title: The Painted Veil (2006 film)

text: He suggested casting Naomi Watts for the role of Kitty, but this did not take place until after she proved herself a bankable star with her performances in "Mulholland Drive" (2001) and "21 Grams" (2003). When Watts joined the project, she recommended director John Curran, with whom she had collaborated on the 2004 film "We Don't Live Here Anymore". The director's expertise with that work convinced Watts and Norton that he would be capable of depicting the dysfunctional relationship in "The Painted Veil".


title: The Painted Veil (2006 film)

text: The project began development at producers Bob Yari and Mark Gordon's Stratus Film Company, but when Stratus executive Mark Gill left to start Warner Independent Pictures, he took the project with him. Gill began production of the film in partnership with Yari. Gill was later fired before the film's completion by Warner Bros. production president Jeff Robinov. This was said to contribute to the film's marketing difficulties.


title: The Painted Veil (2006 film)

text: Yari and Warner Independent Pictures collaborated with a Chinese partner who was granted approval over the script and the finished film. The partnership permitted a budget of $19 million for "The Painted Veil". When the Chinese production company reviewed the film, its representatives were unhappy with the depiction of the Chinese uprising and the cholera victims, requesting that the scenes be revised. Norton and Curran expressed concerns that their studio accepted the censorship too quickly, with the director threatening to remove his name from the film. Their pressure resulted in limiting cuts from the film to 38 seconds.


title: The Painted Veil (2006 film)

text: Screenwriter Ron Nyswaner and Norton collaborated on the screenplay for the film. They considered the 1925 novel by W. Somerset Maugham to be one-dimensional. Norton expanded the character of Walter Fane, giving him an enhanced role. He also had Walter make peace with his wife Kitty, leading to them falling in love with each other. Norton explained, "I like to think that we didn't change the book so much as liberate it. We just imagined it on a slightly bigger scale, and made external some of what is internal in the novel." Norton described the novel as "almost unremittingly bleak" and believed that the author had thought that British colonials were unlikely to change. The actor said of his changes, "I went on the assumption that if you were willing to allow Walter and Kitty to grow... you had the potential for a love story that was both tragic and meaningful." Norton considered "The Painted Veil" to be in the spirit of such films as "Out of Africa" (1985) and "The English Patient" (1996), seeing it as "rooted in really looking at the way that men and women hurt each other".


title: The Painted Veil (2006 film)

text: Director John Curran suggested setting the film during 1925, when the events of the Chinese nationalist movement were taking place. Norton, who had studied Chinese history at Yale University, agreed with the suggestion. To detail scenes from the time period, Curran, Norton, and Nyswaner relied on excerpts from historian Jonathan Spence's 1969 book "To Change China", which covered the inept efforts of Western advisers during these years. Norton said that the character Walter Fane served as "the proxy for the arrogance of Western rationalism." He said that Fane was confused when the Chinese were not grateful for his help, saying, "Walter means well, but he's the folly of empire, and that adds a whole new dimension to what happens in the story. It's a metaphor for the way empires get crushed."


title: The Painted Veil (2006 film)

text: Filming took place on location in Shanghai, China and in a southern Chinese rural village. The director did not want to build a set for the village beset by cholera, and instead sought a rural area in China. He came across the old quarter of Huangyao (黄姚古镇, "huángyáo gǔzhèn") in Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region, which then served as the location for the village scenes. The director described the location, "Even the Chinese crew members were amazed at the place we found... It was like going back in time." According to Nyswaner, a large amount of time of the film production was spent negotiating with the Chinese government for the completion of the film, as there were disagreements over issues in the script.


title: The Painted Veil (2006 film)

text: Most of the film was shot in Guangxi. Director John Curran said, "We wanted this movie to be distinctly Chinese. We didn’t want it to look like a film that you could shoot in Canada or Mexico or Italy." Line producer Antonia Barnard states that initially the film, like the novel, was to be set in Hong Kong; however, the crew realized Hong Kong of the time period would be difficult to replicate. They altered the story to set the plot in Shanghai; the crew shot "Shanghai for Shanghai in the period, and shot London scenes in Shanghai as well."


title: The Painted Veil (2006 film)

text: There are also three songs not listed on the official soundtrack. All of them are performed by the Choir of the Beijing Takahashi Culture and Art Centre:


title: The Painted Veil (2006 film)

text: The film's post-production schedule was slated to conclude in late summer 2006, but did not finish until November. According to Laura Kim, the marketing and publicity head of Warner Independent Pictures, the delay slowed award and media recognition for the film. Other studios were duplicating DVDs of their films for awards organizations, so "The Painted Veil" was unable to get first priority in processing. When "The Painted Veil" had a limited release in the United States on December 20, 2006 in the cities of Los Angeles and New York City, the meager marketing campaign for the film was criticized. Half a dozen people associated with the film complained that Warner Independent Pictures conduct of the marketing campaign was failing to gain the film enough attention. Film critic Rex Reed of "The New York Observer" wrote, "Nobody can understand why Warner Independent Pictures is keeping this movie such a secret; it is filled with Oscar possibilities that should be shouted from the rooftops."


title: The Painted Veil (2006 film)

text: The firing of Mark Gill, one of the initial producers of "The Painted Veil" and who brought it to Warner Independent Pictures, was cited as a reason for the small scale of the film's marketing campaign. Director John Curran said to Warner Independent, "Any transition is not going to be ideal. When the guy who has gotten you on board is gone, you're kind of exposed." Others also criticized the studio for not providing a large enough marketing budget, pointing out that the previous year's "Good Night, and Good Luck" had a more successful campaign with television and newspaper ads. "The Painted Veil" eventually expanded to 23 more markets on December 29, 2006, with additional cities on January 5, 2007. Warner Independent hosted 80 screenings of "The Painted Veil" in Los Angeles, New York, San Francisco, and London, as well as to various Hollywood guilds, to promote the film.


title: The Painted Veil (2006 film)

text: "The Painted Veil" initially had a limited release in four theaters in the United States on December 20, 2006, grossing $51,086 over the opening weekend. The film gradually expanded its showings in the United States and Canada, peaking at 287 theaters on the weekend of January 26, 2007. "The Painted Veil" ultimately grossed $8,060,487 in the United States and Canada and $18,850,360 in other territories for a worldwide total of $26,910,847.


title: The Painted Veil (2006 film)

text: On the review aggregation website Rotten Tomatoes, the film has received an approval rating of 74% based on 143 reviews. On Metacritic, the film has received a score of 69 out of 100 based on 33 reviews, indicating "generally favorable reviews".


title: The Painted Veil (2006 film)

text: "so unlikely for modern adaptation, particularly when, as is the case here, it hasn’t been refitted with a contemporary hook or allegory for audiences who wouldn’t know Maugham from Edna Ferber. Instead, as nicely directed by John Curran and adapted to the screen by Ron Nyswaner, this version of the story lulls you by turning Maugham’s distaff bildungsroman into a fine romance. Even better, the new film gives us ample opportunity to spend time with Ms. Watts, whose remarkable talent helps keep movie faith and love alive, even in the tinniest, tiniest vehicles . . . An inveterate stealer and masticator of scenes, Mr. Norton is very fine here, especially early on, before his billing gets the better of the story and he begins riding around heroically on horseback . . . Whether through craft or constitution, [he] invests Walter with a petty cruelty that makes his character’s emotional thaw and Kitty’s predicament all the more poignant."


title: The Painted Veil (2006 film)

text: Carina Chocano of the "Los Angeles Times" said the film "has all the elements in place to be a great epic, but it fails to connect, to paraphrase Maugham's contemporary E.M. Forster, the prose with the passion. It's impeccable, but leaves you cold."


title: The Painted Veil (2006 film)

text: "If you're suspecting this third movie version of W. Somerset Maugham's 1925 novel may carry the infectious dullness of prestige filmmaking, rest easy . . . the film is a period piece propelled by emotions accessible to a modern audience . . . "The Painted Veil" has the power and intimacy of a timeless love story. By all means, let it sweep you away."


title: The Painted Veil (2006 film)

text: Meghan Keane of "The New York Sun" said the film "may at times threaten to fall into an abyss of sentimentality, and it has moments that seem mere transitions to propel the plot, but it manages a charming historic portrait without insulting the audience's intelligence."


title: The Painted Veil (2006 film)

text: Todd McCarthy of "Variety" thought the story "feels remote and old-school despite a frankness the two previous film versions lacked." He added,


title: The Painted Veil (2006 film)

text: "Present scripter Ron Nyswaner makes some solid fundamental decisions, beginning with the telescoping down to the barest minimum the London-set opening . . . All the same, the film is still dominated by the stuffy, repressed personality of Fane, whose emotional stonewalling of his wife produces a stifling of Kitty's naturally more vivacious, if common, personality. Despite the extremes of human experience on view, there is a certain blandness to them as they play out, a sensation matched by the eye-catching but picture-postcard-like presentation of the settings . . . Even the ultra-capable Norton and Watts aren't fully able to galvanize viewer interest in their narrowly self-absorbed characters."


title: The Painted Veil (2006 film)

text: Composer Alexandre Desplat won the 2006 Golden Globe Award for Best Original Score. Desplat also won an award for Best Original Score from the Los Angeles Film Critics Association for both "The Painted Veil" and "The Queen" (2006).


title: The Painted Veil (2006 film)

text: Ron Nyswaner won the National Board of Review Award for Best Adapted Screenplay and was nominated for the Independent Spirit Award for Best Screenplay but lost to Jason Reitman for "Thank You for Smoking".


title: The Painted Veil (2006 film)

text: Edward Norton was nominated for the Independent Spirit Award for Best Male Lead but lost to Ryan Gosling in "Half Nelson". The San Diego Film Critics Society honored Norton for his work in this, "The Illusionist", and "Down in the Valley".


title: Jason Gideon

text: Jason Gideon is a fictional character in the CBS crime drama "Criminal Minds," portrayed by Mandy Patinkin. Gideon is a Senior Supervisory Special Agent and the unit chief of the FBI's Behavioral Analysis Unit, and appeared from the series' pilot episode "Extreme Aggressor," which was originally broadcast on September 22, 2005, until "In Name and Blood," the second episode of the third season. He is also portrayed as a younger man by Ben Savage in flashbacks.


