Watch PBS’ American Masters Documentaries (Including Scorsese’s Homage to Kazan) Free Online

in Television | December 11th, 2012

Each new Amer­i­can Mas­ters broad­cast, when it debuts on tele­vi­sion, tends to receive a hero’s wel­come. The poten­tial for hero­ism on the part of a bio­graph­i­cal doc­u­men­tary may, of course, seem lim­it­ed, but their astute­ness and atten­tion to detail does put them on a lev­el above. Pro­duced by New York City’s Thirteen/WNET and dis­trib­uted by the Pub­lic Broad­cast­ing Ser­vice, the show has for 26 years told the life sto­ries of cre­ators of all types, Amer­i­can-born and oth­er­wise, who have made an impact on U.S. cul­ture. Last month, we fea­tured Woody Allen answer­ing thir­teen unusu­al ques­tions from Robert B. Wei­de, direc­tor of the series’ recent Woody Allen: A Doc­u­men­tary. That episode stirred up quite a flur­ry of admi­ra­tion, as did the more recent Invent­ing David Gef­fen, a por­trait of the enter­tain­ment indus­try titan direct­ed by Amer­i­can Mas­ters cre­ator Susan Lacy — which you can watch free at PBS.org.

And that’s not the only one. Any self-respect­ing fan of Amer­i­can cin­e­ma will want to watch the pro­gram above, A Let­ter to Elia. It show­cas­es a qual­i­ty often cit­ed as one of Amer­i­can Mas­ters’ great strengths: its match­es of sub­ject and doc­u­men­tar­i­an. In this case, we get the life of Elia Kazan, direc­tor of clas­sic pic­tures like On the Water­front and East of Eden, as described by Mar­tin Scors­ese, direc­tor of such promis­ing can­di­dates for clas­sic sta­tus as Taxi Dri­ver and Rag­ing Bull. The doc­u­men­tary exam­ines not only Kazan’s life and work but Scors­ese’s rela­tion­ship to it, and from there, any young artist’s rela­tion­ship to art itself. PBS has also made freely avail­able their broad­casts on John­ny Car­son, Jeff Bridges, Charles and Ray Eames, and quite a few oth­ers besides. If the cul­ture of a coun­try as vast and young as the Unit­ed States of Amer­i­ca remains dif­fi­cult to pin down, it cer­tain­ly isn’t for Amer­i­can Mas­ters’ lack of try­ing.

Var­i­ous episodes have been added to our col­lec­tion of 500 Free Movies Online.

Relat­ed con­tent:

Alfred Stieglitz: The Elo­quent Eye, a Reveal­ing Look at “The Father of Mod­ern Pho­tog­ra­phy”

Ein­stein Doc­u­men­tary Offers A Reveal­ing Por­trait of the Great 20th Cen­tu­ry Sci­en­tist

Col­in Mar­shall hosts and pro­duces Note­book on Cities and Cul­ture. Fol­low him on Twit­ter at @colinmarshall.

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Schoolhouse Rock: Revisit a Collection of Nostalgia-Inducing Educational Videos

in Animation, Education, K-12, Television | December 6th, 2012

Some­times a tune lives in your head and you hum it now and again with­out any rec­ol­lec­tion of where it orig­i­nal­ly came from. Chances are, if you grew up in the Unit­ed States watch­ing Sat­ur­day morn­ing car­toons, that tune came from School­house Rock.

Like so many of its biggest fans, School­house Rock is now offi­cial­ly in its 40s. This year marks the 40th anniver­sary of the pilot seg­ment, Three is a Mag­ic Num­ber, whose melody and lyrics ooze the type of hip­pie Sun­shine Fam­i­ly whole­some­ness so abun­dant in ‘70s children’s pro­gram­ming.

Man and a woman had a lit­tle baby,

Yes they did.

They had three in the fam­i­ly.

And that’s a mag­ic num­ber

Fol­low that up with School­house Rock’s win­ning for­mu­la: sim­ple, hum­ma­ble tunes mixed with math fact lyrics.

3–6‑9, 12–15-18, 21–24-27, 30.
3–6‑9, 12–15-18, 21–24-27, 30.

School­house Rock start­ed out as an adver­tis­ing ven­ture on ABC, dreamed up by an exec­u­tive whose son was strug­gling to mem­o­rize his mul­ti­pli­ca­tion tables. But it grew into the most pop­u­lar inter­sti­tial pro­gram­ming (short vignettes shown between TV seg­ments) in mod­ern tele­vi­sion.

One of the most mem­o­rable melodies is Blos­som Dearie’s sweet and melan­choly Fig­ure Eight, broad­cast in Feb­ru­ary, 1973. This one was cov­ered by Eliot Smith in a decid­ed­ly less upbeat ver­sion.

