tv Tavis Smiley PBS August 21, 2014 11:30pm-12:01am EDT
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good evening from los angeles i'm travis smiley. a conversation with actor and activist george takei who despite all other accomplishments will likely be remembered a lieutenant sulu on the ss enterprise on star trek. takei is now 77 and the subject about a new documentary about his life "to be takei" in theaters this month. in the documentary, he talks frankly about his life as an activist and including and insists on a formal apology to japanese americans for their internment in world war ii. he saw his family in an internment camp for the duration of the war. and actress mira sorvino coming up now.
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series under his credit but he's most known for star trek. and speaking out on issues like marriage equality and a formal apology for the internment of the japanese americans in world war ii. as well as thousands of other americans wrongly imprisoned during that war. a new story of his life comes to theaters, i love the title, "to be takei." our west coast became a potential combat zone. living in that zone were more than a hundred thousand persons of japanese ancestry. >> my life has been transformed almost as fantastically as science fiction. because as a boy i looked out on the world imprisoned by a barb
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wire fences of american entertainme internment camps. >> you know i think it is hard, george, for many americans, certainly those borne of a certain generation to even imagine their government could or would or more expressly did something like this. >> it is still a little-known chapter of american history. >> yeah. >> people who seem otherwise well-informed and educated are agas when i tell them i grew up behind barbed -- u.s. barbed wire frenss. it is something we need to learn from. i think we learn more from the chapters where we failed than from the glorious chapters. because we need to appreciate how fragile our democracy is. and we learned how to make it stronger by learning where we made mistakes. >> what do you think it is about us that scares us or otherwise prevent us from coming to terms
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with the dark side t night side of american history? >> you know my father used to tell me, when i was a teenager. i was curious about my childhood imprisoned. and i had long afterdinner conversations with him. and i was an idealistic young teenager a teenager, you know. dr. martin luther king was leading the civil rights movement. i was inspired buy that and active in the civil rights movement. and sat down and i said how come you let something like this happen? i would have organized my friends and gone down to the federal building and protests and said this is wrong. it is against the constitution. and my father said our democracy is a people's democracy. and it can be as great as the people can be. but it is also as fallible as people are. and he told me about a
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california attorney general right before the war. he was a very ambitious man. but he was an attorney. and he knew the constitution. but when the bombing of pearl harbor happened, he saw that the most popular issue in california was the "get rid of the japs" issue. and he wanted to be elected governor. so an attorney general who knew better ran on the "get rid of the japs" issue. he was one of the flaming advocates for it. and he won for governor. and he was reelected twice. served three times as the governor of california. and then he was appointed to be the chief justice of the united states supreme court. ear earl warren, the great liberal supreme court chief justice. so he was a great man. but he was also a fallible human
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being. he was ambitious. >> you mentioned dr. diking a moment ago and he said there was good in the worst of us and evil in the best of us. and when people think of earl warren they don't think of that ugly chapter. it takes people like you to remind us i of that. >> ambition. >> yeah. >> a human fallibility. so our democracy is always vulnerable to that quality in us. and i think that is why we need to know about those chapters. and i'm always disappointed and shocked when people tell me they don't know. and so we built the japanese american national museum in los angeles. we are an affiliate of the smithsonian. and we travel on shows all around the country. one of our most controversial
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and at one point when the discussion got really hot, i said, daddy, you led us like sheeps to slaughter when you took us into these internment camps. and my father suddenly became silent. he always engaged me in conversation. and after a few beats, he looked at me and said, well, maybe you are right. and he got up and went into his bedroom and closed had door. and i immediately knew i hurt him. a man who had suffered so much in camp. and then years later, his own son hurting him like that. and i felt terribly. and i wanted to apologize. but he closed the door. and so i thought well, i'll apologize tomorrow morning.
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and when tomorrow morning came, it was a little awkward and i didn't. and time goes by. and before you know it, he's gone. >> yeah. >> i can't apologize anymore. so these are some of the, you know. >> yeah. >> regrets you have in life. >> how do you -- how do you navigate through that? i suspect that you play "allegiance" lows you in a creative space to make amends for that. but you tell me. none of us is human and divine. we're just human. and we all make mistakes. but how do you navigate the rest of your life with that sort of burden that you never had a chance to get that out to your father when he was here at least? >> well my father's given me a lot. >> yeah. >> and i really, deeply appreciate the guidance he's
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given me. and you know, you grew up watching your parents work their fingers to the bones to get back on our feet. because we were literally penniless. our first home was on skid row when they let us go. and i am profoundly grateful for what he did. and this musical that we had developed called "allegiance" because it was our allegiance to this country that was challenged, is my tribute. >> yeah. >> -- to my parents and particularly to my mother. >> are we getting closer to broadway with this? >> well, you know, we opened -- we had the world premier in san diego at the old globe theater. distinguished. >> great theater. >> yes, a distinguished theater. and we had a soldout run. we turned so many people away that the old globe did something they rarely do. they gave us an extension.
