Ang Lee talks about risks, spirituality of "Life of Pi"

NEW YORK (Reuters) - Gay cowboy drama "Brokeback Mountain" may have been considered a risky film to make, but director Ang Lee said his new movie, "Life of Pi," a 3D exploration of faith about a boy stranded on a boat with a Bengal tiger, is his riskiest yet.

The film, which was released in U.S. theaters this week, is adapted from Yann Martel's best-selling novel of the same name and was once considered impossible to make.

Oscar-winning Taiwanese director Lee, 58, took on the laborious task of using computer-generated imagery to bring the sensational plot to the big screen, taking a year and a half just to edit the film together.

The director talked to Reuters about the film's themes, technical barriers and casting an unknown actor in the lead.

Q. Why was "Life of Pi" considered unfilmable?

A. "Because you cannot make the tiger do everything you want to do, you have to use digital. A digital animal, up until two years ago, was not totally realistic yet, let alone in 3D, and then water is pretty difficult."

Q. Was this your most difficult filming experience yet?

A. "Oh yes. And it was also the longest...there was the technical difficulty and then it is a big movie. And it was across continents, I finally decided to shoot most of it in Taiwan, but we also had to go to India to shoot for two to three weeks. Because you can't fake Pondicherry, and Munnar. And then we have scenes in Canada."

Q. But Brokeback Mountain was a risky film too?

A. "No, that wasn't for me. At least when I made it, I thought it was strictly arthouse and few people would see it. And it's a lot cheaper (to make). So I didn't care...And then I got nervous, 'Oh they are going to lynch me, making a gay cowboy movie, that will go into a shopping mall.'"

Q. It was only after you made it you realized that?

A. "Yes, I was afraid. I was looking around when I walked, when I would go home, to see if anybody was following me. Once it hit the shopping mall I was nervous, actually. My brother is a distributor in Taiwan and I told him not to buy it. He hates me to this day, he is still babbling about it."

Q. Why choose unknown Suraj Sharma to play Pi?

A. "I wanted someone authentic, and no bad habits, that means you have to train them from the start. "

Q. Why did you replace Tobey Maguire and reshoot his scenes with the little-known Rafe Spall?

A. "It was a small part, and he is a big movie star. He is a good old friend of mine and he would do this for nothing, for me. But he is not doing anything (in the role), he is just sitting there listening most of the time. It becomes a little distracting I think."

Q. How does the film explore spirituality?

A. "To me, faith can be elusive, but .. As a Taoist would say, 'That's the apple's truth.' The source of all the material comes from nothingness, illusion is working more on things you can prove. That's the principle, the essence of life, it is actually an illusion, not immaterial. That's worth pursuing. So illusion is not nothing. In a way, that is the truth."

"Sometimes I feel (illusions) are more of life's essence, I can trust them more than real life that is full of deceit and covering up."

Q. Did exploring faith encourage you to make this?

"The book is fascinating, it talks about faith. But it didn't make me believe in God or anything...I didn't go to church or a temple after that. When I started making the movie, you do feel faith embody you and carry you through. But when I picked the subject, and chose to do the book, it was actually more storytelling in my mind. The value of storytelling. How people share a story. Because a story has structure, it has a beginning, middle and end. It seems to have meaning, where life has not."

Q. Do you practice any religion?

A. "No, my mother is a baptized Christian, so she made me go to church every Sunday, and I prayed four times a day until I was 14. And at lunchtime kids at school would giggle at my praying...I stopped praying. And two weeks later, nothing happened to me, so I didn't pick it up again."

"I am not particularly religious. But I think we do face the question of where God is, why we are created and where does life go, why we exist. That sort of thing. And it is very hard to talk about it these days, because it cannot be proven. It is hard to discuss it rationally."

Q. Do you consider yourself spiritual?

A. "I hate to think life is just facts and laws. And I am a filmmaker, I am a sensitive person, I like to think it is spiritual, so I like people to be more in that way. I think life without spirit is in the dark, it is absurd. Call it illusion or call it faith, whatever you call it, we have emotional attachment to the unknown. We yearn to find out. That is human nature. It can be, in a way, unrequited love, we don't know. I don't have a particular God I pray to, except sometimes a movie god." (laughs)

(Reporting by Christine Kearney, editing by Piya Sinha-Roy and Andrew Hay)

08.04 | 0 komentar | Read More

Larry Hagman dead at 81, portrayed notorious TV villain J.R. Ewing

(Reuters) - Larry Hagman, who created one of American television's most supreme villains in the conniving, amoral oilman J.R. Ewing of "Dallas," died on Friday, the Dallas Morning News reported. He was 81.

