title: Prince Rupert of the Rhine

text: Other parts of Rupert's scientific work lay in the field of metallurgy. Rupert invented a new brass alloy, slightly darker in hue than regular brass involving three parts of copper to one part of zinc, combined with charcoal; this became known as "Prince's metal" in his honour—sometimes also referred to as "Bristol Brass". Rupert invented the alloy in order to improve naval artillery, but it also became used as a replacement for gold in decorations. Rupert was also credited with having devised an exceptional method for tempering kirby fish hooks, and for casting objects into an appearance of perspective. He also invented an improved method for manufacturing shot of varying sizes in 1663, that was later refined by the scientist Robert Hooke, one of Rupert's Royal Society friends during the period.


title: Prince Rupert of the Rhine

text: Towards the end of his life Rupert fell in love with an attractive Drury Lane actress named Peg Hughes. Rupert became involved with her during the late 1660s, leaving his previous mistress, Frances Bard, although Hughes appears to have held out from reciprocating his attentions with the aim of negotiating a suitable settlement. Hughes rapidly received advancement through his patronage; she became a member of the King's Company by 1669, giving her status and immunity from arrest for debt, and was painted four times by Sir Peter Lely, the foremost court artist of the day.


title: Prince Rupert of the Rhine

text: Despite being encouraged to do so, Rupert did not marry Hughes, but acknowledged their daughter, Ruperta (born in 1673 and who later became Mrs Emanuel Howe). Hughes lived an expensive lifestyle during the 1670s, enjoying gambling and jewels; Rupert gave her at least £20,000 worth of jewellery during their relationship, including several items from the Palatinate royal collection. Margaret continued to act even after Ruperta's birth, returning to the stage in 1676 with the prestigious Duke's Company at the Dorset Garden Theatre, near the Strand in London. The next year Rupert established Hughes with a "grand building" worth £25,000 that he bought in Hammersmith from Sir Nicholas Crispe. Rupert seems rather to have enjoyed the family lifestyle, commenting that his young daughter "already rules the whole house and sometimes argues with her mother, which makes us all laugh."


title: Prince Rupert of the Rhine

text: Rupert died at his house at Spring Gardens, Westminster, on 29 November 1682 after a bout of pleurisy, and was buried in the crypt of Westminster Abbey on 6 December in a state funeral. Rupert left most of his estate, worth some £12,000, equally to Hughes and Ruperta. Hughes had an "uncomfortable widowhood" without Rupert's support, allegedly not helped by her unproductive gambling.


title: Prince Rupert of the Rhine

text: Presents from Rupert such as his mother's earrings were sold to the Duchess of Marlborough, while a pearl necklace given by Elector Frederick to Electress Elizabeth was sold to fellow actress Nell Gwynn. Hughes sold the house in Hammersmith to two London merchants: Timothy Lannoy and George Treadwell—it was then purchased by the Margrave of Brandenburg-Ansbach and became known as Brandenburg (or Brandenburgh) House.


title: Prince Rupert of the Rhine

text: Ruperta later married Emanuel Scrope Howe, future MP and English general, and had five children, Sophia, William, Emanuel, James and Henrietta. Through William's daughter, Mary, Rupert is an ancestor of the Bromley baronets.


title: Prince Rupert of the Rhine

text: Rupert's son, Dudley Bard, became a military officer, frequently known as "Captain Rupert", and died fighting at the Siege of Buda while in his late teens.


title: Prince Rupert of the Rhine

text: Prince Rupert's memory is well-attested in the geography of Canada. The lands of the Hudson Bay Company, being all the land drained by rivers flowing into Hudson Bay, were known as Rupert's Land from 1670 until 1870. The Anglican Diocese of Rupert's Land, based in Winnipeg, Manitoba, is the relic of this period, as are Prince Rupert Avenue, Rupert Avenue, and Rupertsland Avenue in Winnipeg.


title: Prince Rupert of the Rhine

text: Elsewhere in Canada, the city of Prince Rupert, British Columbia, the community of Prince Rupert in the city of Edmonton, Alberta and the Rupert River in Quebec are all named after the Prince. Rupert's Bay on St Helena may also be named after him. In Bristol there was also a street, Rupert Street, and formerly a public house, The Prince Rupert in Rupert Street, is also named to commemorate Prince Rupert.


title: 2011 Joplin tornado

text: A devastating EF5-rated multiple-vortex tornado struck Joplin, Missouri on the evening of Sunday, May 22, 2011. Part of a larger late-May tornado outbreak, the tornado reached a maximum width of nearly during its path through the southern part of the city. This particular tornado was unusual in that it intensified and grew in size at a very fast rate. The tornado tracked eastward across the city, and then continued eastward across Interstate 44 into rural portions of Jasper and Newton counties. It was the third tornado to strike Joplin since May 1971.


title: 2011 Joplin tornado

text: Overall, the tornado killed 158 people (with an additional eight indirect deaths), injured some 1,150 others, and caused damages amounting to a total of $2.8 billion. It was the deadliest tornado to strike the U.S. since the 1947 Glazier–Higgins–Woodward tornadoes, and the seventh-deadliest overall. It also ranks as the costliest single tornado in U.S. history; the insurance payout was $2.8 billion, the highest in Missouri history, with the previous record of $2 billion being the April 10, 2001 hail storm. It was also the deadliest tornado in Missouri history, as all the deaths occurred in that state.


title: 2011 Joplin tornado

text: On the evening of May 21, an area of low pressure was centered over western South Dakota. This feature, in addition to steep lapse rates and dewpoints above , was conducive to the development of supercells later in the day. Very large hail was forecast, but the tornado threat was forecast to remain isolated. At 8:00 a.m. CDT (1300 UTC), the Storm Prediction Center issued a slight risk of severe storms for much of the upper Plains and the Midwest.


title: 2011 Joplin tornado

text: By 8:00 a.m. CDT (1300 UTC) on May 22, forecasters at the SPC realized that a more intense weather outbreak was likely to occur, and upgraded a large swath of the Midwest to a moderate risk. The system was forecast to evolve into a wave early Monday morning as a trough strengthened from the western United States. At the surface, a cold front was forecast to pass through the region later in the day, while a dryline was forecast to intersect the cold front in Kansas. These features, accompanied by the low pressure system, encouraged very strong storm development along the cold front.


title: 2011 Joplin tornado

text: By the 11:30 a.m. CDT (1630 UTC) updated outlook, certainty had grown stronger that a major severe weather event would occur that afternoon. A public severe weather outlook was issued at this time, and the outlook stated that severe weather was expected that afternoon, with tornadoes, large hail, and strong winds all named as threats.


title: 2011 Joplin tornado

text: The tornado initially touched down just east of the Missouri-Kansas state line near the end of 32nd Street at 5:34 pm CDT (22:34 UTC) and tracked due east, downing a few trees at EF0 intensity. Eyewitnesses and storm chasers reported multiple vortices rotating around the parent circulation in that area. Civil defense sirens sounded in Joplin twenty minutes before the tornado struck, in response to a tornado warning issued by the National Weather Service (NWS) at 5:17 pm CDT (22:17 UTC) for northwestern Newton and southwestern Jasper counties in Missouri, and southeastern portions of Cherokee County, Kansas, but many Joplin residents did not heed them. The tornado strengthened to EF1 intensity as it continued through rural areas towards Joplin, snapping trees and power poles and damaging outbuildings. Widening, the tornado then tracked into the more densely populated southwest corner of the city near the Twin Hills Country Club. It heavily damaged several homes at a subdivision in this area at EF1 to EF2 strength. The tornado continued to strengthen as it ripped through another subdivision just east of Iron Gates Road. Numerous homes were destroyed at EF2 to EF3 strength at that location, and multiple vehicles were tossed around, some of which were thrown on or rolled into homes.


title: 2011 Joplin tornado

text: The now massive wedge tornado then crossed S. Schifferdecker Ave., producing its first area of EF4 damage as several small but well-built commercial buildings were flattened. Consistent EF4 to EF5 damage was noted east of S. Schifferdecker Ave. and continued through most of southern Joplin. Numerous homes, businesses, and medical buildings were flattened in this area, with concrete walls collapsed and crushed into the foundations. A large steel-reinforced step and floor structure leading to a completely destroyed medical building was "deflected upward several inches and cracked". Steel trusses from some of the buildings were "rolled up like paper", and deformation or twisting of the main support beams was noted. Multiple vehicles were thrown and mangled or wrapped around trees nearby. Several 300-pound concrete parking stops anchored with rebar were torn from a parking lot in this area and were thrown up to 60 yards away. Iowa State University wind engineer Partha Sarkar calculated the force needed to remove the parking stops and found that winds exceeding 200 mph were needed to tear them from the parking lot.


title: 2011 Joplin tornado

text: Damage became remarkably widespread and catastrophic at and around the nearby St. John's Regional Medical Center, which lost many windows, interior walls, ceilings, and part of its roof; its life flight helicopter was also blown away and destroyed. Loss of backup power caused five fatalities, and the nine-story building was so damaged that it was deemed structurally compromised, and was later torn down. According to the NWS office in Springfield, Missouri, such extreme structural damage to such a large and well-built structure likely indicated winds at or exceeding 200 mph. Vehicles in the hospital parking lot were thrown into the air and mangled beyond recognition, including a semi-truck that was tossed 125 yards and wrapped completely around a debarked tree. Wind-rowing of debris was noted in this area, and additional concrete parking stops were removed from the St. John's parking lot as well. Virtually every house near McClelland Boulevard and 26th Street was flattened; some were swept completely away, and trees sustained severe debarking.


title: 2011 Joplin tornado

text: As the tornado tracked eastward, it maintained EF5 strength as it crossed Main Street (SR 43) between 20th and 26th Streets. It heavily damaged every business along that stretch and virtually destroyed several institutional buildings. It tracked just south of downtown, narrowly missing it. Entire neighborhoods were leveled in this area with some more homes swept away, and trees were stripped completely of their bark. At some residences, reinforced concrete porches were deformed or, in some cases, completely torn away. Damage to driveways was noted at some residences as well. Numerous vehicles were tossed up to several blocks away from the residences where they originated, and a few homeowners never located their vehicles. A large church, Greenbriar Nursing Home, Franklin Technology Center, St. Mary's Catholic Church and School, and Joplin High School were all destroyed along this corridor. The Greenbriar Nursing Home was completely leveled, with 21 fatalities occurring there alone. As the tornado crossed Connecticut Ave. further to the east, it destroyed several large apartment buildings, a Dillons grocery store, and a bank. Only the concrete vault remained at the bank, and a wooden 2x4 was found speared completely through a concrete curb at one location. No one was in the high school at the time; the high school graduation ceremonies held about to the north at Missouri Southern State University had concluded shortly before the storm. Pieces of cardboard were found embedded sideways into stucco walls that remained standing at Joplin High School. Steel beams and pieces of fencing were deeply embedded into the ground in fields near the high school as well, steel fence posts were bent to the ground in opposite directions, and a school bus was thrown into a nearby bus garage. The tornado then approached Range Line Road, the main commercial strip in the eastern part of Joplin, affecting additional neighborhoods along 20th Street.


