prompt_front: Answer the question based on the given passages. Only give me the answer and do not output any other words.

Question: Are Werther and The Odyssey both operas?

The following are given passages.
Context 1: Passage 1:
Encounter with Werther
Encounter with Werther (German: Begegnung mit Werther) is a 1949 West German historical drama film directed by Karl-Heinz Stroux and starring Horst Caspar, Heidemarie Hatheyer and Paul Klinger  It is based on the writing of the 1774 novel The Sorrows of Young Werther by Johann Wolfgang von Goethe  It was released to commemorate the writer's second hundredth birthday in August 1949 
It was shot at the Bavaria Studios in Munich and on location in Limburg, Wetzlar and Marburg an der Lahn 
The film's sets were designed by the art director Paul Markwitz 

Cast
Horst Caspar as Werther
Heidemarie Hatheyer as Lotte
Paul Klinger as Albert
Rudolf Reiff as Amtmann as Lotte's Father
Paul Dahlke as Napoleon
Walter Kottenkamp as Goethe
Fritz Odemar as Graf
Harald Mannl as Gesandter
Christiane Felsmann as Frl  von Bassenheim
Arthur Mentz as Bauernbursche
Friedrich Siemers as Schreiber Heinrich
Karl Lieffen as Bediensteter Bursche
Passage 2:
Piano Quartet No  3 (Brahms)
The Piano Quartet No  3 in C minor, Op  60, completed by Johannes Brahms in 1875, is scored for piano, violin, viola and cello  It is sometimes called the Werther Quartet after Goethe's The Sorrows of Young Werther  The premiere took place in Vienna on November 18th 1875 to an anxious public  Richard Wagner and his wife Cosima were in attendance 

Structure
The quartet is in four movements:

Analysis
First movement
The first movement is a sonata-form movement in C minor in triple meter  It begins with the piano playing bare octaves on C  The violin, viola, and violoncello then play the first theme, consisting of two sighing gestures of a descending minor second, followed by a descending theme  Some have speculated that the sighing motive is a musical utterance of the name "Clara", in reference to Clara Schumann, the composer, pianist, and lifelong friend and love interest of Brahms  More clear is Brahms's transposed version of Robert Schumann's "Clara theme", found in various pieces such as his Bunte Blätter, Op  99 (1841), on which both Clara and Brahms wrote sets of piano variations  The Clara theme (C–B–A–G♯–A, often transposed: here E♭–D–C–B–C) was first detected by Eric Sams in his essays and books on Schumann and Brahms  In his 1971 essay “Brahms and his Clara Themes”, Sams writes on the “Clara content” in op  60: “The first sentence of that autobiographical work is doubly expressive of Clara  Furthermore, there is direct evidence that this melodic form actually embodied her, for Brahms as for Schumann ”After the first statement of the theme, the piano plays octaves on B♭  The opening motives, again played by the strings, becomes more chromatic and unsettling, until finally coming to rest on the dominant of C, G major  The viola and violin play pizzicato octaves on E♮ before the strings cascade down the C harmonic minor scale that ushers in the first theme, stated forte  After a brief development of this theme, an ascending gesture based on sixteenth-notes alternating between the notes of a minor second serves as the transition to the second theme in the relative major of C minor, E♭ major  This second theme is an uplifting eight-measure theme stated initially in the piano alone  Brahms then uses the technique of theme and variations to construct four variations on this theme, each eight measures long  A short idea based on the opening theme closes the exposition, which is not repeated 
The development section begins by restating the theme from measures 32–35 in E♭ minor  This moves to B major for a new fortissimo idea (perhaps a variation) based on the same theme  The quartet's opening sighing motives become developed in an E minor passage that incorporates a triplet figure on the second beat of the measure, and eventually the previous B major idea is restated identically in G major  The second theme from the exposition is then treated in imitative (almost canonic) counterpoint in C minor  After the beginning of the third contrapuntal treatment of this theme, a dominant pedal is sustained in octaves on G  This resolves unexpectedly to an A♭ major chord that is quickly brought down to C minor by the opening sighing motive in the piano 
The sighing motive indicates the beginning of the recapitulation  Rather than affirming the tonic of C minor, however, Brahms takes the recapitulation in a different direction: the opening section again ends on a dominant pedal on G with the violin and viola playing pizzicato octaves on E♮, but the E♮ is used to turn the music to E minor  Chromatic descent is employed to bring the music to a half-cadence on D, leading to the second theme in G major  This is perhaps the only sonata form movement in the minor mode in which the recapitulation features the second subject in the key of the major dominant  The second theme is first stated by the viola, which is then followed by three new variations (the first being played by the violin, the second and third by the piano), and one of the same variations as the exposition  A fifth variation leads to a short digression in C major but becomes chromatic and ends with a development the first theme, coming to a cadence on C  This is followed by a brief coda that expands on the first motives heard in the piece  Nevertheless, the key of C minor is arguably not clearly established by the recapitulation (the key signature of C minor is present at the end of the movement for less than two complete pages)  The movement ends with a clear tonic–dominant–tonic perfect cadence, stated piano  The expansive and exploratory nature of the movement, along with the quiet closing dynamic, helps make the conventional final cadential progression appear mysterious 

Second movement
The second movement is a tempestuous scherzo (ternary form) in compound duple meter in C minor, the same key as the first movement  Donald Francis Tovey argues that Brahms puts the scherzo in the same key as the first movement because the first movement does not sufficiently stabilize its own tonic and requires the second movement to "[furnish] the tonal balance unprovided for by the end of the first movement " Although it is the shortest scherzo of Brahms's piano quartets, it is formally and tonally very complex 
The movement begins with an opening motif of a descending octave on G and a rising minor second to A♭ stated by the piano, followed by a falling diatonic line accompanied by the strings  The first theme, which clearly derives from the opening motif, is immediately by the solo piano played after this and Brahms uses the technique of developing variation to expand this theme  Most melodic ideas can be traced to the opening motif or the ascending minor second of the opening motif, which, notably, is the inversion of the descending sighs of the introduction of the first movement  This scherzo is very chromatic and unstable tonally, although it does actually move to a secondary phrase on the dominant and returns to the tonic with frequency  The scherzo ends with a pedal on the tonic C minor 
The middle section is not demarcated by the title of trio as are the middle sections of the scherzi from Brahms's previous two piano quartets  Moreover, this middle section serves more as a section of contrasting material than as a structural contrast—it maintains the same key signature, time signature, and tempo as the scherzo, is not musically marked off in any clear way, and even develops the same themes as the scherzo  One may argue whether it is in fact a trio at all, as nineteenth century composers knew it  Nonetheless, the middle section begins with a new theme, an ascending line in quarter notes in the strings, accompanied by a descending triplet figure played by the piano  This instrumentation is soon reversed and earlier themes from the scherzo become further developed  The transition back to the scherzo develops and rhythmically diminishes the opening motif of the scherzo and is the most chromatic, rhythmically complex, loud, and dramatic section of the movement  The scherzo is repeated almost entirely, however, the section immediately preceding the tonic pedal is omitted and replaced with a climactic dominant chord in a very high register in the strings, ending with a tierce de picardie on C major with three loud declamations of the tonic major chord 