Hagman died at a Dallas hospital of complications from his battle with throat cancer, the newspaper said, quoting a statement from his family. He had suffered from liver cancer and cirrhosis of the liver in the 1990s after decades of drinking.

Hagman's mother was stage and movie star Mary Martin and he became a star himself in 1965 on "I Dream of Jeannie," a popular television sitcom in which he played Major Anthony Nelson, an astronaut who discovers a beautiful genie in a bottle.

"Dallas," which made its premiere on the CBS network in 1978, made Hagman a superstar. The show quickly became one of the network's top-rated programs, built an international following and inspired a spin-off, imitators and a revival in 2012.

"Dallas" was the night-time soap-opera story of a Texas family, fabulously wealthy from oil and cattle, and its plot brimmed with back-stabbing, double-dealing, family feuds, violence, adultery and other bad behavior.

In the middle of it all stood Hagman's black-hearted J.R. Ewing - grinning wickedly in a broad cowboy hat and boots, plotting how to cheat his business competitors and cheat on his wife. He was the villain TV viewers loved to despise during the show's 356-episode run from 1978 to 1991.

"I really can't remember half of the people I've slept with, stabbed in the back or driven to suicide," Hagman said of his character in Time magazine.

In his autobiography, "Hello Darlin': Tall (and Absolutely True) Tales About My Life," Hagman wrote that J.R. originally was not to be the focus of "Dallas" but that changed when he began ad-libbing on the set to make his character more outrageous and compelling.

'WHO SHOT J.R.?'

To conclude its second season, the "Dallas" producers put together one of U.S. television's most memorable episodes in which Ewing was shot by an unseen assailant. That gave fans months to fret over whether J.R. would survive and who had pulled the trigger. In the show's opening the following season, it was revealed that J.R.'s sister-in-law, Kristin, with whom he had been having an affair, was behind the gun.

Hagman said an international publisher offered him $250,000 to reveal who had shot J.R. and he considered giving the wrong information and taking the money, but in the end, "I decided not to be so like J.R. in real life."

The popularity of "Dallas" made Hagman one of the best-paid actors in television and earned him a fortune that even a Ewing would have coveted. He lost some of it, however, in bad oil investments before turning to real estate.

"I have an apartment in New York, a ranch in Santa Fe, a castle in Ojai outside of L.A., a beach house in Malibu and thinking of buying a place in Santa Monica," Hagman said in a Chicago Tribune interview.

An updated "Dallas" series began in June 2012 on the TNT network with Hagman reprising his J.R. role with original cast members Linda Gray, who played J.R.'s long-suffering wife, Sue Ellen, and Patrick Duffy, who was his brother Bobby. The show was to focus on the sons of J.R. and Bobby.

Hagman had a wide eccentric streak. When he first met actress Lauren Bacall, he licked her arm because he had been told she did not like to be touched and he was known for leading parades on the Malibu beach and showing up at a grocery store in a gorilla suit. Above his Malibu home flew a flag with the credo "Vita Celebratio Est (Life Is a Celebration)" and he lived hard for many years.

In 1967, rock musician David Crosby turned him on to LSD, which Hagman said took away his fear of death, and Jack Nicholson introduced him to marijuana because Nicholson thought he was drinking too much.

Hagman had started drinking as a teenager and said he did not stop until the moment in 1992 when his doctor told him he had cirrhosis of the liver and could die within six months. Hagman wrote that for the past 15 years he had been drinking about four bottles of champagne a day, including while on the "Dallas" set.

LIVER TRANSPLANT

In July 1995, he was diagnosed with liver cancer, which led him to quit smoking, and a month later he underwent a liver transplant.

After giving up his vices, Hagman said he did not lose his zest for life.

"It's the same old Larry Hagman," he told a reporter. "He's just a littler sober-er."

Hagman was born on September 21, 1931, in Weatherford, Texas, and his father was a lawyer who dealt with the Texas oil barons Hagman would later come to portray. He was still a boy when his parents divorced and he went to Los Angeles with Martin, who would become a Broadway and Hollywood musical star.

Hagman eventually landed in New York to pursue acting, making his stage debut there in "The Taming of the Shrew." In New York, he married Maj Axelsson in 1954 while they were in a production of "South Pacific. The marriage produced two children, Heidi and Preston.

Hagman served in the Air Force, spending five years in Europe as the director of USO shows, and on his return to New York he took a starring role in the daytime soap "The Edge of Night." His breakthrough came in 1965 when he landed the "I Dream of Jeannie" role opposite Barbara Eden.

