Teamsters want gap exposed between worker, CEO pay

Teamsters know firsthand what happens to workers when a CEO is allowed to loot his company: The workers get less when the CEO gets more.<br /><br />In the case of McKesson Corp., <a href="http://teamsternation.blogspot.com/2013/09/McKesson-CEO-jaw-dropping-pay.html" rel="nofollow">CEO John Hammergren was planning on taking home $51.7 million</a>. Here's what he did to deserve that enormous compensation: preside over a company that paid the government $200 million in fines last year to settle charges for Medicaid fraud and price fixing. Workers who voted to become <a href="http://www.teamster.org/content/teamsters-protest-mckessons-worker-abuse-and-executive-pay-shareholder-meeting" rel="nofollow">Teamsters, meanwhile, can't afford healthcare and are facing McKesson's high-priced union busters</a>.<br /><br />Shareholders knew about the disparity and <a href="http://teamsternation.blogspot.com/2013/08/McKesson-shareholders-reject-CEO-pay.html" rel="nofollow">voted against McKesson's lavish pay</a> at the July shareholder meeting.<br /><br />Exposing the gross inequality between CEOs and workers <i>can</i> shame companies into paying them less. That's why the Teamsters came out in support of an SEC proposal to require companies reveal the disparity between CEO pay and worker pay.<br /><br /><a href="http://www.teamster.org/sites/teamster.org/files/IBT_Hall_Letter_to_SEC_on_pay_ratio_disclosure_102013.pdf" rel="nofollow">Teamsters General Secretary-Treasurer Ken Hall sent a letter</a> to the SEC endorsing its proposal on the CEO-to-worker pay ratio. According to <a href="http://teamster.org/">teamster.org</a>,<br /><blockquote class="tr_bq">The International Brotherhood of Teamsters supports the SEC’s proposal to require corporations to reveal the difference between the pay of their CEO and their average workers. </blockquote><blockquote class="tr_bq">The SEC rule is required by the Dodd-Frank Act, which became law more than three years ago. Once the rule is written, investors such as Teamster benefit funds will have:<br /><ul><li>a better way to assess the board of directors who set executive pay;</li><li>a correlation between compensation practices throughout companies and morale and productivity; and,</li><li>an important way to measure CEO pay for advisory proxy votes on executive compensation plans.</li></ul>Teamsters General Secretary-Treasurer Ken Hall said the Teamsters’ perspective is important as long-term investors protecting the retirement security of hundreds of thousands of American workers.<br />“The rule will help solve the problem of excessive CEO pay, which harms our funds’ investments, the sustainability of U.S. corporations and the employment and retirement security of Teamster members,” Hall said.</blockquote>We'll keep you posted on the SEC's progress in laying down the rule. Because you know those big corporations don't like it one little bit.

CEO Pay McKesson Teamsters want gap exposed between worker, CEO pay

Teamsters know firsthand what happens to workers when a CEO is allowed to loot his company: The workers get less when the CEO gets more. In ...

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Obesity is not a disease » The Spectator

'Well, what diets have you tried so far?' asked the GP, flicking through the patient's notes. I was an innocent trainee doctor on my general practice placement at the time and watched the interaction carefully, sensing a row was about to ensue. 'Look, I don't want to go on a diet, I want you to prescribe me these,' snapped the patient, bringing out a neatly folded page she had torn out of a magazine. The GP, rolling his eyes at me, took the paper but didn't read it. I suspected he'd read it before. This was yet another example of what's becoming a very British epidemic: obesity being self-diagnosed as disease.<br /><br><br /><br>The doctor attempted to explain that tablets really aren't suitable in her case. As well as having some potentially nasty side effects, they're expensive to prescribe, and don't offer a long-term solution. This was clearly not what the woman wanted to hear. 'Fine then, don't help me, see if I care. I'll get my sister to get them off her GP — he gives her whatever she wants'; and she stormed out. It struck me as bizarre that while some people using the NHS are dangerously malnourished, other people are desperate to take tablets to ensure that their food passes through their body unabsorbed, while the taxpayer foots the bill.<br /><br><br /><br>It happens all the time. The patients who are not interested in changing their diet in any way, demanding to have their cake, eat it and then pop a pill so that the calories never touch their waistline. And as a result, Britain now combines austerity with obesity. The majority of us are now overweight or obese — a third of children are considered too heavy. It costs an extra £5 billion a year, and 300 hospital admissions a day are directly due to obesity. To pick up the newspapers is to witness a country adjusting itself to losing a national battle of the bulge.<br /><br><br /><br>Take the East Midlands Ambulance Service. It emerged this week that it has been picking up so many fat patients — weighing in excess of the 28-stone maximum — that it needs a new fleet. It has, hitherto, been struggling along with just one ambulance for fatties (a 'bariatric' vehicle), but now thinks all 272 of its ambulances need to be upgraded with double-wide stretchers for patients who (it says) can weigh in at 55 stone. The plan will cost £27 million.<br /><br><br /><br>Once the obese patient is in hospital, a whole new set of equipment is required: reinforced operating tables, sturdier trollies, longer needles and even wider MRI scanners. There is a great demand for bariatric surgeons. One of them, Sally Norton, recently wrote in the Royal College of Surgeons' house journal that without special equipment for the obese, there may be 'enquiries into the potential use of veterinary or zoological scanners, with resultant loss of dignity for the patient'. There is a cost to all this: in the kit, and in operations like gastric bypass operations, which have increased sevenfold over the last seven years.<br /><br><br /><br>Moving obese patients out of their house can be too difficult for the NHS. Recently the fire service had to demolish two walls of a house in south Wales so that a 63-stone teenager could be taken to hospital. This required more than 40 emergency service workers at an estimated cost of £100,000. Over the past five years, fire services have been called to more than 2,700 incidents to assist 'severely obese' people, including some who had got stuck in the bath. Rescuing fatties is now a routine operation, with its own entry in the Fire Brigade incident reporting system (filed under 'bariatric persons').<br /><br><br /><br>So what to do? The government spends money asking us to eat 'five a day' fruit and veg, but it seems to have no effect. Nottingham, the fattest region in Britain, recently decided to spend £500,000 on replacing pavements in areas with particularly fat pedestrians, to try and encourage people to walk more. Our landscape is being, quite literally, reshaped in order to accommodate the obese. In the past few years, we have moved from being outraged about the epidemic to just planning around it. Like a middle-aged man deciding to eat what he wants and let himself go, Britain is pulling on a pair of tracksuit bottoms and heading to the fridge.<br /><br><br /><br>It need not be this way. For too long, my fellow doctors have pussyfooted around their obese patients, too scared to confront the, er, elephant in the room. They don't want to cause offence. Unbelievably, draft guidelines announced last year by the National Institute of Clinical Excellence and Health (Nice) suggested that doctors should even avoid the use of the term 'obese' for fear that larger patients might be upset. Instead, Nice recommended advising corpulent patients that they should seek a 'healthier weight'.<br /><br><br /><br>But nice euphemisms mean that people don't confront reality. I'm not going to stop diagnosing cancer just because people don't like hearing the dreaded word. So why should it be different when informing people that they are obese? Sometimes morbidly so. What Nice is delicately skirting round is what many doctors, nurses and dieticians will confirm: people don't like being told that they are overweight, even if it's objectively clearly the case. And by pretending that this is a disease, the doctors are making it even worse.<br /><br><br /><br>There's something comforting about blaming obesity on genes. It enables people to relinquish responsibility for their weight, which can be seen as outside their control. It's nothing new, either. Years ago, fat people blamed their 'glands'. When I started medical school, I patiently waited for us to be taught about these magical 'glands' that made people fat. I'm still waiting. Even when people have problems with an underactive thyroid, which can slow the metabolism and result in weight gain, this can be treated with thyroid replacement tablets and the metabolism returns to normal. As a rule, however, fat people have one thing in common: they eat more than they need to.<br /><br><br /><br>Certainly some people metabolise food at a different rate to others, meaning they are more likely to lay down fat stores than other people. But this is a reason to eat less, not to become fat. You cannot get away from the basic biology of the human body — fat is simply stored excess energy, and weight gain is only possible when the total amount of energy consumed exceeds the total amount of energy expended. Even those who have a genetic predisposition to become fat are not slaves to their DNA.<br /><br><br /><br>An in-depth study published last year, which looked at the genes of more than 20,000 people and was conducted at the Medical Research Council's epidemiology unit in Cambridge, found some people are predisposed to be overweight. But an active lifestyle and reducing food intake can counteract that. Simple. While some will be annoyed by this research, I find it empowering. The idea that our genes control us is profoundly depressing. After all, there is more to being human than a few strands of DNA.<br /><br><br /><br>The rate of people considered clinically obese has risen from around 1 to 2 per cent of the population in the 1960s to over 25 per cent now. Why? A simple answer would be lifestyle, but it's actually a little more complicated. A fascinating survey conducted by the Department of Health compared data collected from 1967 and 2010. It showed that, while people back then were slimmer, they ate fattier foods and had access to far fewer gyms. We eat better now, we work out more. But we live relatively sedentary lives. Only three out of ten households had a car then, compared to seven out of ten now. While 75 per cent of people walked for at least half an hour a day in the 1960s, this is only about 40 per cent now.<br /><br><br /><br>What really stands out, more than the lifestyle differences, is the sharp contrast in the attitudes towards obesity between the two different eras. The 1967 survey found that nine out of ten people had attempted to lose weight in the past year, compared with barely half of adults questioned in 2010. Perhaps most tellingly though, 40 years ago only 7 per cent of those people who considered themselves overweight had failed to do anything about it, compared with nearly half now.<br /><br><br /><br>It would be easy to blame Britain's fatness on lifestyle changes, but the worst of it is attitude. People just aren't bothering to lose weight any more. Perhaps obesity is viewed as more normal. But this is also down to the attitude that we doctors increasingly encounter in our consulting rooms: the reluctance of patients to accept that ailments can be blamed on their behaviour, for which they are reluctant to take responsibility.<br /><br><br /><br>Patients blame obesity on the government, cunning food manufacturers, their parents and their genes. They demand fat-loss pills on the NHS and stomach-stapling surgery as a right. In a world where health care is becoming consumerised, patients see themselves as customers. There's not much demand for hard truths.<br /><br><br /><br>America has severe obesity problems, and seems resigned to them. But Britain has a National Health Service, and therefore a far higher capacity to change. It ought to be easy. Doctors should be required to tell patients a blunt truth: if you're fat, eat less, exercise more, or both. And if you keep guzzling the tasty treats, you will die earlier. It's not a disease, it's a mindset — and that means it can be changed. We doctors need to be a little less understanding, a little more judgmental, and realise that our oath — 'do no harm' — must come before our desire to save the feelings of our patients. The truth can be the hardest drug to administer. But holding our tongues, prescribing the fat pills and bankrupting the NHS in the process is the worst solution of all.<br /><br><br /><br><a href="http://www.spectator.co.uk/features/9049971/the-battle-of-the-bulge/">http://www.spectator.co.uk/features/9049971/the-battle-of-the-bulge/</a>?

