Browse content similar to 24/05/2013. Check below for episodes and series from the same categories and more!
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Tonight the week that shocked us all, after the horrific murder of | :00:16. | :00:20. | |
Drummer Lee Rigby, what can any Government do to prevent the | :00:20. | :00:24. | |
radicalisation of potentially violent young men. We have an | :00:24. | :00:31. | |
exclusive interview of one of the childhood friends that we have just | :00:31. | :00:33. | |
recorded. The authorities say they are | :00:33. | :00:39. | |
increasingly worried about a small number of extremists. There are a | :00:39. | :00:42. | |
handful of people inspired by these two guys we will have a big problem | :00:42. | :00:46. | |
that we have to deal with, and it can't be dealt with Security | :00:46. | :00:52. | |
Services and police alone. Good evening, we have an | :00:52. | :00:57. | |
extraordinary interview tonight of a childhood friend of one of the | :00:57. | :01:01. | |
men arrested for the murder of Drummer Lee Rigby. He tells us the | :01:01. | :01:07. | |
background of the man and why he converted to Islam, and he tells us | :01:07. | :01:12. | |
something of what might have made him become radicalised. Give us a | :01:12. | :01:17. | |
bit of the background to this. Dramatic events tonight. We have | :01:17. | :01:20. | |
spent the last two hours trying to secure an interview with a | :01:20. | :01:25. | |
childhood friend of one of the men accused of the murder. We arranged | :01:25. | :01:29. | |
for that interview. He came into the BBC. We conducted the interview. | :01:29. | :01:33. | |
Immediately after the interview I'm told three people from Special | :01:33. | :01:38. | |
Branch were in the BBC premises, they arrested the man. And so you | :01:38. | :01:43. | |
know very dramatic events tonight. In the interview itself it shows an | :01:43. | :01:51. | |
interesting portrait of the interviewee, and also the suspect, | :01:51. | :01:58. | |
Michael Adebolajo. I started by asking him about his early | :01:58. | :02:02. | |
childhood. How long have you known Michael Adebolajo? We met roughly | :02:02. | :02:07. | |
about early 2002. Where did you meet? We met at Romford, Essex. | :02:07. | :02:10. | |
what the circumstances of you meeting, was it a social contact, | :02:10. | :02:15. | |
was he a friend? I used to go down there to chill out with some of my | :02:15. | :02:19. | |
friends, basically. And during the course of going down there we, one | :02:19. | :02:25. | |
day we bumped into each other. It was a strange thing, we didn't see | :02:25. | :02:29. | |
a lot of black guys down there, it was like how are you. We exchanged | :02:29. | :02:32. | |
number and from there the relationship built up. | :02:32. | :02:38. | |
At that time were you both non- Muslims, I understand you are both | :02:38. | :02:45. | |
reverts to Islam? I wasn't in Islam. I came to Islam 2004, late 2004 | :02:45. | :02:51. | |
basically. He came in about four months after me. It is well known, | :02:51. | :03:01. | |
:03:01. | :03:03. | ||
it is established on the record that he was known and he knew the | :03:03. | :03:07. | |
group Al-Muhajiroun, did you know him in those circles? He used to | :03:07. | :03:11. | |
attend some of those events there, he was an independent guy, he | :03:11. | :03:14. | |
wasn't stuck to one particular group. He would go to various | :03:14. | :03:19. | |
circles and listen to various people. He wasn't stuck only with | :03:19. | :03:23. | |
Anjem Choudary and others. He would float about, basically. But he knew | :03:23. | :03:32. | |
them? He was aware of them. He had attended one or two events. I have | :03:32. | :03:35. | |
interviewed Anjem Choudary and others on many occasions, one of | :03:35. | :03:39. | |
the core beliefs and things that they aspire to is Sharia Law for | :03:39. | :03:45. | |
example, in the UK, was that position your position and his | :03:45. | :03:51. | |
position? I had that position myself which changed at a different | :03:51. | :03:54. | |
time. Michael never took that position, he thought it was more | :03:54. | :03:58. | |
sensible for Muslims to live in Muslim lands and live by the Sharia | :03:58. | :04:02. | |
in Muslim lands, he thought that made more sense that living in the | :04:02. | :04:08. | |
west and trying to implement the Sharia here. Did he consider | :04:08. | :04:13. | |
