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Stuart Gordon 1947-2020

March 27, 2020 at 2:05 pm / Blog

Stuart Gordon has died. In most of the obituaries you will read today, he will be largely (and justifiably) remembered for his film work. He came out of the gate with a classic in Re-Animator (1985), which was the first of many features he made for Charles Band’s Empire Pictures (rebranded as Full Moon Entertainment). If none of the follow-ups can quite claim to have caught the debut’s lightning in a bottle, each nevertheless brought to the screen a combination … Continue reading →
“Here is A Man Who Stood Up”: An Afternoon With Ed Paschke

March 2, 2020 at 4:08 pm / Blog

A Chicago Lost and Found event hosted by Paul Durica, with Jamie Ceaser, Jason Nargis, and Tom Palazzolo in person! Sunday, March 8th, 2020 3:00-5:00pm Ed Paschke Art Center 5415 W Higgins Ave, Chicago, IL 60630 Free, but RSVPs already full! “Here Is a Man Who Stood Up” is an immersive experience that uses archival objects, never-before-seen footage, and one-time-only re-stagings to animate the life and work of lifelong Chicago artist Ed Paschke. Paschke (1939-2004) was known for his dark version … Continue reading →
A Chorus for the Young at Heart

February 14, 2020 at 5:31 pm / Blog

Archival videos shine light on everyday human qualities. Here are two short ones from Media Burn that portray the kind of couples we all know—they’ve been together forever. They know the good things in life. The first is by Maxi Cohen in 1991 on the Jersey shore where her family lived. They appeared on Episode 304 of The 90’s. The second couple, the Falkenburgs, lived in a Chicago seniors’ apartment building a few blocks from Wrigley Field. Footage is taken … Continue reading →
Happy Birthday Bill Veeck, Renaissance Man

February 9, 2020 at 4:56 pm / Blog

This Sunday, February 9th, would be the 106th birthday of one of sports, Chicago’s and our personal heroes, Bill Veeck (1914-1986). The Media Burn Archive has close to 300 videos about and with the baseball Hall of Famer who owned baseball teams in Milwaukee, Cleveland, St. Louis and Chicago (twice). But his life and wisdom went far beyond sports. He wrote five books, had his own radio and TV shows for 40 years and did thousands of speaking engagements. Like many … Continue reading →
Testimony to a Tradition

January 29, 2020 at 3:28 pm / Blog

42 years ago Marty and Frank Kapugi celebrated their 50th anniversary of playing tamburica music in the United States. This 25-minute documentary created by Mirko Popadic and Gordana Trbuhovich in 1979, highlights the two days of festivities with interviews, speeches and fantastic music.
Searching for the Mountaintop

January 17, 2020 at 3:36 pm / Blog

The power of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.’s life—his clarion oratory skill, his burning prophetic demand for racial and economic justice—tremors through the consciousness of our society today. Yet the urgency of his message and radical call to action, it could be said, proved not just from the transformative clarity of his vision but in the way this vision defied the proximity of death’s shadow. “Each morning as I brush my teeth and wash my face,” King would say, according … Continue reading →
Home for the holidays? Dig out those old tapes!

December 30, 2019 at 10:33 am / Blog

Hanging out at home for the holidays? Why not rummage around in the attic or basement to find your old video tapes and bring them to Home Video Day! Attendees are invited to bring a tape to be projected for the audience, or to simply show up and enjoy what’s on the screen. Videos will run the gamut from birthdays, parties, pageants, weddings, sports, movie re-enactments, to who knows what! We invite you to laugh and cry at the touching … Continue reading →
You are part of the Media Burn family

December 27, 2019 at 9:38 am / Blog

Dear friend, We’re writing to you from our fourth-floor office in River West, looking out over a mostly empty city on this dreary gray day. It’s quiet except for the occasional Metra commuter train zipping by, the bells of St. John Cantius, and the clicking of computer keys. That faint tapping is the only evidence of the work we do every day at Media Burn. This isn’t just a “job” to us. We’re part of a small family here at … Continue reading →