A UC Berkeley report on vagrancy laws in LA, how parents can help kids adjust to Daylight Saving Time, the man behind the voice of 'Chappie.'
Report finds California cities increasingly 'criminalize' homeless
Last Sunday, police shot and killed a homeless man in the city's Skid Row. There have been ongoing questions about the identity of the man and what exactly transpired on the scene. But the incident has put a spotlight on how the police and the public interact with the homeless population in Los Angeles.
A recent study from the Policy Advocacy Clinic at the UC Berkeley School of Law analyzed vagrancy laws and found that California cities have more anti-homeless laws on the books than other parts of the country. It also found that L.A. and San Francisco have more of these laws than other California cities.
Lindsay Walter, a second year law student and a co-author of the report, joined Take Two to discuss the findings of the report.
US mortality rates increase for white women
A new report from the Urban Institute found that the morality rate for white women in the U.S. has increased. To find out what might behind the increase, we called up Laudan Aron, senior researcher at the Urban Institute and one of the report's author.
Will 'Frozen Fever' lead to 'Frozen' burnout?
Next week, beloved "Frozen" sisters Anna and Elsa will return to movie theaters in a short animated film called "Frozen Fever," a spinoff from the 2013 musical blockbuster.
It's no surprise Disney won't "let it go" -- the "Frozen" franchise rakes in more than $1 billion in annual retail sales. Case in point: In November, Disney said it sold 3 million role-play dresses.
But does the company run the risk of a "Frozen" burn out? Reporter Shan Li, who wrote about this for the LA Times, shares her thoughts.
'Maps to the Stars' writer Bruce Wagner's life informed his dark take on Hollywood
Director David Cronenberg's new film "Maps to the Stars" explores the darker sides of Hollywood and holds little back.
- A child actor emerges from rehab, even though he's just 13 years old.
- A fading star, played by Julianne Moore, can barely contain her glee when another actress' young son drowns, because it means that she can now take on a role she's been dying to play.
- A young chauffeur played by Robert Pattinson, boasts about the handful of celebrities he's had the chance to meet.
The film was directed by David Cronenberg but written by Bruce Wagner, who grew up in Beverly Hills and had firsthand experience with Hollywood types himself.
He recently took time to speak with Take Two's,
about the film and his life in tinseltown. The Q&A below is taken from theinterview.
The film made the film industry seem so depraved and so disgusting. What was it like when you were growing up in Beverly Hills as a kid?
I refer to it as my Norman Rockwell period, or my Norman Rockwell town. It was a small town. ... There was a 24-hour coffee shop in the Beverly Wilshire hotel, where I used to pick up the Variety for my father, and I'd see Groucho Marx there and Tony Curtis. And I went to school with kids who were celebrities and kids who were the children of celebrities. And so that world is not foreign to me at all.
It's not Norman Rockwell town anymore, is it?
Well, you know, with Kardashian world. And now the Internet, which lets us know in real time where celebrities are eating, it's a different world, of course.
For me, many things did not change, and that was the extremity of human behavior. David and I did not set out to write a satire of Hollywood or a commentary. Or an expose of the morés and manners of people's behavior in show business.
We were writing a kind of fever dream that drew more from the playwrights August Strindberg and Joe Orton than it did from movies such as "The Player" or "Mulholland Drive." We wanted to make our "Sunset Boulevard."
I've always felt that "Sunset Boulevard" was a movie about artistic sellout and how a man allowed himself to become kind of a gigolo and destroyed himself in the process. "Sunset Boulevard," the original script, I met with Billy Wilder when I was working with Oliver Stone on a project, and that script begins in a morgue with all of the cadavers telling each other how they wound up in the morgue. So it's very much a ghost play as well. That was very inspiring for me when I found that out.
Bruce, the characters in this film seem at times almost too over the top to be true. How did you walk the line representing Hollywood and the just utter shallowness of it all, without it becoming too stereotyped?
I kind of have an old-school definition of satire. For me, satire is Monty Python. ... It's an extreme and unrealistic exaggeration that illuminates or throws light on the truth.
In "Maps," we did not want to do that. It was naturalistic for me that people are extremist and speaking in such a way — off the cuff and candid and terrified — was for me something that did throw light on the truth. So [Julianne Moore's] character really speaks the truth. ... It's unsavory the way that she speaks it, but she's very honest. Brutally so. And it's not pleasant to listen to or to watch, but she holds nothing back.
