Audiences
Audiences in 2011
Background information
Origin	Chicago, IL
Genres	Indie rock, alternative, pop, folk rock
Website	http://www.audiencesmusic.com
Members
Billy Jesus Brian Suarez Stephen Kraniotis Bobby Is

Audiences is an indie rock band based in Chicago, Illinois.

The band has been described to have musical elements similar to bands like Polaris, Vampire Weekend, and MGMT.^[1]

The Otterarium is home to Audiences practice space and members Billy Jesus and Cardigan, located in Lakeview, Chicago it is also where the band self-released their first live album; 'Live at The Otterarium'.

Audiences is currently recording their first LP.

Singles[link]

• Ghosts - (April 2012)
• Mountainesque - (March 2011)

Live Albums[link]

• Live at The Otterarium (February 2011)
• Live at Lincoln Hall (March 2011)

References[link]

This article may contain original research. Please improve it by verifying the claims made and adding references. Statements consisting only of original research may be removed. More details may be available on the talk page. (April 2011)

Michael Parenti
Michael Parenti
Born	1933 New York City
Occupation	political scientist, historian, and media critic
Nationality	American
Education	City College of New York, B.A. Brown University, M.A. Yale University, Ph.D.
Subjects	History, Politics, Economics
Children	Christian Parenti
www.michaelparenti.org

Michael Parenti is an American political writer, historian, and culture critic who writes on scholarly and popular subjects. He has taught at American and international universities and has been a guest lecturer before campus and community audiences.^[1][2] He has played an activist role in political struggles, and in various anti-war movements.

Background[link]

Parenti received his Ph.D. in political science from Yale University. He is the author of twenty four books and many more articles. His works have been translated into at least eighteen languages.^[3] Parenti lectures frequently throughout the United States and abroad. He wrote The Assassination of Julius Caesar,^[4] He is the father of Christian Parenti, an author and contributor to The Nation magazine.

Parenti's writings cover a wide range of subjects: U.S. politics, culture, ideology, political economy, imperialism, fascism, communism, democratic socialism, free-market orthodoxies, conservative judicial activism, religion, ancient history, modern history, historiography, repression in academia, news and entertainment media, technology, environmentalism, sexism, racism, homophobia, Venezuela, the wars in Iraq and Yugoslavia, ethnicity, and his own early life.^[5][6][7] Perhaps his most influential book is Democracy for the Few,^[8] now in its ninth edition, a critical analysis of U.S. society, economy, and political institutions^[9] and a college-level political science textbook published by Wadsworth Publishing.^[10] In recent years he has addressed such subjects as "Empires: Past and Present," "US Interventionism: the Case of Iraq," "Race, Gender, and Class Power," "Ideology and History," "The Collapse of Communism," and "Terrorism and Globalization."^[3]

Michael Parenti was raised in an Italian-American working-class family and neighborhood in New York City about which he has written.^[11] For many years Parenti taught political and social science at various institutions of higher learning. Eventually he devoted himself full-time to writing, public speaking, and political activism.^[12]

In 1974, Parenti ran in Vermont on the Liberty Union Party ticket for U.S. Congress and received 7% of the vote.^[13]

In Washington, D.C., in 2003, the Caucus for a New Political Science gave him a Career Achievement Award. In 2007, he received a Certificate of Special Congressional Recognition from U.S. Representative Barbara Lee and an award from New Jersey Peace Action. In the 1980s, he was a Visiting Fellow at the Institute for Policy Studies in Washington, D.C.

He served for some 12 years as a judge for Project Censored. He also is on the advisory boards of Independent Progressive Politics Network, and Education Without Borders; as well as the advisory editorial boards of New Political Science and Nature, Society and Thought.^[14]

Social and political analyses[link]

Parenti has covered many subjects in 45 years of teaching, writing, and speaking. The broad outlines of some of these are summarized below.

Racism[link]

Parenti argues that western racism is systemic and historical in nature and should be regarded as more than just an attitudinal problem^[15]. He identifies the origins of western racism in imperialism and slavery: To justify the colonial plunder of another nation or entire continent (as in the case of Africa) as well as the enslavement of conquered populations, imperialists and/or slave traffickers dehumanize their victims and define them as moral inferiors and subhuman.

Parenti maintains that racism serves several functions for ruling interests in the United States:^[16]

1. It divides the working class against each other.
2. It creates a "super-exploited" group of people who are forced to work at below scale wages thereby depressing wage levels for the entire workforce.
3. It distracts the (United States) white population from its own legitimate grievances by providing an irrelevant scapegoat in the form of minority populations

Culture and social structure[link]

In the late 1960s and early 1970s, becoming increasingly critical of the existing socio-economic system, Parenti argued that images of the United States as a pluralistic, democratic society were more ideological than accurate. He did not deny the existence of a vast plurality of social, ethnic, and regional groups in America, but he felt that this group pluralism did not translate into a democratic pluralism in political life. Only limited portions of the political process are accessed by the general populace. Power in America is not broadly distributed, according to Parenti, but is highly concentrated in a social structure dominated by corporate moneyed interests, whose influence predominates in most mainstream institutions and major policy areas.^[8] Parenti maintains that the resources of power are lodged in the social structure itself, the culture, institutions, and established social roles, and that ruling elements maintain their dominant positions not only by raw economic power but by attaining “cultural hegemony,” a concept formulated earlier by Antonio Gramsci (whom Parenti cites).^[17]

Role of US media[link]

With respect to the US media Parenti has maintained that, while news coverage can be marred by problems of deadlines, space, and ordinary human error, much of the misleading coverage is the result of carefully honed ideological production. Reporters, he says, often exercise much skill to avoid the more important points of a story or news analysis so as not to offend anyone who wields substantial political and economic power, including their own bosses and corporate advertisers. Parenti concludes that their goal is to avoid fishing too deeply into troubled waters thereby maintaining an appearance of objectivity and moderation. Their careers, he suggests, depend in part upon their ability to equate centrist views with “objectivity,” and to stay within the prevailing ideological orthodoxy.^[18]

Parenti’s treatment of entertainment media (movies and television) continues the argument that the media are not neutral and favor elitist interests. Exploring a wide range of films and programs, he has attempted to demonstrate that the entertainment media do more than entertain; they indoctrinate by propagating values in keeping with their corporate ownership and corporate advertisers.^[19] Most recently, he wrote the foreword to Matthew Alford's Reel Power: Hollywood Cinema and American Supremacy (Pluto Press, 2010).

Parenti often attacks specific examples of the misleading coverage provided by the US media. In Blackshirts and Reds^[20] he cites historian J. Arch Getty's figures to demonstrate the exaggeration elsewhere in the US media of the executions effected by Joseph Stalin in the Great Purge. Parenti critically reviews Slobodan Milosevic and the Destruction of Yugoslavia^[21] in "The Demonization of Slobodan Milosevic"^[22] and To Kill a Nation: The Attack on Yugoslavia ,^[23] finding similar exaggeration of war crimes in the breakup of the second Yugoslavia. In "Friendly Feudalism: The Tibet Myth"^[24] he observes, "western news media, travel books, novels, and Hollywood films have portrayed the Tibetan theocracy as a veritable Shangri-La" then goes on to detail what he feels were its negative aspects.

