WEBVTT - From the Archives: Rory Kennedy Puts The Spotlight on Boeing 0:00:00.680 --> 0:00:04.600 Hey, it's Alec. We all love true crime podcasts, but 0:00:04.760 --> 0:00:08.720 perhaps you're looking for something a little different, less murder, 0:00:09.000 --> 0:00:12.680 more intrigue. I invite you to check out a new 0:00:12.720 --> 0:00:17.000 podcast I just released called Art Fraud. It's the true 0:00:17.000 --> 0:00:19.959 story of one of New York City's oldest and most 0:00:20.000 --> 0:00:23.360 trusted galleries dealing in world class art, and how its 0:00:23.400 --> 0:00:27.360 doors would close forever in the wake of an unprecedented scandal. 0:00:28.280 --> 0:00:33.960 The art market is ripe for cons because it's inherently subjective. 0:00:34.600 --> 0:00:37.479 I just couldn't even look at it because it was 0:00:37.680 --> 0:00:42.159 so garish and so not by rothco. 0:00:43.200 --> 0:00:46.279 We're talking about eighty million dollars in fake paintings, or 0:00:46.560 --> 0:00:51.680 more precisely, forgeries. All episodes of Art Fraud are available 0:00:51.840 --> 0:00:58.240 right now. Okay, here's our show. This is Alec Baldwin, 0:00:58.560 --> 0:01:02.840 and you're listening to Here's the Thing from iHeart Radio. 0:01:03.480 --> 0:01:07.880 My guest today comes from the most legendary of American families. 0:01:08.640 --> 0:01:12.640 Rory Kennedy is the youngest daughter of Senator Robert F. 0:01:12.760 --> 0:01:16.160 Kennedy and the niece of President John F. Kennedy. But 0:01:16.360 --> 0:01:19.720 as she will tell us during our conversation, she's also 0:01:19.880 --> 0:01:23.800 one of the great Kennedy Women. Instead of following her 0:01:23.840 --> 0:01:28.120 forbearers into law or politics, Kennedy has made a name 0:01:28.160 --> 0:01:32.200 for herself as a documentary filmmaker. Her films feature a 0:01:32.240 --> 0:01:36.480 wide range of subjects, from surfing legend Laird Hamilton to 0:01:36.680 --> 0:01:41.720 challenging issues like poverty, addiction, and mental illness. In her 0:01:41.800 --> 0:01:46.880 current film, She's tackling corporate corruption. That film, Downfall, the 0:01:46.959 --> 0:01:51.320 case against Boeing, investigates the circumstances that led to two 0:01:51.520 --> 0:01:56.720 tragic passenger jet crashes in twenty eighteen and nineteen. Rory 0:01:56.800 --> 0:01:59.920 Kennedy and I talk about her remarkable upbringing and he 0:01:59.840 --> 0:02:03.480 how the people she's encountered in her life have influenced 0:02:03.640 --> 0:02:04.600 her trajectory. 0:02:05.440 --> 0:02:09.160 I think it's hard to detach anybody from how they 0:02:09.200 --> 0:02:12.400 grew up, right, I mean, that's such an influence and 0:02:12.520 --> 0:02:15.840 impact on who you become. And certainly that was the 0:02:15.880 --> 0:02:19.440 case with me. I grew up, you know, the youngest 0:02:19.440 --> 0:02:24.280 of eleven and in obviously a very political family, and 0:02:24.840 --> 0:02:29.000 I was impacted by that. I mean I was also surrounded, 0:02:29.520 --> 0:02:33.400 my mother made a point of this by really extraordinary 0:02:33.480 --> 0:02:36.800 role models, you know, when we had such a the 0:02:37.080 --> 0:02:41.720 honor of meeting, whether it was you know, presidents or 0:02:42.080 --> 0:02:46.280 congressman and senators, or people like Nelson Mandela and Desmond Tutu, 0:02:47.000 --> 0:02:50.680 you know who were in our homes, and also some 0:02:50.720 --> 0:02:56.040 of the great athletes and you know NASA astronauts. I mean, so, 0:02:56.560 --> 0:02:59.960 I think it was a life where we were surrounded 0:03:00.280 --> 0:03:05.080 by people who created a sense of aspiration and to 0:03:05.680 --> 0:03:07.799 try to make the world a bit of a better place. 