emigrating to a Muslim land? He did, many times, I remember he wanted to | :04:13. | :04:17. | |
do some qualifications in relation to teaching. He wanted to do a | :04:17. | :04:20. | |
qualification in relation to fitness training, which he | :04:20. | :04:25. | |
eventually did. He wanted to use that to go abroad and live in a | :04:25. | :04:30. | |
Muslim country. That's some of the background to the suspect, Michael | :04:30. | :04:35. | |
Adebolajo. But did he give us any clues as to what actually turned a | :04:35. | :04:39. | |
switch in this man's head and made him into this violent person, | :04:39. | :04:44. | |
potentially? He did. He said that about six months ago he had a | :04:44. | :04:51. | |
conversation with him in London and he says that Adebolajo told him, | :04:51. | :04:56. | |
the interviewee, that he had a very bad experience in Kenya. We don't | :04:56. | :04:59. | |
have any way of independently confirming this. This is the | :04:59. | :05:03. | |
account he gave us. He said he had travelled to Kenya, he was arrested | :05:03. | :05:06. | |
and picked up by the Kenyan authorities. He alleges he was | :05:06. | :05:11. | |
tortured and abused. He says that he noticed that it fundamentally | :05:11. | :05:21. | |
:05:21. | :05:22. | ||
changed his mind set after that experience. You describe Michael | :05:22. | :05:25. | |
Adebolajo as a gentle man, the way you are decribing him. The contrast | :05:25. | :05:29. | |
with someone who is capable of murdering on British streets is | :05:29. | :05:35. | |
very, very stark indeed. How do you understand that? Yeah, I mean I | :05:35. | :05:40. | |
believe certain event that happened to him recently kind of had an | :05:40. | :05:46. | |
impact in shaping that change. Although that change wasn't | :05:46. | :05:51. | |
necessarily one that became overt, aggressive or anything like that, | :05:51. | :05:57. | |
he just became more kind of reclined and less talkive and so | :05:57. | :06:05. | |
forth, like he wasn't his bubbly self, basically. The recent events | :06:05. | :06:10. | |
were about six months ago he turned up one day, just out of the blue, | :06:10. | :06:14. | |
no number or anything, he said basically what happened was he went | :06:14. | :06:21. | |
to study in Kenya. When he got to Kenya in a particular village they | :06:21. | :06:28. | |
were rounded up Kenyan troops and taken to a prison cell. They were | :06:29. | :06:33. | |
interrogated one by one, when his turn came he didn't speak to him. | :06:33. | :06:36. | |
Generally here he said no comment, he wouldn't speak to them. He said | :06:36. | :06:42. | |
that basically the officer said you are not in the UK, basically you | :06:42. | :06:49. | |
know taking his private parts he said I will "F" you if you wouldn't | :06:49. | :06:58. | |
speak. They beat him badly and his comment was, he said he wasn't like, | :06:58. | :07:04. | |
by oath, by good, that he feel shy to describe to you what they did to | :07:04. | :07:08. | |
him. These were his exact words. He felt shy to describe what they did | :07:08. | :07:15. | |
to him, basically. Did he tell you he was physically and sexually | :07:15. | :07:19. | |
asaulted He told me he was physically assaulted and sexually | :07:19. | :07:25. | |
threatened. He indicated from what I know of him, and when he said he | :07:25. | :07:28. | |
was ashamed to tell you what had happened to him, as far as I | :07:29. | :07:32. | |
understand it is actual abuse. There was nothing he would feel shy | :07:32. | :07:36. | |
to tell me about except that. did he tell you that? This is | :07:36. | :07:38. | |
roughly about six months ago, that is an estimate. Did you have any | :07:38. | :07:43. | |
doubt that he was telling the truth at that time? No. If you looked at | :07:43. | :07:53. | |
his face, you know, and he was holding tears back when he was | :07:53. | :07:58. | |
mentioning it. My impression, when I heard it is I wanted to hug him. | :07:58. | :08:03. | |
He's a close friend of mine. I wanted to hug him like a brother to | :08:03. | :08:08. | |
say it's OK. It's fine, don't worry about it. So your judgment is that | :08:08. | :08:12. | |
he had quite a profound change of personality after that? Definitely. | :08:12. | :08:22. | |
:08:22. | :08:27. | ||
He just became you know, he would be dour, you would be like we need | :08:27. | :08:33. | |
