The mod mush needed supports to the British Virgin islands. Much more on effo rts British Virgin islands. Much more on efforts to help the caribbean there. Let us take a look at the weather here with ben rich. Good afternoon. Nothing near as bad as we are seeing over the atlantic. Quite a few showers out there in england and wales. Some starting to turn heavy with flashes of lightning and rumbles of thunder. The showers will be fading from Northern Ireland and scotland. A drier story then for the rest of the afternoon. Spells of sunshine. I7 the rest of the afternoon. Spells of sunshine. 17 in glasgow, possibly reaching 19 in london. Most showers will fade later. Dry with clear spells for the most part. Central and eastern areas, a chilly start. There could be the odd fog patch and even a touch of grass frost here and there. Tomorrow, central and eastern areas starting on a bright note. Early sunshine but cloud rolling in from the west. Some really heavy showers blown in ona some really heavy showers blown in on a strong wind, gales on the exposed coast. Temperatures 14 18. Hello, this is bbc news. The headlines. Hurricane irma has made landfall in cuba with heavy rain and winds of more than isomph, hitting the north of the country after devastating several caribbean islands and killing at least 20 people. Meanwhile, officials in southern florida have told 5. 6 Million People, a quarter of the states population, to evacuate their homes before the storm arrives tomorrow. Mexico declares a day of National Mourning after the most deadly earthquake its experienced in 80 years kills more than 60 people. The United Nations is warning of an unprecedented refugee crisis in myanmar. It says more than 250,000 rohinga muslims have crossed the border to bangladesh. Now on bbc news, historian adam smith tells the extraordinary story of Ronald Reagans last movie. As a matter of fact i have been permitted to choose my own words and discuss my own ideas regarding the choice that we face in the next few weeks. In 1964, a middle aged hollywood has been called Ronald Reagan went on tv to speak in support of barry gold water, the republican candidate for president. We are spending m5 billion on welfare. Now do a little arithmetic and you will find that if we divided the m5 billion up equally among those nine million poorfamilies, wed be able to give each family 4600 a year. This added to their present income should eliminate poverty. Reagans mix of wit, warmth and rapid fire statistics made it one of the most effective political addresses in american history. Direct aid to the poor howevers only running at about 600 per family. It would seem some place there must be some overhead. And it launched him into a stratospheric career in politics. How does the glamour of politics compare with the politics of the screen. In 1966 he became governor of california. By 1968, he was running for president. And in 1980, this charming genual old movie actor became the leader of the free world. And yet at the very start of his rise he put that carefully nurtured public image at risk. Just a few months before that break through speech, breakthrough speech, Ronald Reagan was on american screens in a very different role. You get back to the hotel and stay there. I like it here. Go on, get moving. I said, i like it here. Well, i can change that in a hurry. The killers caught one of the most important men of the second half of the 20th century at a turning point between his political future and his hollywood past. But why did reagan make this movie . And what is this screeching change of gear telling us about the role of the movies in the making of a president ial public image . The killers was a gangster movie made for tv in 1963 by the veteran action director don siegel. Reagan plays jack browning, the treacherous violent leader of a gang of thieves. Get it over with, jack. Im adam smith, a historian of america, and in this programme, i want to unpick this strange tangle of movies and politics. To do that, we need to go back to the 19405. Don siegel and Ronald Reagan both got their careers up and running at Warner Brothers. They were two men, i suppose approximately the same age, who came along through warners at the same time, don siegel as a young man was very important in the montage department. Reagan was an actor who was never really ever going to make it big time. But he was a very reliable, supporting part actor. Lets turn in. Theres no regulation against us getting our own ideas. One of the secrets to reagans life is he was a very obedient guy. He was also a very political young man. Not as a right wing republican, but as a democrat. In 1946, hed gone on the radio to lambast the ku klux klan, and in 1951, he played a District Attorney who confronts them. It will take more than a sheet youre wearing to hide the fact that youre mean, frightened little people, or you wouldnt be here desecrating the cross. Don siegel, reagans future director in the killers, they hope for a disillusioned america so that they may set up their own messiah. In 1949, siegel directed reagan for the first time and his impression of him was surprising. The all american boy who at that time was extreme left wing, i thought he was a communist, was Ronald Reagan. In fact, reagans politics were on the move. In 1947, he became president of the Screen Actors Guild known in 1947, he became president of the Screen Actors Guild known as sag, and appeared before the house on american activities committee, denouncing communism from a liberal point of view. 0n the basis that democracy is Strong Enough to stand up and fight for itself against the inroads of any ideaology no matter how much we may disagree with it. By the early 19505, reagans once promising