Third movement
The Andante is in a modified ternary form: ABCA′ with a coda  This is the only movement of the quartet that is not in C minor, and it is in the key of E major, a remote key in the context of C minor  This can be explained by its origin as the slow movement to a piano quartet in C-sharp minor, which Brahms revised and published as Op  60 in C minor  The key of E major is easily explained in the tonal context of C♯ minor, but the key choice of this movement was not revised as was the first movement; it should also be noted that the slow movement to Brahms's Symphony No  1 in C minor is also in E major 
The Andante begins with a luscious melody played by the violoncello in its upper register (Theme A) with only the piano as accompaniment, clearly inspired by Schumann's Piano Quartet, where a similarly sumptuous melody opens the slow movement  The opening thematic material of this melody is a sequence of descending thirds, a gesture frequently used by Brahms (such as in his Op  119, No  1, and the opening to Symphony No  4, to name two examples)  The violin eventually joins in with a new melody over the cello  The viola enters later with a tutti descending stepwise idea  The A section, which is itself in a sort of AAB form, ends in the conventional dominant key of B major 
The B section (in ABAB form) begins with a syncopated ascending stepwise melodic line in the violin to be played molto dolce (Theme B)  The piano begins to gain prominence with a distorted version of the opening cello line, played symmetrically across the piano (Theme C)  Another theme developed in the B section is a falling line with dotted rhythms (Theme D) 
The third section begins in B major but is highly chromatic  The piano plays a version of Theme B in broken octaves under consistent eighth-notes played by the violin and viola  This figure ends with a version of Theme C in broken octaves in the piano  This alternates with the string section, which develops Theme C  The piano rejoins and develops Themes C and D with the strings in E minor, but soon the violin plays Theme D over the other strings  At this point, the strings alternate with the piano, which plays Theme D in an unstable harmonic palette in broken octaves, while the strings play a combination of Themes C and D  This passage of alternating instruments moves from E minor to C minor to G♯ minor back to E major in the reprise of the A section 
The only significant differences between the first and second A sections are that in the second, the piano moves in triplets, there is a full string texture almost entirely throughout (often using pizzicato), and the piano begins the theme (although it is soon replaced by the cello)  The coda is introduced by a new chord progression in the first tutti idea and by a solo cello line  Theme B is presented first by the viola and then by the violin, and the movement ends with the first measure of Theme A, stated first by the cello and then by the piano, concluding with a pianissimo affirmation of the tonic 

