus section and a bass section starts at the end of the track. Lyrically the song is an optimistic track about how a relationship will last as Madonna says "the road looks lonely but that's just Satan's game". "X-Static Process," the eighth track starts once again with an acoustic guitar part, throughout there are vocal harmony lines in addition to an organ part which is also featured in the track. Lyrically like the title track, it questions modern life as Madonna sings "Jesus Christ will you look at me, don't know who I'm supposed to be". "Mother and Father" is the albums ninth track, with a drum and bass beat paired with an electric guitar present the instrumental. Lyrically the song reflects on Madonna's childhood including her mothers death and her fathers reaction, and the effect on their relationship. The tenth track is "Die Another Day", the theme to the James Bond film of the same name which featured dominating string and synth parts, the eleventh however is a more acoustic track opening with yet again acoustic guitars.

Critical reception

Aggregator site Metacritic scored the album as having an averaged score of 60 out of 100, indicating mixed reviews from critics. E! Online gave the album a generally positive review claiming the album featured "warmer sounds and earthy touches" responding well to the track "Nothing Fails" commenting on the "acoustic guitars and a choir that comes from nowhere" featured in the track. Uncut also responded well calling it a "21st century version" of the Love album ''Forever Changes'' saying " it does a similarly eerie ambivalence with its fusion of mind-altering sonics and mellow acoustics". ''Billboard's'' Ken Tucker noted the lyrical differences from past albums such as ''Ray of Light'' positively saying "American Life relies less on spiritual introspection and more on woman-in-the-mirror confrontation." ''Entertainment Weekly'' generally responded well making comments such as "At its best, her new album offers blunt, questing, decisive music at a chaotic time" but also produced less positive statements such as "At its weakest, she sounds like a gal who's grown content with hubby and kids and the hard-earned privilege of hiring the help to keep herself at tip-top tautness". Sal Cinquemani from Slant magazine gave the album a mixed review comparing it to the success of album ''Erotica'' "American Life isn't the masterpiece that Erotica so quickly revealed itself to be. It's frequently self-indulgent, misguided, unpleasant, difficult to listen to, silly yet somehow humorless" however Cinquemani also stated "it's also consistent, uncompromising and unapologetic." and that it also "stands as the last time Madonna seemed to make music without the primary objective of scoring a hit". In an earlier review Cinquemani concluded "After years of flip-flopping between sub-genres and finally finding a comfortable niche in electronica, then teasing us with her electric guitar-wielding rock goddess persona during 2001's ''Drowned World Tour'', and now showing promise as a folk-rock songstress, the only thing left for Madonna to do is plug in and make a full-blown rock album".

Generally critics responses were average as shown in Allmusic's review as they stated "Overall, American Life is better for what it promises than what it delivers, and it's better in theory than practice" with ''Q'' magazine calling it "a record about being Madonna". Alex Petridis of ''The Guardian'' responded well to parts of the record saying "American Life's best tracks make a mockery of virtually all other current pop music" however his conclusive point in the review was "The album's problem has nothing to do with controversy or extreme points of view. This time, there just aren't enough good songs." James Hannaham from ''Spin'' compared the album's introspective themes to that of her previous albums; ''Ray of Light'' and ''Music'' but also noted "Madonna spends much of American Life bemoaning the emptiness of celebrity culture.It's a dramatic gesture from an artist who's synonymous with American glamour, but instead of lashing out at the system that created her, she castigates herself." Ed Howard from ''Stylus'' gave the album a negative review calling the album "about Madonna" instead of American culture explaining "it's Madonna who, surprisingly, has simply run out of things to say."

Commercial reception

''American Life'' debuted at number one on the ''Billboard'' 200 with 241,000 copies sold in its first week. It was Madonna's second consecutive number one debut, and her fifth number one overall in the US On July 7, 2003 just months after the release it was certified Platinum, signifying sales of one million copies in the US alone. In Canada the album topped the charts, and gained a Platinum certification in June 2003. In Japan the album peaked at number four on the Oricon Weekly Albums chart, and went on to gain a Gold certification that same year. In Oceania the album entered the top three in both regions, in Australia the album peaked at number three and gained a Platinum certification, whilst in New Zealand the album peaked at number two.

In European countries the album fared well topping charts in at least nine countries consisting of; Austria, Belgium (Flanders), Belgium (Wallonia), Denmark, France, Italy, Norway, Sweden, Switzerland and in the United Kingdom. Overall in European countries it gained a Platinum certification signifying sales of over one million copies. In the United Kingdom the album was certified Platinum just months after the release, in France this was also the case, after the album topped the chart and was certified Platinum that same year. Worldwide it gained Gold certifications in countries including; Argentina, Brazil, Japan and the Netherlands, as well as gaining Platinum certifications in countries such as; Australia, Canada, France, Russia, Switzerland, the United Kingdom, and the United States. Overall in 2003 the album became the 32nd bestselling album of the year with worldwide sales over four million copies. In addition to this the album gathered several other accolades and nominations. In 2004, ''American Life'' was nominated at the 46th Grammy Awards in two categories "Best Short Form Music Video" and "Best Dance Recording", both for the song "Die Another Day". It was nominated for "Best Video from a Film" at the 2003 MTV Video Music Awards.

Singles

"Die Another Day", was the first single from the original score of the same name for the twentieth James Bond film. It later was added to the album. The song peaked at number eight in the United States; and number three in the United Kingdom. The production costs for the music video were over $6,000,000, making it the second most expensive music video ever made, after "Scream" by Michael Jackson and Janet Jackson. "American Life" was released as the lead single from the album on April 8, 2003 in the United States and on April 14, 2003 in Europe. There are two music videos. The first develops in a fashion runway, where the topic is war. At the end of the music video, is shown the then-President of the United States, George W. Bush. The anti-war content of its music video was interpreted as being unpatriotic, making Madonna withdraw its release for American music channels. She issued a statement saying she did so because she believed it was not appropriate to air it at that time, and that she did not want to risk offending anyone who could misinterpret its meaning. Later, was filmed a second video, which shows Madonna using military clothing and singing in front of the various flags of the world. The song debuted at number ninety on the ''Billboard'' Hot 100; and peaked at number thirty-seven on the chart; becoming Madonna's 45th Top 40 hit in the chart. The song also peaked at number two in the UK; seven in Austria and Australia; and ten in Germany and France.

The second single, "Hollywood", launched on July 3, 2003 in Europe and July 8, 2003 in the U.S., failed to chart in the Hot 100, becoming Madonna's first single in twenty years not to do so, since her song "Everybody". The song was a top-five hit in Canada, Italy and the United Kingdom. "Nothing Fails", was released in Europe on November 21, 2003 as third single. It was a minor chart success, but did not match the success of previous singles from ''American Life'' in the Continent, charting outside the top twenty in some countries. Also, it peaked in the top-ten in Canada, Ireland and Spain. In late 2003, "Nothing Fails" was remixed as "Nothing Fails (Nevins Mix)" for Madonna's remix EP ''Remixed & Revisited''. The remix peaked at number seven in Italy. "Love Profusion", was the fourth and the final single from the album, released on December 8, 2003. It peaked in the top-ten only in Greece, Italy and Canada, her fifth top ten Canadian hit from the album and thirteenth top ten in-a-row. Also, it debuted and peaked at eleven on UK Singles Chart; becoming Madonna sixth single, of eight, in lost the top-ten on the chart, after One More Chance on 1996. The promotional releases, "Nobody Knows Me" and "Mother and Father", became very successful in American clubs, peaking at number four and number nine, respectively on the US Hot Dance Club Songs chart. ''American Life'' became the first album to achieve seven top-ten songs on this chart.