Obesity is not a disease » The Spectator

'Well, what diets have you tried so far?' asked the GP, flicking through the patient's notes. I was an innocent trainee doctor o...

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Top Selling American Idol Album This Week - Same One From 75 Weeks Ago!

<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhLD_Ljo6koW7J0AqO7oUXg9ff0BiFyaMQQux93dnIfOx6rpwDCqdZ3NMLnswVJ6ZbqC1CWOhdRsc5WwgaZFBk5Y1OvkiIO_F1Hd10OoVPyCc-yiXfKoCDLTdCEkynOUgwBlOkxZy6emepN/s1600/bb200-2013-10-11.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="226" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhLD_Ljo6koW7J0AqO7oUXg9ff0BiFyaMQQux93dnIfOx6rpwDCqdZ3NMLnswVJ6ZbqC1CWOhdRsc5WwgaZFBk5Y1OvkiIO_F1Hd10OoVPyCc-yiXfKoCDLTdCEkynOUgwBlOkxZy6emepN/s400/bb200-2013-10-11.png" width="400" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">green = Mandisa, lt blue = Carrie, maroon = Phillip, dk green = Kelly</td></tr></tbody></table>This week there is again one American Idol <a href="http://www.mjsbigblog.com/billboard-chart-date-101913.htm" target="_blank">among the top 100 selling albums</a> in the United States, but amazingly that album is one that was released 75 weeks ago, "Blown Away" by Carrie Underwood. As Mandisa's "Overcomer" drops to #104 from #92 last week (after five weeks in the Top 100), Carrie leads the Idols on the chart, just as she did when her album debuted at #1 in May 2012. That is pretty incredible. The other two Idols on the chart this week are Phillip Phillips at #107 (an improvement from his #117 last week), and Kelly Clarkson, who is just barely in the Top 200 at #193 with her greatest hits album from last November. Luckily Phillip should see a boost with his new "special edition" of his album, and Kelly will see a new boost with the release of her Christmas album "Wrapped in Red" in a few more weeks.<br /><br />Now all eyes will be on the early estimates next week of sales numbers for Scotty McCreery's "<a href="http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00EV1AT96/" target="_blank">See You Tonight</a>" album as it is released Tuesday, October 15. It is good to see that he is actually getting a <a href="http://idolforums.com/index.php?showtopic=694002" target="_blank">good amount of promotion</a>, even if his single is just now starting to move up the airplay charts. I doubt he will hit the lofty initial numbers from "Clear As Day", but as long as he beats his "Christmas With Scotty McCreery" numbers from last year (which he most likely should), I think his label will be pleased. It is hard to complain about a gold certified Christmas album! If Scotty can again find strong holiday sales this year (for a third autumn in a row) he is most likely "gold" bound again. The bigger question will be if he can extend his momentum into 2014 with a second, bigger hit from the album so he can hit platinum for a second time.

Top Selling American Idol Album This Week - Same One From 75 Weeks Ago!

green = Mandisa, lt blue = Carrie, maroon = Phillip, dk green = Kelly This week there is again one American Idol among the top 100 selling a...

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Is Congress driving you to drink? Tell them

<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgRbxI5-Mty_TNoDnUUY9YitnV2Kmh9M7SISfu5OyFZWCaxX52dcbu2Ta68BpUBlwn0S8aMn5CcZuhhAKYuTa_cOitZp7tDIGNDv5fnh9Ju8BouVjLof-yV5fovHZBBzCs0D1qqxouNffRJ/s1600/drunk_dial_congress.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="212" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgRbxI5-Mty_TNoDnUUY9YitnV2Kmh9M7SISfu5OyFZWCaxX52dcbu2Ta68BpUBlwn0S8aMn5CcZuhhAKYuTa_cOitZp7tDIGNDv5fnh9Ju8BouVjLof-yV5fovHZBBzCs0D1qqxouNffRJ/s320/drunk_dial_congress.jpg" width="320" /></a></div><span style="font-family: inherit;">It’s usually not a good idea to make phone calls when you’re drunk (i.e. <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Drunk_dialing" rel="nofollow">drunk dialing</a>). But if the person you’re calling belongs to a dysfunctional political party that's driving America off a cliff, then we say go for it.<br /><br />A new website called <a href="http://drunkdialcongress.org/" rel="nofollow">Drunk Dial Congress</a> allows you to type in your phone number so you can be connected to a member of Congress.<br /><br /> But you’re encouraged to have a drink or two before laying in to lawmakers with some of these talking points: </span><br /><blockquote class="tr_bq"><span style="font-family: inherit;">If you can <a href="http://www.npr.org/blogs/thetwo-way/2013/10/03/228771578/sharp-words-over-shutdown-when-lawmaker-visits-wwii-memorial" rel="nofollow">yell at a Park Ranger</a> after forcing the Government to shut down then I get to yell at you</span></blockquote><span style="font-family: inherit;"></span><blockquote class="tr_bq"><span style="font-family: inherit;">How dare you <a href="http://thehill.com/blogs/congress-blog/healthcare/326691-time-for-congress-to-put-veterans-funding-first" rel="nofollow">not fund Veterans</a></span></blockquote><span style="font-family: inherit;"></span><blockquote class="tr_bq"><span style="font-family: inherit;">You jerks are costing the country <a href="http://www.nbcnews.com/business/money-nothing-government-shutdown-costs-12-5-million-hour-8C11308802" rel="nofollow">$12 million bucks per hour</a>!</span></blockquote><span style="font-family: inherit;"><blockquote class="tr_bq">You guys <a href="http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/10/03/capitol-police-congress-pay_n_4040719.html" rel="nofollow">aren't funding the police</a> that are protecting you??? </blockquote><blockquote class="tr_bq">My grandma <a href="http://www.healio.com/hematology-oncology/practice-management/news/online/%7B137dc175-e6d5-4d9f-bb5c-4a39a8ad4dbc%7D/medical-community-speaks-out-on-effects-of-government-shutdown" rel="nofollow">can't get her cancer treatment</a> </blockquote><blockquote class="tr_bq">Why don't you make yourself useful and <a href="http://www.nydailynews.com/news/politics/south-carolina-man-mow-lawn-lincoln-memorial-article-1.1480998" rel="nofollow">at least mow the lawn</a>?</blockquote>It’s only fair that Congress should hear from angry Americans -- especially during happy hour. Because, as the website points out, members of Congress were found <a href="http://www.salon.com/2013/10/01/grayson_blames_shutdown_on_gop_literally_drinking_on_the_job/" rel="nofollow">boozing up</a> right after they shut down the government and put 800,000 people out of work:<br /><blockquote class="tr_bq">As Members of Congress quickly returned from their final symbolic, non-effective and otherwise useless votes to avert a government shutdown, the heavy drinking began. Reports of our representatives getting plastered on the government's dime -- the one we have left -- have come streaming in from witnesses all over Capitol Hill.  </blockquote> </span><span style="font-family: inherit;">And you certainly don’t have to be a furloughed government worker to be pissed off at Congress. The shutdown being orchestrated by anti-worker Republican extremists is hurting everything from <a href="http://news.yahoo.com/va-chief-shutdown-could-hit-millions-vets-072429820--politics.html" rel="nofollow">veterans’ health care</a> and <a href="http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/10/08/government-shutdown-nlrb_n_4066073.html" rel="nofollow">workers’ rights</a> to <a href="http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/wonkblog/wp/2013/10/08/10-ways-the-shutdown-is-making-us-less-safe/" rel="nofollow">food and transportation safety</a>.<br /><br />Drunk Dial Congress also includes some interesting drink recipes. But while you're having fun, don't forget to enjoy some of the <a href="http://teamsternation.blogspot.com/2013/09/teamster-beer-to-enjoy.html" rel="nofollow">great brews made and distributed by Teamsters</a>.<br /><br />So drink up -- responsibly, of course -- and give Congress a piece of your mind.</span>

anti-worker extremists beer Congress government shutdown Is Congress driving you to drink? Tell them

It’s usually not a good idea to make phone calls when you’re drunk (i.e. drunk dialing ). But if the person you’re calling belongs to a dysf...

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VIDEO: David Tennant Pays Tribute To Patrick Troughton On The Doctors Revisited

<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgfawqwFNwlDW6FUKNYlqOk-6i7nKjXIYDl-3WjI9wlUhxJBr6r2lifGFtgghIZqS_vFRjiNSpWBrN2-ywRbu-IvXcNGIMfmjM5iydyVqTuAszc_nMhQJoqHb7pRbigVBzWs03cnGRYxA8/s1600/David+Tennant+Celebs+Pirates+Adventure+Scientists+6O6PigHMK38l.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="640" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgfawqwFNwlDW6FUKNYlqOk-6i7nKjXIYDl-3WjI9wlUhxJBr6r2lifGFtgghIZqS_vFRjiNSpWBrN2-ywRbu-IvXcNGIMfmjM5iydyVqTuAszc_nMhQJoqHb7pRbigVBzWs03cnGRYxA8/s640/David+Tennant+Celebs+Pirates+Adventure+Scientists+6O6PigHMK38l.jpg" width="424" /></a></div><br /><br /><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><a href="http://www.digitalspy.co.uk/tv/s7/doctor-who/news/a522942/doctor-who-david-tennant-pays-tribute-to-patrick-troughton-video.html" target="_blank">Digital Spy</a> have uploaded a clip of David Tennant paying tribute to Patrick Troughton. The clip is taken from The Doctors Revisited: The Second Doctor which will premiere in the UK on Watch this weekend.</span><br /><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span><br /><div class="MsoNormal" style="background-color: #fafafa; line-height: 19px; margin: 0px; outline: none; padding: 0px; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">On the legacy that Patrick Troughton left <i>Doctor Who</i>, David was beyond generous in his recognition of what the actor had done for the show and the role of the Doctor.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="background-color: #fafafa; line-height: 19px; margin: 0px; outline: none; padding: 0px; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"I think Patrick Troughton created the Doctor as he is now." he says, "William Hartnell created something that was unique and brilliant, but actually the Doctor we recognise today is much more Patrick Troughton’s Doctor. We’ve all sort of done our version of kind of what Patrick Troughton did. He gave the show a way to keep going. He allows it to still exist.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="background-color: #fafafa; line-height: 19px; margin: 0px; outline: none; padding: 0px; text-align: justify;"></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="background-color: #fafafa; line-height: 19px; margin: 0px; outline: none; padding: 0px; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="background-color: #fafafa; line-height: 19px; margin: 0px; outline: none; padding: 0px; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"If Patrick Troughton hadn’t done what he did so confidently  and with such charm and so brilliantly I wouldn’t be sitting here today."</span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="background-color: #fafafa; line-height: 19px; margin: 0px; outline: none; padding: 0px; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="background-color: #fafafa; line-height: 19px; margin: 0px; outline: none; padding: 0px; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">The first two episodes of The Doctors Revisted focusing on William Hartnell and Patrick Troughton wil air on Watch on Saturday and Sunday at 2pm.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="background-color: #fafafa; line-height: 19px; margin: 0px; outline: none; padding: 0px; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="background-color: #fafafa; line-height: 19px; margin: 0px; outline: none; padding: 0px; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Another Doctor Who documentary Doctor Who Explained will premiere on Watch on Saturday at 5.30pm.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="background-color: #fafafa; line-height: 19px; margin: 0px; outline: none; padding: 0px; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="background-color: #fafafa; font-family: Verdana, Geneva, sans-serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 19px; margin: 0px; outline: none; padding: 0px; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span></div><object classid="clsid:D27CDB6E-AE6D-11cf-96B8-444553540000" codebase="http://download.macromedia.com/pub/shockwave/cabs/flash/swflash.cab#version=9,0,47,0" height="348" id="flashObj" width="618"><param name="movie" value="http://c.brightcove.com/services/viewer/federated_f9?isVid=1&isUI=1" /><param name="bgcolor" value="#FFFFFF" /><param name="flashVars" value="videoId=2736158363001&playerID=871166280001&playerKey=AQ~~,AAAAACkAQxo~,JbFjHxgqCuak3gK2T7u3p0eDyamGmIu2&domain=embed&dynamicStreaming=true" /><param name="base" value="http://admin.brightcove.com" /><param name="seamlesstabbing" value="false" /><param name="allowFullScreen" value="true" /><param name="swLiveConnect" value="true" /><param name="allowScriptAccess" value="always" /><embed src="http://c.brightcove.com/services/viewer/federated_f9?isVid=1&isUI=1" bgcolor="#FFFFFF" flashVars="videoId=2736158363001&playerID=871166280001&playerKey=AQ~~,AAAAACkAQxo~,JbFjHxgqCuak3gK2T7u3p0eDyamGmIu2&domain=embed&dynamicStreaming=true" base="http://admin.brightcove.com" name="flashObj" width="618" height="348" seamlesstabbing="false" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" allowFullScreen="true" allowScriptAccess="always" swLiveConnect="true" pluginspage="http://www.macromedia.com/shockwave/download/index.cgi?P1_Prod_Version=ShockwaveFlash"></embed></object>

