Transcripts For KQEH Charlie Rose 20170505

Be expecting it but if theyre careful watchers theyll remember someone. Charlie and photographer tabitha soaren and its called fantasy life baseball and the american dream. Once i got very successful in television i felt like the work i was doing was getting more and more mainstream. The higher i rose the more watered down it got and the less agency i had over the creative process. So for me art was a solution to that. I feel like i can get to a truth in the work but its less of a who, what, when, where and why and more of an emotional truth. Charlie health care, vice media and tabitha soaren. Rose funding for charlie rose has been provided by the following and by bloomberg, a provider of multimedia news and Information Services worldwide. Captioning sponsored by Rose Communications from our studios in new york city, this is charlie rose. Charlie the house of representatives approved the Health Care Act this afternoon and they plan to repeal and replace key parts of the obama care. Its marks a significant victory for President Trump and House Republican leaders their earlier efforts failed to unite in the gop and most republicans have not yet read the legislation which passed without an assessment. Joining us from washington is ed okeefe of the Washington Post and sarah kliff. Tell me what happened. The Trump Administration and president and other key leaders said they had the votes. In fact they did. Was it difficult to pull this off . Absolutely. Theyve been trying for weeks, charlie and they did it today by the skin of their teeth, 217 to 213. That was more more than needed. Theres a few vacancies to the magic number was to get it over 216 and they called the vote shortly thereafter. No democrats voted for this. 20 republicans also voted no. A mix of members from swing districts who will face difficult reelection fights next year and face questions about health care and ardent conservatives who dont think the bill went far enough. When they figured out wednesday they had the votes and decide to do out thursday and they did it and its a significant achievement whether youre a fan of this president and republicans right now or not theres no denying the house pulled off something many thought they could not do. This is the first major legislative achievement for House Speaker paul ryan whos been on the job a little over 18 months and the signature achievement for property and if you thought the house was difficult let me introduce you to the upper chamber. Charlie sarah, pick it up there. Ed is right. The senate will be a struggle. You had two republican centers who came out and said they dont support the bill. Some are concerned about medicaid. Its the cut a lot from medicate and we dont have the cbo score but probably in the neighborhood of 800 billion or so which is a huge concern to the senators in states that expanded medicaid. Its a big victory for republicans but now the senate has to go through a lot of the fights the house already did. Theres discussion the senate might start its own bill from scratch. This is one victory in an ongoing fight and now our focus turns to the senate and what theyll do with the legislation the house has sent them. Charlie theres been much discussion including with my colleague John Dickerson as to what was in the bill and not in the bill. Give us a sense of the key aspects of that conversation in which has been part of the debate the last three or four days whats in the bill and not in the bill . The program suggested its a bill that protects people with preexisting conditions and he wants to sign a bill to protect everybody with a preexisting condition. The problem is theres provisions that are not good for someone who has a preexisting condition. One of the ways that the conservative members of the house caucus was brought on board is letting some Insurance Companies that seek a waiver charge sick people a higher premium. This was a nonnegotiable for the Freedom Caucus. If this bill the house passed goes through and signed into law by President Trump we will once again have an individual market where sick people can face higher premiums because theyre expected to have higher medical bills. Charlie and sometimes high deductions too. Very high deductibles. Charlie ed, when you look at this bill and look at who gave up what, who made the toughest compromise . I think its more mainstream moderate republicans who had to go along to get the concessions sarah was just talking about. These write themselves. Democrats are in fantastic political position they believe because they now get to run campaign ads against republicans saying theyll cut hundreds of billions from medicaid. If have you cancer youll have to pay more for your health care. If your mothers sick youll have to pay for your Health Care Plus your own. Theres ways to spin this. We hat an interview at the post with nancy pelosi and said its easier to talk about things when theyre going to be taken away from americans as oppose to what youll do to change a big law thats becoming a settled issue for Many Americans even if they have general concerns with it. I would say its people who face difficult reelections next year in the suburbs, certainly in the northeast and some florida Congressional District and a handful in california who will face a difficult time explaining what they did especially the nonpartisan been counters claim tens of millions can lose their coverage and the bill could cost billions to the federal government. That was a big risk they took today in having the vote not knowing exactly the potential cost and in many cases members conceding they hadnt read the thing. Charlie why did the