With­out a doubt these three-minute ani­ma­tions (by Loonie Tunes ani­ma­tor Chuck Jones) are some of the best mod­ern edu­ca­tion­al videos around. Whose social stud­ies teacher didn’t show this tune­ful expla­na­tion of the leg­isla­tive process dur­ing class?

And this one about the Con­sti­tu­tion, well I have to admit that it still chokes me up.

The man behind the vast major­i­ty of the music is Bob Dor­ough, a pianist who worked with Miles Davis and Allen Gins­berg before becom­ing the voice and main com­pos­er for School­house Rock.


The series took on near­ly every sub­ject, from mul­ti­pli­ca­tion and gram­mar to sci­ence and Amer­i­can gov­ern­ment. Today’s edu­ca­tion­al soft­ware devel­op­ers would kill to make gram­mar as fun as Con­junc­tion Junc­tion and Lol­ly, Lol­ly, Lol­ly Get Your Adverbs Here.  The pro­duc­ers didn’t shy away from more weighty issues either. Take a lis­ten to this lit­tle dit­ty on the theme of Amer­i­can ter­ri­to­r­i­al expan­sion.

The series took a break dur­ing the 1980s but picked up again in the mid-’90s with Mon­ey Rock. In 2009 came Earth Rock. Both fea­tured a more gloom-and-doom feel than the inspir­ing tone of the ear­li­er School­house Rock iter­a­tions.

Some­times the orig­i­nal real­ly is the best.

You can pur­chase the com­plete set of School­house Rock videos on Ama­zon. We’ve also added a link to this post in our new col­lec­tion: 200 Free Kids Edu­ca­tion­al Resources: Video Lessons, Apps, Books, Web­sites & More

Kate Rix writes about dig­i­tal media and edu­ca­tion. Read more of her work at and thenifty.blogspot.com. 

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Every Apple Ad Ever Aired on TV

in Apple, Television | December 2nd, 2012

Intro­duc­ing a new YouTube Chan­nel that gives you every Apple ad ever aired on TV — 485 ads, in total.

You can start with the icon­ic ones — the 1984 Super Bowl com­mer­cial direct­ed by Rid­ley Scott, which aired just weeks after Steve Jobs demoed the first Mac­In­tosh ever. Or, the famous “Think Dif­fer­ent” cam­paign from the late 1990s. The offi­cial “Think Dif­fer­ent” video was nar­rat­ed by Richard Drey­fuss, but we’d encour­age you to spend time with the nev­er-aired ver­sion nar­rat­ed by Jobs him­self. Oth­er vin­tage ads can be found in these chrono­log­i­cal­ly-orga­nized lists: 1977–1985, 1985–1996, 1996–2007 and 2007–2011. The 1981 Dick Cavett clip above appears in the first group.


But the col­lec­tion also lets you sort ads the­mat­i­cal­ly. So, for exam­ple, you can jump into the U.S. Get a Mac cam­paign, where you’ll get plen­ty of John Hodg­man. Also find ver­sions of the same cam­paign from the UK and Japan. Final­ly, Apple ads fea­tur­ing celebri­ties — from Bob Dylan to Zooey Deschanel to Spike Lee — are all neat­ly pack­aged togeth­er too. H/T @coudal

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Conan O’Brien Plays Charlie Rose, Talks Presidential History with Edmund Morris

in History, Television | November 30th, 2012

“This is my dream job,” Conan O’Brien says while in con­ver­sa­tion with pres­i­den­tial biog­ra­ph­er Edmund Mor­ris. He did­n’t say it when he brought Mor­ris onto Conan, his late-night talk show on TBS. He says it on Seri­ous Jib­ber-Jab­ber, an alto­geth­er dif­fer­ent oper­a­tion. On Conan, he talked to Mor­ris for sev­en min­utes; on Seri­ous Jib­ber-Jab­ber, they talk for 47 min­utes. Offi­cial­ly described as a web series where­in “Conan O’Brien has lengthy, unin­ter­rupt­ed con­ver­sa­tions with inter­est­ing peo­ple on top­ics which fas­ci­nate him,” the show casts the icon of Gen‑X irrev­er­ence not as a pur­vey­or of intel­li­gent silli­ness, but as a con­ver­sa­tion­al­ist in the mold of Char­lie Rose. In any case, he does it prac­ti­cal­ly on the set of Char­lie Rose: a table, chairs, a back­ground of purest black, and no fur­ther dis­trac­tions. (If you’re going to bor­row, they say, bor­row from the best.) O’Brien’s fol­low­ers may not know he has a fer­vent inter­est in pres­i­den­tial his­to­ry, but after watch­ing his inter­view with the man who wrote three vol­umes on Theodore Roo­sevelt and one on Ronald Rea­gan, they’ll cer­tain­ly have found out.