title: 2011 Joplin tornado

text: The now heavily rain-wrapped tornado continued at EF5 intensity as it crossed Range Line Road. In that corridor between about 13th and 32nd Streets, the tornado continued producing catastrophic damage as it was at its widest at this point, being nearly wide. As the tornado hit the Pizza Hut at 1901 South Range Line Road, store manager Christopher Lucas herded four employees and 15 customers into a walk-in freezer. With difficulty closing the door, he wrapped a bungee cable holding the door shut around his arm until he was sucked out and killed by the tornado. The tornado completely destroyed a Walmart Supercenter, a Home Depot, Joann Fabrics, Radio Shack, Payless Shoe Source, Chick-Fil-A, IHOP, Arbys, and numerous other businesses and restaurants in this area, many of which were flattened. Numerous metal roof trusses were torn from the Home Depot building and were found broken and mangled in nearby fields. Cars that originated at the Home Depot parking lot were found hundreds of yards away. Asphalt was scoured from parking lots at Walmart and a nearby pizza restaurant, and large tractor-trailers were thrown up to 200 yards away. An Academy Sports + Outdoors store along Range Line sustained major structural damage, and a chair was found impaled legs-first through an exterior stucco wall at that location. A nearby three-story apartment complex was also devastated, and two cell phone towers were found collapsed onto the remains of the apartments. Numerous cars were thrown and piled on top of each other, 100-pound manhole covers were removed from roads and thrown, ground scouring occurred, and a Pepsi distribution plant was completely leveled in this area as well. Additional calculations of the manhole covers in Joplin by Partha Sarkar revealed that winds had to have exceeded 200 mph for the manhole covers to be removed. Many fatalities occurred in this area, and damage was rated as EF5.


title: 2011 Joplin tornado

text: Extreme damage continued in the area of Duquesne Road in southeast Joplin. Many houses and industrial and commercial buildings were flattened in this area as well. The industrial park near the corner of 20th and Duquesne was especially hard hit with nearly every building flattened. Several large metal warehouse structures were swept cleanly from their foundations, and several heavy industrial vehicles were thrown up to 400 yards away in this area. One of the many warehouses affected was a Cummins warehouse, a concrete block and steel building that was destroyed. The last area of EF5 damage occurred in the industrial park, and a nearby Fastrip gas station and convenience store was completely destroyed. Many homes were destroyed further to the east at EF3 to EF4 strength in a nearby subdivision, and East Middle School sustained major damage.


title: 2011 Joplin tornado

text: The tornado then continued on an east to east-southeast trajectory towards Interstate 44 where it weakened; nonetheless, vehicles were blown off the highway and mangled near the U.S. Route 71 (Exit 11 on what is now Interstate 49) interchange. The damage at and around the interchange was rated EF2 to EF3. The weakening tornado continued to track into the rural areas of southeastern Jasper County and northeastern Newton County where damage was generally minor to moderate, with trees, mobile homes, outbuildings, and frame homes damaged mainly at EF0 to EF1 strength. The tornado lifted east of Diamond at 6:12 pm CDT (23:12 UTC) according to aerial surveys. The tornado's total track length was at least long. Overall, at least 900 homes and other buildings were completely destroyed, 359 homes had major damage and 516 had minor damage. A total of 158 people were killed, and 1,150 others were injured along the path. A separate EF2 tornado touched down near Wentworth from the same supercell about east-southeast of Joplin.


title: 2011 Joplin tornado

text: A preliminary survey of the tornado damage by the National Weather Service office in Springfield, Missouri, began on May 23. The initial survey confirmed a violent tornado rated as a high-end EF4. Subsequent damage surveys, however, found evidence of more intense damage, and so the tornado was upgraded to an EF5 with estimated winds over , peaking at 225 to 250 mph (360 to 400 km/h).


title: 2011 Joplin tornado

text: According to the local branch of the American Red Cross, about 25% of Joplin was destroyed, but the city's emergency manager stated that the number was between 10 and 20%, with roughly 2,000 buildings destroyed. According to the National Weather Service, emergency managers reported damage to 75% of Joplin. In total, nearly 7,000 houses were destroyed (most of which were flattened or blown away) and over 850 others were damaged. Communications were lost in the community and power was knocked out to many areas. With communications down, temporary cell towers had to be constructed. By May 24, three towers owned by AT&T and Sprint had been restored.


title: 2011 Joplin tornado

text: Due to the severe damage caused by the tornado, the travelling Piccadilly Circus was unable to perform as scheduled. As a result, the circus employees brought their two adult elephants to help drag damaged automobiles and other heavy debris out of the streets.


title: 2011 Joplin tornado

text: East of Joplin, a Risk Management Plan facility released of anhydrous ammonia; it was contained within two days.


title: 2011 Joplin tornado

text: Many homes and business have been rebuilt since the tornado. Joplin High School was reopened on September 2, 2014. St. John's Regional Medical Center (now Mercy Hospital) had to be rebuilt and was reopened in 2015.


title: 2011 Joplin tornado

text: The catastrophe and risk modeling firm Eqecat, Inc. has estimated the damage at one billion to three billion USD, but noted that the true damage is not yet known, since the firm does not have access to data on uninsured losses. More than 19,000 insurance claims had been filed by mid-June. The impact on the insurance industry is not so much the number of claims, but the cumulative effect of such a large number of total losses. More than 2500 local people employed in insurance have been involved in some capacity. It is assumed that State Farm will assume the largest share of these losses, having market share of 27% for homeowners insurance and 21% for automobile insurance.


title: 2011 Joplin tornado

text: As of May 2013, the official death toll from National Weather Service was listed at 158 while the City of Joplin listed the death toll at 161 (158 direct). The list was up to 162, until one man's injuries were found to be unrelated to the event. In one indirect fatality, a policeman was struck by lightning and killed while assisting with recovery and cleanup efforts the day after the storm. Another five indirect fatalities occurred after a disease outbreak of Mucormycosis infected 13 people, possibly 18 people. Shortly after the tornado, authorities had listed 1,300 people as missing, but the number quickly dwindled as they were accounted for. Many people were reported to have been trapped in destroyed houses. Seventeen people were rescued from the rubble the day after the tornado struck.


title: 2011 Joplin tornado

text: The Missouri Emergency Management Agency reported more than 990 injured. Of 146 sets of remains recovered from the rubble, 134 victims had been positively identified by June 1. This total included four sets of partial remains, some of which may have been from a single person. On June 2, it was announced that four more victims had died.


title: 2011 Joplin tornado

text: Six people were killed when St. John's was struck by the tornado. Five of those deaths were patients on ventilators who died after the building lost power and a backup generator did not work. The sixth fatality was a hospital visitor.


title: 2011 Joplin tornado

text: The "Joplin Globe" reported that 54 percent of the people died in their residences, 32 percent died in non-residential areas and 14 percent died in vehicles or outdoors. Joplin officials after the tornado announced plans to require hurricane ties or other fasteners between the houses and their foundations (devices add about $600 US to the construction costs). Officials rejected a proposal to require concrete basements in new houses. Officials noted that only 28 percent of Joplin's new homes had basements as of 2009 compared with 38 percent two decades before.


title: 2011 Joplin tornado

text: In 2013, the American Society of Civil Engineers published a study disputing the tornado's initial EF5 rating, based on surveying damage on over 150 structures within a six-mile segment of the storm's path. According to the report, over 83 percent of the damage was caused by wind speeds of 135 miles per hour or less, the maximum wind speed of an EF2 tornado. An additional 13 percent was caused by EF3 wind speeds, and 3 percent was consistent with EF4 winds. The study found no damage consistent with wind speeds over 200 miles per hour, the minimum threshold of an EF5 tornado. Researchers concluded that the inability to find EF5 damage was due to the absence of construction standards that were able to determine the necessary wind speeds. Bill Colbourne, a member of the engineering team that surveyed the damage, declared that "a relatively large number of buildings could have survived in Joplin if they had been built to sustain hurricane winds."


title: 2011 Joplin tornado

text: However, the EF5 rating stood as the National Weather Service in Springfield, Missouri stated that their survey teams found only a very small area of EF5 structural damage and that it could have easily been missed in the survey (at and around St. John's Medical Center). Bill Davis, head of the NWS station in Springfield, said that the results of the study "do not surprise me at all," adding that "there was only a very small area of EF5 damage in Joplin...we knew right off the bat there was EF4 damage. It took us longer to identify the EF5 damage and that it would take winds of over 200 miles per hour to do that damage." Additionally, the basis for the EF5 rating in Joplin was mainly contextual rather than structural, with non-conventional damage indicators such as removal of concrete parking stops, manhole covers, reinforced concrete porches, driveways, and asphalt were used to arrive at a final rating of EF5, as it was concluded that these specific instances of damage were indicative of winds exceeding 200 miles per hour. The presence of wind rowed structural debris, instances of very large vehicles such as buses, vans, and semi-trucks being thrown hundreds of yards to several blocks from their points of origin, the fact that some homeowners never located their vehicles, and the overwhelming extent and totality of the destruction in Joplin were also taken into consideration to conclude EF5 intensity.


title: 2011 Joplin tornado

text: Immediately following the disaster, emergency responders were deployed within and to the city to undertake search and rescue efforts. Governor Jay Nixon declared a state of emergency for the Joplin area shortly after the tornado hit, and ordered Missouri National Guard troops to the city. By May 23, Missouri Task Force One (consisting of 85 personnel, four dogs, and heavy equipment) arrived and began searching for missing persons. Five heavy rescue teams were also sent to the city a day later. Within two days, numerous agencies arrived to assist residents in the recovery process. The National Guard deployed 191 personnel and placed 2,000 more on standby to be deployed if needed. In addition, the Missouri State Highway Patrol provided 180 troopers to assist the Joplin Police Department and other local agencies with law enforcement, rescue, and recovery efforts that also included the deployment of five ambulance strike teams, and a total of 25 ambulances in the affected area on May 24 as well over 75 Marines from the Ft. Leonard Wood Army Base. Within two years the city's workers and community groups compiled and published "Joplin Pays it Forward" to give recovery advice to other places hurt by disaster.