Culture across the globe[link]

Parenti maintains that, far from being neutral, culture is often ideologically driven in a highly skewed system of social power, benefiting some groups at the expense of others. “Growing portions of our culture are increasingly commodified and mass marketed.” “So we buy more and more of our culture and create less and less of it.” Rather than being accepted at face value, Parenti says that all cultures should be subjected to critical investigation to be judged by “universal human rights standards” and by the criticisms voiced by those who are victimized within the various cultures of the world. Parenti gives extensive attention to those who are regularly victimized by their own cultures, providing examples in chapters entitled “Custom Against Women,” “The Global Rape Culture,” and “Racist Myths.”^[16]

Role of voting fraud in US elections[link]

Parenti is among those who have cited a variety of studies claiming that the 2004 presidential election was fraudulent. In an essay entitled "The Stolen Election of 2004"^[25] he argued that modern voting technology allowed powerful corporations to manipulate the electoral results. He concluded the article by observing, about the forthcoming US election, "Given this situation, it is not likely that the GOP will lose control of Congress come November 2006. The two-party monopoly threatens to become an even worse one-party tyranny." In an updated analysis of the 2000 and 2004 presidential elections, he adds a postscript explaining why—despite the massive crossover reported in the polls away from the GOP-—the Democrats won only a slim victory in the Congressional 2006 elections.”^[26]

Class and class power[link]

Parenti stresses the role of class in all societies, particularly the purportedly classless US one. He extends the definition of class as a demographic trait relating to status, education, lifestyle, and income level to include the effects of social interrelationships. He observes that there can be no rich slaveholders without poor slaves, no powerful feudal lords without serfs, no corporate bosses without workers. The interrelationship is highly asymmetrical. It centers on the organized wealth of the society.^[8]

Parenti also believes that there is a third factor involved in class relationships, specifically the productive resources (land, agriculture, herds, natural resources, factories, technology, etc.). The dominant group in class relationships owns or controls these economic resources. The weaker class historically has had only its labor to sell. Hence the “dominant money classes” exercise a preponderant influence over workforces, markets, major investments, consumption patterns, media, and public policies. Parenti concludes that when discussing class, class power—how it is used, for whose interests, and at whose expense—must also be discussed.^[27]

US downplay of class[link]

Parenti has repeatedly criticized the tendency among many who profess to be progressive to downplay the importance of class and class power as a formative force as compared to race, gender, and culture. He allows that each of these other categories of social experience have imperatives that are distinctly their own, sometimes of a life-and-death urgency. Still they should not be seen as being mutually exclusive of, or in competition with, considerations of class power in society, he argues, and should not be used as a means of evading class analysis.^[28]

Democracy and capitalism[link]

From the late 60s well into the 80s, Parenti was one of many radicals and socialists who questioned the validity and value of what they called “bourgeois democracy,” seeing it more as a charade to mislead the people into thinking that they were free and self-governing. By the late 80s, however, he noticeably modified his position, arguing that democracy should not be thought of as merely a subterfuge or cloak created by ruling elites, although it certainly can serve that purpose. More often, Parenti claimed, whatever modicum of democracy the people attain in any society is usually the outcome of genuine struggle for a more equitable politico-economic order. He asks why the corporate class should be credited with giving people a “bourgeois democracy,” when in fact the ruling plutocrats furiously opposed most democratic advances in U.S. history, such as the extension of the franchise or the struggle for ethnic and gender equality, more direct forms of representation, more room for dissent and free speech, greater accountability of elected officials, and more equitable socio-economic domestic programs.^[8]

According to Parenti, reacting to mainstream commentators who turn every systemic vice and deficiency into a virtue, leftist critics of the status quo, seeing no real victories or progress in the centuries of popular struggle, have felt compelled to turn every virtue into a vice. To counter this trend, he says, people should recognize that real gains have been made, democracy refuses to die, and both at home and abroad popular forces, continue the democratic struggle, even against great odds.^[29]

For Parenti, democracy has two basic dimensions, the procedural and the substantive, both of which are equally important. Procedural democracy consists of the basic political forms: free speech and assembly, the right to dissent, accountability of officeholders, the right to vote in regular and honest elections, etc. Substantive democracy consists of egalitarian socio-economic outputs that advance the well-being of the populace, protect the environment, and curb the abuses and often untrammeled powers of great wealth. Parenti quotes the German sociologist Max Weber who remarked almost a century earlier that it remains to be seen whether democracy and freedom can exist under the dominion of a highly developed capitalism.^[8]

Parenti concludes that “there is no one grand, secret, power elite governing this country, but numerous coteries of corporate and governmental elites that communicate and coordinate across various policy realms. Behind their special interests are the common overall interests of the moneyed class,” which is not to say that differences never arise among these elites.

Technology, money, and deficit spending[link]

Parenti believes that people's thinking about past and present developments needs to be contextualized, that is seen in a social context of power and ideology. He gives the examples of technology and money. Both are seen as neutral entities that are inherently neither good nor bad. This may be true hypothetically, he writes, but, in reality, both technology and money have been developed within specific historical contexts by powerful interests that gained great advantage from their development. Almost all technology, he argues, is devoted to advancing the interests of higher circles, maximizing profits and corporate production, or in the case of government, maximizing surveillance, communication, and military striking power. New advances in technology are not neutral things. They impact upon us and our environment in ways that can advantage some and hurt others, according to Parenti. He writes similarly about money: "Like technology, money has a feedback effect of its own, advantaging the already advantaged", liquefying wealth, making it easier to mobilize and accumulate. With the growth of moneyed wealth comes a greater concentration and command over technology by the moneyed class.^[30]

Few phenomena in the social order can operate with neutral effect even if supposedly pursued with neutral intent, according to Parenti. The national debt is a good example. Considered merely as a “problem” of excessive government spending, the national debt in fact works well for certain interests, specifically the moneyed class, Parenti claims. By 1977,he noted how the national debt brought a transfer of income from the taxpayers to the wealthy creditors, the holders of government bonds. The greater the debt, the greater the upward transfer, as the government continues to borrow money from those they should be taxing (the big money interests). Parenti concludes it is no accident that the biggest deficit spenders have been conservative presidents like Ronald Reagan and both George H. W. Bush and George W. Bush. The national debt is in effect a way of privatizing public spending and defunding the federal budget, Parenti argues. The bigger the debt, the less money available for domestic programs, and the more money that goes from the pockets of ordinary taxpayers to rich creditors.^[8]

Fascism[link]

Parenti’s treatment of fascism differs from that of the many writers who stress the irrational features of fascism: its state idolatry, nationalistic atavism, and leadership cult. While not denying that these are key components in the propagation of fascism’s appeal, he invites us not to overlook the “rational politico economic functions” that fascism performed. “Much of politics is the rational manipulation of irrational symbols,” he claims. The emotive appeals of fascist ideology have served a class-control function, “distracting the populace from their legitimate grievances and directing their frustrations at various scapegoats.”

Most of the immense literature on the subject of fascism and Nazism focuses on who supported Hitler’s rise to power. Relatively little, Parenti writes, is said about whom the Nazis supported when they came to power. In both fascist Italy and Nazi Germany, he points out, wages were cut drastically, domestic programs were rolled back, huge subsidies were given to heavy industry, labor unions were broken, taxes on the very rich were greatly reduced or eliminated altogether, and workplace safety regulations were ignored or abolished. Fascism, he concludes, has a much overlooked politico- economic agenda; it involves something more than just goose stepping.^[31]

Empire[link]

U.S. foreign policy is neither confused nor bungling, according to Parenti. It is quite consistently directed toward certain goals, and is largely successful. For the most part, U.S. leaders have maintained friendly relations with those governments that have opened up their countries to Western corporate investors, and have shown hostility toward those countries that have tried to use their land, labor, natural resources, and markets for their own self-development, Parenti believes. Iraq was targeted for “having committed economic nationalism,” with a state-run economy that pretty much shut out Western investors. The same holds true for Yugoslavia, he claims. Both countries were bombed and invaded, and their public economies were shattered. Parenti believes that Yugoslavia was transformed from a viable social democracy to a cluster of little right-wing mini-republics.

Parenti's beliefs led him to become head of the United States chapter of the International Committee to Defend Slobodan Milošević,^[32] in which capacity he added to the criticisms of bias in the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia^[33][34]

Parenti also maintains that the U.S. empire feeds off the U.S. republic. The empire’s expansion abroad entails increasing costs for the republic. Ventures that are profitable for military contractors and overseas investors have to be paid in blood and taxes by the American populace. The many third world countries that are the targets of colonial intervention pay the highest price, he writes. They suffer not from underdevelopment, but from “maldevelopment,” a result of generations of overexploitation.^[35]

Communism[link]

Many on the left continue to deliver impassioned and blanket condemnations of deceased communist countries, Parenti states. “Those of us who refused to join in the Soviet bashing were branded by left anti-communists as ‘Soviet apologists’ and ‘Stalinists,’ even if we disliked Stalin and his autocratic system of rule and believed there were things seriously wrong with existing Soviet society.”^[20]

Parenti did in fact make a number of criticisms of the Soviet Union. In 1986 he wrote: "In the USSR there exist serious problems of labor productivity, industrialization, urbanization, bureaucracy, corruption, and alcoholism. There are production and distribution bottlenecks, plan failures, consumer scarcities, criminal abuses of power, suppression of dissidents, and expressions of alienation among some of the population."^[36]

More recently he wrote that the state-owned economies of Eastern Europe and the Soviet Union suffered “fatal distortions in their development” because of the years of “embargo, invasion, devastating wars, and costly arms buildup; excessive bureaucratization and poor incentive systems; lack of administrative initiative and technological innovation; and a repressive political rule that allowed little critical expression and feedback while fostering stagnation and elitism.”^[6] Some on the left heavily criticized Parenti for what they saw as his defense of such regimes, however, in his book Blackshirt and Reds.