Fourth movement
The finale is a sonata-allegro in C minor in cut time with a secondary subject in E♭ major  The tempo is Allegro comodo and the exposition is repeated  The piano accompaniment for the first theme, stated immediately in measure 1, is derived from the opening piano line of Felix Mendelssohn's Piano Trio in C minor, Op  66, movement 1  Mendelssohn's Piano Trio also features a quotation of a chorale melody taken from the sixteenth-century Genevan psalter 'Vor deinen Thron tret ich hiermit' (“Before Your Throne I Now Appear”)  Vincent C  K  Cheung has also observed that the opening G–E♭ motion in the violin, coupled with the G–G–G–C in the piano greatly points toward the “Fate theme” in Beethoven's Fifth Symphony  Brahms's piece thus operates on multiple levels of reference (both literary and musical) and quotation 
The movement begins with the violin playing a theme above piano accompaniment  Both lines are separate themes that are developed individually throughout the movement, but they are similar in one major respect: both are constructed of three ascending notes preceded by a pickup, which go to a neighbor tone of the highest note and move back to that note  The essential notes of the violin theme are B–C–D–E♭–F–E♭, and the essential notes of the piano theme are: G–C–E♭–G–F♯–G (the rest of the piano theme is a descending sequence of ascending seconds: G–A♭–F–G–E♭–F–D–E♭)  Therefore, the violin line uses an upper neighbor tone while the piano line uses a lower neighbor tone  This is crucial for understanding Brahms's development of the thematic ideas of this movement 
The violin melody is halting and primarily diatonic, played over an energetic piano accompaniment  It moves from C minor to G minor, although it ends with a change of mode to G major  After this, the violin plays a descending stepwise melody, which under close inspection is revealed to be an inversion of its own original theme (from B–C–D–E♭–F–E♭ to G–F–E♭–D–C–B) in successive quarter notes  The viola and cello soon accompany this figure  This builds up until measure 39, where a thunderous theme erupts in all instruments  This moves quickly to an idea constructed in triplets  Tonally, this passage is in C minor, and the final progression ends with an alternation between B-diminished and A♭ major  The piano plays a broken A♭ major chord, followed by a broken A♭ minor chord that is used to make a transition to E♭ major 
The section in the relative major begins with a theme clearly composed from the theme of the piano's accompaniment, in this case stated by the violin and viola moving in unison over a piano accompaniment based on the previous broken chordal figure  This briefly exchanges with a cello countermelody  When the violin and viola soar to an unexpectedly high register, the piano interrupts by playing an explosive broken dominant seventh chord  The strings respond by a piano, homophonic, homorythmic theme to be played mezza voce (medium voice)  This idea is taken directly from the opening string theme of the first movement  Rather than accompanying this theme, the piano plays a descending broken chord after each utterance  The exposition ends in E-flat major, and Brahms indicates that it should be repeated 
The development begins with an exploration of the descending third that begins the violin's opening theme; when sequenced, this produces a series of descending thirds that recalls the opening theme of the third movement (G♯–E–C–A)  The piano accompanies this with its initial theme  Brahms quickly eliminates accidentals from the key signature as the piece progresses to D major and A minor  Interspersed are descending chromatic phrases played by the piano  In measures 117–118, the cello introduces a new four-note idea (E–F–D–E) played pizzicato underneath the piano  This idea is taken from the second half of the first piano theme (G–A♭–F–G)  The viola plays the opening of the piano's first theme, which resembles an inversion of the sequenced thirds developed moments earlier  Brahms repeats this pattern almost exactly, moving from A minor to E minor to B minor  In B minor, the piano develops its initial theme to a greater extent  This part of the development section is concluded by syncopated phrases by the viola and piano, which echo the second half of the piano's first theme in B minor 
Austrian musicologist and educator Karl Geiringer has shown that the next section (measures 155–188) is an insertion "in order to mitigate the excessive conciseness of this movement " Later insertions were atypical of Brahms because of his "striving after compression," and it seems that he "for once overshot the mark " The later addition explains the motion away from B minor, only to return to the key some thirty measures later  This section continues with the homorhythmic theme in G major, then in E♭ major  What follows is a quick (Tempo I) development of the initial piano theme in C minor, with all strings playing the opening four notes (moving in the often used progression i – I – iv)  This exact sequence is used again in the coda to turn the movement from the minor mode to major  A dominant seventh chord in C minor is used as a pivot chord to return to B minor (a similar progression is used in Brahms's Ballade, Op  118, No  3, in which a dominant seventh chord built on G moves abruptly to B major)  The violin develops its initial theme in B minor and then D minor with all three string instruments  The final notes of the theme (F–E♭) are sequenced and inverted repeatedly, recalling the significance of descending seconds in the first movement of this quartet  This moves from D minor to G minor to C minor  The end of the development section sees a very high and prolonged A♭, which parallels the end of the development section of the first movement 
The recapitulation, which reinstates the key signature of C minor, begins with the initial violin theme stated forte by all strings, accompanied by the piano playing broken octaves in triplets, outlining the main notes of its theme  After the first statement, the piano resumes its original accompaniment and the strings are reduced to a piano dynamic  This proceeds similarly to the exposition, albeit with the themes developed more extensively  Notably, the music turns toward G minor more strongly and the key signature changes to C major, as the relative major section from the exposition is in the tonic major in the recapitulation  The rest of the recapitulation is nearly identical to the exposition, ending in C major 
The coda begins at measure 311, with the piano loudly declaring the homorhythmic theme, alternating with the strings  The violin theme is then played by the strings in C major, but it soon shifts back to C minor (the key signature too returns)  The four-note idea from the development section comes back, this time with its first note removed  The chromatic descending scale in the piano, an abbreviation of the violin theme in the viola, the four-note theme, and the chord progression (i – I – iv) indicate that the coda draws more from the development section than from the exposition or recapitulation  The music quietly subsides into a tranquillo section in which the inversion of the violin theme (first stated in measures 21–22 from the exposition) is sequenced across the strings while the piano continues to develop its initial theme  The violin and cello eventually sustain the tonic C for a great amount of time while the piano and viola begin to lean toward the tonic major in a continuing I – iv progression  All instruments continue to die down as the piano plays one last descending chromatic scale, the violin and viola combine the piano's initial theme with the quarter note rhythm of the violin theme, and the cello sustains a low C  As the piano and strings reach their final notes, a C major chord stated pianissimo is held briefly, shining out of the mist  Two sudden forte C major chords complete this quartet 
Passage 3:
William Render
William Render (fl  1800), grammarian and translator, was a native of Germany  He was a fellow student at Giessen University with a brother of Charlotte (Werther's inamorata), and was well acquainted with Werther himself  In an appendix to his English version of Goethe's romance, Render relates a conversation he had with Werther at Frankfort-on-the-Main a few days before the latter's suicide Render was ordained to the Lutheran ministry  Subsequently he acted as 'traveling guardian to the son of a distinguished personage'  He then traveled in western Germany with 'several English gentlemen', one of whom may have been Francis, afterwards the Marquis Hastings, to whom, as Earl of Moira, he dedicated his Tour through Germany  Render came to England about 1790, and settled in London  He taught German and other languages 'in several families of distinction ' Towards the end of the century he also became 'teacher of German' at Cambridge, Oxford, and Edinburgh  In 1798 he published an English version of Kotzebue's play Count Benyowsky, which reached a second edition within the year  
In 1800, Render further translated The Robbers, Don Carlos, Maria Stuart, and The Armenian of Schiller  In the following year appeared his version of The Sorrows of Werther, the first translation into English made direct from the original German  In the preface he speaks of 'his friend the baron Goethe', whom he may have met at Frankfurt  Render's Tour through Germany, particularly along the Banks of the Rhine, Mayne, also appeared in 1801  A vocabulary of familiar phrases in German and English is annexed for the benefit of travelers  The remainder of Render's publications were educational manuals  The chief of these, A concise Practical Grammar of the German Tongue (1799), was very successful  
A fifth edition, corrected and augmented with improvements made by the Berlin Academy, was issued in 1817  As a token of his appreciation of the work, Alexander I of Russia ordered Woronzow, his ambassador in England, to present Render with a ring and an autograph letter  Render also published German Exercises, a Pocket Dictionary in English and German, and other manuals of instruction in German 
Passage 4:
Werther, North Rhine-Westphalia
Werther is a town in the district of Gütersloh in the state of North Rhine-Westphalia, Germany  It is located near the Teutoburg Forest, approximately 10 km (6 miles) north-west of Bielefeld  It is best known for the Werther's Original caramel sweets, which are nowadays produced in the nearby city of Halle  Werther has one Gesamtschule and one Gymnasium, which has an exchange partnership with a Yarm School, an independent school in Yarm, England 

People
August Oberwelland, entrepreneur, August Storck company founder
Passage 5:
Odyssey
The Odyssey (; Ancient Greek: Ὀδύσσεια, romanized: Odýsseia) is one of two major ancient Greek epic poems attributed to Homer  It is one of the oldest extant works of literature still widely read by modern audiences  As with the Iliad, the poem is divided into 24 books  It follows the Greek hero Odysseus, king of Ithaca, and his journey home after the Trojan War  After the war, which lasted ten years, his journey lasted for ten additional years, during which time he encountered many perils and all of his crewmates were killed  In his absence, Odysseus was assumed dead, and his wife Penelope and son Telemachus had to contend with a group of unruly suitors who were competing for Penelope's hand in marriage 
The Odyssey was originally composed in Homeric Greek in around the 8th or 7th century BC and, by the mid-6th century BC, had become part of the Greek literary canon  In antiquity, Homer's authorship of the poem was not questioned, but contemporary scholarship predominantly assumes that the Iliad and the Odyssey were composed independently and that the stories formed as part of a long oral tradition  Given widespread illiteracy, the poem was performed by an aoidos or rhapsode and was more likely to be heard than read 
Crucial themes in the poem include the ideas of nostos (νόστος; "return"), wandering, xenia (ξενία; "guest-friendship"), testing, and omens  Scholars still reflect on the narrative significance of certain groups in the poem, such as women and slaves, who have a more prominent role in the epic than in many other works of ancient literature  This focus is especially remarkable when contrasted with the Iliad, which centres the exploits of soldiers and kings during the Trojan War 
The Odyssey is regarded as one of the most significant works of the Western canon  The first English translation of the Odyssey was in the 16th century  Adaptations and re-imaginings continue to be produced across a wide variety of media  In 2018, when BBC Culture polled experts around the world to find literature's most enduring narrative, the Odyssey topped the list 