title: 2011 Joplin tornado

text: The tornado also highlighted a new form of disaster response, using social media. This type of disaster response is now known as Social Media Emergency Management. News outlets began aggregating images and video from eyewitnesses shared through social media. Public citizen-led Facebook groups and web sites coordinated information, needs, and offers. The results were so effective the project became a finalist in the 2011 Mashable Awards for Best Social Good Cause Campaign.


title: 2011 Joplin tornado

text: President Barack Obama toured the community on May 29, flying into Joplin Regional Airport and speaking at a memorial at the Taylor Performing Arts Center at Missouri Southern State University about two miles (3 km) north of the worst of the devastation. Obama had been on a state visit to Europe at the time of the storm. Members of the controversial Westboro Baptist Church were also scheduled to protest the same day in Joplin, but they did not show up. There was a massive counterprotest that was organized in response to the Westboro protest, in which thousands of protesters showed up holding signs saying, "God Loves Joplin" and "We Support You Joplin."


title: 2011 Joplin tornado

text: Engineers have criticized the tilt-up construction of the Home Depot in which all but two of its walls collapsed in a domino effect after the tornado lifted the roof, killing seven people in the front of the store (although 28 people in the back of the store survived when those walls collapsed outwards). Home Depot officials said they disagreed with the study published by "The Kansas City Star" and said they would use the tilt up practice when they rebuild the Joplin store. On June 1, The Home Depot said it would have a new temporary building built and operational within two weeks. In the meantime, it opened for business in the parking lot of its demolished building. On June 20, The Home Depot opened a temporary building constructed by the company's disaster recovery team.


title: 2011 Joplin tornado

text: In May 2012, the Missouri National Guard released documents showing that four soldiers looted video game equipment and a digital camera from a ruined Walmart during cleanup efforts. According to the investigative memo, they believed the merchandise was going to be destroyed. All four soldiers were demoted and had letters of reprimand placed in their personnel files, but were never prosecuted, even though many civilian looters were prosecuted.


title: 2011 Joplin tornado

text: Along with the Tri-State Tornado and the 1896 St. Louis–East St. Louis tornado, it ranks as one of Missouri's and America's deadliest tornadoes and is also the costliest single tornado in U.S. history ($2.8 billion). It was the first F5/EF5 tornado in Missouri since May 20, 1957, when an F5 destroyed several suburbs of Kansas City. It was only the second F5/EF5 tornado in Missouri history dating back to 1950. It was the deadliest U.S. tornado since the April 9, 1947 tornado in Woodward, Oklahoma, the seventh-deadliest in U.S. history. It was also the first single tornado since the June 8, 1953 F5 tornado in Flint, Michigan, to have 100 or more associated fatalities.


title: Chico Marx

text: Leonard Joseph "Chico" Marx (; March 22, 1887 – October 11, 1961) was an American comedian, actor and pianist. He was the oldest brother in the Marx Brothers comedy troupe, alongside his brothers Adolph ("Harpo"), Julius ("Groucho"), Milton ("Gummo") and Herbert ("Zeppo"). His persona in the act was that of a charming, uneducated but crafty con artist, seemingly of rural Italian origin, who wore shabby clothes and sported a curly-haired wig and Tyrolean hat. On screen, Chico is often in alliance with Harpo, usually as partners in crime, and is also frequently seen trying to con or outfox Groucho. Leonard was the oldest of the Marx Brothers to live past early childhood (first-born was his older brother Manfred Marx who had died in infancy). In addition to his work as a performer, he played an important role in the management and development of the act in its early years.


title: Chico Marx

text: Chico (pronounced as Chicko) was born in Manhattan, New York City, on March 22, 1887. His parents were Sam Marx (called "Frenchie" throughout his life), and his wife, Minnie Schoenberg Marx. Minnie's brother was vaudeville comedian Al Shean, best known as one half of Gallagher and Shean. The Marx family was Franco-German Jewish. His father was a native of Alsace who worked as a tailor and his mother was from East Frisia in Germany.


title: Chico Marx

text: Billing himself as Chico, he used an Italian persona for his onstage character (stereotyped ethnic characters were common with vaudevillians). His questionable Italian ethnicity was specifically referred to twice on film: In their second feature, "Animal Crackers", he recognizes someone he knows to be a fish peddler from Czechoslovakia impersonating a respected art collector:


title: Chico Marx

text: Ravelli (Chico): "How is it you got to be Roscoe W. Chandler?" Chandler: "Say, how did "you" get to be an "Italian"?" Ravelli: "Never mind—whose confession is this?"


title: Chico Marx

text: In "A Night at the Opera", which begins in Italy, his character, Fiorello, claims not to be Italian, eliciting a surprised look from Groucho:


title: Chico Marx

text: Driftwood (Groucho): "Well, things seem to be getting better around the country." Fiorello (Chico): "I don't know, I'm a stranger here myself."


title: Chico Marx

text: A scene in the film "Go West", in which Chico attempts to placate an Indian chief of whom Groucho has run afoul, has a line that plays a bit on Chico's lack of Italian nationality, but is more or less proper Marxian wordplay:


title: Chico Marx

text: S. Quentin Quayle (Groucho): "Can you talk Indian?"<br>Joe Panello (Chico): "I was born in Indianapolis!"


title: Chico Marx

text: There are moments, however, where his characters appear to be genuinely Italian; examples include the film "The Big Store", in which his character Ravelli runs into an old friend he worked with in Naples (after a brief misunderstanding due to his accent), the film "Monkey Business", in which Chico claims his grandfather sailed with Christopher Columbus, and their very first outing "The Cocoanuts", where Mr. Hammer (Groucho) asks him if he knew what an auction was, in which he responds "I come from Italy on the Atlantic Auction [Atlantic Ocean]!" Chico's character is often assumed to be dim-witted, as he frequently misunderstands words spoken by other characters (particularly Groucho). However, he often gets the better of the same characters by extorting money from them, either by con or blackmail; again, Groucho is his most frequent target.


title: Chico Marx

text: Chico was a talented pianist. He originally started playing with only his right hand and fake playing with his left, as his teacher did so herself. Although he took lessons, Chico was a largely self-taught pianist. As a young boy, he gained jobs playing piano to earn money for the Marx family. Sometimes Chico even worked playing in two places at the same time. He would acquire the first job with his piano-playing skills, work for a few nights, and then substitute Harpo on one of the jobs. (During their boyhood, Chico and Harpo looked so much alike that they were often mistaken for each other.)


title: Chico Marx

text: In the brothers' last film, "Love Happy", Chico plays a piano and violin duet with 'Mr. Lyons' (Leon Belasco). Lyons plays some ornate riffs on the violin; Chico comments, "Look-a, Mister Lyons, I know you wanna make a good impression, but please don't-a play better than me!"


title: Chico Marx

text: In a record album about the Marx Brothers, narrator Gary Owens stated that "although Chico's technique was limited, his repertoire was not." The opposite was true of Harpo, who reportedly could play only two tunes on the piano, which typically thwarted Chico's scam and resulted in both brothers being fired.


title: Chico Marx

text: Groucho Marx once said that Chico never practiced the pieces he played. Instead, before performances he soaked his fingers in hot water. He was known for 'shooting' the keys of the piano. He played passages with his thumb up and index finger straight, like a gun, as part of the act. Other examples of his keyboard flamboyance are found in "Go West" (1940), where he plays the piano by rolling an orange over the keys and "A Night in Casablanca" (1946), where he performs a rendition of "The Beer Barrel Polka".


title: Chico Marx

text: Chico became the unofficial manager of the Marx Brothers after their mother, Minnie, died in 1929. As manager, he negotiated with the studios to get the brothers a percentage of a film's gross receipts—the first deal of its kind in Hollywood which has become common practice today. Furthermore, it was Chico's connection with Irving Thalberg, head of production at Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer, that led to Thalberg's signing the Brothers when they were in a career slump after "Duck Soup" (1933), the last of their films for Paramount.


title: Chico Marx

text: For a while in the 1930s and 1940s, Chico led a big band. Crooner Mel Tormé began his professional career singing with the Chico Marx Orchestra. Through the 1950s, Chico occasionally appeared on a variety of television anthology shows and some television commercials, most notably with Harpo (and a cameo appearance by Groucho) in "The Incredible Jewelry Robbery", a pantomime episode of "General Electric Theater" in 1959; This was the final appearance of the three Marx Brothers.


title: Chico Marx

text: His nickname (acquired during a card game in Chicago in 1915) was originally spelled "Chicko". A typesetter accidentally omitted the 'k', so his name became "Chico" but the Marxes still pronounced it "Chick-oh", although others sometimes mistakenly pronounced it "Cheek-oh". Numerous radio recordings from the 1940s exist in which announcers and fellow actors mispronounce the nickname, but Chico does not correct them. As late as the 1950s, Groucho used the wrong pronunciation for comedic effect. A guest on "You Bet Your Life" told the quizmaster she grew up around Chico (California) and Groucho responded, "I grew up around Chico myself. You aren't Gummo, are you?" In most interviews, Groucho is heard correctly pronouncing it "Chicko", as in a Dick Cavett episode with Groucho talking to Dan Rowan.


title: Chico Marx

text: During Groucho's live performance at Carnegie Hall in 1972, he states that his brother got the name Chico because he was a "chicken-chaser" (early 20th century slang for womanizer).


title: Chico Marx

text: As well as being a compulsive womanizer, Chico had a lifelong gambling habit. His favorite gambling pursuits were card games, horse racing, dog racing, and various sports betting. His addiction cost him millions of dollars by his own account. When an interviewer in the late 1930s asked him how much money he had lost from gambling, he answered, "Find out how much money Harpo's got. That's how much I've lost." Gummo Marx, in an interview years after Chico's death, said: "Chico's favorite people were actors who gambled, producers who gambled, and women who screwed." In reference to Chico's well-known promiscuity, George Jessel quipped, "Chico didn't button his fly until he was seventy."


title: Chico Marx

text: Chico's lifelong gambling addiction compelled him to continue working in show business long after his brothers had retired in comfort from their Hollywood income, and in the early 1940s, he found himself playing in the same small, cheap halls in which he had begun his career 30 years earlier. The Marx Brothers' penultimate film, "A Night in Casablanca" (1946), was made largely for Chico's financial benefit since he had filed for bankruptcy a few years prior. Because of his out-of-control gambling, his brothers finally took the money as he earned it and put him on an allowance, on which he stayed until his death.