For the actors in this film, what was their reaction to playing these sorts of characters? Because this is their world, right? I've got to imagine that they're thinking, "Oh, this isn't me, but I know a lot of people like this."
Well, they were thrilled. I mean, John Cusack saw a lot of his experience in Evan Bird's character, Benjie Weiss. ... And John related to that a lot. And John is quite savage in his own critique of Hollywood and the business in which he grew up in that he relished it.
His character was a celebrity therapist, which is a species unto itself. I think everyone had great fun. And it's always great for an actor to inhabit a role of a character that says and does things that are extreme. You know, I think that that's what actors enjoy doing, so I think everyone had a really rollicking good time, as one might say.
The film isn't just about the movie stars, but also about the whole kind of species of people, the constellation around these stars. The agents, the masseuses, the personal therapist. John Cusack plays this self-help guru that works with Julianne Moore's character. Can you describe your experience with people like this in real life?
Well, it's a kind of rancid ecosystem. You know, celebrity shrinks are not immune to the virus of their famous clients. ... As rigorously professional as therapists may claim to be, there's this seduction involved. So much of Hollywood and celebrity and fame is seductive.
You know, I kind of amended [Andy] Warhol's quote that "In the future, everyone will be famous for 15 minutes" to "In the future, which is now, everyone will be famous all the time." And I think that that world where one is at the beck and call, or on the other side. ... It is a vast and complex ecosystem that is now sponsored by TMZ, essentially.
So everyone feeds the other, and it's a massive food chain that's in a loop. So part of "Maps to the Stars," we, of course, showcase that. But, in the end, "Maps to the Stars," as David and I wanted it to be, was an exploration or exhumation of a dysfunctional Hollywood family.
You have on your hand, a tattoo of maps and stars. Why?
When we finished the film, David gave me a gift, and it was a 1936 map to the stars that was Beverly Hills. And there's a section of it that was important to me as a boy, because I was raised in Beverly Hills.
I lived on a few of the streets that are depicted on it. So I have a number of tattoos on my body, and I added this last one to my writing hand because it contains the history of my psycho history, so to speak, and also geographic history of where I was raised. So it shows the streets that were near and dear to me and the path that the bus tours took and the little red stars marked the houses. And it also, from a distance, looks skeletal. The streets look like bones. So I thought, in the forth trimester of my life, why not?
Have trouble getting your kid to sleep? You're not alone.
This weekend marks the beginning of Daylight Saving Time. You may be looking forward to longer nights filled with light, but to parents of young kids, time changes can be a bit of a nightmare. As can teething, growth spurts, traveling, the list goes on and on.
But there are people you can turn to for help. Heather Turgeon and Julie Wright are authors of the new book "The Happy Sleeper."
Turgeon and Wright joined Take Two to offer some tips for getting little ones to sleep.
To listen to the full interview, click the link above.
EXCERPT:
"The Happy Sleeper: The Science-Backed Guide to Helping Your Baby Get a Good Night’s Sleep"
Introduction
Do any of these “scenarios” sound familiar?
You feed or rock your baby until she’s fast asleep, lower her gently into her crib, and tiptoe out of the room. Two hours later, she’s awake and calling for you.
It’s past bedtime, but your toddler runs when you try to put pj’s on him, breaks down in tears over brushing teeth, and summons you back into the room repeatedly for more water, another song, and different stuffed animal configurations.
You have to lie down with your little one until he falls asleep, which can take up to forty-five minutes and, sometimes, you doze off, too.
Your baby will only nap in the stroller, car, or with you carrying her.
Your child stays up too late and you suspect he’s not getting enough sleep, but you can’t figure out how to get him into bed earlier.
Your child calls out to you at night and needs you to sleep with her, or to join you in your bed.
You and your partner are so exhausted you can barely function, much less be present or happy with your baby during waking hours.
Sleep is a basic building block of your family’s health and happiness— just like good food and regular exercise. Sleep is about as natural as it comes; in fact, kids are literally built to do it. Their brains are programmed to develop good sleep from the time they’re babies.
