Burns tackles Vietnam
PBS turns its attention to war, Patsy Cline, kids
Highlights from the Television Critics Association’s winter preview of upcoming shows.
PASADENA, CALIF. As he did with The Civil War, filmmaker Ken Burns will examine The Vietnam
War for PBS. Made with his partner, Lynn Novick, this 10-episode, 18-hour documentary arrives in September and will feature a score by Nine Inch Nails’ Trent Reznor and Atticus Ross (Oscar winners for The Social Network).
Burns, who has been working on the project for 10 years, says that if nothing else Vietnam will remind people “the past is like the present.” Many of our divisions, he says, were born in the military, political, cultural, social and familial conflicts surrounding Vietnam, a war that took more than 58,000 American lives.
Yes, Burns says, it’s possible that some people in our polarized nation will react negatively to the film, but Burns says he’s more hopeful that the film will inspire people to come together and talk.
The divisions caused by the war played out in every facet of American life, including the music of the time — much of which will be heard on the soundtrack. That’s one of the reasons Burns says he’s so excited to work with Reznor and Ross, who will write the original score and bring a new sound to his films.
Reznor says he and Ross were contacted in fall 2012, and they began writing the music not long after that, “the goal being to create a world that was unique to this project.”
Why Reznor and Ross? “We knew we needed something different here,” says Novick. She found it, she says, in 2011 when she went to see a movie they scored, The Girl With the Dragon
Tattoo. “I thought, ‘Whoever did this music, I need to get them for this film.’ ” CRAZY FOR PATSY CLINE Patsy Cline’s career spanned only six years, from her first hit in 1957 to her death in 1963 in a plane crash at age 30. But in those years, she changed country music — and American music, leaving behind such classics as Walkin’ After Midnight, Sweet Dreams and Crazy. Which is why PBS’
American Masters is examining her life and work in its March special Patsy Cline.
Director and producer Barbara Hall says she’s happy American
Masters made this film: “I’ve been pitching it for seven years.”
If she had to fight to get the film made, that may be fitting, as Cline had to fight every step of her career. “She was probably the ultimate feminist,” says Hall, “and if she was sitting right here, she probably wouldn’t call herself a feminist. ... She just did what she knew she was born to do.”
Hall says she was given access to some performances that hadn’t been heard for years. Her favorite clip? Cline’s live performance of Walkin’ on Arthur Godfrey’s Tal
ent Scouts. “Hearing her excitement when she won ... I felt like, ‘Oh my gosh, I’m in the room with her.’ ” KIDS, 24/7 The nation’s public broadcasting service has launched PBS KIDS, a 24/7 channel devoted to children’s programming provided by PBS’ local stations on television and via live-streaming on digital platforms. The goal, PBS President Paula Kerger said, is to reach all America’s children, of every socio-economic level, with the service’s high-quality children’s programming.
By year’s end, Kerger expects the channel to be available to 90% of American TV households.