In his later years, Hagman became an advocate for organ transplants and an anti-smoking campaigner. He also was devoted to solar energy, telling the New York Times he had a $750,000 solar panel system at his Ojai estate, and made a commercial in which he portrayed a J.R. Ewing who had forsaken oil for solar power. He was a longtime member of the Peace and Freedom Party, a minor leftist organization in California.

Hagman told the Times that after death he wanted his remains to be "spread over a field and have marijuana and wheat planted and harvest it in a couple of years and then have a big marijuana cake, enough for 200 to 300 people. People would eat a little of Larry."

(Writing by Bill Trott in Washington; Additional reporting by Alex Dobuszinkis in Los Angeles; Editing by Peter Cooney)

08.04 | 0 komentar | Read More

Psy's "Gangnam Style" video becomes YouTube's most viewed

LOS ANGELES (Reuters) - South Korean rap star Psy's music video "Gangnam Style" on Saturday became the most watched item ever posted to YouTube with more than 800 million views, edging past Canadian teen star Justin Bieber's 2-year-old video for his song "Baby."

The milestone was the latest pop culture victory for Psy, 34, a portly rap singer known for his slicked-back hair and comic dance style who has become one of the most unlikely global stars of 2012.

Psy succeeded with a video that generated countless parodies and became a media sensation. He gained more fame outside his native country than the more polished singers in South Korea's so-called K-Pop style who have sought to win international audiences.

YouTube, in a post on its Trends blog, said "Gangnam Style" on Saturday surpassed the site's previous record holder, Bieber's 2010 music video "Baby," and by mid-day "Gangnam Style" had reached 805 million views, compared to 803 million for "Baby." Within a few hours, "Gangnam Style" had gone up to more than 809 million views.

"Gangnam Style" was first posted to YouTube in July, and by the following month it began to show huge popularity on YouTube with audiences outside of South Korea.

"It's been a massive hit at a global level unlike anything we've ever seen before," said the YouTube blog.

The blog also said the "velocity" of the video's popularity has been unprecedented for YouTube.

In his "Gangnam Style" video the outlandishly dressed, sunglass-wearing Psy raps in Korean and dances in the style of an upper-crust person riding an invisible horse.

The song is named after the affluent Gangnam District of Seoul and it mocks the rampant consumerism of that suburb. Psy, whose real name is Park Jai-sang, is no stranger to wealth as his father is chairman of a South Korean semiconductor company.

His parents sent him to business school in the United States but he confesses that he bought musical instruments with his tuition money. He later graduated from Berklee College of Music in Boston and won fame in South Korea with his 2001 debut album.

The viral success of "Gangnam Style" on YouTube also has translated into strong record sales. In late September, the song jumped to the top of the British pop charts and it also has sold well in other countries.

Popular parodies of the "Gangnam Style" video included one featuring the University of Oregon's duck mascot, and another done in the "Star Trek" language Klingon.

The official YouTube view count for Gangnam Style represents only the figure for the original video posted to the site, but copycat versions, parodies and videos by people commenting on the song have been posted to the site and elsewhere on the Web.

Counting all those different versions, "Gangnam Style" and its related videos have more than 2.2 billion views across the Internet, said Matt Fiorentino, spokesman for the online video tracking firm Visible Measures.

"Without the dance, I don't think it would have been as big as it is," Fiorentino said. "And the other thing is, Psy has a unique sense of humor which comes through in the video. He doesn't take himself too seriously."

(Editing by Barbara Goldberg and Bill Trott)

08.04 | 0 komentar | Read More

Beyonce to direct documentary about herself for HBO

LOS ANGELES (Reuters) - Pop superstar Beyonce is stepping behind the camera to direct a behind-the-scenes documentary about her personal and professional life, U.S. cable channel HBO said on Monday.

The currently untitled film will debut on February 16 and show the Grammy-winning singer's life in the recording studio, readying for live performances and running her own TV and music production company.

"Everybody knows Beyonce's music, but few know Beyonce the person," HBO Programming President Michael Lombardo said in a statement. "Along with electrifying footage of Beyonce on stage, this unique special looks beyond the glamour to reveal a vibrant, vulnerable, unforgettable woman."

The documentary will also feature moments in the "Crazy in Love" singer's family life and first-person footage Beyonce captured on her laptop.

Beyonce, 31, who is married to hip hop artist and mogul Jay-Z, will headline the Super Bowl halftime show in New Orleans on February 3.