David Tennant Doctor Who Doctor Who 50th Anniversary Patrick Troughton The Doctors Revisited VIDEO VIDEO: David Tennant Pays Tribute To Patrick Troughton On The Doctors Revisited

Digital Spy have uploaded a clip of David Tennant paying tribute to Patrick Troughton. The clip is taken from The Doctors Revisited: The Se...

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VIDEO: Richard II - Production Diary 7

<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh2bmBoJ-afcZ7WUE02wLNOggj86eNxaothvntJlKXKVHW7E2leDL3R4nKEB3qwkpdrwsKzkNv4L9DvlqLtLN49YIysM7Y1cRRNMXFe6vSTpZPQhf0uP0xLW9DJCjHeHHloCBAdw3iVShM/s1600/prod7.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh2bmBoJ-afcZ7WUE02wLNOggj86eNxaothvntJlKXKVHW7E2leDL3R4nKEB3qwkpdrwsKzkNv4L9DvlqLtLN49YIysM7Y1cRRNMXFe6vSTpZPQhf0uP0xLW9DJCjHeHHloCBAdw3iVShM/s1600/prod7.JPG" /></a></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">I<span style="background-color: white; color: #333333; font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 19px; text-align: justify;">n this week's production diary video from the Royal Shakespeare Company </span><span style="color: #333333; font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: 14px; line-height: 19px;">Simon Ash, Senior Production Manager for the Royal Shakespeare Theatre, describes the last week of technical work before Richard II opens.</span></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="color: #333333; font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: 14px; line-height: 19px;"><br /></span></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="color: #333333; font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: 14px; line-height: 19px;">'Are we going to be ready to get the actors on stage on Monday evening at 6 o'clock?' he asks. His explanation of the process of bringing the show to stage makes clear it's not an easy question to answer.</span></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="color: #333333; font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: 14px; line-height: 19px;"><br /></span></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="color: #333333; font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: 14px; line-height: 19px;">Simon and the team have been planning this work for at least three months. In the week before the show opens, six departments - 40 to 50 people - will be working in the forestage, auditorium and backstage of the the theatre for 12 hours a day. Transport, facilities, equipment and scenery all come together. Watch the video to see it happen.</span></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="color: #333333; font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: 14px; line-height: 19px;"><br /></span></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="color: #333333; font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: 14px; line-height: 19px;">Richard II plays in the Royal Shakespeare Theatre, Stratford-upon-Avon from 10 October to 16 November 2013. It transfers to the Barbican 9 December to 25 January. </span></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="color: #333333; font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: 14px; line-height: 19px;"><br /></span></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="color: #333333; font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: 14px; line-height: 19px;">For more information visit http://onscreen.rsc.org.uk/richard-ii/</span></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="color: #333333; font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: 14px; line-height: 19px;"><br /></span></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="color: #333333; font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: 14px; line-height: 19px;"><br /></span></span></div><iframe allowfullscreen="" frameborder="0" height="360" src="//www.youtube.com/embed/wa0-_arRG64?rel=0" width="480"></iframe>

David Tennant Richard II Royal Shakespeare Company Theatre VIDEO VIDEO: Richard II - Production Diary 7

I n this week's production diary video from the Royal Shakespeare Company  Simon Ash, Senior Production Manager for the Royal Shakespear...

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From Lab to Guggenheim

The exhibition <a href="http://www.guggenheim.org/new-york/exhibitions/on-view/participatory-city-100-urban-trends-from-the-bmw-guggenheim-lab"><i>Participatory City: 100 Urban Trends from the BMW Guggenheim Lab</i></a> opens today at the Guggenheim in New York City, running until January 5, 2014. It comes a little over two years after the <a href="http://archidose.blogspot.com/2011/08/bmw-guggenheim-lab.html">launch of the BMW Guggenheim Lab</a> on an empty plot of city land in the East Village. As one of the presenters in yesterday's press preview noted, the size and proportions of the gallery space in the Guggenheim are about the same as those of the <a href="http://www.bow-wow.jp/">Atelier Bow-Wow</a> pavilion that called NYC home before heading to Berlin for the second Lab installation (the third pavilion, in Mumbai, was also designed by Atelier Bow-Wow but was built from bamboo instead of carbon fiber). I couldn't help mashing these two environments together to see just how close this relationship is:<br /><br /><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgqHBR09oN9caA-jAymqUR-exQix_8ChEvKlYi6Q9b6p0WaxmyQiDlTxHIKA1Y1rkV2XcKZRoBQI3-idYew2j4w9ZmWWZTZyLxzw8qjGXyolouxk9HFcYO_T1KnoMCNGScs4wHQWZp8tiE5/s1600/LAB-Guggenheim.gif" /><br /><br />The exhibition—organized by <a href="http://www.guggenheim.org/new-york/about/staff-profiles/curators/maria-nicanor">Maria Nicanor</a>, Curator, BMW Guggenheim Lab (with David van der Leer, formerly of the Guggenheim) and Associate Curator, Architecture and Urbanism, Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum—does a good job of documenting what happened in the New York City, Berlin and Mumbai Labs over the course of two years.<br /><br />The exhibition includes some introductory text and videos:<br /><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEidMQ6gaDazykbjf_cM7E437T04ictu1vUt7Avp90TUasW8JxupcWCqPAM8ucM5LK484-jYYW7oQQ2CvuIcWlCF-X8asdtrC-DICqXkYWoxWUf0HMqXuy1ldM9YucA1R7pBhHYVnOWo63TC/s1600/P1011561a.jpg" /><br /><br />Clips of talks at the three venues:<br /><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj0Lb6aoIa0a2pTVAlJC2eO6BsLvym0SXiTgA_zH1BIuSyus5Nrg_3vN3M9bXlUqsjmXY1uK4EjU8LTmD7VH0m_cBnlvju5LpQvDY1PaJiq7nmkgI3Ne02pPkz6hm3RlmNtGzBP7dIt2Zb7/s1600/P1011559a.jpg" /><br /><br />Screen walls cycling through the <a href="http://www.bmwguggenheimlab.org/100urbantrends/">100 Urban Trends</a> determined over the course of the Lab's existence:<br /><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjABYq6MrQyK_VSCCGvt5cfq_eXWpMlMHL6xEomVxie8bUumJ0Q8oJb6-Cb0IBeE-wIGfy8PVofMHgdtreOeuCpKhY7Zss6R-4nZdnH21aS2lOweT-vEQxhjh44wgl1fZ1_WNtSiJf9UH1Z/s1600/P1011562a.jpg" /><br /><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi2WVToTPuZjL3PEyOV8wlJNI1Tbap44wO0mIKYQOUteiaI_mA21xWkAem9brMU8NP8p8c9I7EGYZ2DG3HDJ4flr8Jxsb5WZ7S_HFJPEcGFNn_ZtTV1sIQE_2n_P3J2M3yy-a4n6vr5cDrz/s1600/P1011569a.jpg" /><br /><br />And a wall charting each trend and its relationship to other trends:<br /><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgpJxC5i8-sQbQYHPbCfHP1wkO31igP2fsLT_xIIJhDRI0bS3NUcIVtTjGf7-3q0dT3qDQ8HqhLWowyohXcIh9haY4CsYvRU36na8o02p8kKpwkeH84t2mg3k3xR3EjFZZPbXl1fpJpi1ah/s1600/P1011565a.jpg" /><br /><br />On this last I'm a bit skeptical of the connections, since the lines drawn between the trends in the program pamphlet* do not coincide with the lines on the wall. Are the lines arbitrary, merely existing to illustrate the complexity of urban life (and create a strong visual)? Or do the connections constantly change depending on the context and the values we ascribe them?<br /><br />All tolled, I wish there was more participation in the exhibition rather than the more passive engagement of watching and reading. The Lab was all about participation, so it would have been beneficial to extend this into the gallery. To me the exhibition says that the Lab's work is done, and no more participation will happen (beyond some interaction in the two scheduled lectures*); and that the Lab's participation, which worked toward making cities better places for people, does not have a place inside a museum. In the case of the latter, this must be why Nicanor and van der Leer broke outside of the walls of the Guggenheim to directly engage the city and allow for the spontaneous to happen within tightly scheduled programs.<br /><br />*The exhibition also consists of <a href="http://www.guggenheim.org/new-york/exhibitions/on-view/participatory-city-100-urban-trends-from-the-bmw-guggenheim-lab/programs">a program of lectures and film screenings</a>.

From Lab to Guggenheim

The exhibition Participatory City: 100 Urban Trends from the BMW Guggenheim Lab opens today at the Guggenheim in New York City, running unt...

