An Essay on Death: A Memorial to John F. Kennedy

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Program
An Essay on Death: A Memorial to John F. Kennedy
Producing Organization
Oregon Public Broadcasting
National Educational Television and Radio Center
Contributing Organization
UNC-TV (Research Triangle Park, North Carolina)
Thirteen WNET (New York, New York)
Oregon Public Broadcasting (Portland, Oregon)
University of Houston (Houston, Texas)
AAPB ID
cpb-aacip/153-46qz6708
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Description
Program Description
This program takes the first anniversary of the assassination of John F. Kennedy as an occasion for a poetic reflection on the meaning of death. It is not specifically about the late President -- his life as a public figure and private citizen, his violent end on November 22, 1963. Such a biographical approach is being well covered by ABC, CBS, and NBC in their commemorative documentaries. The NET program, on the contrary -- inferential in its method, lyrical in its expression, and contemplative in his mood -- present for the viewer a sense of the life and death of the President in the broader terms of the life and death of all men, and without so much as a single reference to the facts of John F. Kennedy's extraordinary career. For the viewer looking back on the searing tragic event of a year ago, the image of John F. Kennedy will pervade the hour-long program. And for the viewer whose sensibility has mixed that sad and shocking death with all the general feelings which come to every mortal being faced with the irony and the glory of a measured span of years, the program will have a less explicit -- but equally profound -- meaning.An Essay on Death is a very personal program, and, as such, cannot be properly described in terms of its fullest dimension: the impact on the individual viewer. Its structure, however, can be spoke of to advantage. The ESSAY weaves together four separate strands - each developed as a creative project of its own -- into a single poetic aggregate. There is: 1. A Narrative ... a script, conceived by Brice Howard, consisting of selections of prose and poetry by the following: Henry Bergson, Leon Bloy, Albert Camus, Deuteronomy, John Donne, Theodore Dreiser, Robert Frost, Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, Frederick Holderlin, Robinson Jeffers, Denise Levertov, Michel de Montaigne, Robert Nathan, James Oppenheim, Plato, Rainer Maria Rilke, Theodore Roethke, Muriel Rukeyser, Seneca, William Shakespeare, Stephen Spender, Rabindranath Tagore, Miguel de Unamuno, and William Wordsworth, selected and arranged with transitional lines by Howard. This narration is spoken by three unseen readers Christopher Plummer, Helen Gahagan Douglas, and Morris Carnovsky. 2. A Film Story, conceived by Brice Howard and Leo Hurwitz, directed by Leo Hurwitz and acted by James Broderick, Allen Markey, and Jane Zecher. The story is about a boy, his father, and a Labrador retriever, and the trio's weekend hike in the Vermont countryside. Except for a few lines spoken by the boy, the actors taking part in this element of the program are seen but not heard. 3. An original music score by Ulysses Kay. 4. A collection of visuals -- statuary, paintings, and drawings -- which are meaningfully interwoven into the story.A question that may come up for programming directors in scheduling this special and for public relations directors in their promotion is: For what audience is the program suitable? The producers feel that while (1) An Essay on Death is the kind of program that a child can see and understand as a child; and (2) there being nothing morbid or shocking about the program, it is most unlikely that it can be traumatic for, or offensive to anyone of any age group; it is, nonetheless, a script mainly of poetic selections and visual symbolism, and it is not likely to appeal to young children except on a limited level (there is a certain interest for children in the film story about the father and son on their hike). It should, however, prove of great appeal to high school age youngsters and above.Brice Howard says of his project: "A program about death prepared as a memorial to our late President may strike some as a strange doing. But there are those who feel that to affirm life is to acknowledge its cessation, and this has been our motivation. To make such an ephemeral object as a television program of the kind, studded with its bursts of light and evocative symbols of persistent beauty, seemed appropriate for a man like him. Our memorial has been a labor of life." An Essay on Death is a 1964 production of National Educational Television. This program runs approximately an hour. (Description adapted from documents in the NET Microfiche)
Broadcast Date
1964-11-20
Asset type
Episode
Genres
Special
Media type
Moving Image
Embed Code
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Credits
Actor: Broderick, James
Actor: Zecher, Jane
Actor: Markey, Allen
Associate Producer: Lawson, Peggy
Composer: Kay, Ulysses, 1917-1995
Director: Hurwitz, Leo T., 1909-1991
Editor: Lawson, Peggy
Executive Producer: Howard, Brice
Narrator: Plummer, Christopher
Narrator: Carnovsky, Morris
Narrator: Douglas, Helen Gahagan
Producer: Hurwitz, Leo T., 1909-1991
Producing Organization: Oregon Public Broadcasting
Producing Organization: National Educational Television and Radio Center
Production Manager: Broder, Rita
Writer: Howard, Brice
Writer: Hurwitz, Leo T., 1909-1991
AAPB Contributor Holdings
UNC-TV
Identifier: F-40258/1609 (UNC-TV)
Format: 16mm film
Color: B&W
Thirteen - New York Public Media (WNET)
Identifier: wnet_aacip_2019 (WNET Archive)
Format: 2 inch videotape: Quad
Duration: 00:42:55?
Thirteen - New York Public Media (WNET)
Identifier: wnet_aacip_2020 (WNET Archive)
Format: 2 inch videotape: Quad
Duration: 00:42:56?
Thirteen - New York Public Media (WNET)
Identifier: wnet_aacip_2021 (WNET Archive)
Format: 2 inch videotape: Quad
Duration: 00:33:04?
Thirteen - New York Public Media (WNET)
Identifier: wnet_aacip_2022 (WNET Archive)
Format: 2 inch videotape: Quad
Duration: 00:34:05?
Oregon Public Broadcasting (OPB)
Identifier: FRB001099 (Unique ID)
Format: 16mm film
Generation: Print
Duration: 6000.0
Indiana University Libraries Moving Image Archive
Identifier: [request film based on title] (Indiana University)
Format: 16mm film
University of Houston
Identifier: /repositories/2/archival_objects/42466 (Archives Space URI)
Format: Film
Duration: 0:43:24
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Citations
Chicago: “An Essay on Death: A Memorial to John F. Kennedy,” 1964-11-20, UNC-TV, Thirteen WNET, Oregon Public Broadcasting, University of Houston, American Archive of Public Broadcasting (GBH and the Library of Congress), Boston, MA and Washington, DC, accessed October 6, 2024, http://americanarchive.org/catalog/cpb-aacip-153-46qz6708.
MLA: “An Essay on Death: A Memorial to John F. Kennedy.” 1964-11-20. UNC-TV, Thirteen WNET, Oregon Public Broadcasting, University of Houston, American Archive of Public Broadcasting (GBH and the Library of Congress), Boston, MA and Washington, DC. Web. October 6, 2024. <http://americanarchive.org/catalog/cpb-aacip-153-46qz6708>.
APA: An Essay on Death: A Memorial to John F. Kennedy. Boston, MA: UNC-TV, Thirteen WNET, Oregon Public Broadcasting, University of Houston, American Archive of Public Broadcasting (GBH and the Library of Congress), Boston, MA and Washington, DC. Retrieved from http://americanarchive.org/catalog/cpb-aacip-153-46qz6708