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Filmmaker Ken Burns has been called America's Storyteller with his landmark documentaries on baseball and jazz, the Civil War and Vietnam.
Now he's going back to where it all began, to tell the founding story of these United States, taking an in-depth look at the American Revolution. We'll watch our nation's history unfold this morning with John Dickerson. From a small spark Kindled in America. A flame has arisen. Ten years ago, when Ken Burns and his team started their latest documentary, they had no idea its examination of our democracy would be so timely.
Is America in crisis? Oh, I think it's almost perpetually in crisis. We've been always disagreeing, and our revolution is the thing. I mean, this is a civil war. Coming up on Sunday morning, Ken Burns on the Foundations of Freedom.
It's an overused word these days, but George Clooney is truly a Hollywood icon. He's a two time Academy Award winner, but awards only tell part of the story. This morning Clooney talks about life on and off camera with our Seth Doane. Here we come up on the Grand Canal. It's hard to beat a tour of Venice with George Clooney.
He talks about fame, relationships, and aging. aging gracefully You've got to work at it. You got to exercise. Yes, I exercise every day. You must watch what you eat.
I watch what I eat. But everything in moderation, including moderation. an actor that got fair. In his latest role, he's a movie star struggling with regrets. Were there things that felt autobiographical?
That's later this Sunday morning. When we hear the phrase sticker shock, It brings to mind the price of luxury items, a fancy car, an exotic vacation. But for millions of families, paying for something as fundamental as childcare is causing sticker shock like never before. Tracy Smith looks at the present and future of childcare in America. The price of child care is enough to make even the calmest among us throw a tantrum like a two-year-old.
I just can't believe it. Child care. That's how much it costs The extraordinary expense of childcare and what's being done about it ahead on Sunday morning. On this day when we fall back, Mark Strassman introduces us to a rock star of the watch world. Martha Teischner sits down with author Salman Rushdie to talk about his new book and life after that horrific knife attack.
Lee Cowan tells the tale of one musician's unexpected inheritance and how he put that money toward a very good cause. Plus, Robert Costa talking about free speech with the President of Princeton. and more. on this first Sunday morning of a new month, november second, twenty twenty five. And we'll be right back.
We begin this morning at the beginning of our country, that is. For this weekend's look at these United States, we focus on the American Revolution as seen through the lens of acclaimed filmmaker Ken Burns. Here's John Dickerson. From a small spark Kindled in America. A flame has arisen.
To dispel the idea that the American Revolution refers only to a war. We're going to start our look at Ken Burns' latest epic at the end. after the war is won. The American War is over. But this is far from being the case with the American Revolution.
At the end of twelve hours, Benjamin Rush says, the revolution is not over. The American War is over, he says, but the revolution is not. On the contrary, Nothing but the first act of the great drama is closed. It remains yet to establish and perfect our new forms of government. It's all up to us to take whatever's been done and try to make what we can of it.
I mean, let's just back up. This is, I think, the most important event since the birth of Christ, the creation of the United States of America. with no trees or stone walls for cover. With all of the violence, with all of the sturm and the drung of it all. All of the extraordinary people, not just the familiar boldface names, but the bottom-up people who did the fighting and dying.
The horrors of battle then presented themselves to my mind in all their hideousness. I must come to it now, thought I. It's kind of a sun. You know, it has a kind of energy to it and that's why I get so animated about the revolution because you just realize that that was it, the kind of moment of creation. If 72-year-old Ken Byrne sometimes gets a little animated himself, The Civil War was fought in 10,000 places.
It's because he's devoted his career to animating. Breathing life. Willie Mays first made his mark as a member of the Chattanooga people. Into our shared past. Jazz music objectifies America.
By now, the cinematic trappings of a Burns film are familiar. We think of the revolution as a war against empire. But it very quickly becomes a war for empire. But within even the most well-worn story, he always uncovers the unexpected. Our editing room.
I've got a neon sign. And it says it's complicated. Is that why history is important to study? It's not to learn happy stories about the past, but to sit with complexity. That's the whole story.
Harry Truman said: the only thing that's really new is the history you don't know, which I just love that. David McCullough told that to me, and I just think it's really important. And he also said, that doing good history means that it you think that it might not turn out the way you know it did. He was the glue that held people together. Consider the film's portrayal of George Washington.
These 13 colonies had to come together. And he was the person To do it. Annette Gordon Reed, who has a very clear-eyed View of the founders and their flaws and failings says of Washington: we would not have had a country without him. Help me understand. almost the necessity of Washington's flaws.