Promotion

To start marketing the album, Madonna performed the American Life Promo Tour. A performance on Tower's Fourth Street in Manhattan was presented to around 400 people, the set started with an acoustic performance of "American Life" followed by the track "X-Static Process". The promotional show also saw Madonna perform two other tracks from the album being; "Mother and Father" and "Hollywood" before performing an "impromptu" performance of "Like a Virgin", and lastly performing the title track again but this time being the album version. A stage was built in preparation for the performances with long dark drapes and large speakers, according to ''Billboard'' was so that over one thousand fans nearby could hear the performance. As well as several other television performances, Madonna performed at the 2003 MTV Video Music Awards, her performance consisted of a medley of two of her singles "Like a Virgin" and "Hollywood" and featured popular singers; Christina Aguilera, Britney Spears as well as Missy Elliot who performed her song "Work It" at the end of the performance. After the song "Hollywood" was performed by Madonna, she engaged in kissing with both Spears and Aguilera becoming an infamous moment for all three acts and in television history. In 2003, Madonna planned to release a special commemorative box set to celebrate her twentieth anniversary in the music business and the release of her first studio album, ''Madonna'', in 1983. The plan for the box set was eventually cancelled and ''Remixed & Revisited'' was conceived in its place. The compilation contains remixed versions of four songs from ''American Life'' and a previously unreleased song called "Your Honesty".

In 2003, Madonna collaborated with photographer Steven Klein for an art installation project called ''X-STaTIC PRo=CeSS''. The installation portrayed Madonna in different incarnations of her spiritual practices – from yogi, prophet, queen to freak and pole dancer. The publication was a worldwide success, leading to a number of exhibitions in New York, London, Paris, Düsseldorf, Berlin and Florence. After the exhibition was over, Madonna was inspired by the images from the exhibitions and decided to incorporate them into her then unplanned tour and asked Klein to help her with the task. The poster released for the tour used one of the images from the installation project. It featured Madonna in a seventeenth century style dress, crawling on all fours towards the camera. The central theme of the show was unity versus violence. It was divided into five acts with different themes: ''French Baroque-Marie Antionette'' Revival, ''Military-Army'', ''Circus-Cabaret'', ''Acoustic'' and ''Scottish-Tribal'' segments. During the Re-Invention Tour, the ''Q magazine'' awards, Elton John accused Madonna for lip-synching in her shows which gained great controversy and was denied by Madonna's representatives. No official DVD has been released yet. A documentary titled ''I'm Going to Tell You a Secret'', which chronicled the tour, was released. The documentary was recorded during Madonna's performance on the tour and was finished during the recording of Madonna's ''Confessions on a Dance Floor'' album.

Track listing

{{tracklist | extra_column = Producer(s) | writing_credits = yes | title1 = American Life | writer1 = Madonna, Mirwais Ahmadzaï | extra1 = Madonna, Mirwais Ahmadzaï | length1 = 4:58 | title2 = Hollywood | writer2 = Madonna, Ahmadzaï | extra2 = Madonna, Mirwais Ahmadzaï | length2 = 4:24 | title3 = I'm So Stupid | writer3 = Madonna, Ahmadzaï | extra3 = Madonna, Mirwais Ahmadzaï Mark "Spike" Stent (add.) | length3 = 4:09 | title4 = Love Profusion | writer4 = Madonna, Ahmadzaï | extra4 = Madonna, Mirwais Ahmadzaï | length4 = 3:38 | title5 = Nobody Knows Me | writer5 = Madonna, Ahmadzaï | extra5 = Madonna, Mirwais Ahmadzaï | length5 = 4:39 | title6 = Nothing Fails | writer6 = Madonna, Guy Sigsworth, Jem Griffiths | extra6 = Madonna, Mirwais Ahmadzaï Mark "Spike" Stent (add.) | length6 = 4:49 | title7 = Intervention | writer7 = Madonna, Ahmadzaï | extra7 = Madonna, Mirwais Ahmadzaï | length7 = 4:54 | title8 = X-Static Process | writer8 = Madonna, Stuart Price | extra8 = Madonna, Mirwais Ahmadzaï | length8 = 3:50 | title9 = Mother and Father | writer9 = Madonna, Ahmadzaï | extra9 = Madonna, Mirwais Ahmadzaï | length9 = 4:33 | title10 = Die Another Day | writer10 = Madonna, Ahmadzaï | extra10 = Madonna, Mirwais Ahmadzaï | length10 = 4:38 | title11 = Easy Ride | writer11 = Madonna, Monte Pittman | extra11 = Madonna, Mirwais Ahmadzaï | length11 = 5:05 }}

Album credits

Personnel

Madonna – vocals, background vocals, acoustic guitar

Michel Colombier – conductor

Mirwais Ahmadzaï – acoustic guitar, keyboards, programming, background vocals

Stuart Price – piano, synthesizers, keyboards, sequencing, programming

The London Community Gospel Choir – backing vocals in "Nothing Fails"

Monte Pittman – guitar in "Easy Ride"

Production

Producers – Madonna, Mirwais Ahmadzaï, Mark Stent

Engineers – Paul PDub Walton

String engineer – George Foster

Assistant engineers – Rob Haggett, Tom Hannen, Jeff Kanan, Tim Lambert, Gabe Sganga, David Treahearn

Mastering – Tim Young

Programming – Mirwais Ahmadzaï

Choir arrangement – Nicky Brown

String arrangements – Michel Colombier

Photography – Craig McDean

Charts, certifications and procession

Charts

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Certifications

{|class="wikitable sortable" !Country !Certification |- |Argentina |Gold |- |Australia |Platinum |- |Brazil |Gold |- |Canada |Platinum |- |Europe |Platinum |- |France |Platinum |- |Germany |Platinum |- |Hungary |Platinum |- |Japan |Gold |- |Netherlands |Gold |- |Russia |Platinum |- |Switzerland |Platinum |- |United Kingdom |Platinum |- |United States |Platinum |- |}

Chart procession and succession

References

External links

American Life at Madonna.com

Category:Madonna (entertainer) albums Category:2003 albums Category:Maverick Records albums Category:Concept albums Category:Albums certified gold by the Recording Industry Association of Japan

bg:American Life cs:American Life de:American Life es:American Life fr:American Life (album) hr:American Life (album) id:American Life it:American Life (album) he:American Life ka:American Life lv:American Life hu:American Life nl:American Life (album) ja:アメリカン・ライフ pl:American Life pt:American Life ro:American Life ru:American Life sk:American Life sr:American Life fi:American Life sv:American Life tr:American Life (albüm) uk:American Life vi:American Life

birthname	Daniel Keenan Savage
birth date	October 07, 1964
birth place	Chicago, Illinois
spouse	Terry Miller
children	D.J.
other names	Keenan Hollahan
education	B.A., Theater, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign
occupation	Author, media pundit, journalist, newspaper editor and sex advice columnist }}

Daniel Keenan "Dan" Savage (born October 7, 1964) is an American author, media pundit, journalist and newspaper editor. Savage writes the internationally syndicated relationship and sex advice column ''Savage Love''. Its tone is frank in its discussion of sexuality, often humorous, and hostile to social conservatives, as in the Santorum controversy regarding homosexuality. Savage, who is gay, has often been the subject of controversy regarding some of his opinions that pointedly clash with cultural conservatives and those put forth by what Savage has been known to call the "gay establishment". He has also worked as a theater director, both under his real name and under the name Keenan Hollahan, using his middle name and his grandmother's maiden name. In 2010, Savage and his husband Terry Miller began the It Gets Better Project to help prevent suicide among LGBT youth.