president feel he had to do this now rather than go directly to tax reform. You need a lot of the savings the republicans hope to generate from health care in order to help pay for and figure out tax reform. Thats the basic policy answer. He also knows if you cant get health care it may be impossible to get tax reform. It may be very difficult to do eded to get to a point where they got a win and House Republicans felt look, we can governor and come together on something as difficult as this with us and he needed a big policy achievement. This is only step one of probably three or four but it was a big step. He rightfully today wanted to celebrate that with House Republicans and the latest trip to new york to see the australian Prime Minister in order to do so because to date really the only big thing that congress has given him is neil gore gorsuch. Charlie theyll will help him . They got a sense of how the house can Work Together and depending on what a final Health Care Bill looks like and sarahs really the inhouse expert at least in this conversation on what it will do to save money or move money around, it would make doing tax reform easier from a policy suspect as well, yeah. Charlie sarah . I think its a step forward but health care is becoming this allconsuming task. Remember back to january President Trump had said he wants to sign an obama care repeal bill in his first day in office and were now 100 days away from the first day in office and its hard to see a time line where the republicans are both able to finish health care this year and go to tax reform given all the work that has to be done. The senate is talking about writing its own bill and start from scratch and merging those together. When you look at the legislative calendar it seems hard but not impossible to Reform Health care and tax reform in the same year. There was a moment today at the white house at the rose garden event where the president was talking about the fact, people have been telling me maybe you should get rid of paul ryan. The president didnt deny he talked about it and did nothing to suggest he wants ryan to stay put and happy with the work hes done. Clearly that relationship has been strained. It would have been far worse if this had not happened for ryan and trump and their relationship. If theyre not able to Work Together the Republican Party and their ability to governor would be seriously jeopardized. Charlie paul ryan has consistently said ever since obama care was act the affordable Health Care Act was passed republican said they had to do something about it and tried to change it include court challenge. Here it is, finally having a republican president not to have acted on this, according to paul ryan, would have been a defying of their own constituency. It would have been an existential crisis and he said there are people in the chamber now who are here because they vowed to take this vote. If we dont take this vote their entire political existence is alled into question. I think that remained the motivating factor for many of these republican members and probably will for the senators as well. They understand much of their political success in recent years has been to rail against legislation like this and they need to demonstrate they at least tried hard to get it done. One of the interesting dynamics weve seen develop is it seems like no one wants to be blamed for stopping this. So you see in the first round of negotiations the Freedom Caucus had the finger pointed at them for the road block and then the moderates were in the hot seat and its a hot potato no one wants to drop though they dont like the final product. Well see that dynamic played not senate. Theres hurdles towards passing legislation but one of the things i learn from the health care process is that nobody at the end of the day wants to be the one with the finger pointed at them saying youre the one standing in the way of this Campaign Promise weve made for seven years. I think it will be a motivating factor in the senate to pass something. Charlie when you look at this bill which many people havent as you pointed out, how rare is that people are asked to vote on something you dont know whats in it . Incredibly rare. And republicans demanded you needed a cbo score and democrats have chastised republicans but we could see a cbo score showing millions losing coverage. The vote has been taken. You cant take back the fact you voted for it. It seems quite a risk republicans are taking to vote for a Health Care Bill when they dont know how many people it covers or costs. Charlie can they go to their constituents and say we did it. We said wed repeal and replace obama care and we did it, thank you very much. We dont know they have. First of all, the way its written now its not a wholesale replacement of the Affordable Care act. Its a rewrite so if you wanted it wiped clean you wont be happy. The other risk if members go home tonight for a weeklong recess for some reason theyre take break in the middle of may im calling it the mothers day recess if they are asked whats in it and struggle to answer i think even republican supporters will wonder was that the best thing to do. It shows they were willing to put it all at risk and put out to vote because they understand the consequence of dragging it out longer and fumbling the ball yet again was worse than taking the vote now and starting the process and kicking it over to the senate. Charlie so is it greater than 50 50 the republicans wont be able to create a bill signed by the president that will be a republican act of health care . I think it is certainly an uphill battle but the desire to pass something is very strong. As ed