Posts Tagged ‘COVID-19’

TOTALLY UNDER CONTROL: 4 STARS. “The truth will make you sick.”

“Totally Under Control,” the title of the new Alex Gibney now on VOD, is a bad joke. Kind of like nicknaming a tall guy Tiny it’s an ironic, sarcastic comment on President Donald Trump’s repeated denial of the severity of the COVID-19 pandemic. Made in secret over the five months leading up to the U.S. Presidential Election, it features damning interviews with scientists, medical professionals and government insiders.

The opening narration sets the stage, not that anyone alive needs reminding that we are living in very strange times. “2020. Since the 1980s, it’s been a magical year for science fiction writers, the year of predictions about the future, and the ruthless power of technology and humanity would be bound together by a world wide web. Artificial Intelligence would exponentially expand the powers of the human mind. And the world would be dominated and controlled by information based mega corporations without need for government intervention. But all that turned out to be a technocratic illusion when nature set loose a terrible disease that took advantage of the very connectivity we had manufactured.”

The narration goes on to say, “At a moment of crisis the world’s most powerful nation didn’t rise to the occasion it descended into division and chaos,” before asking the million dollar question, “Why did it fail to reckon for a danger for which it should have been so well prepared?”

To answer the question Oscar winner Gibney with co-directors Ophelia Harutyunyan and Suzanne Hillinger invented the “Corona Cam,” an easy and sanitary way to do interviews—this does not look like a Zoom meeting—to interview a variety of experts like whistleblower Dr. Rick Bright who says, “We, the scientists, knew what to do for the pandemic response. The plan was in front of us, but leadership would not do it.”

Add to that recent newsreel footage, investigative reporting and ominous narration and you have a portrait of catastrophic systemic bungling, beginning in January 20, 2020 when the U.S. and South Korea both discovered their first cases of COVID-19, that has left hundreds of thousands dead, many hundreds of thousands more ill with side effects that will linger for years and an economy in tatters.

It’s a haunting collection of facts that would be unbelievable if it wasn’t true. Gibney, Harutyunyan and Hillinger’s aim to expose “a system-wide collapse caused by a profound dereliction of Presidential leadership,” is methodical and urgent, digging behind the headlines to reveal a timeline that should be of concern to everyone reading this or watching the film. It is a difficult watch, not because it isn’t slickly made but because it an infuriating reminder of how we got into this situation.

The movie’s tagline says it all, “The truth will make you sick.”

IN ISOLATION WITH..: BILLY JOEL DRUMMER AND AUTHOR LIBERTY DEVITTO!

Check out episode twenty-three of Richard’s web series, “In Isolation With…” It’s the talk show where we make a connection without actually making contact! Today, broadcasting directly from Isolation Studios (a.k.a. my home office), we meet Liberty DeVitto. He joins me via Zoom but you’ve been listening to him for decades. As Billy Joel’s drummer from 1976 to 2003, he’s credited as drummer on records with sales of over 150 million copies. Do you love “Just the Way You Are”? That Liberty DeVitto. How about “She’s Always a Woman,” “Only the Good Die Young” “You May be Right” or “It’s Still Rock and Roll to Me”? All Liberty DeVitto. He’s what they call a New York City style drummer, solid and powerful. He also an author with a new memoir, “Liberty: Life, Billy and the Pursuit of Happiness,” available now wherever you buy fine books. It details not only the good times with Joel, but also the bad… leading up to their split in 2006. Later in the show I ask Liberty about how his relations with the singer disintegrated… and how they buried the hatchet after fifteen years. We started though, by talking about something we’re all missing these days: live music.

Watch the whole thing HERE on YouTube or HERE on ctvnews.ca!

 

IN ISOLATION WITH..: THE STAR OF “FISHERMAN’S FRIENDS,” JAMES PUREFOY!

Check out episode twenty-two of Richard’s web series, “In Isolation With…” It’s the talk show where we make a connection without actually making contact! Today, broadcasting directly from Isolation Studios (a.k.a. my home office), we meet actor James Purefoy, direct from the south west of England, via Zoom. If you were a fan of HBO’s “Rome,” you know him as joyfully decadent Roman general and politician Mark Antony. Perhaps you were a fan of “The Following,” which saw him play a college professor-turned-serial-killer and cult leader for three seasons opposite Kevin Bacon. The versatile actor has a list of credits as long as my arm including the film he joins me to talk about today, “Fisherman’s Friends.” No, it’s not about the cough drops… it is a is a good-natured crowd pleaser about a real life singing group from Cornwall in England who went from singing at the local pub, when they weren’t on the water making a living, to producing the biggest selling traditional folk album of all time. Purefoy plays Jim, the leader of the group, who was initially skeptical about their chances for success outside their tiny village. When we did this interview he was sitting in his garden, and proudly showed me all the produce he’s been growing since the beginning of the pandemic. That also means that from time to time you’ll hear a bird chirping or a bit of wind… it’s not your speakers, it’s just nature on Purefoy’s property.

