Page 6 The Lance
March 5,1991
Fortner Writing and
Community Awards
Recently Presented
By Malissa Talbert
Communications Director
Three North Carolina journalists
received the Ethel Nestell Fortner
Writer and Community Award Fri
day, February 22 at St. Andrews Pres
byterian College.
Rolfe Neill, chairman and pub
lisher of The Charlotte Observer; Roy
Parker Jr., contributing editor to the
Fayetteville Observer-Times; and Roy
H. Park, of Ithica NY, founder and
chairman of Park Communications
Inc., are all key figures in journalism
today. They were chosen to receive
the Fortner awards in recognition of
their support of beginning writers, as
well as their continued support of the
fine arts.
Published frequendy by the St.
Andrews Review, Fortner was a ma
jor benefactor of the St. Andrews Press
Award winners Rolfe Neill, Roy Park, Roy Parker, Jr. and
mediator Sam Ragan participate in a panel discussion on
censorship. (Photo by Rooney Coffman)
and routinely encouraged the efforts
of beginning writers until her death in
1987.
Sam Ragan, Poet laureate of North
Carolina and publisher of The Pilot in
Southern Pines, knows each of the
recipients personally and presented
the awards during a luncheon at St.
Andrews.
Ragan called Park, “A man of great
vision who has made tremendous
accomplishments. The development
of Park Communications is one of the
most significant developments in
journalism in this country.”
Ragan said of Neill,” One of the
things that has most stood out about
Rolfe Neill is the integrity he has
maintained as a reporter, editor, col
umnist and publisher. He is one of
America’s great newspaper men.”
Ragan said Parker,” has contrib
uted so much to the arts and culture of
North Carolina.lt is fitting that he has
received this award.”
Also during the luncheon. Associ
ate Professor of History, Tom Wil
liams, discussed a trip that he and nine
students recently took to Vietnam.
Williams said that the experience
helped to,”shrink the distance” of
Vietnam and the Vietnam War and
thus, “enlarged the sense of commu
nity.”
Lane Moore, a senior from Geor
gia, said the trip helped,” expand my
awareness of world events. It opened
my eyes, my ears and my heart to the
greater community.”
Following the luncheon, Neill,
Parker, and Park took part in a panel
discussion, moderated by Ragan,
concerning censorship and the Per
sian Gulf War.
All four men acknowledged cen
sorship in reporting the war is preva
lent, but expressed varying opinions
about that censorship.
Noting the axiom “truth is the
casualty of war,” Ragan said,”It is a
very serious matter when we are lied
to day after day and we do not do
anything about it.”
Park agreed with Ragan, adding
that the censorship does not allow for
a “free press” and that reporters, par
ticularly those in broadcasting, often
report events without citing sources.
Without substantiation, television
reporters, “end up writing fiction many
times,” Park added.
Neill took a somewhat different
viewpoint, saying, “Yes we do have a
censorship problem with this war,”
but that some degree of censorship in
the media is inevitable.
Parker agreed, saying that the re
porting of the war has so far been
accurate. However, he added, “The
military really has us over a barrel and
there is not much we can do about it.”
Reporters in both the print and
broadcast media can only work with
the military officials and try to get any
additional information on their own,
Parker added.
Neill said reporting of the war’s
events are controlled by the military.
“Basic{illy we know only what we
have bfeen told. In that sense, we are
being deprived of America ’ s oxygen.”
Primal Screen
By Angela Lynch
Contributing
"Awakenings" is
a Real Hit
On the widescreen this month, a
delightfully light-hearted and yet
profound emotional film takes a pano
ramic view of life’s precious moments
and meanings. Awakenings, directed
by Penny Marshall, focuses on the
transference of friendship among Dr.
Malcolm Sayer (Robin Williams) and
a group of post-encephalitic patients—
victims of a sleeping sickness that
emerged in the 1920s.
Emotionless and frozen in a sus
pended world, these patients are
brought into a new reality led by
Dr.Sayers medical treatment and their
own awakened desires to grasp onto
any emotion that will confirm that
they are, indeed, alive. Robert DeNiro
also stars in this film as Leonard Lowe,
a “dormant” patient which is the first
f- :
Leonard Lowe (Robert DeNiro) lost in a sleep-like state for decades, is
brought back into the real world when Dr. Malcolm Sayer (Robin
Williams) treats him with an experimental drug in "AWAKENINGS."