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The truth behind the "Grand Bargain" hoax

<iframe allowfullscreen="" frameborder="0" height="315" src="//www.youtube.com/embed/Rui5m_DRdvg" width="420"></iframe><br /><br />The so-called <a href="http://www.huffingtonpost.com/ben-veghte/grand-bargain_b_4060292.html" rel="nofollow">Grand Bargain</a> that we should all be afraid of may be looming as a solution to the government shutdown. The Grand Bargain is more of a<a href="http://therealnews.com/t2/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=31&Itemid=74&jumival=10822&updaterx=2013-10-07+14%3A55%3A58" rel="nofollow"> grand betrayal</a>, really, and would involve Democrats agreeing to cut Social Security and Medicare. Not something we care for.<br /><br />Here's an excellent video that exposes the truth behind the Grand Bargain, aka the drive to shrink the U.S. government and destroy the middle class. It's masterminded by greedy old billionaires like <a href="http://teamsternation.blogspot.com/2013/03/memo-to-billionaires-dont-lecture-us-on.html" rel="nofollow">Pete Peterson</a> and the<span style="background-color: white; color: #333333; font-family: Verdana, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 16.890625px;"> </span><strike style="background-color: white; color: #333333; font-family: Verdana, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 16.890625px;"><a href="http://teamsternation.blogspot.com/2011/10/bombshell-kochs-sold-oil-equipment-to.html" style="color: #336699;">Benedict Arnold</a></strike> Koch brothers. They get their kicks lecture the rest of us on living beyond our means. <br /><br />These people are even worse than the <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robber_baron" rel="nofollow">robber baron</a>s of the Gilded Age. At least their 19th-century forefathers didn't shut down the government.

government shutdown grand bargain social security The truth behind the "Grand Bargain" hoax

The so-called Grand Bargain  that we should all be afraid of may be looming as a solution to the government shutdown. The Grand Bargain is m...

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Tenth Doctor Month: Quote Of The Day #11

<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgsvWMUCHZNIptQ3UHUsrEzYxE7xd6Db5_BHCPisJZZqCPf1KheIQUyMXvy6lQ4bzfneB30yNhMAp9DWeL-UHxsZPg8oxW9U88Bri9wGJ_4H0anoDFhwucF6XBVM8fDogaOoy3rEWnwW4U/s1600/lovemon3.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="426" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgsvWMUCHZNIptQ3UHUsrEzYxE7xd6Db5_BHCPisJZZqCPf1KheIQUyMXvy6lQ4bzfneB30yNhMAp9DWeL-UHxsZPg8oxW9U88Bri9wGJ_4H0anoDFhwucF6XBVM8fDogaOoy3rEWnwW4U/s640/lovemon3.jpg" width="640" /></a></div><span style="background-color: white;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><strong style="line-height: 20px; text-align: center;"><br /></strong></span></span><span style="background-color: white;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><strong style="line-height: 20px; text-align: center;"><br /></strong></span></span><span style="background-color: white;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><strong style="line-height: 20px; text-align: center;">Abzorbaloff</strong><span style="line-height: 20px; text-align: center;">: You see I've read about you, Doctor. I've studied you. So passionate, so sweet. You wouldn't let an innocent man die. And I'll absorb him. Unless you give yourself to me.</span><br /><b>The Doctor</b><span style="line-height: 20px; text-align: center;"><b>: </b>Sweet, maybe. Passionate, I suppose. But don't ever mistake that for nice. Do what you want.</span><br style="line-height: 20px; text-align: center;" /><strong style="line-height: 20px; text-align: center;">Abzorbaloff</strong><span style="line-height: 20px; text-align: center;">: He'll die, Doctor!</span><br style="line-height: 20px; text-align: center;" /><b>The Doctor</b><span style="line-height: 20px; text-align: center;"><b>:</b> I know.</span><br style="line-height: 20px; text-align: center;" /><strong style="line-height: 20px; text-align: center;">Abzorbaloff</strong><span style="line-height: 20px; text-align: center;">: So be it.</span><br style="line-height: 20px; text-align: center;" /><b>The Doctor</b><span style="line-height: 20px; text-align: center;"><b>: </b>Mind you, the others might having something to say. </span></span></span><br /><span style="background-color: white; line-height: 20px; text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span></span><span style="background-color: white; line-height: 20px; text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Love & Monsters (2006)</span></span>

David Tennant Doctor Who Doctor Who 50th Anniversary Tenth Doctor Quotes Tenth Doctor Month: Quote Of The Day #11

Abzorbaloff : You see I've read about you, Doctor. I've studied you. So passionate, so sweet. You wouldn't let an innocent man d...

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Madison supervisors ask Congress to reopen Shenandoah National Park

Wouldn't it be great to see every county adjoining Shenandoah National Park take the same action as the Madison County supervisors by asking Congress to reopen Shenandoah National Park [<a href="http://www.dailyprogress.com/starexponent/news/local_news/madison-supes-to-congress-reopen-shenandoah-national-park/article_e0ae5cf2-31dd-11e3-96ce-001a4bcf6878.html">link</a>]? For many, it's difficult to watch as nearby businesses suffer from the closure and endure the lack of tourist traffic at this time of year when millions travel to the mountains for the colorful autumn leaf season.<br /><br />Graves Mountain Lodge in Madison County is feeling the pinch at the time of year when their parking lots are usually blown out with vehicles and tourists:<br /><blockquote>"The next three weeks are going to be the main time for foliage," said Jimmy Graves with Graves Mountain Lodge on Thursday. "You've got the businesses on top of the mountain, they're closed and so ... yes it's an impact because you don't have the people here whether they'd come to eat lunch, some would spend the night, but they're going other places. Normally this time of year we would probably have another 50 people coming hiking, eating, would be more than 100 cars a day going to White Oak (Canyon), probably more than that going to Old Rag.<br /><br />"We are losing money from the park being closed - everyone around the park is losing money," he said.</blockquote>Some attractions are set to reopen on the Blue Ridge Parkway ... it's past time to reopen Shenandoah National Park. [<a href="http://www.roanoke.com/news/2291048-12/mabry-mill-other-parkway-attractions-poised-to-reopen.html">link</a>] <br /><br />End the government shutdown.

Blue Ridge Mountains Blue Ridge Parkway government shutdown Shenandoah National Park Skyline Drive tourism Virginia Is For Lovers Madison supervisors ask Congress to reopen Shenandoah National Park

Wouldn't it be great to see every county adjoining Shenandoah National Park take the same action as the Madison County supervisors by as...

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Mabry Mill, others poised to open this weekend

This is great news! Hit the Blue Ridge Parkway to see the changing leaves and stop by the re-opened restaurants and attractions along the way. This would be a great way to help these businesses recover and get back on their feet after ten days of government shutdown.<br /><br />Check before going just to be sure they're open but the restaurant at Mabry Mill was hoping to be reopened this morning, and Peaks of Otter was hoping to be reopened for this weekend including lodging and restaurant, according to the Roanoke Times:<br /><blockquote>Mabry Mill will reopen today and the Peaks of Otter Lodge in Bedford County could be open by this weekend under agreements with the National Park Service, which had ordered parkway sites and concessionaires to close when the federal government shut down Oct. 1.<br /><br /> Radcliff was planning for a Friday reopening of Mabry Mill, though she had yet to hear from the park service Thursday afternoon. Robert Peters, the general manager of the Peaks of Otter Lodge, said he was “very optimistic” the lodge will be open by this weekend.</blockquote>Private businesses that are helping the federal government by running park concessions should not be forced to close during budget debates.

Blue Ridge Mountains Blue Ridge Parkway government shutdown Mabry Mill Peaks of Otter tourism Virginia Is For Lovers Mabry Mill, others poised to open this weekend

This is great news! Hit the Blue Ridge Parkway to see the changing leaves and stop by the re-opened restaurants and attractions along the wa...

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The Escape Artist Director: "Working With David Tennant Is Something Else"