Early life and college

Dan Savage was born to William and Judy Savage in Chicago, Illinois. He is of Irish ancestry. The third of four children, Savage was raised as a Roman Catholic and attended Quigley Preparatory Seminary North, which he has described as "a Catholic high school in Chicago for boys thinking of becoming priests." Though Savage has stated that he is now "a wishy-washy agnostic" and an atheist, he has said that he still considers himself "culturally Catholic."

Savage attended the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, where he studied theater and history. As a theater director, Savage (working under the name "Keenan Hollahan") was a founder of Seattle's Greek Active Theater. Much of the group's work has been queer recontextualizations of classic works, such as a tragicomic ''Macbeth'' with both the title character and Lady Macbeth played by performers of the opposite sex. In March 2001, he directed his own ''Egguus'' at Consolidated Works, a parody of Peter Shaffer's 1973 play ''Equus'' which exchanged a fixation on horses for a fixation on chickens. Savage has not directed, produced, or performed in any productions since a 2003 production of ''Letters from the Earth'', also at Consolidated Works, his trimmed version of Mark Twain's ''The Diary of Adam and Eve'', which received scathing reviews, including one from his own paper, "My Boss's Show Stinks".

Savage Love

In 1991, Savage was living in Madison, Wisconsin, and working as a manager at a local video store that specialized in independent film titles. There, Savage befriended Tim Keck, co-founder of ''The Onion'', who announced that he was moving to Seattle to help start an alternative weekly newspaper titled ''The Stranger''. Savage "made the offhand comment that forever altered [his] life: 'Make sure your paper has an advice column — everybody claims to hate 'em, but everybody seems to read 'em'." Savage typed up a sample column, and to Savage's surprise Keck offered him the job.

Savage stated in a February 2006 interview in ''The Onion'''s ''A.V. Club'' (which publishes his column) that he began the column with the express purpose of providing mocking advice to heterosexuals. Savage wanted to call the column "Hey Faggot!" His editors at the time refused his choice of column name, but for the first several years of the column, he attached "Hey Faggot!" at the beginning of each printed letter as a salutation. According to Savage: In his February 25, 1999 column, Savage announced that he was retiring the phrase: "Lo many columns later, it feels strange to begin every column with a joke about a debate that ended years ago."

He has written in a number of columns about "straight rights" concerns, such as the HPV vaccine and the morning-after pill, stating in his November 9, 2005, column that "[t]he right-wingers and the fundies and the sex-phobes don't just have it in for the queers. They're coming for your asses too."

Radio and journalism

thumb|right|Dan Savage speaking at Illinois Wesleyan University, 2007In addition to maintaining his weekly column and authoring four books, Savage has been involved in several other projects.

From 1994 until 1997, he had a weekly three-hour call-in show called ''Savage Love Live'' on Seattle's KCMU (now KEXP). From 1998 to 2000, he ran the biweekly advice column ''Dear Dan'' on the news website abcnews.com.

He is now the editorial director of the weekly Seattle newspaper ''The Stranger'', a promotion from his former position as ''The Stranger''s editor-in-chief. Savage is currently a contributor to ''This American Life'', an hour-long radio show on Chicago's WBEZ syndicated by PRI, as well as a frequent contributor to ''Out'' magazine and a "Real Time Real Reporter" on HBO's ''Real Time with Bill Maher''. He has also made multiple appearances on MSNBC's ''Countdown with Keith Olbermann'' and CNN's ''Anderson Cooper 360'' discussing LGBT politcal issues such as same-sex marriage and Don't Ask Don't Tell.

Podcast

The Savage Lovecast is a weekly audio podcast based on Savage's column ''Savage Love'', available via iTunes and at the ''Stranger'''s website for free download. It features Savage doing a call-in version of his sex advice column.

iPhone App

In 2010, the Savage Love iPhone App was released. The app features a "Question of the Day" pulled from "Slog," the Stranger's blog, as well as archived and indexed advice from ''Savage Love''s archives. The app also provides access to The Savage Lovecast podcast and videos of Savage's speaking appearances, among other features.

Opinions and points of view

It Gets Better Project

On September 21, 2010, Savage started the It Gets Better Project in light of the suicide of 15-year-old Billy Lucas, who was bullied for his perceived sexual orientation. The project encourages adults, both LGBT and otherwise, to submit videos assuring gay teenagers that life can improve after bullying in early life. As of January 3, 2011, the project had over 5,000 user created testimonials.

Political advocacy

Savage has written about his interest in political matters. His political leanings are primarily liberal, with pronounced contrarian and libertarian streaks. For example, he wrote that in 2000, suffering from the flu while on an assignment for salon.com to cover the Iowa caucuses, he was so angered by televised remarks in opposition to same-sex marriage by conservative Republican presidential hopeful Gary Bauer that he abandoned his original plan "to follow one of the loopy conservative Christian candidates around — Bauer or Alan Keyes — and write something insightful and humanizing about him, his campaign, and his supporters." Instead, he volunteered for the Bauer campaign with the intent to infect the candidate with his flu. He wrote that he licked doorknobs and other objects in the campaign office, and handed Bauer a saliva-coated pen, hoping to pass the virus on to Bauer and his supporters (though he later said that much of the article had been fictitious). He also registered and participated in the caucus, which was illegal, as Savage was not an Iowa resident. He was charged and pleaded guilty to a misdemeanor charge of fraudulent voting in a caucus, and was sentenced to a year's probation, 50 hours of community service, and a $750 fine.

Savage frequently mentions political issues in his column, particularly issues that affect family planning, birth control, and sexuality. He often encourages readers to get involved and/or voice a positive or negative opinion about a politician or public official.

After Rick Santorum, then a United States senator from Pennsylvania, made comments to a reporter comparing homosexual sex to bestiality and incest in 2003, Savage assailed Santorum in his column. Later, he sponsored a contest that led to the term ''santorum'' being used to refer to "the frothy mixture of lube and fecal matter that is sometimes a byproduct of anal sex". Savage set up a website to spread the definition. In 2010, Savage offered to remove his website if Rick Santorum would agree to donate US$5 million to a gay rights group. The organization, Freedom to Marry, advocates on behalf of same-sex marriage in the United States. Savage told ''Mother Jones'' in 2010, "If Rick Santorum wants to make a $5 million donation to [the gay marriage group] Freedom to Marry, I will take it down. Interest starts accruing now." Evan Wolfson, executive director of Freedom to Marry, responded in a statement to ''Metro Weekly'': "Support for Freedom to Marry's national campaign would be welcome—and a good way for Rick Santorum to start cleaning up the discriminatory mess he and his companions have made."

Savage continued the tradition in 2009 by having his readers vote to define ''saddlebacking'' as "the phenomenon of Christian teens engaging in unprotected anal sex in order to preserve their virginities", as a protest against the vocal support given to California Proposition 8 by Rick Warren (pastor of Saddleback Church), and President Barack Obama's invitation to Warren to give the invocation at his inauguration. When Savage vowed to boycott Utah due to strong Mormon support for Proposition 8 ("Fuck you, Utah – we’re going to big, blue Colorado"), the ''Salt Lake City Weekly'' dropped Savage's column: "all Utahns aren’t to blame."

