Volume 10, Issue 8 April 2020

T h e U n i v e r s i t y o f K a n s a s

Department of Film & Media Studies

Inside this issue:

A Message From The Chair

2-3

Out & About 3-6

Alumni News 7-8

And more! 9

Department of Film & Media Studies April 2020

Page 2

A Message from the Chair…

Dear FMS Students,

All of us are feeling the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic. As you know, KU has transitioned to online instruction for the rest of the semester, cancelled all meetings over 50 people, and closed many public spaces to reduce in-person interactions and protect lives. The Film and Media industries have taken similar precautions. Across the globe professional productions have mostly shut down and such high-profile public media events as SXSW and the Cannes Film Festivals have been cancelled or postponed.

Amidst this uncertainty, we want you to know that your health and safety is our top priority. FMS is united in its commitment to reducing the chances for anyone to be put at risk. For this reason, we made the difficult decision to suspend access to equipment and spaces for the foreseeable future. For additional information, read the FMS Production Policy on COVID-19 here: http://film.ku.edu/facilities

We know that many of you are frustrated by the lack of access and anxious over what this new policy may mean for completing your projects as well as for your academic progress. We truly understand and empathize with you because these changes have a direct effect on us all. But please understand that these precautions are there to protect you. We encourage you to recognize that change—even unforeseen radical change—is a constant part of film and media production. Learning to deal with that change by using the skills you are learning is instructive in ways that may be difficult to anticipate at this time.

No one knows for certain how this situation will unfold, but FMS is focusing on what can be done now. Your professors and instructors met via Zoom to discuss how best to minimize the impact on you. The transition to online instruction requires significant changes to course syllabi and content but please know that your grade will not be negatively impacted by the official responses to COVID-19. Our goal as a Department is to help you complete the semester on time and with as little disruption as possible.

To this end, your instructors will inform you of syllabus/expectations adjustments starting 3/23. I’ve encouraged all instructors to work with students by keeping flexible policies regarding attendance, assignments, tests, make-up work, etc. Instructors will also strive to heighten communication and reduce response times to student inquires for the rest of the semester. Finally, FMS will not tolerate discrimination against anyone because of race, ethnicity, sexual identity, gender, travel history or any other factor.

This is only a first step. I expect that there will be questions and adjustments in the days ahead that we will need to address. We will adjust our policies as needed moving forward. We encourage you to contact the Department directly if you have concerns or questions. We want to help all students, staff, and faculty through this time.

Because each student is experiencing this situation in different ways, we have provided below some links to a range of resources that we hope will be of help. We will continue to post updates with more information and resources as they become available.

Be well and stay strong,

Michael Baskett

Department of Film & Media Studies April 2020

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A Message from the Chair… (continued) For information on all KU policies regarding COVID-19 including:

• Housing

• Travel

• Study Abroad

• General Health & Wellness

…and more, please see the following: https://coronavirus.ku.edu/

College of Liberal Arts and Sciences: https://college.ku.edu/coronavirus

Emergency Aid Network: https://help.ku.edu

For general information on State policies for Kansas regarding:

• Individuals/Families

• Child Care/Foster Care

• Cleaning

• Education

• Public Events/Mass Gatherings

• Public Utilities

…and more go to:

http://www.kdheks.gov/coronavirus/COVID-19_Resource_Center.htm#undefined

For more information on Gov. Kelly’s executive order banning evictions until 5/1 see:

www.kansan.com/news/article_c71a32fa-6932-11ea-9aaa-8b6e96b1ddeb.html

Out & About

Ron Wilson, John Tibbetts, and Tamara Falicov participated in the KU Federico Fellini Centenary Festival in February.

Department of Film & Media Studies April 2020

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Out & About

Premiere: ‘Who’s Back’ by Cuee

You’ve been performing with a live band backing you—Glass Bandit—how has that experience been, in terms of how it’s changed how you perform?

Man, look, I remember going to Chance the Rapper’s concert at Providence, and he had that band up there, and I was like, “I need to do that next. I want a band.” Just performing with a band is totally different. You have to rap different. You have to move differently—I don’t have the stage as much as I used to, ’cause they’re a 10-piece band, and I usually perform with at least six of them.

They bring a different edge to my music. A lot of my beats are very hard-hitting, Chicago-style, and then I get this funk-jazz band that just takes my music and tones it out. Like, who can make “Feelin’ Lucky” sound the way they have? Only Glass Bandit, so that experience has helped me get a little bit more musically inclined. I think, overall, that process has been a growing process, and I love it and I don’t think I want to perform without one. It’s kind of one of those things like, “Dang, I did it,” and now I don’t see my performing without a band in the future.

Because you work with students, do you feel—even being a musician, yourself—do you feel that, working with kids in the Career Center, you’re getting turned on to stuff that you probably wouldn’t?

I think it’s two different worlds. I flip those worlds every day. That’s the hardest part about not being a full-time, hundred percent into your craft, is when you work, right? I have degrees in marketing, so I’m doing that all day long, and I’m loving it, and I’m working with my interns and we’re hashing out problems for the Career Center. After that, I have to head into the studio and turn on my creative hat and rap.