0:03:07.960 --> 0:03:10.400 Now, what would you say though that, as you're making 0:03:10.440 --> 0:03:15.880 a film, do you have protocols, rules, tenets, whatever word 0:03:15.919 --> 0:03:17.679 you want to use, where you sit there and say 0:03:17.680 --> 0:03:19.600 that's not something I'm going to do. That's influenced by 0:03:19.600 --> 0:03:22.280 the way your family's been treated. If you're making a 0:03:22.280 --> 0:03:24.600 film and let's say some aspect of a story, there's 0:03:24.600 --> 0:03:29.080 a very kind of scandalizing, tawdry. When to shy away 0:03:29.080 --> 0:03:30.760 from that is the way you guys have been attacked 0:03:30.760 --> 0:03:31.560 from time to time. 0:03:31.680 --> 0:03:36.400 I think I have certain sensitivities. For example, with Downfall, 0:03:36.440 --> 0:03:40.080 the case against Going, there's three hundred and forty six 0:03:40.120 --> 0:03:43.560 people who died, and there are the family members who 0:03:43.840 --> 0:03:47.680 are related to those people, some of whom we talked 0:03:47.680 --> 0:03:50.960 to in our film, And I was definitely thinking, well, 0:03:51.000 --> 0:03:53.160 how is it going to be for these folks to 0:03:53.240 --> 0:03:57.120 watch this film, right, And I've had to see scenes 0:03:57.200 --> 0:03:59.360 over and over again that play themselves out on the 0:03:59.400 --> 0:04:02.480 news that are very upsetting to watch about my family 0:04:03.200 --> 0:04:07.080 dying right and being killed, and I didn't want to 0:04:07.160 --> 0:04:10.040 subject them to that. But I also wanted to make 0:04:10.240 --> 0:04:15.000 a film that was impactful. We do cgi recreations of 0:04:15.080 --> 0:04:17.000 what it was like to be in the cockpit so 0:04:17.040 --> 0:04:20.320 that we could really help people understand the perspective of 0:04:20.360 --> 0:04:23.480 the pilots in these planes and what they were struggling 0:04:23.520 --> 0:04:27.119 with with the MCS system. And you know, but I thought, 0:04:27.400 --> 0:04:29.400 how are these folks going to watch this film? So 0:04:29.480 --> 0:04:32.719 when I sent the film to them before it's coming out, 0:04:33.160 --> 0:04:35.640 I highlighted all the sections that I thought would be 0:04:35.680 --> 0:04:38.560 hard for them to watch, so that they could be 0:04:38.640 --> 0:04:41.560 aware of that and go into it and decide to 0:04:41.560 --> 0:04:45.000 watch those sections or not. So, you know, maybe I 0:04:45.040 --> 0:04:49.359 have some sensitivity and moments like that. I think the 0:04:49.520 --> 0:04:54.080 types of films I choose generally tend to be political 0:04:54.120 --> 0:04:57.760 in nature and tend to, you know, I hope when 0:04:57.760 --> 0:05:01.039 people watch these films, whether it's this or a film 0:05:01.120 --> 0:05:05.080 about Vietnam the final days of the war, film about 0:05:05.120 --> 0:05:10.000 Abu grabe that we learned from them, and we learn 0:05:10.120 --> 0:05:16.480 from watching these stories and hopefully make better choices moving forward. Right, So, 0:05:16.560 --> 0:05:19.120 I think the choices of the films I make are 0:05:19.200 --> 0:05:21.360 certainly impacted by the family I grew up in. 0:05:21.680 --> 0:05:24.480 It's interesting that you mentioned that. And this is only tangential, 0:05:24.520 --> 0:05:28.000 but remember being invited years ago Clinton was in the 0:05:28.000 --> 0:05:29.800 White House. I was invited to the White House to 0:05:29.839 --> 0:05:33.520 a screening of the movie The Paper by Ronnie Howard, 0:05:33.920 --> 0:05:36.000 and I'm sitting in a seat in the theater and 0:05:36.040 --> 0:05:38.560 the woman to my right, who's sitting next to me, 0:05:38.720 --> 0:05:40.719 A gun goes off in the middle of the film, 0:05:41.240 --> 0:05:44.520 and that woman grabbed my arm and gasped this huge 0:05:44.640 --> 0:05:46.040 gasp when the gun went off. 0:05:46.080 --> 0:05:50.040 It was your mom, right, So you know there's me. 0:05:50.000 --> 0:05:53.480 To this day's she's not prepared for that. 0:05:53.560 --> 0:05:56.480 Yeah, those sounds. Yeah, so there's trauma related to that 0:05:56.560 --> 0:05:56.960 for sure. 0:05:57.600 --> 0:06:00.440 Now to get to the film. So I watched this film, obviously, 0:06:00.520 --> 0:06:04.440 and I was mesmerized. Congratulations by the way, I