title: Jason Gideon

text: Mandy Patinkin abruptly left the show in 2007, just as his character abruptly quit from the BAU, due to emotional distress. In 2012, Patinkin opened up about why he left stating that the show "was very destructive to my soul and my personality. After that, I didn't think I would get to work in television again." Immediately after Gideon's departure, Aaron Hotchner (Thomas Gibson) is appointed unit chief. When Hotchner also leaves the BAU, the position is given to Emily Prentiss (Paget Brewster), then temporarily to Jennifer Jareau (A. J. Cook), until Prentiss again becomes chief and remains so for the duration of the series. In season ten, Gideon is murdered off-screen by serial killer Donnie Mallick (Arye Gross).


title: Jason Gideon

text: Gideon was the protégé of Max Ryan (Geoff Pierson), who taught him everything he knew about profiling. One of Gideon's earliest cases was a bomber case, which was supervised by Max. As a prank for the new member, Max and the other investigators involved planted a list of the FBI director's whereabouts over the next 48 hours in the bomber's car for Gideon to find. When he found it, before Max could stop him, Gideon rushed up 25 flights of stairs and interrupted a meeting between the director and the U.S. Attorney General in an attempt to save him.


title: Jason Gideon

text: During his early career with the FBI, Gideon was partnered with David Rossi (Joe Mantegna); following Gideon's resignation from the BAU, Rossi replaces him as Senior Supervisory Special Agent.


title: Jason Gideon

text: While investigating the case of Adrian Bale (Tim Kelleher), a.k.a. "The Boston Shrapnel Bomber," Gideon had reportedly suffered a nervous breakdown after he sent six men into a warehouse before Bale detonated a bomb inside. All six agents and a hostage were killed, and he was blamed. He took a six-month medical leave because he was suffering from post-traumatic stress disorder. Upon his return from medical leave, he is given the Senior Agent position, as Hotchner is confirmed as Unit Chief. Not much is known about his personal life, other than that he is divorced and has a son named Stephen, from whom he is estranged.


title: Jason Gideon

text: Through the first two seasons, Gideon is portrayed to be very good at chess, winning against Agent Spencer Reid (Matthew Gray Gubler) many times, the only exception being Reid's birthday. Prior to the series, he was said to have had a "nervous breakdown" (or "major depressive episode") after he sent six agents into a warehouse with a bomb in it; all six agents and a hostage were killed, and he was heavily criticized about the event. He showed particular dislike for the practice of using religion as a defense or motivation for one's crimes. He blamed himself for the torture Reid suffered at the hands of serial killer Tobias Hankel (James Van Der Beek), as he had ordered technical analyst Penelope Garcia (Kirsten Vangsness) to add a virus warning to the videos Hankel posted. He also blamed himself for Agent Elle Greenaway's shooting.


title: Jason Gideon

text: The character of Jason Gideon was partially based on real-life criminal profiler John E. Douglas, one of the founders of modern behavioral science.


title: Jason Gideon

text: He helps Reid and Derek Morgan (Shemar Moore) through their personal struggles. He is shown to have a very close relationship with Reid, having hand-picked him from the FBI Academy for his team, helping Reid through many difficulties and even leaving his good-bye letter for Reid to find.


title: Jason Gideon

text: In the show's first episode, "Extreme Aggressor," Gideon is called back to work to help profile a killer, called "The Seattle Strangler" by the media, who abducts women and holds them prisoner before strangling them and dumping their bodies. After solving the case of the Seattle Strangler, Gideon goes on vacation and stops at an old-fashioned gas station in Dumfries, Virginia. While inside, Gideon notices that the cashier (Lukas Haas) fits his profile of the Footpath Killer, a serial killer he had been investigating prior to being called in for the Seattle Strangler case. The man notices Gideon's gun and threatens him with a shotgun, insisting that he tell him who he is. When Gideon reveals he is with the FBI, the killer becomes even more agitated and begins stuttering, a feature included in Gideon's profile. Gideon then tells the man that he can tell him the one thing no one has ever been able to tell him: why he stutters. However, Gideon does not truly know the answer but is merely trying to provoke a stutter in order to distract the killer. The killer forces Gideon down a hall and into a small room full of pictures of his victims. Gideon intentionally demeans and insults the killer, increasingly agitating him and making his stutter worse. He takes his eyes off Gideon just long enough for him to grab the gun and subdue the killer.


title: Jason Gideon

text: In "Won't Get Fooled Again," a copycat bomber uses the methods of serial bomber Adrian Bale, the same criminal who committed the warehouse bombing that killed his six colleagues. Gideon has to face his past and Bale, to find out who the bomber is and stop him. After preventing the copycat's suicide bombing, Gideon is forced to make a deal with Bale to help defuse a bomb set to kill the BAU team and a hostage. When Gideon realizes that Bale is lying about how dismantle it, he calls his bluff, saving them all from a bomb going off. He then has the pleasure of returning Bale to prison, the burden of the six agents' deaths presumably gone, even mocking him while he was being placed in a cell by using Bale's own words ("[A]n emotional release") in a sentence; he states that he finds an emotional release in putting away criminals like Bale.


title: Jason Gideon

text: In "No Way Out," Gideon faces serial killer Frank Breitkopf (Keith Carradine). The BAU had received a call from Georgia Davis (Melissa Leo), the Sheriff of the Golconda, Nevada Sheriff's Department, who had recently found two murder victims, both missing their right rib bones, similar to a case that took place in 1996. However, Gideon realized that this killer has been active for 30 years. After studying one of the murder victims, he determines that the killer has extensive medical knowledge; his victims are alive when he cuts off their limbs; and he uses Ketamine to immobilize his victims. With this information, Gideon and the team are able to build a profile of the killer. In order to find the killer, the Sheriff's Department set up a road-block looking for an RV, truck, or trailer, which was believed to be his mode of transportation.


title: Jason Gideon

text: Gideon later noticed that something is bothering Davis, and she tells him that the profile the BAU gave them reminds her of the experience of a mentally ill local named Jane Hanratty (Amy Madigan), a.k.a. "Crazy Jane". The killer had abducted Jane 30 years before on the side of a road when her car broke down, but let her live; she believed that an alien had abducted her. Gideon deduces that the killer allowed Jane to survive because she wasn't scared of him. Eventually, Gideon leads local police in cornering Breitkopf in Fat Sam's Diner, and he tells them that he has abducted a group of schoolchildren in the middle of a desert, and is willing to let them go if Gideon brings Jane to him. Gideon makes a deal with Breitkopf: he and Jane will come with him if he takes them to where the children are. After the police rescue the children, Breitkopf and Jane walk off while Gideon runs in the opposite way. Gideon and Hotchner try to follow Breitkopf's tracks, but they suddenly disappear in the desert.


title: Jason Gideon

text: In "No Way Out II: The Evilution of Frank," while Gideon is trying to make up his mind about what flowers to buy his new girlfriend, Sarah Jacobs (Moira Squier), he sees Jane. When he looks up again, she has disappeared. Gideon then receives a call from Breitkopf, who is in Gideon's apartment, having murdered Sarah. He demands to have Jane back before hanging up. When the BAU begin to investigate, Gideon contacts Hotchner from a pay phone and tells him that Breitkopf dumped something in the trash on the street, later revealed to be bloody clothing. During the investigation, it is deduced that Breitkopf is targeting people Gideon previously rescued. Breitkopf later kills one such person, Rebecca Bryant (Amanda Bernero), who was abducted by serial killer Randall Garner (Charles Haid) and held captive for two years before being rescued by the BAU. Later, Tracy Belle (Elle Fanning), the only living victim of preteen spree killer Jeffrey Charles (Cameron Monaghan), goes missing. Gideon and Garcia are later able to figure out that the only story that moved Breitkopf the first time Gideon met him was that of the body of a woman who was found in an apartment on the Upper East Side of New York City because he was talking about his mother. Gideon then realizes that Breitkopf was hiding his mother's existence. Later, the team manages to find Breitkopf, who is calmly sitting on a bench at the Union Train Station, waiting for them to bring him Jane. The team brings in Jane, who refuses to go with Breitkopf. Gideon shows up and tells Breitkopf about Sarah, Breitkopf's mother, who Gideon claims was a prostitute. As Gideon and Hotchner describe Breitkopf, Jareau and Reid locate Tracy, who is bound and gagged but unharmed. Breitkopf convinces Jane to come back to him, and the two commit suicide. Later, Tracy calls Gideon and thanks him for saving her once again.


title: Jason Gideon

text: Gideon began to lose confidence in his profiling skills after Sarah's murder. During his final case in Arizona ("Doubt," season 3), he further loses faith in his abilities when his decision to release a suspect resulted in the deaths of both the suspect and a young woman. As a result of Gideon's actions, Hotchner is suspended, which is the final straw for Gideon. At the end of the following episode, "In Name and Blood," Reid visits Gideon's cabin but finds only his gun and badge, along with a letter meant for him. Gideon is last seen entering a Nevada diner; asked by a waitress where he is going, he replies that he does not know his destination or how he would know when he had reached it. He then leaves the diner and drives off, as his voiceover off-screen narrates the final lines of his letter: "I guess I'm just looking for it again. For the belief I had back in college. The belief I had when I first met Sarah and it all seemed so right. The belief in happy endings."


title: Jason Gideon

text: In the Season 10 episode "Nelson's Sparrow," Gideon is murdered off-screen, having been shot dead at a close range by serial killer Donnie Mallick, whom he and Rossi had investigated 30 years before. During the flashbacks focusing on a young version of him for the episode, which show him working at the BAU in 1978, he is played by Ben Savage.


title: B-flat major

text: B-flat major is a major scale based on B, with pitches B, C, D, E, F, G, and A. Its key signature has two flats. Its relative minor is G minor and its parallel minor is B-flat minor.


title: B-flat major

text: Many transposing instruments are pitched in B-flat major, including the clarinet, trumpet, tenor saxophone, and soprano saxophone. As a result, B-flat major is one of the most popular keys for concert band compositions.


title: B-flat major

text: Joseph Haydn's Symphony No. 98 is often credited as the first symphony written in that key, including trumpet and timpani parts. However, his brother Michael Haydn wrote one such symphony earlier, No. 36. Nonetheless, Joseph Haydn still gets credit for writing the timpani part at actual pitch with an F major key signature (instead of transposing with a C major key signature), a procedure that made sense since he limited that instrument to the tonic and dominant pitches. Many editions of the work use no key signature and specify the instrument as "Timpani in B–F".