<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhihLD79h86rDKUTRQ-RHfqtYPDMA6nU5oF35v9py2tY3fzApuOu_Dhrjre7UiTHrOVqVMoQoQSSvuk7anx2S22fYSqe_SXUTh3peQ9ptcBjSOmjJbjz7_Re6Z_mKy_eYyetC3-kxE_kSU/s1600/thees7.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="360" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhihLD79h86rDKUTRQ-RHfqtYPDMA6nU5oF35v9py2tY3fzApuOu_Dhrjre7UiTHrOVqVMoQoQSSvuk7anx2S22fYSqe_SXUTh3peQ9ptcBjSOmjJbjz7_Re6Z_mKy_eYyetC3-kxE_kSU/s640/thees7.jpg" width="640" /></a></div><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Interview with Brian Welsh, the director of David Tennant's new BBC One drama, The Escape Artist:</span><br /><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span><br /><div style="background-color: white; line-height: 1.22; margin-bottom: 14px; margin-left: 1px; padding: 0px; position: relative; top: -2px;"><strong><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Can you tell us what the title ‘The Escape Artist’ means to you?</span></strong></div><div style="background-color: white; line-height: 1.22; margin-bottom: 14px; margin-left: 1px; padding: 0px; position: relative; top: -2px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">The story is about Will Burton who is a criminal defence barrister. He’s at the top of his game and he spends his days getting criminals off on technicalities and using his amazing brain to work his way through evidence. ‘The Escape Artist’ refers to his ability to escape from any situation.</span></div><div style="background-color: white; line-height: 1.22; margin-bottom: 14px; margin-left: 1px; padding: 0px; position: relative; top: -2px;"><strong><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Where would you place The Escape Artist in terms of genre?</span></strong></div><div style="background-color: white; line-height: 1.22; margin-bottom: 14px; margin-left: 1px; padding: 0px; position: relative; top: -2px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">I would probably describe The Escape Artist as a legal drama that you never feel safe in. You know that there is danger. It’s totally unique.</span></div><div style="background-color: white; line-height: 1.22; margin-bottom: 14px; margin-left: 1px; padding: 0px; position: relative; top: -2px;"><strong><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">What was your vision for the piece?</span></strong></div><div style="background-color: white; line-height: 1.22; margin-bottom: 14px; margin-left: 1px; padding: 0px; position: relative; top: -2px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">When I first looked at the script I almost saw it as a mixture of genres. In one way it is a courtroom drama and in another way it’s a Hitchcock-esque thriller. There’s also an emotional family theme at its heart, which deals with loss and grief. So that was one of the things that drew me to it, because I didn’t see it like other courtroom dramas.</span></div><div style="background-color: white; line-height: 1.22; margin-bottom: 14px; margin-left: 1px; padding: 0px; position: relative; top: -2px;"><strong><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">How did you try to avoid clichés in the courtroom scenes?</span></strong></div><div style="background-color: white; line-height: 1.22; margin-bottom: 14px; margin-left: 1px; padding: 0px; position: relative; top: -2px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">We made a choice to use a big courtroom (courtroom one in the Old Bailey) that allowed us a lot of space and the opportunity to manoeuvre the camera around the environment in quite a unique way. I tried at all times to avoid descending into the clichés that we all know too well (i.e. do you swear by the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth). We tried to keep to the information that was necessary for the story and also the information that had an emotional resonance for the story.</span></div><div style="background-color: white; line-height: 1.22; margin-bottom: 14px; margin-left: 1px; padding: 0px; position: relative; top: -2px;"><strong><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">David Tennant plays Will, can you tell us about casting the role?</span></strong></div><div style="background-color: white; line-height: 1.22; margin-bottom: 14px; margin-left: 1px; padding: 0px; position: relative; top: -2px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Well, David was on the show before I came to it, but working with him is something else. He’s a force of nature. It’s an incredible gift to be able to learn pages and pages of really complicated legal jargon and dialogue, whilst keeping an honest emotional truthfulness throughout. He’s a special man.</span></div><div style="background-color: white; line-height: 1.22; margin-bottom: 14px; margin-left: 1px; padding: 0px; position: relative; top: -2px;"><strong><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">How much rehearsal did you do with David?</span></strong></div><div style="background-color: white; line-height: 1.22; margin-bottom: 14px; margin-left: 1px; padding: 0px; position: relative; top: -2px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">We talked a lot about the moral complexity of the piece. There’s almost a Machiavellian element to Will’s character. We also met some criminal barristers who had this swagger and charm about them, as well as wit and intellect, these were the attributes that allowed them to win in this ‘game’ that is essentially it. David and I spent time going through the script before we began filming about some of the subtext decisions. The script is really rich with subtext. We also played a lot on set, in some cases there was a number of ways in which it could go and David was great with it.</span></div><div style="background-color: white; line-height: 1.22; margin-bottom: 14px; margin-left: 1px; padding: 0px; position: relative; top: -2px;"><strong><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Can you tell us about Kate and Will’s relationship, and why it was so important to have Ashley playing Will’s partner?</span></strong></div><div style="background-color: white; line-height: 1.22; margin-bottom: 14px; margin-left: 1px; padding: 0px; position: relative; top: -2px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">When I read the script for the first time Ashley Jensen was the first person that came to my mind. She has a warmth and intelligence that felt like a great contrast to Will’s work environment. I think she really demonstrates the strength and stability of his home. I didn’t want the character to be a stereotype in any way, which was why it was so great that as soon as Ashley came in she was just full of ideas.</span></div><div style="background-color: white; line-height: 1.22; margin-bottom: 14px; margin-left: 1px; padding: 0px; position: relative; top: -2px;"><strong><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Can you tell us about Toby Kebbell’s character, Foyle?</span></strong></div><div style="background-color: white; line-height: 1.22; margin-bottom: 14px; margin-left: 1px; padding: 0px; position: relative; top: -2px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">I knew absolutely that Foyle had to be able to battle with Will’s intellect, and be as smart if not smarter than him at times. The story is essentially about these two guys and their slightly animalistic competition with each other. Toby, whom I’ve worked with before, I knew would elevate this character off the page. I talked to Toby a lot before starting about how we could really push David Tennant’s buttons. One of the most exciting scenes for me, even at the script stage, was when the two of them meet for the first time. There’s not a lot of action or high drama, it’s just two guys speaking. However, it’s the richness in subtext and what’s going on between them that make it so much more interesting to me.</span></div><div style="background-color: white; line-height: 1.22; margin-bottom: 14px; margin-left: 1px; padding: 0px; position: relative; top: -2px;"><strong><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Can you tell us about Monica Dolan and her character?</span></strong></div><div style="background-color: white; line-height: 1.22; margin-bottom: 14px; margin-left: 1px; padding: 0px; position: relative; top: -2px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Monica Dolan is an actress whom I have admired for a very long time. She came onto the show very late and I was nervous because we didn’t have very much time to chat, apart from a two-hour phone conversation. We discussed this female character who is on the parish council and is quite sexually repressed. She sees this charming man who appears to be a pillar of the community, almost like a rock star. Monica is so wide open and instinctive as an actress that we shot a lot of her stuff on one day.</span></div><div style="background-color: white; line-height: 1.22; margin-bottom: 14px; margin-left: 1px; padding: 0px; position: relative; top: -2px;"><strong><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Could you tell us about Sophie Okenado and her character Maggie?</span></strong></div><div style="background-color: white; line-height: 1.22; margin-bottom: 14px; margin-left: 1px; padding: 0px; position: relative; top: -2px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">I was really keen to cast Sophie as Maggie from the outset. I knew that she had some innate personal attributes that felt very in tune with Maggie. There was also something about her ethnicity and her desire to succeed in the Oxbridge-elite world that I knew Sophie could really identify with. There’s something about the way that she works, the rawness, the freedom she brings to it that’s the type of acting I really love. I’ve never seen Sophie do something twice from take to take.</span></div><div style="background-color: white; line-height: 1.22; margin-bottom: 14px; margin-left: 1px; padding: 0px; position: relative; top: -2px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">In terms of Maggie’s character she’s always second place to Will. They regularly engage in sparring matches and he often takes her out when she least expects it. She’s utterly driven to try and beat him. Through this story she makes some decisions to try and put herself in that place, ultimately some real darkness comes out in her soul as well.</span></div><div style="background-color: white; line-height: 1.22; margin-bottom: 14px; margin-left: 1px; padding: 0px; position: relative; top: -2px;"><strong><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">What was it like to film in the historical areas of London such as the old Bailey?</span></strong></div><div style="background-color: white; line-height: 1.22; margin-bottom: 14px; margin-left: 1px; padding: 0px; position: relative; top: -2px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">It was amazing to be in that environment. Quite early on we came up with a colour pallet for the look of the show, I wanted it to have a heavy, dark feel. I was amazed at how nicely The Old Bailey fitted in with our film noir vision. Then we found Kingston which had the same architect as the courtroom we used in the Old Bailey. It was important for us to stay authentic to that world but also to maintain the look we wanted.</span></div><div style="background-color: white; line-height: 1.22; margin-bottom: 14px; margin-left: 1px; padding: 0px; position: relative; top: -2px;"><strong><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">There are some interesting, small scenes in the script like cancelling a subscription, why did you include moments like that?</span></strong></div><div style="background-color: white; line-height: 1.22; margin-bottom: 14px; margin-left: 1px; padding: 0px; position: relative; top: -2px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Another thing that drew me to the script was that it explores grief in a very honest way. It deals with the everyday mundane things that one has to cope with after the trauma of loss. It could be cancelling insurance, or a bank card, or trying to get their password for something, and having to deal with these robots on the end of the phone who don’t understand what you’ve gone through. I suppose the bureaucracy of losing someone is beautifully illustrated in the script and was something that I could really identify with.</span></div><div style="background-color: white; line-height: 1.22; margin-bottom: 14px; margin-left: 1px; padding: 0px; position: relative; top: -2px;"><strong><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">How was your relationship with David Wolstencroft?</span></strong></div><div style="background-color: white; line-height: 1.22; margin-bottom: 14px; margin-left: 1px; padding: 0px; position: relative; top: -2px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">When I came on board we only had the first script. I really enjoyed working with David and feeding through ideas, he’s a really collaborative writer. I had a lot of questions about Will’s character and also thematic questions on law and the legal system etc. David and I spent hours talking about that, and I enjoyed the collaboration.</span></div><div style="background-color: white; line-height: 1.22; margin-bottom: 14px; margin-left: 1px; padding: 0px; position: relative; top: -2px;"><strong><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Was having the audience jump out of their skin something you really wanted to happen?</span></strong></div><div style="background-color: white; line-height: 1.22; margin-bottom: 14px; margin-left: 1px; padding: 0px; position: relative; top: -2px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Definitely. I think it’s important in a show like this where you have so much suspense and fear, you need those ‘jump’ moments. It’s part of what the audience buys into anyway.</span></div><div style="background-color: white; line-height: 1.22; margin-bottom: 14px; margin-left: 1px; padding: 0px; position: relative; top: -2px;"><strong><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">How did you create that suspense?</span></strong></div><div style="background-color: white; line-height: 1.22; margin-bottom: 14px; margin-left: 1px; padding: 0px; position: relative; top: -2px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">It really is all about what you hold back and what you show. Trying to find a balance between the information that you need to feel that impending fear of doom, and what’s best left to the imagination. Also there’s choosing the right points for music and not pre-empting things too much. It’s an on going process that continues into the edit and beyond. You’re essentially always playing around to try and maximize those moments.</span></div><div style="background-color: white; line-height: 1.22; margin-bottom: 14px; margin-left: 1px; padding: 0px; position: relative; top: -2px;"><strong><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">If you were going to get somebody to watch The Escape Artist what would you say to them?</span></strong></div><div style="background-color: white; line-height: 1.22; margin-bottom: 14px; margin-left: 1px; padding: 0px; position: relative; top: -2px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">I wouldn’t want to say too much about the show because it’s so surprising in so many ways. I guess part of the beauty of it is that it’s a mixture of so many genres and you never quite know what’s coming next. I guess I would just plea to them to trust me because it will take you on a real journey.</span></div>

BBC One David Tennant The Escape Artist TV Drama The Escape Artist Director: "Working With David Tennant Is Something Else"

Interview with Brian Welsh, the director of David Tennant's new BBC One drama, The Escape Artist: Can you tell us what the title ‘The Es...

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Truths About Fish Oil Weight Loss

<div style='font-style:italic;' class='uawbyline'>By Dr. Mary Butler</div><br /><br /> <div class='uawarticle'>Fish oil may or may not help you with weight management, or more specifically, fat management. Several factors come into play, some of which can enhance the positive effects of fish oil and others of which can undermine them.<br /> <br /> A multitude of studies have examined the potential effects of fish oil weight loss. Unfortunately, relatively few have shown how other factors might influence the results, either positively or negatively. This is why so many studies listed on PubMed, our national medical database, show contradictory results.<br /> <br /> In examining one study that compares fish oil vs. sunflower oil, from a 2007 article in the American Journal of Clinical Nutrition, we can see why results can vary. This and other such comparative reports point out the positive effects of omega-3 fatty acids in fish oil as well as the negative effects of omega-6 fatty acids in sunflower oil.<br /> <br /> In addition, this study also showed that a crucial factor for getting positive effects from fish oil is exercise. Even moderate exercise, such as walking for 45 minutes at 75 percent of age-predicted maximal heart rate, just 3 days each week, boosts the benefits of fish oil. In the absence of exercise, the effects of fish oil are insignificant.<br /> <br /> The bottom line among all the seemingly contradictory results of studies that entail the effects of fish oil on weight loss can be summarized in four take-home lessons:<br /> <br /> 1) The overabundance of omega-6 fatty acids from vegetable oils negates the benefits of omega-3 fatty acids from fish oil. Our modern dietary intake of omega-6 and omega-3 fatty acids is in a ratio of about 20:1. It should be closer to 2:1. Consume less vegetable oil and more fish oil.<br /> <br /> 2) The benefits of dietary fish oil for fat loss and lean body mass are boosted by even moderate exercise. Such benefits are insignificant in the absence of exercise.<br /> <br /> 3) The positive effects from consuming fish oil are also negated by dietary sugar. Fructose and its ubiquitous occurrence in foods and beverages in the form of high fructose corn syrup can be particulary powerful in undermining the benefits of fish oil.<br /> <br /> 4) The daily amount of fish oil is crucial. It should be at least 1.5 grams, with 2-3 grams being even better. It is also important to take fish oil supplements that have the highest amounts of EPA and DHA, which are the two main omega-3 fatty acids in fish oil.<br /> <br /> </div><br /> <div class='uawresource'><br /> <div style='font-style:italic;' class='uawabout'><br /> About the Author:<br /> </div><br /> <div class='uawlinks'>Find out what real science has to say about fat loss at <a href="http://fatlossbiology.com/">FatLossBiology.com</a>.</div><br /> </div><br />

Truths About Fish Oil Weight Loss

By Dr. Mary Butler Fish oil may or may not help you with weight management, or more specifically, fat management. Several factors come i...