mean, 0:06:04.800 --> 0:06:08.359 you came to the Hampton's Film Festival. Every year a 0:06:08.400 --> 0:06:10.120 film of yours comes and we all look at together 0:06:10.160 --> 0:06:13.880 and we're like, can we really invite her again? Do 0:06:13.880 --> 0:06:17.080 we bringing rored out to Eastampton again? I mean, isn't 0:06:17.200 --> 0:06:19.279 enough enough? I mean, how much more can we shine 0:06:19.279 --> 0:06:21.680 her up here? But we loved your film about your mom. 0:06:21.720 --> 0:06:23.479 We're going to get to that later. I loved Last 0:06:23.560 --> 0:06:25.880 Days of Vietnam. That was a great I'm not just 0:06:25.880 --> 0:06:29.800 saying this, that's a great movie. Great movie really just 0:06:30.040 --> 0:06:33.240 you what film can do and the spirit of what's 0:06:33.279 --> 0:06:36.880 happening and understanding that those moments that you did a 0:06:36.880 --> 0:06:41.040 great job. Now, this film made me angry. This film. 0:06:41.120 --> 0:06:44.280 I was pissed off because only one guy I think 0:06:45.080 --> 0:06:48.240 is criminally charged, correct, that's correct, and that we identify 0:06:48.320 --> 0:06:51.640 that person, Mark Forkner, And he was in charge of 0:06:51.680 --> 0:06:52.279 what is bowing. 0:06:52.680 --> 0:06:56.800 He was a pilot, a test pilot, and he was 0:06:57.400 --> 0:07:01.280 you know, he really wasn't responsible for what end and 0:07:01.360 --> 0:07:04.520 a lot of people feel like he was scapegoaded because 0:07:04.600 --> 0:07:08.120 he was really in charge of making sure, you know, 0:07:08.160 --> 0:07:11.680 he was testing the plane. And then he played a 0:07:11.800 --> 0:07:15.640 role in keeping the MCS system away from the regulators 0:07:16.080 --> 0:07:19.560 and that's documented and there's proof of that, and so 0:07:19.760 --> 0:07:23.080 they followed up with that. But you know, Congressman Defasio, 0:07:23.200 --> 0:07:28.560 for example, led the Congressional investigation into what happened the 0:07:28.560 --> 0:07:33.040 biggest investigation the Infrastructure and Transportation Committee's history. And he 0:07:33.200 --> 0:07:37.160 concluded that this was really top down right, that the 0:07:37.200 --> 0:07:42.440 top group in management at Boeing was very aware of 0:07:42.520 --> 0:07:45.680 the MCS system, that there was a concerted effort to 0:07:45.960 --> 0:07:50.720 keep the system away from the regulators, to hide the system, 0:07:51.000 --> 0:07:53.520 and to cut corners along the way, and that there 0:07:53.600 --> 0:07:56.600 was you know, it was a culture of concealment, is 0:07:56.640 --> 0:07:59.000 what he calls it. So I think that there are 0:07:59.040 --> 0:08:01.840 a lot of people who feel like the folks who 0:08:01.840 --> 0:08:07.040 are most responsible have yet to be held accountable. And 0:08:07.160 --> 0:08:10.400 there's been no criminal charges, and you know, Lahllenberg walked 0:08:10.400 --> 0:08:11.120 away with. 0:08:11.200 --> 0:08:13.840 The head of Boeing, the head of Boeing sixty something. 0:08:13.560 --> 0:08:15.239 That sixty two million dollars. 0:08:15.840 --> 0:08:18.920 So you know, I think after you've kind of watched 0:08:18.920 --> 0:08:23.520 the film and really understand all the decisions that the 0:08:23.600 --> 0:08:27.960 management at Boeing made along the way to prioritize profit 0:08:28.280 --> 0:08:31.880 over safety, that you know, when you understand the depths 0:08:31.880 --> 0:08:34.920 of those choices that I think many people like you 0:08:35.040 --> 0:08:36.000 are outraged. 