title: Chico Marx

text: Chico had a reputation as a world-class pinochle player, a game he and Harpo learned from their father. Groucho said Chico would throw away good cards (with the knowledge of spectators) to make the play "more interesting". Chico's last public appearance was in 1960, playing cards on the television show "Championship Bridge". He and his partner lost the game.


title: Chico Marx

text: Chico was married twice. His first marriage was to Betty Karp in 1917. They had a daughter, Maxine (1918–2009). His first marriage was affected by his infidelity, ending in divorce in 1940; he was very close to his daughter Maxine and gave her acting lessons.


title: Chico Marx

text: In the 1974 Academy Awards telecast, Jack Lemmon presented Groucho with an honorary Academy Award to a standing ovation. The award was also for Harpo, Chico, and Zeppo, whom Lemmon mentioned by name. It was one of Groucho's last public appearances. "I wish that Harpo and Chico could be here to share with me this great honor," he said, naming the two deceased brothers (Zeppo was still alive at the time and in the audience). Groucho also praised the late Margaret Dumont as a great straight woman who never understood any of his jokes.


title: Chico Marx

text: Chico died of arteriosclerosis at age 74 on October 11, 1961, at his Hollywood home. He was the eldest brother and the first to die. He was survived by his second wife Mary and daughter Maxine (from his first marriage to Betty Karp).


title: Chico Marx

text: Chico is entombed in the mausoleum at Forest Lawn Memorial Park Cemetery in Glendale, California. Chico's younger brother Gummo is in a crypt across the hall from him.


title: Chico Marx

text: Actor Michael Tucci portrayed Chico alongside Gabriel Kaplan as Groucho in the play "" (later released on home video under the title "Gabe Kaplan as Groucho") originally broadcast on HBO in 1982.


title: Chico Marx

text: Actors who have portrayed Chico Marx in stage revivals of the Marx Brothers musical plays include Peter Slutsker, Les Marsden and Matt Roper. Frank Lazarus played Chico in a 1990 radio adaptation of "Flywheel, Shyster, and Flywheel".


title: Rebus

text: A rebus () is a puzzle device that combines the use of illustrated pictures with individual letters to depict words or phrases. For example: the word "been" might be depicted by a rebus showing an illustrated bumblebee next to a plus sign (+) and the letter "n". It was a favourite form of heraldic expression used in the Middle Ages to denote surnames.


title: Rebus

text: For example, in its basic form, three salmon (fish) are used to denote the surname "Salmon". A more sophisticated example was the rebus of Bishop Walter Lyhart (d. 1472) of Norwich, consisting of a stag (or hart) lying down in a conventional representation of water.


title: Rebus

text: The composition alludes to the name, profession or personal characteristics of the bearer, and speaks to the beholder "Non verbis, sed rebus", which Latin expression signifies "not by words but by things" ("res, rei" (f), a thing, object, matter; "rebus" being ablative plural).


title: Rebus

text: Rebuses are used extensively as a form of heraldic expression as a hint to the name of the bearer; they are not synonymous with canting arms. A man might have a rebus as a personal identification device entirely separate from his armorials, canting or otherwise. For example, Sir Richard Weston (d. 1541) bore as arms: "Ermine, on a chief azure five bezants", whilst his rebus, displayed many times in terracotta plaques on the walls of his mansion Sutton Place, Surrey, was a "tun" or barrel, used to designate the last syllable of his surname.


title: Rebus

text: An example of canting arms proper are those of the Borough of Congleton in Cheshire consisting of a conger eel, a lion (in Latin, "leo") and a tun (barrel). This word sequence "conger-leo-tun" enunciates the town's name.


title: Rebus

text: Similarly, the coat of arms of St. Ignatius Loyola contains wolves (in Spanish, "lobo") and a kettle ("olla"), said by some (probably incorrectly) to be a rebus for "Loyola". The arms of Elizabeth Bowes-Lyon feature bows and lions.


title: Rebus

text: By extension, it also uses the positioning of words or parts of words in relation to each other to convey a hidden meaning, for example:


title: Rebus

text: A rebus made up solely of letters (such as "CU" for "See you") is known as a gramogram, grammagram, or letteral word. This concept is sometimes extended to include numbers (as in "Q8" for "Kuwait", or "8" for "ate"). Rebuses are sometimes used in crossword puzzles, with multiple letters or a symbol fitting into a single square.


title: Rebus

text: The term "rebus" also refers to the use of a pictogram to represent a syllabic sound. This adapts pictograms into phonograms. A precursor to the development of the alphabet, this process represents one of the most important developments of writing. Fully developed hieroglyphs read in rebus fashion were in use at Abydos in Egypt as early as 3400 BCE. In Mesopotamia, the principle was first employed on Proto-Cuneiform tablets, beginning in the Jemdet Nasr period (c. 3100–2900 BC).


title: Rebus

text: The writing of correspondence in rebus form became popular in the 18th century and continued into the 19th century. Lewis Carroll wrote the children he befriended picture-puzzle rebus letters, nonsense letters, and looking-glass letters, which had to be held in front of a mirror to be read. Rebus letters served either as a sort of code or simply as a pastime.


title: Rebus

text: In linguistics, the rebus principle is the use of existing symbols, such as pictograms, purely for their sounds regardless of their meaning, to represent new words. Many ancient writing systems used what we now term 'the rebus principle' to represent abstract words, which otherwise would be hard to represent with pictograms. An example that illustrates the Rebus principle is the representation of the sentence "I can see you" by using the pictographs of "eye—can—sea—ewe".


title: Rebus

text: Some linguists believe that the Chinese developed their writing system according to the rebus principle, and Egyptian hieroglyphs sometimes used a similar system. A famous rebus statue of Ramses II uses three hieroglyphs to compose his name: Horus (as Ra), for "Ra"; the child, "mes"; and the sedge plant (stalk held in left hand), "su"; the name Ra-mes-su is then formed.


title: Rebus

text: Freud posited that the rebus was the basis for uncovering the latent content of the dream. He wrote, "A dream is a picture puzzle of this sort and our predecessors in the


title: Rebus

text: field of dream interpretation have made the mistake of treating the rebus as a pictorial composition: and as such it has seemed to them


title: Rebus

text: In Japan, the rebus known as was immensely popular during the Edo period. A piece by ukiyo-e artist Kunisada was "Actor Puzzles" ("Yakusha hanjimono") that featured rebuses.


title: Rebus

text: Today the most often seen of these symbols is a picture of a sickle, a circle, and the letter , read as , interpreted as , the old-fashioned form of . This is known as the , and dates to circa 1700, being used in kabuki since circa 1815.


title: Rebus

text: Kabuki actors would wear "yukata" and other clothing whose pictorial design, in rebus, represented their Yagō "guild names", and would distribute tenugui cloth with their rebused names as well. The practice was not restricted to the acting profession and was undertaken by townsfolk of various walks of life. There were also pictorial calendars called egoyomi that represented the Japanese calendar in rebus so it could be "read" by the illiterate.


title: Rebus

text: Today a number of abstract examples following certain conventions are occasionally used for names, primarily for corporate logos or product logos and incorporating some characters of the name, as in a monogram; see Japanese rebus monogram. The most familiar example globally is the logo for Yamasa soy sauce, which is a ∧ with a サ under it. This is read as "Yama", for (symbolized by the ∧) + .


title: The People Under the Stairs

text: The People Under the Stairs is a 1991 American horror comedy film written and directed by Wes Craven and starring Brandon Adams, Everett McGill, Wendy Robie, and A. J. Langer. The plot follows a young boy and two adult robbers who become trapped in a house belonging to a strange couple after breaking in to steal their collection of rare coins.


title: The People Under the Stairs

text: Craven has stated that "The People Under the Stairs" was partially inspired by a news story from the late 1970s, in which two burglars broke into a Los Angeles household, inadvertently causing the police to discover two children who had been locked away by their parents. The film was a surprise commercial success, and has been analyzed for its satirical depiction of gentrification, class warfare, and capitalism.


title: The People Under the Stairs

text: Poindexter "Fool" Williams is a resident of a Los Angeles ghetto. He and his family are being evicted from their apartment by their landlords the Robesons. The Robesons, who are believed to be a married couple, call themselves Mommy and Daddy. They have a daughter named Alice, to whom they are extremely abusive.


title: The People Under the Stairs

text: Leroy, his associate Spencer, and Fool break into the Robesons' house by using Spencer to pose as a municipal worker. The Robesons leave the home shortly, but Spencer does not return. Fool and Leroy break into the house to look for Spencer and Fool finds his dead body and a large group of strange, pale children in a locked pen inside a dungeon-like basement.


title: The People Under the Stairs

text: The Robesons return and Fool flees while Leroy is shot to death by Daddy. Fool runs into another section of the house where he meets Alice. She tells him that the people under the stairs were children who broke the "see/hear/speak no evil" rules of the Robeson household. The children have degenerated into cannibalism to survive and Alice has avoided this fate by obeying the rules without question. A boy named Roach whose tongue was removed as punishment for having called out for help to escape (thus breaking the "speak no evil" rule enforced by Mommy and Daddy) also evades the Robesons by hiding in the walls.


title: The People Under the Stairs

text: Fool is discovered by Daddy and is thrown to the cannibalistic children to die. However, Roach helps Fool escape, but is critically wounded. As he dies, he gives Fool a small bag of gold coins and a written plea to save Alice. Fool reunites with Alice and the two escape into the passageways between the walls. Daddy releases his Rottweiler dog Prince into the walls to kill them. Fool tricks Daddy into stabbing Prince and he and Alice reach the attic where they find an open window above a pond. Alice is too afraid to jump and Fool is forced to escape without her, but he promises to return for her.


title: The People Under the Stairs

text: Fool learns that he has enough gold to pay for both his rent and for his mother's surgery. He also finds out that Mommy and Daddy are actually brother and sister, coming from a long line of disturbed, inbred family members. They started out as a family that ran a funeral home, selling cheap coffins for expensive prices, before entering the real estate business, leading them to become greedier and more unhinged. Fool vows to help right the wrong. He reports the Robesons to child welfare and as the police are investigating the house, Fool sneaks back in and reveals to Alice that she is not their daughter; she was stolen from her birth parents, as were all the other children in the basement.