movie career was stalling. When his limited range landed him leads. I only made a down payment on one house. It was only in pedestrian movies like this. But then, a whole new phenomenon began to sweep through hollywood. Commercial television will probably use more material than one week than all the studios in hollywood turn out in a year. Television transformed hollywood and american politics and with them the career of Ronald Reagan. To understand what happened, we need to look behind the cameras at the role of a man called Lew Wasserman, the head of the huge acting agency, mca. In the early 19505, most hollywood moguls were scared or scornful of tv. Not Lew Wasserman. So wasserman gambled on taking mca into tv production and it paid off handsomely. But to do that, he needed the help of one of his clients who handily was also the head of the Screen Actors Guild. They asked reagan to please give them a waiver because back then you couldnt be an act who was selling talent and be a producer who supposedly was buying talent. So Ronald Reagan gave Lew Wasserman and mca a waiver of sag rules so they could both buy and sell talent. That was enormously helpful of the Lew Wasserman because suddenly their tv revenues boomed to six times higher than their Talent Agency business and that was because of the favour that Ronald Reagan had given. What did reagan get out of that . Well, reagan got in 1951 a nice little ranch in malibu and he later said that that ranch when he sold it enabled him to run for governor in the mid 605, so it was a huge gift. And then in 1954, mca agent Lew Wasserman also got reagan and then in 1954, mca agent mr schrive also got reagan a rather promising new gig as the frontman for a new tv drama show called General Electric theatre. In 1959, he was given quarter ownership of the show. There is no question that mca and schriver particularly had a big stake in reagan. Mca and reagan were kind of interlocking members of the same corporation. Reagan had a stake in their success, they had a stake in his. Here is lou costello in blaze of glory. In the beginning, Ronald Reagan would come on and tell america just what they were going to see now and so he became their friend, their uncle, the guy next door. That was hugely important for his political career. Reagans mind was turning more and more in that direction. By 1963, hed become a republican and was writing what was to become his political launch memoir. Wheres the rest of me. Yet he found mca pressing him into another Lew Wasserman wheeze. Mca bought an entire movie studio, universal, next to which they were building themselves a massive new hq, the black tower. And they were busy reworking an old universalfilm noir called the killers as the first ever film for tv. Reagans old Warner Brothers colleague don siegel was brought in to direct. Having two magnificent actors like lee marvin and clu gulager as the two killers, it would be very dull if i showed them going over to everybody and beating everybody up. But who should play the crime boss. Why, Ronald Reagan. But reagan had generally played a good guy. Are you sure youre just thinking of the success of the job . So why did he agree to play a role so completely add odds so completely at odds with his public persona . Reagan was working on his memoir, the wheres the rest of me and he was busy and i think he was focussed much more at that point for the political. Reagan never wanted to play a bad guy. He didnt see himself as a bad guy. He didnt want to do that movie at all. But his friend, Lew Wasserman, who owned the studio at universal had made him a lot of money so he owed lew big time. Big time. I asked him why did he do this movie and he just said immediately, lew wanted me to do it. I mean dont blame me, you know. I like what youre doing with the car, just stick with that. So like an ageing movie gangster doing one last bankjob, the ageing movie actor decided to do one last film. I like it here. Reagan later said his fans kept waiting for him to be revealed as good guy. In one shocking scene, he lashes out at his screen wife angie dickinson. I can change that in a hurry. I asked him how he felt about it and he said he didnt like it. He did his part, he was a professional, he said he memorised the part and he thought he did 0k in it. He didnt like hitting angie dickinson. Theres a meanness to the action he has in the film that really shocked people. That was the shock at the time. The shock of what he was going to do later would only dawn gradually. Lets tell them that we believe that we can. The other part of reagans life was beginning to clamour for his attention. Barry goldwater wants to give the Government Back to the people. Right wing republican senator Barry Goldwater began a campaign for president. His run was the beginning of the modern conservative movement. Thats the great trouble with big inflationary government. It takes more and more of your earnings. At the time, some saw goldwaters campaign as the great hope for the moral redemption of the nation. Others saw it as dangerously extreme. The United States should amount in so Uncertain Terms that we are against disarmament. Absolutely. Barry goldwaters team asked reagan to make speeches for him. He doesnt really commit to that. He commits later on at the same time hes filming the killers and trying to write his own book. This is a bizarre turning point. In this highly charged atmosphere, the two halves of reagans life, hollywood and politics, look as if theyre about to collide. I showed extreme violence as quickly as possible and then from then on you werent really seeing as much violence as you thought. It was so violent this movie, even the networks for whom it was made decided not to run it. At that