Parenti argues that “despite the well-publicized deficiencies, crimes, and injustices, there were positive features about existing communist systems that were worth preserving, such as the free medical care and human services; affordable food, fuel, transportation, and housing; universal literacy; gains in women’s rights; free education to the highest level of one’s ability; a guaranteed right to a job; free cultural and sporting events, and the like.”^[6] He supported Gorbachev’s campaign of perestroika and glasnost until 1990 when it became evident to him that the Gorbachev reforms were leading to the implantation of free-market capitalism and were, as he saw it, bringing hardships to the common people.^[37]

Social democracy[link]

Parenti maintains that the structural problems of free-market transnational capitalism will only worsen the living standards of people in the United States and abroad, while deepening the environmental crises. He advocates a greater measure of public ownership in the USA. Parenti asks “can socialism work? ... Is it not just a dream in theory and a nightmare in practice? Can the government produce anything of worth?”^[8] He goes on to point out that it already does, citing publicly owned transportation systems, utilities, banking, education, and health services that are run efficiently by the governments of the USA and various social democracies and at a far lesser cost than their private counterparts.

Ecology[link]

Parenti points to the increasingly catastrophic droughts, storms, floods, and abnormally high temperatures in many parts of the world to justify a hypothesis that the widely discussed ecological crisis of global warming will not be upon us “by the end of the century” or “in the lives of our grandchildren,” but is already happening today. He builds on this in an essay, "Why the Corporate Rich Oppose Environmentalism,"^[6] to argue that immediate and immense profits that come at a cost to the environment are of more concern to corporate investors than the diffuse and long-run damage done to the global ecology.

History and historiography[link]

Much of Parenti’s work draws upon history. In his History as Mystery^[38] he takes the old adage that history is written by the victors and fleshes it out with examples drawn from ancient and modern times. In regard to early Christianity, for instance, he maintains that, contrary to popular notions, the “Jesus worshipers” did not gather most of their followers from the poor and downtrodden but from the more affluent strata. Some Christian leaders discouraged slaves from converting to Christianity. Slaves were prohibited from becoming church deacons or priests, he maintains. Contrary to conventional US notions, he argues that the Christians were not the keepers of learning and scholarship during the Dark Ages but played a relentless role in destroying all the advanced learning and all the libraries of antiquity that were in their reach.

In The Assassination of Julius Caesar,^[4] he states that many historians, both ancient and modern, have treated popular insurgencies and the common people with fear and loathing, depicting them as mindless rootless mobs of ne’er-do-wells. He also argues that Caesar and other popular reformers of the Roman Republic before him were assassinated not because they were violating the Roman constitution but because they were advocating reforms that benefited the commoners at a cost to the aristocracy. He does not draw a link between Caesarism and the eventual descent of the Republic into the despotism of the Empire.

References in popular culture[link]

• New York City based punk rock band Choking Victim use a number of samples from Michael Parenti's lectures in their album, No Gods, No Managers.

Appearances in Film and Television[link]

Apart from several recordings of some of his public speeches, Parenti has also appeared in the 1992 documentary Panama Deception and the 2004 documentary Liberty Bound as an author and social commentator.

In addition, he was interviewed for two episodes of the Showtime series Penn & Teller: Bullshit!, speaking briefly about the Dalai Lama (Episode 305 - Holier Than Thou) and patriotism (Episode 508 - Mount Rushmore).

Bibliography[link]

• The Anti-Communist Impulse, Random House, 1970.
• Trends and Tragedies in American Foreign Policy, Little, Brown, 1971.
• Ethnic and Political Attitudes, Arno, 1975. ISBN 0-405-06413-6
• Democracy for the Few, First Edition circa 1974, Eighth Edition 2007.^[8] ISBN 0-495-00744-7, ISBN 978-0-495-00744-9
• Power and the Powerless, St. Martin's Press, 1978. ISBN 0-312-63372-6, ISBN 0-312-63373-4
• Inventing Reality: the Politics of News Media. First edition 1986, Second Edition 1993. ISBN 0-312-02013-9, ISBN 0-312-08629-6
• The Sword and the Dollar: Imperialism, Revolution and the Arms Race, St. Martin's, 1989. ISBN 0-312-02295-6
• Make-Believe Media: the Politics of Entertainment, St. Martin's Press, 1992. ISBN 0-312-05603-6, ISBN 0-312-05894-2
• Land of Idols: Political Mythology in America, St. Martin's, 1993. ISBN 0-312-09497-3, ISBN 0-312-09841-3
• [1] Against Empire Published by City Lights Books, 1995, ISBN 0-87286-298-4, ISBN 978-0-87286-298-2, 217 pages
• Dirty Truths, City Lights Books, 1996. Includes some autobiographical essays. ISBN 0-87286-317-4, ISBN 0-87286-318-2
• Blackshirts & Reds: Rational Fascism and the Overthrow of Communism, City Lights Books, San Francisco, 1997. ISBN 0-87286-329-8, ISBN 0-87286-330-1
• America Besieged, City Lights, 1998. ISBN 0-87286-338-7, ISBN 0-87286-338-7
• History as Mystery, City Lights, 1999. ISBN 0-87286-357-3, ISBN 0-87286-364-6
• To Kill a Nation: The Attack on Yugoslavia, Verso, 2000, ISBN 1-85984-776-5
• The Terrorism Trap: September 11 and Beyond, City Lights, 2002. ISBN 0-87286-405-7
• The Assassination of Julius Caesar: A People's History of Ancient Rome, The New Press, 2003. ISBN 1-56584-797-0.^[4]
• Superpatriotism, City Lights, 2004. ISBN 978-0-87286-433-7
• The Culture Struggle, Seven Stories Press, 2006. ISBN 1-58322-704-0, ISBN 978-1-58322-704-6
• Contrary Notions, City Lights Books, 2007.^[6] ISBN 0-87286-482-0, ISBN 978-0-87286-482-5
• God and His Demons, Prometheus Books, 2010
• The Face of Imperialism, (Paradigm, 2011)

References[link]

External links[link]

• Michael Parenti Political Archive maintained by Michael Parenti
• Booknotes interview with Parenti on The Assassination of Julius Caesar, September 7, 2003.

Wikiquote has a collection of quotations related to: Michael Parenti

Michael Parenti's articles[link]

• GIobal Rollback: After communism
• Dubious Design (Creationism & Intelligent Design)

Audio[link]

• Talks by Michael Parenti - MP3 format.
• TUC Radio's Michael Parenti Archive - recordings available for purchase.
• Michael Parenti talks about “The Culture Struggle” May 2007 on Democracy Now radio.
• October 2006 interview on KPFA radio.

Michael Moore
Moore in New York to promote his memoir Here Comes Trouble, September 2011
Born	Michael Francis Moore (1954-04-23) April 23, 1954 (age 58) Flint, Michigan, United States[1]
Alma mater	University of Michigan–Flint
Occupation	Actor, director, screenwriter, producer
Years active	1972–present[2]
Religion	Roman Catholic[3]
Spouse	Kathleen Glynn (1991–present)
Website
michaelmoore.com

Michael Francis Moore (born April 23, 1954) is an American filmmaker, author, social critic and activist.^[4] He is the director and producer of Fahrenheit 9/11, which is the highest-grossing documentary of all time.^[5] His films Bowling for Columbine and Sicko also place in the top ten highest-grossing documentaries.^[5] In September 2008, he released his first free movie on the Internet, Slacker Uprising, which documented his personal quest to encourage more Americans to vote in presidential elections.^[6] He has also written and starred in the TV shows TV Nation and The Awful Truth.

Moore criticizes globalization, large corporations, assault weapon ownership, U.S. Presidents Bill Clinton^[7] and George W. Bush, the Iraq War, the American health care system, and capitalism in his written and cinematic works.