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The Escape Artist Producers: "David Tennant is one of the most extraordinary actors I’ve ever worked with."

<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhDYIaSP-qV-yXlGarl4UKdnutuTtwCYkslArREpOMW2onNH_7B7WiG38Xi7R8YwDbQ14nfiAnAX3RlDfNt3PvkzGJBI8DZze1Pgyitszqhy6tiNKNcwsjUznU-P1AdmaUDMiKeqLkRH_c/s1600/thees6.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><span style="color: black;"><img border="0" height="360" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhDYIaSP-qV-yXlGarl4UKdnutuTtwCYkslArREpOMW2onNH_7B7WiG38Xi7R8YwDbQ14nfiAnAX3RlDfNt3PvkzGJBI8DZze1Pgyitszqhy6tiNKNcwsjUznU-P1AdmaUDMiKeqLkRH_c/s640/thees6.jpg" width="640" /></span></a></div><h1 class="minisite" style="clear: left; letter-spacing: -1px; margin: 0px; padding: 11px 8px 6px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: small; font-weight: normal;"><br /></span></h1><h1 class="minisite" style="clear: left; letter-spacing: -1px; margin: 0px; padding: 11px 8px 6px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: small; font-weight: normal;">Interview with The Escape Artists producers, Hilary Bevan Jones and Paul Frift:</span></h1><div><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: small; font-weight: normal;"><br /></span></div><div><div class="section" id="section-1" style="background-color: white; line-height: 13px; margin: 0px 0px 32px;"><h2 style="border-color: rgb(20, 122, 200); border-top-style: solid; border-top-width: 3px; margin: 0px 0px 4px; padding: 6px 1px 0px; position: relative; top: -2px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: small;">Hilary Bevan Jones</span></h2><div class="content content-rich-text"><div class="richtext"><div style="line-height: 1.22; margin-bottom: 14px; margin-left: 1px; padding: 0px; position: relative; top: -2px;"><strong><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">David Wolstencroft has described your relationship as a ‘will they won’t they’ romance with regards to ever working together. Why now and why this project?</span></strong></div><div style="line-height: 1.22; margin-bottom: 14px; margin-left: 1px; padding: 0px; position: relative; top: -2px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">David and I have wanted to work together for ages, but then he moved out of the country. Then we had a lovely lunch at BAFTA and that’s when the moment was right. He told me this idea and I leapt at it, within a couple of hours the working script had come around to my office and within another hour I’d read it and I’d told him I wanted to do it. So it all happened very quickly.</span></div><div style="line-height: 1.22; margin-bottom: 14px; margin-left: 1px; padding: 0px; position: relative; top: -2px;"><strong><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">What was so appealing about the script?</span></strong></div><div style="line-height: 1.22; margin-bottom: 14px; margin-left: 1px; padding: 0px; position: relative; top: -2px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">There are so many different elements to The Escape Artist and that’s why I find it so appetising. When I first read it and the story unravelled something happened which actually made me jump a foot out of my seat. I was really shaken and really surprised. David’s writing always manages to surprise me and I absolutely love that.</span></div><div style="line-height: 1.22; margin-bottom: 14px; margin-left: 1px; padding: 0px; position: relative; top: -2px;"><strong><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Could you tell us a bit about the casting?</span></strong></div><div style="line-height: 1.22; margin-bottom: 14px; margin-left: 1px; padding: 0px; position: relative; top: -2px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">David Tennant was the first choice for Will so that was fantastic when he said yes. We then wanted somebody you absolutely believe he could have a very sexy but happy relationship with, and Ashley Jensen was again a first thought, and is perfect. For Maggie, Brian Welsh had worked with Sophie a lot, and I had been longing to work with her for years.</span></div><div style="line-height: 1.22; margin-bottom: 14px; margin-left: 1px; padding: 0px; position: relative; top: -2px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">I think Toby Kebbell brings what Will could have been in another life, in another time to the role of Foyle. Foyle is not the most pleasant of people but there’s something attractive about him, there’s a sensuality, a charisma. They’re both magnetic and I think magnets do sometimes attract and sometimes they repel and we really needed that dynamic at the core of the piece.</span></div><div style="line-height: 1.22; margin-bottom: 14px; margin-left: 1px; padding: 0px; position: relative; top: -2px;"><strong><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">What did Brian Welsh bring to the project?</span></strong></div><div style="line-height: 1.22; margin-bottom: 14px; margin-left: 1px; padding: 0px; position: relative; top: -2px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">It’s the first time I’ve worked with Brian. I really loved Black Mirror, it was sensational and I knew other actors that had worked with him and they all spoke very highly of him. I think what he brings is an absolute focus, he’s wonderful with the cast but he also has a real vision for the whole piece. This is quite a tapestry so you need somebody who can stand back and make sure it all comes together and he does that really well.</span></div><div style="line-height: 1.22; margin-bottom: 14px; margin-left: 1px; padding: 0px; position: relative; top: -2px;"><strong><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Why is this suited to television in particular?</span></strong></div><div style="line-height: 1.22; margin-bottom: 14px; margin-left: 1px; padding: 0px; position: relative; top: -2px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">To be honest TV gives you extra time, it’s that simple. There is nothing else that would warrant it not being on a big screen except that 180 minutes is a bit long. You can explore the characters more and get into the nuances, where as in a movie of 100 minutes you can’t quite have the same scope. You can have scale obviously but you can’t get into those little extras.</span></div></div></div></div><div class="section" id="section-2" style="background-color: white; line-height: 13px; margin: 0px 0px 32px;"><h2 style="border-color: rgb(20, 122, 200); border-top-style: solid; border-top-width: 3px; margin: 0px 0px 4px; padding: 6px 1px 0px; position: relative; top: -2px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: small;">Paul Frift</span></h2><div class="content content-rich-text"><div class="richtext"><div style="line-height: 1.22; margin-bottom: 14px; margin-left: 1px; padding: 0px; position: relative; top: -2px;"><strong><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">How did you get involved with the project?</span></strong></div><div style="line-height: 1.22; margin-bottom: 14px; margin-left: 1px; padding: 0px; position: relative; top: -2px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Hilary called me quite early on and I was very excited because we hadn’t worked together since State Of Play. Though since then we worked together on Restless. When she told me it was a contemporary legal thriller written by David Wolstencroft, creator of Spooks I became even more excited. Then she told me it was going to star David Tennant, and the excitement levels went straight through the roof!</span></div><div style="line-height: 1.22; margin-bottom: 14px; margin-left: 1px; padding: 0px; position: relative; top: -2px;"><strong><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">What do you think the story is really about?</span></strong></div><div style="line-height: 1.22; margin-bottom: 14px; margin-left: 1px; padding: 0px; position: relative; top: -2px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">I guess it’s something to do with the existence of good and evil in life. Legal dramas tend to work out who is innocent or who is guilty, so it’s to do with that hunt for justice. I’ve always been fascinated by legal dramas in the sense that it is something that has been going on for centuries. When you get to the trial there’s something about that event - prosecution, defence, jury, judge - seeing that on film brings out that sense of justice in all of us.</span></div><div style="line-height: 1.22; margin-bottom: 14px; margin-left: 1px; padding: 0px; position: relative; top: -2px;"><strong><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">How did you make sure everything was legally accurate?</span></strong></div><div style="line-height: 1.22; margin-bottom: 14px; margin-left: 1px; padding: 0px; position: relative; top: -2px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">We have a legal advisor who is a QC, Andrew Jeffries. We went to watch him at The Old Bailey and there’s certainly something of an actor in him and I think probably in every barrister because they are having to sell something to their public, the jury.</span></div><div style="line-height: 1.22; margin-bottom: 14px; margin-left: 1px; padding: 0px; position: relative; top: -2px;"><strong><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Were there any challenges on the shoot?</span></strong></div><div style="line-height: 1.22; margin-bottom: 14px; margin-left: 1px; padding: 0px; position: relative; top: -2px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Shooting in Scotland was very challenging. It was snowing, very cold, possibly the coldest I’ve ever felt on a film location, and I’ve filmed in Iceland and Austria but this was very, very cold. It was a real challenge for the actors as they’re a bit more exposed than us - completely layered up in our clothing. We try and make them as warm as we possibly can but I think they are quite incredible to keep their concentration and deliver even in those circumstances. The crew too were incredibly professional, they just kept going.</span></div><div style="line-height: 1.22; margin-bottom: 14px; margin-left: 1px; padding: 0px; position: relative; top: -2px;"><strong><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Can you talk about working with David Tennant?</span></strong></div><div style="line-height: 1.22; margin-bottom: 14px; margin-left: 1px; padding: 0px; position: relative; top: -2px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">David is one of the most extraordinary actors I’ve ever worked with. He’s incredibly professional, very good technically, he seems to be able to remember lines like no other actor I’ve come across. I think this role will take him to places no other role has taken him recently. I think it really pushes him to give a fantastic performance.</span></div><div style="line-height: 1.22; margin-bottom: 14px; margin-left: 1px; padding: 0px; position: relative; top: -2px;"><strong><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">What made you choose Brian Welsh to direct?</span></strong></div><div style="line-height: 1.22; margin-bottom: 14px; margin-left: 1px; padding: 0px; position: relative; top: -2px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">We looked at Black Mirror and Mayday, they were both very striking pieces of television. Brian is young, he’s fresh, he’s got a lot of new ideas and it’s been a great joy working with him. I think he is really trying to bring out the Hitchcockian tension in the drama. He’s also extremely good with actors, he’s an actors director and we like that. And he’s very good at the visual side of it. He’s doing a great job.</span></div><div style="line-height: 1.22; margin-bottom: 14px; margin-left: 1px; padding: 0px; position: relative; top: -2px;"><strong><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Could you talk more about the visuals and look of the show?</span></strong></div><div style="line-height: 1.22; margin-bottom: 14px; margin-left: 1px; padding: 0px; position: relative; top: -2px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Well we’re also very lucky to have David Higgs as our cinematographer. He is extremely experienced and gives all of the visuals a very rich look. His operating style is very dynamic, and he brings out all of the different aspects of the drama.</span></div><div style="line-height: 1.22; margin-bottom: 14px; margin-left: 1px; padding: 0px; position: relative; top: -2px;"><strong><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">What about the location choices?</span></strong></div><div style="line-height: 1.22; margin-bottom: 14px; margin-left: 1px; padding: 0px; position: relative; top: -2px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">In terms of locations, there is a distinction between the very ancient and the modern. The legal world has been around for centuries and our characters live in the modern world so we chose some very ultra modern loft apartments for both Will and Maggie, and of course The Old Bailey, Middle Temple and the High Court in Scotland bring a great contrast to the piece and it works very well.</span></div><div style="line-height: 1.22; margin-bottom: 14px; margin-left: 1px; padding: 0px; position: relative; top: -2px;"><strong><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">What audience are you aiming at with The Escape Artist?</span></strong></div><div style="line-height: 1.22; margin-bottom: 14px; margin-left: 1px; padding: 0px; position: relative; top: -2px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Every so often a thriller comes along that bites into what the audience wants and pushes all their buttons, and that’s what we’re hoping to do with this.</span></div></div></div></div></div>

BBC One David Tennant The Escape Artist TV Drama The Escape Artist Producers: "David Tennant is one of the most extraordinary actors I’ve ever worked with."