Synopsis
Exposition (books 1–4)
The Odyssey begins after the end of the ten-year Trojan War (the subject of the Iliad), from which Odysseus (also known by the Latin variant Ulysses), king of Ithaca, has still not returned because he angered Poseidon, the god of the sea  Odysseus' son, Telemachus, is about 20 years old and is sharing his absent father's house on the island of Ithaca with his mother Penelope and the suitors of Penelope, a crowd of 108 boisterous young men who each aim to persuade Penelope for her hand in marriage, all the while reveling in the king's palace and eating up his wealth 
Odysseus' protectress, the goddess Athena, asks Zeus, king of the gods, to finally allow Odysseus to return home when Poseidon is absent from Mount Olympus  Disguised as a chieftain named Mentes, Athena visits Telemachus to urge him to search for news of his father  He offers her hospitality, and they observe the suitors dining rowdily while Phemius, the bard, performs a narrative poem for them 
That night, Athena, disguised as Telemachus, finds a ship and crew for the true prince  The next morning, Telemachus calls an assembly of citizens of Ithaca to discuss what should be done with the insolent suitors, who then scoff at Telemachus  Accompanied by Athena (now disguised as Mentor), the son of Odysseus departs for the Greek mainland to the household of Nestor, most venerable of the Greek warriors at Troy, who resided in Pylos after the war 
From there, Telemachus rides to Sparta, accompanied by Nestor's son  There he finds Menelaus and Helen, who are now reconciled  Both Helen and Menelaus also say that they returned to Sparta after a long voyage by way of Egypt  There, on the island of Pharos, Menelaus encounters the old sea-god Proteus, who tells him that Odysseus was a captive of the nymph Calypso  Telemachus learns the fate of Menelaus' brother, Agamemnon, king of Mycenae and leader of the Greeks at Troy: he was murdered on his return home by his wife Clytemnestra and her lover Aegisthus  The story briefly shifts to the suitors, who have only just realized that Telemachus is gone  Angry, they formulate a plan to ambush his ship and kill him as he sails back home  Penelope overhears their plot and worries for her son's safety 

Escape to the Phaeacians (books 5–8)
In the course of Odysseus' seven years as a captive of Calypso on the island Ogygia, she has fallen deeply in love with him, even though he spurns her offers of immortality as her husband and still mourns for home  She is ordered to release him by the messenger god Hermes, who has been sent by Zeus in response to Athena's plea  Odysseus builds a raft and is given clothing, food, and drink by Calypso  When Poseidon learns that Odysseus has escaped, he wrecks the raft, but helped by a veil given by the sea nymph Ino, Odysseus swims ashore on Scherie, the island of the Phaeacians  Naked and exhausted, he hides in a pile of leaves and falls asleep 
The next morning, awakened by girls' laughter, he sees the young Nausicaä, who has gone to the seashore with her maids after Athena told her in a dream to do so  He appeals for help  She encourages him to seek the hospitality of her parents, Arete and Alcinous  Alcinous promises to provide him a ship to return him home without knowing the identity of Odysseus  He remains for several days  Odysseus asks the blind singer Demodocus to tell the story of the Trojan Horse, a stratagem in which Odysseus had played a leading role  Unable to hide his emotion as he relives this episode, Odysseus at last reveals his identity  He then tells the story of his return from Troy 

Odysseus' account of his adventures (books 9–12)
Odysseus recounts his story to the Phaeacians  After a failed raid against the Cicones, Odysseus and his twelve ships were driven off course by storms  Odysseus visited the lotus-eaters who gave his men their fruit which caused them to forget their homecoming  Odysseus had to drag them back to the ship by force 
Afterward, Odysseus and his men landed on a lush, uninhabited island near the land of the Cyclopes  The men entered the cave of Polyphemus, where they found all the cheeses and meat they desired  Upon returning to his cave, Polyphemus sealed the entrance with a massive boulder and proceeded to eat Odysseus' men  Odysseus devised an escape plan in which he, identifying himself as "Nobody," plied Polyphemus with wine and blinded him with a wooden stake  When Polyphemus cried out, his neighbors left after Polyphemus claimed that "Nobody" had attacked him  Odysseus and his men finally escaped the cave by hiding on the underbellies of the sheep as they were let out of the cave 
As they escaped, however, Odysseus taunted Polyphemus and revealed himself  The Cyclops prayed to his father Poseidon, asking him to curse Odysseus to wander for ten years  After the escape, Aeolus gave Odysseus a leather bag containing all the winds except the west wind, a gift that should have ensured a safe return home  Just as Ithaca came into sight, the sailors opened the bag while Odysseus slept, thinking it contained gold  The winds flew out, and the storm drove the ships back the way they had come  Aeolus, recognizing that Odysseus had drawn the ire of the gods, refused to further assist him 

After the cannibalistic Laestrygonians destroyed all of his ships except his own, Odysseus sailed on and reached the island of Aeaea, home of witch-goddess Circe  She turned half of his men into swine with drugged cheese and wine  Hermes warned Odysseus about Circe and gave Odysseus an herb called moly, making him resistant to Circe's magic  Odysseus forced Circe to change his men back to their human forms and was seduced by her  They remained with her for one year  Finally, guided by Circe's instructions, Odysseus and his crew crossed the ocean and reached a harbor at the western edge of the world, where Odysseus sacrificed to the dead  Odysseus summoned the spirit of the prophet Tiresias and was told that he may return home if he is able to stay himself and his crew from eating the sacred livestock of Helios on the island of Thrinacia and that failure to do so would result in the loss of his ship and his entire crew  He then meets his dead mother Anticleia and first learns of the suitors and what happened in Ithaca in his absence  Odysseus also converses with his dead comrades from Troy 
Returning to Aeaea, they buried Elpenor and were advised by Circe on the remaining stages of the journey  They skirted the land of the Sirens  All of the sailors had their ears plugged up with beeswax, except for Odysseus, who was tied to the mast as he wanted to hear the song  He told his sailors not to untie him as it would only make him drown himself  They then passed between the six-headed monster Scylla and the whirlpool Charybdis  Scylla claimed six of his men 
Next, they landed on the island of Thrinacia, with the crew overriding Odysseus's wishes to remain away from the island  Zeus caused a storm that prevented them from leaving, causing them to deplete the food given to them by Circe  While Odysseus was away praying, his men ignored the warnings of Tiresias and Circe and hunted the sacred cattle  Helios insisted that Zeus punish the men for this sacrilege  They suffered a shipwreck, and all but Odysseus drowned as he clung to a fig tree  Washed ashore on Ogygia, he remained there as Calypso's lover 