So The flaws are pretty obvious, right? He's a slave owner in a country that is now proclaiming universal rights and liberties. Washington was also one of America's richest men. the beneficiary of the work of scores of indentured servants. and more than 100 enslaved people at his plantation on the Potomac River.
And he recognizes that in order for this to be a successful venture, People in Georgia and people in Massachusetts are going to have to go. yes, we share th some things in common which they had never shared before. They were foreign countries. He seemed to be able to articulate not just in words, but I would say in deeds and manner and atmosphere, How we were going to coalesce. Let's put it this way.
It's easy to see. The American. effort for independence failing. without Washington's leadership. Holding our past up to the unforgiving light of the present takes years and an army of filmmakers.
Based largely here in bucolic Walpole, New Hampshire. You worked on this for how long?
Well, we decided to make it in 2015, so it's almost a decade since we decided to do it. And for the better part of five or six years, this is really all I thought about. Sarah Botstein has worked with Ken Burns for almost thirty years. She, along with David Schmidt and Burns, co-directed the American Revolution. What is it like to carry the revolution in your head for that long?
It's an enormous responsibility and an enormous privilege. Although the aesthetics of the film are thoroughly 18th century, the concerns of the 21st are never far from mind. The idea of that government derives its authority from the consent of the governed? was pretty radical. It's still pretty radical.
The political and cultural tumult of the decade during which the film was made provide the context in which we, the viewers, will watch. Is America in crisis? Oh, I think it's almost perpetually in crisis. We've been always disagreeing, and our revolution is the thing. I mean, this is a civil war.
I mean, in our film, not intentionally, but once we finish, you go, oh, wow, there's this. admonition. Don't fall out, keep the union together. Maybe that has some inspirational. possibilities in our own difficult times.
I am now embarked on a tempestuous ocean. from whence perhaps no friendly harbour is to be found. As with all of Ken Burns' films, we desperately want to know: can the stories of our past guide us through a future that has rarely felt so uncertain to so many? The second sentence of the Declaration is the most important sentence, second most important sentence in the English language after I love you. I mean There's nothing better than that sentence.
And it says we hold these truths to be self-evident. There is nothing self-evident about these truths. They've never been introduced in this way, quite this way, before, that all men are created equal. Think about where we are right now. and all the divisions that we have.
how incredibly helpful. Coming back to this origin story could be. I mean, this is the kind of stuff that we look for. and that by finding our original narrative, reclaiming our original narrative, you have a chance to begin to heal those things or at least remind people Oh yeah, I I I'm supposed to be listening to what the other person said. The other person who disagrees with me is not the enemy.
To mark the end of Daylight Saving Time, Mark Strassman has the story of a maestro in the world of high-end watches. Really? High end. Lot number one, ladies and gentlemen. The gavel is up.
The gavel is once again up. And I have 50,000, 65,000. Let's start with a fabulous turquoise blue Rolex oyster. Arel Bax is such a commanding auctioneer. The hands on the watch he's selling should start clapping.
260, 270. He auctions exquisite timepieces.
Some are gilded, some audacious, some iconic. Going twice.
Solar three million. The prices could make a tycoon blush. Congratulations. On stage, he's alternately flamboyant, mischievous, beguiling. 180.
You see, Alex, I warned you about it. and the best in the world at imploring one watch lover to outspend another. Collecting is is nothing rationale. What you do with your heart. Yes, you use your brain too, but It's it's it's a love affair and you cannot put limits on love.
When did your love affair with watches begin? 11 or 12 years old. Falling in love with not a pretty 12-year-old girl, but with a watch. What about that watch was so alluring. I was fascinated by The features, the beauty of the details, a script.
color. a shape, a facet. that you say, wow, that's what I like.
So here, Bax, now 54, grew up middle class here in Zurich. He caught the watch bug from his father. At 23, he had talked his way into Sotheby's as a junior watch expert. 30 years later. If the watch world has a celebrity.
He's it. You have this incredible calatrava. Bach walked us through the auction room at the annual Phillips Watch auction in Manhattan. From here, he juggles bids from multiple continents in multiple languages. He speaks five.
His audience at Philips, 2,000 collectors and enthusiasts in 60 countries, bidding in person, on the phone, or online for 200 watches. Since he and his wife Livia Russo partnered with Philips in 2015. They have been responsible for $1.6 billion in watch sales. In the watch auction world, Bart Not, he's the most influential person. Ben Clymer is one of the watch world's best-known voices.
He's the founder of Hodinki, a luxury watch and lifestyle website. The watch is only worth what two people are willing to pay. He gets both. the seller and the potential buyers hot for the same transaction. Every watch in this room could sell for a record if those two guys hate each other.