Savage strongly supported the war in Iraq in the pages of ''The Stranger'' in October 2002. By the time of the U.S. invasion in March 2003, however, he had somewhat softened his argument.

Savage has also been a vocal opponent of state legislation proscribing the sale of sex toys. After an exposé by Kandiss Crone from WLBT (Jackson, Mississippi) precipitated the arrest and fining of an adult video store owner, Savage suggested that readers send any sex toys that they needed to dispose of to Crone.

Personal opinions

Savage initially supported the Iraq war and advocated military action against other Middle Eastern states, including Iran and Saudi Arabia, saying, "Islamo-fascism is a regional problem, like European fascism – and the Middle East [has] to be remade just as Europe was remade." One week before the war began, Savage spoke against it, citing the inability of President George W. Bush to form a convincing case and sway the UN and NATO allies. By 2005 he deemed the situation "hopeless" and advocated an immediate troop withdrawal. He describes his view toward family as "conservative", and his husband, Terry Miller, is a "stay-at-home dad" for the couple's adopted son. He has, however, expressed skepticism of "simplistic" views of monogamy. In response to a letter asking "Is the AIDS crisis over?" Savage, in his October 22, 1997 column, answered simply, "Yes." Several weeks of columns were devoted in whole or in part to discussion of the issue. In an interview with the ''Daily Pennsylvanian'', Savage stated that then-Green Party Senate candidate Carl Romanelli, whom Savage claimed was partially funded by state Republicans for a spoiler effect against Democrat Bob Casey, "should be dragged behind a pickup truck until there's nothing left but the rope." In the same interview, he stated, "Mr. Romanelli should go fuck himself." Immediately after the interview, Savage wrote, "I regret using that truck metaphor, and didn't mean it literally, and it was in poor taste, and I regret it." He opposes the tactics of the War on Drugs, and opposes the prohibition of certain controlled substances. On HBO's ''Real Time With Bill Maher'' July 15, 2011, during a panel discussion of the debt limit increase negotiations between the U.S. Congress and President Barack Obama, Savage said in a stand-alone remark, "I wish the Republicans were all fucking dead." He apologized for his remarks on his blog later the same night saying in part, "I don't feel that way. My dad is a Republican. (Well, he says he's an independent, but he hasn't voted for a Democrat since JFK. My dad is a Republican.)"

Views on outing

Savage stated in a column that he favors outing in some cases, specifically mentioning anti-gay activist Tyler Whitney. However, in the same column he noted that "I recently talked someone ''out'' of outing a public figure. A ''Savage Love'' reader was contemplating outing an innocuous celebrity back in April. I advised him against it because, as I wrote to him privately, outing is brutal and it should be reserved for brutes."

Local issues

Savage's editorship of ''The Stranger'' has established him as a voice in local Seattle politics. His most high-profile commentary has been as an outspoken critic of the Teen Dance Ordinance and other crackdowns on all-ages events.

Savage argues that closing down supervised all-ages dance venues drives teens to boredom and reckless activities: "Places like Ground Zero and the Kirkland Teen Center are invaluable from a law enforcement point of view. They keep kids out of, say, 7-Eleven parking lots or the homes of friends whose parents are away."

Ann Landers

On December 3, 2002, Savage announced in an article that he had purchased columnist Ann Landers's desk; she died on June 22 of that year. Savage has facetiously referred to Landers as his "college roommate" and said "I like to think of myself as a gay Ann Landers."

Family and marriage

Savage's home state of Washington allows same-sex couples to adopt children and enter civil unions, but does not legally recognize same-sex marriage. In March 2004, Savage wrote about an action that he took to highlight what he saw as being indicative of same-sex couples' lack of legal right to marry. After his co-worker Amy Jenniges was denied a license to marry her girlfriend Sonia, Jenniges and Savage obtained a license to marry one another. He wrote at the time, "We emphasized to the clerk and her manager that Amy and I don't live together, we don't love each other, we don't plan to have kids together, and we're going to go on living and sleeping with our same-sex partners after we get married. So could we still get a marriage license?" According to Savage, the license-department manager replied, "Sure. If you've got $54, you can have a marriage license."

Savage and his husband, Terry, have one adopted son, D.J., and were married in Vancouver, BC in 2005.

Awards

!Year !! Work !! Award !! Organization !! Result
1999	''The Kid: What Happened After My Boyfriend and I Decided to Go Get Pregnant''	PEN West Award for Excellence in Creative Nonfiction	PEN Center USA
2003	rowspan="2"	Lambda Literary Award	Lambda Literary Foundation
2004	''The Best American Sex Writing 2004''	Running Press
			International Academy of Digital Arts and Sciences
Anthony Giffard "Make the Change" Award

Bibliography

In addition to his advice column, Savage has written four books, edited one book, and authored various op-ed pieces in ''The New York Times''.

References

External links

Savage Love – Savage's weekly sex advice column

* Savage's podcasts

It Gets Better Project

Category:1964 births Category:American advice columnists Category:American agnostics Category:American memoirists Category:American political pundits Category:American political writers Category:American relationships and sexuality writers Category:American Roman Catholics Category:American writers of Irish descent Category:Gay writers Category:Lambda Literary Award winners Category:LGBT memoirists Category:LGBT writers from the United States Category:LGBT journalists Category:LGBT parents Category:Living people Category:People from Chicago, Illinois Category:People from Madison, Wisconsin Category:People from Seattle, Washington Category:Sex columnists Category:Sex educators Category:University of Illinois at Urbana–Champaign alumni Category:Writers from Chicago, Illinois Category:Writers from Washington (state) Category:Writers from Wisconsin *

de:Dan Savage es:Dan Savage fr:Dan Savage la:Daniel Keenan Savage simple:Dan Savage

name	Ira Glass
birth date	March 03, 1959
birth place	Baltimore, MD, United States
show	This American Life
station	WBEZ
network	Public Radio International
timeslot	Syndication
style	Presenter
country	United States
website	Official website }}

Ira Glass (born March 3, 1959) is an American public radio personality, and host and producer of the radio and television show ''This American Life''.

Early life

Glass was born in Baltimore, Maryland, United States, to Barry Glass, an accountant, and Shirley Glass, a psychologist and infidelity researcher. He attended Milford Mill High School in Baltimore County where he was active in student theater. He attended Northwestern University, in Evanston, Illinois, but transferred to Brown University, where he concentrated in semiotics and graduated in 1982. He is the first cousin once removed of composer Philip Glass, who has appeared on Ira's show and whose music can often be heard on the program. Glass stated on ''This American Life'' that he is a staunch atheist.

Career

Radio broadcasting

Glass has worked in public radio for some 30 years. He began as an intern at National Public Radio. He was a reporter and host on several NPR programs, including ''Morning Edition,'' ''All Things Considered'', and ''Talk of the Nation''. Glass wrote,

"The very first National Public Radio show that I worked on was Joe Frank's. I think I was influenced in a huge way... Before I saw Joe put together a show, I had never thought about radio as a place where you could tell a certain kind of story."

From November 1990 until September 1995, he co-hosted, with NPR producer Gary Covino a weekly, local program on Chicago Public Radio called ''The Wild Room''. In 1993, Glass said,

“I like to think of it as the only show on public radio other than ''Car Talk'' that both Daniel Schorr [NPR news analyst] and Kurt Cobain [lead singer/guitarist of Nirvana] could listen to. I think it’s appropriate that the show [which aired on Friday evenings] is on a station that most people don’t listen to at a time when most people won’t hear it. And the fact that public radio never puts a new show on the air or takes any off is definitely to our advantage.”