was about to say, given that republicans control the senate, the white house is going to be hard to go back to the voters and say we werent able to get this done and it weighs heavily on republican legislators. And theres at least a 52 chance they can do it. The question will be whether they get 51 because theres no democrat who plans to vote with them. It was described to me by democratic aides said theyre sitting on their hands. Charlie thank you. Well be right back. Stay with us. 23 years ago three selfdescribed hipsters created a free montrealbased magazine which quickly developed a reputation for bold, provocative reporting. Its called vice. Its now becomes a multiplatform corporation valued at 5 billion. Along the way theyve avoided the trapping of traditional view media and doing instead immersive journalism and has been characterized as hard news with an edge. Vice news tonight was launched and hbos first nightly news program. We have shane smith the founder and ceo of vice media and the executive director of Vice News Tonight and host of the weekly documentary series and josh tyrangiel. Im please to have them both back on this program. Thank you. Charlie welcome back. Thank you. Charlie tell me what vice media is as if i dont know. We started the magazine in montreal then we came down here as the first dotcom revolution which went bust and then we moved to brooklyn and started being a Digital Company so online. We were the first to do online video and native advertising and all that good stuff and got bigger and bigger and grew internationally and we have online and mobile and magazines and agencies, we have record label. Its a Media Company. Charlie valued at about 5 billion is that about right . Well, that was last year. Charlie david carr said its hellbent libertarianism and colorful literacy. I was lucky i got to spend time with david. Charlie you loved him on the show. We met when he was shooting page one and butted heads and became good friends and we were in dublin and they called and said if we get shane will you come to dublin and we said sure. We both went and it was a love fest and we went away and we got this place and set up all these irish musicians and david and i just danced around this crazy castle together. We was one of the best and called it right. We are no rules, nonparademic. Charlie is it news . Its entertaining news. I think one of the things to speak of reviews or critiques the first review of vice news by the New York Times said its hipsters in skinny jeans and tattoos highfiving in war zones. Everyone was bombed and i said its perfect because theyre not getting us on the facts or dinging us on the story and theyre not saying its not great but theyre saying we look different and if we look different guess what, thats our audience. Those are the millennials. So you can have the older generation. Well take the Younger Generation and if youre making fun of how we dress which is how they dress, its a win. Charlie so you come up with a nightly presence. Did you say lets get the guy who knows how to do a taped show or magazine and hell tell us what to do. He said it was his idea and knew what he wanted to do. He loves the news we create for hbo and we love being on hbo. Its a great platform for us. When he came to us and said look, we want to do this not weekly. We want to do it all the time and nightly it was a big conundrum. We didnt want a voice of god. We didnt want hosts. We didnt want it to look like other news because it could be derivativ derivativ derivative and i got sick of beating by this guy at the awards shows every year at bloomberg. Charlie in the magazine business. Yes, hed always be up for best magazine and would always win. When we wanted someone with a Creative Vision to reinvent news which is hard to do because it has to be recognizable to call it news but different enough so were not derivative. Charlie you had been at Time Magazine and other places and bloomberg. You had no trepidation about this. When you were leaving a tons of people wanted you to come do a variety of things. Why was this right for you . It was a combination of things. I like solving problems and the naugh naughtier the problem the more interested i am and ive been blessed with having good patron. You need support because you wont get it right first time out but ten when you take on a big media problem like how to get people to watch something they havent watched in 60 years. On one hand, shane has a record of being the right kind of media rogue and said well do it and figure it out. And hbo was expressing the kind of commitment you need and insistence on quality. So i felt safe which say weird thing to say because jumping into the most Competitive Landscape which is just delivering news over the air is not a safe thing. I felt like of all the things i could potentially do and was interested in you can have impact, you can be smart, you can have permission to experiment and thats a dream. Thats what you want to be able to do. Charlie beyond that what are the elements of it, the nightly show . When shane and i first spoke about this and i think i said this to him and richard, you know, nobody needs this, right . The medias changed so much. If youre an engaged news consumer youre getting it all day, on your phone, over the radio, tv. So nobody needs it to just tell you what happened. What happened is pretty obvious. To do this you have to make people want it by seducing them. You have to give them something a little bit familiar. Were unconventional in many ways. The thing were very conventional about is you watch the show and youll hear a lot of about what happened in the world today and understand it better. From