Prince's legacy and how he pushed gender norms, Uber drivers remain independent contractors, how social media affects the way architects design for SoCal.
Signing of the Paris climate accord a historic first step
Earth Day is today, and this year it's a historic one.
Over 150 world leaders are gathered at the United Nations in New York to sign a landmark climate agreement.
The accord was adopted in Paris late last year, aimed at cutting global greenhouse gas emissions and slowing the warming of the planet.
Now countries actually have to meet those emissions targets.
Cara Horowitz, co-executive director of the Emmett Institute on Climate Change and the Environment at the UCLA School of Law, joined Take Two to explain what comes next after today's signing:
What makes the global climate accord so significant?
These countries agreed to a new international accord with the goal of keeping global warming to well below 2 degrees Celsius. And for the first time they agreed to a structure where every country around the globe pledges to reduce emissions. So this isn't like the predecessor to this agreement which is the Kyoto Protocol where only developed countries had obligations. The structure of the agreement has countries pledging every five years, and the content of those pledges is really self-generated.
How will countries be held accountable for their pledges?
It's really an agreement that works by naming and shaming in some senses. So countries come to the table, the make pledges about what they'll do, and then they report every couple of years about what they've achieved or what they haven't. But there's really no legal mechanism for forcing countries to cut emissions if they wouldn't otherwise do so. Instead it's really about incentives. There's a lot of funding on the table for example.
Today's signing is just a step in the process, right? What needs to happen next for countries to formally join the accord?
Countries are signing today. This is the largest number of countries that have ever signed an international agreement in one day. And by its own terms, the Paris agreement comes into effect when 55 countries representing at least 55 percent of global emissions have signed and ratified. And so they're signing today, in order to ratify, the countries need to actually formally submit the pledges that they're making.
When will that happen?
I expect that will happen quickly, so the Paris agreement I think is likely to come into effect in the next 30 days.
Where are we on the goal of bringing down pollution levels so that global temperatures don't rise more than 2 degrees Celsius above preindustrial levels?
So MIT and others have done analyses taking a look at the pledges that have been made in the aggregate under the Paris agreement so far and it looks like no. Somewhat not surprisingly, this first round of pledges by countries, even if countries were to achieve everything they've said they will achieve under their pledges, doesn't get us by itself to the 2 degree goal. It looks like maybe, if we're lucky, it would keep us to something like 3 or 3 1/2 degrees of warming. But even that by itself is significant.
This agreement, and the signing of this agreement, isn't success by itself, but lots of people think it's what the beginning of success probably looks like. If we're going to change global energy economies and transition to low carbon economies, this is how you start to do it.
If all these countries meet their goals, and continue to meet their goals, when do you think we could begin to see a change?
So Christiana Figueras, who is the Executive Secretary of the group that created this agreement, has compared the world's energy infrastructure to a huge tanker on the ocean. She says it doesn't turn on a dime, but it can be turned. It'll take maybe 50 or 60 years, people are looking at maybe the end of the century before we get to a place where we've decarbonized our economy. The problem with climate change is you still then have greenhouse gases in the atmosphere that live on for many many decades, and we continue to feel the effects of the warming created by those gases even after we've stopped emitting. So this is a long-term problem, it will take a while to solve, but this is definitely an important first step.
Ecuador earthquake: Residents and aid workers facing aftershocks, trauma
Almost a week after a 7.8-magnitude earthquake struck Ecuador, the death toll has now reached almost 600.
Aid workers are on the ground, but aftershocks and supply delays are hampering the efforts. People remain afraid.
"The aftershocks are still scaring the population, who are still pretty traumatized," said Javier Alvarez, director of strategic response and global urgencies for Mercy Corps.
Alvarez is on the ground in Manta, Ecuador. He joined host A Martinez with updates on efforts and conditions.
If you'd like to help, you can donate to Mercy Corps by clicking here.
To listen to the full interview, click on the blue audio player above.
Uber settlement with drivers a victory for the ride-hailing company, expert says
Uber drivers remain independent contractors — at least, for now.
Last night came the announcement that the ride-sharing company settled major class-action lawsuits here in California and Massachusetts.
U.S. District Court Judge Edward Chen must still sign off on the deal.
If approved, Uber will pay $84 million dollars to plaintiffs and another $16 million if the company goes public and meets individual goals. Roughly 385,000 drivers in the two states are expected to be part of the settlement.
For more on what this announcement means, Take Two talked to Harley Shaiken, a professor specializing in labor issues at UC Berkeley.
Press the blue play button above to hear the interview.
Prince showed black kids it was OK to be who they wanted to be
Music in the Eighties mostly fell into two camps - black or white. Yet the Purple One, Prince, blurred all kinds of lines: with his music, his sexuality ... and race.