During this time, he spent two years reporting on the Chicago Public School System—one year at a high school, and another at an elementary school. The largest finding of his investigations was that smaller class sizes would contribute to more success in impoverished, inner-city schools.

In 1995, the MacArthur Foundation approached Torey Malatia, general manager of Chicago Public Radio, with an offer of $150,000 to produce a show featuring local Chicago writers and performance artists. Malatia approached Glass who countered that he wanted to do a weekly program with a budget of $300,000. In 1998, Covino told the ''Chicago Reader'', "The show he proposed was The Wild Room. He just didn't call it The Wild Room." Covino continued to produce ''The Wild Room'' until February 1996.

Glass invited David Sedaris to read his essays on NPR, which led to Sedaris's success as an independent author; Glass also produced Sedaris' commentaries on NPR.

Since 1995, he has hosted and produced ''This American Life'', from WBEZ. The show was nationally syndicated in June 1996 by Public Radio International and has been national ever since. PRI was eager to take on the program even as NPR passed on it.

''This American Life'' reaches over 1.7 million listeners on over 500 stations weekly, with an average listening time of 48 minutes. Glass can be heard in all but four episodes.

On November 17, 2005, ''This American Life'' celebrated its 10th anniversary. The following week, as a special show celebrating the anniversary, the first episode, "New Beginnings", was re-broadcast. Prior to this, the first episode had never been aired outside of Chicago. When the first episode was broadcast in 1995, the show was known as ''Your Radio Playhouse''. That first episode includes interviews with talk-show host Joe Franklin and Ira's mother, as well as stories by Kevin Kelly, founding editor of ''Wired'', and performance artist Lawrence Steger.

In May 2009, the ''This American Life'' radio show was broadcast live to over 300 movie theaters.

In 2009, Glass was named the recipient of the Edward R. Murrow Award for Outstanding Contributions to Public Radio.

Other works

While in high school, he wrote jokes for Baltimore radio personality Johnny Walker.

In September 1999, Ira collaborated on a comic book, ''Radio: An Illustrated Guide'', with Jessica Abel. The book showcases how ''This American Life'' is produced, and how to produce your own radio program.

In 2006, he served as one of the executive producers of the feature film ''Unaccompanied Minors''. It is based on the true story of what happened to ''This American Life'' contributing editor Susan Burton and her sister Betsy at an airport on the day before Christmas. Burton had already produced a segment on ''This American Life'' about the same experience before the story was adapted to film.

In October 2007, he published the anthology ''The New Kings of Nonfiction''.

On March 22, 2007, Glass and company began airing a television version of ''This American Life'' as half-hour episodes on the Showtime network. During an interview with Patt Morrison on 89.3 KPCC, Southern California Public Radio, Glass said that he lost 30 lb (13.5 kg) for this venture. The show aired for thirteen episodes over two seasons, and ended in 2009 because of the heavy workload required to produce it.

Appearances

On April 25, 2008, Glass again appeared on ''The Late Show''. On April 22, 2009, Glass appeared as the featured guest on ''The Colbert Report''. He also was on TBTL on September 18, 2009. Glass served as the monologist for ASSSSCAT at the Upright Citizens Brigade Theatre in New York on February 21, 2010. He appeared in a green motion capture suit in a John Hodgman segment on the ''Daily Show with Jon Stewart'' on Thursday, November 4, 2010 where he acted as the main character of the Grand Theft Auto: Vice City video game. Glass appeared on the June 24th, 2011 edition of Adam Carolla's podcast.

References

External links

Official website

Ira Glass's Manifesto at the Transom.org

Ira Glass: Live and Uncut – Mother Jones interview. August 11, 1998

The Onion A/V Club's interview with Ira Glass, November 5, 2003

Category:American vegetarians Category:American atheists Category:Brown University alumni Category:Radio personalities from Chicago, Illinois Category:National Public Radio personalities Category:People from Baltimore, Maryland Category:This American Life people Category:1959 births Category:Living people Category:Jewish atheists Category:Jewish actors Category:American television hosts Category:American film producers Category:American radio producers Category:American book editors Category:American comics writers Category:American Jews

de:Ira Glass

name	Robin Williams
birth name	Robin McLaurin Williams
birth date	July 21, 1951
birth place	Chicago, Illinois, United States
medium	Stand-up, film, television
nationality	American
active	1972–present
genre	Character comedy, physical comedy, improvisational comedy, satire/political satire, observational comedy, blue comedy
influences	Richard Pryor, Jonathan Winters, George Carlin, Chuck Jones
influenced	Conan O'Brien, Frank Caliendo, Dat Phan, Jo Koy
spouse	Valerie Velardi (1978–88; 1 child) Marsha Garces Williams (1989–2011; 2 children)
website	RobinWilliams.com

Robin McLaurin Williams (born July 21, 1951) is an American actor and comedian. Rising to fame with his role as the alien Mork in the TV series ''Mork and Mindy'', and later stand-up comedy work, Williams has performed in many feature films since 1980. He won the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor for his performance in the 1997 film ''Good Will Hunting''. He has also won two Emmy Awards, four Golden Globes, two Screen Actors Guild Awards and five Grammy Awards.

Early life

Williams was born in Chicago, Illinois. His mother, Laura McLaurin (née Smith, 1922–2001), was a former model from New Orleans, Louisiana. His father, Robert Fitzgerald Williams (September 10, 1906 – October 18, 1987), was a senior executive at Ford Motorship in charge of the Midwest area. His maternal great-great-grandfather was senator and Mississippi governor Anselm J. McLaurin. Williams is of English, Welsh, Irish, and French ancestry. He was raised in the Episcopal Church (his mother practiced Christian Science). He grew up in Bloomfield Hills, Michigan, where he was a student at the Detroit Country Day School, and later moved to Woodacre, Marin County, California, where he attended the public Redwood High School. Williams studied at Claremont McKenna College (then called Claremont Men's College) for four years. He has two half-brothers: Todd (who died August 14, 2007) and McLaurin.

Williams has described himself as a quiet child whose first imitation was of his grandmother to his mother. He did not overcome his shyness until he became involved with his high-school drama department.

In 1973, Williams was one of only 20 students accepted into the freshman class at the Juilliard School, and one of only two students to be accepted by John Houseman into the Advanced Program at the school that year, the other being Christopher Reeve. In his dialects class, Williams had no trouble mastering all dialects quickly. Williams left Juilliard in 1976.

Television career

After appearing in the cast of the short-lived ''The Richard Pryor Show'' on NBC, Williams was cast by Garry Marshall as the alien Mork in the hit TV series ''Happy Days''. As Mork, Williams improvised much of his dialogue and physical comedy, speaking in a high, nasal voice. Mork's appearance was so popular with viewers that it led to a spin-off hit television sitcom, ''Mork and Mindy'', which ran from 1978 to 1982; the show was written to accommodate Williams' improvisations. Although playing the same character as in his appearance in ''Happy Days'', the show was set in the present day, in Boulder, Colorado, instead of the late '50s in Milwaukee. Mork was an extremely popular character, featured on posters, coloring books, lunchboxes, and other merchandise.

Starting in the late 1970s and throughout the 1980s, Williams began to reach a wider audience with his standup comedy, including three HBO comedy specials, ''Off The Wall'' (1978), ''An Evening with Robin Williams'' (1982), and ''Robin Williams: Live at the Met'' (1986). Also in 1986, Williams reached an ever wider audience to exhibit his style at the 58th Academy Awards show.