Working with students, I think, keeps me in that place in higher ed. I love the students. They help keep me young. They really enjoy my music or at least they say they love it. [laughs] So, it’s been really cool to still be on a college campus.

Actually, the coolest thing about this song, was it started off as a KU class project. KU was like, “Hey, Cuee, we have this new production class.* We want them to get cool behind keys. We’ll throw you a beat, write to it—we want to practice recording.” So, we all worked on this song, the song ended up being amazing, and I said, “You know what? I think I’m gonna drop this as a single, because it’s pretty dope.”

* FMS 477 Sound Design, taught by Professor Bob Hurst

Read the full article in The Pitch: https://www.thepitchkc.com/premiere-whos-back-by-cuee/?fbclid=IwAR0MnmUMBnvJaM_nq794pH6ZUG3XUG7qVnLJpbEKhaM2I0HIWb0aoHUtqG0

Department of Film & Media Studies April 2020

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Out & About Activist Filmmaker: Spike Lee’s screenwriter talks about his mockumentary “Confederate States of America.”

Kevin Willmott is that rare professor of film who got to share an Oscar with iconic filmmaker Spike Lee. The screenwriter, director, actor and University of Kansas faculty member shared a 2018 Academy Award for best screenplay with Lee for “BlacKkKlansman.”

This year’s James River Film Festival will screen the popular film along with Willmott’s satirical mockumentary, “Confederate States of America” from 2004.

Style Weekly spoke with Willmott in advance of his appearance in Richmond.

Style Weekly: You loved movies from an early age, but when did the film writing bug first hit you?

Kevin Willmott: It was pretty early. The film that had a big impact was “The Good the Bad and the Ugly.” I was in fifth grade and I asked my mother for the album of the soundtrack. When I was a teenager Gordon Parks and “The Learning Tree” and then “Shaft” and the blaxploitation films really defined my ambition.

In college, I was introduced to foreign films and I learned about subtext and, in general, art films brought film to another level for me: “Seven Beauties,” “Swept Away,” “The Verdict,” “Chariots of Fire,” “Chinatown,” “Nothing but a Man,” and “The Conversation.”

“BlacKkKlansman” is set in the 1970s. What appealed to you about the Ron Stallworth story and that era?

The ’70s was something I think appealed to Spike and I both: the music, the clothes, the politics. It is a great period. It allowed us to deal with black power politics in a way audiences had never seen before. It was such a unique story. We were able to have a great deal of fun while examining heavy-duty issues like hate and racism.

The students you teach film studies came up in a different world, film-wise and otherwise, than you did. What’s the most challenging part of teaching today?

Trying to explain my take on things is sometimes a challenge. What doesn’t speak to me, that they love, is always an interesting discussion. But as a whole there are very few differences. The principles that guide what makes a film great have never changed and probably never will.

When you came to Richmond in 2016 for the James River Film Festival, we were also in an election cycle, but many of us had no idea what the future held. How does the state of race relations factor into your writing in the current landscape?

It’s made things easier for me. People didn’t understand what I was doing with “C.S.A.” when I made it in 2004. Now they understand we are living in the Confederate States of America. In 2017, Richard Brody of the New Yorker reviewed the film again when it was screened in NYC and the first line was, “We can’t say we weren’t warned and sometimes the warning comes from far away and goes unheeded.”

(continued)

Screenwriter, director and actor Kevin Willmott

Department of Film & Media Studies April 2020

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Out & About

Activist Filmmaker: Spike Lee’s screenwriter talks about his mockumentary “Confederate States of America.” (continued)

What did you set out to accomplish with “C.S.A.” and where did it take you?

I was setting out to define what the CSA meant. The Confederate flag was flying proud over the capital of South Carolina and there was much debate about the flag. I wanted to connect it to slavery and use that premise to reveal what was at stake.

As I started to work on the film, I began to realize that the CSA did win the war and that is the country we are living in. It made me see how we are in a constant battle with what country we are, the USA or the CSA. We go back and forth. We had eight years of the USA under Obama. Now we are clearly living in the CSA and we may never come out of it again.

Spike is a genius and it is always great to work with him. He has always understood what I was trying to do, begin-ning with CSA, and I have been fortunate to collaborate with him.

Why does social consciousness run through [all] your films?

I’ve always been an activist and a filmmaker. The two go hand-in-hand to me. The best films, for me, have some social point. It’s my way of trying to make the world a better place.

Richmond was once the capital of the Confederacy and it’s a city still trying to figure itself out. Thoughts?

Richmond should confront its past with pure honesty and with no apology. It was the capital of the CSA and was part of the worst of America. That’s OK. America was an evil place at that time. It must take ownership and move forward.

Being ashamed hurts us all. Admitting the crime and working toward what America wants to believe in is the solution. Truth and reconciliation are what’s required. People who still hold on to the CSA as a great thing are wrong and must be taught that the CSA was treasonous and against everything that America stands for.