title: Mario Cantone

text: Mario Cantone (born December 9, 1959) is an American comedian, writer, actor, and singer with numerous appearances on Comedy Central including "Chappelle's Show". He also played Anthony Marentino in "Sex and the City" and Terri in "Men In Trees" (2006-2008). His style is fast-paced and energetic, with much of his humor coming from his impersonations of characters ranging from family members to celebrities to stereotypes.


title: Mario Cantone

text: Cantone was born in Massachusetts, and raised in Stoneham, where his Italian-American family moved when he was two. He was the fourth of five children of Mario Sr., a Boston restaurant owner, and his wife, Elizabeth (née Pescione). His father moved the family to Stoneham, according to Cantone in a 2004 "New York Times" interview to get her away from her bookie relatives. Cantone stated that the problem "was that she was not only a bookie but she was also a compulsive gambler." His mother, who had been a big band singer in her youth, died when he was 21.


title: Mario Cantone

text: As a child, Cantone would direct reenactments of shows. Cantone's first impression was of Julia Child, which he presented in a junior high school talent show. He graduated from Stoneham High School in 1978 and Emerson College in 1982. He moved to New York City in 1983 and got a job as a chocolate vendor at Trump Tower.


title: Mario Cantone

text: While working at Trump Tower, he did impressions of people while selling chocolate truffles. He later worked as a jewelry salesman, quitting a year later to pursue comedy full time. He began his professional career hosting a children's show called "Steampipe Alley", which aired on New York-New Jersey superstation WWOR-TV from 1987 to 1993.


title: Mario Cantone

text: In his stand-up concerts, he is known for his occasionally campy impressions of entertainment personalities such as Liza Minnelli, Judy Garland, Bruce Springsteen, Jim Morrison, and Bette Davis as well as for his original songs.


title: Mario Cantone

text: Much of his comedy derives from his boisterous Italian-American family. Cantone, who is gay, has said that he considers himself an actor and comedian who happens to be gay rather than a gay comic relying on gay jokes. "Talking about being gay is a very small part of my show and when I first started I wasn't out on stage but I was out off stage, I certainly didn't lie about it on stage but if you didn't know you were an idiot and you lived in a cave after seeing me…really??"


title: Mario Cantone

text: Cantone is known for his role in the HBO series "Sex and the City" as Anthony Marentino, Charlotte York's gay wedding planner who dispensed advice with a rapid fire delivery.


title: Mario Cantone

text: Cantone made his Broadway debut in 1995, replacing Nathan Lane in the role of Buzz in Terrence McNally's Tony Award–winning play, "Love! Valour! Compassion! " Later that year, he appeared in the revival of "The Tempest" with Patrick Stewart. Several years later, Cantone did a workshop for "The Lion King" as Timon but was not comfortable with the makeup or manipulating a puppet and eventually left the project. In 2002, he created and wrote his own one-man show for Broadway, "An Evening With Mario Cantone". A year later, Cantone starred as Gidger in Richard Greenberg's "The Violet Hour" in a part written specifically for him. "The Violet Hour "received mixed reviews and closed after 54 performances.


title: Mario Cantone

text: In 2004, Cantone appeared as Samuel Byck in Stephen Sondheim's musical "Assassins. "" "Originally slated for the 2001 Broadway season, "Assassins" was postponed because of the September 11, 2001 attacks." " In 2001, Cantone had turned down the role of Carmen Ghia in Mel Brooks's "The Producers". His other Broadway credits include his second one-man show, "Laugh Whore, "which ran" "from October 24, 2004, to January 2, 2005, at the Cort Theatre. "Laugh Whore" received a Tony Award nomination for Best Special Theatrical Event and an Outer Critics Circle award nomination for Outstanding Solo Performance. Showtime taped the December 11, 2004 performance, which premiered on May 28, 2005. It was the network's first Broadway production to air as a comedy special.


title: Mario Cantone

text: In September 2010, Cantone appeared in a staged reading of the Charles Messina play "A Room of My Own" at The Theatre at 45 Bleecker Street in Greenwich Village. As of November 2012, the play was still in development with Cantone in the cast. The Off-Broadway production is expected to begin previews in February 2016.


title: Mario Cantone

text: He started his career as the host of children’s show, “Steampipe Alley,” which aired in the late 80’s through 1993.


title: Mario Cantone

text: He has appeared in the Comedy Central roasts of Joan Rivers and fellow Boston-area native and Emerson College alumnus Denis Leary. The network's "Chappelle's Show" featured him in a segment called "Ask A Gay Dude."


title: Mario Cantone

text: His voice-over work includes Sunsilk "hairapy" advertisements. and the voice of talent scout Mikey Abromowitz in the 2007 computer animated movie "Surf's Up." He has appeared frequently on the Opie and Anthony radio show.


title: Mario Cantone

text: He was a regular guest on the ABC daytime talk show "The View" since at least 2003 and became a guest co-host in 2005. In August 2013, he was in the news as a rumored replacement for retiring co-host Joy Behar and since 2014 has been co-hosting more frequently.


title: Mario Cantone

text: Cantone was among the judges of the Miss America 2014 pageant. He has appeared several times on "The $100,000 Pyramid" and "Match Game" as a celebrity guest star.


title: Mario Cantone

text: In 2022, Cantone competed in season eight of "The Masked Singer" as "Maize". He was eliminated on "Andrew Lloyd Webber Night" alongside Gloria Gaynor as "Mermaid".


title: Mario Cantone

text: In October 2011, Cantone married his partner of 20 years, musical theater director Jerry Dixon. The ceremony was officiated by pastor Jay Bakker.


title: Peter Douglas

text: Peter Vincent Douglas (born November 23, 1955) is an American television and film producer, actor and photographer. He is the third son of actor Kirk Douglas, and the first by his second wife, German-American producer Anne Buydens. Douglas worked closely with his father and became president of The Bryna Company, an independent film and television production company formed by Kirk Douglas in 1949. In 1978, he formed his own film production company, Vincent Pictures.


title: Peter Douglas

text: Douglas won a Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Drama/Comedy Special in 1988 for his production of "Inherit the Wind", which co-starred his father and Jason Robards. He had been nominated for the same award two years prior for his production of "Amos", which also starred his father.


title: Peter Douglas

text: Peter Douglas was born in Los Angeles, California, on November 23, 1955. His middle name was given in homage to Vincent van Gogh, whom his father was portraying in a film version being shot in Europe at the time of his birth. The film in question, "Lust for Life", was later released in 1956. In 1958, his father named his new music publishing company, Peter Vincent Music Corporation (a subsidiary of Bryna Productions), after his son, while Peter later named his own independent film production company Vincent Pictures. In 1958, a young Peter was seen on the television program "This Is Your Life", which was honoring the life and career of his father.


title: Peter Douglas

text: Douglas' early work in the film industry was tied to his father, namely through of his independent film production company, Bryna Productions. As a child, Douglas had uncredited bit parts in his father's films "The Vikings" and "Stranger When We Meet" (in which Kirk Douglas both produced and starred). Douglas went to high school at a military academy in Southern California. In the early 1970s, Douglas studied photography at the Los Angeles Art Center. In June 1972, aged 17, Douglas was hired by his father as the still photographer when The Bryna Company produced "Scalawag" on location in Yugoslavia. His father produced, directed and starred in the film, while his mother Anne was co-producer; his younger brother Eric was the producer's assistant and their family dog Shaft Douglas had a part in the film. During the production of "Scalawag", actress Lesley-Anne Down posed for Peter and the pictures were sold to "Playboy" magazine.


title: Peter Douglas

text: Douglas again served as still photographer when his family traveled from Yugoslavia to England for The Bryna Company's television musical film "Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde". Pictures taken by Douglas of the character's transformation were used on the cover of "Los Angeles Times"' "TV Times" section on March 4, 1973. Douglas attended the University of California at Santa Barbara for a year and a half but ultimately dropped out to focus on photography and motion picture work. In November 1973, Douglas photographed his brother Michael and his at-the-time girlfriend Brenda Vaccaro in their Benedict Canyon home for publication in several leading magazines. He also became Olympic swimmer Mark Spitz's official photographer. In March 1974, Douglas formed his own photographic service company and photography studio, Bryna International, and was represented by talent agent Phyllis Carlyle through her agency A-Plus. Carlyle landed Douglas photography contracts for such publications as "Cosmopolitan" and large advertisement agencies. In June 1974, Douglas photographed Frank Sinatra cooking a special Italian dinner for his parent's anniversary and the pictures were used in several publications.


title: Peter Douglas

text: For The Bryna Company's next picture, "Posse", filmed from September to November 1974, Douglas served as post-production supervisor. Douglas then began working on the development of Ray Bradbury's "Something Wicked This Way Comes", which would take nine years to complete and was eventually filmed as a coproduction between The Bryna Company and Walt Disney Productions. Douglas also worked as a producer's assistant at Columbia Pictures during the mid-to-late 1970s.


title: Peter Douglas

text: Peter Douglas' television production credits include "Inherit the Wind" (1988), for which he won the Emmy Award for Outstanding Drama or Comedy Special, and "Amos" (1984), which was also Emmy-nominated in the same category. His motion picture credits include the science-fiction time-travel classic "The Final Countdown" (1980), in which his father starred, and the adaptation of the classic Ray Bradbury novel "Something Wicked This Way Comes" (1983), which won the Saturn Award for Best Fantasy Film. He also produced the suspense-comedy hit "Fletch" (1985), as well as its sequel "Fletch Lives" (1989), both starring Chevy Chase. In December 1985, it was reported that Peter Douglas and Michael Phillips were working on developing a film from Isaac Asimov's novel "The End of Eternity" for Tri-Star Pictures. The property would remain in development for several years but was never filmed.


title: Peter Douglas

text: Douglas wrote, directed, and produced the independent film "A Tiger's Tale" (1988), starring Ann-Margret. He was the executive producer of the HBO Drama thriller "The Enemy Within", starring Forest Whitaker and Jason Robards, and was also executive producer of the 2009 motion picture "Whip It" starring Drew Barrymore and Elliot Page.


title: Peter Douglas

text: In 2012, Vincent Pictures announced that Peter Douglas was working on a remake of the 1966 film "Grand Prix", which his father executive produced through Douglas and Lewis Productions.