0:08:36.559 --> 0:08:38.520 Well for people, I don't want to I want them 0:08:38.559 --> 0:08:40.160 to see the film obviously, but I want to give 0:08:40.160 --> 0:08:43.560 them just a taste of so Boeing wants to create 0:08:43.600 --> 0:08:45.199 I'll let you fill in the blank. So they want 0:08:45.240 --> 0:08:49.640 to create a fleet. They're losing market share, they're getting 0:08:49.679 --> 0:08:52.640 their hat handed to them by Airbus. Things are not 0:08:52.679 --> 0:08:54.959 looking good for Boeing, who have been dominant around the 0:08:55.000 --> 0:08:57.640 world for decades and then and were the pride of 0:08:57.679 --> 0:09:00.880 not just Seattle, but the United States as industry. And 0:09:00.880 --> 0:09:02.920 then the things start to go down from so they 0:09:02.960 --> 0:09:05.560 want to play ketchup and they want to produce a 0:09:05.600 --> 0:09:08.440 lower cost, more fuel efficient I think was the goal of. 0:09:08.360 --> 0:09:11.880 The seven seven seven thirty seven MAX. 0:09:11.960 --> 0:09:13.240 Got to get the word max in there. The seven 0:09:13.320 --> 0:09:16.200 thirty seven fuel efficiency was the goal. And then a 0:09:16.240 --> 0:09:18.280 part of this was the development of this system which 0:09:18.360 --> 0:09:20.520 was to help to so they don't make too steep 0:09:20.520 --> 0:09:23.960 a climb. A system takes over the plane and lowers 0:09:23.960 --> 0:09:26.000 the nose of the plane and forces the plane down, 0:09:26.280 --> 0:09:28.920 but doesn't shut off. It forces the nose of the 0:09:28.960 --> 0:09:30.840 plane down straight into the ground. 0:09:30.960 --> 0:09:32.920 Correct, Well, yeah, that's correct. 0:09:32.960 --> 0:09:35.440 There was there were concern at a certain angle that 0:09:35.480 --> 0:09:40.120 the plane would stall, and so they instead of changing 0:09:40.240 --> 0:09:42.679 the kind of structure of the plane and moving the 0:09:42.720 --> 0:09:46.320 engines and whatnot. They decided to fix it with a 0:09:46.320 --> 0:09:51.600 computer system, again in an effort to save money, it seems, 0:09:51.960 --> 0:09:56.760 and that computer system was connected to one sensor on 0:09:56.840 --> 0:10:00.280 the side of the airplane, like a weather van. And 0:10:00.360 --> 0:10:04.000 so if that sensor was damage, which happens off and 0:10:04.040 --> 0:10:07.160 gets hit by bird, something happens to it, it would 0:10:07.200 --> 0:10:10.880 send and this is what happened erroneous the information to 0:10:11.040 --> 0:10:13.800 the computer system. So it would tell the computer system 0:10:13.880 --> 0:10:16.440 that the plane was at a certain angle and you 0:10:16.520 --> 0:10:19.120 needed to push the nose down, But it wasn't at 0:10:19.120 --> 0:10:21.880 that angle. It was more at a flat angle, and 0:10:22.520 --> 0:10:25.360 not only would it push the nose of the plane down, 0:10:25.880 --> 0:10:28.240 but it would do it over and over and over again. 0:10:28.640 --> 0:10:32.040 Probably the most powerwing details you covered the film is 0:10:32.320 --> 0:10:35.079 and the pilots were not told about the installation of 0:10:35.120 --> 0:10:35.679 the system. 0:10:36.080 --> 0:10:36.680 That's correct. 0:10:36.720 --> 0:10:40.079 It's prior to the Line air crash, which was the 0:10:41.280 --> 0:10:46.760 first crash. The pilots were completely unaware that the system 0:10:46.880 --> 0:10:50.320 was even on the airplane, which was also kind of 0:10:50.360 --> 0:10:54.679 flew in the face of what had been the normal 0:10:54.960 --> 0:10:59.560 relationship between Boeing and pilots, which was to really educate 0:10:59.640 --> 0:11:03.480 and form pilots about everything training, you know, make them 0:11:03.480 --> 0:11:07.320 fully equipped to handle any situation that would happen. But 0:11:07.440 --> 0:11:10.720 in this case they in an effort to really keep 0:11:10.720 --> 0:11:14.640 this from regulators. Really, what was motivating them is that 0:11:15.120 --> 0:11:18.520 if they have a totally new system on the airplane, 0:11:18.960 --> 0:11:21.960 then they have to train pilots. And if they have 0:11:22.080 --> 0:11:25.040 to train pilots, it costs them a million dollars per 0:11:25.040 --> 0:11:28.320 an aircraft, you know, on average to train these pilots. 0:11:28.320 --> 0:11:32.080 So they wanted to again it seems save the money. 