Interview with The Escape Artists producers, Hilary Bevan Jones and Paul Frift: Hilary Bevan Jones David Wolstencroft has described your rel...

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David Wolstencroft On The Escape Artist: "David Tennant Inhabits The Part Completely"

<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj6LOWRHjWwGq6_6h-r9P-ecqkKN7jaUHG1xHJhUX0Iw6YNrqWHpEtWEqYEBvOZtbstDFIlu0JVS9Xg4fb9AhRWk9TlMgcxZMBDHlD8f-gSOG4Lc3DJhs7qHQ_OfFD1buVIGE-wYglZKU8/s1600/thees5.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="360" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj6LOWRHjWwGq6_6h-r9P-ecqkKN7jaUHG1xHJhUX0Iw6YNrqWHpEtWEqYEBvOZtbstDFIlu0JVS9Xg4fb9AhRWk9TlMgcxZMBDHlD8f-gSOG4Lc3DJhs7qHQ_OfFD1buVIGE-wYglZKU8/s640/thees5.jpg" width="640" /></a></div><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">The Escape Artists writer David Wolstencroft talks about the new BBC One drama:</span><br /><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span><div style="background-color: white; color: #333333; line-height: 1.22; margin-bottom: 14px; margin-left: 1px; padding: 0px; position: relative; top: -2px;"><strong><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Why did you choose ‘The Escape Artist’ as the title?</span></strong></div><div style="background-color: white; color: #333333; line-height: 1.22; margin-bottom: 14px; margin-left: 1px; padding: 0px; position: relative; top: -2px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Titles just materialise. When I created Spooks, that title was literally the first thing I wrote, at the top of the notepad. It was exactly the same with The Escape Artist. I knew I wanted to write a legal drama that had aspects of a Hitchcockian thriller to it. Something that didn’t go the usual way these types of stories can go, I wanted to give it an air of mystery and menace.</span></div><div style="background-color: white; color: #333333; line-height: 1.22; margin-bottom: 14px; margin-left: 1px; padding: 0px; position: relative; top: -2px;"><strong><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Can you tell us what makes this crime drama different?</span></strong></div><div style="background-color: white; color: #333333; line-height: 1.22; margin-bottom: 14px; margin-left: 1px; padding: 0px; position: relative; top: -2px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">There’s a tendency with legal stories to get caught up in the intellectual side of things rather than the emotional underbelly. I wanted to do something that from the gut rather than something that was about the ins and outs of the law, although this does of course involve that but I tried to frame it in a different way.</span></div><div style="background-color: white; color: #333333; line-height: 1.22; margin-bottom: 14px; margin-left: 1px; padding: 0px; position: relative; top: -2px;"><strong><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Can you tell us about the character of Will?</span></strong></div><div style="background-color: white; color: #333333; line-height: 1.22; margin-bottom: 14px; margin-left: 1px; padding: 0px; position: relative; top: -2px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Will is the master of the machine that is the legal system. I wanted to write a story about someone who gets out of that machine and is promptly run over by it. I’ve had personal experiences with legal process both here and in America, and all of those experiences have resulted in me thinking deep, raw, primal thoughts. You’re dealing with these spectacularly complex legal concepts, having these meetings that are full of legal gibberish, and yet the overall feeling for me was one of boiling fury. I was like a caged animal, and so I wanted to put that into this story of a criminal barrister.</span></div><div style="background-color: white; color: #333333; line-height: 1.22; margin-bottom: 14px; margin-left: 1px; padding: 0px; position: relative; top: -2px;"><strong><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">How important are Will’s family to his journey?</span></strong></div><div style="background-color: white; color: #333333; line-height: 1.22; margin-bottom: 14px; margin-left: 1px; padding: 0px; position: relative; top: -2px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Our private life often tells a more truthful story about ourselves that the one we project professionally. Will’s world - his marriage, his relationship with his son, is paramount in this story. It helps us identify with him. I don’t imagine I could be a lawyer or do what Will does, but he’s committed to his family, and that’s something I relate to very much. I think that creates a powerful emotional connection.</span></div><div style="background-color: white; color: #333333; line-height: 1.22; margin-bottom: 14px; margin-left: 1px; padding: 0px; position: relative; top: -2px;"><strong><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Did you have casting in mind when writing?</span></strong></div><div style="background-color: white; color: #333333; line-height: 1.22; margin-bottom: 14px; margin-left: 1px; padding: 0px; position: relative; top: -2px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">I rarely have anyone in mind when I write because I think that sometimes limits the character. In any case the right actor will also bring their own stuff to it. I have been very lucky in that David Tennant does just inhabit the part completely.</span></div><div style="background-color: white; color: #333333; line-height: 1.22; margin-bottom: 14px; margin-left: 1px; padding: 0px; position: relative; top: -2px;"><strong><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Ashley and David had worked together before, that must have helped in terms of casting?</span></strong></div><div style="background-color: white; color: #333333; line-height: 1.22; margin-bottom: 14px; margin-left: 1px; padding: 0px; position: relative; top: -2px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">I was so excited when we were talking about Ashley joining the cast as I’ve long admired her work in Ugly Betty and in Extras. I knew that working with them both was going to be a lot of fun because they’ve got a short hand together.</span></div><div style="background-color: white; color: #333333; line-height: 1.22; margin-bottom: 14px; margin-left: 1px; padding: 0px; position: relative; top: -2px;"><strong><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Could you tell us a bit about the part of Maggie played by Sophie Okonedo?</span></strong></div><div style="background-color: white; color: #333333; line-height: 1.22; margin-bottom: 14px; margin-left: 1px; padding: 0px; position: relative; top: -2px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">I think Will, Maggie and Foyle all share an element of the psychopath about them. What I love about Maggie and what Sophie has done with the character is she gives the impression that she would truly stop at nothing in order to succeed - but she never does go that far, she’s a brilliant lawyer.</span></div><div style="background-color: white; color: #333333; line-height: 1.22; margin-bottom: 14px; margin-left: 1px; padding: 0px; position: relative; top: -2px;"><strong><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">How did you feel about Toby Kebbell being cast as Foyle?</span></strong></div><div style="background-color: white; color: #333333; line-height: 1.22; margin-bottom: 14px; margin-left: 1px; padding: 0px; position: relative; top: -2px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">I was blown away by what Toby did. He was like a de-tuned television walking around the set. Deeply unsettling. The scenes between Foyle and Eileen especially. Those scenes really are messed up. When I wrote them I had an image in my mind on just how dark it would be but they went completely into the basement.</span></div><div style="background-color: white; color: #333333; line-height: 1.22; margin-bottom: 14px; margin-left: 1px; padding: 0px; position: relative; top: -2px;"><strong><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Was the character of Foyle based on any real-life criminals?</span></strong></div><div style="background-color: white; color: #333333; line-height: 1.22; margin-bottom: 14px; margin-left: 1px; padding: 0px; position: relative; top: -2px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">No, but I think he evolved out of the need for him to be in the script. In as much as I wanted him to be as engaging a nemesis as possible. He needed to be intelligent and manipulative a classic villain. I also wanted him to have an emotional response, he stays very much true to what he believes in, even as a psychopath he goes into very dark hellish places but he still stands up for what he believes in, in a horrible way. He’s a man of honour, perversely, but the wires are all jumbled.</span></div><div style="background-color: white; color: #333333; line-height: 1.22; margin-bottom: 14px; margin-left: 1px; padding: 0px; position: relative; top: -2px;"><strong><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">How did you put the twists and turns of the story together?</span></strong></div><div style="background-color: white; color: #333333; line-height: 1.22; margin-bottom: 14px; margin-left: 1px; padding: 0px; position: relative; top: -2px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">I did what I always do – I wrote myself into a corner and waited to see what happened. Will helped me get there, by that stage I knew him and although it sounds weird he sort of helped me do that.</span></div><div style="background-color: white; color: #333333; line-height: 1.22; margin-bottom: 14px; margin-left: 1px; padding: 0px; position: relative; top: -2px;"><strong><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Are there hints that Foyle and Will could have swapped places?</span></strong></div><div style="background-color: white; color: #333333; line-height: 1.22; margin-bottom: 14px; margin-left: 1px; padding: 0px; position: relative; top: -2px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">There are a lot of mirror scenes in the script to make that point. Brian (Welsh) does a great job in showing it using reflections in people’s glasses, mirrors on walls etc. That’s part of what I think the ambition has always been, to show reflections between the characters, showing their similarities. There are a lot of ways to approach the show that aren’t just about who done it and how.</span></div><div style="background-color: white; color: #333333; line-height: 1.22; margin-bottom: 14px; margin-left: 1px; padding: 0px; position: relative; top: -2px;"><strong><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Why did you choose television rather than film to tell the story?</span></strong></div><div style="background-color: white; color: #333333; line-height: 1.22; margin-bottom: 14px; margin-left: 1px; padding: 0px; position: relative; top: -2px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">I’m a TV addict. I grew up with the big event series like Cracker, House Of Cards, Edge Of Darkness. And the bar keeps being raised, which speaking personally as a writer I respond to very much. Look at something like Sherlock, and the way they tell stories on that show. I think television does allow you to inhabit a world in a way film doesn’t. I also wanted this to return. The BBC have been really supportive in that regard, they really got it from the beginning and we all wanted to make the same thing so it seemed like a perfect fit.</span></div>

BBC One David Tennant David Wolstencroft The Escape Artist TV Drama David Wolstencroft On The Escape Artist: "David Tennant Inhabits The Part Completely"

The Escape Artists writer David Wolstencroft talks about the new BBC One drama: Why did you choose ‘The Escape Artist’ as the title? Titles ...