title: Handshake

text: A handshake is a globally widespread, brief greeting or parting tradition in which two people grasp one of each other's like hands, in most cases accompanied by a brief up-and-down movement of the grasped hands. Customs surrounding handshakes are specific to cultures. Different cultures may be more or less likely to shake hands, or there may be different customs about how or when to shake hands.


title: Handshake

text: The handshake may have originated in prehistory as a demonstration of peaceful intent, since it shows that the hand holds no weapon. Another possibility is that it originated as a symbolic gesture of mutual commitment to an oath or promise: two hands clasping each other represents the sealing of a bond. One of the earliest known depictions of a handshake is an ancient Assyrian relief of the 9th century BC depicting the Assyrian king Shalmaneser III shaking the hand of the Babylonian king Marduk-zakir-shumi I to seal an alliance.


title: Handshake

text: Archaeological ruins and ancient texts show that handshaking was practiced in ancient Greece (where it was called dexiosis) as early as the 5th century BC. For example, a depiction of two soldiers shaking hands can be found on part of a 5th-century BC funerary stele that is on display in Berlin’s Pergamon Museum (stele SK1708) and on other funerary steles, such as one from the 4th century BC that depicts Thraseas and his wife Euandria shaking hands.


title: Handshake

text: Depictions of handshakes also appear in Archaic Greek, Etruscan and Roman funerary and non-funerary art. Muslim scholars have written that the custom of handshaking was introduced to them by the people of Yemen.


title: Handshake

text: The handshake is commonly done upon meeting, greeting, parting, offering congratulations, expressing gratitude, or as a public sign of completing a business or diplomatic agreement. In sports or other competitive activities, it is also done as a sign of good sportsmanship. Its purpose is to convey trust, respect, balance, and equality. If it is done to form an agreement, the agreement is not official until the hands are parted.


title: Handshake

text: Unless health issues or local customs dictate otherwise, a handshake is made usually with bare hands. It depends on the situation.


title: Handshake

text: Handshakes are known to spread a number of microbial pathogens. Certain diseases such as scabies are known to spread most frequently through direct skin-to-skin contact. A medical study has found that fist bumps and high fives spread fewer germs than handshakes.


title: Handshake

text: During the 2009 H1N1 pandemic, the dean of medicine at the University of Calgary, Tomas Feasby, suggested that fist bumps may be a "nice replacement of the handshake" in an effort to prevent transmission of the virus.


title: Handshake

text: Following a 2010 study that showed that only about 40% of doctors and other health care providers complied with hand hygiene rules in hospitals, Mark Sklansky, a doctor at UCLA hospital, decided to test "a handshake-free zone" as a method for limiting the spread of germs and reducing the transmission of disease. UCLA did not ban the handshakes outright, but rather suggested other options like fist bumping, smiling, bowing, waving, and non-contact Namaste gestures. Other sources suggest raised brows, smiling, wai bow, two claps, hand over heart, sign language wave, or the shaka sign.


title: Handshake

text: During the COVID-19 pandemic, several countries and organisations adopted policies encouraging people to use alternative modes of greeting instead of a handshake. Suggested alternatives included the elbow bump, the fist bump, foot tapping or non-contact actions for social distancing purposes, such as a namaste gesture. Footshaking was also suggested.


title: Handshake

text: It has been discovered as a part of a research in the Weizmann Institute, that human handshakes serve as a means of transferring social chemical signals between the shakers.


title: Handshake

text: It appears that there is a tendency to bring the shaken hands to the vicinity of the nose and smell them. They may serve an evolutionary need to learn about the person whose hand was shaken, replacing a more overt sniffing behavior, as is common among animals and in certain human cultures (such as Tuvalu, Greenland or rural Mongolia, where a quick sniff is part of the traditional greeting ritual).


title: Handshake

text: Atlantic City, New Jersey Mayor Joseph Lazarow was recognized by the "Guinness Book of World Records" for a July 1977 publicity stunt, in which the mayor shook more than 11,000 hands in a single day, breaking the record previously held by President Theodore Roosevelt, who had set the record with 8,510 handshakes at a White House reception on 1 January 1907. Dowson's record was recognised by the Guinness World Records Organisation and published in their 1964 publication. On 31 August 1987, Stephen Potter from St Albans shook 19,550 hands at the St Albans Carnival to take the world record for shaking most hands verified by the Guinness Book of World Records. In 1992 Scott Killon of Vancouver,Canada set a World Record of 25,289 hands at the Worlds Fair in Seville, Spain. A photo of Scott Killon with a Canadian Mountie is shown in the 1994 edition of the Guinness Book. The record has since been exceeded but has been retired from the book.


title: Handshake

text: On 27 May 2008, Kevin Whittaker and Cory Jens broke the Guinness World Record for the World's Longest Handshake (single hand) in San Francisco, CA by shaking hands for 9 hours and 30 minutes, besting the previous record of 9 hours and 19 minutes set in 2006. This record stood briefly until 16 August 2008 when Kirk Williamson and Richard McCulley were recognized by Guinness World Records for the longest time two people shook hands uninterruptedly for 10 hours at Aloha Stadium in Aiea, Hawaii USA. On 21 September 2009, Jack Tsonis and Lindsay Morrison then broke that record by shaking hands for 12 hours, 34 minutes and 56 seconds. Their record was broken less than a month later in Claremont, California, when John-Clark Levin and George Posner shook hands for 15 hours, 15 minutes, and 15 seconds. The next month, on 21 November, Matthew Rosen and Joe Ackerman surpassed this feat, with a new world record time of 15 hours, 30 minutes and 45 seconds certified in an edition of the "Guinness Book of Records" on page 111.


title: Handshake

text: At 8 p.m. EST on Friday 14 January 2011 a new attempt at the longest hand-shake commenced in New York Times Square and the existing record was broken by semi-professional world record-breaker Alastair Galpin and Don Purdon from New Zealand and Nepalese brothers Rohit and Santosh Timilsina who agreed to share the new record after 33 hours and 3 minutes.


title: Handshake

text: On 29 January 2020, a new world record for the longest handshaking relay was set by approximately 1,817 people in Abu Dhabi, United Arab Emirates at Umm Al Emarat Park in an event organized by the Abu Dhabi Police to celebrate the 1 year anniversary of the signing of the Document on Human Fraternity for World Peace and Living Together in the city.


title: Arab states of the Persian Gulf

text: The Arab states of the Persian Gulf refers to a group of Arab states which border the Persian Gulf. There are seven member states of the Arab League in the region: Bahrain, Kuwait, Iraq, Oman, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, and the United Arab Emirates. Yemen is bound to the six countries of the Gulf Cooperation Council, based on history and culture.


title: Arab states of the Persian Gulf

text: The term has been used in different contexts to refer to a number of Arab states in the Persian Gulf region. The prominent regional political union Gulf Cooperation Council includes Bahrain, Kuwait, Oman, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, and the United Arab Emirates. Historically, various British Empire protectorates, including the Trucial States were Arab states along the Persian Gulf.


title: Arab states of the Persian Gulf

text: Some of the Arab states of the Persian Gulf are constitutional monarchies with elected parliaments. Bahrain ("Majlis al Watani") and Kuwait ("Majlis al Ummah") have legislatures with members elected by the population.


title: Arab states of the Persian Gulf

text: The Sultanate of Oman also has an advisory council ("Majlis ash-Shura") that is popularly elected. In the United Arab Emirates, a federation of seven monarchical emirates, the Federal National Council, functions only as an advisory body, but some of its members are now chosen via a limited electoral college nominated by the seven rulers.


title: Arab states of the Persian Gulf

text: The Kingdom of Saudi Arabia remains a hereditary monarchy with limited political representation. In Qatar, an elected national parliament has been mooted and is written into the new constitution, but elections are yet to be held. Saudi Arabia and Qatar are the two Arab states and absolute monarchies to have never held elections since their respective establishments as nations in 1932 and 1971. Iraq is the only federal republic situated in the Persian Gulf region.


title: Arab states of the Persian Gulf

text: Mass media in the seven Arab states of the Persian Gulf have varying degrees of freedom, with Kuwait topping the league with a lively press that enjoys considerably more freedom than its Persian Gulf counterparts according to Freedom House and Reporters Without Borders. Both organizations rank Kuwait's press as the freest of all Arab states of the Persian Gulf. Kuwait ranks amongst the top three for free press in the Arab world. Qatar and Oman come in second and third respectively within the regional ranks of the Arab states of the Persian Gulf.


title: Arab states of the Persian Gulf

text: The seven Arab states of the Persian Gulf lie in a volatile region and their seven governments, with varying degrees of success and effort, try and advance peace in their own countries and other countries. However, Arab countries in the Persian Gulf region—specifically Saudi Arabia and Qatar—stand accused of funding militant Islamist organizations, such as Hamas and the Muslim Brotherhood. According to the Institute for Economics and Peace (IEP)'s Global Peace Index of 2016, the six governments had varying degrees of success in maintaining peace amongst their respective borders with Qatar ranked number 1 amongst its regional peers as the most peaceful regional and Middle Eastern nation (and ranked 34 worldwide), while Kuwait ranks second both in the Persian Gulf and Middle East regions (and 51 worldwide), followed by the UAE in the third spot (61 worldwide).


title: Arab states of the Persian Gulf

text: Most of these Arab states have significant revenues from petroleum. The United Arab Emirates has been successfully diversifying its economy. 79% of UAE's total GDP comes from non-oil sectors. Oil accounts for only 2% of Dubai's GDP. Bahrain has the Persian Gulf's first "post-oil" economy because the Bahraini economy does not rely on oil.


title: Arab states of the Persian Gulf

text: Since the late 20th century, Bahrain has heavily invested in the banking and tourism sectors. The country's capital, Manama, is home to many large financial structures. The UAE and Bahrain have a high Human Development Index (ranking 31 and 42 worldwide respectively in 2019) and was recognised by the World Bank as high income economies. According to the World Bank, most of these Arab states have been the world's most generous donors of aid as a share of GDP.


title: Kota Srinivasa Rao

text: Kota Srinivasa Rao (born 10 July 1942) is an Indian character actor known for his work primarily in Telugu cinema and Telugu theatre. He has also starred in a few films in Tamil, Hindi, Kannada and Malayalam. As a former politician, Rao has served as the MLA from Vijayawada East in Andhra Pradesh, India from 1999 to 2004. He made his debut with the Telugu film "Pranam Khareedu" in 1978. He starred in over 750 feature films. He has received nine state Nandi Awards in various categories of villain, character actor, and supporting actor. In 2012, he has garnered the SIIMA Award for his work in "Krishnam Vande Jagadgurum". In 2015, he received India's fourth highest civilian honour Padma Shri for his contribution to Indian cinema.