time, reagan begged wasserman, you know, tojust put it in the can and put it away. Well, wasserman wasnt going to do that and he instead released it in the theatres where it did not do well at all. Reagan went off to present and act in a tv series called death valley days. But he also became California Co chair of the right wing republican Barry Goldwaters president ial campaign. So the decision to pull the killers from tv was a lucky escape. The enduering image of him on tv in 1964 was not this. But this. His barnstorming rallying cry for American Freedom and american business. Every businessman has his own tale of harassment. Somewhere a perversion has taken place. Reagan had been developing this speech for years. Often in his touring visits to General Electric staff when he was the companys spokesman. What he was talking about was how government shouldnt be so big or so powerful and restrain the individual and he had that as a theme before he became a partisan. He sort of, that was the theme there all along and reagan had given this speech of his which became the speech to a group of California Republicans that knocked them off their socks. Knocked them off their socks. The leading finance man at the time said, this would really help goldwater. You and i have a rendezvous with destiny. So a few days before the 1964 president ial election, reagans prerecorded speech before a hand picked audience was broadcast. 0n the very same network, nbc that was to have broadcast reagans last movie but dropped it. You and i have the ability and the dignity and the right to make our own decisions and determine our own destiny. Thank you very much. Instead, a bear few months later they broadcast reagans First Great National political speech. Thank you, ronnie for this very stirring speech. I amjohn kilroy, national chairman, tv for goldwater miller. The speech was a great hit. The speech was a big hit. Raised a million dollars, which would be like raising £ 10 million today. No speech had ever raised that kind of money. Here is the striking thing john kilroy was a Real Estate Developer and was certainly a perfectly respectable businessman. Reagan was becoming a champion of the virtues of californias business community. And yet that was exactly the sort of person hed just been portraying as a corrupt thug in the killers. Because reagans character uses his ill gotten gains to go legit, as Property Developer in los angeles. Yes . Mrstram and another gentleman to see you, sir. Until the killers track him down and expose him as a criminal. Gulager played the clu younger killer and remembers the sharp clu gulager played the younger killer and remembers the sharp contrast between reagans approach to the scene and that of the older killer, lee marvin. He came in and he did it. Completely differently. There was not one smidgen of similarity between the first take and the second take of his performance. You know who that is. Ronald reagan, same performance, really thought out. He save gave the same reactions to the lines. And it was really good. Browning development corporation. Youve come a long way from being an ex male robber. Reagan was actually a mobster pretending to be a legitimate businessman and this could have come back to bite him. The story gets stranger. In hollywood, businessman and gangsters have often been closer in hollywood, businessmen and gangsters have often been closer than you might think. The founders of mca had had to deal with gangsters ever since the company began, booking bands in al capones chicago. So that makes this scene in the killers where reagan plays a crook turned businessman even more extraordinary. First of all, look at what lee marvins wearing. That was the mca agents uniform which don siegel deliberately copied for the movie to make his fictional killers look like his real life bosses. But look closer still. See that model of a new building development, clu gulager is messing about with is messing about with in reagans office . Its a model of mcas big new development, universal city, centred on the black tower. So what on earth were don siegel and his designer playing at putting a model of their producers shiny new development bang in the middle of a criminal turned businessmans office . Even if the businessman wasnt played by Ronald Reagan, seems a bit cheeky. Perhaps the universal executives were in on the gag, perhaps they didnt notice, or perhaps they knew that siegel had a point about their old gangster links and decided to let him have hisjoke. Whatever the reason, that scene hinted that business and crime might not always have been polar opposites which wasnt the obvious message to launch a career as a conservative politician. But, with the killers and its awkward links between business and crime safely confined to a few movie theatres, Ronald Reagan was able to move towards his new role as a politician. In the wake of his dazzling tv speech for Barry Goldwater, California Republicans clamoured to get him to run for governor and early in 1966 he finally launched himself as a politician in his own right. Cue an avalanche of ridicule. I always knew they was playing a part and when the director yelled i always knew that i was playing a part and when the director yelled cut and i took off my make up and my costume, i wasjust plain damn him again. One of my colleagues is having a little trouble separating fantasy from reality. Hes confusing the ability to play a fictional character with the ability to be that person in real life. But in the mid 19605, america was changing at terrifying speed. And reagan discovered a weapon that would blow mockery of his acting career to pieces. While he was running the campuses in california became a flame. There were protests and free