(Photo courtesy of Columbia Pictures)
torecieve the experimental treatment, ance and Williams definitely proves
Through this summer of awakening, himself worthy of another Academy
it is the connection that Leonard and Award. Julie Kavner (the voice of
Sayers share that uncovers a layer of Marge Simpson) makes a commend-
care, warmth, and love in them both, able performance as Nurse Costello
Director Penny Marshall shows a with the right touches of laughter and
considerable growth in vision from heart. All in all. Awakenings is a
her last film. Big, and allows this true wonderful picture— let’s hope that it
story— based on Dr. Oliver Sack’s is not overlooked on Oscar Night,
book— to be both fun and touching. MPA A Rating: PG-13
DeNiro turns in a wonderful perform- Running Time; 121 mins.
”Flatliners" on
Jazz Ensemble to
Perform at Monday
Night in the Arts
By Heather Lyn Gupton
Staff Writer
St. Andrews Presbyterian
College’s “Monday Night in the Arts”
series will present The Classic Touch
Orchestra March 10.
The concert will begin at 4 pm, in
the Belk Center Lounge at St. An
drews. The public is invided to attend
free of charge.
The Classic Touch Orchestra was
organized in 1984 by five former
membersofthe 1976-77 Appalachian
S tate University Jazz B and. The eight-
piece ensemble is based in Rock Hill
S.C., and travels throughout North
and South Carolina, Virgina, and
Georgia. The ensemble performs big
band music of the 1940’s, adult con
temporary hits and light jazz.
Jon Entzi, a frequent performer
with the USAir Jazz Band and the
Guy Lombardo Orchestra, is the
orchestra’s manager and lead trum
peter. Band personnel is comprised of
high school and collegiate educators,
business professionals and free-lance
musicians, including Laurinburg resi
dent Debbie Bridges. Ms. Bridges is
a 1990 graduate of St. Andrews who
plays piano for the ensemble. Entzi
and other band members have per
formed with Clark Terry, Lew Soloff,
Bill Watrous and Rich Matteson in
clinics and concerts at Appalachian
and other universities.
The group consists of trumpet,
trombone, alto/baritone sax, tenor/
soprano sax, piano, bass, rhythm gui
tar and drums with vocals as well.
Bridges and her husband Willie are
the only Laurinburg residents in the
group. Other members come from
Columbia, Rock Hill, Clover and
Charlotte.
The Classic Touch Orchestra fea
tures the work of Duke Ellington,
Count Basie, Glenn Miller, Woody
Herman and other big band legends as
well as poular music from the fifties
through the nineties.
Nelson Wright (Kiefer Sutherland), David Labraccio (Kevin Bacon),
Rachel Mannus (Julia Roberts) and Randy Steckle (Oliver Platt) revive
Joe Hurley (William Baldwin), who had his heart stopped as part of a
chilling life-after-death experiment in "FLATLINERS." (Photo cour
tesy of Columbia Pictures)
Videocassette
Joel Schumacher's 1990 box of
fice hit could be characterized as a
chilling, modem day version of the
Prometheus myth. Kiefer Sutherland,
along with Julia Roberts and Kevin
Bacon, star as part of an ambitious
group of medical students who dare to
breach the infamous "undiscovered
country" to bring back the secrets/
meanings of life, death, and the after
life.
Foltowing the successful deaths
and resurrection s, each character finds
that he/she has not only brought back
a glimpse of the "other" side but, the
horrors that have manifested them
selves from their sins. Having reached
into the realm once held sacred by
religion and philosophy, they must
search for their own catharis through
atonement and redemption.
Under the direction of Joel Schu
macher (also of The Lost Bovs fame)
and Production Designer Eugenio
Zanetti, Flatliners is a visually pro
vocative and lyrically symbolic film.
Much of the action takes place in an
atmosphere surrounded in darkly lit
Gothic and Greek architecture while
"shielded" from overhead by ubiqui
tous frescoes of angels and the ethe
real. Suggesting the pull between the
light and the dark forces of the world,
Sutherland and the others find them
selves caught in the middle - frantic
ally searching for the answers to
worlds they are not meant to under
stand.
MPAA Rating: R
Running Time: 111 mins.