title: Kota Srinivasa Rao

text: He received wide critical acclaim for his diverse roles in films such as "S/O Satyamurthy" (2015)"," "Attarintiki Daredi" (2013), "Rakta Charitra" (2010), "Leader" (2010), "Ready" (2008), "Pellaina Kothalo" (2006), "Sarkar" (2006), "Bommarillu" (2006), "Chatrapathi" (2005), "Athadu" (2005), "Aa Naluguru" (2004), "Malliswari" (2004), "Idiot" (2002), "Prudhvi Narayana" (2002), "Chinna" (2000), "Ganesh" (1998), "Anaganaga Oka Roju" (1997), "Little Soldiers" (1996), "Aame" (1994), "Hello Brother" (1994), "Teerpu" (1994), "Govindha Govindha" (1993), "Gaayam" (1993), "Money" (1993), "Sathruvu" (1990), "Siva" (1989), "Aha Naa Pellanta" (1987), "Pratighatana" (1986), and "Repati Pourulu" (1986). In 2003, he made his debut in the Tamil industry with "Saamy" as a suave villain.


title: Kota Srinivasa Rao

text: Kota Srinivasa Rao was born on 10 July 1942 in the village of Kankipadu in present-day Andhra Pradesh. His father Seetha Rama Anjaneyulu was a doctor. Srinivasa initially aimed to become a doctor but eventually couldn't make it because of his love towards acting. He started his career on stage in plays during college. He has a Bachelor of Science degree and worked as a State Bank employee before entering the film industry.


title: Kota Srinivasa Rao

text: He is married to Rukmini and has three children (2 daughters and a son). He lost his son Kota Venkata Anjaneya Prasad on 20 June 2010 in a road accident in Hyderabad. Prasad acted in J. D. Chakravarthy's flick "Siddham" and alongside his father in "Gaayam 2" (2010). His acting was critically acclaimed.


title: Kota Srinivasa Rao

text: Srinivasa's younger brother Kota Sankara Rao is also an actor. He works in a nationalised bank and acts in soap operas.


title: BlazBlue

text: BlazBlue is a fighting video game series developed and published in Japan by Arc System Works, and later localized in North America by Aksys Games and in Europe by Zen United. An anime adaptation aired in Autumn 2013. The series has sold 1.7 million copies since August 2012.


title: BlazBlue

text: Two official events were held in Japan in June 2009 and February 2010, called and (contraction of "BlueFestival"), respectively. A variety of posters, artbooks, apparel, and figurines were produced. On February 11, 2017, Arc System Works announced a collaboration with Tecmo Koei's Team Ninja to release Arc System Works Costume Set consisting the costumes of some characters from "BlazBlue" and "Guilty Gear" series in March 2017 for "".


title: Bank account

text: A bank account is a financial account maintained by a bank or other financial institution in which the financial transactions between the bank and a customer are recorded. Each financial institution sets the terms and conditions for each type of account it offers, which are classified in commonly understood types, such as deposit accounts, credit card accounts, current accounts, loan accounts or many other types of account. A customer may have more than one account. Once an account is opened, funds entrusted by the customer to the financial institution on deposit are recorded in the account designated by the customer. Funds can be withdrawn from loan loaders.


title: Bank account

text: The financial transactions which have occurred on a bank account within a given period of time are reported to the customer on a bank statement, and the balance of the accounts of a customer at any point in time is their financial position with the institution.


title: Bank account

text: In most legal systems, a deposit of funds in a bank is not a bailment - that is, the actual funds deposited by a person in a bank cease to be the property of the depositor and become the property of the bank. The depositor acquires a claim against the bank for the sum deposited but not to the actual cash handed over to the bank. In accounting terms, the bank creates ("opens") an account in the name of the depositor or a name directed by the depositor in which the amount received by it is recorded as a transaction. The deposit account is a "liability" of the bank and an "asset" of the depositor (the account holder).


title: Bank account

text: On the other hand, a bank can lend some or all of the money it has on deposit to a third party/s. Such accounts, generally called loan or credit accounts, are subject to similar but reverse principles of a deposit account. In accounting terms, a loan account is an "asset" of the bank and a "liability" of the borrower. Loan accounts may be unsecured or secured by the borrower, and they may be guaranteed by a third person, with or without security.


title: Bank account

text: Each financial institution sets the terms and conditions for each type of account it offers, and when a customer applies for the opening of an account, and accepted by the institution, they form the contract between the financial institution and the customer in relation to the account.


title: Bank account

text: The laws of each country specify how bank accounts may be opened and operated. They may specify who may open an account, for example, how the signatories can identify themselves, deposit, withdrawal limits among other specifications.


title: Bank account

text: The minimum age for opening a bank account is most commonly 18 years of age. However, in some countries, the minimum age to open a bank account can be 16 years, and accounts may be opened in the name of minors but operated by their parent or guardian. In general, it is unlawful to open an account in a false name.


title: Bank account

text: From the customer’s point of view, bank accounts may have a positive, or "credit" balance, when the financial institution owes money to the customer; or a negative, or "debit" balance, when the customer owes the financial institution money.


title: Bank account

text: Broadly, accounts that hold credit balances are referred to as deposit accounts, and accounts opened to hold debit balances are referred to as loan accounts. Some accounts can switch between credit and debit balances.


title: Bank account

text: Some accounts are categorized by the function rather than nature of the balance they hold, such as savings account, which routinely are in credit.


title: Bank account

text: Financial institutions have an account numbering scheme to identify each account, which is important as a customer may have multiple accounts.


title: Bank account

text: Each financial institution has its own names for the various accounts it offers to customers, but these can be categorised as:


title: Double agent

text: In the field of counterintelligence, a double agent is an employee of a secret intelligence service for one country, whose primary purpose is to spy on a target organization of another country, but who is now spying on their own country's organization for the target organization.


title: Double agent

text: Double agentry may be practised by spies of the target organization who infiltrate the controlling organization or may result from the "turning" (switching sides) of previously loyal agents of the controlling organization by the target. The threat of execution is the most common method of turning a captured agent (working for an intelligence service) into a double agent (working for a foreign intelligence service) or a double agent into a "re-doubled agent". It is unlike a defector, who is not considered an agent as agents are in place to function for an intelligence service and defectors are not, but some consider that defectors in place are agents until they have defected.


title: Double agent

text: Double agents are often used to transmit disinformation or to identify other agents as part of counter-espionage operations. They are often very trusted by the controlling organization since the target organization will give them true, but useless or even counterproductive, information to pass along.


title: Double agent

text: A re-doubled agent is an agent who gets caught as a double agent and is forced to mislead the foreign intelligence service. F.M. Begoum describes the re-doubled agent as "one whose duplicity in doubling for another service has been detected by his original sponsor and who has been persuaded to reverse his affections again".


title: Double agent

text: A triple agent is a spy who pretends to be a double agent for one side, while they are truthfully a double agent for the other side. Unlike a re-doubled agent, who changes allegiance due to being compromised, a triple agent is usually considered to have been always loyal to their original side. It may also refer to a spy who works for three opposing sides, such that each side thinks the spy works for them alone.


title: Natasha Bassett

text: Bassett was born in Sydney, Australia. She began acting in high school and moved to New York at age nineteen to pursue a career in acting.


title: Natasha Bassett

text: Natasha Bassett started acting at the age of 13. She landed the lead role in the Australian Theatre for Young People's production of "Romeo and Juliet" and studied at the National Institute of Dramatic Art.


title: Natasha Bassett

text: Bassett landed the lead in the MTV film, "Dungoona" (2009), and appeared on several Australian television series ("Rake" (2010), "Wild Boys" (2011), "Cops L.A.C." (2010)), while attending classes. After graduating high school, she appeared in the film, "Mental".


title: Natasha Bassett

text: At 19, she was awarded a screenwriting scholarship from the ArtStart Screenwriters Program, where she wrote and directed her short film, "Kite" (2013). The short was featured in the Rhode Island International Film Festival, Balinale International Film Festival, and the Big Bear Lake International Film Festival.


title: Natasha Bassett

text: Bassett moved to New York City, studied at the Atlantic Acting School, and relocated to Los Angeles for the NBC series, "Camp" (2013). She appeared in the indie drama, "Katie Says Goodbye" (2016), and as 50s-era starlet Gloria DeLamour in "Hail, Caesar!" (2016).


title: Jacques Ellul

text: Jacques Ellul (; ; January 6, 1912 – May 19, 1994) was a French philosopher, sociologist, lay theologian, and professor who was a noted Christian anarchist. Ellul was a longtime Professor of History and the Sociology of Institutions on the Faculty of Law and Economic Sciences at the University of Bordeaux. A prolific writer, he authored more than 60 books and more than 600 articles over his lifetime, many of which discussed propaganda, the impact of technology on society, and the interaction between religion and politics.


title: Jacques Ellul

text: The dominant theme of Ellul's work proved to be the threat to human freedom and religion created by modern technology. He did not seek to eliminate modern technology or technique but sought to change our perception of modern technology and technique to that of a tool rather than regulator of the status quo. Among his most influential books are "The Technological Society" and "".


title: Jacques Ellul

text: Considered by many a philosopher, Ellul was trained as a sociologist, and approached the question of technology and human action from a dialectical viewpoint. His writings are frequently concerned with the emergence of a technological tyranny over humanity. As a philosopher and theologian, he further explored the religiosity of the technological society. In 2000, the International Jacques Ellul Society was founded by a group of former Ellul students. The society, which includes scholars from a variety of disciplines, is devoted to continuing Ellul's legacy and discussing the contemporary relevance and implications of his work.


title: Jacques Ellul

text: Jacques Ellul was born in Bordeaux, France, on January 6, 1912, to Marthe Mendes (Protestant; French-Portuguese) and Joseph Ellul (initially an Eastern Orthodox Christian, but then a Voltarian deist by conviction; born in Malta of an Italo-Maltese father and Serb mother). As a teenager he wanted to be a naval officer but his father made him study law. He married Yvette Lensvelt in 1937.