Raise your pedals now because the gavel is up. Explaining passion, what makes people tick, is complicated. 600,000. Understanding it is Arell Bach's gift. Do you see yourself as A performer.
or as a ringmaster. A bit of everything.
So they feel the adrenaline, they feel the excitement, the tensions, the rivalry. Um but Everybody should be happy at the end. To many here in the room, the most iconic Rolex wristwatch in the world. In 2017, Paul Newman's Rolex Daytona came up for auction. a legendary moment in the world of orological exotica.
I think we hoped on a good day could make four to six million dollars. The opening bid? $1 million. Then quickly, $10 million. Officially at $15,500,000, the numbers kept climbing.
Final sales price nearly $17.8 million a record. It is history now. You were as astounded as everyone else? Speechless? Just a huge release.
Just every kind of high and low you can ever imagine in your professional life. It was Amazing.
Some call me the Indiana Jones of Watches. I'm hunting, I'm searching, I'm romantic. I'm looking for that next grail. With the Paul Newman Record ever be beaten. There will be a $50 million watch.
Oh yeah. The community is growing. 50 million, 5-0. You bet. And you want to be there for that.
Of course, I love a good adrenaline rush. No doubt. To say author Salman Rushdie has lived an uncommon life would be an understatement of literary proportions. This morning with Martha Teischner, he's looking back. It's actually Not particularly close to where I live, but I come here a lot.
Yes, Salman Rushdie is back. To browsing in bookstores. What do you do when you come into a bookstore?
Well, at first I want to make sure you've got my books. Sure enough. Right at eye level. And this new one, the 11th hour, is the 23rd. A collection of short stories and novellas.
It's out this week. Since the attack, have you altered how you go about yeah, I think what change has changed Is it for public-facing things. then there has to be security in a way that There wasn't for 20 years. The attack. August 12th, 2022, Chautauqua, New York.
Author Salman Rushdie was stabbed by a man who stormed the stage. Rushdie was on stage, ready to speak. ironically about America as a safe haven for writers. A man lunged at him with a knife. I raise my left hand in self-defense.
He plunges the knife into it. After that there are many blows. to my neck, to my chest, to my eye. everywhere. I feel my legs give way.
And I fall. His account of the attack was published in 2024. Rushdie lost the sight in his right eye. I can still read, but I do find that I use iPads in a way that I never used to. Because there's light, and because I can adjust the size of the type.
So I never ever read a book on an iPad, but now I do. His left hand and liver were badly damaged. But he lived. which he considers a A miracle. In May of this year, Salman Rushdie's attacker, Lebanese-American Hadi Matar, was sentenced to 25 years in prison.
Rushti's head! Prosecutors argued he was acting under fatwa. The order by Iran's leader, the late Ayatollah Khomeini, in 1989. to kill the author. claiming passages of his fourth novel, The Satanic Verses.
insulted Islam. Recognized just for his fiction before, suddenly Rushdie was world famous to some infamous. for the fatwa. After nearly a decade in hiding, protected twenty four seven by British security, He emerged and moved to New York. thinking times had changed.
But he was wrong. Writer Salman Rushdie, whose work has made him the subject of death threats, is hospitalized with serious injuries. You do not seem bitter. You do not seem angry. Is that just your public persona, or is that actually possible?
No, I think that's who I am. And so I thought just put put that to one side. Most people would say, well, this is a clear recipe for a life of PTSD. One? I do have a therapist.
And I asked him at what point to list for me the symptoms of PTSD. And I said, but I don't seem to be having those symptoms.
So what's wrong with me? And he said, well It's because you're badass, that's the technical term. The new book is the first fiction he's published since the attack. Why the 11th hour?
Well,. For a start, I'm 78. For another I had a fairly intimate encounter with death, you know, and got away with it. But it makes you think. And so I thought this idea of running out of time.
But something I had on the brain.
Now you have entered the magic space of my childhood, the fictional narrator of one story says, as he takes a last walk up the hill to the neighborhood where the real Salman Rushdie grew up In Mumbai, India, Which he still calls Bombay. My relationship with the place is kind of elegiac now. It's a relationship about something that is past. Rushdie left India for an English boarding school at the age of thirteen. He left Britain after nearly forty years there.
He became an American citizen in 2016. He sees his place in the world. through the eye of an immigrant. What did you feel as you were being sworn in and becoming a citizen? I remember getting into a cab leaving the office where I'd been sworn in.
and being driven back through the streets of the city. and it felt different. I thought, oh. I carried the log. And it felt very good.