title: The People Under the Stairs

text: Mommy finds out that Alice knows the truth and believes that Fool has turned her against them, so she attempts to kill Alice. However, the cannibal children charge at Mommy, causing her to flee and run into a knife held by Alice. The children seize her and throw her into the basement, where she lands dead at Daddy's feet. Daddy finds Fool at the vault, where Fool sets off explosives, demolishing the house and causing the money to blow up through the crematorium chimney and into the crowd of people outside. Daddy is killed in the explosion and Alice and Fool reunite in the basement. Meanwhile, the people outside claim the money distributed by the blast, and the freed children venture into the night.


title: The People Under the Stairs

text: According to writer-director Craven, the film's story was partially inspired by a real-life news story from 1978. The case involved two African-American burglars who made a forced entry into a house in Los Angeles, California, which unintentionally led to the local law enforcement discovering a pair of children who had been locked away by their parents.


title: The People Under the Stairs

text: The film was made on a relatively low budget of $6 million, without significant studio interference. The Thomas W. Phillips residence, located at 2215 S. Harvard Blvd in Los Angeles, was used in the film as the house of the Robesons. Everett McGill and Wendy Robie were cast as the Robesons after having starred together as the married couple "Big" Ed and Nadine Hurley in the television series "Twin Peaks".


title: The People Under the Stairs

text: The film opened at the spot at the box office, taking in over $5.5 million that weekend, and stayed in the top 10 for a month until early December. The film went on to gross over $24,204,154 domestically (U.S.) and $7,143,000 internationally, bringing its worldwide total to $31,347,154.


title: The People Under the Stairs

text: On review aggregator website Rotten Tomatoes, 70% of 33 critics gave the film a positive review with an average rating of 6/10. The site's consensus reads: "Held aloft by gonzo black comedy and socially conscious subtext, "The People Under The Stairs" marks a unique -- though wildly uneven -- change of pace for writer-director Wes Craven". Marjorie Baumgarten of "The Austin Chronicle" wrote that "this is the work of the Wes Craven we came to admire". Vincent Canby, writing for "The New York Times", described "The People Under the Stairs" as "an affirmative-action horror film", containing "its share of blood and gore", and lauded the film for being "mostly creepy and, considering the bizarre circumstances, surprisingly funny" in that "it's impossible not to like fiends who, having just dispatched someone in an especially nasty way, can't contain their natural high spirits. They dance."


title: The People Under the Stairs

text: Chicago-based "Siskel & Ebert" had mixed responses to the movie on their TV show. Roger Ebert of "The Chicago Sun-Times" gave the movie a "thumbs down" review and admitted a distaste for gory horror films but nonetheless gave Craven credit for "creating a distinctive visual world" featuring dark humor and biting social commentary. Gene Siskel of "The Chicago Tribune" gave "The People Under the Stairs" a reserved "thumbs up", warning viewers about some disturbing material but also saying "if you like this kind of picture, [Craven] does it as well as you can imagine."


title: The People Under the Stairs

text: Richard Harrington of "The Washington Post" criticized Craven's directing, going on to state that "Craven also wrote the script here, based on a news story about California parents who kept their children locked in the basement for many years. That's scary -- and so is how far Craven has fallen." Nigel Floyd of "Time Out" wrote of the film that "There are a few push-button frights, but a total dearth of mind-disturbing terror; the humour, too, is broad, crowd-pleasing stuff".


title: The People Under the Stairs

text: S.C. Dacy of "Empire" gave the film four out of five possible stars and called it "brilliantly deceptive", writing that it is "Not just a disturbing ride but also a hard-hitting political statement". Brent McKnight of "PopMatters" wrote that the film "is a careful synthesis of genres, steeped in horror, with a satiric bite, and action and thriller traits thrown in just for the hell of it", calling it "easily one of the director's most original, deranged, and off the wall films".


title: The People Under the Stairs

text: Noel Murray of "The A.V. Club" wrote that "footage from the first Gulf War on the Robesons' TV—coupled with the depiction of them as a wealth-hoarding perversion of the typical upstanding suburban couple—marks the movie as a satire", and called the Mommy and Daddy characters a "cartoonish parody of conservatism". S.C. Dacy of "Empire" referred to the Robesons as a "camouflaged Ronald and Nancy Reagan", and Brett Gallman of ComingSoon.net referred to them as "nightmare versions of Ronald and Nancy Reagan". Jonny Coleman of "LA Weekly" called the film "a satire of late capitalism, specifically in an L.A. run ragged by the free market of the '80s and the violence it created", noted the comparisons between the Robesons and the Reagans, and compared them to more contemporary figures like Donald Sterling and Donald Trump.


title: The People Under the Stairs

text: In a 1991 interview with "Fangoria", Craven stated that the film "is much closer to "The Hills Have Eyes" than anything I've done in a long time ... It's a raw film with no dreams in it whatsoever. It's an extraordinary, real situation involving an awful family that shouldn't exist, but unfortunately, often does. In the 2015 Blu-ray commentary track released by Scream Factory, Craven refers to the Robesons' house as representing "the whole society of the United States".


title: The People Under the Stairs

text: "The People Under the Stairs" was released on VHS by MCA/Universal Home Video in the spring of 1992, and was later released on DVD in 2003. The film received a Blu-ray release in Region B by Arrow Video on November 4, 2013, featuring a high-definition transfer of the film, an audio commentary by actor Brandon Adams moderated by Calum Waddell, along with various interviews and a theatrical trailer. The film was released in Region A as a Blu-ray Collector's Edition by Scream Factory in 2015, featuring audio commentaries by Wes Craven with Michael Felsher, and by actors Brandon Adams, A. J. Langer, Sean Whalen, and Yan Birch. The Scream Factory release also includes interviews with members of the cast and crew, behind-the-scenes footage, a "making of" featurette, a theatrical trailer, and TV spots.


title: The People Under the Stairs

text: Craven at one point said he would like to remake the film along with "The Last House on the Left" and "Shocker". However, after the release of the 2009 remake of "The Last House on the Left", news of a remake fell dormant until 2015, when it was announced (shortly before Craven's death) that the director was developing a "People Under the Stairs" TV series for Syfy.


title: The People Under the Stairs

text: On October 30, 2020, "Collider" reported that Jordan Peele and Win Rosenfeld signed on to produce a remake under Monkeypaw Productions for Universal Pictures.


title: The People Under the Stairs

text: Universal Studios Florida has incorporated the house of Mommy and Daddy, along with other elements of the film's plot, into a maze attraction in the past for their annual Halloween Horror Nights event. It is also featured on the drive-in movie screen in the "Twister...Ride It Out" attraction.


title: Jimi Hendrix discography

text: Jimi Hendrix (1942–1970) was an American guitarist and singer-songwriter whose career spanned from 1962 to 1970. His discography includes the recordings released during his lifetime. Prior to his rise to fame, he recorded 24 singles as a backing guitarist with American R&B artists, such as the Isley Brothers and Little Richard. Beginning in late 1966, he recorded three best-selling studio albums and 13 singles with the Jimi Hendrix Experience. An Experience compilation album and half of a live album recorded at the Monterey Pop Festival were also issued prior to his death. After the breakup of the Experience in mid-1969, songs from his live performances were included on the "" and "Band of Gypsys" albums. A studio single with the Band of Gypsys was also released.


title: Jimi Hendrix discography

text: Hendrix's albums and singles with the Experience were originally released by Track Records in the United Kingdom and Reprise Records in the United States. Track also issued the Band of Gypsys' album, but to settle an American contract dispute, it was released by Capitol Records in the US. The Woodstock soundtrack album was issued by Atlantic Records and its subsidiary Cotillion Records in US. Over the years, the Hendrix catalogue has been handled by different record companies, including Track's successor, Polydor Records in Europe and the UK, and MCA Records. In 2010, Sony's Legacy Recordings became the exclusive distributor for the recordings managed by Experience Hendrix, a family company. His original albums have been reissued, sometimes with new album art, mixes, and bonus material.


title: Jimi Hendrix discography

text: Hendrix's work as an accompanist appears on several different labels. After he became popular, Hendrix contributed to recordings by several different artists. In addition to the legitimate singles and albums released before his death, two albums worth of demos and outtakes recorded with Curtis Knight with misleading cover art and titles were released, which Hendrix publicly denounced. After his death, many more such albums appeared.


title: I Heart Huckabees

text: I Heart Huckabees (stylized as I ♥ Huckabees; also I Love Huckabees) is a 2004 independent black comedy film directed and produced by David O. Russell, who co-wrote the screenplay with Jeff Baena.


title: I Heart Huckabees

text: A self-described "existential comedy", "I Heart Huckabees" follows a pair of detectives (Dustin Hoffman and Lily Tomlin), hired to investigate the meaning of the life of their clients (Jude Law, Jason Schwartzman, Mark Wahlberg, and Naomi Watts). As the different investigations cross paths, their rival and nemesis (Isabelle Huppert) tries to drag their clients into her own views on the meaning of their lives.


title: I Heart Huckabees

text: Young Albert Markovski heads the local chapter of the "Open Spaces Coalition" environmental group. One of their current projects is stopping the building of a new chain store "big-box" department stores, Huckabees.


title: I Heart Huckabees

text: Albert is a rival of Brad Stand, a shallow executive at Huckabees. Brad infiltrates Open Spaces and charismatically displaces Albert as the leader. Dawn Campbell is Brad's live-in girlfriend and the face and voice of Huckabees; appearing in all of the store's ads.


title: I Heart Huckabees

text: After seeing the same conspicuous stranger three times, Albert contacts a couple of existential detectives, Bernard and Vivian Jaffe. They offer him their optimistic brand of existentialism—they call "universal interconnectivity" (combining romantic and transcendentalist philosophies)—and spy on him, ostensibly to help him solve the coincidence. Fireman Tommy Corn is another client of the Jaffe's, with an idealistic, obsessively anti-petroleum-industry philosophy. They introduce Albert to Tommy as his 'other', and they become friends.


title: I Heart Huckabees

text: Tommy grows dissatisfied with the Jaffes, feeling they are not helping. Seeking out other possibilities, He ends up abandoning and undermining the Jaffes by introducing Albert to Caterine Vauban, a former student of the Jaffes who espouses a seemingly opposing nihilistic/absurdist philosophy.


title: I Heart Huckabees

text: Caterine teaches them to disconnect their inner beings from their daily lives and problems, to synthesize a non-thinking state of "pure being." Lifted from their troubles, they wish to keep that feeling forever. But she says it is inevitable to be drawn back into human drama, and the core truth of it is misery and meaninglessness. To prove her point, Caterine takes Albert into the woods to have sex, leaving Tommy behind. He finds out about it and feels hurt. She tells him that they found each other through all of the human suffering and drama. Tommy rejects this idea and leaves them, furious and lost.