His stand-up work has been a consistent thread through his career, as is seen by the success of his one-man show (and subsequent DVD) ''Robin Williams: Live on Broadway'' (2002). He was voted 13th on Comedy Central's list "100 Greatest Stand-ups of All Time" in 2004.

After some encouragement from his friend Whoopi Goldberg, he was set to make a guest appearance in the 1991 ''Star Trek: The Next Generation'' episode, "A Matter of Time", but he had to cancel due to a scheduling conflict; Matt Frewer took his place as a time-traveling con man, Professor Berlingoff Rasmussen. Williams, along with Billy Crystal, appeared in a cameo together at the beginning of an episode of the third season of ''Friends''. Both Williams and Crystal's parts weren't originally in the script. They were apparently in the building where the show was shooting and were asked to improvise their lines.

Williams appeared on an episode of the American version of ''Whose Line Is It Anyway?'' (Season 3, Episode 9: November 16, 2000). During a game of "Scenes from a Hat", the scene "What Robin Williams is thinking right now" was drawn, and Williams stated "I have a career. What the hell am I doing here?" On December 4, 2010, he appeared with Robert De Niro on SNL in the sketch ''What Up with That''.

Movie roles

Most of Williams' acting career has been in film, although he has given some performances on stage as well (notably as Estragon in a production of ''Waiting for Godot'' with Steve Martin). His performance in ''Good Morning, Vietnam'' (1987) resulted in Williams being nominated for an Academy Award. Many of his roles have been comedies tinged with pathos.

His role as the Genie in the animated film ''Aladdin'' (1992) was instrumental in establishing the importance of star power in voice actor casting. Williams also used his voice talents in ''Fern Gully'', as the holographic Dr. Know in the 2001 film ''A.I. Artificial Intelligence'', in the 2005 animated film ''Robots'', the 2006 Academy Award-winning ''Happy Feet'', and an uncredited vocal performance in the film ''Everyone's Hero''. Furthermore, he was the voice of The Timekeeper, a former attraction at the Walt Disney World Resort about a time-traveling robot who encounters Jules Verne and brings him to the future.

In 1998, he won an Oscar as Best Supporting Actor for his role as a psychologist in ''Good Will Hunting''. Williams has also starred in dramatic films, which earned him two subsequent Academy Award nominations: First for playing an English teacher in ''Dead Poets Society'' (1989), and later for playing a troubled homeless man in ''The Fisher King'' (1991); that same year, he played an adult Peter Pan in the movie ''Hook''. Other acclaimed dramatic films include ''Awakenings'' (1990) and ''What Dreams May Come'' (1998). In the 2002 film ''Insomnia'', Williams portrays a writer/killer on the run from a sleep-deprived Los Angeles policeman (played by Al Pacino) in rural Alaska. And also in 2002, in the psychological thriller ''One Hour Photo'', Williams played an emotionally disturbed photo development technician who becomes obsessed with a family for whom he has developed pictures for a long time. In 2006 Williams starred in ''The Night Listener'', a thriller about a radio show host who realizes he has developed a friendship with a child who may or may not exist.

He is known for his improvisational skills and impersonations. His performances frequently involve impromptu humor designed and delivered in rapid-fire succession while on stage. According to the ''Aladdin'' DVD commentary, most of his dialogue as the Genie was improvised.

In 2006, he starred in five movies including ''Man of the Year'' and was the Surprise Guest at the 2006 Nickelodeon Kids' Choice Awards. He appeared on an episode of ''Extreme Makeover: Home Edition'' that aired on January 30, 2006.

At one point, he was in the running to play the Riddler in ''Batman Forever'' until director Tim Burton dropped the project. Earlier, Williams had been a strong contender to play the Joker in ''Batman''. He had expressed interest in assuming the role in ''The Dark Knight'', the sequel to 2005's ''Batman Begins'', although the part of the Joker was played by Heath Ledger, who went on to win, posthumously, the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor.

He was portrayed by Chris Diamantopoulos in the made-for-TV biopic ''Behind the Camera: The Unauthorized Story of Mork & Mindy'' (2005), documenting the actor's arrival in Hollywood as a struggling comedian.

Disputes with Disney

In gratitude for his success with the Disney/Touchstone film ''Good Morning, Vietnam'', Robin Williams voiced the Genie in the Disney animated film ''Aladdin'' for SAG scale pay ($75,000), on condition that his name or image not be used for marketing, and his (supporting) character not take more than 25% of space on advertising artwork, since ''Toys'' was scheduled for release one month after ''Aladdin'''s debut. The studio went back on the deal on both counts, especially in poster art by having the Genie in 25% of the image, but having other major and supporting characters portrayed considerably smaller. Disney's Hyperion book, ''Aladdin: The Making Of An Animated Film'', listed both of Williams' characters "The Peddler" and "The Genie" ahead of main characters, but was forced to refer to him only as "the actor signed to play the Genie".

Williams and Disney had a bitter falling-out, and as a result Dan Castellaneta voiced the Genie in ''The Return of Jafar'', the ''Aladdin'' animated television series, and had recorded his voice for ''Aladdin and the King of Thieves.'' When Jeffrey Katzenberg was fired from Disney and replaced by former 20th Century Fox production head Joe Roth (whose last act for Fox was greenlighting Williams' film ''Mrs. Doubtfire''), Roth arranged for a public apology to Williams by Disney. Williams agreed to perform in Hollywood Pictures' ''Jack'', directed by Francis Ford Coppola, and even agreed to voice the Genie again for the ''King Of Thieves'' sequel (for considerably more than scale), replacing all of Castellaneta's dialogue.

When Williams re-teamed with ''Doubtfire'' director Chris Columbus for 1999's ''Bicentennial Man'', Disney asked that the budget be cut by approximately $20 million, and when the film was released on Christmas Day, it flopped at the box office. Williams blamed Disney's marketing and the loss of content the film had suffered due to the budget cuts. As a result, Williams was again on bad terms with Disney, and Castellaneta was once again recruited to replace him as Genie in the ''Kingdom Hearts'' video game series and the ''House of Mouse'' TV series. The DVD release for ''Aladdin'' has no involvement whatsoever from Williams in the bonus materials, although some of his original recording sessions can be seen.

Robin Williams has recently made peace with the Walt Disney Company and in 2009 agreed to be inducted into the Disney Hall of Fame, designated as a Disney Legend.

Stand-up career

Williams has done a number of stand-up comedy tours since the early 1970s. Some of his most notable tours include ''An Evening With Robin Williams'' (1982), ''Robin Williams: At The Met'' (1986) and ''Robin Williams LIVE on Broadway'' (2002). The latter broke many long-held records for a comedy show. In some cases, tickets were sold out within thirty minutes of going on sale.

After a six year break, in August 2008 Williams announced a brand new 26-city tour titled "Weapons of Self Destruction". He was quoted as saying that this was his last chance to make cracks at the expense of the current Bush Administration, but by the time the show was staged only a few minutes covered that subject. The tour started at the end of September 2009, finishing in New York on December 3, and was the subject of an HBO special on December 8, 2009.

Accusations of plagiarism

Williams was accused of stealing material from other comics to the extent that David Brenner claims that he confronted Williams personally and threatened him with bodily harm if he heard Williams utter another one of his jokes.