there thats the basic Value Proposition but we looked at what conventional news delivers and saw its the only news product where its on at the same time, it has the same format which is one person behind the desk. Often theyre doing the same kinds of stories like you with the morning show. Lets start over, lets make the thing we want to make and the visual inspiration in some ways was saturday night live on the one hand and sesame street on the other. Not because we wanted to be funny or childish but both those things know their audience. Gou to saturday night live to laugh and go to sesame street to educate your kids. Charlie and 60 minutes for great story telling. But each has moves. No matter the problem theyre trying to solve is they have moves. Saturday night live are trying to to make you laugh with monologue jokes and spoofs and they have ways to package ideas. Sesame street sometimes its simple like number two and sometimes its an ethical and they have character moves and we need data that moves on screen. We need animation. Because one of the reasons i think people have fallen out of faith with tv news is they dont have footage, you dont have a story. We very early on said its a lot of things that happen in the World Without a camera charlie its interesting you say that the three network news ill add fox to it, they all reach somewhere between 3 million, 4 million to 5 million and 6 Million People a night. We have the youngest audience according to nielsen of any news show cable or networks. Theres some consistency obviously. Charlie like 13 million . Im sure hbo would be thrilled. There has to be originality in the presentation. Charlie what is the originality. I know its not a voiceover. Its a mix of format and belief you dont need to t everything up with an introduction. Your audience is tracking stories outside your news program. Theyre bringing context to it and theyre going to put up with longer form story telling. We do package are sometimes four to twelve minutes. Its a faith if we deliver on that theyll come back again. I think also if you look at the numbers if you want to bring up numbers you say ok, hbos in 30 million homes the network is 100 million full discretiotribu. The fact ware doing 500,000 off the bat and were number one in digital for hbo is fantastic, a. B, if you combine the nightly and weekly were doing somewhere around north of 5 million ourselves. Now, its video on demand and bespoke and cumed. Charlie and whats the difference between what your doing and hes doing. He does the work and they wheel me out to lunch and i wave. I do longer stuff. I do more interviews. I like to get in the field and shoot but now because i dont have a lot of time they send me in for interviews. Charlie your time demand is from being an executive as well as being on air. The weekly is my baby and josh is on weekly for special and nightly. Charlie when is that show on, vice . Friday nights. Charlie this is a clip from season high from february 2017 featuring you reporting from the north sea on the cost of Climate Change. Here it is. [ ] im on an oil and gas platform one of the biggest in the world and we came here to talk to a company for more than 20 years admitted Climate Change is reel real and supported the kyoto protocol and look at how big oil and gas can do something to reduce emission. Charlie what i see there is reporting, i see a lot of video, well done, i hear a lot of music [laughter] that story is actually about theres a lawsuit against exxon thats being put forth by a number of attorneys general in america saying they knew about Climate Change yet spent billions to say it wasnt happening and question the science. The same scientist did that job for big tobacco did the same job for big oil. Basically were talking to a lot of lawyers about a lawsuit which isnt great tv. So we went and said, ok. Norway is interesting because theyre a Progressive Company and one of the largest natural oil and gas producer and say, Climate Change is happening. Its happening because of oil and gas and were doing Carbon Capture and all those rigs are actually the energy comes from hydro. To have an oil company tell the truth was fantastic. And they own these platforms and back in the 80s they elevated the platforms by eight to twelve feet which cost millions of millions and said they we had to get them insured for 100 years and the outside of Climate Change Sea Level Rise is eight feet and now it comes about thats the level of Sea Level Rise. It was a gotcha moment. Charlie you shoot and broadcast the same night in do you have to or package stuff you can decie when to do it . We have longer lead stuff we invest time in. Last week we did a piece we started shooting really in december about Gang Violence in chicago. It takes a long time. But we are often times really just cutting in the control room and go live two or three nights a week meaning we feed live to hbo and what youre seeing is being dispatched. We need time to get up to date stuff in the show and we also know planning, preparation and longterm story telling is our hallmark. Charlie you said story selection is about asking whether we can add value. We dont just want to do another story then another. Look, im cognizant ase avid news consumer. Im tracking a lot of stuff all day. If youre going to tell somebody something and i can find that information out in different places you havent distinguished yourself at all. One of the ways this has come up for us is the election of territory President Trump like a volcano and theres lava everyone. And for the first week or so we were tearing up lineups all day long. There was so much going on. We discovered we were for that period