But also, their feelings are understandable because the country was always the CSA and we are now trying to become the USA.

The country was founded in 1776, then again in the Civil War, and then again in the Civil Rights Movement. Since then, we’ve been trying to include women and gays and all the people on the outside into the family of the nation. It is still a process.

The only shame is not admitting the truth.

This event was originally scheduled to be a part of the James River Film Festival, which has been canceled. Some of the events may be rescheduled in the coming months, check jamesriverfilm.org for updates.

Copied from: https://www.styleweekly.com/richmond/activist-filmmaker/Content?oid=15809781

“Confederate States of America.”

Department of Film & Media Studies April 2020

Alumni News

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Jacob Hood, FMS BGS 2018, currently works for KU Athletics. Much of his work has been shown, but one segment of one of his animations was put into a promotional video. It runs at the 24 second mark, but you can’t miss it.

https://www.facebook.com/KansasBasketball/videos/2358013254299184/

Alex Robinson, FMS BA 2017, writes: I am currently a prep tech at Otto Nemenz International in Hollywood, where I prep cinema cameras and accessories for various films and TV shows like "Grey's Anatomy," "The Good Place," and "The Ballad of Buster Scruggs" (and also multitudes of commercials). I rushed to LA after graduation, reaching out to people like Grant Babbitt who I met when I was on the KU Career Week trip to LA, and getting random freelance jobs as a PA on commercial shoots (often driving a truck full of all the expensive equipment), as a grip and gaffer/electrician lighting commercials, indie projects and music videos, and as a camera assistant for small projects. I have held all sorts of positions on set, taking me to streets in downtown LA to the desert in Palm Springs, I love it and any chance to get on a set and get paid is nice, and getting on an interesting location is a side benefit – especially if they're paying and feeding you to be there! I have even worked a shoot involving the emperor's guards from Star Wars, and I can confirm you can get paid to blow a fan on a guy covered in expensive red plastic. My favorite job had to be being a background PA on one of the "Ford v. Ferrari" racetrack shoots; they had me get in period wardrobe, even making me shave my beard, so that I could guide other background members via radio and wave race flags out on the track. For the time being, I am working towards assistant cameraman (AC, 1 and 2) and camera operator, with the hope to join IATSE Local 600 union to further work on network productions here in LA. One surprise – just how many weird, specific positions there can be on sets, so there is always a way to make a career out of specific skills on set!

Check out my Instagram account that links to some work I have done. @hollywooboi

Alex Robinson, fifth from the left.

Department of Film & Media Studies April 2020

Alumni News

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Rodney F. Hill (Ph.D. 2006, TH&F) recently published an essay, “Kubrick’s Inheritors: Aesthetics, Independence and Philosophy in the Films of Joel and Ethan Coen,” in the collection, After Kubrick: A Filmmaker’s Legacy (Bloomsbury, 2020), edited by Jeremi Szaniawski:

https://www.bloomsbury.com/us/after-kubrick-9781501347641/

He also interviewed producer Rosalie Varda, as a “web exclusive” for the well-known journal, Cineaste: https://www.cineaste.com/spring2020/family-business-rosalie-varda-about-varda-by-agnes

Dr. Hill is Associate Professor of Film in the Herbert School of Communication at Hofstra University in New York.

T h e D e p a r t m e n t o f F i l m a n d M e d i a S t u d i e s T h e U n i v e r s i t y o f K a n s a s

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Department of Film and Media Studies

Summerfield Hall, Suite 230

1300 Sunnyside Avenue

Lawrence, KS 66045

Phone: 785-864-1340

E-mail: film@ku.edu

Send your news items and

updates to Karla Conrad at

kmconrad@ku.edu.

Academic Calendar

April 20 — Last day to withdraw from a class or the University

April 20 — Second Period Drop Ends

www.registrar.ku.edu/calendar/

Until in-Person classes resume... Facilities usage: All FMS facilities (production spaces, editing bays, classrooms, computer lab, service

centers, etc.) will remain closed until in-person classes resume. Equipment check-out: The Equipment room will remain closed until in-person classes resume.

KU students can now download and use Adobe Creative Cloud on their personal computer at no cost through May 31, 2020 or as soon as students are able to return to our campuses. Go to remote.ku.edu/adobe for instructions on how to access and download Adobe Creative Cloud.

Check with your instructor or John McCluskey, Director of Operations, for more information.

For Academic

Advising:

Until in-person classes

resume, schedule an

online appointment with

Chelsea Lantz-Cashman

by calling 785-864-3500.

Follow us Check out the College Blog: http://blog.college.ku.edu/

Are you a Film & Media Studies alum? We’d love to

hear from you. Go to https://film.ku.edu/alumni-

submissions to update your information with us, so we can

add you to the impressive ranks of our alumni.

Twitter: @KUFMS, @KUSchoolofArts, @KUCollege

April 2020

Read past issues of the

FMS newsletter on the

FMS website: http://

film.ku.edu/newsletters