Page 31 - ATD13Febr2016

PEOPLE & ARTS A31
Saturday 13 February 2016

Amazon debuts series based on New Yorker magazine

DAVID BAUDER In this Jan. 11, 2016 file photo, executive producers Alex Gibney, left, and Kahane Cooperman participate in “The New Yorker
AP Television Writer Presents” panel at the The Amazon 2016 Winter TCA in Pasadena, Calif.
NEW YORK (AP) — After
working 18 years at “The Associated Press
Daily Show,” Kahane
Cooperman had only a New Yorker itself, like its car- worlds. And I thought this the magazine is.” ure a way to make it more
weekend off last summer toonists and fact checkers. show could do something Not every piece works. An current and on top of the
before starting a job run- Random Manhattan sites similar.” essay on elevators seems news. His dream is to make
ning Amazon’s new video are visited, like a hat mak- It fills a void, too. Traditional caught between sociology “The New Yorker Presents”
version of The New Yorker er in Harlem or the Morbid newsmagazines, with the and history, and doesn’t available as often as “60
magazine. Anatomy Museum, where exception of “60 Minutes,” satisfy on either level. But Minutes.”
In retrospect, she considers hipster girls skin rats. are scarce on network TV. the batting average is high, Producers are also figuring
that a blessing. Most of the show’s pieces “The New Yorker Presents” and the show avoids stuffi- out ways to take advan-
“I would have lost my nerve are inspired by things in and Vice’s work with HBO ness. It will appeal to the tage of the magazine’s
if I had more time to think the magazine, but Gibney are taking the format in sensibility of the average cultural critics.Remnick
about having to do justice didn’t want video recita- new directions. New Yorker reader and, said he hadn’t been ac-
to the institution that is The tions of print articles. He The involvement of Gib- Remnick hopes, people tively looking to expand
New Yorker magazine,” asked filmmakers to fo- ney and Cooperman sold who aren’t familiar with the into television. But given to-
said Cooperman, who cre- cus on angles that interest David Remnick, editor of magazine or website. day’s media environment,
ated the series with “Going them. One longer piece, The New Yorker, on an Most stories during the initial he said he’d be foolish not
Clear” filmmaker Alex Gib- Jarecki’s look at Cuba, idea he initially regarded run were filmed last sum- to listen. He’s pleased with
ney and Conde Nast En- came from nothing that with wariness.“I’m a com- mer. One of the only real how the series has turned
tertainment chief Dawn had been in the magazine. plicated customer,” Rem- topical pieces, an Adam out, comparing it with the
Ostroff. The New Yorker “What does The New nick said. “Anything we do Gopnik essay on gun vio- magazine’s own infancy.
regularly features a formi- Yorker magazine provide that’s called The New York- lence, was prepared in the “The New Yorker wasn’t
dable mix of deeply re- for people?” Cooperman er, I don’t want to sound aftermath of the San Ber- very good in 1925,” he
ported stories and profiles, asked. “What it really does snobby, but I want it to be nardino, California shoot- said. “This program is good
fiction, slices of life, cultural in each issue is provide a as good as the magazine, ing. Gibney said if the series right off the bat and that’s
coverage and cartoons. window into many different or at least how I imagine continues he’d like to fig- a huge achievement.”q
Makers of “The New York- ___
er Presents” achieved the
small miracle of captur-
ing the magazine’s rhythm
and pioneering a “60
Minutes”-style newsmaga-
zine with the work done by
documentarians instead of
news reporters.
Amazon is making two epi-
sodes a week available for
five weeks, starting Tues-
day, then will pause to as-
sess the marketplace’s re-
action and decide wheth-
er to make more.
Each 30-minute episode
has stories of various
lengths, anchored by a
longer piece from film-
makers like Gibney, Steve
James, Roger Ross Wil-
liams, Dawn Porter and
Eugene Jarecki. Examples
are a profile of the gay
star of Mexican wrestling,
stories on competitive bull
riding and police pursuit
of a legendary silver thief,
and a look at intelligence
agency infighting before
the Sept. 11 attacks.
Shorter pieces include a
skit with Charles Grodin
and John Turturro as a
psychiatrist and patient, a
story on erotic art created
by a Finnish advertising ex-
ecutive and people who
tell, in a 12-step style meet-
ing, of odd encounters
with Bill Murray. Interstitials
explore worlds within The