to invite people to join Islam and he would say, yeah. His mind was | :08:33. | :08:37. | |
somewhere else but he was present. Did he give any indication to you | :08:37. | :08:45. | |
that he was capable of such horrific violence? No, when I saw | :08:45. | :08:47. | |
the photos initially of him, I thought it was a joke. I thought | :08:47. | :08:53. | |
are you serious, it can't be him. There is no way it can be him. | :08:54. | :08:58. | |
Because it didn't make sense because his whole concept you know | :08:58. | :09:02. | |
was he just wanted to go and live in the Muslim land and get away | :09:02. | :09:08. | |
from all the problems and all the troubles, basically. At that time | :09:09. | :09:13. | |
he was being harassed by MI5. This is something that he specifically | :09:13. | :09:19. | |
mentioned to me. He said MI5 had come to him. On his return back he | :09:19. | :09:23. | |
had been stopped and subsequently after that he was followed up by | :09:23. | :09:28. | |
MI5. He said they came to his house. They were knocking on his door. He | :09:28. | :09:31. | |
pretended that he wasn't there. But they were knocking so much he | :09:31. | :09:36. | |
thought he needed to come and show his face. He came out, he spoke to | :09:36. | :09:40. | |
the MI5 agent and they were saying they just wanted a chat with him, | :09:40. | :09:44. | |
they just wanted to speak with him. When did he tell you this? Roughly | :09:44. | :09:48. | |
about six months ago. What was his reaction to being approached by the | :09:48. | :09:53. | |
Security Service and MI5? situation was that his wording was, | :09:53. | :10:01. | |
you know, they are bugging him, they won't leave him alone. | :10:01. | :10:08. | |
they explain what they wanted? mentioned initially they want to | :10:08. | :10:12. | |
ask him did he know certain individuals. After him saying he | :10:12. | :10:16. | |
didn't know the individuals, what he said is they asked him whether | :10:16. | :10:20. | |
he would be interested in working for them. Did you think he did end | :10:20. | :10:24. | |
up doing any work for them or not? No, he was explicit in that, he | :10:24. | :10:27. | |
refused to work for them. He did confirm that he didn't know the | :10:27. | :10:30. | |
individuals that they asked him whether he knew. There is a lot of | :10:30. | :10:36. | |
allegations there. We will come to them in a second. On the MI5 point | :10:36. | :10:39. | |
a lot of people will be thinking that is MI5 doing their job? | :10:39. | :10:42. | |
Absolutely, we have no way of verifying this, of course. What I | :10:42. | :10:47. | |
would say, in general terms, is that Security Services will of | :10:47. | :10:52. | |
course approach people to provide information or even act as covert | :10:53. | :10:56. | |
sources. This is part of the work they do more generally. I don't | :10:56. | :11:01. | |
think we can expect them to comment on this case specifically. In | :11:01. | :11:08. | |
general terms, it is not out of the ordinary to expect the Security | :11:08. | :11:10. | |
Services approach people for information. What we heard about | :11:11. | :11:14. | |
Kenya. Kenya for some people is a tourist destination, for others it | :11:14. | :11:20. | |
is a route into Somalia and to joining Al-Shabab, an Al-Qaeda | :11:20. | :11:25. | |
affiliate, and Kenya itself has a severe terrorist problem? | :11:25. | :11:31. | |
certainly is. On this man's account we hear he was picked up by the | :11:31. | :11:34. | |
Kenyan authorities. We have no way of substantiating this at the | :11:34. | :11:38. | |
moment. It is plausible as a story. One could say that. We will have to | :11:38. | :11:41. | |
wait and see whether we can actually get other coroborating | :11:41. | :11:45. | |
evidence to back it up. In terms of your interviewee, Abu Nusaybah, | :11:45. | :11:50. | |
what was his reaction to these horrific events a couple of days | :11:50. | :11:56. | |
ago. If he knew, would he have done anything to stop something like | :11:56. | :12:01. | |
this? He was quite clear in the interview. He is quite open about | :12:01. | :12:08. | |
having been influenced by Al- Muhajiroun, this Islamist group in | :12:08. | :12:12. | |
the past and its leaders in the past. He was clear tonight that if | :12:12. | :12:16. | |
he had been told, which he wasn't, about any plans for these horrific | :12:16. | :12:20. | |