Your child wants to sleep; and with the right patterns in place, her natural abilities will surprise you. Naptime, bedtime, and sleeping through the night—they don’t have to be a big struggle or a source of anxiety. As easy as it is to disrupt sleep and create unhealthy sleep habits, it’s achievable and often quick to get back on the right track. Consider this scene:
You help your baby wind down after her last feeding. You give her a bath and put on her pj’s. After a few stories, a few cuddles, and a song, you kiss her good night, lower her into her crib, and leave the room. Your happy sleeper rolls over, grabs her lovey, moves into a comfortable sleep position, and drifts off until the next morning. You have time to yourself to eat dinner, read a book, or spend time with your partner before going to bed and getting a full night’s sleep.
Your baby already knows how to sleep.
Our clients are always shocked when they hear this. They’ve been breaking a sweat rocking their baby into a deep slumber, waking up every 2 hours to feed throughout the night, or wringing their hands in frustration with a wide-eyed, nap-resistant toddler.
But it’s true. Sleep is a basic action that babies are naturally born to do. Their bodies crave healthy sleep, and their brains are wired for it. By five or six months of age, almost all babies are capable of sleeping well without much assistance from Mom or Dad.
So why do so many families struggle at night? The answer is that most parents do what works today, don’t notice when it’s no longer needed tomorrow, and then keep pushing even harder when it’s become a hindrance the day after that. They work overtime with all kinds of fanfare and tricks to put their babies to bed. We’ve heard it all: parents feeding, rocking, and bouncing on a yoga ball for 45 minutes every night, lying down with kids, re-tucking and re filling water glasses endlessly—one couple even told us they found themselves putting on a full music show with guitars, singing, and lights every night before bedtime.
Over time, parents’ “helping ways” overshadow their baby’s natural sleep abilities. Children get confused as to whether they or their parents are doing the soothing, and parents aren’t sure when and how much to back off so their little ones can take over the job. The Happy Sleeper is the guide to doing just that. We will give you a clear, easy-to-follow system for transferring the role of independent sleep to your baby or child, as we’ve done for thousands of families in our practice. If you’re consistent in how you apply the methods in this book, your baby or child’s sleep will improve dramatically within one to two weeks.
Good Sleep Is in Their Genes
Kids don’t need to be trained to sleep; they’re built to sleep. Think about it: sleep is like other areas of development, and you know how quickly your baby learns. Within a year, a baby can sit, pull to stand, and maybe take her first steps. She understands language and soon she’ll speak in sentences. Almost overnight, she’s a master in all realms.
So why should sleep be any different?
But over and over in our practice, we see that it is. Children take off in their motor, social, cognitive, and language skills, while sleep skills stall and even decline as the months go on. It’s a common course for little kids—they show robust, thriving development in all other domains but actually regress in their ability to sleep.
In the early months, this happens when a soothing technique like nursing or rocking to sleep works and becomes your go-to habit (and we don’t blame you!). The problem is that while newborns often need these soothing devices, they outgrow this need quickly as their natural self-soothing abilities grow—sometimes within a matter of days or weeks. With toddlers and kids, the same idea applies. We know that they can sleep, but milestones and life transitions (learning to climb out of the crib, starting preschool, or having nightmares) rock the boat just enough to warrant a new trick (like lying down with the child until they doze off) that kids quickly become reliant on.
As parents get stuck in a habit of soothing their little one to sleep, it masks the child’s natural abilities and makes it look as if she can’t sleep on her own. Imagine your child was capable of walking, but you still carried her everywhere instead of letting her practice this new skill! This overhelping is the crux of family sleep problems. Eventually parents become exasperated, while baby’s sleep potential has actually been stifled.
Why We Wrote This Book
We wrote this book to help solve a dilemma. Over and over in our parenting groups, we’ve seen moms and dads work diligently to be responsive and nurturing around sleep, only to become frustrated, exhausted, and confused as their baby’s sleep gets worse instead of better. These parents feel stuck, and many reach the end of their rope and turn to a harsh, shut-the-door-and-don’t-go-in approach.
We know that sleep is a natural, hardwired function that shouldn’t be so difficult. As clinicians who follow science and new thinking on child development, we realized why sleep was stumping so many families—it’s the same overhelping or “helicopter parenting” dilemma that parents find themselves in elsewhere. Logic tells us (and research confirms) that overhelping doesn’t work: When we do things for our babies and kids that they are capable of doing for themselves, it keeps them from developing to their potential (in this case, their sleep potential). The problem is that, as parents, we don’t know how to stop overhelping, while still being warm and supportive to our kids.