Personal life[link]

Moore was born in Flint, Michigan,^[1] and raised in Davison, a suburb of Flint, by parents Veronica (née Wall), a secretary, and Frank Moore, an automotive assembly-line worker.^[8][9][10] At that time, the city of Flint was home to many General Motors factories, where his parents and grandfather worked. His uncle LaVerne was one of the founders of the United Automobile Workers labor union and participated in the Flint Sit-Down Strike.^[11]

Moore was brought up Catholic,^[12] attended parochial St. John's Elementary School for primary school and later attended St. Paul's Seminary in Saginaw, Michigan, for a year.^{[13][8][14][15][16]} He then attended Davison High School, where he was active in both drama and debate,^[17] graduating in 1972. As a member of the Boy Scouts of America, he achieved the rank of Eagle Scout.^[8] At the age of 18, he was elected to the Davison school board.^[18]

Since 1990, Moore has been married to producer Kathleen Glynn,^[19] with whom he has a stepdaughter named Natalie. Moore is a Catholic,^[3][20] but has said he disagrees with church teaching on subjects such as abortion^[21] and same-sex marriage.^[22]

Following the Columbine High School massacre, Moore acquired a life membership to the National Rifle Association (NRA). Moore said that he initially intended to become the NRA's president and dismantle it, but he soon dismissed the plan as too difficult.^[23][24] Observers such as Dave Kopel noted that there was no chance of that happening;^[25] authors David T. Hardy and Jason Clarke wrote about how Moore failed to discover that the NRA selects a president not by membership vote but by a vote of the board of directors.^[26]

In 2005 Time magazine named Moore one of the world's 100 most influential people.^[27] Also in 2005, Moore started the annual Traverse City Film Festival in Traverse City, Michigan.

Career[link]

After dropping out of the University of Michigan–Flint following his freshman year (where he wrote for the student newspaper The Michigan Times), Moore worked at the local Buick plant.^[28] At 22 he founded the alternative weekly magazine The Flint Voice, which soon changed its name to The Michigan Voice as it expanded to cover the entire state. In 1986, when Moore became the editor of Mother Jones, a liberal political magazine, he moved to California and The Michigan Voice was shut down.

Moore at the 66th Venice International Film Festival in 2009

After four months at Mother Jones, Moore was fired. Matt Labash of The Weekly Standard reported this was for refusing to print an article by Paul Berman that was critical of the Sandinista human rights record in Nicaragua.^[29] Moore refused to run the article, believing it to be inaccurate. "The article was flatly wrong and the worst kind of patronizing bullshit. You would scarcely know from it that the United States had been at war with Nicaragua for the last five years."^[30] Moore believes that Mother Jones fired him because of the publisher's refusal to allow him to cover a story on the GM plant closings in his hometown of Flint, Michigan. He responded by putting laid-off GM worker Ben Hamper (who was also writing for the same magazine at the time) on the magazine's cover, leading to his termination. Moore sued for wrongful dismissal, and settled out of court for $58,000, providing him with seed money for his first film, Roger & Me.^[31]

Directing/producing[link]

Roger & Me

Moore first became famous for his 1989 film, Roger & Me, a documentary about what happened to Flint, Michigan, after General Motors closed its factories and opened new ones in Mexico, where the workers were paid much less. Since then Moore has been known as a critic of the neoliberal view of globalization. "Roger" is Roger B. Smith, former CEO and president of General Motors. Harlan Jacobson, editor of Film Comment magazine, said that Moore muddled the chronology in Roger & Me to make it seem that events that took place before G.M.’s layoffs were a consequence of them. Critic Roger Ebert defended Moore's handling of the timeline as an artistic and stylistic choice that had less to do with his credibility as a filmmaker and more to do with the flexibility of film as a medium to express a satiric viewpoint.^[32]

Pets or Meat: The Return to Flint

(1992) is a short (23-minute) documentary film that was aired on PBS. It is based on the feature-length film Roger & Me (1989) by Michael Moore. The film's title refers to Rhonda Britton, a Flint, Michigan, resident featured in both the 1989 and 1992 films who sells rabbits as either pets or meat.^[33]

Canadian Bacon

In 1995, Moore released a satirical film, Canadian Bacon, which features a fictional US president (played by Alan Alda) engineering a fake war with Canada in order to boost his popularity. It is noted for containing a number of Canadian and American stereotypes, and for being Moore's only non-documentary film. The film is also one of the last featuring Canadian-born actor John Candy, and also features a number of cameos by other Canadian actors. In the film, several potential enemies for America's next great campaign are discussed by the president and his cabinet. (The scene was strongly influenced by the Stanley Kubrick film Dr. Strangelove.) The President comments that declaring war on Canada was as ridiculous as declaring war on international terrorism. His military adviser, played by Rip Torn, quickly rebuffs this idea, saying that no one would care about "... a bunch of guys driving around blowing up rent-a-cars."

The Big One

In 1997, Moore directed The Big One, which documents the tour publicizing his book Downsize This! Random Threats from an Unarmed American, in which he criticizes mass layoffs despite record corporate profits. Among others, he targets Nike for outsourcing shoe production to Indonesia.

Bowling for Columbine

Moore's 2002 film, Bowling for Columbine, probes the culture of guns and violence in the United States, taking as a starting point the Columbine High School massacre of 1999. Bowling for Columbine won the Anniversary Prize at the 2002 Cannes Film Festival^[34] and France's César Award as the Best Foreign Film. In the United States, it won the 2002 Academy Award for Documentary Feature. It also enjoyed great commercial and critical success for a film of its type and became, at the time, the highest-grossing mainstream-released documentary (a record now held by Moore's Fahrenheit 9/11).^[5] It was praised by some for illuminating a subject avoided by the mainstream media.

Fahrenheit 9/11

Fahrenheit 9/11 examines America in the aftermath of the September 11, 2001 attacks, particularly the record of the Bush administration and alleged links between the families of George W. Bush and Osama bin Laden. Fahrenheit was awarded the Palme d'Or,^[35] the top honor at the 2004 Cannes Film Festival; it was the first documentary film to win the prize since 1956. Moore later announced that Fahrenheit 9/11 would not be in consideration for the 2005 Academy Award for Documentary Feature, but instead for the Academy Award for Best Picture. He stated he wanted the movie to be seen by a few million more people via a television broadcast prior to election day. According to Moore, "Academy rules forbid the airing of a documentary on television within nine months of its theatrical release", and since the November 2 election was fewer than nine months after the film's release, it would have been disqualified for the Documentary Oscar.^[36] However, Fahrenheit received no Oscar nomination for Best Picture. The title of the film alludes to the classic book Fahrenheit 451 about a future totalitarian state in which books are banned; according to the book, paper begins to burn at 451 degrees Fahrenheit. The pre-release subtitle of the film confirms the allusion: "The temperature at which freedom burns." At the box office, as of 2010 Fahrenheit 9/11 is the highest-grossing documentary of all time, taking in over US$200 million worldwide, including United States box office revenue of almost US$120 million.^[5] In February 2011, Moore sued producers Bob and Harvey Weinstein for US$2.7 million in unpaid profits from the film, claiming they used "Hollywood accounting tricks" to avoid paying him the money.^[37]

Michael Moore at the 2007 Cannes Film Festival receiving a standing ovation for Sicko

Sicko

Moore directed this film about the American health care system, focusing particularly on the managed-care and pharmaceutical industries. At least four major pharmaceutical companies — Pfizer, Eli Lilly, AstraZeneca, and GlaxoSmithKline — ordered their employees not to grant any interviews to Moore.^[38][39][40] According to Moore on a letter at his website, "roads that often surprise us and lead us to new ideas—and challenge us to reconsider the ones we began with have caused some minor delays." The film premiered at the Cannes Film Festival on May 19, 2007, receiving a lengthy standing ovation, and was released in the U.S. and Canada on June 29, 2007.^[41] The film was the subject of some controversy when it became known that Moore went to Cuba with chronically ill September 11th rescue workers to shoot parts of the film. The United States is looking into whether this violates the trade embargo. The film is currently ranked the fourth highest grossing documentary of all time^[5] and received an Academy Award nomination for Best Documentary Feature.^[42]

Captain Mike Across America

Moore takes a look at the politics of college students in what he calls "Bush Administration America" with this film shot during Moore's 60-city college campus tour in the months leading up to the 2004 election.^[43][44] The film was later re-edited by Moore into Slacker Uprising.