title: I Heart Huckabees

text: Meanwhile, in Brad's further attempts to undercut Albert, he and Dawn meet with and are influenced by Bernard and Vivian. In the following days, Brad and Dawn rethink their entire lives: she rejects the modeling world, looking for deeper meaning, while he realizes his whole ascent up the corporate ladder is meaningless, as he has focused his whole life on trying to please others and not himself.


title: I Heart Huckabees

text: All the storylines collide when Brad's house catches fire. While the fire trucks get stuck in a traffic jam, Tommy arrives on his bicycle to put out the fire, which also trapped Dawn inside. As he saves her life, they fall in love. Meanwhile, Brad despairs at the destruction of his home, the symbol of his material success. Albert attains a sort of enlightenment when he synthesizes the two opposing outlooks of the Jaffes and Caterine to realize the cosmic truth of everything.


title: I Heart Huckabees

text: Brad, meanwhile, is fired from Huckabees, leaving him rudderless. Albert reveals to him that the fire started when he burned Brad's jet skis, then it spread to the rest of the house. He says they are no different, that everything really is inextricably connected, but that these connections necessarily arise from the often senselessly painful reality of human existence. Having realized this, he refers Brad to Caterine, believing she can help him as she did Albert and Tommy.


title: I Heart Huckabees

text: Albert and Tommy talk later about everything that has happened. Caterine and the Jaffes watch them from afar, concluding they can close both of their cases.


title: I Heart Huckabees

text: Before directing his first feature, "Spanking the Monkey", Russell intended to make a film "about a guy who sits in the back of a Chinese restaurant with microphones on every table to surreptitiously listen to everybody’s conversations, then write perversely personal fortunes for each of the people."


title: I Heart Huckabees

text: Hitting a writer's block, Russell could not figure out how to make the film work. In the meantime Russell was called for jury duty, after which he stopped writing the film. Ideas in the script stayed with him though and they would later form the basis for the Huckabee script. The final idea came to Russell in a dream where "This female detective she was not following me for criminal reasons, but she was following me for spiritual and metaphysical reasons." Russell, who makes a habit of writing his dreams down, knew instantly upon reading his summary of the dream that this was the story he wanted to pursue.


title: I Heart Huckabees

text: In March 2007, two videos were leaked onto YouTube portraying on-set arguments between Russell and Tomlin. When the "Miami New Times" asked Tomlin about the videos, she responded, "I love David. There was a lot of pressure in making the movie—even the way it came out you could see it was a very free-associative, crazy movie, and David was under a tremendous amount of pressure. And he's a very free-form kind of guy anyway."


title: I Heart Huckabees

text: Jon Brion provided the score and seven original songs for the film. His unique methods for writing previous film scores ("Punch-Drunk Love", "Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind") involved very close collaboration with the director. Through this process, David O. Russell was able to sit in the same room with Brion and watch an early cut of the film. Russell described what he wanted to portray and Brion would compose music to Russell's descriptions. The process can be seen on a featurette on the film's special edition DVD.


title: I Heart Huckabees

text: David O. Russell, while working with Brion, had come across Brion's first solo album, "Meaningless". Russell has mentioned that Brion's album asks similar questions to the ones Russell was trying to ask with "I Heart Huckabees". In particular, Russell notes that the questions on "Meaningless" are closer to the questions directed from Caterine Vauban's negative and dark point of view.


title: I Heart Huckabees

text: Many cues used in the film feature a Chamberlin, a keyboard instrument from the 1950s that replicates instrumental sounds using recorded tape.


title: I Heart Huckabees

text: In an advertising campaign for the film, four fictional websites were created. They were portrayed as if they were actual websites involving the characters and organizations featured in the film. Each website had a link called "Disclaimer" at the bottom that leads to FOX Searchlight's official website for the film. Websites were rendered inactive a few months after release, each now redirecting to FOX Searchlight's website.


title: I Heart Huckabees

text: "I Heart Huckabees" opened in a limited release on October 1, 2004, earning $292,177 and ranking number 24 in the weekend's box office. The film was granted a wide release three weeks later on October 22, earning $2,902,468, ranking tenth in the box office. At the end of its run, the film grossed $12,785,432 domestically and $7,286,740 overseas for a worldwide total of $20,072,172.


title: I Heart Huckabees

text: The film received mixed to positive reviews from critics. Some critics were displeased with the existential subject matter and said the script was unfocused, while others celebrated its performances (especially Wahlberg as Tommy Corn) and originality. Review aggregator website Rotten Tomatoes gives the film a 63% rating based on 192 reviews, with an average rating of 6.30/10. The site's consensus states: ""I Heart Huckabees" certainly isn't for everyone, but audiences attuned to its quirky wavelength will find a singularly brainy screwball comedy that refuses to pander." Metacritic reports a 55 out of 100 rating based on 40 critics, indicating "mixed or average reviews".


title: I Heart Huckabees

text: In an article for New Review of Film and Television Studies film scholar, Kim Wilkins labelled the dialogue in "I Heart Huckabees" "hyper-dialogue," which is described as "intensified, unevenly fluctuating, and often ironically inflected use of dialogue in the place of action".


title: KSTS

text: KSTS (channel 48) is a television station licensed to San Jose, California, United States, broadcasting the Spanish-language Telemundo network to the San Francisco Bay Area. It is owned and operated by NBCUniversal's Telemundo Station Group alongside NBC outlet KNTV (channel 11); it is also sister to regional sports networks NBC Sports Bay Area and NBC Sports California. KSTS and KNTV share studios on North 1st Street in the North San Jose Innovation District; KSTS's transmitter is located on Mount Allison, and two of its main subchannels are also broadcast from the KNTV tower on San Bruno Mountain.


title: KSTS

text: KSTS was established in 1981 to provide subscription television service in the South Bay and Santa Clara Valley. The STV programming ended in 1983, and the station mostly became noted for specialty programming about business and computers as well as some ethnic programs. Telemundo purchased the station in 1987, giving the Bay Area a second station focusing on Spanish-language programming and a second choice for Spanish-language local news.


title: KSTS

text: On March 29, 1978, the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) granted National Group Television a construction permit to build a new television station on channel 48 in San Jose. The permit took the call letters KQWT before becoming KSTS on January 2, 1979. The station first signed on the air on May 31, 1981, as an independent station. It was owned by National Group Television, which was headed by John Douglas. The station's commercial programming included business programs, including a local program called "Business Today", as well as old off-network shows. At night, the station originally carried subscription television programming supplied by Satellite Television & Associated Resources (STAR TV) of Santa Monica; STAR had acquired the franchise from Universal Subscription Television three months prior to launch. STAR would have a short run on channel 48 because it bought the Super Time STV service on KTSF and relaunched it as STAR TV that September. It would be replaced by a unique STV offering known as International Network Television, which consisted of three program tiers: two hours a night of Japanese-language shows, another two hours of Chinese-language programming, and a late-night adult film block. Daytime hours were filled by the then-new Financial News Network after it launched in November 1981.


title: KSTS

text: The STV service, with just 3,000 subscribers in February 1983, ended later that year. The station then added additional brokered programming, including several shows on the young computer industry. The Thursday night "Affordable Computer Hotline", channel 48's highest-rated show, was one of three devoted to the topic and cemented KSTS's place as "The Computer Connection". The station also rebroadcast the 1984 shareholders meeting of Apple Computer, where the Macintosh was introduced, as the company had been unable to accommodate all those who wanted to attend. However, when must-carry provisions were struck down, KSTS disappeared from several San Francisco-market cable systems; the manager of Viacom Cablevision systems in Marin County said that channel 48 had "phenomenally low ratings". The vast majority of its programming continued to be related to business and computing, as well as sports, wine, and photography, passions linked to its upscale audience. Further, the station aired foreign-language programming in Filipino and Vietnamese, among others, from independent producers.


title: KSTS

text: In 1987, after several members of National Group Television desired to sell, Douglas sold KSTS to Telemundo Group, Inc., which operated the fledgling Telemundo Spanish-language network, for $17 million. At the insistence of network executive Paul Niedermayer, who had been instrumental in the 1985 launch of KVEA in the Los Angeles area, the network bypassed KCNS channel 38 to buy the station in San Jose, which at the time was home to 35 percent of the Hispanics in the Bay Area. The station, however, was not Spanish around the clock even after the sale. As late as 1990, locally produced programs in Portuguese and Farsi were airing on KSTS. An effort at regional expansion began in 1990 when K15CU "KCU", a KSTS translator, began broadcasting in Salinas.


title: KSTS

text: In October 1990, half of KSTS's 18 employees went on strike in protest of low pay and poor working conditions. The week-long strike, which resulted in temporary suspensions of the station's 6 p.m. newscast and the outright cancellation of its 11 p.m. news, resulted in the station staff unionizing with the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers and agreeing to a contract in 1992.


title: KSTS

text: The acquisition of Telemundo by NBC in 2002 came at the same time the network bought San Jose's KNTV and turned it into an NBC owned-and-operated station. Both stations moved from their separate facilities—KSTS from its site on Bering Drive—to a new building on First Street.


title: KSTS

text: In 1988, KSTS launched its news department with the debut of a half-hour 6 p.m. newscast, which was originally co-anchored by Celina Rodriguez and Dante Betteo; both left in 1999. The program proved successful, which resulted in the station later adding a half-hour 11 p.m. newscast. This was canceled after the 1990 strike and was not reinstated until 1997.


title: KSTS

text: In 1999, KSTS hired model Mónica Mesones in 1999 to present the weather, resulting in controversy over the selection.


title: KSTS

text: KSTS expanded its news programming in 2001, launcing a morning newscast, "Noticiero 48 Esta Mañana", and a mid-morning newscast, "Noticiero 48 Al Mediodía" anchored by Blanca Garza and Santiago Aburto. These were canceled in 2004. At this time, César Bayona and Mariate Ramos anchored the 6 p.m. and 11 p.m. newscasts. 2006 saw the dismantling of the local news operation and the creation of a regional news operation to serve the western United States as part of the NBCUni 2.0 cost-cutting initiative. This was later reversed, and local news production was restored at KSTS in 2010. On February 27, 2012, KSTS became the first Spanish language television station in the Bay Area to begin broadcasting its local newscasts in high definition.