0:11:32.679 --> 0:11:36.880 And so instead of making people aware that this system 0:11:36.960 --> 0:11:40.239 was on the airplane, they made a concerted effort to. 0:11:40.080 --> 0:11:42.640 We're not even going to tell you about this machine 0:11:42.679 --> 0:11:45.840 we've installed, which, if it behaves badly, is going to 0:11:45.840 --> 0:11:50.000 crash the plane. Yes, and there's a manual override that 0:11:50.040 --> 0:11:52.400 they might have been able to activate. They could have 0:11:52.440 --> 0:11:54.760 gotten out of it, I guess if they'd had the training. 0:11:54.920 --> 0:11:58.480 If they had had the training. Except what we also 0:11:59.080 --> 0:12:01.720 discover and show case in the course of this film 0:12:02.280 --> 0:12:06.240 is a document that came out in twenty sixteen. It's 0:12:06.280 --> 0:12:09.840 called a coordination sheet that shows that if something went 0:12:09.920 --> 0:12:13.280 wrong with the system, that the pilots would need to 0:12:13.320 --> 0:12:17.520 fix it within ten seconds. Otherwise the power of the 0:12:17.640 --> 0:12:20.280 MCS system would overtake them if they didn't do it 0:12:20.320 --> 0:12:24.000 in ten seconds and the results would be catastrophic. And 0:12:24.080 --> 0:12:27.880 catastrophic in airplane language means the plane will crash and 0:12:27.920 --> 0:12:32.679 everybody will die. So you know, even if the pilots right. 0:12:32.800 --> 0:12:36.679 So in the second instance, in the Ethiopian airplane crash, 0:12:36.760 --> 0:12:40.440 the pilots were aware of the system, they did everything right, 0:12:40.640 --> 0:12:42.920 they did what they were told to do, and the 0:12:42.920 --> 0:12:46.920 plane still crashed. So you know if you don't and 0:12:47.400 --> 0:12:49.880 what you have to also remember, and this is why 0:12:49.920 --> 0:12:52.800 we also created the kind of the CGI recreation of 0:12:52.800 --> 0:12:57.000 what happens in that cockpit is there's this cacophony of 0:12:57.160 --> 0:13:00.800 sounds and error alerts that are all contradict each other 0:13:01.320 --> 0:13:04.840 that the pilots are trying to understand and navigate and 0:13:04.880 --> 0:13:07.160 figure out. Okay, this is saying where you know, the 0:13:07.280 --> 0:13:11.520 altitude is in disagreement, the airspeed is in disagreement, that 0:13:11.880 --> 0:13:15.400 all systems alert is on, the stick shaker is going, 0:13:15.960 --> 0:13:18.920 there's all of these alerts coming at them, and then 0:13:19.280 --> 0:13:22.400 with that they have to navigate. Okay, Well, what this 0:13:22.600 --> 0:13:25.600 all means is that I need to do these steps 0:13:25.640 --> 0:13:30.280 within ten seconds and otherwise this plane is going to crash. 0:13:30.440 --> 0:13:31.800 I mean, I don't want to go on a plane 0:13:31.880 --> 0:13:34.720 that is putting pilots in that position. I don't want 0:13:34.760 --> 0:13:35.840 to put my children. 0:13:35.760 --> 0:13:39.920 Face people are whose job who give anything to save 0:13:40.000 --> 0:13:44.400 the lives of their passengers. Think of something more unimaginable 0:13:44.440 --> 0:13:46.400 than to be on in the cockpit of a plane 0:13:46.720 --> 0:13:49.680 and the plane is behaving and not in some anomalous way. 0:13:50.120 --> 0:13:52.760 You see yourself hurtling towards the ground. It's like nine 0:13:52.760 --> 0:13:55.160 to eleven. Yeah, you're the plane's going into the ground 0:13:55.240 --> 0:13:57.480 and you're sitting there thinking what can and you don't 0:13:57.520 --> 0:13:58.200 know what to do? 0:13:58.520 --> 0:14:01.960 Yeah, right, it's completely funny. Maybe they're eating a turkey sandwich. 0:14:02.360 --> 0:14:04.760 You know, it does not like you're not there sitting 0:14:04.760 --> 0:14:08.000 there every on total alert for the entire plane ride. 0:14:08.040 --> 0:14:10.719 Well, before we get into the macro of your filmmaking, 0:14:10.760 --> 0:14:13.840 one more thing, I think you make it clear in 0:14:13.880 --> 0:14:16.480 the film the idea that this is a different Boeing. 