Capitalism: A Love Story

On September 23, 2009, Moore released a new movie titled Capitalism: A Love Story, which looks at the late-2000s financial crisis and the U.S. economy during the transition between the incoming Obama Administration and the outgoing Bush Administration. Addressing a press conference at its release, Moore said, "Democracy is not a spectator sport, it's a participatory event. If we don't participate in it, it ceases to be a democracy. So Obama will rise or fall based not so much on what he does but on what we do to support him."^[45]

Writing[link]

Moore has written or co-written eight non-fiction books, mostly on similar subject matter to his documentaries. Stupid White Men (2001) is ostensibly a critique of American domestic and foreign policy but, by Moore's own admission, is also "a book of political humor."^[46] Dude, Where's My Country? (2003), is an examination of the Bush family's relationships with Saudi royalty, the Bin Laden family, and the energy industry, and a call-to-action for liberals in the 2004 election. Several of his works have made bestseller lists.

Acting[link]

Moore has dabbled in acting, following a 2000 supporting role in Lucky Numbers as the cousin of Lisa Kudrow's character, who agrees to be part of the scheme concocted by John Travolta's character. He also had a cameo in his Canadian Bacon as an anti-Canada activist. In 2004, he did a cameo, as a news journalist, in The Fever, starring Vanessa Redgrave in the lead.

Television[link]

Between 1994 and 1995, he directed and hosted the BBC television series TV Nation, which followed the format of news magazine shows but covered topics they avoid. The series aired on BBC2 in the UK. The series was also aired in the US on NBC in 1994 for 9 episodes and again for 8 episodes on Fox in 1995.

His other major series was The Awful Truth, which satirized actions by big corporations and politicians. It aired on Channel 4 in the UK, and the Bravo network in the US, in 1999 and 2000. Moore won the Hugh M. Hefner First Amendment Award in Arts and Entertainment for being the executive producer and host of The Awful Truth, where he was also described as "muckraker, author and documentary filmmaker".

Another 1999 series, Michael Moore Live, was aired in the UK only on Channel 4, though it was broadcast from New York. This show had a similar format to The Awful Truth, but also incorporated phone-ins and a live stunt each week.

Music videos[link]

Moore has directed several music videos, including two for Rage Against the Machine for songs from The Battle of Los Angeles: "Sleep Now in the Fire" and "Testify". He was threatened with arrest during the shooting of "Sleep Now in the Fire", which was filmed on Wall Street; the city of New York had denied the band permission to play there, although the band and Moore had secured a federal permit to perform.^[47]

He also directed the videos for R.E.M. single "All the Way to Reno (You're Gonna Be a Star)" in 2001 and the System of a Down song "Boom!".

Appearances in other documentaries[link]

• Moore appeared in The Drugging of Our Children,^[48] a 2005 documentary about over-prescription of psychiatric medication to children and teenagers, directed by Gary Null a proponent of Alternative Medicine. In the film Moore agrees with Gary Null that Ritalin and other similar drugs are over-prescribed, saying that they are seen as a "pacifier".
• Moore appeared on fellow Flint natives Grand Funk Railroad's edition of Behind The Music.
• Moore appeared as an off-camera interviewer in Blood in the Face, a 1991 documentary about white supremacy groups. At the center of the film is a neo-Nazi gathering in Michigan.^[49]
• Moore appeared in The Yes Men, a 2003 documentary about two men who pose as the World Trade Organization. He appears during a segment concerning working conditions in Mexico and Latin America.
• Moore briefly appears in Alex Jones's documentary Martial Law 9/11: Rise of the Police State. Jones criticises Moore for not going into more depth about the World Trade Center attacks in Fahrenheit 9/11, particularly about NORAD standing down, and for portraying George W. Bush as an unassuming frontman instead of an active conspirator in 9/11. Jones manages to ask Moore why he didn't mention NORAD standing down, and Moore swiftly answers that "it would be un-American".
• Moore was interviewed for the 2004 documentary, The Corporation. One of his highlighted quotes was: "The problem is the profit motive: for corporations, there's no such thing as 'enough'".^[50]
• Moore appeared in the 2006 documentary I'm Going to Tell You a Secret, which chronicles Madonna's 2004 Re-Invention World Tour. Moore attended her show in New York City at Madison Square Garden.

Political views[link]

Moore lampoons George W. Bush's reaction to the September 11 attacks notification

Although Moore has been noted for his liberal political activism,^[4] he rejects the label "political activist" saying such a description is redundant as a citizen of a democracy: "I and you and everyone else has to be a political activist. If we're not politically active, it ceases to be a democracy."^[51] According to John Flesher of the Associated Press, Moore is known for his "fiery left-wing populism,"^[52] and publications such as the Socialist Worker Online have hailed him as the "new Tom Paine."^[53]

Moore was a high-profile guest at both the 2004 Democratic National Convention and the 2004 Republican National Convention, chronicling his impressions in USA Today. He was criticized in a speech by Republican Senator John McCain as "a disingenuous film-maker." Moore laughed and waved as Republican attendees jeered, later chanting "four more years." Moore gestured his thumb and finger at the crowd, which translates into "loser."^[54]

During September and October 2004, Moore spoke at universities and colleges in swing states during his "Slacker Uprising Tour". The tour gave away ramen and underwear to students who promised to vote.^[55][56] One stop during the tour was Utah Valley State College. A fight for his right to speak resulted in massive public debates and a media blitz.^[57] The Utah event was chronicled in the documentary film This Divided State.^[58]

Despite having supported Ralph Nader in the 2000 presidential election, Moore urged Nader not to run in 2004 so as not to split the left vote. On Real Time with Bill Maher, Moore and Maher knelt before Nader to plead with him to stay out of the race.^[59]

Moore drew attention in 2004 when he used the term "deserter" when he introduced Retired Army Gen. Wesley K. Clark at a Democratic Presidential debate in New Hampshire. Noting that Clark had been a champion debater at West Point, Moore told a laughing crowd, "I know what you're thinking. I want to see that debate" between Clark and [George W.] Bush -- "the general versus the deserter." Moore said he was referring to published reports in several media outlets including The Boston Globe which had reported that "there is strong evidence that Bush performed no military service as required when he moved from Houston to Alabama to work on a U.S. Senate campaign from May to November 1972."^{[60] [61][62]}

On April 21, 2008, Moore endorsed Barack Obama for President, stating that Hillary Clinton's recent actions had been "disgusting."^[63] Moore is an active supporter of the Occupy Wall Street protest in New York City and spoke with the OWS protesters on September 26, 2011.^[64] On October 29, 2011, he spoke at the Occupy Oakland protest site to express his support. ^[65]

Published work[link]

Bibliography[link]

• Moore, Michael (1996). Downsize This! Random Threats from an Unarmed American. New York: HarperPerennial. ISBN 0-06-097733-7. 
• Moore, Michael; Glynn, Kathleen (1998). Adventures In A TV Nation. New York: HarperPerennial. ISBN 0-06-098809-6. 
• Moore, Michael (2002). Stupid White Men ...and Other Sorry Excuses for the State of the Nation!. New York: Regan Books. ISBN 0-06-039245-2. 
• Moore, Michael (2003). Dude, Where's My Country?. New York: Warner Books. ISBN 0-446-53223-1. 
• Moore, Michael (2004). Will They Ever Trust Us Again?. New York: Simon & Schuster. ISBN 0-7432-7152-1. 
• Moore, Michael (2004). The Official Fahrenheit 9/11 Reader. New York: Simon & Schuster. ISBN 0-7432-7292-7. 
• Moore, Michael (2008). Mike's Election Guide 2008. New York: Grand Central Publishing. ISBN 0-446-54627-5. 
• Moore, Michael (2011). Here Comes Trouble: Stories from My Life. New York: Grand Central Publishing. ISBN 0-446-53224-X. 