speech, filthy speech, vietnam, civil rights, so there was kind of a backlash against this. Reagans opponents underestimated the old actors chances. He ran a canny highly moralistic campaign that played out the issues campaign that played up the issues of crime and social unrest. I dont think that taking to the streets and rioting and disorder has ever solved anything or ever will. It worked. Against the odds, he won. Even as radical unrest and the backlash against it grew ever more aggressive, he launched his first run for president. We must recover the will necessary to make our streets safe and our cities free of violence. And our campuses centres of learning rather than for outrage and insurrection. We must reject the idea that every time the laws broken, society is guilty, rather than the law brea ker. It is time to restore to america the precept that each individual is accountable for his actions. Applause. And then in 1971, the rising tensions in governor reagans state were dramatised by reagans old director on the killers, don siegel, in a film called dirty harry. The backlash had found its super hero. Harry behaves like a right wing cop. But he talks and he moves and he sort of reacts like a natural amiable loner. That is very much a sort of pattern that reagan had. Reagan would do harsh things. He would talk about them in a chatty way. You think he fired six shots or only five. If Clint Eastwoods Harry Callaghan was the embodiment of the age of reagan, the tough cop on the tale of a murderous hippy, there was still that awkward memory from reagans own acting career, the killers. Get it over with, jack. And so even as reagan rose towards presidency, his role in that old movie refused to die. A reminder that his new, simple moral certainties were built on shifting sands. Much to his annoyance, it was still being rerun on tv in 1972. I do have any doubts about my ability to play the role of leader man in america. Of leading man in america. And even during his 1980 run for president , his opponent screened it in new yorkjust so that could laugh at him. And yet maybe that tensed up narrow eyed thug reagan played in the killers was actually the missing piece of his public image. The sunny boy made good ssh tick was all very well the sunny boy made good shtick was all very well but it was his capacity to play the hard man that completed reagans political persona. Maybe he regretted that old made for tv movie as a bad end to his hollywood career, but perhaps it was more useful to his transformation into a politician than he thought. All he had to do was flip the aggression round and turn it like Clint Eastwood in dirty harry against the criminals. We have Hurricane Irma and also hurricanejose we have Hurricane Irma and also hurricane jose heading north we have Hurricane Irma and also hurricanejose heading north into the atlantic. Irma remains the main weather maker and could strengthen again as it pushes towards florida where its likely to arrive in the south west as we go on through tomorrow. Back home, on the radar you can see we have tomorrow. Back home, on the radar you can see we have quite a few showers around, some of these heavy, some starting to turn thundery as we drift further south and east. The showers will continue as we go on through the afternoon, particularly across england and wales. For Northern Ireland and scotland, showers fade away. More in the way of dry weather with spells of sunshine through the rest of the day. Temperatures 16 in aberdeen, 19 in london. At the cricket, we certainly could see some interruptions with heavy thunder. The showers should tend to ease through the evening. That is the story across the country. More weather in tell evening, try spells overnight. For central and eastern areas, it could get chilly. In the countryside, maybe cold enough for a touch of ground frost and the odd fog patch as well. In east anglia and the south east, by 9 oclock, it should be mainly fine with early brightness, but all the while cloud will be streaming in across the south west, wales, the midlands, up into northern england. Temperatures 12 or 13. The cloud streaming in ahead of this band of rain which will be working across scotland. Much of it light and patchy. The odd heavier burst here and there and hefty showers following on into Northern Ireland. Tomorrow, this band of rain will continue to work its way eastwards, any brightness in the south east will tend to be replaced by increased cloud cover. The wind picking up in the afternoon. Could be gales for exposed coasts. During sunday night, this area of low pressure will lumber across scotland. Notice a squeeze in the isobars. Could be severe gales for exposed parts. What it leaves us with into monday and tuesday is an u nsettled with into monday and tuesday is an unsettled look to the weather. A mixture of sunshine and showers, blustery winds and a cool feel. This is bbc news. Im annita mcveigh. The headlines at 3pm. Hurricane irma pounds cuba with winds of more than 150mph. The cuban authorities did try to move large numbers of people out of harms way, but still many have been left, particularly in the central province. We understand there are many thousands ever people there without power at the moment. As the storm approaches florida, nearly six Million People have been told to leave their homes. If youve been ordered to evacuate. You need to leave now. Do not wait. Evacuate. Not tonight, not in an hour, you need to go right now. Other caribbean islands, such as barbuda, already devastated by irma, are now bracing for the expected arrival of another hurricane, jose, over the weekend. The un warns of an unprecedented refugee crisis, after nearly 300,000
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