title: Jacques Ellul

text: Ellul was educated at the universities of Bordeaux and Paris. In World War II, he was a leader in the French resistance. For his efforts to save Jews he was awarded the title "Righteous among the Nations" by Yad Vashem in 2001. He was a layman in the Reformed Church of France and attained a high position within it as part of the National Council.


title: Jacques Ellul

text: Ellul was best friends with Bernard Charbonneau, who was also a writer from the Aquitaine region and a protagonist of the French personalism movement. They met through the Protestant Student Federation during the academic school year of 1929–1930. Both men acknowledged the great influence each had on the other.


title: Jacques Ellul

text: By the early 1930s, Ellul's three primary sources of inspiration were Karl Marx, Søren Kierkegaard, and Karl Barth. Ellul was first introduced to the ideas of Karl Marx during an economics lecture course taught by Joseph Benzacar in 1929–30; Ellul studied Marx and became a prolific exegete of his theories. During this same period, he also came across the Christian existentialism of Kierkegaard. According to Ellul, Marx and Kierkegaard were his two greatest influences, and the only two authors whose work he read in its entirety. Also, he considered Karl Barth, who was a leader of the resistance against the German state church in World War II, the greatest theologian of the 20th century. In addition to these intellectual influences, Ellul also said that his father played a great role in his life and considered him his role model.


title: Jacques Ellul

text: In large measure, and especially in those of his books concerned with theological matters, Ellul restates the viewpoints held by Barth, whose polar dialectic of the Word of God, in which the Gospel both judges and renews the world, shaped Ellul's theological perspective. In "Jacques Ellul: A Systemic Exposition" Darrell J. Fasching claimed Ellul believed "That which desacralizes a given reality, itself in turn becomes the new sacred reality".


title: Jacques Ellul

text: In 1932, after what he describes as "a very brutal and very sudden conversion", Ellul professed himself a Christian. Ellul believes he was about 17 (1929–30) and spending the summer with some friends in Blanquefort, France. While translating "Faust" alone in the house, Ellul knew (without seeing or hearing anything) he was in the presence of a something so astounding, so overwhelming, which entered the very center of his being. He jumped on a bike and fled, concluding eventually that he had been in the presence of God. This experience started the conversion process which Ellul said then continued over a period of years thereafter. Although Ellul identified as a Protestant, he was critical of church authority in general because he believed the church dogmas did not place enough emphasis on the teachings of Jesus or Christian scripture.


title: Jacques Ellul

text: Ellul was also prominent in the worldwide ecumenical movement, although he later became sharply critical of the movement for what he felt were indiscriminate endorsements of political establishments. Ellul came to like Pierre-Joseph Proudhon, who convinced him that the creation of new institutions from the grass roots level was the best way to create an anarchist society. He stated his view is close to that of anarcho-syndicalism, however the kind of change Ellul wanted was an evolutionary approach by means of a "... Proudhonian socialism ... by transforming the press, the media, and the economic structures ... by means of a federative cooperative approach" that would lead to an Anarchist society based on federation and the Mutualist economics of Proudhon. In regards to Jesus and Anarchism he believed Jesus was not merely a socialist but anarchist and that "anarchism is the fullest and most serious form of socialism".


title: Jacques Ellul

text: Ellul has been credited with coining the phrase, "Think globally, act locally." He often said that he was born in Bordeaux by chance, but that it was by choice that he spent almost all his academic career there.


title: Jacques Ellul

text: Ellul fell into a deep grief following the 16 April 1991 death of his wife, Yvette. He died three years later, on 19 May 1994 in Pessac.


title: Jacques Ellul

text: While Ellul was primarily a sociologist who focused on discussions of technology, he saw his theological work as an essential aspect of his career. He began publishing theological discussions early, with such books as "The Presence of the Kingdom" (1948).


title: Jacques Ellul

text: Although a son of the minority French Reformed tradition and thus a spiritual heir of thinkers like John Calvin and Ulrich Zwingli, Ellul departed substantially from Reformed doctrinal traditions, but unlike other European Protestant thinkers, utterly rejected the influence of philosophical idealism or romanticism upon his beliefs about God and human faith. In articulating his theological ideas, he mainly drew upon the corpus of works by the Swiss-German theologian Karl Barth and the critiques of European state Christianity made by Dane Søren Kierkegaard. Thus, some have considered him one of the more ardent expositors of dialectical theology, which was in decline elsewhere in the Western theological scene during Ellul's heyday. Much like Barth, Ellul had no use for either liberal theology (to him dominated by Enlightenment notions about the goodness of humanity and thus rendered puerile by its naïveté) or orthodox Protestantism (e.g., fundamentalism or scholastic Calvinism, both of which to him refuse to acknowledge the radical freedom of God and humanity) and maintained a roughly un-Catholic view of the Bible, theology, and the churches.


title: Jacques Ellul

text: One particular theological movement that aroused his ire was death of God theology. Some within this movement held the conviction that the traditional Christian conceptions of God and humanity arise from a primitive consciousness, one that most civilized people have quite overcome. This line of thought affirmed the ethical teachings of Jesus but rejected the idea that he represented anything more than a highly accomplished human being. Ellul attacked this school, and practitioners of it such as Harvey Cox, as out of accord not with Christian doctrinal traditions, but reality itself, namely what he perceived as the irreducible religiosity of the human race, a devotion that has worshiped idols such as rulers, nations, and in more recent times materialism, scientism, technology and economics. To Ellul, people use such fallen images, or powers, as a substitute for God, and are, in turn, used by them, with no possible appeal to innocence or neutrality, which, although possible theoretically, does not in fact exist. Ellul thus renovates in a non-legalistic manner the traditional Christian understanding of original sin and espouses a thoroughgoing pessimism about human capabilities, a view most sharply evidenced in his "The Meaning of the City". Ellul stated that one of the problems with these "new theologies" was:


title: Jacques Ellul

text: Ellul espouses views on salvation, the sovereignty of God, and ethical action that appear to take a deliberately contrarian stance toward established, "mainstream" opinion. For instance, in the book "What I Believe," he declared himself to be a Christian Universalist, writing "that all people from the beginning of time are saved by God in Jesus Christ, that they have all been recipients of His grace no matter what they have done." Ellul formulated this stance not from any liberal or humanistic sympathies, but in the main from an extremely high view of God's transcendence, that God is totally free to do what God pleases. Any attempts to modify that freedom from merely human standards of righteousness and justice amount to sin, to putting oneself in God's place, which is precisely what Adam and Eve sought to do in the creation myths in Genesis. This highly unusual juxtaposition of original sin and universal salvation has repelled liberal and conservative critics and commentators alike, who charge that such views amount to antinomianism, denying that God's laws are binding upon human beings. In most of his theologically oriented writings, Ellul effectively dismisses those charges as stemming from a radical confusion between religions as human phenomena and the unique claims of the Christian faith, which are not predicated upon human achievement or moral integrity whatsoever.


title: Jacques Ellul

text: The Ellulian concept of technique is briefly defined within the "Notes to Reader" section of "The Technological Society" (1964). It is "the totality of methods rationally arrived at and having absolute efficiency (for a given stage of development) in every field of human activity." He states here as well that the term technique is not solely machines, technology, or a procedure used to attain an end.


title: Jacques Ellul

text: What many consider to be Ellul's most important work, "The Technological Society" (1964), was originally published in French as "La Technique: L'enjeu du siècle" (literally, "The Stake of the Century"). In it, Ellul set forth seven characteristics of modern technology that make efficiency a necessity: rationality, artificiality, automatism of technical choice, self-augmentation, monism, universalism, and autonomy. The rationality of technique enforces logical and mechanical organization through division of labor, the setting of production standards, etc. And it creates an artificial system which "eliminates or subordinates the natural world."


title: Jacques Ellul

text: Regarding technology, instead of it being subservient to humanity, "human beings have to adapt to it, and accept total change." As an example, Ellul offered the diminished value of the humanities to a technological society. As people begin to question the value of learning ancient languages and history, they question those things which, on the surface, do little to advance their financial and technical state. According to Ellul, this misplaced emphasis is one of the problems with modern education, as it produces a situation in which immense stress is placed on information in our schools. The focus in those schools is to prepare young people to enter the world of information, to be able to work with computers but knowing only their reasoning, their language, their combinations, and the connections between them. This movement is invading the whole intellectual domain and also that of conscience.


title: Jacques Ellul

text: The sacred then, as classically defined, is the object of both hope and fear, both fascination and dread. Once, nature was the all-encompassing environment and power upon which human beings were dependent in life and death, and so was experienced as sacred. The Reformation desacralized the church in the name of the Bible, and the Bible became the sacred book. But since then, scientism (through Charles Darwin's theory of evolution) and reason (higher criticism and liberal theology) have desacralized the scriptures, and the sciences, particularly those applied sciences that are amenable to the aims of collective economic production (be it capitalist, socialist, or communist), have been elevated to the position of sacred in Western culture. Today, he argues, the technological society is generally held sacred. Since he defines technique as "the totality of methods rationally arrived at, and having absolute efficiency (for a given stage of development) in every field of human activity", it is clear that his sociological analysis focuses not on the society of machines as such, but on the society of "efficient techniques":


title: Jacques Ellul

text: It is useless, he argues, to think that a distinction can be made between technique and its use, for techniques have specific social and psychological consequences independent of human desires. There can be no room for moral considerations in their use:


title: Jacques Ellul

text: What is the solution to technique according to Ellul? The solution is to simply view technique as objects that can be useful to us and recognize it for what it is, just another thing among many others, instead of believing in technique for its own sake or that of society. If we do this we "...destroy the basis for the power technique has over humanity."


title: Jacques Ellul

text: Ellul identified himself as a Christian Anarchist. Ellul explained his view in this way: "By anarchy I mean first an absolute rejection of violence." And, "... Jesus was not only a socialist but an anarchist – and I want to stress here that I regard anarchism as the fullest and most serious form of socialism." For him, this meant that nation-states, as the primary sources of violence in the modern era, should neither be praised nor feared, but continually questioned and challenged. For Ellul, human government is largely irrelevant in that the revelation of God contained in Scripture is sufficient and exclusive. That is, being a Christian means pledging absolute allegiance to Christ, which makes other laws redundant at best or counter to the revelation of God at worst. Despite the initial attraction of some evangelicals to his thinking because of his high view of Biblical texts (i.e., generally eschewing the historical-critical method), this position alienated some conservative Protestants. Later, he would attract a following among adherents of more ethically compatible traditions such as the Anabaptists and the house church movement. Similar political ideas to Ellul's appear in the writings of a corresponding friend of his, the American William Stringfellow, and long-time admirer Vernard Eller, author of "Christian Anarchy". Ellul identified the State and political power as the Beast in the Book of Revelation.