violent attacks, he would have done his best to dissuade this young man | :12:20. | :12:24. | |
from carrying those out. He says it is not justified. His reaction to | :12:24. | :12:28. | |
what he saw was horror that everybody else had? He tells me he | :12:28. | :12:31. | |
was horrified by it. He couldn't believe it when he saw the images. | :12:31. | :12:36. | |
He couldn't believe this was the young man he used to hang around | :12:36. | :12:39. | |
with in 2003, he was very, very shocked, so he says. | :12:40. | :12:43. | |
Thank you very much. For some more perspective on this we have been | :12:43. | :12:48. | |
looking at some of the ways in which the Government and | :12:48. | :12:55. | |
communities shrb trying to take on -- have been trying to take on | :12:55. | :12:58. | |
radical Islamists in communities. East London, one of the areas the | :12:58. | :13:02. | |
Government believes is most likely to be a breeding ground for | :13:02. | :13:05. | |
extremism. Up a narrow flight of stairs beside a mosque is a project | :13:05. | :13:10. | |
the state has invested in as part of its key counter terrorism plan, | :13:10. | :13:17. | |
the Prevent Strategy. It is a youth club. The Active Change Foundation, | :13:17. | :13:22. | |
games and other activities are a tool to draw mostly disaffected, | :13:22. | :13:25. | |
mainly Muslim people in off the streets, listen to their problems | :13:25. | :13:29. | |
and engage them in discussion. the last period of ten years we | :13:29. | :13:32. | |
have built up such a relationship within the community and the young | :13:32. | :13:36. | |
people, we are recognised, if you like, the middle people between the | :13:36. | :13:41. | |
authorities and the young people. The young people have learned to | :13:41. | :13:48. | |
trust us in the past years. Prevent Strategy was set up after | :13:48. | :13:54. | |
the 2005 London bombings to try to tack the radicalisation of Muslim | :13:54. | :13:59. | |
youth, by integration and argument. But for place like this, Muslim | :13:59. | :14:03. | |
workers say, there would be far more extremists than those | :14:03. | :14:07. | |
suspected of the murder in Woolich. If people are angered by the | :14:07. | :14:12. | |
foreign policy, one thing is they might see on the internet or on the | :14:12. | :14:14. | |
news a situation someone has taken things into their own hands and | :14:14. | :14:18. | |
gone and do this. We say that is wrong. If you are against foreign | :14:18. | :14:22. | |
policy this is not the way to deal with it. This is not the way to | :14:22. | :14:26. | |
tackle it. But state funding for this project and others was cut | :14:26. | :14:30. | |
back when the coalition Government came to power. That followed | :14:30. | :14:34. | |
criticism that Prevent was unfocused and it sometimes even | :14:34. | :14:36. | |
subsidised the very extremist organisations it should have been | :14:36. | :14:40. | |
confronting. That's not stopped youth workers | :14:40. | :14:44. | |
here getting on their bikes every day. Even in the rain to engage | :14:44. | :14:48. | |
with young people in parks and on street corners and to find out what | :14:48. | :14:52. | |
they are thinking. They didn't want us to follow them, because of | :14:52. | :14:57. | |
course it is bad for their credibility to be seen with outside | :14:57. | :15:01. | |
authority figures. That points up one of the difficulties of the | :15:01. | :15:04. | |
whole programme, it is about integration but also intelligence | :15:04. | :15:08. | |
gathering. Some people think that is not a very comfortable | :15:08. | :15:11. | |
combination. Prevent has to avoid being seen as | :15:11. | :15:15. | |
a form of state snooping. But on the other hand, to be an effective | :15:15. | :15:20. | |
counter terrorism policy, it has to help identify potentially dangerous | :15:20. | :15:25. | |
extremists. You are listening and if you hear, | :15:25. | :15:31. | |
or any of the outreach workers hear things that worry them. Yep. | :15:31. | :15:35. | |
terms of inclination towards terrorism and extremism, do you | :15:35. | :15:39. | |
report that, and to who? We don't need to report that. We bring those | :15:39. | :15:44. | |
young people into our sent, -- centre, we talk to them, we have | :15:44. | :15:49. | |
workshops, depending on the issue out on the street with the young | :15:49. | :15:51. | |