Theater career

In theatre, Williams has headed his own one-man show, ''Robin Williams: Live on Broadway'', that played at The Broadway Theatre in July 2002. He made his Broadway acting debut in Rajiv Joseph's ''Bengal Tiger at the Baghdad Zoo'', which opened on Broadway at the Richard Rodgers Theatre on March 31, 2011. He previously appeared opposite Steve Martin at Lincoln Center in an Off-Broadway production of ''Waiting for Godot''.

Personal life

Robin Williams' first marriage was to Valerie Velardi on June 4, 1978, with whom he has one child, Zachary Pym (Zak) (born April 11, 1983). During Williams' first marriage, he was involved in an extramarital relationship with Michelle Tish Carter, a cocktail waitress whom he met in 1984. She sued him in 1986, claiming that he did not tell her he was infected with the herpes simplex virus before he embarked on a sexual relationship with her in the mid-1980s, during which, she said, he transmitted the virus to her. The case was settled out of court. Williams and Velardi divorced in 1988.

On April 30, 1989, he married Marsha Garces, his son's nanny who was already several months pregnant with his child. They have two children, Zelda Rae (born July 31, 1989) and Cody Alan (born November 25, 1991). However, in March 2008, Garces filed for divorce from Williams, citing irreconcilable differences.

On August 20, 2007, Williams' elder brother, Robert Todd Williams, died of complications from heart surgery performed a month earlier.

Williams is a member of the Episcopal Church. He has described his denomination in a comedy routine as "Catholic Lite – same rituals, half the guilt."

While studying at Juilliard, Williams befriended Christopher Reeve. They had several classes together in which they were the only students, and they remained good friends for the rest of Reeve's life. Williams visited Reeve after the horse riding accident that rendered him a quadriplegic, and cheered him up by pretending to be an eccentric Russian doctor (similar to his role in ''Nine Months''). Williams claimed that he was there to perform a colonoscopy. Reeve stated that he laughed for the first time since the accident and knew that life was going to be okay.

During the late 1970s and early 1980s, Williams had an addiction to cocaine; he has stated that he has since quit. Williams was a close friend of and frequent partier alongside John Belushi. He says the death of his friend and the birth of his son prompted him to quit drugs: "Was it a wake-up call? Oh yeah, on a huge level. The grand jury helped too."

On August 9, 2006, Williams checked himself in to a substance-abuse rehabilitation center (located in Newberg, Oregon), later admitting that he was an alcoholic. His publicist delivered the announcement:

After 20 years of sobriety, Robin Williams found himself drinking again and has decided to take proactive measures to deal with this for his own well-being and the well-being of his family. He asks that you respect him and his family's privacy during this time. He looks forward to returning to work this fall to support his upcoming film releases.

Williams was hospitalized in March 2009 due to heart problems. He postponed his one-man tour in order to undergo surgery to replace his aortic valve. The surgery was successfully completed on March 13, 2009, at the Cleveland Clinic.

Other interests

Williams is an avid enthusiast of games, even naming both his children after game characters. He named his daughter after Princess Zelda from ''The Legend of Zelda'' action-adventure game series. They both have even been featured in an advert for the Nintendo 3DS remake of The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time.http://www.escapistmagazine.com/news/view/111044-New-Zelda-Ad-Stars-Robin-Williams-and-his-Daughter-Zelda On this note, his son may have been named after Cody from the beat 'em up game ''Final Fight''. He also enjoys pen-and-paper role-playing games and online video games, recently playing ''Warcraft 3'', ''Day of Defeat'', ''Half-Life'', and the first-person shooter ''Battlefield 2'' as a sniper. He was also previously a fan of the ''Wizardry'' series of role-playing video games.

On January 6, 2006, he performed live at Consumer Electronics Show during Google's keynote. In the 2006 E3, on the invitation of Will Wright, he demonstrated the creature editor of ''Spore'' while simultaneously commenting on the creature's look: "This will actually make a platypus look good." He also complimented the game's versatility, comparing it to ''Populous'' and ''Black & White''. Later that year, he was one of several celebrities to participate in the Worldwide Dungeons & Dragons Game Day.

A fan of professional road cycling, he was a regular on the US Postal and Discovery Channel Pro Cycling team bus and hotels during the years Lance Armstrong dominated the Tour de France. He owns over 50 bicycles.

He also enjoys rugby union and is a big fan of former All Black, Jonah Lomu.

Williams is a supporter of eco-friendly vehicles. He currently drives a Toyota Prius, and is on the waiting list for an Aptera 2 Series electric vehicle.

Williams has recently announced that he would love to play The Riddler in the next installment to the ''Batman'' films by director Christopher Nolan, though Nolan has stated that The Riddler will not be featured in the film.

Charity work

Williams and his former wife, Marsha, founded the Windfall Foundation, a philanthropic organization to raise money for many different charities. Williams devotes much of his energy to charity work, including the ''Comic Relief'' fundraising efforts (the program is hosted by himself, Billy Crystal, and Whoopi Goldberg). In December 1999, he sang in French on the BBC-inspired music video of international celebrities doing a cover of the Rolling Stones' "It's Only Rock & Roll" for the charity Children's Promise.

In response to the 2010 Canterbury Earthquake, Williams donated all proceeds of his "Weapons of Self Destruction" Christchurch performance to helping rebuild the New Zealand city. Half the proceeds were donated to the Red Cross and half to the mayoral building fund with the words "I hope this donation will go some way to helping the extensive rebuilding effort in the city." Williams has performed with the USO for U.S. troops stationed in Iraq and Afghanistan.

Filmography

+ Film credits
! Year	! Title	! Role	Notes
1977	''Can I Do It 'Till I Need Glasses?''	Himself
1980		Popeye
1982	''''
1983		Donald Quinelle
1984	''Moscow on the Hudson''	Vladimir Ivanov	Nominated—Golden Globe Award for Best Actor – Motion Picture Musical or Comedy
1986		Tommy Wilhelm
1986	''Club Paradise''	Jack Moniker
1986	''''	Jack Dundee
1987	''Good Morning, Vietnam''	Adrian Cronauer
1988	''''	King of the Moon
1988	''Portrait of a White Marriage''	Air Conditioning Salesman	Uncredited
1988	''Rabbit Ears: Pecos Bill''	Narrator	Voice
1989	''Dead Poets Society''	John Keating
1989	''I'm from Hollywood''	Himself
1990	''Cadillac Man''	Joey O'Brien
1990	''Awakenings''	Dr. Malcolm Sayer
1990	''Back to Neverland''	Himself
1991	''Dead Again''	Doctor Cozy Carlisle
1991	''''	Parry
1991		Peter Banning/Peter Pan
1991	''Rabbit Ears: The Fool and the Flying Ship''	Narrator	Voice
1992		Leslie Zevo	Nominated—Saturn Award for Best Actor
1992		Genie, merchant
1992	''''	The Timekeeper
1992	''FernGully: The Last Rainforest''	Batty Koda	Voice
1992	''Shakes the Clown''	Mime Class Instructor
1993	''Mrs. Doubtfire''	Daniel Hillard/Mrs. Doubtfire
1993		Hector
1994	''In Search of Dr. Seuss''	Father
1995		Alan Parrish
1995	''To Wong Foo, Thanks for Everything! Julie Newmar''	John Jacob Jingleheimer Schmidt
1995	''Nine Months''	Dr. Kosevich
1996	''Aladdin and the King of Thieves''	Genie	Voice
1996		Osric
1996		The Professor
1996		Jack Powell
1996	''''	Armand Goldman
1997	''Good Will Hunting''	Sean Maguire
1997		Professor Philip Brainard
1997	''Deconstructing Harry''	Mel/Harry's Character
1997		Dale Putley
1998
1998	''Junket Whore''	Himself
1998		Chris Nielsen
1999		Andrew Martin
1999	''Jakob the Liar''	Jakob Heym/Narrator
1999	''Get Bruce''	Himself
2000	''Model Behavior''	Faremain
2001	''A.I. Artificial Intelligence''	Dr. Know	Voice
2002	''''	Hans Hänkie
2002		Walter Finch	Nominated—Saturn Award for Best Supporting Actor
2002	''Death to Smoochy''	'Rainbow' Randolph Smiley
2002	''One Hour Photo''	Seymour 'Sy' Parrish
2004		Charlie Boyd/The Priest
2004	''House of D''	Pappass
2004	''''	Alan W. Hakman
2005	''''	Paul Barnell
2005		Fender
2005	''''	Himself
2006		Tom Dobbs
2006	''Night at the Museum''	Theodore Roosevelt
2006	''Happy Feet''	Ramon/Lovelace	Voice
2006	''Everyone's Hero''	Napoleon Cross	Voice
2006		Bob Munro
2006	''''	Gabriel Noone
2007	''License to Wed''	Reverend Frank
2007	''August Rush''	Maxwell "Wizard" Wallace
2009		Holden
2009	''World's Greatest Dad''	Lance Clayton
2009	''Night at the Museum: Battle of the Smithsonian''	Theodore Roosevelt
2009		Dan Rayburn
2011	''Happy Feet 2''	Ramon, Lovelace	Voice; filming