Though the show’s title con­tains the word Seri­ous and O’Brien speaks with gen­uine curios­i­ty through­out, it also con­tains the words Jib­ber-Jab­ber, and I doubt he has it in him not to crack jokes. This is wel­come, and a rea­son why I’d like to see him direct all of Team Coco’s con­sid­er­able resources to these inter­views from now on. He even gets into the sub­ject of pres­i­den­tial sens­es of humor — evi­dent­ly pres­i­dents aren’t allowed to have them any­more — which he picks up again in the show’s sec­ond inter­view, with com­e­dy writer and film­mak­er Judd Apa­tow. Though we get a warn­ing that O’Brien will only tape more of these con­ver­sa­tions “when­ev­er time and fate allow,” I per­son­al­ly await the next one with bat­ed breath. Some­how, the man who gave the world the Horny Man­a­tee, the Coked-Up Were­wolf, and the immor­tal Mas­tur­bat­ing Bear real­ized the most impor­tant thing about view­ers like you and me: we’d much rather watch two peo­ple dis­cuss enthu­si­as­ti­cal­ly and at length sub­jects that inter­est them rather than swift­ly man­gle sub­jects they guess might inter­est us.

Relat­ed con­tent:

Conan O’Brien Writes Chica­go Blues Songs With School Kids

Conan O’Brien @ Google

Conan O’Brien Kills It at Dart­mouth Grad­u­a­tion

Col­in Mar­shall hosts and pro­duces Note­book on Cities and Cul­ture. Fol­low him on Twit­ter at @colinmarshall.

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Watch The Mind of a Chef, the Unconventional Travel-Cooking Show Online (for a Limited Time)

in Television | November 26th, 2012

Ear­li­er this month, PBS pre­miered The Mind of a Chef, a 16-episode series that fea­tures nar­ra­tor Antho­ny Bour­dain tak­ing view­ers inside the mind of the award-win­ning Kore­an-Amer­i­can chef David Chang. In the series pre­miere above, David “dis­sects the roots of his pas­sion for ramen dish­es and tsuke­men on a trip to Japan,” giv­ing you an overview of the famous noo­dle and tak­ing you right to a ramen fac­to­ry. If the first episode, um, whets your appetite, then you’ll want to spend time with nine oth­er episodes from the series. They’re now post­ed online for a lim­it­ed time, cour­tesy of PBS, and they each run about 20 min­utes. But don’t dil­ly dal­ly, some will go offline on Novem­ber 30.

via Kot­tke

Relat­ed Con­tent:

Wim Wen­ders Vis­its, Mar­vels at a Japan­ese Fake Food Work­shop

Woody Allen Lives the “Deli­cious Life” in Ear­ly-80s Japan­ese Com­mer­cials

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Johnny Cash Sings “Man in Black” for the First Time, 1971

in Music, Television | November 26th, 2012

Recent­ly we fea­tured a video of Neil Young per­form­ing on The John­ny Cash Show in 1971. Today we bring you anoth­er extra­or­di­nary moment from the very same episode: John­ny Cash intro­duc­ing his now-clas­sic song, “Man in Black.”

It’s from a spe­cial called “John­ny Cash on Cam­pus” which aired on Feb­ru­ary 17, 1971. The per­for­mance was taped in front of an all-stu­dent audi­ence at the Ryman Audi­to­ri­um in down­town Nashville. A few days ear­li­er Cash had trav­eled across town to vis­it stu­dents on the cam­pus of Van­der­bilt Uni­ver­si­ty and, as he explains here in the intro­duc­tion, an idea began brew­ing.

1971 was a time of wide­spread stu­dent protests over the Viet­nam War and oth­er issues. The Kent State shoot­ings had hap­pened the year before. As a protest song, “Man in Black” shows Cash’s abil­i­ty to reach across gen­er­a­tions and appeal to audi­ences much wider than those usu­al­ly afford­ed to coun­try music.

When Cash first played the song at Ryman Audi­to­ri­um it was so new he need­ed cue cards to fol­low the words. The video offers a rare glimpse of an artist try­ing out a major work when the paint was still wet.

Relat­ed con­tent:

John­ny Cash: Singer, Out­law and, Briefly, Tele­vi­sion Host

The 1969 Bob Dylan-John­ny Cash Ses­sions: Twelve Rare Record­ings

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The Coen Brothers Make a TV Commercial — Ridiculing “Clean Coal”

in Comedy, Film, Technology, Television | November 26th, 2012

When famous movie direc­tors shoot tele­vi­sion spots, they usu­al­ly focus on the mer­its of a par­tic­u­lar prod­uct: Wim Wen­ders and Stel­la Artois, Wes Ander­son and the Hyundai Azera, Jean-Luc Godard and Schick after­shave. Above, you’ll see one by Joel and Ethan Coen meant not to endorse but to oppose. Premised on the notion that the name “clean coal” masks a not-espe­cial­ly-clean tech­nol­o­gy, “Clean Coal Clean” dish­es it out against the coal indus­try — “the most trust­ed name in coal” — with a satir­i­cal pas­tiche of house­hold clean­ing spray com­mer­cials. I’ll say this: if any pair of film­mak­ers can get me to watch a video about the pol­i­tics of coal, the guys behind Rais­ing Ari­zona, Bar­ton Fink, and A Seri­ous Man can. The clip just below offers a look into the pro­duc­tion of anoth­er “Clean Coal Clean” par­o­dy com­mer­cial, and a rare chance to see the Coen broth­ers at work.