(Reporting By Eric Kelsey, editing by Jill Serjeant and Andrew Hay)

08.04 | 0 komentar | Read More

New Jersey's Christie, more popular than ever, seeks re-election

NEW YORK (Reuters) - New Jersey Governor Chris Christie, a Republican star who has enjoying record-high popularity for his hands-on approach to Superstorm Sandy, on Monday filed papers announcing his intention to seek a second term next November.

Christie, a popular surrogate on Republican Mitt Romney's failed presidential campaign, delivered the keynote address at the Republican National Convention this summer and is considered a popular choice to run for president in 2016.

Despite his popularity on the national stage, Christie - known for his blunt, sometimes over-the-top style - has sometimes struggled to win over his constituents in liberal New Jersey, where Democrats control both houses of the legislature.

Since Sandy tore through the state on October 29, laying waste to large stretches of the Jersey Shore, Christie's approval rating has jumped 19 percentage points.

Christie appeared to set politics aside, touring the damage with Democratic President Barack Obama days before November 6 Election Day, and showing a personal touch with residents who lost their homes or loved ones in the storm.

Christie has a 67 percent favorability rating among registered voters, up from 48 percent in October, according to the Rutgers-Eagleton poll.

Since taking office three years ago, Christie's signature achievement has been a 2011 law that made sweeping changes to the state's pensions and health benefits for state workers.

(Reporting by Edith Honan; Editing by Jackie Frank)

08.04 | 0 komentar | Read More

Halle Berry's ex claims he was victim in Thanksgiving brawl

LOS ANGELES (Reuters) - Halle Berry's ex-boyfriend Gabriel Aubry on Monday won a restraining order against the actress's current lover, as the two men fought in the Los Angeles courts over who started their Thanksgiving Day brawl.

Releasing photos of himself with a black eye and cuts to his face, Aubry claimed that he was the victim in the November 22 punch-up with Berry's fiancé, French actor Olivier Martinez, in the driveway of her Los Angeles house.

"I suffered numerous injuries as a result of the attack, including a fractured rib, multiple bruises on my face and a number of cuts which required stitches," Aubry said in court papers, alleging that Martinez had threatened the day before to kill him.

"It all happened so fast and so suddenly; I did not see Mr Martinez's actions coming and thus I was not ready for it and was not able to defend myself," Aubry wrote.

Aubry, Martinez, and the Oscar-winning "Monster's Ball" actress have been embroiled for months in a custody fight over Berry's 4-year-old daughter, Nahla. Berry wants to take the daughter she had with Aubry to live with her and Martinez in France, but a Los Angeles judge denied that request earlier in November.

Aubry claimed in his request for a restraining order on Monday that Martinez told him, "You cost us $3 million," while the French actor punched and kicked him on November 22.

Aubry, a Canadian model, was arrested last week for battery after the fist fight, and ordered to stay away from Berry, the child, and Martinez.

Neither man has been yet been formally charged in the case.

(Reporting by Jill Serjeant; Editing by Jackie Frank)

08.04 | 0 komentar | Read More

Nobel winner and organ transplant pioneer Joseph Murray dies at 93

(Reuters) - Dr. Joseph Murray, the surgeon who carried out the first successful kidney transplant and later won a Nobel Prize for his work in medicine and physiology, died on Monday in Boston at the age of 93.

Murray died after suffering a stroke last Thursday, Brigham and Women's Hospital spokesman Tom Langford said.

Murray and his team completed the first human organ transplant in 1954, taking a kidney from one identical twin and giving it to his twin brother, opening a new field in medicine, the hospital said.

"The world is a better place because of all Dr. Murray has given. His legacy will forever endure in our hearts and in every patient who has received the gift of life through transplantation," hospital president Dr. Elizabeth Nabel said in a statement.

Later in his career, Murray continued to search for ways of suppressing a patient's immune response to prevent it from rejecting foreign tissue, eventually becoming a co-winner of the Nobel Prize for Physiology or Medicine in 1990.

"Difficulties are opportunities. This is a quote that sits atop my father's desk at home. It reflects the unwavering optimism of a great man who was generous, curious, and always humble," his son Rick said in a statement.

Murray began a career in medicine on graduating from Harvard Medical School in the 1940s, and developed an interest in transplanting tissue while working with service personnel injured in World War Two, according to the Britannica Online Encyclopedia.

He completed his surgical training at the Brigham and Women's Hospital and later returned to join the staff and serve as chief of plastic surgery.

With broad interests beyond medicine, Murray said in a brief autobiography for the Nobel Prize organization that he and his extended family had been "blessed in our lives beyond my wildest dreams."

"My only wish would be to have 10 more lives to live on this planet. If that were possible, I'd spend one lifetime each in embryology, genetics, physics, astronomy and geology," he said.