0:14:16.520 --> 0:14:18.560 At this point, I thought it was fascinating how you 0:14:18.600 --> 0:14:21.280 talk about the move to Chicago. They moved the headquarters 0:14:21.280 --> 0:14:25.400 to Chicago for the purposes of distancing themselves from the influence, 0:14:25.880 --> 0:14:27.760 and I thought it was well that the influence was good. 0:14:28.080 --> 0:14:30.240 It was a nice battery. It was a nice exchange 0:14:30.240 --> 0:14:35.480 between Union's management, design and technology and the corporate And 0:14:35.520 --> 0:14:37.200 these guys are like, no, no, no, we don't want 0:14:37.200 --> 0:14:38.960 to be too close to those guys in Seattle. So 0:14:39.000 --> 0:14:40.680 we're going to move to Chicago so we can make 0:14:40.720 --> 0:14:44.320 our decisions in this bubble in Chicago. And it seems 0:14:44.360 --> 0:14:48.600 like what was a great company, that rare I mean, 0:14:48.800 --> 0:14:53.320 multi billion dollar enterprise that made big, expensive things that 0:14:53.360 --> 0:14:55.880 they were very proud of, that defined a city, and 0:14:55.920 --> 0:14:58.640 everything moves to Chicago, And it seems like that's part 0:14:58.680 --> 0:15:01.200 of the problem was once the that merger was made 0:15:01.240 --> 0:15:04.440 and they moved Chicago, that cost cutting thing becomes primary. 0:15:05.040 --> 0:15:07.720 I think that's right, you know, I think, like you, 0:15:08.400 --> 0:15:11.640 I love Boeing and what Boeing stood for in this country, 0:15:11.680 --> 0:15:13.840 and you know the history of Boeing, and we really 0:15:13.880 --> 0:15:17.760 celebrate that in the film because it's been an extraordinary 0:15:17.960 --> 0:15:20.920 company for decades. You know, it helped us get out 0:15:20.920 --> 0:15:23.360 of World War two, It helped build the fighter jets 0:15:23.480 --> 0:15:26.560 to win that war. It helped get us to the 0:15:26.560 --> 0:15:29.960 moon with my uncle Jack. I mean, they helped build 0:15:29.960 --> 0:15:34.800 those engines in the rocket ships, they helped people be 0:15:34.880 --> 0:15:37.760 able to travel all over the world for the first time, 0:15:37.880 --> 0:15:40.920 you know, with the seven forty seven and extraordinary accomplishment. 0:15:41.480 --> 0:15:45.480 So we wanted to celebrate that. And during those very 0:15:45.480 --> 0:15:49.240 early years and for many decades, Boeing did one thing, 0:15:49.320 --> 0:15:53.640 which was to say, we're going to prioritize excellence and 0:15:53.680 --> 0:15:56.680 safety and then the profits will follow. We're going to 0:15:56.760 --> 0:16:00.240 make the best planes possible, we're going to innovate, we're 0:16:00.240 --> 0:16:02.760 going to do new things, and we're going to think 0:16:02.800 --> 0:16:07.480 to the future. And then it changed hands, taken over really. 0:16:07.640 --> 0:16:12.320 I mean, one person we interviewed said somehow McDonald douglas 0:16:12.400 --> 0:16:16.240 bought Boeing with Boeing's money and the McDonald douglas people 0:16:16.280 --> 0:16:19.480 were put in charge, and they had a very different 0:16:19.480 --> 0:16:25.400 business model, which was very Wall Street focused and quarterly earnings, 0:16:25.960 --> 0:16:28.880 you know, And so they've made a series of decision 0:16:29.080 --> 0:16:33.640 corporate decisions to cut back on personnel whose job it 0:16:33.840 --> 0:16:38.400 was to ensure safety and put pressure on the folks 0:16:38.400 --> 0:16:42.000 who were building the planes to build them quicker and faster. 0:16:42.240 --> 0:16:45.160 And when people would complain about safety, that slows that 0:16:45.240 --> 0:16:45.880 process down. 0:16:47.640 --> 0:16:52.720 Documentary filmmaker Rory Kennedy, if you enjoy conversations about the 0:16:52.720 --> 0:16:56.440 making of documentary films. Check out my episode with British 0:16:56.440 --> 0:17:00.880 filmmaker Lucy Walker. Her documentary Bring Your Own Gate is 0:17:00.920 --> 0:17:04.520 an in depth look at California wildfires and their effect 0:17:04.760 --> 0:17:06.280 on local residents. 