Mar­la Dick­er­son in the Los Ange­les Times pro­vides back­ground on this “lat­est sal­vo in the media bat­tle between the coal indus­try and envi­ron­men­tal­ists over the role that car­bon fuels should play in the Unit­ed States’ ener­gy future.” Dick­er­son quotes a coal spokesman on how the “the indus­try spent more than $50 bil­lion since the 1970s installing pol­lu­tion-con­trol equip­ment and design­ing plants that are more effi­cient.” She also lays out the envi­ron­men­tal­ists’ argu­ment: “the coal indus­try’s mar­ket­ing cam­paign has left Amer­i­cans with the impres­sion that such ‘clean coal” tech­nol­o­gy already exists. Such a break­through has yet to be devel­oped,” she quotes the Sier­ra Cub’s coal cam­paign direc­tor as say­ing, “and may nev­er be at a cost that makes eco­nom­ic sense.” Of course, not even a genius auteur — not even two of them — can make up your mind on this issue. But with these spots, the Coen broth­ers and the Alliance for Cli­mate Pro­tec­tion reit­er­ate an invalu­able point: whether about house­hold clean­ers or ener­gy sources, nev­er believe the hype.

Relat­ed con­tent:

Wim Wen­ders Cre­ates Ads to Sell Beer (Stel­la Artois), Pas­ta (Bar­il­la), and More Beer (Car­ling)

Wes Anderson’s New Com­mer­cials Sell the Hyundai Azera

Fellini’s Fan­tas­tic TV Com­mer­cials

David Lynch’s Sur­re­al Com­mer­cials

Jean-Luc Godard’s After-Shave Com­mer­cial for Schick

Col­in Mar­shall hosts and pro­duces Note­book on Cities and Cul­ture. Fol­low him on Twit­ter at @colinmarshall.

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Louis CK Plays Abraham Lincoln, America’s 16th President and (Yes) Stand-Up Comedian Too

in Comedy, History, Television | November 16th, 2012

Abra­ham Lin­coln fret­ted over the tim­ing of eman­ci­pa­tion, Gen­er­al George McClel­lan’s reluc­tance to take deci­sive action, North-South reuni­fi­ca­tion, and his wife’s men­tal insta­bil­i­ty.

Louis CK wor­ries about sex, his kids, and the decline of his flab­by, mid­dle-aged body.

The ten­den­cy to dwell on weighty mat­ters makes CK a fit­ting choice to embody our 16th pres­i­dent  on the small screen. (A dis­tinc­tion shared by such lumi­nar­ies as Lance Hen­rik­sen and Sam Water­ston, though not at the behest of Sat­ur­day Night Live). Movie star Daniel Day-Lewis’ cur­rent­ly run­ning por­tray­al may net him a Best Actor Triple Crown come awards sea­son, but CK’s the one who takes Abe to anoth­er dimen­sion, tai­lor­ing the Great Empan­ci­pa­tor to fit the estab­lished tem­plate of his own crit­i­cal­ly acclaimed sit­com.

His­to­ry comes alive in a whole new way as the stovepipe-hat­ted, pudgi­er-than-nor­mal Lin­coln trudges up from the sub­way, chok­ing down an anony­mous West Vil­lage slice to get him through a set at the Com­e­dy Cel­lar. Abe’s rou­tine on slave own­er­ship has def­i­nite echoes of Louis’ Sea­son One mus­ings on bes­tial­i­ty, a there-but-for-the-grace-of-god-go‑I flir­ta­tion res­cued by pro­fan­i­ty-laced moral out­rage.

No dis­re­spect to Day-Lewis’ First Lady Sal­ly Field, but there’s sim­i­lar fresh­ness to be found in Sat­ur­day Night Live reg­u­lar Aidy Bryant’s inter­pre­ta­tion of Mary Todd Lin­coln. Par­tic­u­lar­ly  when one fac­tors in a Direc­tor’s Cut that restores the pet­ti­coat peel­ing mate­r­i­al cut from the late night broad­cast.

Relat­ed Con­tent:

David Lynch Teach­es Louis C.K. How to Host The David Let­ter­man Show

How the Great George Car­lin Showed Louis CK the Way to Suc­cess (NSFW)

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