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and when we finally closed we had broken their 77 year record for both box office and attendance. and then to top it all off, we won the best musical of the year award from the san diego catalytic circle. so -- critic circle. so we thout goight going to bro was going to be a piece of cake. nothing is. >> you should know out of all of us. >> a year and a half waiting to get a theater. every theater on broadway is booked up. we know that there is an audience there. >> right. >> and one that is enthusiastic. the music is fantastic. >> oh sure. >> we're very optimistic about the production itself. it is a matter of just getting it into a theater and presenting it to the public. i know the public is there for
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but it is very much alive today. voter suppression. and so we have to get young people, and all people in our democracy engaged in the electoral process. >> yeah. >> and i hope that they gain from this documentary, the importance of that. because when 9/11 happened, almost the same thing that happened to us, happened to arab americans. thank god not on the wholesale scale we were subjected to. but people got detained. and given the fact that people are fallible, it -- we have to keep reminding ourselves of
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this. >> yeah. your father's words, those are powerful words. that our democracy is as good or as strong as the people and as fallible as the people. having heard now your father's brilliant dissertation in brief to you, i now get why you are such an activist. because i get why you are so engaged in all these issues. makes perfect sense. >> the barbed wire that incarcerated me as a child still exists sz kinvisibly in legalis barbed wire fences confining people, because of the hysteria, which is what confined. rgb inequality. we're starting to snap at those legalistic barb wire fences. but states are equality. but it is still a patch work. and we are working to make our nation the united states of
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america. >> george takei is a good man. i'm honored to be in conversation with him either on television or on radio or in the neighborhood. it is good to have you on our show. >> good to be talking with you. >> "to be takei kwk" check it out if you get a chance. coming up a conversation with oscar stay with us. if you get a chanc. coming up a conversation with oscar winner mirra sorvino. stay with us. oscar winning actress mira sorvino returns to television in a science fiction called "intruders" which has a good pedigree. in addition to this he has the x-files to our conversation. we'll start with a clip from intruders.
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"what the hell is this music? i thought you hated jazz. "we're in private. "i respect that, i just never heard you listen to it. that's all. "sorry honey, i guess the music just took me away". >> i was whispering to mira before we played that clip, that when i saw the pilot episode in the studio when the network. the first couple episodes, but after watching the first episode i was to thoroughly lost. which i think that is a good thing for a pilot. that you are waiting to see what happens next. so i got to episode two and it made a little more suspense. but this is one of those things you can't give it all away at the beginning. >> no.
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if you are watching a the hi hickcock film, he would never give away what you are going to find out later. that is the way this starts unfolding and you are sort of in a position as my husband john sim in the story whose completely baffled by what is going on with his wife and these strange unrelated events, seemingly unrelated like his friend from high school who shows up and says i have things about a murder i need to talk to you about your wife. and he is just lost and saying what is going on? and very strange things are occurring and i seem to be going under some kind of transformation, some internal turmoil. and at first blush you could say it's just martdal issues. but it is a lot deeper than that. >> so how then without giving too much away which is the trick talking about this series, how
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would you describe your series and your character without giving to much away? that way if they get mad at somebody it's you and not me. >> a paranormal thriller with shades of the conspiracy film and star-crossed love story. >> very nice. you must have been asked that before. >> i i've had to think about it. but it does have supernatural elements but it is not horror even though it has a feel to it. both of our directors. we had two, one for the first tw four and two for the second. and so there is a very creepy feeling to the way the camera moves and the heighting and everything but ultimately it is not horror. it is mystery. it is thriller. and i find it completely fascinating. based on a book called the "intruders" by michael marshal smith and it's adapted closely
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to the book and takes off where the book sort of stops. especially as it relates to my character i'm far more fleshed out in the series than the book. in the book she's really a mystery figure and the in the series. >> the series goes far than the book. >> it does. it gets to the point of the book by the end but it also branches it all out. and fleshes it all out. i've loving the ability to play over eight episodes, where in a film you are done in an hour and a half. so you only have so much time to grow with the character. and i had the most amazing scenes written for me by glen morgan and his brother darren and his wife kristen. and they are incredible writers and the work was like an actor's dream. crazy things happen. but very human. and i think the audience is really going to start connecting to john simms' character because he's this every day man caught