Filmography[link]

• Roger & Me (1989)
• Pets or Meat: The Return to Flint (1992) (TV)
• Canadian Bacon (1995)
• The Big One (1997)
• And Justice for All (1998) (TV)
• EDtv (1999) (cameo as himself)
• Lucky Numbers (2000) (as actor)
• Bowling for Columbine (2002)
• Fahrenheit 9/11 (2004)
• Sicko (2007)
• Captain Mike Across America (2007)
• Slacker Uprising (2008)
• Capitalism: A Love Story (2009)

Television series[link]

• TV Nation (1994)
• The Awful Truth (1999)
• Michael Moore Live (1999)

References[link]

External links[link]

This article's use of external links may not follow Wikipedia's policies or guidelines. Please improve this article by removing excessive or inappropriate external links, and converting useful links where appropriate into footnote references. (December 2010)

Wikisource has original works written by or about: Michael Moore

Wikiquote has a collection of quotations related to: Michael Moore

Wikimedia Commons has media related to: Michael Moore

• Michael Moore at the Internet Movie Database
• Works by or about Michael Moore in libraries (WorldCat catalog)
• The Populist: Michael Moore Can Make You Cry / New Yorker (16 February 2004)
• America's Teacher by Naomi Klein, The Nation, September 23, 2009
• A 2007 NOW on PBS interview with Michael Moore
• Michael Moore on His Life, His Films and His Activism - video interview by Democracy Now!
• Michael Moore on 2010 Midterm Elections, the Tea Party, and the Future of the Democratic Party
• In Depth interview with Moore, October 2, 2011

John Cassavetes
John Cassavetes as he appeared in the trailer for the movie Edge of the City (1957)
Born	John Nicholas Cassavetes (1929-12-09)December 9, 1929 New York City, New York, U.S.
Died	February 3, 1989(1989-02-03) (aged 59) Los Angeles, California, U.S.
Occupation	Actor, Director, Producer, Screenwriter, Film editor
Years active	1951–1988
Spouse	Gena Rowlands (1954-1989, his death)

John Nicholas Cassavetes (in Greek: Γιάννης Νικόλαος Κασσαβέτης; December 9, 1929 – February 3, 1989) was an Greek-American actor, screenwriter and filmmaker.^[1] He acted in many Hollywood films, notably Rosemary's Baby (1968) and The Dirty Dozen (1967). Cassevetes was also a pioneer of American independent film by writing and directing over a dozen movies, which he financed in part with his Hollywood paychecks, and which pioneered the use of improvisation and a realistic cinéma vérité style.

Early life[link]

Cassavetes was born in New York as the son of Greek American Katherine Cassavetes (who was to feature in some of his films) and Greek immigrant Nicholas John Cassavetes. His early years were spent with his family in Greece; when he returned at age seven, he spoke no English.^[2] He grew up on Long Island, New York. He attended Port Washington High School from 1945 to 1947, participating in Port Weekly (the school paper), Red Domino (interclass play), football, and the Port Light (yearbook). Next to his photo on page 55 of his 1947 year book is written: "'Cassy' is always ready with a wisecrack, but he does have a serious side. A 'sensational' personality. Drives his 'heap' all over." Cassavetes also attended high school at Blair Academy in New Jersey before spending a year at Colgate University in Hamilton, New York, before transferring to the American Academy of Dramatic Arts. After graduating in 1950, he continued acting in the theater, took small parts in films and began working on television in anthology series, such as Alcoa Theatre.

The middle years[link]

[edit] Acting workshop and Shadows

By 1956, Cassavetes had begun teaching method acting in his own workshop in New York City. An improvisation exercise in his workshop inspired the idea for his writing and directorial debut, Shadows (1959; first version 1957). Cassavetes raised the funds for production from friends and family, as well as listeners to Jean Shepherd's late-night radio talk show Night People. His stated purpose was to make a film about little people, different from Hollywood studio productions.

Cassavetes was unable to gain American distribution of Shadows, but it won the Critics Award at the Venice Film Festival. European distributors later released the movie in the United States as an import. Although the box office of Shadows in the United States was slight, it did gain attention from the Hollywood studios.

Television and acting jobs[link]

Cassavetes played bit parts in B-pictures and in television serials, until gaining notice in 1955 as a vicious killer in The Night Holds Terror, and as a juvenile delinquent in the live TV drama Crime In The Streets (he would repeat this latter performance in the 1956 film version). His first starring role in a feature film was Edge of the City (1957), which co-starred Sidney Poitier. He was briefly under contract to MGM and co-starred with Robert Taylor in the western Saddle the Wind, written by Rod Serling. In the late 1950s Cassavetes played Johnny Staccato, the title character in a television series about a jazz pianist who also worked as a private detective. In total he directed five episodes of the series, which also features a guest performance from his wife Gena Rowlands. It was broadcast on NBC between September 1959 and March 1960, when it was acquired by ABC. Although critically acclaimed, the series was cancelled in September 1960. Cassavetes also appeared on the NBC interview program, Here's Hollywood. Cassavetes directed two movies for Hollywood in the early 1960s - Too Late Blues and A Child Is Waiting. He also starred in CBS western series Rawhide, in the episode "Incident Near Gloomy River" (1961). In the 1962-1963 season Cassavetes guest-starred on the CBS anthology series, The Lloyd Bridges Show, and directed two episodes, including "A Pair of Boots", in which his friend, Seymour Cassel, guest-starred. In the 1963-1964 season Cassavetes appeared in Jason Evers's ABC drama about college life, Channing. That same season he appeared in the ABC medical drama about psychiatry, Breaking Point. In 1965 he appeared on ABC's western series, The Legend of Jesse James. The same year he also guest-starred in the World War II series, Combat!, in the episode "S.I.W.".

It was with the payment for his work on television, as well as a handful of film acting jobs, that he was able to relocate to California and to make his subsequent films independent of any studio, as Shadows had been. The films in which he acted with this intention include, Don Siegel's The Killers; the motorcycle gang movie, Devil's Angels (1967); The Dirty Dozen (1967), in a role for which he was nominated for an Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor as PVT. Victor R. Franko; Roman Polanski's Rosemary's Baby (1968); and The Fury (1978).

[edit] The Faces International films

Faces (1968) was the second film to be both directed and independently financed by Cassavetes. The film starred Cassavetes' wife Gena Rowlands, whom he had married during his struggling actor days, John Marley, Seymour Cassel and Val Avery, as well as several first time actors, such as lead actress Lynn Carlin. It depicts the slow disintegration of a contemporary marriage. The film reportedly took three years to make, and was made largely in the Cassavetes home. Faces was nominated for three Academy Awards (Best Original Screenplay, Best Supporting Actor and Best Supporting Actress). Around this time, Cassavetes formed "Faces International" as a distribution company to handle all of his films.

In 1970, Cassavetes directed and acted in Husbands, with actors Peter Falk and Ben Gazzara. They played a trio of married men on a spree in New York and London after the funeral of one of their best friends. Minnie and Moskowitz (1971), about two unlikely lovers, had Rowlands with Seymour Cassel.

In 1972, Cassavetes played opposite Peter Falk again and Blythe Danner in the Columbo episode Etude in Black, playing the symphony conductor Alex Benedict.

A Woman Under the Influence (1974) stars Rowlands as an increasingly troubled housewife named Mabel. Rowlands received a Academy Award nomination for Best Actress, while Cassavetes was nominated for Best Director.

In The Killing of a Chinese Bookie (1976), Ben Gazzara plays Cosmo Vitelli, a small-time strip-club owner with an out-of-control gambling habit, pressured by mobsters to commit a murder to pay off his debt.

Opening Night (1977) has Gena Rowlands as lead actress with Cassavetes, Ben Gazzara and Joan Blondell. Rowlands portrays an aging film star named Myrtle Gordon working in the theater and suffering a personal crisis. Alone and unloved by her colleagues, in fear of age and always at a remove from others on account of her stardom, she succumbs to alcohol and hallucinations after witnessing the accidental death of a young fan. Ultimately, she fights through this, delivering the performance of her life in a play. Rowlands won the Silver Bear for Best Actress at the 28th Berlin International Film Festival for her performance.^[3]

Last years[link]

Cassavetes directed the film Gloria (1980), featuring Rowlands as a Mob moll who tries to protect an orphan boy whom the Mob wants to kill. Rowlands earned another Best Actress nomination for it. In 1982, Cassavetes starred in Paul Mazursky's Tempest, which costarred Rowlands, Susan Sarandon, Molly Ringwald, and Raúl Juliá.