Did the feeling that you had when you were sworn in as a citizen become fractured or altered based on What's happened since, both in public life in the United States and to you.
Well, it's a hard time in America, but it's a hard time all over. If you think of countries as people, There is their better self and their less good self. And it would be nice if this country were to remember its better self. The Eleventh Hour includes a ghost story, characters who get even. A writer who disappears.
But the book is also political. Words such as good and bad or right and wrong. are losing their effect. emptying of meaning. and failing anymore.
to shape society. The meaning of words matters to Salman Rushdie. who has spent his entire career advocating for free speech. even though exercising it, nearly got him killed. The final story in the collection, The Old Man in the Piazza, Is kind of an allegory of that.
In fact, free speech, to my great surprise, Language itself turned into a character. female character. She just walked into the story and sat down in a corner. I hadn't expected her at all. She is in fact a very old language.
One of the oldest and richest. The story is about what happens when speech is restricted. It's even possible. though it's hard for her, to admit this even to herself, that she may die. Nobody's listening.
Nobody cares. Language abandons her corner. leaving people no longer able to speak. We're at a loss to know how things will proceed. Our words fail us.
That's pretty. startling and scary. Yeah, it's supposed to be. Childcare has become a complicated and costly challenge for millions of American families. Tracy Smith takes a close-up look.
Tenny, be careful. Don't you want it? How do you feel at the end of the day? Tired. Exhausted actually.
You want some chicken? As parents to a one and three year old. Yenny Abraham and husband Deli could use a good night's sleep. Come on, let's take a shower. Come on, come on, come on, come on.
But one thing in particular keeps them up at night. When you're listing your household expenses, where is childcare on that list from most expensive to least expensive? Oh yeah, it's right around the mortgage. Yeah, about $100 more than the mortgage. Wait, child care is $100 more than your mortgage?
Yes. It's just insane. The couple lives in Texas. She's a physical therapist. He's an IT engineer.
They say the cost of childcare is crushing, but that's not the only problem. Literally, you had friends who, the minute they found out they were pregnant, signed up for daycare. Otherwise, you're not going to get in. The demand is there, and it just never occurred to me that the supply would be so low. When you were trying to figure out.
Childcare situations, sometimes you would have to bring your baby to work for them. Oh my gosh, yes. And I'm taking my son to the clinic, so he was on my hip while I was treating my patient. Real life. True story.
In the United States, childcare for two kids costs on average more than rents and mortgages and even in-state college tuition. It's pushed parents into debt and pulled thousands of women out of the workforce this year alone. What are the choices that some families are being forced to make? Give me some examples. I mean, none of them are good.
And because two-thirds of the caregiving work is often done by women, it's moms who are having to make this choice.
So they're downshifting their jobs. They're dropping out of the workforce entirely. Reshma Sajani is CEO and founder of the group Moms First. We have lots of conversations about the cost of housing, about the cost of gas, about the cost of eggs. But when you look at a family's budget and you say, what is the most expensive line item?
The answer is childcare. And it's not just families who are struggling. Part of the reason why we have a shortage is because we don't have enough childcare workers. And we don't have enough childcare workers because we've never paid them adequately. Dozens of countries consistently outrank the United States when it comes to childcare, most offering free or highly subsidized programs, ideas that aren't as foreign to America as you might think.
Back in the 40s, childcare was paid for by Uncle Sam. In Portland, Oregon, the Kaiser shipyards have solved the problem of welding without worrying over junior. Mothers now just leave the children at the service center. We knew the men were going off to war and somebody needed to work. This was funded by the federal government?
This was funded by the federal government during World War II, but when the men came back. They dismantled it. And ever since then, we've done really nothing to really fix it or solve it. Fast forward to 2025, while millions of families continue to struggle, calls for solutions have intensified. This is a basic building block of our society.
A growing number of red and blue states are making changes, but none have gone as far as New Mexico. Free childcare for every New Mexico family. Starting this month, New Mexico becomes the first state to offer free child care to all residents, paid for largely with tax money from the oil and gas industry. If you want people to work, this is how you do it. You give them the tools and the resources.
This is how you strengthen your community. I'm gonna pass it to you, okay? Since 2022, Carrie Ellis and her wife Amanda Cordova have participated in an early phase of New Mexico's childcare reform. Almost. They choose the provider.
The state puts the bill. Good job. Can you imagine what life would have been like if you still had to pay for child care. We wouldn't be in this house right now. We she probably wouldn't have her own business.