+ Television credits
! Year	! Title	! Role	Notes
1977	''''	Himself
1977
1977	''Eight is Enough''		Episode: "The Return of Auntie V"
1978	''Happy Days''		Episode: "My Favorite Orkan" (There are two versions of this episode. One with the original ending where events were all a dream of Richie Cunningham's and another that sets up the Mork and Mindy spin-off series. Williams appears in both versions.)
1978	''America 2-Night''	Jason Shine	Episodes: "Jason Shine" and "Olfactory Distosis Telethon"
1978–1982	''Mork & Mindy''
1979	''Happy Days''		Episode: "Mork Returns"
1979			Episode: "Random's Arrival"
1981	''Saturday Night Live''	Himself	Host/Various
1982	''''	Himself	Episode: #1.1
1982	''Faerie Tale Theatre''	Frog/Prince Robin	Episode: "Tale of the Frog Prince"
1982		Various	Episode: "Jane Eyrehead"
1984	''Saturday Night Live''	Himself	Host/Various
1984	''Pryor's Place	Gaby	Episode: "Sax Education"
1986	''Saturday Night Live''	Himself	Host/Various
1986	''The Max Headroom Show''	Himself	Episode: "Max Headroom's Giant Christmas Turkey"
1988	''Saturday Night Live''	Himself	Host/Various
1988	''Wogan''	Himself
1991	''Wogan''	Himself
1991	''''	The Kiwi	Voice (Credited as Sudy Nim)
1992	''''	Himself	Episode: "Hank's Contract"
1994	''Homicide: Life on the Streets''	Robert Ellison
1994	''Live & Kicking''	Himself
1994	''''	Himself	Episode: "Montana"
1994	''Nyhetsmorgon''	Himself	Episode: "Filmen 'Mrs. Doubtfire' svensk premiär"
1994	''In the Wild''	Himself	Episode: "In the Wild: Dolphins with Robin Williams"
1995	''Primer Plano''	Himself
1996	''American Masters''	Himself	Episode: "Take Two: Mike Nichols and Elaine May"
1996	''Primer Plano''
1996	''HBO First Look	Himself	Episode: "Fathers Day"
1997	''Friends''	Tomas	Uncredited
1998	''Nyhetsmorgon''	Himself/Sean Maguire	Episode: "Filmen 'Good Will Hunting
1998	''Hollywood Squares''	Himself	Guest appearance
1998	''Noel's House Party''	Himself	Episode: #8.10
1999	''L.A. Doctors''	Hugo Kinsley	Episode: "Just Duet"
2000		Himself	Episode: #3.9
2002	''Comedy Central Canned Ham''	Himself	Episode: "Death to Smoochy"
2002	''Leute heute''	Himself
2002	''Supermarket Sweep''	Himself
2003	''Player$''	Himself	Episodes: "E3 03, Playa", "Players Halloweenie Televizzie"
2003	''Freedoom: A History of Us''	Josiah Quincy/Ulysses S. Grant/Missouri Farmer/Wilbur Wright/Orville Wright	Episodes: "Wake Up America", "A War to End Slavery", "Liberty for All", and "Safe for Democracy"
2003	''Life With Bonnie''	Kevin Powalski	Episode: "Psychic"
2004	''This Hour Has 22 Minutes''	Himself
2005	''Just For Laughs''	Himself
2006	''Extreme Makeover: Home Edition''	Himself
2006	''Mind of Mencia''	Himself	Episode: "That's F**king Historical"
2006	''Getaway''	Himself	Episode: #15.15
2008		Ivan "Bob" Poppanoff the "Russian Idol"/Himself	Episodes: "Idol Gives Back" and "Live Results Show: One Contestant Eliminated"
2008	''Law & Order: Special Victims Unit''	Merrit Rook
2009	''SpongeBob SquarePants''	Himself	Episode: "Truth or Square"
2009	''TV Land Moguls''	Himself	Episode: "The 80s"
2010	''Alan Carr Chatty Man''	Himself
2010	''Pentagon Channel''	Himself	"Promotional Advertisement for the Pentagon Channel"
2011		Himself	Episode: "What Drugs Do To Our Bodies?"

Discography

''Reality...What a Concept'' (1979)

''Throbbing Python of Love'' (1983)

''A Night at The Met'' (1986)

''Pecos Bill'' (1988)

''Live 2002'' (2002)

''Weapons of Self Destruction'' (2010)

Williams appeared in the music video of Bobby McFerrin's hit song "Don't Worry, Be Happy".

He made a cameo in Cobra Starship's Video "You Make Me Feel..." along with his daughter, Zelda Williams.

References

"Road Trip with Robin"

"Robin Williams mimic ends 'fraud'" (BBC News)

"Robin Williams' impersonator stopped" (AskMen.com)

"Robin Williams Enters Rehab", August 9, 2006 (Access Hollywood)

Lovece, Frank, ''New York Newsday'' (April 27, 2006)

Bibliography

External links

Robin Williams – official website

Category:1951 births Category:Actors from California Category:Actors from Chicago, Illinois Category:American comedians of Irish descent Category:American Episcopalians Category:American film actors Category:American impressionists (entertainers) Category:American people of English descent Category:American people of French descent Category:American people of Irish descent Category:American people of Welsh descent Category:American people of Scottish descent Category:American stand-up comedians Category:American television actors Category:American voice actors Category:Audio book narrators Category:Best Musical or Comedy Actor Golden Globe (film) winners Category:Best Musical or Comedy Actor Golden Globe (television) winners Category:Best Supporting Actor Academy Award winners Category:Grammy Award winners Category:Juilliard School alumni Category:Living people Category:Outstanding Performance by a Cast in a Motion Picture Screen Actors Guild Award winners Category:People from Marin County, California Category:People self-identifying as alcoholics Category:Saturn Award winners

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