person. We have developed a relationship with our young people. | :15:51. | :15:55. | |
They do trust us. So when they are angry and upset about something | :15:55. | :15:59. | |
they do voice it out to us, they might not do it with anybody else. | :15:59. | :16:02. | |
Isn't it your duty to report that as part of the strategy? Report | :16:02. | :16:07. | |
what, what are we supposed to be reporting, when someone's life is | :16:07. | :16:11. | |
in danger. Report that someone might have an inclination towards | :16:11. | :16:14. | |
terrorism? Absolutely right. But when we talk to young people out | :16:14. | :16:17. | |
there, they are angry and upset, they have a right to be an and | :16:17. | :16:21. | |
upset about that, they are not telling me they will do something | :16:21. | :16:25. | |
bad. What will I try to report, what are you asking me. In practice | :16:25. | :16:27. | |
they do sometimes exchange information with the authorities. | :16:27. | :16:31. | |
Of course the most dangerous people may be off the radar of projects | :16:31. | :16:37. | |
like this. In the wake of the Woolich killing, the project's head, | :16:37. | :16:42. | |
has rushed back early from a trip to Pakistan. He's afraid some | :16:42. | :16:45. | |
extremists will now try to copy Wednesday's atrocity. He can't | :16:45. | :16:48. | |
confront them because the Government is nervous about letting | :16:48. | :16:53. | |
organisations like his tackle the most incendiary preachers in debate. | :16:53. | :17:00. | |
It has become very risk adverse. This is a risky business. We as an | :17:00. | :17:05. | |
organisation have set our up tole challenge the problem. We know the | :17:05. | :17:09. | |
-- to challenge the problem. We know there are risks in this but we | :17:09. | :17:14. | |
have to challenge the people head on. Has the Prevent project failed, | :17:14. | :17:20. | |
because the scope has been too narrow. Prevent was lacking in | :17:20. | :17:23. | |
ambition, it only concerned itself with violent extremism and looked | :17:23. | :17:26. | |
at intervening at that point. They should have been going much further | :17:26. | :17:31. | |
downstream and looking at people who espouse extremist views. As we | :17:31. | :17:35. | |
have seen in Woolich, people who hold extremist views then go on to | :17:35. | :17:40. | |
commit terrorist attacks. We need to be doing into that sub culture | :17:40. | :17:42. | |
of extremism, which preaches separation and confrontation with | :17:42. | :17:46. | |
British society and with our values and working on people at that stage. | :17:46. | :17:51. | |
Once they go operational it is too late. Community engagment like this | :17:51. | :17:56. | |
may have prevented some attacks. But it hasn't solved the problem of | :17:56. | :17:58. | |
radicalisation. As we have seen this week, the price of getting it | :17:58. | :18:03. | |
wrong is very high. I'm joined now to discuss this by | :18:03. | :18:09. | |
the CEO of the Active Change Foundation, you saw that in the | :18:09. | :18:14. | |
film. We have the research and policy director for a think-tank | :18:14. | :18:19. | |
helping to advise the Government on tackling on-line extremism. You | :18:19. | :18:23. | |
heard our discussion with Richard Watson earlier and the interview. I | :18:23. | :18:26. | |
wondered if that pattern seemed familiar to you? The pattern of | :18:26. | :18:30. | |
somebody who seemed to fit in at one point to British society, and | :18:30. | :18:36. | |
then didn't? Yeah, if you look back at some of the cases that we have | :18:36. | :18:41. | |
uncovered in the past, the airline plot, some of the guys in the 7/7 | :18:41. | :18:44. | |
bombings, a similar pattern. Very involved in mainstream, and all of | :18:44. | :18:48. | |
a sudden they have excluded themselves from society. | :18:48. | :18:52. | |
Guardian has pretty much on the same theme, a crackdown on the | :18:52. | :18:56. | |
preachers of hate as soldier families grieve. How do you do | :18:56. | :19:00. | |
that? Crack down on the preachers of hate if so far under British law | :19:00. | :19:03. | |
they are not committing any offence? It is difficult. They are | :19:03. | :19:07. | |
not committing any offence, if we look back and the amount of times | :19:07. | :19:12. | |
that Anjem Choudary and his like have been associated to terrorist | :19:12. | :19:16. | |
plots and violent extremist individuals, there comes a point | :19:16. | :19:20. | |
