GORE VIDAL: THE UNITED STATES OF AMNESIA with dir. Nicholas Wrathall
BYOD: Bring Your Own Doc
Episode 160
Episode Synopsis
GORE VIDAL: THE UNITED STATES OF AMNESIA, is the documentary about the brilliant author/philosopher/provocateur, Gore Vidal. Director Nicholas Wrathall shares his doc in this uncensored interview with film and trailer footage. Atheism, promiscuity, war, religion, and the police state of America is all put to the sword by Vidal, and we talk about the production of the movie + get insights from the thought-provoking director on BYOD-the world’s only all documentary talk show.
Guest Bio
Nicholas Wrathall is an award-winning director and producer who has been working in the documentary and commercial fields for more than fifteen years. At 22 he moved to New York where he began to make his way as an Assistant Director and Producer for music videos and commercials shot around the world, including Madonna’s “Frozen,” which won the 1998 MTV Award for Best Music Video.
He was first recognized for his direction of the documentary Abandoned: The Betrayal of America’s Immigrants, which was featured on PBS Independent Lens and won the 2000 Alfred I. duPont Columbia Award for Broadcast Journalism.
In addition to his feature work, Nicholas directs and produces short documentaries on a variety of social issues. Recent work includes Endless Caravan, Haitian Eksperyans and The Modern Gulag, which was picked-up by the New York Times as the basis for a feature on North Korean gulags operating in Far East Russia.
Currently Nicholas is based in Los Angeles and New York and has just completed the feature documentary Gore Vidal: The United States Of Amnesia, an independent documentary that he is directing and producing. Nicholas was fortunate to interview Gore many times over the last few years of his life, having sparked an idea for the documentary after the release of several of Gore’s political pamphlets post-911. Nicholas went on to travel with Gore to Italy, Cuba and many U.S. Cities, gaining further access to Gore’s insight on the current state of affairs in this country.
Hosts
Ondi Timoner
Episode Breakdown
00:01 Welcome to BYOD.
00:30 Introducing Nicholas D. Wrathall.
2:20 Gore Vidal as a storyteller and novelist and his analysis of historical figures.
04:50 Gore Vidal: The United States of Amnesia clip: Shooting guns with JFK and Tennessee Williams.
08:30 Valuing promiscuity and Vidal’s ideas of love and relationships.
11:10 Gore Vidal: The United States of Amnesia clip: Controversy over his book about homosexuality.
19:50 Vidal’s relationship with Christopher Hitchens.
23:20 Vidal’s writings on religion and his outspoken views on atheism.
26:00 Gore Vidal: The United States of Amnesia clip: The police state.
34:40 Thanks and goodbye.
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