title: Jacques Ellul

text: Jacques Ellul discusses anarchy on a few pages in "The Ethics of Freedom" and in more detail within his later work, "Anarchy & Christianity". Although he does admit that anarchy does not seem to be a direct expression of Christian freedom, he concludes that the absolute power he sees within the current (as of 1991) nation-state can only be responded to with an absolute negative position (i.e. anarchy). He states that his intention is not to establish an unrealistically pure anarchist society or the total destruction of the state. His initial point in "Anarchy & Christianity" is that he is led toward a realistic form of anarchy by his commitment to an absolute rejection of violence through the creation of alternative grassroots institutions in the manner similar to Anarcho-Syndicalism. However, Ellul does not entertain the idea that all Christians in all places and all times will refrain from violence. Rather, he insisted that violence could not be reconciled with the God of Love, and thus, true freedom. A Christian that chooses the path of violence must admit that he or she is abandoning the path of freedom and committing to the way of necessity.


title: Jacques Ellul

text: During the Spanish Civil War Spanish anarchist friends of Ellul's soon-to-be wife came to France in search of weapons. He tried to get some for them through an old school friend of his and claimed that this was probably the one time in his life when he was sufficiently motivated to commit an act of violence. He did not go with the anarchists primarily because he had only recently met the woman that would become his wife and did not wish to leave her.


title: Jacques Ellul

text: Ellul states in "The Subversion of Christianity" that he thinks "that the biblical teaching is clear. It always contests political power. It incites to 'counterpower,' to 'positive' criticism, to an irreducible dialogue (like that between king and prophet in Israel), to antistatism, to a decentralizing of the relation, to an extreme relativizing of everything political, to an anti-ideology, to a questioning of all that claims either power or dominion (in other words, of all things political), and finally, if we may use a modern term, to a kind of "anarchism" (so long as we do not relate the term to the anarchist teaching of the nineteenth century)."


title: Jacques Ellul

text: 3. pacifist idealism (beliefs and lifestyles which are only possible within a larger violence-based society)


title: Jacques Ellul

text: 4. Christian idealism (which is always concerned with the moral goodness of the human world). This leads to concepts of progressiveness and unreserved participation with good conscience in political or scientific action. "In their idyllic world, harshness, torture, and war seem abnormal and almost incomprehensible. But it is only gross, highly visible, undeniable violence that evokes this scandalized reaction. They deny the existence of masked, secret, covert violence—insofar as this can be concealed..."


title: Jacques Ellul

text: Ellul's ultimate goal was to create by evolutionary means a "...Proudhonian socialism...by transforming the press, the media, and the economic structures...by means of a federative cooperative approach..." an Anarchist society based on federation and the Mutualist economics of Proudhon.


title: Jacques Ellul

text: Ellul believed that social justice and true freedom were incompatible. He rejected any attempt to reconcile them. He believed that a Christian could choose to join a movement for justice, but in doing so, must admit that this fight for justice is necessarily, and at the same time, a fight against all forms of freedom. While social justice provides a guarantee against the risk of bondage, it simultaneously subjects a life to necessities. Ellul believed that when a Christian decides to act it must be in a way that is specifically Christian. "Christians must never identify themselves with this or that political or economic movement. Rather, they must bring to social movements what they alone can provide. Only so can they signalize the kingdom. So far as they act like the others—even to forward social justice, equality, etc.—I say that there is no sense and nothing specifically Christian in acting like the others. In fact the political and revolutionary attitude proper to the Christian is radically different from the attitude of others; it is specifically Christian or else it is nothing."


title: Jacques Ellul

text: In "Violence" Ellul states his belief that only God is able to establish justice and God alone who will institute the kingdom at the end of time. He acknowledges that some have used this as an excuse to do nothing, but also points out how some death-of-God advocates use this to claim that "we ourselves must undertake to establish social justice". Ellul maintained that without a belief in the traditional Judeo-Christian conception of God, love and the pursuit for justice becomes selective, for the only relation left is the horizontal one. Ellul asks how we are to define justice and claims that followers of death-of-God theology and/or philosophy clung to Matthew 25 stating that justice requires them to feed the poor. Ellul says that many European Christians rushed into socialist circles (and with this began to accept the movement's tactics of violence, propaganda, etc.) mistakenly thinking socialism would assure justice when in fact it only pursues justice for the chosen and/or interesting poor whose condition (as a victim of capitalism or some other socialist enemy) is consistent with the socialist ideology.


title: Jacques Ellul

text: Ellul states in "The Subversion of Christianity" that "to proclaim the class conflict and the 'classical' revolutionary struggle is to stop at the same point as those who defend their goods and organizations. This may be useful socially but it is not at all Christian in spite of the disconcerting efforts of theologies of revolution. Revelation demands this renunciation—the renunciation of illusions, of historic hopes, of references to our own abilities or numbers or sense of justice. We are to tell people and thus to increase their awareness (the offense of the ruling classes is that of trying to blind and deaden the awareness of those whom they dominate). Renounce everything in order to be everything. Trust in no human means, for God will provide (we cannot say where, when, or how). Have confidence in his Word and not in a rational program. Enter on a way on which you will gradually find answers but with no guaranteed substance. All this is difficult, much more so than recruiting guerillas, instigating terrorism, or stirring up the masses. And this is why the gospel is so intolerable, intolerable to myself as I speak, as I say all this to myself and others, intolerable for readers, who can only shrug their shoulders."


title: Jacques Ellul

text: Ellul discusses these topics in detail in his landmark work, "". He viewed the power of the media as another example of technology exerting control over human destiny. As a mechanism of change, the media are almost invariably manipulated by special interests, whether of the market or the state.


title: Jacques Ellul

text: Also within "Propaganda" Ellul claims that "it is a fact that excessive data do not enlighten the reader or the listener; they drown him. He cannot remember them all, or coordinate them, or understand them; if he does not want to risk losing his mind, he will merely draw a general picture from them. And the more facts supplied, the more simplistic the image". Additionally, people become "caught in a web of facts they have been given. They cannot even form a choice or a judgment in other areas or on other subjects. Thus the mechanisms of modern information induce a sort of hypnosis in the individual, who cannot get out of the field that has been laid out for him by the information". "It is not true that he can choose freely with regard to what is presented to him as the truth. And because rational propaganda thus creates an irrational situation, it remains, above all, propaganda—that is, an inner control over the individual by a social force, which means that it deprives him of himself".


title: Jacques Ellul

text: Ellul agreed with who stated that "All individual passion leads to the suppression of all critical judgment with regard to the object of that passion".


title: Jacques Ellul

text: In response to an invitation from Protestant associations, Ellul visited Germany twice (1934 and 1935). On the second visit he attended a Nazi meeting out of curiosity which influenced his later work on propaganda and its ability to unify a group.


title: Jacques Ellul

text: "To throw this wager or secular faith into the boldest possible relief, Ellul places it in dialectical contrast with Biblical faith. As a dialectical contrast to "La Technique," for instance, Ellul writes "Sans feu ni lieu" (published in 1975, although written much earlier.)"


title: Jacques Ellul

text: In explaining the significance of freedom and the purpose for resisting the enslavement of humans via acculturation (or sociological bondage), Ellul rejects the notion that this is due to some supposed supreme importance linked to humanity. He states that modern enslavement expresses how authority, signification, and value are attached to humanity and the beliefs and institutions it creates. This leads to an exaltation of the nation or state, money, technology, art, morality, the party, etc. The work of humanity is glorified and worshiped, while simultaneously enslaving humankind.


title: My Sassy Girl (TV series)

text: My Sassy Girl () is a 2017 South Korean television drama starring Joo Won, Oh Yeon-seo, Lee Jung-shin and Kim Yoon-hye, based on the 2001 South Korean movie "My Sassy Girl" by Kwak Jae-yong, but during Joseon period. It aired on SBS from May 29 to July 18, 2017, on Mondays and Tuesdays at 22:00 (KST) time slot for 32 episodes.


title: My Sassy Girl (TV series)

text: Love story of a cold city scholar Gyeon Woo (Joo Won) who's known as "Joseon's national treasure" and the sassy princess Hye-myung (Oh Yeon-seo) in the Joseon Dynasty era who doesn't have the best reputation among the people. She often sneaks out of the palace in search of her mother, the dethroned queen. During one such adventure, she meets Gyeon Woo; initially enemies, then friends, they fall in love.


title: My Sassy Girl (TV series)

text: An eminent and affable scholar who has returned after three years of study in Qing, where he was highly praised by its ruler. Gyeon Woo earned the title of 'National Treasure of Joseon' from King Hwijong during his childhood. He is the son of the education minister and the king appoints him as the tutor to the Heir Presumptive. Despite initial conflicts with Princess Hye-myung, he assists her, as she pursues the secrets surrounding her mother's dethronement.


title: My Sassy Girl (TV series)

text: She is a strong willed, independent yet mischievous and a trouble making person with a kind heart and cannot stand the wrongdoings of people. Initially she dislikes Gyeon Woo but, later falls in love with him. She is struggling to know what has happened to her mother.


title: My Sassy Girl (TV series)

text: She is the stubborn and spoiled daughter of the left minister Jung Ki-joon. She falls for Gyeon Woo and will do anything to get him. She is the love rival of princess Hyemyeong.


title: Nakam

text: Nakam (, 'Revenge') was a paramilitary organization of about fifty Holocaust survivors who, after 1945, sought genocidal revenge for the murder of six million Jews during the Holocaust. Led by Abba Kovner, the group sought to kill six million German people in a form of indiscriminate revenge, "a nation for a nation". Kovner went to Mandatory Palestine in order to secure large quantities of poison for poisoning water mains to kill large numbers of Germans, and his followers infiltrated the water system of Nuremberg. However, Kovner was arrested upon arrival in the British Zone of Occupied Germany and had to throw the poison overboard.