when you have to say what do we do with these guy. First of all the | :19:20. | :19:23. | |
communities they operate within, I will give you an example in Waltham | :19:23. | :19:28. | |
Forest, or in Birmingham, you have a number of mosques preaching Islam | :19:28. | :19:35. | |
on a daily basis, why does a third party, someone unknown and not a | :19:35. | :19:41. | |
legitimate scholar coming into the area and preaching a warped version | :19:41. | :19:45. | |
of Islam. But you don't have to leave your house to see this stuff. | :19:45. | :19:49. | |
The Government would say the communications data Bill, at least | :19:49. | :19:53. | |
the Conservatives in the Government would say that is a way forward, | :19:53. | :19:56. | |
but it isn't going forward? Internet is playing a larger role | :19:56. | :20:01. | |
in more and more cases. We have to take it seriously and something the | :20:01. | :20:03. | |
Governments right across Europe and North America are looking at. There | :20:03. | :20:06. | |
is two different elements to this, one around the negative measures | :20:06. | :20:12. | |
you can take. Getting stuff offline that is on-line, the filtering, the | :20:13. | :20:17. | |
take-down approach. When you think about the fact that extremists are | :20:17. | :20:25. | |
now moving towards social media member site, and there are five | :20:25. | :20:32. | |
billion new pieces of data uploaded to Facebook, and the same to | :20:32. | :20:35. | |
YouTube, there is extreme limitations to that approach. Much | :20:35. | :20:39. | |
more focus needs to be put on how you can get the 99% of us who are | :20:39. | :20:45. | |
the good guys more active on-line, challenging, disrupting and how you | :20:45. | :20:50. | |
can use creative approaches to drown out the noise that the 1% are | :20:50. | :20:53. | |
making. That is interesting that implies that there is a bat of | :20:53. | :20:58. | |
ideas, but one side is really -- a battle of ideas but one side is | :20:58. | :21:04. | |
fighting it and the other side aren't? 99% are good guys and 1% | :21:04. | :21:09. | |
aren't, but they shout the loudest and have the clearest message. We | :21:09. | :21:15. | |
need to rouse that 99%. Of course people will concentrate on those | :21:15. | :21:20. | |
who will be violent or they think may be prone to violence, but it | :21:20. | :21:23. | |
may be the people who won't do anything violent who are just as | :21:23. | :21:28. | |
dangerous, if not more, because they incite it? This is why I think | :21:28. | :21:32. | |
community outreach and engagment programmes are important. Talking | :21:32. | :21:39. | |
about issues, contentious issues like Afghanistan and other things, | :21:39. | :21:42. | |
things that are angering our young people. We need to have engagment | :21:42. | :21:46. | |
in the hope we come across extremist views. It does arouse | :21:46. | :21:49. | |
those individuals to speak about it and those who are silent. It is our | :21:49. | :21:54. | |
job to filter out who we need to work more with and who we don't. | :21:54. | :21:59. | |
This is a horrific crime, but is this a watershed moment? I don't | :21:59. | :22:02. | |
think it is a watershed, we have seen examples like this over the | :22:02. | :22:05. | |
last five or so years in the terrorism domain. This isn't a new | :22:05. | :22:09. | |
thing. We have seen things like this in other European countries. I | :22:09. | :22:14. | |
think we are definitely going to be seeing a shift to these kinds of | :22:14. | :22:19. | |
low tech attacks more often. small groups? Partly because our | :22:19. | :22:22. | |
police and Intelligence Services have been effective at tackling | :22:22. | :22:27. | |
more sophisticated plots. What is different here, I beg beg to differ, | :22:27. | :22:32. | |
is these guys have set a precedent. They have apologised to the women | :22:32. | :22:36. | |
and children and females, they have stragically attacked a military | :22:36. | :22:40. | |
target. And what that has done is given them legitimacy. So other | :22:40. | :22:44. | |
people who have got similar views and similar sentiments now see that | :22:44. | :22:47. | |
as they have done right. They haven't attacked any innocent | :22:47. | :22:50. | |
person, in their view they have attacked a person with a military | :22:50. | :22:54. | |
background. That's worrying. will leave it there, thank you both | :22:54. | :22:57. | |