0:17:06.640 --> 0:17:08.359 What I want to understand is, well, how are we 0:17:08.440 --> 0:17:11.120 stopping it and why are people living in these areas 0:17:11.200 --> 0:17:14.479 and building these houses that burn over and over and 0:17:14.520 --> 0:17:17.320 over again. Could we do better? So you would think 0:17:17.640 --> 0:17:21.080 that when people look at developing an area for housing, 0:17:21.400 --> 0:17:26.760 they would think about fire safety, but nobody's actually thinking about, 0:17:27.000 --> 0:17:28.560 well are they going to be able to ensure these 0:17:28.600 --> 0:17:31.800 homes and who's going to pay if these homes burn down. 0:17:33.400 --> 0:17:36.800 To hear more of my conversation with Lucy Walker, go 0:17:36.840 --> 0:17:40.399 to Here's the Thing dot org. After the break, Rory 0:17:40.480 --> 0:17:44.440 Kennedy and I discussed the filmmakers who have influenced her work. 0:17:55.119 --> 0:17:57.800 I'm Alec Baldwin and you're listening to Here's the Thing. 0:17:58.520 --> 0:18:02.840 Filmmaker Rory Kennedy has made more than forty documentaries. Her 0:18:02.920 --> 0:18:06.600 work has earned an Emmy and several Oscar nominations along 0:18:06.640 --> 0:18:09.320 the way. I wanted her to share some of her 0:18:09.400 --> 0:18:11.800 process as a filmmaker. 0:18:12.440 --> 0:18:15.879 Well, you know, different people and companies work in different ways. 0:18:16.000 --> 0:18:18.800 I'm very hands on as a filmmaker, and I you know, 0:18:19.400 --> 0:18:22.399 I love to be doing all the interviews. 0:18:21.800 --> 0:18:24.160 And being in the edit room, and. 0:18:24.000 --> 0:18:26.800 So I don't take on a huge number of projects 0:18:26.840 --> 0:18:30.240 at any given time. And usually when I decide that 0:18:30.280 --> 0:18:34.280 I really want to do a particular project, I really 0:18:34.280 --> 0:18:37.080 try to make it happen. I was really committed. I 0:18:37.160 --> 0:18:40.640 felt like this story was so important, the downfall story. 0:18:41.640 --> 0:18:44.080 I think, like so many other people, I witnessed these 0:18:44.160 --> 0:18:46.960 two airplanes crashing within five months of each other, the 0:18:47.000 --> 0:18:50.520 exact same aircraft. Three hundred and forty six people died, 0:18:51.119 --> 0:18:55.000 and you know, I, like so many other people, fly right, 0:18:55.080 --> 0:18:58.440 and I felt like I want to know what happened, 0:18:59.040 --> 0:19:03.120 who knew what when, who is responsible for this? And 0:19:03.400 --> 0:19:05.600 I want to make sure that something like this doesn't 0:19:05.600 --> 0:19:09.960 happen again. But I also felt that, you know, during 0:19:10.000 --> 0:19:17.000 the last decades that America has been really prioritizing corporate interests, right, 0:19:17.560 --> 0:19:20.920 And so I think this film than usual. I think 0:19:20.960 --> 0:19:27.040 this film, I hope rises to something that's not just 0:19:27.200 --> 0:19:31.000 about these crashes, which is you know, as meaningful as 0:19:31.000 --> 0:19:33.560 it gets. But I think it touches on something else, 0:19:33.800 --> 0:19:39.080 which is the need to regulate, the need to balance 0:19:39.240 --> 0:19:44.240 out corporate interests making money, making money, making money, and 0:19:44.359 --> 0:19:47.280 the need to balance out with public interest right. And 0:19:47.440 --> 0:19:51.479 we've seen corporations like Gooing balances for many decades and 0:19:51.520 --> 0:19:55.800 do fantastically well. And I think that when that gets 0:19:55.840 --> 0:19:58.320 out of balance, it hurts everybody. 0:19:58.560 --> 0:20:00.840 So when you see someone like the fire the head 0:20:00.880 --> 0:20:02.880 of the committee, the guy that was the leading life 0:20:02.880 --> 0:20:05.360 there in the Congress, did he have as much integrity 0:20:05.880 --> 0:20:08.040 overall as it appears to be on screen? 