"The other lifetimes would be as a pianist, backwoodsman, tennis player, or writer for the National Geographic."

More than 600,000 people worldwide have received transplants since Murray's innovation, the hospital said.

(Additional reporting by Tim Gaynor; Editing by Lisa Shumaker)

08.04 | 0 komentar | Read More

Ex-Elmo puppeteer faces new sex-with-minor allegation

NEW YORK (Reuters) - The puppeteer formerly behind the "Sesame Street" character Elmo faces a new accusation of having sex with an underage boy, a week after a similar allegation prompted him to resign from the iconic public television children's program.

In a lawsuit filed Tuesday in U.S. District Court in Manhattan, a man identified only as John alleges Kevin Clash engaged in oral sex and other sex acts with him when John was 16 years old. The suit seeks at least $75,000 in damages.

The suit alleges the incident occurred in either 2000 or 2001 when John, who is from Florida, visited New York for modeling opportunities. John came to know Clash, then 40, through a telephone chat line for gays on which Clash claimed to be a 30-year-old named Craig, according to the suit.

John returned to New York when he turned 18, and he and Clash renewed the relationship, the lawsuit said.

"Mr. Clash believes the lawsuit has no merit," Clash's publicist, Risa B. Heller, said in an emailed statement.

It is the latest charge levied against Clash, now 52, who resigned on November 20 from Sesame Workshop, the company behind "Sesame Street," after nearly 30 years on the show.

His resignation came the same day Cecil Singleton filed a claim seeking more than $5 million in damages from Clash. Singleton claims he met the then-32-year-old puppeteer in 1993 in a gay chat room when he was 15.

It added that on numerous occasions over a period of years Clash engaged in sexual activity with Singleton.

The newest allegation comes about two weeks after another man recanted his claims that Clash had sex with him when he was 16 years old. The man later said the relationship was consensual.

Clash had denied the allegations and acknowledged a past relationship with his first accuser. He added the pair were both consenting adults at the time.

The Elmo character debuted on "Sesame Street" in 1979, 10 years after the show premiered and introduced the now-iconic characters Big Bird, Bert and Ernie, Oscar the Grouch and Cookie Monster, among others, to American children.

While Clash was the third performer to animate the child-like shaggy red monster, Sesame Workshop credits him with turning Elmo into the international sensation he became.

(Reporting by Dan Burns; Editing by Paul Thomasch and Cynthia Osterman)

08.04 | 0 komentar | Read More

Former presidential nominee Dole in hospital: media reports

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Former Republican presidential nominee Bob Dole has been admitted to Washington's Walter Reed Army medical center for what an aide called a "routine procedure," media reports said on Tuesday.

Dole, 89, "self-checked into the hospital for a routine procedure and will be discharged tomorrow," an aide told NBC News. "He's doing very well."

According to Politico, Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, a Democrat, said on the Senate floor on Tuesday that Dole was hospitalized "because he is infirm. He is sick."

Reid's comments came during debate on the U.N. Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities. Dole, who was severely wounded during World War Two, had sent a letter to the Senate urging passage.

Dole, a former Senate majority leader from Kansas, lost the 1996 presidential election to Democratic incumbent Bill Clinton. Dole served as a senator from 1969 to 1996.

(Reporting by Ian Simpson; Editing by Paul Simao)

08.04 | 0 komentar | Read More

X Factor judge Louis Walsh settles defamation case

DUBLIN (Reuters) - Television personality and pop music producer Louis Walsh on Wednesday settled a 500,000 euro ($640,000) defamation case against News Group Newspapers in Ireland.

The deal came after Walsh, best known for his role as a judge on the hit television show "The X Factor", sued the group for publishing a story last year based on false allegations that he had groped a man in a Dublin night club.

Leonard Watters, who made the accusations before later retracting them, was jailed for six months earlier this year.

Paul Tweed, Walsh's solicitor, said: "The publishers of the Irish, UK and online editions of the Sun have this morning unreservedly apologized to Louis Walsh.

"They have also agreed to pay very substantial damages of 500,000 euros together with his legal costs."

Walsh, who managed Irish boy bands Westlife and Boyzone, said the story had a "terrible effect" on him.

"I'm very satisfied with this morning's total vindication for me, but I remain very angry at the treatment I received at the hands of the Sun," he said outside court.

"I have the utmost respect and time for most journalists with whom I've always enjoyed a good relationship, and I'm therefore absolutely gutted and traumatized that these allegations should have been published

"I wouldn't wish this on my worst enemy."

The Sun said it apologized "unreservedly".

(Reporting by Sarah O'Connor)

08.04 | 0 komentar | Read More