Marc Bernardin is a film editor at the LA Times. On the day Prince died, he wrote a personal essay about how he, as an African-American teenager growing up in the 1980s , was impacted by Prince's music and his look.
He writes,"What David Bowie was to white kids who didn't fit in, Prince was to black kids. He gave young African Americans growing up in Harlem or St. Louis or Watts the license to be who they wanted to be, not what society thought they should be."
To listen to the whole interview Click on the Player above
Director of the 1984 film 'Purple Rain' remembers Prince
The world continued to mourn the passing of legendary musician Prince today.
Over the years, Prince adopted many different sounds and many different styles, but many fans first fell in love with him thanks to an incredible album and film, known as "Purple Rain."
The film came out in 1984 and starred Prince as a young musician on the rise to fame in Minneapolis.
The film was directed and written by Albert Magnoli, who was a relative newbie in the film world back when he was offered the opportunity to take the project on.
At the time, Magnoli says, Prince's manager Robert (Bob) Cavallo had been shopping around the script, but wasn't getting any takers.
Magnoli spoke with Take Two's Alex Cohen about what made him decide to take on "Purple Rain" and what it was like to work with Prince on the film.
Interview highlights:
On telling Prince's manager that the initial script wasn't right
"We sat down over a large breakfast [at DuPars in Sherman Oaks] and I explained to him that I knew nothing about the film industry except that I graduated from USC film school a year earlier, and was editing my first motion picture for MGM, and that essentially he had gotten caught in the web that was Hollywood at the time, and still is, whereby they did everything right except make the script authentic. And so I said unless this is coming from the heart, and unless this is going to be an authentic depiction of the life that's going on in Minneapolis with these musicians now, you don't have a chance."
On whether or not the film was about Prince's life story
"The interesting thing about the screenplay being about his life, that's actually not true. I had no idea about Prince's personal life, all I had at my disposal at the time that I sat down to write was what I had learned upon meeting him and what I had learned upon meeting the other musicians. He kept his life very quiet, very personal. My vision of the piece was simply that I recognized a tremendous amount of vulnerability in Prince, and essentially that vulnerability inspired what was essentially a story that I pitched to Robert Cavallo in DuPars, sight unseen of Prince at the time. But upon meeting Prince within 24 hours after I discussed a new story with Robert Cavallo I met Prince for the first time and was immediately struck by just how vulnerable and sensitive he was and also very dedicated, it was obvious... And I said to Prince that very night that I met him I said if you are willing to do what it takes emotionally to connect to what I'm about to write, then I believe we have the chance to do something special. He agreed and the next seven to eight weeks I sat and wrote what became 'Purple Rain.'"
On whether Prince lost his vulnerability as he gained worldwide fame
"Not at all. It was a part of his core. A lot of people discuss his shyness, and that he was a man of few words, and a lot of that was a result of the vulnerability. He was just very guarded, very dedicated to his craft. If he could do his craft, if he could perform, if he could write music, that was his wheelhouse, that's where he felt comfortable. When he had to do the things in the musical business world that were required of him, that was less appealing and as a result he was a bit reticent."
To hear the full interview with Albert Magnoli, click the blue player above.
Glam Slam West: Prince's club was the celebrity hotspot in the early '90s
While Prince fans around the world mourn his death, we remember his time here in Los Angeles.
Rewind to January 1993. The city was still recovering from the civil unrest of the L.A. riots. Excitement was brewing for the showdown between the Buffalo Bills and Dallas Cowboys at the Pasadena Rose Bowl for Super Bowl 27. And in downtown L.A., a new club debuted — and not just any new celebrity hotspot.
The grand opening of Glam Slam West was attended by the biggest names of the day: C+C Music Factory, Treach from the rap group Naughty by Nature, Evander Holyfield, Jamie Foxx then of "In Living Color," and actress Halle Berry.
In the early '90s, this club was the place to be — because it was co-owned by Prince.
Steve Edelson was the club owner who collaborated with Prince, and he joined Take Two to reminisce on Glam Slam's glory days and what it was like to work with Prince.
Interview Highlights:
On how involved Prince was:
"That was 100 percent Prince, what Glam Slam was going to look like... He wanted to have his own place in Hollywood because of, perhaps, his shyness or his desire to have his own space to do his music, or maybe the way he was treated at other nightclubs around the city... He made a deal with us to get half the club, and after we made the deal we pretty much lost control of the club..."
On his standout Prince memory:
"The Joffrey Ballet commissioned him to do the music for a ballet, and that was very important to him. It happened at the Dorothy Chandler pavilion. They turned the fountain purple that night. Pretty much everyone who was anyone in Prince's world went there, and that was just a wonderful night for him. His family was there and there was a big party afterwards..."
To hear the full interview, click the blue play button above.