Return to Ithaca (books 13–20)
Having listened to his story, the Phaeacians agree to provide Odysseus with more treasure than he would have received from the spoils of Troy  They deliver him at night, while he is fast asleep, to a hidden harbour on Ithaca  Odysseus awakens and believes that he has been dropped on a distant land before Athena appears to him and reveals that he is indeed on Ithaca  She hides his treasure in a nearby cave and disguises him as an elderly beggar so he can see how things stand in his household  He finds his way to the hut of one of his own slaves, swineherd Eumaeus, who treats him hospitably and speaks favorably of Odysseus  After dinner, the disguised Odysseus tells the farm laborers a fictitious tale of himself 
Telemachus sails home from Sparta, evading an ambush set by the suitors  He disembarks on the coast of Ithaca and meets Odysseus  Odysseus identifies himself to Telemachus (but not to Eumaeus), and they decide that the suitors must be killed  Telemachus goes home first  Accompanied by Eumaeus, Odysseus returns to his own house, still pretending to be a beggar  He is ridiculed by the suitors in his own home, especially Antinous  Odysseus meets Penelope and tests her intentions by saying he once met Odysseus in Crete  Closely questioned, he adds that he had recently been in Thesprotia and had learned something there of Odysseus's recent wanderings 
Odysseus's identity is discovered by the housekeeper Eurycleia when she recognizes an old scar as she is washing his feet  Eurycleia tries to tell Penelope about the beggar's true identity, but Athena makes sure that Penelope cannot hear her  Odysseus swears Eurycleia to secrecy 

Slaying of the Suitors (books 21–24)
The next day, at Athena's prompting, Penelope maneuvers the suitors into competing for her hand with an archery competition using Odysseus' bow  The man who can string the bow and shoot an arrow through a dozen axe heads would win  Odysseus takes part in the competition, and he alone is strong enough to string the bow and shoot the arrow through the dozen axe heads, making him the winner  He then throws off his rags and kills Antinous with his next arrow  Odysseus kills the other suitors, first using the rest of the arrows and then by swords and spears  Once the battle is won, Telemachus also hangs twelve of their household maids whom Eurycleia identifies as guilty of betraying Penelope or having sex with the suitors  Odysseus identifies himself to Penelope  She is hesitant but recognizes him when he mentions that he made their bed from an olive tree still rooted to the ground  She embraces him and they sleep 
The next day, Odysseus goes to his father Laertes's farm and reveals himself  Following them to the farm is a group of Ithacans, led by Eupeithes, father of Antinous, who are out for revenge for the murder of the suitors  A battle breaks out, but it is stopped by Athena and Zeus 

Structure
The Odyssey is 12,109 lines composed in dactylic hexameter, also called Homeric hexameter  It opens in medias res, in the middle of the overall story, with prior events described through flashbacks and storytelling  The 24 books correspond to the letters of the Greek alphabet; the division was likely made after the poem's composition, by someone other than Homer, but is generally accepted In the Classical period, some of the books (individually and in groups) were commonly given their own titles:

Book 1–4: Telemachy—the story focuses on the perspective of Telemachus 
Books 9–12: Apologoi—Odysseus recalls his adventures for his Phaeacian hosts 
Book 22: Mnesterophonia ('slaughter of the suitors'; Mnesteres, 'suitors' + phónos, 'slaughter') Book 22 concludes the Greek Epic Cycle, though fragments remain of the "alternative ending" of sorts known as the Telegony  The Telegony aside, the last 548 lines of the Odyssey, corresponding to Book 24, are believed by many scholars to have been added by a slightly later poet 

Geography
The events in the main sequence of the Odyssey (excluding Odysseus' embedded narrative of his wanderings) have been said to take place in the Peloponnese and in what are now called the Ionian Islands  There are difficulties in the apparently simple identification of Ithaca, the homeland of Odysseus, which may or may not be the same island that is now called Ithakē (modern Greek: Ιθάκη)  The wanderings of Odysseus as told to the Phaeacians, and the location of the Phaeacians' own island of Scheria, pose more fundamental problems, if geography is to be applied: scholars, both ancient and modern, are divided as to whether any of the places visited by Odysseus (after Ismaros and before his return to Ithaca) are real  Both antiquated and contemporary scholars have attempted to map Odysseus' journey but now largely agree that the landscapes, especially of the Apologia (Books 9 to 11), include too many mythological aspects as features to be unequivocally mappable  Classicist Peter T  Struck created an interactive map which plots Odysseus' travels, including his near homecoming which was thwarted by the bag of wind 

Influences
Scholars have seen strong influences from Near Eastern mythology and literature in the Odyssey  Martin West notes substantial parallels between the Epic of Gilgamesh and the Odyssey  Both Odysseus and Gilgamesh are known for traveling to the ends of the earth and on their journeys go to the land of the dead  On his voyage to the underworld, Odysseus follows instructions given to him by Circe, who is located at the edges of the world and is associated through imagery with the sun  Like Odysseus, Gilgamesh gets directions on how to reach the land of the dead from a divine helper: the goddess Siduri, who, like Circe, dwells by the sea at the ends of the earth, whose home is also associated with the sun  Gilgamesh reaches Siduri's house by passing through a tunnel underneath Mt  Mashu, the high mountain from which the sun comes into the sky  West argues that the similarity of Odysseus' and Gilgamesh's journeys to the edges of the earth are the result of the influence of the Gilgamesh epic upon the Odyssey In 1914, paleontologist Othenio Abel surmised the origins of the Cyclops to be the result of ancient Greeks finding an elephant skull  The enormous nasal passage in the middle of the forehead could have looked like the eye socket of a giant, to those who had never seen a living elephant  Classical scholars, on the other hand, have long known that the story of the Cyclops was originally a folk tale, which existed independently of the Odyssey and which became part of it at a later date  Similar stories are found in cultures across Europe and the Middle East  According to this explanation, the Cyclops was originally simply a giant or ogre, much like Humbaba in the Epic of Gilgamesh  Graham Anderson suggests that the addition about it having only one eye was invented to explain how the creature was so easily blinded 

Themes and patterns
Homecoming
Homecoming (Ancient Greek: νόστος, nostos) is a central theme of the Odyssey  Anna Bonafazi of the University of Cologne writes that, in Homer, nostos is "return home from Troy, by sea"  Agatha Thornton examines nostos in the context of characters other than Odysseus, in order to provide an alternative for what might happen after the end of the Odyssey  For instance, one example is that of Agamemnon's homecoming versus Odysseus'  Upon Agamemnon's return, his wife Clytemnestra and her lover, Aegisthus, kill Agamemnon  Agamemnon's son, Orestes, out of vengeance for his father's death, kills Aegisthus  This parallel compares the death of the suitors to the death of Aegisthus and sets Orestes up as an example for Telemachus  Also, because Odysseus knows about Clytemnestra's betrayal, Odysseus returns home in disguise in order to test the loyalty of his own wife, Penelope  Later, Agamemnon praises Penelope for not killing Odysseus  It is because of Penelope that Odysseus has fame and a successful homecoming  This successful homecoming is unlike Achilles, who has fame but is dead, and Agamemnon, who had an unsuccessful homecoming resulting in his death 