This Opened up doors. That I I don't know. would have been possible. before. we were able to find a quality place where they are, you know, getting The education and support that they need while we're trying to raise.
Good humans. He did a great job with that. You did read the home book. Of course, the program has its critics, including those who say childcare is the responsibility of the family, not the government. What would you say to people who say, oh come on, previous generations figured it out?
I think that a lot of grandparents probably are still working themselves and are not even in a position. to be able to watch. their grandchildren. Right, and I mean people used to be able to afford a house and their full family on one income. Right?
So, yeah, mom could stay home or whoever could stay home, but we can't do that anymore. It's a message that's made its way to Washington, D.C. and across party lines. My wife and I grappled with it, you know, 50 years before she did. Democratic Senator Tim Kaine of Virginia and Republican Senator Katie Britt of Alabama disagree on plenty, but not this.
Our economy loses $122 billion a year because of affordability or accessibility of childcare.
So this isn't just a social issue, it's an economic issue. Absolutely. Studies show that 59% of stay-at-home and or part-time working parents say that they want to re-enter the workforce, but this reliability, affordability, accessibility issue is keeping them out of it. This year, as part of the One Big Beautiful bill, the duo updated childcare tax credits for the first time in a quarter century. And we took action.
to make a difference, to make it easier for parents to keep more of their hard-earned money. They also increased tax benefits for business and limits to flexible spending accounts. Let's spread the word because again, the Getting this done in the statute is one thing, but making sure people know to take advantage of it. Critics argue the larger bill cuts other key social programs and will ultimately hurt families. In fact, Kain himself didn't vote for the bill.
But both senators say the childcare provisions are a win.
So if today childcare is the number one expense that families are facing? When do you think that's going to change? This is a classic thing where there's no one you know, part of government that's got the whole answer. It's got to be federal and state. Yeah, you do see states doing some cool things, and that's to be encouraged.
I have a feeling this work will always be before us, but we've taken a really good step together on this.
So what would you say to the parent who's watching now? sitting at their kitchen table trying to figure out how to pay these bills. We're fighting for you, and so we're going to keep working and keep making sure that we deliver solutions. And for the Abrahams and so many other families, solutions can't come soon enough. Tenny is jumping on the couch behind child care.
She's no child care. Lee Cowan now on a man who turned a loved one's death. into something everlasting. The late summer crickets were making music in the meadow of New York's Hudson Valley. long before concert pianist Adam Kendler.
took the stage. He was double-checking everything. Because very corny. In a few hours. Whenever you see this, I'm ready to go.
he'd be performing an 80-minute program. that took lifetimes to compose. Yes, lifetimes. No. In a way, it felt like each piece was each composer's way of saying, I see you.
I can hear where you're coming from. Here's how it resonates with me. And here's, in a way, here's how I can help. He is a soloist, and yet. Still pretty crowded up there on stage.
In every chord. There are ghosts.
Some we might recognize. For Adam? It's his dad. Gary. I found out that he died mid-October and I had last talked to him on Father's Day, which is June.
That was six years ago. His dad's death was sudden. at least to Adam. Royale? Right, Dad.
His parents divorced when he was just two years old, but he stayed close with his dad at first. Are you recording? No, I'm just putting it. But as Adam got older and his father remarried, Their paths Crossed less and less. It wasn't like you resented your dad, there was just kind of a.
A distance, kind of an almost a mutually agreed upon distance, right? Yeah, it wasn't like a rift so much as a drift. And we both allowed that to happen. There was, we still loved each other, but at a distance. Much to Adam's surprise, on a cold New Year's Day, in the parking lot of a Denny's.
His stepmother handed him an envelope. Turns out his dad had left him some cash. Wasn't much of an inheritance, but to Adam, It was sacred. This is his inheritance, so putting it toward my credit card That's so ephemeral, it's just gone, you know, or even putting it toward a vacation or something. I just Nothing felt right.
Mr. Virgo also. Music, however, always felt right. It gave him purpose. And music became a life raft.
In an angry sea of bullying. Everyone made fun. Of my gay voice and all of this and that. And I. It was pretty relentless.
And so I started to really invest in music as sort of a refuge. That refuge was a revelation. Adam had talent. A lot of it. He'd go on to earn a Grammy nomination for his contemporary, sometimes experimental work.
If you're a cutting-edge composer these days, you want Adam to perform your pieces. But few expected he'd solicit their work so specifically and so personally via an email. I have decided to commission piano pieces from composers whom I care about and whose work I admire. You are one of them. You know, and he said, my dad has passed away.