title: KSTS

text: 2014 saw a series of news expansions at Telemundo, KSTS included. A second attempt at a morning newscast, titled "Noticiero Telemundo 48 Primera Edición", began in June, and in November, KSTS launched a 5:30 p.m. newscast as part of a national news expansion; a 10 a.m. newscast also was added to the schedule at this time. Additionally, KSTS received a new set, began producing its own weather segments locally, launched a local "Telemundo Responde" consumer investigative franchise, added 20 additional staffers to its news department, and began a deeper sharing of resources, including the public affairs program "Comunidad del Valle", with KNTV.


title: KSTS

text: Effective June 27, 2016, the morning and 10 a.m. newscasts were canceled in order to begin the production of weekend editions of the 5:30 and 11 p.m. newscasts beginning July 2.


title: KSTS

text: Between them, KNTV and KSTS broadcast the same five services (48.3 and 48.4 on the KNTV multiplex simulcast 48.1 and 48.2 on the KSTS multiplex and vice versa for KNTV), though Oxygen is only broadcast by KSTS.


title: KSTS

text: KSTS shut down its analog signal, over UHF channel 48, on June 12, 2009, as part of the federally mandated transition from analog to digital television, and continued broadcasting in digital on channel 49, using virtual channel 48.


title: Death at a Funeral (2010 film)

text: Death at a Funeral is a 2010 American black comedy film directed by Neil LaBute with a screenplay by Dean Craig. It is a remake of the 2007 British film of the same name that Craig wrote. The film features an ensemble cast including Chris Rock, Martin Lawrence, Danny Glover, Regina Hall, Peter Dinklage, James Marsden, Tracy Morgan, Loretta Devine, Zoë Saldaña, Columbus Short, Luke Wilson, Keith David, Ron Glass and Kevin Hart; Dinklage is the only actor to appear in both films. The film was released in the United States on April 16, 2010.


title: Death at a Funeral (2010 film)

text: A funeral service is being held for a man named Edward. His older son Aaron and Aaron's wife Michelle live at his parents' home, but have been trying to buy their own and have children. Aaron's younger brother Ryan is a successful author, while Aaron (a tax accountant) has not yet completed his own novel, and resents that Ryan would rather spend money on a first class airline ticket than help pay for the funeral expenses.


title: Death at a Funeral (2010 film)

text: Aaron and Ryan's cousin Elaine and her fiancé Oscar are on their way to pick up Elaine's brother Jeff before heading to the funeral. To ease Oscar's nerves, she gives him a pill from a bottle labeled as Valium. Jeff later reveals to Elaine that it is a powerful hallucinogenic drug he has concocted for a friend. Chaos ensues when Oscar hallucinates that the coffin is moving. He knocks it over, and the body falls out of the coffin.


title: Death at a Funeral (2010 film)

text: Aaron is approached by an unknown guest named Frank, who reveals himself to be the secret lover of his late father. Frank shows Aaron photos as proof and threatens to reveal them to Aaron and Ryan's mother Cynthia unless he is paid $30,000. While in shock, Aaron relays the situation to Ryan, who suggests Aaron to pay the money because Ryan claims that he is in debt. When Aaron and Ryan meet with Frank to pay him, Frank starts to deride Aaron's ability as a writer and Aaron refuses to pay. Frank turns violent, but Aaron and Ryan subdue him, tying him up to prevent him from leaving. Family friend Norman enters the room, giving Frank several doses of what he also believes is Valium to try to calm him down. Jeff also enters the room, telling them that it is the same hallucinogen Oscar took earlier.


title: Death at a Funeral (2010 film)

text: When Jeff and Norman, who are supposed to be watching Frank, get distracted by Uncle Russell, Frank releases himself from his bonds and is knocked unconscious upon falling over and hitting his head on a table. With Aaron, Ryan, Jeff and Norman believing that Frank is dead, they plan to put him in the coffin, and their opportunity comes when everyone is outside watching Oscar, who is on the roof naked and threatening to jump off the roof because he has seen Elaine's ex-boyfriend Derek kissing her. Elaine tells Oscar that Derek forcibly kissed her and calms him down by revealing she is pregnant. With everyone back inside, they continue the eulogy. While Aaron awkwardly tries to give his speech, Frank starts banging on the coffin, then suddenly forces it open and emerges. The pictures fall out of Frank's pocket, causing Cynthia to attack Frank in a berserk rage. Aaron yells for everyone's attention as he delivers a moving and impromptu eulogy, saying that his father was a good man with flaws like everyone else.


title: Death at a Funeral (2010 film)

text: Aaron and Ryan say goodbye while Ryan gets a ride to the airport from Martina, whom he had been trying to seduce all day. Aaron and Michelle are finally alone when Aaron asks where Uncle Russell is. Michelle tells him that she gave him what she believes is Valium to calm him down, shocking Aaron. Uncle Russell sits on the roof naked, like Oscar had been, remarking that "everything's so f**king green..."


title: Death at a Funeral (2010 film)

text: Review aggregator Rotten Tomatoes reports that 43% of critics have given the film a positive review, based on 138 reviews, with an average rating of 5.00/10. The site's critical consensus reads, "It's amusing and it assembles a talented cast, but Neil LaBute's surprisingly faithful remake of the 2007 Frank Oz dramedy ultimately falls short of the original." Another review aggregator, Metacritic, gave the film a weighted average score of 51 out of 100, based on 25 critics, indicating "mixed or average reviews". Audiences polled by CinemaScore gave the film an average grade of "B+" on an A+ to F scale.


title: Death at a Funeral (2010 film)

text: Roger Ebert of the "Chicago Sun-Times" gave the film out of 4 stars, believing it was better than the original. He wrote, "here's the best comedy since "The Hangover" ... a lot of "Death at a Funeral" is in very bad taste. That's when I laughed the most."


title: Draft horse

text: A draft horse (US), draught horse (UK) or dray horse (from the Old English "dragan" meaning "to draw or haul"; compare Dutch "dragen" and German "tragen" meaning "to carry" and Danish "drage" meaning "to draw" or "to fare"), less often called a carthorse, work horse or heavy horse, is a large horse bred to be a working animal doing hard tasks such as plowing and other farm labor. There are a number of breeds, with varying characteristics, but all share common traits of strength, patience, and a docile temperament which made them indispensable to generations of pre-industrial farmers.


title: Draft horse

text: Draft horses and draft crossbreds are versatile breeds used today for a multitude of purposes, including farming, draft horse showing, logging, recreation, and other uses. They are also commonly used for crossbreeding, especially to light riding breeds such as the Thoroughbred, for the purpose of creating sport horses of warmblood type. While most draft horses are used for driving, they can be ridden and some of the lighter draft breeds are capable performers under saddle.


title: Draft horse

text: Draft horses are recognizable by their tall stature and extremely muscular build. In general, they tend to have a more upright shoulder, producing more upright movement and conformation that is well suited for pulling. They tend to have broad, short backs with powerful hindquarters, again best suited for the purpose of pulling. Additionally, the draft breeds usually have heavy bone, and a good deal of feathering on their lower legs. Many have a straight profile or "Roman nose" (a convex profile). Draft breeds range from approximately high and from .


title: Draft horse

text: Draft horses crossbred on light riding horses adds height and weight to the ensuing offspring, and may increase the power and "scope" of the animal's movement.


title: Draft horse

text: The largest horse in recorded history was probably a Shire named Sampson (later Mammoth), who was born in 1846. He stood high, and his peak weight was estimated at . At over , a Shire gelding named Goliath was the Guinness Book of World Records record holder for the world's tallest horse until his death in 2001.


title: Draft horse

text: Humans domesticated horses and used them to perform a variety of duties. One type of horse-powered work was the hauling of heavy loads, plowing fields, and other tasks that required pulling ability. A heavy, calm, patient and well-muscled animal was desired for this work. Conversely, a light, more energetic horse was needed for riding and rapid transport. Thus, to the extent possible, a certain amount of selective breeding was used to develop different types of horse for different types of work.


title: Draft horse

text: It is a common misunderstanding that the Destrier that carried the armoured knight of the Middle Ages had the size and conformation of a modern draft horse, and some of these Medieval war horses may have provided some bloodlines for some of the modern draft breeds. The reality was that the high-spirited, quick-moving Destrier was closer to the size, build, and temperament of a modern Andalusian or Friesian. There also were working farm horses of more phlegmatic temperaments used for pulling military wagons or performing ordinary farm work which provided bloodlines of the modern draft horse. Records indicate that even medieval drafts were not as large as those today. Of the modern draft breeds, the Percheron probably has the closest ties to the medieval war horse.


title: Draft horse

text: By the 19th century horses weighing more than that also moved at a quick pace were in demand. Tall stature, muscular backs, and powerful hindquarters made the draft horse a source of "Horsepower" for farming, hauling freight and moving passengers. The railroads increased demand for working horses, as a growing economy still needed transport over the 'last mile' between the goods yard or station and the final customer. Even in the 20th century, draft horses were used for practical work, including over half a million used during World War I to support the military effort, until motor vehicles became an affordable and reliable substitute.


title: Draft horse

text: In the late 19th century and early 20th century, thousands of draft horses were imported from Western Europe into the United States. Percherons came from France, Belgians from Belgium, Shires from England, Clydesdales from Scotland. Many American draft registries were founded in the late 19th century. The Percheron, with 40,000 broodmares registered as of 1915, was America's most numerous draft breed at the turn of the 20th century. A breed developed exclusively in the U.S. was the American Cream Draft, which had a stud book established by the 1930s.


title: Draft horse

text: Beginning in the late 19th century, and with increasing mechanization in the 20th century, especially following World War I in the US and after World War II in Europe, the popularity of the internal combustion engine, and particularly the tractor, reduced the need for the draft horse. Many were sold to slaughter for horsemeat and a number of breeds went into significant decline.


title: Draft horse

text: Today draft horses are most often seen at shows, pulling competition and entered in competitions called "heavy horse" trials, or as exhibition animals pulling large wagons. However, they are still seen on some smaller farms in the US and Europe. They are particularly popular with groups such as Amish and Mennonite farmers, as well as those individuals who wish to farm with a renewable source of power. They are also sometimes used during horse logging, a forestry management practice to remove logs from dense woodland where there is insufficient space for mechanized vehicles or for other conservation considerations. Crossbred draft horses also played a significant role in the development of a number of warmblood breeds, popular today in international FEI competition up to the Olympic Equestrian level.


title: Draft horse

text: Small areas still exist where draft horses are widely used as transportation due to legislation preventing automotive traffic, such as on Mackinac Island in the United States.