Wandering
Only two of Odysseus's adventures are described by the narrator  The rest of Odysseus' adventures are recounted by Odysseus himself  The two scenes described by the narrator are Odysseus on Calypso's island and Odysseus' encounter with the Phaeacians  These scenes are told by the poet to represent an important transition in Odysseus' journey: being concealed to returning home Calypso's name comes from the Greek word kalúptō (καλύπτω), meaning 'to cover' or 'conceal', which is apt, as this is exactly what she does with Odysseus  Calypso keeps Odysseus concealed from the world and unable to return home  After leaving Calypso's island, the poet describes Odysseus' encounters with the Phaeacians—those who "convoy without hurt to all men"—which represents his transition from not returning home to returning home Also, during Odysseus' journey, he encounters many beings that are close to the gods  These encounters are useful in understanding that Odysseus is in a world beyond man and that influences the fact he cannot return home  These beings that are close to the gods include the Phaeacians who lived near the Cyclopes, whose king, Alcinous, is the great-grandson of the king of the giants, Eurymedon, and the grandson of Poseidon  Some of the other characters that Odysseus encounters are the cyclops Polyphemus, the son of Poseidon; Circe, a sorceress who turns men into animals; and the cannibalistic giants, the Laestrygonians 

Guest-friendship
Throughout the course of the epic, Odysseus encounters several examples of xenia ("guest-friendship"), which provide models of how hosts should and should not act  The Phaeacians demonstrate exemplary guest-friendship by feeding Odysseus, giving him a place to sleep, and granting him many gifts and a safe voyage home, which are all things a good host should do  Polyphemus demonstrates poor guest-friendship  His only "gift" to Odysseus is that he will eat him last  Calypso also exemplifies poor guest-friendship because she does not allow Odysseus to leave her island  Another important factor to guest-friendship is that kingship implies generosity  It is assumed that a king has the means to be a generous host and is more generous with his own property  This is best seen when Odysseus, disguised as a beggar, begs Antinous, one of the suitors, for food and Antinous denies his request  Odysseus essentially says that while Antinous may look like a king, he is far from a king since he is not generous According to J  B  Hainsworth, guest-friendship follows a very specific pattern:
The arrival and the reception of the guest 
Bathing or providing fresh clothes to the guest 
Providing food and drink to the guest 
Questions may be asked of the guest and entertainment should be provided by the host 
The guest should be given a place to sleep, and both the guest and host retire for the night 
The guest and host exchange gifts, the guest is granted a safe journey home, and the guest departs Another important factor of guest-friendship is not keeping the guest longer than they wish and also promising their safety while they are a guest within the host's home 

Testing
Another theme throughout the Odyssey is testing  This occurs in two distinct ways  Odysseus tests the loyalty of others and others test Odysseus' identity  An example of Odysseus testing the loyalties of others is when he returns home  Instead of immediately revealing his identity, he arrives disguised as a beggar and then proceeds to determine who in his house has remained loyal to him and who has helped the suitors  After Odysseus reveals his true identity, the characters test Odysseus' identity to see if he really is who he says he is  For instance, Penelope tests Odysseus' identity by saying that she will move the bed into the other room for him  This is a difficult task since it is made out of a living tree that would require being cut down, a fact that only the real Odysseus would know, thus proving his identity Testing also has a very specific type scene that accompanies it  Throughout the epic, the testing of others follows a typical pattern  This pattern is:
Odysseus is hesitant to question the loyalties of others 
Odysseus tests the loyalties of others by questioning them 
The characters reply to Odysseus' questions 
Odysseus proceeds to reveal his identity 
The characters test Odysseus' identity 
There is a rise of emotions associated with Odysseus' recognition, usually lament or joy 
Finally, the reconciled characters work together 

Omens
Omens occur frequently throughout the Odyssey  Within the epic poem, they frequently involve birds  According to Thornton, most crucial is who receives each omen and in what way it manifests  For instance, bird omens are shown to Telemachus, Penelope, Odysseus, and the suitors  Telemachus and Penelope receive their omens as well in the form of words, sneezes, and dreams  However, Odysseus is the only character who receives thunder or lightning as an omen  She highlights this as crucial because lightning, as a symbol of Zeus, represents the kingship of Odysseus  Odysseus is associated with Zeus throughout both the Iliad and the Odyssey Omens are another example of a type scene in the Odyssey  Two important parts of an omen type scene are the recognition of the omen, followed by its interpretation  In the Odyssey, all of the bird omens—with the exception of the first—show large birds attacking smaller birds  Accompanying each omen is a wish which can be either explicitly stated or only implied  For example, Telemachus wishes for vengeance and for Odysseus to be home, Penelope wishes for Odysseus' return, and the suitors wish for the death of Telemachus 

Textual history
Composition
The date of the poem is a matter of some disagreement among classicists  In the middle of the 8th century BC, the inhabitants of Greece began to adopt a modified version of the Phoenician alphabet to write down their own language  The Homeric poems may have been one of the earliest products of that literacy, and if so, would have been composed some time in the late 8th century BC  Inscribed on a clay cup found in Ischia, Italy, are the words "Nestor's cup, good to drink from " Some scholars, such as Calvert Watkins, have tied this cup to a description of King Nestor's golden cup in the Iliad  If the cup is an allusion to the Iliad, that poem's composition can be dated to at least 700–750 BC Dating is similarly complicated by the fact that the Homeric poems, or sections of them, were performed regularly by rhapsodes for several hundred years  The Odyssey as it exists today is likely not significantly different  Aside from minor differences, the Homeric poems gained a canonical place in the institutions of ancient Athens by the 6th century  In 566 BC, Peisistratos instituted a civic and religious festival called the Panathenaia, which featured performances of Homeric poems  These are significant because a "correct" version of the poems had to be performed, indicating that a particular version of the text had become canonised 