The topic of baby sleep needs a fresh perspective. It’s been bogged down in old-school notions like “training” and misunderstandings of basic concepts like attachment. In this book, we take an integrated approach that is sensitive, simple, and truly effective. We don’t want anyone suffering sleep deprivation unnecessarily, nor do we ever want a baby to feel alone or fearful. Happily, neither of these ever needs to happen.
Dawn spacecraft arrives at dwarf planet Ceres
Early this morning, the Dawn spacecraft was captured in orbit around Ceres, a dwarf planet 3.1 billion miles away from earth.
The mission was seven and a half years in the making for NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory and marks the first time a spacecraft has ever achieved orbit around a dwarf planet.
For more on this mysterious, alien world, Host A Martinez spoke with Professor Christopher Russell, Dawn's principal investigator and the man who proposed the mission to NASA 15 years ago.
Since its discovery in 1801, Ceres has suffered an identity crisis, but now it has finally found its place in the sun.
“Ceres got demoted several times and the IAU (International Astronomical Union) came along and demoted Pluto just a few years ago, but they really promoted Ceres because Ceres now became a planet again even if it was only a dwarf planet, ” said Russell.
Dawn has captured several images of Ceres from the time it began its approach to the dwarf planet last December. A few of those images revealed some unexpected things.
“We were surprised. We expected to see a cratered surface... but we discovered at least a couple of spots that are really bright... it’s very, very small so we can’t resolve what it is. We don’t know whether there’s a mountain of ice or a skating rink or a pile of snow," said Russell.
Though scientists know with certainty that Ceres is wet, the next goal is to figure out whether the water is frozen or liquid floating underneath the surface. Russell hopes that they can resolve this question with higher resolution images expected next month.
“In late April, when we get into that preferred orbit that we are trying to work our way towards, we will point cameras at the planet and then it will rotate under us and we will do that from different vantage points. We’ll get a look at the whole planet and then start looking for the various exciting things down on the surface." Said Russell.
For a more in-depth explanation of Dawn and its journey to Ceres by Mission Director, Marc Rayman, see the video below:
'Chappie' star Sharlto Copley reveals how he brought a robot to life
"Is artificial intelligence, if it came to be, as valid as human intelligence?" That's a question asked by Sharlto Copley, the star of
latest movie, "Chappie," which opens Friday.
South African director Blomkamp ("District 9") reimagines what artificial intelligence could be in "Chappie," which explores what happens when a robot, originally designed to fight crime, is reprogrammed to learn and begins its life in a newborn state.
In the following clip from the film, Chappie is being taught to behave more like a gangster by his adoptive father, Ninja. Yes, that's
from Die Antwoord, playing a version of himself in Blomkamp's film.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pG8mCC1ZQ1g
While you might never see his face, the voice and movements of Chappie are all acted out by Copley, who's appeared in two of Blomkamp's previous films, "Elysium" and "District 9."
He joined Take Two's A Martinez to talk about "Chappie."
How does your role in "Chappie" differ from the rest of your work with Neill Blomkamp?
"The most notable difference is, you don't see me. It's a process called performance capture. I really love it, because I love character acting. And this is like the ultimate disguise or prosthetic you could imagine. ... I act all the scenes with the other actors on the set, just as you normally would, wearing a special kind of tracking suit. And then the animators painstakingly animate, frame by frame, over me afterwards, down to every single finger movement. And it creates a really magical character. Something that really is integrated into the scenes. ... In this case, it was more studying just what the character was going to be that I was doing. You know, I'm playing, really, a child most of the time."
You're playing this child in essence that's growing up right in front of us. Where did the decision to create a robot with human emotions come from? Where did that start from?
"One of the big questions that the film asks, 'Is artificial intelligence, if it came to be, as valid as human intelligence?' You know, is an artificial life form as valid as we are? And it was a fascinating exploration into that idea.
I'd grown up, for example — I think a lot of us did — with films that would show any kind of computerized artificial intelligence as something that would most likely think humans are idiots and kind of just start killing us. And this film explores the idea of, if you had, for example, a genius IQ, as an artificial life form would be, does that mean that you wouldn't be emotional?