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Ashely Jensen: "I think there are a lot of women that would be slightly jealous of my bedroom scenes with David Tennant"

<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgDiUY-F6ouyupFt7cZprqfjNPXQRpWrMP5HZqPMwZdajxEdW2dxwVYPB_xh8qREJOPeMa4KktB0iYDF7iCa7B36vkFWEIfCCc2_aDrAGnzmIXAXC65f3eGg8EnEQ_Y3B8qNm1qvn_fXKQ/s1600/thees2.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="360" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgDiUY-F6ouyupFt7cZprqfjNPXQRpWrMP5HZqPMwZdajxEdW2dxwVYPB_xh8qREJOPeMa4KktB0iYDF7iCa7B36vkFWEIfCCc2_aDrAGnzmIXAXC65f3eGg8EnEQ_Y3B8qNm1qvn_fXKQ/s640/thees2.jpg" width="640" /></a></div><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">David Tennant's The Escape Artists co star Ashley Jensen has been chatting about working on the BBC drama:</span><br /><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span><div style="background-color: white; color: #333333; line-height: 1.22; margin-bottom: 14px; margin-left: 1px; padding: 0px; position: relative; top: -2px;"><strong><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">It’s a fantastic script - was that what drew you to the part?</span></strong></div><div style="background-color: white; color: #333333; line-height: 1.22; margin-bottom: 14px; margin-left: 1px; padding: 0px; position: relative; top: -2px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">I think every actor says it ultimately comes down to the script. In this case the script was such a brilliantly executed story, with very complex moral dilemmas, that I couldn’t say no. Quite often when you read a script you find that life gets in the way, you have to do something else and you get distracted, but this was a genuine page-turner, so I really, really liked it.</span></div><div style="background-color: white; color: #333333; line-height: 1.22; margin-bottom: 14px; margin-left: 1px; padding: 0px; position: relative; top: -2px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">You take different jobs for different reasons and I think because David and I have a good rapport it will add to the impact of the story. I wanted to be part of that.</span></div><div style="background-color: white; color: #333333; line-height: 1.22; margin-bottom: 14px; margin-left: 1px; padding: 0px; position: relative; top: -2px;"><strong><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">How do the producer and director manage to reflect the twists and turns of the script in the finished films?</span></strong></div><div style="background-color: white; color: #333333; line-height: 1.22; margin-bottom: 14px; margin-left: 1px; padding: 0px; position: relative; top: -2px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">The way it’s been shot very much sets the tone for the whole piece. It’s a collaboration of course, the casting, lighting, directing just as much as the writing of the script, but to have the wonderful base to work from is always a great place to start. When I first discussed it with our director Brian he told me that he wanted to shoot it like a Hitchcock thriller, so it would have subtle lighting and interesting shots, and indeed from what I’ve seen he’s achieved that.</span></div><div style="background-color: white; color: #333333; line-height: 1.22; margin-bottom: 14px; margin-left: 1px; padding: 0px; position: relative; top: -2px;"><strong><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">David Wolstencroft describes The Escape Artist as a thriller set against a legal back-drop?</span></strong></div><div style="background-color: white; color: #333333; line-height: 1.22; margin-bottom: 14px; margin-left: 1px; padding: 0px; position: relative; top: -2px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">That’s what’s so interesting. You can almost set a thriller anywhere but I do think it is fascinating to watch the British legal system in action. The story has several different levels - David is going on this journey where he has to address things that he has believed in all his life. He’s questioning his whole way of thinking and his life has just been turned on its head so I think this is an intellectual show as much as it is a thriller. With any good thriller you should get to the point where you ask yourself, what would I do? The Escape Artist absolutely does that. If you’re asking yourself those questions then that’s good story telling.</span></div><div style="background-color: white; color: #333333; line-height: 1.22; margin-bottom: 14px; margin-left: 1px; padding: 0px; position: relative; top: -2px;"><strong><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Did it make accepting the job easier knowing David Tennant was going to be your on-screen husband?</span></strong></div><div style="background-color: white; color: #333333; line-height: 1.22; margin-bottom: 14px; margin-left: 1px; padding: 0px; position: relative; top: -2px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">David and I knew each other from 20 years ago. We did theatre together in Scotland and then worked in theatre together 10 years later. We’ve kept in touch throughout that time which helps when you’re playing a married couple that need to be so familiar with each other. I think there are a lot of women that would be slightly jealous of my bedroom scenes with David Tennant - but it’s all part of the job!</span></div><div style="background-color: white; color: #333333; line-height: 1.22; margin-bottom: 14px; margin-left: 1px; padding: 0px; position: relative; top: -2px;"><strong><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">You’re known for both your dramatic and comedic roles – do you approach them differently?</span></strong></div><div style="background-color: white; color: #333333; line-height: 1.22; margin-bottom: 14px; margin-left: 1px; padding: 0px; position: relative; top: -2px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">I wouldn’t say I approach drama in a particularly different way to comedy. If anything I approach American and British comedy a little differently. All of the American comedy I’ve done is quite often about the lines, whereas the British comedy is about the space between the lines and the things that are not said.</span></div><div style="background-color: white; color: #333333; line-height: 1.22; margin-bottom: 14px; margin-left: 1px; padding: 0px; position: relative; top: -2px;"><strong><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">What was the shoot like for you as a whole?</span></strong></div><div style="background-color: white; color: #333333; line-height: 1.22; margin-bottom: 14px; margin-left: 1px; padding: 0px; position: relative; top: -2px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">I seemed to be literally on my back the whole time. I was in a bath on my back, I was in a bed on my back. So I would get up and walk into work then lie down. The glamour of it all!</span></div><div style="background-color: white; color: #333333; line-height: 1.22; margin-bottom: 14px; margin-left: 1px; padding: 0px; position: relative; top: -2px;"><strong><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">What was it like working with Monica Dolan?</span></strong></div><div style="background-color: white; color: #333333; line-height: 1.22; margin-bottom: 14px; margin-left: 1px; padding: 0px; position: relative; top: -2px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Monica is a friend of mine. It’s funny actually - I was just saying earlier that when women get to the age of 40 they’re split into two categories - you’re either playing the Glenn Close in Fatal Attraction or the Anne Archer in Fatal Attraction. My good friend Monica is definitely Glenn Close and I’m definitely Anne Archer!</span></div><div style="background-color: white; color: #333333; line-height: 1.22; margin-bottom: 14px; margin-left: 1px; padding: 0px; position: relative; top: -2px;"><strong><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">What is the dynamic like between your character and Maggie?</span></strong></div><div style="background-color: white; color: #333333; line-height: 1.22; margin-bottom: 14px; margin-left: 1px; padding: 0px; position: relative; top: -2px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">I think women can be their own worst enemies sometimes. Maggie is so deeply patronising to Kate but it’s Maggie’s insecurity and her need to constantly prove things to herself. Kate is the bigger woman I think because she is very secure in her relationship. Maggie wants affirmation whereas Kate is very secure in who she is and what she has, so it doesn’t really affect her.</span></div><div style="background-color: white; color: #333333; line-height: 1.22; margin-bottom: 14px; margin-left: 1px; padding: 0px; position: relative; top: -2px;"><strong><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">What were the producers Hilary Bevan Jones and Paul Frift like to work with?</span></strong></div><div style="background-color: white; color: #333333; line-height: 1.22; margin-bottom: 14px; margin-left: 1px; padding: 0px; position: relative; top: -2px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">They have a body of work that is BAFTA winning, with wonderful, eclectic, interesting scripts, so knowing the calibre of work they have behind them you always felt in safe hands. They were always around and they really were brilliant producers!</span></div><div style="background-color: white; color: #333333; line-height: 1.22; margin-bottom: 14px; margin-left: 1px; padding: 0px; position: relative; top: -2px;"><strong><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">The story is heavily set in British law, could that be an issue for international viewers?</span></strong></div><div style="background-color: white; color: #333333; line-height: 1.22; margin-bottom: 14px; margin-left: 1px; padding: 0px; position: relative; top: -2px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">I think really this is a morality tale of good and evil, and those themes are universal – so in terms of a drama and a thriller it works for everyone. I also think it is quite interesting for an international audience to see how British law works because it is so steeped in history. It’s not like Judge Judy - we still wear wigs and there are rules you have to adhere to and speeches that people have to make. It was fascinating for me as I didn’t really know much about it before.</span></div><div style="background-color: white; color: #333333; line-height: 1.22; margin-bottom: 14px; margin-left: 1px; padding: 0px; position: relative; top: -2px;"><strong><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">How was it working within such an ensemble cast?</span></strong></div><div style="background-color: white; color: #333333; line-height: 1.22; margin-bottom: 14px; margin-left: 1px; padding: 0px; position: relative; top: -2px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">I think we got a certain calibre of actors wanting to be a part of The Escape Artist because they believed in the script and in Brian and David’s vision for the films. It’s a very creative piece of filmmaking and as an actor that’s always exciting to be part of. Gus, who played my on screen son Jamie, was absolutely brilliant, I think child actors these days seem to be getting better and better. He was so free and very receptive. Before a scene we would have a bit of banter and he didn’t get shy or embarrassed or coy or feel silly about it and he was very much there and very open.</span></div><div style="background-color: white; color: #333333; line-height: 1.22; margin-bottom: 14px; margin-left: 1px; padding: 0px; position: relative; top: -2px;"><strong><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Did you feel at all protective towards Gus given some of the darker subject matter?</span></strong></div><div style="background-color: white; color: #333333; line-height: 1.22; margin-bottom: 14px; margin-left: 1px; padding: 0px; position: relative; top: -2px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Well Gus wasn’t allowed on set for the more disturbing scenes. Production went to great lengths to do that which was the right thing to do. He was completely unperturbed by it. Gus, I believe, is 12 but looks a lot younger.</span></div><div style="background-color: white; color: #333333; line-height: 1.22; margin-bottom: 14px; margin-left: 1px; padding: 0px; position: relative; top: -2px;"><strong><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">You must have felt at home with all the Scottish accents?</span></strong></div><div style="background-color: white; color: #333333; line-height: 1.22; margin-bottom: 14px; margin-left: 1px; padding: 0px; position: relative; top: -2px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">It’s always nice to hear the dulcet tones of a Scottish accent. I spent six yours in America being the only Scottish person. I used to make jokes about being the token jock and of course out there a jock is a totally different thing and they all said, ‘what you play football?’ and I found myself having to explain my sense of humour.</span></div><div style="background-color: white; color: #333333; line-height: 1.22; margin-bottom: 14px; margin-left: 1px; padding: 0px; position: relative; top: -2px;"><strong><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Why should people tune in for the show?</span></strong></div><div style="background-color: white; color: #333333; line-height: 1.22; margin-bottom: 14px; margin-left: 1px; padding: 0px; position: relative; top: -2px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">I want people to watch it because good drama makes you question things and question yourself, like a good book can and going to the theatre makes you have a discussion afterwards. This is the sort of piece that will have the audience asking themselves what would they do in that situation, and what would provoke them to make them go that far?</span></div>

Ashley Jensen BBC One interview The Escape Artist TV Drama Ashely Jensen: "I think there are a lot of women that would be slightly jealous of my bedroom scenes with David Tennant"

David Tennant's The Escape Artists co star Ashley Jensen has been chatting about working on the BBC drama: It’s a fantastic script - was...

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