I received this inheritance in the form of $10,000 in an envelope in a Denny's parking lot. And I was immediately like, I'm intrigued. Tell me more. His inheritance went toward paying 16 acclaimed composers. It's really just very Cool to have us all in the same space.
Some of whom joined us at the 92nd Street Y in New York. They and their music became Adam's grief counselors, in a way. I was very upfront with them. Like, this is a bit selfish on my part. I need to figure out a way through this.
Grief. Did you know what kind of response you'd get? No, I I didn't know if anyone would say yes. Everyone said yes. It was a really Rare.
Email to get us a composer is something that was so open and vulnerable and raw. Multi instrumentalis and helica negrone. as well as Pulitzer Prize finalist Chris Sarone. We're both honored, but still a little tentative. I was sort of avoiding writing this piece, honestly, and um.
And then very unfortunately my dad passed away right as I was about to start writing it. Then there was two-time Grammy nominee Missy Mazzoli. My own father passed away about 11 months ago and all of a sudden I had a totally different perspective on the whole project. What Adam ended up getting. was a cornucopia of all kinds of emotions.
Some were meditative. Others build. anger. Summer light. And others, like Grammy Nominee Dev Heinz's composition, are mournfully unchanging.
That's beautiful. It just does, yeah, and that just keeps going. I wanted to start with This is soft. repetition of Almost like taking in the air. When I think about people I've loved Passing I always think about silence, I always think about the moment after that news, there's a stillness or you hear the air or something.
Do you get emotional? Every time. I get emotional every time. I have to let myself become that vulnerable, or else it's just sort of. a cabaret of grief, which it's not.
Adam Tendler took a strained relationship and turned it. into something that actually relates to everyone. His father is in the music, but so is mine, maybe yours, your friends. Death is a universal end. And yet for Adam Tendler, It was awesome.
A beginning. I'll be playing these pieces for the rest of my life. Oh yeah. You know, we don't learn a Beethoven sonata so that we conquer it. You learn a Beethoven sonata so you keep it and you watch it mature and you watch it evolve.
That to me is grief. And I can carry grief with me in a way that I actually keep it. and I can cherish it and I don't want to lose it. I don't want to lose him. These temperatures are free.
Six degrees. Going into VTAC, race 180. Give me 100 of procanamide. Come on, Ben, you can make... Hold on, buddy.
Hold on. Since his breakout role on television's ER back in the 90s, George Clooney has lived a life very much in the public eye.
So what has fame meant for him, for his family, for his work? Seth Doan visits with Clooney in Venice to find out. Venice can feel like a movie set, particularly when riding on a boat down the Grand Canal with George Clooney. You love this place. Yes, because look at this place.
But many are looking at him. You said oh wow, they've gotten close. Does that ever get normal? No. Clooney does have practice navigating this kind of attention.
He's made about 50 films, picking up a couple of Academy Awards along the way. Is that Jay Kelly? And for his latest, yes, it's meta, he plays Jay Kelly. Jay Kelly, so handsome! Look at you, you're the American dream.
One of the world's biggest movie stars. I think what you do is magic. Filmmakers say you said in 24 hours I'm in. Is that true? Yeah.
That's true.
Well, I read it. And I was like, well, if I i i if I take time to think of it, they might go get Brad. And I can't have that. I can't have that, man. When you read something, you know.
Co-starring Adam Sandler and Laura Dern, the Netflix film, part comedy, part drama, critiques the cult of celebrity. No one wants to say it, but it does. We're not to him what he is to us. As Clooney's character embarks on a journey to reconcile his professional success Personal failings. I See people.
This is your last summer. It would be so lonely here without you. No, it won't. You're never alone. Really?
I think I'm always alone. Thanks, Avanior. There's this kind of mind-bending experience where you're watching the film and you're wondering how much is the character and how much is George Clooney. Yeah. Did you feel that making it?
I really didn't. You know, what I know in life is You can live with failure. I tried this, it didn't work out. What you can't live with is regret. J.
Kelly is filled with regret. I mean, if I get hit by a bus tomorrow, I have no regrets. I've certainly made mistakes. I've certainly done some dumb things. But I took a big bite.
at the Apple and I really took Big swings. Were there things that felt autobiographical? I mean, there's things that we would laugh about. Movie where I'm playing myself, playing a guy who no one says no to. And that's the case for you?
Well, I designed it so that that's not the case. How do you design that? I pay people. No, I designed it by surrounding myself with the same friends that I met when I was 20 years old. who are still, I talk to them every day.
Do you go out of your way to understand that there is this perceived gap between you and others? Look, I didn't grow up around fame. I mean, my father was a newscaster in Cincinnati, Ohio. My aunt was a famous singer, but I'd met her three times.