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in this circumstance. and then we have fascinating performances by the little milley brown, this little girl who starts acting like a sociopath. a very nasty things occurs with a cat. yeah, james fran is a wonderful actor. robs forester is incredible. an amazing ke ining cast and pr >> at this point in your life and career academy award already having been secured, what are you looking for artistically in the characters you choose to play? i get the point about the story art that you get a chance to develop like you couldn't necessarily in a film. but is that what drew you to this? >> what drew me originally was glen morgan and the stript and the book because i kind of got all of them at once. i met with him. i read the script. the first four. >> you read the scripts or the
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book first? >> i part of the book in preparation. and i said is it about this? and he said you're a little off. it's about this. and i could see broad strokes, this is immortality, the ability to control immortality, to live forever and there is a concept in the story that there is like, you know, the 1%. so the 1% is not only controlling finances and political -- geo political situations but actually control the ability to live forever and to control how happens. and that is sort of at the heart of the story. that's as much asky kind of say but that is where the mystery is circling. >> one of the things this series, looking at it and preparing for our conversation had me wrestling with was something i really never thought of until i got to preparing for this. and that is whether or not if i could live forever, if i had the power to make a decision to live forever, whether or not i would want to. >> yes. >> have you ever thought about
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that. >> yes. well the show poses that question in a very interesting way. because it is really about that which we care most about, the people we love. you know, the loss of loved ones like wouldn't it be incredible if you were on your death bed and you were holding the hand of the person you loved most bearly and you were able to say don't worry we'll meet again and you knew it with certainty and the form it would take. not like the vagueness, the promise of heaven or the next world or afterlife as certain religions see it. but actually i know how we're going to meet. it is going to happen and i know. so don't cry because very soon we'll be back together again that would kind of change everything. but if you had to live without that which you hold most dear, some kind of love which sustains, maybe it wouldn't be worth living forever. how far would you go for love? would you give up your love? would you give up the possibility of living forever? would you kill for love?
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it's really rich and really about the human condition and i think all of us a terrified about the. and i think what makes me most rich is my children and my family and my husband and being with them is the most special and credible time. even though i've had many wonderful times but that is it. and if immortality sort of took a form and you were sort of solo entity bobbing through time, i don't know if that would be worth it. because that attachment to other human beings that is so strong the people you love, maybe it would not have the same taste. you know, life being short gives it zest in a way. but then again as we said nobody really wants to die. >> i assume -- advocacy work on behalf of women and girl, you are still doing that i assume. >> i'm still very strong in the human trafficking sphere. the u.n. odc goodwill ambassador to got human trafficking since 2009 and a lot of private
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advocacy in the u.s. on trying to ameliorate state laws to be tougher on modern slavery. because federal laws are great but no state is whole in terms of response to human trafficking. it's been really rewarding. the show was very accommodating. they let me get out in april to go to the vatican. i got to present on behalf of the u.n. and that was a very heady experience. i was very, very nervous. i thought the pope would be in the room. he wasn't actually in the room until the end of the whole conference then he blessed all of us. but it was incredible honor and responsibility because i was speaking to cardinal and heads from around the world. people from the fbi, the cia. chiefs of police from all these countries around the world about how to step up the game to fight modern slavery. so it was -- it was amazing and they allowed me do that. they allowed me go to another conference in atlanta. and, you know, so it's definitely concurrent. i'm still doing all that and
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working. >> you're a busy woman. how you found time to come see me. i do not know. but i appreciate you coming back. always glad have you back. intruders can be seen on bbc in america. and it will pull you in. good to see you. >> thank you. >> that is ow our show for tonight. thanks for watching and as always keep the faith. >> for more information on today's show visit travis smiley at pbs org. >> join me next time for a conversation with three time tony winning actor about his movie draft day. that's next time. we'll see you then.
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>> rose: welcome to the program strkts end of summer and we're looking at some of the best moments of the past year. tonight an encore presentation with mandy pa tin kin. >> you don't get to pick and choose. you pick and choose everything. >> it all shapes you. >> but when i think back, you know how we are as human beings, all these wonderful things happen every second of our life. we just go on, we ignore the fact that we breathe. and all these things are going on. and then one little tiny thread happens. you can hardly see it, just some little negative thing and you go tumbling down. >> mandy patinkin the star of homeland when we continue. >> funding for charlie rose was provided by the followingal funding for charlie rose is provided by the following:
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