very much. Big change of gear, and the hot tip | :22:57. | :23:01. | |
for the Palme D'Or at the Cannes Film Festival this weekend is a | :23:01. | :23:08. | |
black comedy about the private life about lib a mucy, the director won | :23:08. | :23:18. | |
:23:18. | :23:18. | ||
at -- Liberace, Stephen Sodenberg said this film will be his last | :23:18. | :23:21. | |
because Hollywood wouldn't back his story, apparently it is too gay for | :23:22. | :23:24. | |
the cinema audience. It will be released on cable in the United | :23:24. | :23:29. | |
States and will appear in UK cinemas next month. We have been to | :23:29. | :23:32. | |
the south of France for an exclusive interview with the | :23:32. | :23:42. | |
:23:42. | :23:45. | ||
director. You may have heard reports from the Cannes Film | :23:45. | :23:50. | |
Festival that a lot of the bling has gone missing, but hello, I | :23:50. | :23:56. | |
don't think so. I know someone in the audience who preerts this! | :23:56. | :24:00. | |
Michael Douglas's performance as the spaingled virto sow, Liberace, | :24:00. | :24:10. | |
:24:10. | :24:10. | ||
has been the talk of France. When I was working saloons in Milwaukee, | :24:10. | :24:15. | |
they called them saloons, that is how old I am. I'm from Wisconsin | :24:15. | :24:19. | |
too. No, you are, well this must be fate. | :24:19. | :24:29. | |
:24:29. | :24:29. | ||
Newsnight met the director, Stephen Sodeberg, at his arduous Riviera | :24:29. | :24:33. | |
billet. Thank you for inviting us to this summer house you have going | :24:33. | :24:38. | |
here. It is a tough job and somebody has to do it! It is brutal | :24:39. | :24:43. | |
but I soldier on. I suppose we are old enough to remember Liberace in | :24:43. | :24:47. | |
his prime, watching your film it came back to me how extraordinary | :24:47. | :24:55. | |
that was. He really was the sort of you know, the Godfather of bling. | :24:55. | :24:59. | |
Absolutely. He really singlehandedly created the idea of | :24:59. | :25:06. | |
bling, and the idea that a performer could sort of be so | :25:06. | :25:13. | |
extravagant. When he was alive, and the world and its laws were rather | :25:13. | :25:16. | |
different, the story about Liberace was that he just hadn't met the | :25:16. | :25:22. | |
right girl! In fact, it wasn't only the ief rees he tickled. The new | :25:22. | :25:29. | |
film -- ivories he tickled, the new film is based on the memoirs of his | :25:29. | :25:33. | |
lover, Scott. Jack I want to talk about doing surgery on Scott here. | :25:33. | :25:41. | |
Fine, what would you like me to do with Scott? I want you to make | :25:41. | :25:47. | |
Scott look like this! This won't be shown in American cinemas, is it | :25:47. | :25:53. | |
too gay for conservative Hollywood. Oh I see, yes I think I can do what | :25:53. | :25:57. | |
you want. You're going to need a nose job. It was more frustrating | :25:57. | :26:04. | |
than anything else. I understood the, I understood the economic | :26:04. | :26:09. | |
issue that they were concerned that there wasn't an audience for the | :26:09. | :26:14. | |
film beyond a gay audience. I didn't share that belief, but | :26:14. | :26:18. | |
that's certainly how they felt. But it was more frustrating, I just | :26:18. | :26:22. | |
thought we didn't need, we had financed the movie almost entirely | :26:22. | :26:28. | |
out of foreign. We only needed add small amount, and I thought we had | :26:28. | :26:33. | |
a great script and we had Michael and Matt. I was surprised. You have | :26:33. | :26:37. | |
Hollywood full of gay stars who don't wish to appear as gay and you | :26:37. | :26:42. | |
are casting well known straight actors in these parts? I don't know, | :26:42. | :26:49. | |
I'm hoping that some day all these discussions will become irrelevant, | :26:49. | :26:54. | |
you know. And that people won't care in the same way that | :26:54. | :27:04. | |
:27:04. | :27:04. | ||
ultimately even after the story broke of Scott and L i in the | :27:04. | :27:10. | |
tabloids nobody cared. I have never been in casting session everywhere | :27:10. | :27:15. | |
somebody's personal sexual preference was ever discussed as a | :27:15. | :27:23. | |
topic. I think, hmmm, black piano, black tuxedo, who is going to see | :27:23. | :27:33. | |
:27:33. | :27:36. | ||
me in this giant clam shell! Well I ask you, can you see me now? | :27:36. | :27:43. | |