After receiving the prognosis from his doctor that he had six months to live, Cassavetes made Love Streams (1984) which featured him as an aging playboy who suffers the overbearing affection of his recently divorced sister. It was entered into the 34th Berlin International Film Festival where it won the Golden Bear.^[4] The film is often considered Cassavetes' "last film", in that it brought together many aspects of his previous films and also in that he despised the film he made afterwards. Big Trouble (1986), was taken over during filming from Andrew Bergman who wrote the original screenplay. Cassavetes came to refer to the film as "the aptly titled 'Big Trouble'", since the studio vetoed many of his decisions for the film and eventually edited most of the film in a way which Cassavetes disagreed with.^[5]

In January 1987, Cassavetes was facing health problems but having outlasted his doctor's prognosis, wrote the three-act play Woman of Mystery and succeeded in bringing it to the stage in May and June at the Court Theater.^[6]

Cassavetes worked during the last year of his life to produce a last film which was to be titled She's Delovely. He was in talks with Sean Penn to star, though legal and financial hurdles proved insurmountable and the project was forgotten about until after Cassavetes's death, when it was finally made as She's So Lovely.^[7]

Death and legacy[link]

John Cassavetes' grave

An alcoholic,^[8] Cassavetes died from cirrhosis of the liver in 1989 at the age of 59. He was survived by Rowlands and three children (Nick, Alexandra and Zoe). Cassavetes is buried at Westwood Village Memorial Park cemetery in Los Angeles.

At the time of his death Cassavetes had amassed a collection of more than forty unproduced screenplays, as well as a novel of Husbands.^[9]

Cassavetes is the subject of several books about the actor/filmmakers life. Cassavetes on Cassavetes is a collection of interviews collected or conducted by Boston University film scholar Ray Carney, in which the filmmaker recalled his experiences, influences and outlook on the film industry. In the Oscar 2005 edition of Vanity Fair magazine, one article features a tribute to Cassavetes by three members of his stock company, Rowlands, Ben Gazzara and Peter Falk.

Many of Cassavetes' films are owned by Faces Distribution, a company overseen by Gena Rowlands and Julian Schlossberg, distributed by Castle Hill Productions. In September 2004 The Criterion Collection produced a Region 1 DVD box set of his five independent films: Shadows, Faces, A Woman Under the Influence, The Killing of a Chinese Bookie and Opening Night. Also featured in the set is a documentary about the life and works of Cassavetes, A Constant Forge, a booklet featuring critical assessments of the director's work and tributes by old friends. In 2005 a box set of the same films was released in Region 2 by Optimum Releasing. The Optimum DVD of Shadows has a voice-over commentary by Seymour Cassel. Mistakes about the first and second versions of the film are documented on Ray Carney's web site.^[10]

Cassavetes's son, Nick Cassavetes, followed in his father's footsteps as an actor and director. In 1997 Nick Cassavetes made the film, She's So Lovely, from the She's Delovely screenplay his father had written. The film starred Sean Penn, as John Cassavetes had wanted. Alexandra Cassavetes directed the documentary, Z Channel: A Magnificent Obsession in 2004, and in 2006 served as 2nd Unit Director on her brother, Nick's, film, Alpha Dog. Cassavetes's younger daughter, Zoe Cassavetes, wrote and directed the 2007 film, Broken English, featuring Rowlands and Parker Posey.

Filmmaking style[link]

Directing[link]

Aside from presenting difficult characters whose inner desires were not easily understood, Cassavetes paid little attention to the “impressionistic cinematography, linear editing, and star-centred scene making”^[11] that are fashionable in Hollywood and art films. Instead, he chose to shoot mostly hand held with general lighting or documentary style, to accommodate the spontaneity of his actors.

Cassavetes was never interested in working with actors who were more concerned with their images than with that of the characters whom they were portraying, which is why he rarely had actors of note (other than Gena Rowlands and Ben Gazzara) in his films. As Cassavetes said, he strove “to put [actors] in a position where they may make asses of themselves without feeling they’re revealing things that will eventually be used against them.”^[12]

The manner in which Cassavetes employed improvisation frequently misunderstood. With the exception of the original version of Shadows, his films were completely scripted. Confusion arises in part because Cassavetes allowed actors to bring their own interpretations of characters to their performances. Dialogue and action were scripted but delivery was not.

Cassavetes's unorthodox characters reflected his similarly unconventional method in the making of his films. He employed mostly his friends as actors and set personnel, generally for little or no money guarantee and a share in the profits of the film. Both Shadows and Faces, two of his earliest films, were shot over a four-year period on week-ends and whenever funds became available.

Cassavetes said: “The hardest thing for a film-maker, or a person like me, is to find people…who really want to do something…They’ve got to work on a project that’s theirs.”^[13] This method differs greatly from the 'director run' sets of big-budget Hollywood productions

According to Marshall Fine, “Cassavetes, who provided the impetus of what would become the independent film movement in America…spent the majority of his career making his films ‘off the grid’ so to speak…unfettered by the commercial concerns of Hollywood.”^[14] To make the kind of films he wanted to make, it was essential to work in this ‘communal', ‘off the grid’ atmosphere because Hollywood’s “basis is economic rather than political or philosophical,”^[15] and no Hollywood executives were interested in Cassavetes’s studies of human behaviour. He mortgaged his house to acquire the funds to shoot A Woman Under the Influence, instead of seeking money from an investor who might try to change the script so as to make the film more marketable.

Music[link]

Cassavetes was passionate about a wide range of music, from jazz to classical to rock, "I like all music. It makes you feel like living. Silence is death."^[16]

For the soundtrack of Shadows, Cassavetes worked with jazz composer and musician Charles Mingus and Shafi Hadi to provide the score. Mingus's friend, Diane Dorr-Dorynek, described Cassavetes' approach to film-making in jazz terms:

"The script formed the skeleton around which the actors might change or ad lib lines according to their response to the situation at the moment, so that each performance was slightly different. A jazz musician works in this way, using a given musical skeleton and creating out of it, building a musical whole related to a particular moment by listening to and interacting with his fellow musicians. Jazz musicians working with actors could conceivably provide audiences with some of the most moving and alive theater they have ever experienced."^[17]

When asked by a documentarian, during the making of Faces, whether he had the desire to make a musical film, Cassavetes responded that he wanted to make only one musical, Dostoyevsky's Crime and Punishment.^[18]

Cassavetes worked with Bo Harwood, from 1970 to 1984, on six films in several different capacities, even though Harwood had initially only signed on to do "a little editing" for Husbands, and "a little sound editing" for Minnie and Moskowitz. Harwood composed poignant music for Cassavetes' following three films, and was also credited as "Sound" for two of them. During these projects, Harwood wrote several songs, some with Cassavetes.^[19]

During his work with Cassavetes, Harwood claimed that the notoriously unpredictable director preferred to use the "scratch track" version of his compositions, rather than to let Harwood refine and re-record them with an orchestra. Some of these scratch tracks were recorded in Cassavetes office, with piano or guitar, as demos, and then eventually ended up in the final film. While this matched the raw, unpolished feel that marks most of Cassavetes' films, Harwood was sometimes surprised and embarrassed.^[20]

The relationship seems to have ended amicably. When asked by documentarian Michael Ventura, during the making of Cassavetes' last film Love Streams, what he had learned from working with Cassavetes, Harwood replied:

I learned a lot through John. I've done a lot of editing for him. Picture editing, sound editing, music editing, shot sound, composed score, and I've learned a lot about integrity...I think you know what I mean. You know, thirty years from now, I can say I rode with Billy the Kid."^[21]

Filmography[link]

Notes[link]

• Charles Warren, "Cavell, Altman and Cassavetes" in the Stanley Cavell special issue, Jeffrey Crouse (ed.) Film International, Issue 22, Vol. 4, No. 4, 2006, pp. 14–20.

References[link]

External links[link]

• John Cassavetes at the Internet Movie Database
• John Cassavetes at the Internet Broadway Database
• John Cassavetes at Find a Grave
• Ray Carney's The John Cassavetes Pages
• John Cassavetes Tribute Site
• Bright Lights Film Journal:Review of Criterion's Box Set Five Films
• Playboy Magazine interview (07/1971)
• Literature on John Cassavetes

Natsume Sōseki
Natsume Sōseki in 1912
Born	(1867-02-09)9 February 1867 Tokyo, Japan
Died	9 December 1916(1916-12-09) (aged 49) Tokyo, Japan
Occupation	Writer
Genres	novels, short stories, poetry
Notable work(s)	Kokoro, Botchan, I Am a Cat
Influenced virtually all subsequent Japanese novelists, Karatani Kōjin

Natsume Sōseki (夏目 漱石^?, February 9, 1867 – December 9, 1916), born Natsume Kinnosuke (夏目 金之助^?), is widely considered to be the foremost Japanese novelist of the Meiji period (1868–1912). He is best known for his novels Kokoro, Botchan, I Am a Cat and his unfinished work Light and Darkness. He was also a scholar of British literature and composer of haiku, Chinese-style poetry, and fairy tales. From 1984 until 2004, his portrait appeared on the front of the Japanese 1000 yen note.