Textual tradition
The Iliad and the Odyssey were widely copied and used as school texts in lands where the Greek language was spoken throughout antiquity  Scholars may have begun to write commentaries on the poems as early as the time of Aristotle in the 4th century BC  In the 3rd and 2nd centuries BC, scholars affiliated with the Library of Alexandria—particularly Zenodotus and Aristarchus of Samothrace—edited the Homeric poems, wrote commentaries on them, and helped establish the canonical texts The Iliad and the Odyssey remained widely studied and used as school texts in the Byzantine Empire during the Middle Ages  The Byzantine Greek scholar and archbishop Eustathios of Thessalonike (c  1115 – c  1195/6 AD) wrote exhaustive commentaries on both of the Homeric epics that became seen by later generations as authoritative; his commentary on the Odyssey alone spans nearly 2,000 oversized pages in a twentieth-century edition  The first printed edition of the Odyssey, known as the editio princeps, was produced in 1488 by the Greek scholar Demetrios Chalkokondyles, who had been born in Athens and had studied in Constantinople  His edition was printed in Milan by a Greek printer named Antonios Damilas Since the late 19th century, many papyri containing fragments of the Odyssey have been found in Egypt, some with content different from later medieval versions 
In 2018, the Greek Cultural Ministry revealed the discovery of a clay tablet near the Temple of Zeus at Olympia, containing 13 verses from the Odyssey's 14th book  While it was initially reported to date from the 3rd century AD, the date is unconfirmed 

English translations
George Chapman's English translations of the Odyssey and the Iliad, published together in 1616 but serialised earlier, were the first to enjoy widespread success  The texts had been published in translation before, with some translated not from the original Greek  Chapman worked on these for a large part of his life  In 1581, Arthur Hall translated the first 10 books of the Iliad from a French version  Chapman's translations persisted in popularity, and are often remembered today through John Keats' sonnet  "On First Looking into Chapman's Homer" (1816)  Years after completing his translation of the Iliad, Alexander Pope began to translate the Odyssey because of his financial situation  His second translation was not received as favourably as the first Emily Wilson, a professor of classical studies at the University of Pennsylvania, notes that as late as the first decade of the 21st century, almost all of the most prominent translators of Greek and Roman literature had been men  She calls her experience of translating Homer one of "intimate alienation " Wilson writes that this has affected the popular conception of characters and events of the Odyssey, inflecting the story with connotations not present in the original text: "For instance, in the scene where Telemachus oversees the hanging of the slaves who have been sleeping with the suitors, most translations introduce derogatory language ("sluts" or "whores") [   ] The original Greek does not label these slaves with derogatory language " In the original Greek, the word used is hai, the feminine article, equivalent to "those female people" 

Legacy
The influence of the Homeric texts can be difficult to summarise because of how greatly they have impacted the popular imagination and cultural values  The Odyssey and the Iliad formed the basis of education for members of ancient Mediterranean society  That curriculum was adopted by Western humanists, meaning the text was so much a part of the cultural fabric that it became irrelevant whether an individual had read it  As such, the influence of the Odyssey has reverberated through over a millennium of writing  The poem topped a poll of experts by BBC Culture to find literature's most enduring narrative  It is widely regarded by western literary critics as a timeless classic and remains one of the oldest works of extant literature commonly read by Western audiences 

Literature
In Canto XXVI of the Inferno, Dante Alighieri meets Odysseus in the eighth circle of hell, where Odysseus appends a new ending to the Odyssey in which he never returns to Ithaca and instead continues his restless adventuring  Edith Hall suggests that Dante's depiction of Odysseus became understood as a manifestation of Renaissance colonialism and othering, with the cyclops standing in for "accounts of monstrous races on the edge of the world", and his defeat as symbolising "the Roman domination of the western Mediterranean" Irish poet James Joyce's modernist novel Ulysses (1922) was significantly influenced by the Odyssey  Joyce had encountered the figure of Odysseus in Charles Lamb's Adventures of Ulysses, an adaptation of the epic poem for children, which seems to have established the Latin name in Joyce's mind  Ulysses, a re-telling of the Odyssey set in Dublin, is divided into 18 sections ("episodes") which can be mapped roughly onto the 24 books of the Odyssey  Joyce claimed familiarity with the original Homeric Greek, but this has been disputed by some scholars, who cite his poor grasp of the language as evidence to the contrary  The book, and especially its stream of consciousness prose, is widely considered foundational to the modernist genre Modern writers have revisited the Odyssey to highlight the poem's female characters  Canadian writer Margaret Atwood adapted parts of the Odyssey for her novella, The Penelopiad (2005)  The novella focuses on Penelope and the twelve female slaves hanged by Odysseus at the poem's ending, an image which haunted Atwood  Atwood's novella comments on the original text, wherein Odysseus' successful return to Ithaca symbolises the restoration of a patriarchal system  Similarly, Madeline Miller's Circe (2018) revisits the relationship between Odysseus and Circe on Aeaea  As a reader, Miller was frustrated by Circe's lack of motivation in the original poem and sought to explain her capriciousness  The novel recontextualises the sorceress' transformations of sailors into pigs from an act of malice into one of self-defence, given that she has no superhuman strength with which to repel attackers 

Film and television
L'Odissea (1911) is an Italian silent film by Giuseppe de Liguoro 
Ulysses (1954) is a film adaptation starring Kirk Douglas as Ulysses, Silvana Mangano as Penelope and Circe, and Anthony Quinn as Antinous 
L'Odissea (1968) is an Italian-French-German-Yugoslavian television miniseries praised for its faithful rendering of the original epic 
Nostos: The Return (1989) is an Italian film about Odysseus' homecoming  Directed by Franco Piavoli, it relies on visual storytelling and has a strong focus on nature 
Ulysses' Gaze (1995), directed by Theo Angelopoulos, has many of the elements of the Odyssey set against the backdrop of the most recent and previous Balkan Wars 
The Odyssey (1997) is a television miniseries directed by Andrei Konchalovsky and starring Armand Assante as Odysseus and Greta Scacchi as Penelope 
O Brother, Where Art Thou? (2000) is a crime comedy drama film written, produced, co-edited and directed by the Coen brothers and is very loosely based on Homer's poem 

Opera and music
Il ritorno d'Ulisse in patria, first performed in 1640, is an opera by Claudio Monteverdi based on the second half of Homer's Odyssey 
Rolf Riehm composed an opera based on the myth, Sirenen – Bilder des Begehrens und des Vernichtens (Sirens – Images of Desire and Destruction), which premiered at the Oper Frankfurt in 2014 
Robert W  Smith's second symphony for concert band, The Odyssey, tells four of the main highlights of the story in the piece's four movements: "The Iliad", "The Winds of Poseidon", "The Isle of Calypso", and "Ithaca" 