“I’ve become so inured and disappointed towards marketing people and advertising people,” he says in the interview, “what they’ve done to projects that I’ve been in where you go, “I can’t believe you even watched it, and yet you’ve come up with this poster. Do you know anything about this show?” So I think that one becomes a little cynical about that kind of thing and I think the answer to that is just to really be present between action and cut, and that that’s the thing. That’s the only really, really pure bit of job that I’m really interested in. That’s what I love doing. And the fame? Keep it. It really doesn’t bother me. If I can keep doing what I’m doing and not be vastly famous, then I’m really happy with that. That’s OK.”

Watch the whole thing HERE on YouTube or HERE on ctvnews.ca!

IN ISOLATION WITH..: “GHOSTS OF WEST VIRGINIA” SINGER STEVE EARLE!

Check out episode nineteen of Richard’s new web series, “In Isolation With…” It’s the talk show where we make a connection without actually making contact! Today, broadcasting directly from Isolation Studios (a.k.a. my home office), we meet a Grammy award winning singer-songwriter, a record producer, author and actor whose song Copperhead Road is still a jukebox favorite thirty-three years after it made him a superstar. Steve Earle Zooms in from his home in Tennessee to talk about how his new album “Ghosts of West Virginia” might bridge the political gap, going to Walmart and how doing yoga helps to center him in these anxious times. Come visit with us! In isolation we are united!

Steve Earle on songwriting from the “In Isolation With” interview: “This job is about empathy. That’s what makes it work. That’s how you’re able to tell really complicated stories in three or four minutes. That’s how you’re able to get ideas across that are unpopular… I have had three people over the years and, keep in mind, not everybody has access to walk up and talk to me, or the opportunity to do that. I’ve had three people come up to me and say something you wrote changed my mind about the death penalty. So, you can’t tell me that music can’t change the world because I have experience of that in my life.”

Watch the whole thing HERE on YouTube and HERE on ctvnews.ca!

WOLOSHYN: Pandemic life would have been very different 60 years ago.

From The Toronto Sun June 2, 2020: “CTV’s Pop Life host Richard Crouse — a colleague at Newstalk 1010 — and I were chatting about these COVID-19 binge-watching days we’re experiencing.

 “I asked if he’d now seen everything that CTV has to offer and he replied: “Not yet, but when you do, the screen just goes blank.”

“And suddenly, I thought back to the ’50s and early ’60s, when the screen did go blank around midnight.  What would people have done had a “damndemic” like COVID-19 reared its ugly head back then?…” read the whole thing HERE!

Tags: ,
Posted in Richard Sez | Comments Off on WOLOSHYN: Pandemic life would have been very different 60 years ago.

WHAT TO WATCH WHEN YOU’VE ALREADY WATCHED EVERYTHING PART 10!

What to watch when you’ve already watched everything Part Eight! Binge worthy, not cringe worthy recommendations from Isolation Studios in the eerily quiet downtown Toronto. Three movies to stream, rent or buy from the comfort of home isolation. Today, newsrooms, vigilantes and a twelve-year-old vampire. #Christine #HarryBrown #LetMeIn

Listen to the whole thing HERE!

OUTBREAK: DAY 47 – The COVID-19 Daily Podcast with Dave Trafford.

Richard joined “Outbreak: The Facts and Fiction of Covid-19” podcast with Dave Trafford to talk about staying in and the new web series “In isolation With.”

Listen to the whole thing HERE!

Here is some more info on the show: Getting back to business in the face of this pandemic…certainly won’t be business as usual. We’re all learning to work together while working in isolation. But how will that isolation culture affect our willingness to gather in large crowds in the coming months? We’ll talk to CTV’s  Richard Crouse, host of Pop Life and a new YouTube show – called “In Isolation With…” That’s coming up in the podcast.

Food security has been the focus of discussion this weekend in Canada. The COVID-19 pandemic has forced non-essential businesses to close, forcing historic layoffs and job losses across the country. More than a million jobs were lost in March and that has meant added stress on food banks in every region of Canada.

That is the focus for the cast of Canadian celebrities who volunteered their time and talents for STAND TOGETHER – a virtual, multi-platform presentation of performances produced by all of Canada’s major broadcasters, including Bell Media.

The intent is to raise $150 million for community food banks. Christ Hatch is the President and CEO at FOOD BANKS CANADA and I talked to him when he and his team launched the fundraising campaign.

IN ISOLATION WITH…: THE DIRECTOR AND STAR OF “SHE NEVER DIED.”

Check out episode three of my new web series, “In Isolation With…” It’s the talk show where we make a connection without actually making contact! Today, broadcasting directly from Isolation Studios (a.k.a. my home office), we meet the director and star of the soon-to-be-midnight-movie-favourite “She Never Died,” Audrey Cummings and Oluniké Adeliyi. In my review I called this “a snazzy horror film with equal parts gore and gags… Come for the bloodshed, stay for the subtext.” Join us and find out about the virtues of vinegar water, making a movie in 15 days and how to pass the time during the pandemic. Come visit with us! In isolation we are united!

Watch the whole thing HERE!