'Elvis & Nixon': The story behind history's curious meeting
In December 1970, Elvis Presley decided he wanted to meet President Richard Nixon, so he and his buddy Jerry Schilling traveled to Washington, D.C. to make it happen.
The president's staff thought it might help boost their boss's popularity to be seen with such a huge celebrity, so they set up some time.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o9x3Z6b0Z1g
"Elvis & Nixon" is the new film starring Kevin Spacey as the president and actor Michael Shannon as the rock star. Director Liza Johnson joined host Alex Cohen with more.
Interview Highlights
On Michael Shannon not looking like Elvis:
"I think a lot of the times when people think of Elvis, there's this face of Elvis that's burned onto everyone's brain world-wide. And there isn't really anyone who looks like that, including, actually, Elvis in this period... and he goes on to transform even further. So for me, the likeness issue wasn't really what was at stake, because I don't think there is anyone that looks like Elvis. I can appreciate that maybe for some fans, that could be a hard thing to sort of get one's mind around but I thought that probably better than anyone I can think of, Michael Shannon is so good at disappearing into the depth of a character and I really did feel that he could handle the kind of unusually intimate treatment of Elvis. We always think about his sparkly, blingy surfaces, but it's rare that we actually ask ourselves, 'Well, what did Elvis want?' I thought Mike would be able to do that, and also, to play that through the comedy of situation."
On what the famous photo told Liza Johnson about the meeting between Elvis and Nixon:
"One of the things that I couldn't get out of my mind was the little bird sculptures in the background... I guess Nixon had a lot of bird tchotchkes. It's interesting how much you can learn about the characters from what stuff they have around them. It helped us think about the production design, which I think then is also meaningful in terms of character. And I guess for me also, their fashion really says something. Do you know where Nixon is wearing a somewhat unremarkable and maybe poorly-fitting business suit, and Elvis is wearing this incredible velvet number with a kind of capey jacket that wraps around his shoulders, and a big gold belt... So, for me, I think why people are interested in the photograph and why they're interested in the meeting in the first place which is that those men are coming from radically different worlds, you know, and where Elvis is flamboyant and emerging from a counter-cultural world and then Nixon is really trying as hard as he can to preserve the establishment against all the forces that don't like the establishment. And even if Elvis is proposing a lot of points of contact for them, I think in the images, there's no way that you can see those two icons without knowing that they don't represent the same thing, right? And so then, when you look at it, I think it's mysterious to think, 'Well how did they get to be in the same room, and why did they want to be there and what are those points of contact?' And I think you can actually see that in this still image."
To listen to the full interview, click on the blue audio player above.
Thousands volunteer to clean the LA River
The 27th annual Great LA River Cleanup, which takes place over three Saturdays in April, will bring about nine thousands volunteers from throughout the county to collect tons of trash in 15 different sites.
The event, organized by the environmental group Friends of the LA River, will be especially challenging due to with the rains from El Niño.
Shelly Backlar, vice president of the Friends of the LA River, spoke to Alex Cohen about the details.
To listen to the whole interview, please click on the player above
The future of Southern California architecture: Is it selfie-ready?
Los Angeles is one of the most picturesque cities in the world, with stunning beach views and iconic landmarks like the Hollywood sign.
But nowadays, there's another way to measure how beautiful a new building or vista is – how does it look on Instagram?
A new sculpture in Grand Park, for example, features breathtaking bronze angel wings that Curbed L.A. described as "selfie-ready."
It turns out, social media is having a real effect on the way architects and artists think about their craft as they design the next Broad Museum or Getty Center.
"There are moments in our buildings that people are really gravitating towards," says architect Alice Kimm with John Friedman Alice Kimm Architects. "The Instagram age and social media is bringing new life to cities through pictures that didn't really exist for outsiders before."
The honeycombed veil of the Broad Museum, for instance, has become a favorite background for people to selfie themselves up against.
Kimm says designers now consider how a building's placement or designated photo-op "stations" affect the way it looks on social media and, by extension, to the world.
"We are subconsciously thinking about how spaces can be reduced down to the scale of the person," she says.
The new Roberts Pavilion at Claremont McKenna College is one project by Kimm's firm, and the exterior was created with design in mind. Because it's so huge, however, it's hard for people to capture on film in a selfie.
Inside, however, is a graphic, textured wall that's smaller and allows both the design and people's faces to be clearly seen on camera – and Kimm thinks it will be more social media-friendly.
"It might well become the identifier for the building," she says, "more so than the objectified exterior which you can't capture in a selfie or photo of a person or group up close. "
As Los Angeles builds ambitious buildings and public works projects, how it looks to the world will be defined by selfie-ready architecture.
"The city is less abstract, now, because we can get to know a city through the millions of images online that don't necessarily have to do with landmarks," says Kimm.
What are your favorite buildings in SoCal to post about? Tweet us @TakeTwo!
Here are some of our own favorites.