doing things not as valueadded as we ought to be doing and if we know he tweeted media is the enemy of all people what can we do. If we overlap with somebody else we better overlap we better have Something Different and additive. Theres so many choices. Were new. We look different. Use that. Charlie whats the profile of the people who watch your show or all your shows . Young, affluent, diverse charlie have they been news watchers . Have they been news watchers or simply turned off by news because they were tired of it and thought it was boring and dont believe in appointment television. We have both. We have a little from column a and column b. We make this nightly show and slave away and push it out to 7 30 and we heard from hbo people would binge watch which is an interesting behavior for a news show. Not one we heard about before. Charlie it happens all the time on this show. People say i devote saturday morning to watching your show. I take five hours and go through it and what i like i watch. What i dont like i skip through. It gives you more liberty. It gives you the extra day of consideration to do something you may not have been able to do if youre just responding to dead lines. Our users want us in the presence tense. They dont want us if the future and dont necessarily demand were up to date as long as we provide value. When talk about millennials, 18 to 34. 18 is much different than 34. We have people who have been disenfranchised by Mainstream Media charlie meaning what . They dont feel like it speaks to them or that theres been scandals. And so basically theyre saying well im going to these guys over here. Then we have other younger kids who have come up saying because their older brothers or sisters or whatever were watching vice theyve been reared on vice news and were their goto and theres people who compare us to the other Mainstream Media and say they do stuff not on the news cycle. They go behind it. Charlie during when john stewart was at the helm for jon stewart was at the helm for the daily show they said this is not good. Its about satire but the story you always heard is it good or bad so many young people this is the only way they get news. They watch the daily show. I think its good. Charlie you think its good . Yeah. Its good because theyre getting news. Charlie and jons show wasnt much news well, its issues. He was talking about issues. He was popularizing it. But you also cant enjoy it unless you know the news. All the references pass you. That was a i believe an underestimation of that audience where i think our audience is underestimated too. You cant enjoy a 12 minute piece about Gang Violence in chicago unless you come to it prepared and have a little bit of knowledge. Charlie you said vice doesnt assume young people dont care about news. They assume they do. Its how its presented in a way that is part of who they are and their own sort of lifestyle dna. Look, one of the things in Business News where i was for six years you forget is people want to feel something. You mention the music under shanes piece. One of the things that i have learned in part from shane and from spike jonze and others is people dont mind learning something while theyre feeling something and some of our audience may not be expecting it but thats the reward theyll have season theyll remember and attach to the issue. Charlie wheres it going . Wheres the trajectory . For news or the company . Charlie for both. Start with the company. We started when i first came to talk to you. We were one of ten and then we were one of four and now were one of one so the largest new Media Company in the world and the want to take them out. Charlie i heard everybody was running out to brooklyn i thought i better find out whats going on. Everythings going on out there. Thats the hub. Charlie the trajectory is what though . For the next two years its boring. For the next two years we go into a country and launch the network and push it to mobile. We launch our studios and go to s just bang, bang, bang, bang launching all of our platforms in other countries, 80 countries. The big question in the next two years is expand and what do we do after that because you have vice on hbo, you have vice on sky and times of india and at some point youll have to go direct to consumer. Youll have to go and i think thats where everythings going. Charlie when . Now. Charlie when will it be pre dominant . Now, netflix, the success and apple will enter into the fray, hulu, its going to be and as thats happening your having skinny bundle and going bespoke. Youll have 30 things you paid for and some over the top and some old school tv but its happening today. The fact at t is buying time warner is because of that. They have to drive data which is video and stop exclusivity. Charlie and whatever they can find. Rumors are apple is looking to buy whats out there. Charlie they have 250 billion in cash. Thats a fact. Charlie he said those guys out there have so much money. Go ahead. Well, if trump can say were going to make jobs in america you can repatriate the cash and theyll buy up everything. Why not. Charlie is this the end of networks . Everybodys been predicting the end of networks a long time. We got into tv at the end of networks. Have you five years because of the way contracts work because of status quo as it shrinks. I always tell my guys we have to be in the top 30 networks because all those other 170 will go away. I think youre seeing the beginning of the end of the traditional network. Charlie but staying for a long time though . Five years and then it will be an ip game. Everybody will say who has the most ip and amazon or apple or netflix theyll try to accumulate