title: Nakam

text: Following this failure, Nakam turned their attention to "Plan B", targeting prisoners of war held by the United States military in the American Zone. They obtained arsenic locally and infiltrated the bakeries that supplied these prison camps. The conspirators poisoned 3,000 loaves of bread at "Konsum-Genossenschaftsbäckerei" (Consumer Cooperative Bakery) in Nuremberg, which sickened more than 2,000 German prisoners of war at Langwasser internment camp. However, no known deaths can be attributed to the group. Although Nakam is considered by some to have been a terrorist organization, German public prosecutors dismissed a case against two of its members due to the "unusual circumstances".


title: Nakam

text: During the Holocaust, Nazi Germany, its allies and collaborators murdered about six million Jews, by a variety of methods, including mass shootings and gassing. Many survivors, having lost their entire families and communities, had difficulty imagining a return to a normal life. The desire for revenge, either against Nazi war criminals or the entire German people, was widespread. From late 1942, as news of the Holocaust arrived in Mandatory Palestine, Jewish newspapers were full of calls for retribution. One of the leaders of the Warsaw Ghetto uprising, Yitzhak Zuckerman, later said he "didn't know a Jew who wasn't obsessed with revenge". However, very few survivors acted on these fantasies, instead focusing on rebuilding their lives and communities and commemorating those who had perished. In all, Israeli historian Dina Porat estimates that about 200 or 250 Holocaust survivors attempted to exact violent revenge, of which Nakam was a significant portion. Including assassinations carried out by Mossad, these operations claimed the lives of as many as 1,000 to 1,500 people.


title: Nakam

text: In 1945, Abba Kovner, after visiting the site of the Ponary massacre and the extermination camp at Majdanek, and meeting survivors of Auschwitz in Romania, decided to take revenge. He recruited about 50 Holocaust survivors, mostly former Jewish partisans, but including a few who had escaped to the Soviet Union. Recruited for their ability to live undercover and not break down, most were in their early twenties and hailed from Vilnius, Rovno, Częstochowa, or Kraków. Generally known as Nakam ("Revenge"), the organization used the Hebrew name דין ("Din", "judgement"), also an acronym of דם ישראל נוטר ("Dam Yisrael Noter", "the blood of Israel avenges").


title: Nakam

text: The group's members believed that the defeat of Nazi Germany did not mean that Jews were safe from another Holocaust-level genocide. Kovner believed that a proportional revenge, killing six million Germans, was the only way to teach enemies of the Jews that they could not act with impunity: "The act should be shocking. The Germans should know that after Auschwitz there can be no return to normality." According to survivors, Kovner's "hypnotic" eloquence put words to the emotions that they were feeling. Members of the group believed that the laws of the time were unable to adequately punish such an extreme event as the Holocaust and that the complete moral bankruptcy of the world could only be cured by catastrophic retributive violence. Porat hypothesizes that Nakam was "a necessary stage" before the embittered survivors would be prepared "to return to a life of society and laws".


title: Nakam

text: The group's leaders formed two plans: Plan A, to kill a large number of Germans, and Plan B, to poison several thousand SS prisoners held in United States prisoner of war camps. From Romania Kovner's group traveled to Italy, where Kovner received a warm reception from Jewish Brigade soldiers who wanted him to help organize Aliyah Bet (illegal immigration to Mandate Palestine). Kovner refused because he was already set on revenge. Nakam developed a network of underground cells and immediately set out raising money, infiltrating German infrastructure, and securing poison. The group received a large supply of German-forged British currency from a Hashomer Hatzair emissary, forced speculators to contribute, and also obtained some money from sympathizers in the Jewish Brigade.


title: Nakam

text: Joseph Harmatz, posing as a Polish displaced person (DP) named "Maim Mendele", attempted to infiltrate the municipal water supply in Nuremberg; Nakam targeted the city because it had been the stronghold of the Nazi Party. Harmatz had difficulty finding rooms for the conspirators to rent due to the housing shortage caused by the destruction of most of the city by Allied bombing. Through the use of bribes, he managed to place Willek Schwerzreich (Wilek Shinar), an engineer from Kraków who spoke fluent German, in a position with the municipal water company. Schwarzreich obtained the plan of the water system and control of the main water valve, and plotted where the poison should be introduced so as to kill the largest possible number of Germans. In Paris, was in charge of a Nakam cell including Vitka Kempner, Kovner's future wife and former comrade in the Vilna Ghetto underground. Reichman reportedly spoke to David Ben-Gurion during the latter's trip to a DP camp in Germany, but the latter preferred to work towards Israeli independence than seek revenge for the Holocaust.


title: Nakam

text: It fell to Kovner to obtain the poison from leaders in the Yishuv, the Jewish leadership in Mandatory Palestine. In July 1945, Kovner left the Jewish Brigade for Milan, disguising himself as a Jewish Brigade soldier on leave, and boarded a ship for Palestine the following month. Reichman became leader in Europe in his absence. Upon reaching Palestine, Kovner was held for three days in an apartment by the Mossad LeAliyah Bet and was personally interrogated by Mossad chief Shaul Meirov. Kovner negotiated with Haganah chiefs Moshe Sneh and Israel Galilee in hopes of convincing them to give him poison for a smaller revenge operation in return for not linking the murder to the Yishuv.


title: Nakam

text: In September, Kovner informed Nakam in Europe that he had not had any success in locating poison, and therefore they should recruit Yitzhak Ratner, a chemist and former Vilna Ghetto insurgent, and focus on Plan B. Kovner was eventually introduced to Ephraim and Aharon Katzir, chemists at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, via one of their students who was a member of the Haganah. The Katzir brothers were sympathetic to Kovner's revenge plot and convinced the head of chemical storage at the Hebrew University to give him poison. Decades after the fact, Kovner claimed that he had pitched Plan B to Chaim Weizmann, then president of the World Zionist Organization, who had directed him to the Katzir brothers. However, according to his biographer, if Kovner met Weizmann at all it was in February or March 1946, as Weizmann was out of the country before that.


title: Nakam

text: After several delays, Kovner traveled to Alexandria, Egypt, in December 1945 carrying false papers that identified him as a Jewish Brigade soldier returning from leave, and a duffel with gold hidden in toothpaste tubes and cans full of poison. Shortly after boarding a ship headed to Toulon, France, Kovner's name along with three others was called over the public address system. Kovner told a friend, Yitzik Rosenkranz, to convey the duffel to Kempner in Paris, and then threw half the poison overboard. After this, he turned himself in and was arrested by the British police. Nakam members later claimed that Kovner had been betrayed by the Haganah, but Porat writes that it is more likely that he was arrested as a suspected organizer of Aliyah Bet. Kovner, who spoke no English and had not attended the Jewish Brigade training, was not questioned about Nakam; after two months in jails in Egypt and Palestine, he was released. His involvement in Nakam ended at that time.


title: Nakam

text: Because Kovner had not managed to secure the quantity of poison required, the Nuremberg cell decided to switch to poisoning SS prisoners definitively during the first months of 1946. Most of the Nakam action groups disbanded as ordered and their members dispersed into displaced persons camps, promised by the leaders that in future they would be reactivated to implement Plan A. The cells in Nuremberg and Dachau remained active because of the large United States prisoner of war camps nearby. Yitzhak Ratner was recruited into the group to obtain poison locally. In October 1945, he set up a laboratory in the Nakam headquarters in Paris, where he tested various formulations in order to find a tasteless, odorless poison that would have delayed effects. Ratner eventually formulated a mixture of arsenic, glue, and other additives which could be painted onto loaves of bread; tests on cats proved the lethality of the mixture. He obtained more than of arsenic from friends who worked in the tanning industry, which was smuggled into Germany.


title: Nakam

text: Nakam focused on Langwasser internment camp near Nuremberg (formerly Stalag XIII-D), where 12,000 to 15,000 prisoners, mainly former SS officers or prominent Nazis, were imprisoned by the United States. Initially, two Nakam members were hired by the camp, one as a driver, another as a storehouse worker. The bread for Langwasser came from a single bakery in Nuremberg, the "Konsum-Genossenschaftsbäckerei" (Consumer Cooperative Bakery). Leipke Distel, a survivor of several Nazi concentration camps, posed as a Polish displaced person awaiting a visa to work at an uncle's bakery in Canada. He asked the manager if he could work for free and eventually secured access to the bakery storeroom after bribing him with cigarettes, alcohol, and chocolate. The Nakam operatives met each night in a rented room in Fürth to discuss their findings, especially how to confine their attack to the German prisoners and avoid harming the American guards. When Harmatz placed a few of the workers in clerical positions in the camp, they discovered that on Sundays, the black bread would be eaten only by the German prisoners because the American guards were specially issued white bread. Therefore, they decided to execute the attack on a Saturday night.


title: Nakam

text: Similar preparations were made with regard to a prison camp near Dachau and the bakery supplying it, an effort led by Warsaw Ghetto uprising veteran Simcha Rotem. After becoming friends with Poles who worked in the bakery, Rotem got the manager drunk, made copies of his keys, and then returned them before he sobered up. A few days before the planned attack, Reichman received a tip-off from a Jewish intelligence officer in the United States Army that two of the operatives were wanted by the police. As ordered, the Dachau Nakam operatives aborted on 11 April 1946. Reichman feared that the failure of one attack would cause the United States to increase its security measures at prison camps, preventing a second attack.


title: Nakam

text: By this time, six Nakam members worked at the "Konsum-Genossenschaftsbäckerei" in Nuremberg. Subverting tight security aimed at preventing the theft of food, they smuggled the arsenic in over several days, hiding it under raincoats, and stashed it beneath the floorboards. Because experiments had shown that the arsenic mixture did not spread evenly, the operatives decided to paint it onto the bottom of each loaf. On Saturday, 13 April, the bakery workers were on strike, delaying the Nakam operatives and preventing three of them from entering the bakery. As a result, Distel and his two accomplices only had time to poison some 3,000 loaves of bread instead of 14,000 as originally planned. After painting the loaves, they fled to Czechoslovakia, helped by an Auschwitz survivor named Yehuda Maimon, continuing on through Italy to southern France.


title: Nakam

text: On 23 April 1946, "The New York Times" reported that 2,283 German prisoners of war had fallen ill from poisoning, with 207 hospitalized and seriously ill. However, the operation ultimately caused no known deaths. According to documents obtained by a Freedom of Information request to the National Archives and Records Administration, the amount of arsenic found in the bakery was enough to kill approximately 60,000 persons. It is unknown why the poisoners failed, but it is suspected either to be that they spread the poison too thinly, or else that the prisoners realized that the bread had been poisoned and did not eat very much.