Author: JaniaJania

Band of Brothers at 20: Revisiting Dick Winters

Here it is the twentieth year anniversary of Band of Brothers, and the interest in this great series has, surprisingly, gotten only greater. Such a complete portrait of a rag-tag bunch of newbie soldiers out on the mission of a lifetime, told thru the halcyon Spielbergian lens, seen never before and never since. Quipped today to my blog mates that the series demands a rewatch soon. Perhaps a project for the sixteen year anniversary? Until then, let’s revisit Dick Winters once again. Enjoy!

Damian Lewis’ first role as an American was in the role of Dick Winters in Spielberg/Hanks’ Band of Brothers. (Fun fact: the title Band of Brothers is taken from Shakespeare, from Henry V’s speech to his troops: “We few, we happy few, we band of brothers; For he to-day that sheds his blood with me Shall be my brother”)

Source: HBO
Source: HBO

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A Lesson in Rhetoric: Damian Lewis as Antony

To be filed in the category of “This is a guy who makes you want to go back to school”, we learned and reported (on our lovely sister site damian-lewis.com) that Damian’s version of Antony’s funeral speech from Julius Caesar, for The Guardian’s video series Shakespeare Solos, was featured in a seminar on rhetoric. This wasn’t an avenue for literary criticism or drama theory, but a newsletter on effective public speaking.

How is speaking any different from writing and reading, you may wonder? Well, there are components to classical rhetoric, when dissected, can show you what makes one speech different from another. Such an analysis would reach your brain (or at least attempt to). Alternatively, we can talk about how a speech makes you feel. Granted we’re not seeing much great oratory from our current elder statesmen, so examples are few and far between. But, there was a time, wasn’t there? In our not too distant history, when a leader spoke, it did a heart good to hear, didn’t it?

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Following Footsteps of Damian in London

Taking inspiration from Vicky’s fun retelling of walking in the footsteps of Milo Shakespeare, here’s me walking in some of the footsteps taken by Damian in his home town. Enjoy!

Gotta love it when a passing thought from one post leads to an entire new fully-fleshed-out post. I had remarked, during my two-week tour in London, I was reminded often of places I’d seen Damian in images and film. In particular, when I was walking from Shakespeare’s Globe west towards Blackfriars Bridge along the Thames Path I looked down to the river and saw the moss covered walls where Damian and Helen leaned and loafed for a photoshoot, as well as the pier under which Hector made a phone call in Our Kind of Traitor.

That bit of Proustian mind-wandering lead Damianista to the thought, “Hey, why not do a post where we follow along in Damian’s footsteps throughout London?” “Isn’t that a bit stalkery?” I worried. “Nah,” we both concluded. Happily, Damian knows we are the most harmless variety of stalkers he could ever have. So, here it is, a catalog of all the places and sites where we “saw” Damian, characters he’s played, and stories he’s been a part of in his beloved home town.

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Throwback Thursday to Damian Lewis in Bill : Comedy for Kings and Kids Alike

Anything that can render history and literature accessible to the masses plus get children excited about learning is a winner in my book. Combine that with cameo appearances by Damian Lewis and Helen McCrory and what you’ve got is a must-see treat.

The comedy, Bill, put together by the folks who do the BBC series Horrible Histories, is a good example. The film imagines what may have happened during William Shakespeare’s “Lost Years”, the time during which he transformed from a married father of three in bucolic Stratford to the greatest dramatist of all time in London.

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TOP Damian Lewis Moments 2020: Theater of War UK – Philoctetes

Whenever I’m compelled to watch or read or listen to something out of our place and time, something “foreign”, I’m sent back to ninth grade, to when I first learned to read. No doubt I’d been deciphering the alphabet strung into words and sentences long before I turned 14, but ninth grade is the time, I think, when we really learn to read, if given the chance. To look at meaning between the lines, find the metaphors and the messages connecting one story to another to yet another and then back to ourselves.

And I’m brought back to my ninth grade teacher asking us “why do we read?” Maybe she was provoked by someone sighing too loudly at an assignment or maybe even muttering under their breath “why do we have to read this stuff?” She asked the question of us all and waited. Someone likely said “to pass this class so we can get into college” or “to write the paper, take the test, get the grade.” These answers didn’t satisfy her, so she waited and asked us again “why do we read?”

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