title: Draft horse

text: Feeding, caring for and shoeing a one-ton draft horse is costly. Although many draft horses can work without a need for shoes, if they are required, farriers may charge twice the price to shoe a draft horse as a light riding horse because of the extra labor and specialized equipment required. Historically, draft horses were shod with horseshoes that were significantly wider and heavier than those for other types of horses, custom-made, often with caulkins.


title: Draft horse

text: The draft horse's metabolism is a bit slower than riding horse breeds, more akin to that of ponies, requiring less feed per pound of body weight. This is possibly due to their calmer nature. Nonetheless, because of their sheer size, most require a significant amount of fodder per day. Generally a supplement to balance nutrients is preferred over a large quantity of grain. They consume hay or other forage from 1.5% to 3% of their body weight per day, depending on work level. They also can drink up to of water a day. Overfeeding can lead to obesity, and risk of laminitis can be a concern.


title: Draft horse

text: The Shire horse holds the record for the world's biggest horse; Sampson, foaled in 1846 in Bedfordshire, England, stood at his withers, and weighed approx .


title: Draft horse

text: A number of horse breeds are used as draft horses, with the popularity of a given breed often closely linked to geographic location. In North America there were five draft horse breeds on the classic list: Belgian, Clydesdale, Percheron, Shire, and Suffolk.


title: Draft horse

text: The terms harness horse and light harness horse refer to horses of a lighter build, such as traditional carriage horses and show horses, and are not terms generally used to denote "heavy" or draft horses. Harness horse breeds include heavy warmblood breeds such as the Oldenburg and Cleveland Bay, as well as lighter breeds such as the Hackney, and in some disciplines, such as combined driving, light riding breeds such as the Thoroughbred or Morgan may be seen.


title: Legend of the Seeker

text: Legend of the Seeker is an American television series created by Sam Raimi, based on the fantasy novel series "The Sword of Truth" by Terry Goodkind. Distributed in U.S. by Disney-ABC Domestic Television, ABC Studios produced the series for first-run syndication with Raimi, Robert Tapert, Joshua Donen, Ned Nalle, and Kenneth Biller serving as executive producers. The show premiered on November 1, 2008 and ran for two seasons before its cancellation in 2010.


title: Legend of the Seeker

text: The series follows the journeys of a long-awaited "Seeker of Truth" named Richard Cypher (Craig Horner), a Confessor named Kahlan Amnell (Bridget Regan), a wizard named Zeddicus Zu'l Zorander (Bruce Spence), and a Mord-Sith named Cara (Tabrett Bethell) as they defend the people of their realm against tyranny and destruction. While the names and places are the same, the story in the television series is different from that in the books.


title: Legend of the Seeker

text: The story takes place in the world created by author Terry Goodkind in his fantasy novel series, "The Sword of Truth". The three main provinces are Westland, the Midlands and D'Hara. Westland is separated from the Midlands by a magical boundary, which was created to prevent any magic from entering Westland. On the other side of the Midlands is D'Hara, which is ruled by Darken Rahl. Seekers are accompanied by a Wizard of The First Order and Confessors, an ancient order of women, who oversee the welfare of the people of the Midlands and the Seeker.


title: Legend of the Seeker

text: The first season is loosely based on the first book of "The Sword of Truth" series "Wizard's First Rule". Some of the stories feature events and characters not encountered in the books, while others loosely adapt events from the book. The story begins after the invasion of Darken Rahl's army into the Midlands. Kahlan Amnell, a Confessor, ventures into Westland in search of a wizard and the Seeker, who has been prophesied to defeat Rahl. Kahlan finds the wizard, Zeddicus Zu'l Zorander, and the Seeker, a young man named Richard Cypher, who is forced to accept a destiny he never knew about. Together, they set off on a quest to seek out and defeat Darken Rahl.


title: Legend of the Seeker

text: The second season is loosely based on "Stone of Tears", the second book in Goodkind's series. It tells the story of how Richard, Kahlan, and Zeddicus discover that their quest during the first season caused them to unintentionally help the Keeper of the Underworld create tears in the veil which separates the land of the dead from the world of the living. Their new quest is to find the Stone of Tears, seal the rifts between the worlds, and defeat the Keeper. They are joined in this quest by Cara, a Mord-Sith and their former enemy.


title: Legend of the Seeker

text: The series premiered on November 1, 2008 in the United States and was broadcast weekly on Saturday or Sunday, depending on the local television station. It is based on the novel "Wizard's First Rule". In addition to the 22 episodes of the first season, the series was renewed by Disney for a second season.


title: Legend of the Seeker

text: Filming of the second season started in July 2009; it was based on the sequel to "Wizard's First Rule", "Stone of Tears". The first episode aired on November 7, 2009. The season consisted of 22 episodes.


title: Legend of the Seeker

text: Sam Raimi became interested in adapting "The Sword of Truth" novels after his business partner Joshua Donen encouraged him to read the books, and he in turn gave the books to Robert Tapert to read. Raimi considered adapting the first book into a movie or a five-part miniseries, but later settled on making a weekly television series after speaking to the books' author Terry Goodkind. A weekly television program would allow them to include most of the stories and important aspects of the series. Goodkind had resisted selling the rights of his books on multiple occasions before he met Raimi because he was not confident that other producers would maintain the integrity of his stories and characters. Raimi, who had produced "" and "" with Tapert and Ned Nalle, saw this as an opportunity to return to the first-run syndicated television business. However, the syndicated television business had diminished after the loss of crucial foreign markets around 2000. But with the former minor networks, UPN and WB, being replaced by a still struggling The CW that may disappear, the timing seemed right.


title: Legend of the Seeker

text: ABC Studios agreed to fund the project and greenlit the production for 22 episodes in March 2008, after it was cleared for broadcast to stations representing 84% of the United States, with Tribune Broadcasting being the primary launch group. The show, which is heavily action-oriented and requires visual effects, was given a "network-sized" production budget of US$1.5 million per episode.


title: Legend of the Seeker

text: Originally named "Wizard's First Rule" (after the first book in "The Sword of Truth" series), the show was retitled to "Legend of the Seeker" at Goodkind's suggestion since the producers wanted to differentiate the show from the books, it would have been too restrictive for them to only include plot lines from the first book, and because this would allow them the opportunity to cover the story within all the books in the series.


title: Legend of the Seeker

text: Executive producers Raimi and Tapert intended "Legend of the Seeker" to be "just about telling the stories of these characters and the sacrifices they make for each other. Sometimes it's about the meaning of real friendship. And always, it's the stories of the hero's journey." Tapert added, "We didn't want to have the '90s postmodern attitude where the audience is in on the joke. "Seeker" is much more serious than "Hercules" and "Xena"."


title: Legend of the Seeker

text: With show's production based in New Zealand and a writing staff based in Los Angeles, one of the biggest challenges has been dealing with the time differences and the communication issues. Kenneth Biller noted that the biggest challenges the writing staff faced were to create standalone episodes while integrating the storylines and mythology created by Terry Goodkind, and to "honor the books without literally translating them". As such, the series contains some stories from the books and new stories and events created by the series' writers. Raimi's reason for the changes is that the structure of a novel differs from a weekly one-hour television program. Tapert and Raimi maintain that while the writers have had to create events that are not portrayed in the books, they have remained faithful to the characters, themes and overarching story of the books:


title: Legend of the Seeker

text: Goodkind released a message to his readers on his official website prior to the show's production, saying: "No series (or mini-series, or feature film) can follow the underlying book exactly. Sam Raimi and his team want to keep the TV series true to my vision, so rest assured that I am going to be intimately involved in the writing of each of the episodes." He added, "If you love the book just the way it is, then enjoy the book for what it is and come to the TV series prepared to enjoy the show for what it is." However, after production started, Goodkind released another press statement in response to questions posed to him by fans: "I want you all to understand that ABC studios chose not to consult me on actors, scripts, or any other aspect of the show," he stated. "I have had no input whatsoever on the TV series, so I am the wrong person to write to or complain about the show. If you wish to make comments, positive or negative, please direct them to Disney/ABC." He continued, "For my part, I trust in Sam Raimi and Rob Tapert to at some point be able to exert their immense creative talent and do a great job at bringing to life the characters we all love."


title: Legend of the Seeker

text: When casting the role of Richard Cypher, Tapert recalled that when he saw Craig Horner's audition tape, he "absolutely thought he was the guy, instantly". Raimi thought that although Horner is older than the character he plays (even though he actually is not), he was "very believable" and that "he's got enough good qualities in him, in real life, and he will probably make the audience believe that he's taking that ride towards making a responsible person and that growth of character that's so important for me in the stories of Terry Goodkind." Horner had not heard of the books prior to the audition, and was convinced by a friend to read the books and try out for the role.


title: Legend of the Seeker

text: For the role of Kahlan Amnell, Raimi credits Tapert for finding Bridget Regan, whom he saw on one of the audition tapes they received. Raimi thought that she grounded the fantastical situations by being "very human and real", and recalled, "I was moved by her and I believed her and I thought we couldn't ask for anything more." Like Horner, Regan had not read the books prior to the audition. Horner and Regan were brought together for a "chemistry reading" in Los Angeles, upon which the producers concurred that they had found their two lead actors.


title: Legend of the Seeker

text: Production was set to begin in May 2008, but it was delayed by six weeks. The series was shot entirely in New Zealand in high-definition. Though based in Auckland, filming took place in various places in and outside of the city: at Henderson Valley Studios, in the city's outskirts and in the mountainous region around Queenstown.


title: Legend of the Seeker

text: Tribune Broadcasting, the major station group carrying the show, decided not to renew the series on March 4, 2010, but according to a statement from ABC Studios, this was not a deciding factor of its cancellation. After an apparent deal with Syfy fell through, Ausiello Files reported on April 26 that "Legend of the Seeker" had been cancelled and would not return for a third season. Fans of the series responded by launching an ongoing renewal campaign titled ""Save Our Seeker"". Terry Goodkind expressed his support for the campaign.


title: Legend of the Seeker

text: In addition to the United States, broadcast rights for "Legend of the Seeker" have been picked up in more than 60 international markets. In Spain, the show began airing on Telecinco on March 15, 2009. In New Zealand, it premiered on March 29, 2009 on Prime and aired weekly in the Monday 7:30 pm timeslot. In the UK & Ireland, Syfy picked up the rights for Season 1 and Season 2 with the air time slot of 8:00pm starting on August 13, 2009. Irish broadcaster RTÉ One aired the show on August 19. In French Canada, the first season aired in 2009 and the second season in 2010 on Ztélé under the French title "L'Épée de vérité".