unimprovably titled, Behind The Candelabra arrives smack in the | :27:43. | :27:49. | |
middle of the gay marriage debate. The fact that it will arrive at a | :27:49. | :27:55. | |
key inflex in the whole discussion point is interesting. I'm not a big | :27:55. | :27:59. | |
believer in the idea that movies really influence that kind of | :27:59. | :28:08. | |
decision making for people. I'm glad right now that the movey will | :28:08. | :28:12. | |
be viewed through that lens of what is happening socially with this | :28:12. | :28:18. | |
issue. Why don't you let me tape you? Doing what? Talking. About | :28:18. | :28:25. | |
what? The director won at Cannes with his debut feeture, Sex Lies | :28:25. | :28:28. | |
and Videotape, a benchmark in independent cinema. Now he says | :28:28. | :28:38. | |
he's turning in his bullhorn and Darren Jolly purrs. -- jolpurs. Has | :28:38. | :28:43. | |
Hollywood got in the way of making movies? That is one of a handful of | :28:43. | :28:48. | |
things that got me thinking about five years ago that I would like to | :28:48. | :28:56. | |
have an exit strategy. My own feeling that I would like to stop, | :28:56. | :28:59. | |
destroy everything I have done and see if I can rebuild and come out | :28:59. | :29:03. | |
from a completely different angle and become primitive again. I don't | :29:03. | :29:06. | |
know if that is possible, I don't know if you can consciously do that, | :29:06. | :29:11. | |
but I'm going to try. You are tweeting a novel, is this true? | :29:11. | :29:21. | |
:29:21. | :29:26. | ||
trying to take advantage of its I'm not sure how but there is a | :29:26. | :29:29. | |
muscle being exercised in this experiment that I know is connected | :29:29. | :29:34. | |
to me trying to figure out the next version of me as a film maker. | :29:34. | :29:38. | |
don't wake up in the night frightened that they won't let you | :29:38. | :29:42. | |
back into this fabulous sweet shop. This fabulous dream factory and | :29:42. | :29:47. | |
they will say sorry, you turned your back on movies, good luck with | :29:47. | :29:51. | |
that Twitter thing, but the door is closed, my friend. I would be fine | :29:51. | :29:54. | |
with that. I never imagined that all of this would happen to me, | :29:54. | :29:58. | |
that I would have gone this far, been able to make as many films as | :29:58. | :30:07. | |
I have and be able to control them. That's, I have had plenty of fun. | :30:07. | :30:14. | |
Aren't you sweet! Not bad for an old bag, huh? | :30:14. | :30:24. | |
:30:24. | :30:36. | ||
A quick look at two of the front That's it for Newsnight, we are | :30:36. | :30:39. | |
back on Tuesday, enjoy the bank back on Tuesday, enjoy the bank | :30:39. | :30:49. | |
:30:49. | :31:11. | ||
Good evening, it's a bank holiday weekend, and for once it looks like | :31:11. | :31:15. | |
the weather want to play along, at least forea while. For Saturday | :31:15. | :31:18. | |
much dryer and brighter for England and Wales on Friday. Much warmer as | :31:18. | :31:23. | |
well and with a much lighter wind. Another pretty decent day across | :31:23. | :31:25. | |
the majority of Scotland and Northern Ireland as well. A really | :31:25. | :31:29. | |
big contrast for England and Wales after the cold wind and rain on | :31:29. | :31:35. | |
Friday. Some fairly recent sunshine and highs of 15, 16 and 17 on | :31:35. | :31:39. | |
Saturday. Just a little cooler along the east coast with the winds | :31:39. | :31:41. | |
feeding off the North Sea. For Scotland and Northern Ireland, | :31:41. | :31:45. | |
plenty of sunshine on the whole. Particularly around the Moray firth, | :31:45. | :31:50. | |
highs of 17, 18. Cloud in the west, we could see rain on and off the | :31:50. | :31:53. | |
likes of the Western Isles from time to time. Sunday still looks | :31:53. | :31:58. | |
like a pretty reasonable day. Particularly by bank holiday | :31:58. | :32:01. | |
weekend standards, for the bulk of the UK. A bit more cloud sitting | :32:02. | :32:05. | |
towards the North West. Perhaps not that much sunshine to be found | :32:05. | :32:08. | |
during the day across Scotland and Northern Ireland. Any rain here | :32:08. | :32:11. | |
should be fairly light and patchy. For England and Wales, the best of | :32:11. | :32:15. | |
the sunshine towards the west, highs of 20 degrees, a bit more | :32:15. | :32:20. |