So when I met someone famous, I was always like, oh my God. And so I always try to remind people that, honestly, God, this is. the job that I do and that I'm, you know, that we're all fairly normal. Why is that so important to you? I think because I was raised Not only that you treat everyone equally, but that everyone treats you equally as well.
Do you want to look at yourself and. No, I don't care. I'm too old to give a shit anymore. Oh, please. I might wear these anyway, just because I might keep them on.
You're happy with his glasses and everything here afterwards? She's not happy with him, but I gave her any about it. You are. for many kind of the poster man of aging gracefully. That's why I'm wearing these glasses.
For the record, I have a horrible sinus infection. And if I take these up, Oh, I see, I see. How much does aging factor into the uh do you see parts changing? I see parts on my body changing. I'm like, I didn't mean that, but that fell off.
How did that fall off? Oh, sure, parts have changed. Significantly. He's 64 now. Married to human rights lawyer Amal Alamoudin, the two juggle Hollywood glamour with social justice work through their foundation.
They have eight-year-old twins, and the actor, once famously single, says family life suits him. Another thing that sets him apart from this character. Same he actually does really well. And I'm kind of the opposite of that in a way. What do you mean?
I feel I'm a better. Parent, I hope. Certainly a husband. And uh and fame, if there was one of the two, that would be the one I'm least Comfortable way. Wow, you seem to be quite comfortable with fame and celebrity.
Well, you know, you got to put on your. Famous outfit when you come here to do a film premiere. But you know, everywhere you go, people watch you. Is it performative? Is it.
Sometimes it's performative. I mean, listen, you don't get caught picking your nose, you know. Hopefully. You have to be more aware than other people would be. You.
Seem to have this desire to keep some things for yourself, but then you can also be very political and. really stick yourself out there. I try to do it when I think I have Uh a responsibility too. My father always told me to you know, challenge people with more power than you. and protect people with less power.
One of the things you understand is You can't take on every fight. You have to pick things. I worked on trying to help solve some of the problems in Darfur. early 2000s. Failed.
You failed more often than you succeeded. But it doesn't mean you don't keep trying. You still work there, you're still involved. He also does not regret writing that opinion piece in the New York Times urging President Biden to drop out. To not do it would be to say, I'm not going to tell the truth.
While Clooney does not shy away from public activism, he gets some help guarding his private life at the family's place in Italy. Italian towns adopt you. Like, people come up and say, Which house is George Cloody's? And they go, ayy, it doesn't live here. It doesn't live here.
Really? They try to protect you. They protect you, yeah. Where do you consider home? France right now.
We live on a seven hundred fifty acre farm. And our kids run around. We wanted them to have something of a normal existence, you know. And you find that on a 750-acre ranch. You find it on a farm, and you find it on.
And a very small school and a very sort of farming community. We found a real peace there. He prizes that piece. Jake Kelly. In the film, Jay Kelly is searching for what George Clooney already has.
Jay Kelly. A sense of self. and balance. He really does seem to have it all. People say, well what was it like being with George Clooney?
One of the things I'm gonna say is well I was seeing her sweating. And somehow you don't seem to sweat. It's a funny thing. I don't sweat much. when I'm on camera.
Funnily enough, I don't know why. I put ice cubes under my arms. But like the rest of us, he still has to contend with the passing of time. Oh, Jesus, he got some air. That's a wanna work.
But I don't want to. Fill my life with work. When I turned 60, Amala, I talked about it. I said, look, I can still play basketball with the boys, I can still hang out. But in 25 years, I'll be 85.
And that's a real number. And things change, and it doesn't matter how many granola bars you eat, it catches you.
So we have to focus on making sure we work. We also have to focus on spending time with the people we love. More time. Because at the end of your life, you don't go, I wish I worked more. To Robert Costa.
And how an Ivy League University President is handling the challenges facing the nation's academic institutions. How tough has it been to be a university leader? In these turbulent times, it's a hard time to be a university president, but even in the best of times. You're dealing with such a wide set of constituencies, right? Trustees.
Alumni students sometimes the president of the united states sometimes the president of the united states Princeton President Christopher Eisgruber found his university under pressure from President Trump this past spring. Along with other schools, Princeton's federal support was frozen. more than 200 million in grants. And these were grants in fields like Quantum science or artificial intelligence that are high on our list of priorities, and that are also high on the list of priorities for the Trump administration.