0:20:08.200 --> 0:20:10.639 He's fantastic because you know as well as I do. 0:20:10.840 --> 0:20:13.440 You know, where are people in governments who care enough 0:20:13.440 --> 0:20:16.320 and they want to fight the way we're going. Like 0:20:16.600 --> 0:20:18.440 Boeing was a company you see, well, you understand you 0:20:18.440 --> 0:20:20.520 want people to make money and make profits. Boeing was 0:20:20.560 --> 0:20:23.159 doing quite well before. Sure they had a slump when 0:20:23.240 --> 0:20:25.560 Douglas took over. But what you find is not only 0:20:25.560 --> 0:20:27.120 do people want to make money, they want to make 0:20:27.240 --> 0:20:29.200 obscene amounts of money. They want to make an amount 0:20:29.240 --> 0:20:32.360 of money that they're looking at you like you're a child, like, well, 0:20:32.400 --> 0:20:34.600 you know, now, calm down, sunny, because there's a lot 0:20:34.600 --> 0:20:37.320 of money at stake here for us who run and 0:20:37.320 --> 0:20:40.440 own the company. And my point is is that for me, 0:20:40.920 --> 0:20:45.800 I'm always so sad. I'm always so impacted by government 0:20:45.840 --> 0:20:48.080 officials who don't have the guts to do their job, 0:20:48.840 --> 0:20:51.960 and the government's job is to mean. I watched people 0:20:52.000 --> 0:20:55.680 in testimony in hearings, and I think to myself, thank 0:20:55.720 --> 0:20:57.240 God I'm not there, because I would be looking at 0:20:57.280 --> 0:21:00.399 the heads of car companies or ol companies, going, you 0:21:00.400 --> 0:21:03.080 don't get it. You come here, you answer our questions 0:21:03.080 --> 0:21:06.040 on behalf of the American people. We have the authority, 0:21:06.440 --> 0:21:09.960 and I feel like that authority is not always employed effectively. 0:21:10.000 --> 0:21:11.400 You said, Defasio did a good job. 0:21:11.560 --> 0:21:15.359 He's amazing. I mean, he and his heart was so 0:21:15.480 --> 0:21:18.680 in the right place. But he was also dogged and 0:21:18.760 --> 0:21:21.479 he held these folks accountable. And you know when you 0:21:21.520 --> 0:21:25.120 see him in those congressional testimonies and chasing down every 0:21:25.119 --> 0:21:30.000 single document and you know, putting this report together, which 0:21:30.280 --> 0:21:34.800 took years in the making and is incredibly thorough. They 0:21:35.160 --> 0:21:38.400 go after bowing and they hold them accountable, and they're 0:21:38.640 --> 0:21:41.879 continuing to go after bowing. So I think there are 0:21:41.920 --> 0:21:45.479 a lot of extraordinary heroes who are celebrated, who are 0:21:45.520 --> 0:21:48.160 really on the front lines of this, whether it's Defasio 0:21:48.840 --> 0:21:53.080 or Michael Stumo who's the father of Samya Stummo who 0:21:53.119 --> 0:21:56.600 died in the Ethiopian plane crash and turned from a 0:21:56.680 --> 0:22:00.480 victim to really an advocate. And he, I mean, I 0:22:00.560 --> 0:22:03.160 just got off the phone with him yesterday and he 0:22:03.160 --> 0:22:05.760 he's not giving up on this. I mean, Boeing's thrown 0:22:05.840 --> 0:22:08.000 a lot of money at these families to get them 0:22:08.040 --> 0:22:12.320 to be quiet, and he is not going to be silenced, 0:22:12.440 --> 0:22:15.840 and he is continuing to you know, spread the message 0:22:15.880 --> 0:22:20.160 that that is that he has very continued concerns about 0:22:20.200 --> 0:22:23.440 the safety of the seven thirty seven Acts, the seven 0:22:23.520 --> 0:22:27.600 eighty seven Dreamliner. They just announced yesterday the FAA that 0:22:27.960 --> 0:22:29.919 I mean as though this should be news, but that 0:22:30.000 --> 0:22:32.800 the FAA is going to actually regulate Boeing and not 0:22:32.920 --> 0:22:34.800 let Boeing regulation regulating. 0:22:35.880 --> 0:22:40.400 So, you know, point to watch the film because that's 0:22:40.440 --> 0:22:43.760 another interesting point about how when I was studying government 0:22:44.200 --> 0:22:46.560 at GW in the seventies, when I went down to 0:22:46.800 --> 0:22:49.080 Washington to go to school, and we talked about that, 0:22:49.119 --> 0:22:52.920 and we talked about how, you know, departmentalization, how people 0:22:52.920 --> 0:22:56.120 are in these departments, like presidents come and go we're 0:22:56.160 --> 0:22:58.879