as much as content as they can to have a better more robust direct to consumer offering. Charlie good luck. Back in a moment. Stay with us. In 2002 Tabitha Soren began photographing a group of Minor League Draft pick for the oakland as and watched players of looking to make it to the big show and those that never made it. The stories and photos are captured in her new book called fantasy life baseball and the american dream. And has a new project opening this month in san francisco. Im please to have her back at the table. Welcome. Thank you. Charlie where have you been . I have been following some Baseball Players but in that 15 years i already had three children, got married and sort of charlie they stop by to talk about his wanted to continue to hang out with billy bean and dragged me to spring training in 2003 you know how you make compromises in relationships and when i got there i was really happy i went because i went 21 guys from the 2002 draft class at their very first spring training and a felt as an artist like how often do you get to meet a whole group of people embarking on the same journey at the exact same time and their faces were so full of hopefulness and purpose i had a hard time figuring out how fast to get started. When i met these players i assumed they were just on their way to the major leagues. It was inevitable they would get there and i had to learn through hanging out with them through a long period of time that really only 6 of them get there. I actually figured out eventually i assumed i would fall in love with baseball like all the fanatics in the stands and it never really happened. But what the project turned into was much more about resilience and striving and what baseball says about American Culture because these guys know only 6 of them get there but theyre pushing, pushing anyway and i felt its not just professional athletes driving themselves at that speed and with that endurance and risking injuries and leaving college, i feel like a lot of americans push themselves that hard. Charlie theres stories. Were both from the bay area and hes a very generous soul as im sure you must know. When he found out i was doing this he asked if he could help. I said why dont you write one of those art essays and he said tabitha nobody reads those stupid things. I dont want to write what nobodys going to read and wrote a short story which i never would have asked him to write a short story but he did and hes incredibly prolific. Charlie is it the circle . Yes, you cant keep up with him and his wife is no slouch either. Charlie lets talk about the pictures and come back and find out whatever happened to you. Im still here. Charlie yes, you are. So the first one. Tell me what the photographer saw here. Thats the stockton port dugout and theyre a Minor League Affiliate of the oakland as. I felt like that picture encapsulated the daily routine. The groundhog daylike grind of people being bored and upset. Aperture publishing helped me take 15 years of work and pare it down to this visual alternate reality the long bus rides, cramped hotel rooms, injuries, friendships charlie all built around hope. You have to believe youre going to make it or you wont. We cant all be derek jeter. I think they know that logically at some point. But if you dont believe youre going to be, if you dont believe youre the person to win the game, get the oscar go from mail room to boardroom as americans were wrapped up in what i believe is a false premise if you have a dream and work hard success is within anyones reach. I think thats not logical. Most people know its not logical but in this case and in a lot of cases where youre trying to be the exception and trying to be number one its the dream that matters. Charlie lets look at the second picture. Its fritz in the pool during spring training and its hot as you know and theyd cool off in the pool and reason i like it is thats what you see on the surface but what it means to me is that you can take the personal and go universal with this. Were all trying to stay afloat. Cant tell whether hes sinking or floating and looks like an underwater super hero and he showed up at spring training and everybody assumed hed make it and injured and had a surgery and another surgery and kept going and pushing and i thought thats what we all do and learn resilience. Charlie the next slide. Thats derek jeter at his last home game. Hes the exception to the rule. Charlie because of supreme talent or because of Something Else . I think all of it. I think lack of injuries the injuries play a huge part in derailing these people. Charlie look at the next slide. This is clinton, iowa. Its so hot there that they have showers attached to the outside. So probably most the photographers were inside the stadium taking pictures of the game and a got bored and wandered outside and caught this young man who probably plays Little League and idolizes the peoplen the field taking a break. Charlie what am i looking at . This is oakland coliseum. They have an annual night where they not only explode fireworks but also let fans on the field. This is a case where i feel like art is really an anecdote to the busy overscheduled lives we all lead. In this case i wasnt interested in the fireworks, i was interested in what happened after. Just like the name these guys are making for themselves within baseball its less interesting to me than how they rebuild their identity afterwards. Charlie they call it the night of the dream. This is rain . It was torrential downpour when arrived to shoot a player in the now independent league and he was released. It was so stormy outside i didnt feel safe carrying my equipment i stayed and my