So we were surprised. to see those grants suspended. But for many in Trump's circle, it was anything but a surprise. The latest chapter in the president's shake-up of higher education. Though Trump graduated from the University of Pennsylvania, the Ivy League has been one of his biggest targets.
Billions of dollars has been paid to Harvard. How ridiculous is that? You know, Colombia has been uh really and they were very, very bad what they've done at very anti-Semitic. And in the wake of campus protests, the Trump administration has put an emphasis on addressing charges of anti-Semitism. In recent weeks, the administration has ramped up its efforts.
offering universities a so-called compact. In exchange for preferential treatment on funding, universities would have to align with the White House's priorities, from how it defines gender to protecting conservative speech. May Maelman has been a key player inside the Trump White House. has to make difficult decisions and universities should only get funding if there's going to be a benefit for Americans on the other side of it.
So far, only one university has agreed to sign the compact. Many have rejected it, and others are reviewing the terms. Princeton is not signing the compact, and Icegruber, an expert on constitutional law. calls the proposal dangerous. In his new book, Terms of Respect, IceGruber defends higher education on free speech and gives universities a roadmap.
You write in your book about A genuine civic crisis. Is that crisis on campuses or in society? It's on campuses because it's in society.
So we've got an American crisis in the United States where we are having trouble talking to one another across political differences. Campuses are part of that society. And they're a place where civil discussions and discussions across difference are especially important. Princeton has had its own standoffs over speech. In 2015, students held a sit-in in Icegruper's office calling for the renaming of the university's School of International Relations, citing racist comments by former President Woodrow Wilson.
And personnel disputes have led to sharp criticism from some conservatives. Ice Grouper acknowledges there is work to be done. but says universities need to be careful. We shouldn't make the mistake of thinking that what we're doing is looking to mirror political views. On a college campus.
It's not our job to just be making the same arguments that are being made out in society.
So there might be a lot of division about, say, vaccines within our society. and a scholarly consensus that is inconsistent with those divisions. That says vaccines have been safe and vaccines have been effective. There's not some obligation on the part of universities. to reflect the political argument.
Making things even more complicated is the specter of political violence. When you learned that conservative activist Charlie Kirk was gone down on a college campus in Utah. What went through your mind? I was so deeply saddened. First of all, I was I was saddened for Charlie Kirk's family.
I was saddened for our country and our. And our Constitution, because whatever else is true, and whatever political views one may have. We have got to be a country where people can have discussions. Without the threat of assassination and political violence.
So I worried. I worried about our. Future because as these events occur, I fear they deepen our crisis. What do you say to students? who feels so down.
about the wave of violence, especially on college campuses. Yeah. Well, I I think, first of all, I think college campuses are great places to have have conversations and great places to be and in general, safe places to be, right? We've seen a lot of political violence in our country, you know, at the homes of Minnesota lawmakers, at the Israeli embassy in Washington, at the home of the Pennsylvania Governor at our nation's capital.
So I think college campuses. in general, have done a pretty good job of allowing controversial speech. Universities are not the only institutions in American life dealing with the White House. law firms, arts organizations, Even late night hosts. He tried his best to cancel me.
Instead, he forced millions of people to watch the show. That backfired Big Lee. Longtime leaders in higher ed are keeping close watch of how universities are responding. Lawrence Summers is the former president of Harvard. tougher problems than any university president has faced.
Since the Vietnam War period, 50 years ago. Lee Bollinger was president of both Columbia and the University of Michigan. This is a broad. based attack on norms and values that are really fundamental. to the United States as we have known it.
Back at Princeton, the school is engaging with the Trump administration to protect its research. and it has been able to get roughly half of the suspended grants restored. after underscoring how those efforts in science, energy, and other fields matter for the country. But Christopher Ricegruber and other university leaders know The storm in higher education is far from over.
So to you, this situation with federal funding It's not a game. The stakes couldn't be higher. The stakes are really high. There are a number of things. Our Constitution, our commitment to freedom, our commitment to the individual.
That have made a difference to America and its strength in the world. But our investment, our smart investment by the federal government. In research universities and education has been critical to the leadership that we have developed in the world. And it is critical to America's future. Thank you for listening.
Please join us when our trumpet sounds again next Sunday morning. This is the story of the one. As head of maintenance at a concert hall, he knows the show must always go on. That's why he works behind the scenes, ensuring every light is working, the HVAC is humming. and his facility shines.
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His distillery is a very interesting business. And we gotta know the enemy. From Taylor Sheridan, co-creator of Landman. What are you saying? I'm a rat.
If you think you're gonna take me out It's gonna be really Difficult Tulza King. New season now streaming exclusively on Paramount Plus. Mm.