And Neill [Blomkamp] opts, in this case, to say, 'No. No. You would.' In the sense that, if I can calculate logically that it doesn't make sense for people to kill each other, for example, well, that would then allow me to be more compassionate and more human, almost, towards other life forms on the planet. You know? So it was a very interesting balance between intellect and emotion in this character and how those two work together."
The character, Chappie, since he's almost a blank slate, as an actor is that a challenge? Is that freedom to basically build him from scratch?
"It's fantastic. It's one of the best experiences I've ever had as an actor for that exact reason. Essentially, I'm playing from a baby to, ... I mean, he gets to about 10, 11 years old in his emotional maturity, and then, obviously, like a beyond-genius IQ. And a lot of, like, reacting from the characters around him.
He has these two parents. He has this creator, played by Dev Patel, who wants him to write poetry and paint pictures. And then he has this — sort of through a series of entertaining events — he ends up with a kind of a stepfather, played by Ninja from Die Antwoord, who is a gangster and wants to use Chappie to commit carjackings and armored car heists. And Chappie has to kind of choose the road that he wants to go down and the behavior that he wants to adopt."
Did anything change for you when the portrayal from Chappie went from an innocent to maybe more mature? Maybe a little evil in some ways?
"The interesting part for me was dealing with how much you would have the ability to control your own behavior in the case of playing something that is an artificial intelligence. Meaning that Chappie doesn't have the old brain survival instincts that humans have.
A lot of activities, or actions that human beings take, seem to come from very primal old brain kind of functions. Like, we know that it doesn't make sense to kill each other. We know it doesn't make sense to destroy our planet, but we just keep doing it anyway.
So we opted to sort of have this thing where Chappie would have some of those experiences. He would start to feel anger or revenge or greed or those things, but he would have, without that old brain automation, automated behavior almost. You know, you hit me, and I just hit you back. He would have a little bit of that, but then he would probably have the ability to go, 'But why? Why do you hit me, and why do I hit you? And if I keep hitting you, you keep hitting me, and then it's just a cycle that continues, so, actually, I'm going to stop hitting you.'"
Will there be a sequel?
"When [Neill] originally pitched it, you know, ... he was kind of planning to do more than one from the beginning, which he didn't do with 'District 9,' for example, which is kind of primed for a sequel. ... So, yeah, I guess we'll have to see what happens."
If you ever get on the dance floor, can you dance the robot?
"Can I dance the robot? Dude, I'm from Africa, I can dance anything!"
Etsy IPO latest sign of changing culture at DIY site
Over the past decade, Etsy has become the most popular online hub for handmade goods - from crocheted snoopy baby booties to hats which will transform your chihuaha into a rainbow-maned unicorn.
It has lots of buyers - almost 20 million in the past year, according to Etsy. Last year they spent almost 2 billion dollars on the site.
Despite that, Etsy has been running at a loss for the last three years.
Now the privately held company has filed for an initial public offering - meaning you too could soon own a slice of their e-commerce pie.
But what might this mean for the more than one million sellers on the site?
Amy Roth joins the show with more. She's been selling her ceramic jewelry from her LA home on Etsy since 2007
Southern California man buys boat John Steinbeck sailed in Sea of Cortez
A Southern California geologist, John Gregg, recently purchased the Western Flyer - the boat used by John Steinbeck in his voyage of the Sea of Cortez with marine biologist Ed Ricketts.
Steinbeck's 1951 nonfiction book, "The Log from the Sea of Cortez" was based on his experience with the boat, which has gone into disrepair for decades and was set to be chopped into pieces and displayed in a restaurant.
John Greggs stepped in a few weeks ago to purchase the boat. He plans to restore it to its former glory, bring it back to Monterey Bay and use it for educational purposes, possibly to recreate Steinbeck and Rickett's original journey.
Irvine teen talks competition at Intel Science Talent Search
The Intel Science Talent Search is a place some teens who love science aim for. Jennifer McCleary, 17, of Irvine, is one of 40 finalists in this year's competition.
Weekend on the cheap: Festival of the Kite, 'Back to the Future' art, $2 brunch
Angelenos, our sunny SoCal weather is back.
Close those laptops and turn off the tablets (after you read this) because there's plenty to do in real life this weekend.
SCPR's Kristen Lepore shares some of the top things to see and do this weekend including a kite fest in Redondo Beach, "Back to the Future" art, $2 brunch and PaleyFest.