breath fogged up the window. Charlie tell me about surface tension. Its a harbinger of the next because the aesthetic of the stadium shot in the rain relates to this new work. Im letting people use my ipad and im using the ipad and let the dirt and the grime and fingerprints a9l into the history and grab a link i had looked at and pull it up and then i shoot it with age 8 x 10 film camera and im using an analog process to shoot a digital project. Its something that i think speaks to the struggle of forces within our heads while were trying to deal with email and text and various screens in our lives. I feel Like Technology has creating a lot of tension and distraction in our heads and this visually gets at that. Charlie when does you decide you wanted to be a photographer . Well, i have always taken pictures. My dad was in the military so i took pictures all the time as a memory bank. They were not interesting pictures. It was a catalog basically. My dad, the rug, the desk because we moved so often id forget. Once i got successful in television i felt like the work i was doing was getting more and more mainstream. The higher i rose the more watered down it got and the less agency i had over the creative process. For me art was a solution to that. I feel like i can get to a truth in the work its less of a who, what, when, where and why and more of an emotional truth and more room for subtle and nuanced which is what i was alonging f r i was looking for. Charlie you couldnt have the creative thrill you have now . It wasnt as focussed as that. The other thing is i have kind of a dark side. Nobody ever tells me to smile in the art world. If i want to explore panic and dread and anxiety and the complex of mental turbulence i feel in managing all my devices then theyre interested. Charlie do you miss it at all . No, not really. The only thing i miss is being at the center of politics or current events. Charlie thats the point of it all. Theres other work you have to do in addition. Ive done tons of stories that werent that important because it was my job. Its nice to be able to explore things that occur to me in a way thats never been done. So these images are very much talking about how the world is getting more visual than verbal and as a verbal person i think its interesting lol is a funny laugh and my daughter sent me an jpeg air kiss to and didnt think to call me. Its a funny kind of kiss. Were substituting a lot of intimacy with these devices and i dont think we really know what affect theyre fon us. I can think of a ton of benefits with the technology and history and gps and everything but i dont think were very good at anticipating the effect of technology on us even charlie robbing us of some kind of intimacy and personal communication well, in addition i think we dont anticipate the affectful have on us even if it its not just screens. Can you think of anything more pathological than a nuclear weapon. Thats a technology too. We didnt anticipate the problems that would occur with building Something Like that. Charlie an interesting thing about technology is its not just in the hands of good people but in the hands of bad people too. Sure. I would also say you have this grind, this residue and when we space out on your computer, how many times have you been managing your windows and phones and all of a sudden its time to go whatever the deadline is and have you no idea what youve been doing the last three hours. The fingerprints and grime are a map of what youve been up to. I love the idea that photography can show you what would otherwise be invisible. Charlie thats julian, right . Julian julian assange. When you deal with it you have privacy and surveillance and i needed to have each one of the pictures connect to some deal of the internet and he belongs there. Charlie the next one is your daughter sending a virtual good night kiss. Thats what you were referring to. She didnt call you up and say mom i love you, i want to say goodnight. She sent you this. The visual substrate is obvious because the negative is so large and i think the world is become being more visual. She transacts by sending manipulated pictures back and forth. Very rarely do they call or text. Charlie what do you think its doing to her . I think id sound old. Charlie i want to know. Theres a lack of social development. Charlie how old is your daughter . This one is 15. I have two. Charlie how many children do you have . Three children. Charlie and michael is crazy for baseball and coaches Little League and obsessed by that too. Yep, they make art with me so a lot of these fingerprints are my 10yearold son playing video games and his fans are fantastic because they sweat so they leave heavy duty drips and easy things to focus on. Charlie the next slide. One thing im trying to get the project to address is us confusing the perfection of the devices with the perfection of ourselves. I feel the apple designers or any designer has made this screen to be perfectly minimal, its meant to resist oil and reminding viewers with our hairiness and saliva and oil that our humanity is very messy and i dont think we should feel physically inferior or deny that part of ourselves as were dealing with this technology. Kind of beautiful in the end. Charlie fantasy life was published april 1. Yes. And the next project moves to los angeles in june. Charlie congratulations. Thank you. Charlie thank you for joining us. See you next time. Captioning sponsored by Rose Communications captioned by Media Access Group at wgbh access. Wgbh. Org rose funding for charlie rose has been provided by and by bloomberg, a provider of multimedia news and Information Services worldwide. Youre watching pbs