Early years[link]

Born as Natsume Kinnosuke in the town of Babashita in the Edo region of Ushigome (present Kikui, Shinjuku), Natsume began his life as an unwanted child, born to his mother late in her life, forty years old and his father then fifty-three.^[1] When he was born, he already had five siblings. Having five children and a toddler had created family insecurity and was in some ways a disgrace to the Natsume family.^[1] In 1868, a childless couple, Shiobara Masanosuke and his wife, adopted him until the age of nine, when the couple divorced.^[1] He returned to his family and was welcomed by his mother although regarded as a nuisance by his father. His mother died when he was fourteen, and his two eldest brothers died in 1887, intensifying his sense of insecurity.^{[citation needed]}

Natsume attended the First Tokyo Middle School (now Hibiya High School),^[2] where he became enamored with Chinese literature, and fancied that he might someday become a writer. His desire to become an author arose when he was about fifteen when he told his older brother about his interest in literature.^[1] However, his family disapproved strongly of this course of action, and when Natsume entered the Tokyo Imperial University in September 1884, it was with the intention of becoming an architect. Although he preferred Chinese classics, he began studying English at that time, feeling that it might prove useful to him in his future career, as English was a necessity in Japanese college.^[1]

In 1887, Natsume met Masaoka Shiki, a friend who would give him encouragement on the path to becoming a writer, which would ultimately be his career. Shiki tutored him in the art of composing haiku. From this point on, he began signing his poems with the name Sōseki, which is a Chinese idiom meaning "stubborn". In 1890, he entered the English Literature department, and quickly mastered the English language. Natsume graduated in 1893, and enrolled for some time as a graduate student and part-time teacher at the Tokyo Normal School.^{[citation needed]}

In 1895, Natsume began teaching at Matsuyama Middle School in Shikoku, which became the setting of his novel Botchan. Along with fulfilling his teaching duties, Natsume published haiku and Chinese poetry in a number of newspapers and periodicals. He resigned his post in 1896, and began teaching at the Fifth High School in Kumamoto. On June 10 of that year, he married Nakane Kyoko.^{[citation needed]}

Natsume Sōseki's lodgings in Clapham, South London

In the United Kingdom, 1901–1903[link]

In 1900, the Japanese government sent Natsume to study in Great Britain as "Japan's first Japanese English literary scholar".^[3] He visited Cambridge and stayed a night there, but gave up the idea of studying at the university because he could not afford it on his government scholarship.^[4] He studied instead at University College, London (UCL). He had a miserable time of it in London, spending most of his days indoors buried in books, and his friends feared that he might be losing his mind.^[5] He also visited Pitlochry in Scotland.

He lived in four different lodgings, only the last of which, lodging with Priscilla and her sister Elizabeth Leale in Clapham (see the photograph), proved satisfactory. Five years later, in his preface to Bungakuron (The Criticism of Literature), he wrote about the period:

The two years I spent in London were the most unpleasant years in my life. Among English gentlemen I lived in misery, like a poor dog that had strayed among a pack of wolves.^[6]

He got along well with the one Leale sister, who shared his love of literature (notably Shakespeare—his tutor at UCL was the Shakespeare scholar W. J. Craig^[7]—and Milton) and spoke fluent French, much to his admiration. The Leales were a Channel Island family, and Priscilla had been born in France. The sisters worried about Natsume's incipient paranoia and successfully urged him to get out more and take up cycling.

Despite his poverty, loneliness, and mental problems, he solidified his knowledge of English literature during this period and returned to Japan in 1903.

After his return to the Empire of Japan, he replaced Koizumi Yakumo (Lafcadio Hearn) at the First Higher School, and subsequently became a professor of English literature at Tokyo Imperial University, where he taught literary theory and literary criticism.^{[citation needed]}

Literary career[link]

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Natsume's literary career began in 1903, when he began to contribute haiku, renku (haiku-style linked verse), haitaishi (linked verse on a set theme) and literary sketches to literary magazines, such as the prominent Hototogisu, edited by his former mentor Masaoka Shiki, and later by Takahama Kyoshi. However, it was the public success of his satirical novel I Am a Cat in 1905 that won him wide public admiration as well as critical acclaim.^[8]

He followed on this success with short stories, such as Rondon tō ("Tower of London") in 1905 and the novels Botchan ("Little Master"), and Kusamakura ("Grass Pillow") in 1906, which established his reputation, and which enabled him to leave his post at the university for a position with Asahi Shimbun in 1907, and to begin writing full-time. Much of his work deals with the relation between Japanese culture and Western culture. Especially his early works are influenced by his studies in London; his novel Kairo-kō was the earliest and only major prose treatment of the Arthurian legend in Japanese.^[9] He began writing one novel a year until his death from a stomach ulcer in 1916.

Obverse of a 1984 series 1000 Japanese yen banknote

Major themes in Natsume's works include ordinary people fighting against economic hardship, the conflict between duty and desire (a traditional Japanese theme; see giri), loyalty and group mentality versus freedom and individuality, personal isolation and estrangement, the rapid industrialization of Japan and its social consequences, contempt of Japan's aping of Western culture, and a pessimistic view of human nature. Natsume took a strong interest in the writers of the Shirakaba (White Birch) literary group. In his final years, authors such as Akutagawa Ryūnosuke and Kume Masao became close followers of his literary style.^{[citation needed]}

Major works[link]

Natsume's major works include:

See also[link]

• Anglo-Japanese relations
• Japanese literature
• List of Japanese authors
• Fusanosuke Natsume – Natsume's grandson
• Minae Mizumura – finished Natsume's last, unfinished novel, Light and Darkness

Sources[link]

• Bargen, Doris D. Suicidal Honor: General Nogi and the Writings of Mori Ogai and Natsume Sōseki. University of Hawaii Press (2006). ISBN 0-8248-2998-0
• Brodey, I. S. and S. I. Tsunematsu, Rediscovering Natsume Sōseki, (Kent: Global Oriental, 2000)
• Doi, Takeo, trans. by W. J. Tyler, The Psychological World of Natsume Sōseki. Harvard University Asia Center (1976). ISBN 0-674-72116-0
• Gessel, Van C. Three Modern Novelists: Soseki, Tanizaki, Kawabata. Kodansha International, 1993
• Keene, Donald. Dawn to the West: Japanese Literature of the Modern Era: Fiction, Chapter 12. 2nd Revised Edition, Columbia University Press, 1998.
• Milward, Peter. The Heart of Natsume Sōseki: First Impressions of His Novels. Azuma Shobo (1981). ASIN: B000IK2690
• Olson, Lawrence. Ambivalent Moderns: Portraits of Japanese Cultural Identity. Savage, Maryland: Rowman & Littlefield (1992). ISBN 0-8476-7739-7
• Ridgeway, William N. A Critical Study of The Novels of Natsume Sōseki, 1867–1916. Edwin Mellen Press (January 28, 2005). ISBN 0-7734-6230-9
• Yu, Beongchoeon. Natsume Sōseki. Macmillan Publishing Company (1984). ISBN 0-8057-2850-3

References[link]

External links[link]

Wikisource has original text related to this article: Natsume Sōseki

	Novels portal
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• natsumesoseki.com
• Natsume Sōseki at かまくら GreenNet, the website of Kamakura City
• Natsume Souseki at Meisaku Live
• Video: House of Ogai Mori & Soseki Natsume
• Natsume Souseki at Amazon Kindle Store
• Works by Natsume Sōseki at Project Gutenberg
• Sōseki page including links to the entire text of Kokoro
• Natsume Sōseki on aozora.gr.jp (complete texts with furigana)
• Tohoku University: Natsume Soseki Library
• Natsume Sōseki's grave