Sciences
Psychiatrist Jonathan Shay wrote two books, Achilles in Vietnam: Combat Trauma and the Undoing of Character  (1994) and Odysseus in America: Combat Trauma and the Trials of Homecoming (2002), which relate the Iliad and the Odyssey to posttraumatic stress disorder and moral injury as seen in the rehabilitation histories of combat veteran patients  
Passage 6:
Albert Odyssey (Super Famicom game)
Albert Odyssey (アルバートオデッセイ, Arubaato Odessei) is a tactical role-playing video game developed and published by Sunsoft and released for the Super Nintendo Entertainment System in Japan in March 1993  The game features strategy-based combat in addition to traditional role-playing game elements in two-dimensional environments  It is the first game in the Albert Odyssey series, and was followed by two sequels, Albert Odyssey 2: Jashin no Taidou in 1994, and Albert Odyssey: Legend of Eldean in 1996   On June 12, 1996, Albert Odyssey was made available as a full game download on the Satellaview add-on as BS Albert Odyssey (BSアルバートオデッセイ, BS Arubaato Odessei), and the original Albert Odyssey was re-released for Satellaview in March 1998 Players assume the role of Albert, the young heroic swordsman who lives in a fantasy world filled with monsters and mythical creatures  While much of the world remains in relative peace following a great war many years before, a military faction led by the dark magician Globus has emerged to conquer the newly pacified nations and expand their empire  With the help of Albert's friends as well as hired mercenaries, the player must travel the world and eventually confront Golbus and his forces to prevent another large-scale conflict 

Gameplay
Albert Odyssey is a role-playing video game with strategy elements where players must travel through a fantasy environment battling monsters and other enemies to advance the story  The game uses two-dimensional character sprites and environments accompanied by the Super Nintendo Entertainment System's Mode 7 graphics capabilities that give the impression of three dimensions  Players move their characters from a top-down perspective through towns and other peaceful areas, while the game's overworld and dungeons are rendered as large battlefields laden with enemies  Throughout the game, players take part in the story by interacting with non-player characters and performing story-driven quests that continually expand the game's narrative 
Using a turn-based system, both the player and computer opponent take turns moving and attacking across the field  A player may choose to move, attack, perform magic, use an item in their possession to aid themselves, or retreat to the nearest safe area to rest or restock supplies  Once two characters come in contact with one another, a battle sequence ensues where the attacking character deals damage to the opponent, lowering their health  When the player or enemy's health reaches zero, they are defeated and ejected from the field  Player's advance by confronting and defeating enemies, gaining experience points in the process that go towards making characters stronger and learn new abilities  A character can be further augmented with progressively more powerful weapons and equipment can be purchased in towns or found on defeated enemies  Progress is recorded by using save points found in set areas throughout the game that utilize the Famicom's battery backup-up system  If all of a player's characters are defeated at any time, they are forced to restart the game from the last recorded save file 

Audio
The music for Albert Odyssey was written and programmed by Sunsoft in-house composer Naoki Kodaka, with the game being his first Super Famicom and role-playing endeavor  On June 25, 1993, Sunsoft released an official soundtrack titled All Sounds of Albert Odyssey in Japan published by Datam Polystar featuring all background music and jingles from the game   Later that year, selected music from Albert Odyssey was performed by the Tokyo City Philharmonic Orchestra as part of the third Game Music Concert series in Tokyo, Japan, later made available as a commercial album the following December  The two tracks represented were "The Road Walked by Heroes" and "Hometown Tibelis", retitled as "Albert Odyssey Theme" and "God's People" respectively 

Sequel
Albert Odyssey 2: Jashin no Taidou (アルバートオデッセイ2 邪神の胎動, Aruberto Odesei Tsu Jashin no Taidou, lit  Albert Odyssey 2: Sign of the Devil) is a tactical role-playing video game developed and published by Sunsoft for the Super Famicom and released in December 1994  It is the sequel to the original Albert Odyssey and retains many of the same gameplay and story elements while featuring enhanced graphics and battle features 
The game is set ten years after the previous title and follows the story of Dean, a young warrior who is enthralled by the exploits of the hero Albert who saved the world a decade earlier from an evil magician   Setting off on his own journey to investigate the conflict, Dean becomes entangled in an adventure of his own while meeting characters from the previous game  He soon learns that the world is once again in danger from an ancient evil god known as Okutoba, and must become a hero himself to stop him from throwing the world into darkness 

Gameplay
Like its predecessor, Albert Odyssey 2 is a traditional strategy-based role-playing video game featuring two-dimensional character and background graphics  While towns and other safe areas are presented in a top-down fashion where players can move about freely, the game's overworld and dungeons take the appearance of a grid-like strategy board filled with monsters and other enemies   Using the Super Famicom's Mode 7 graphics function, environments can scroll and zoom smoothly based on the player's point of view, and give the appearance of three-dimensions  Players advance the game's story by taking part in large-scale battles and interacting with non-player characters 
The battle system in Albert Odyssey 2 has been modified slightly from the original   While players can still move in eight directions to engage opponents, the size of many battlefields, as well as the number of enemies represented, has been reduced, with the entire system becoming more streamlined  Characters move about the battle environment using a turn-based system where enemies and the player's party take turns attacking in phases, with one entire side acting before another  On a player's turn, characters may move, fight, use a magic attack, use an item from their inventory, or retreat to a nearby safe location  Battle are won when an entire enemy party has been defeated, yielding experience points that allow characters to gain levels and become stronger as well as give access to new abilities   Players record their progress using the game cartridge's built-in battery back-up system by accessing preset save points during gameplay 
Passage 7:
Sorrows of Werther
"Sorrows of Werther" is a satirical poem by William Makepeace Thackeray written in response to the enormous success of Johann Wolfgang von Goethe's novel The Sorrows of Young Werther 


== Text ==
Passage 8:
Werther (film)
Werther is an opera by Jules Massenet 
Werther may also refer to:

Places
Werther, North Rhine-Westphalia, a town in western Germany
Werther, Thuringia, a municipality in eastern Germany

People with the surname
Gustav Werther (1815–1869), German chemist
Heinrich Wilhelm von Werther (1772–1859), Prussian diplomat and politician

Arts
The Sorrows of Young Werther, a novel by Johann Wolfgang von Goethe that the opera Werther is loosely based on
Werther (1986 film), a Spanish film based on the novel
Werther (1927 film), a Czech film

Others
Werther's Original, a toffee-and-cream candy
The New Werther, by the statistician Karl Pearson
Passage 9:
Werther
Werther is an opera (drame lyrique) in four acts by Jules Massenet to a French libretto by Édouard Blau, Paul Milliet and Georges Hartmann (who used the pseudonym Henri Grémont)  It is loosely based on Goethe's epistolary novel The Sorrows of Young Werther, which was based both on fact and on Goethe's own early life  Earlier examples of operas using the story were made by Kreutzer (1792) and Pucitta (1802) 

Performance history
Massenet started composing Werther in 1885, completing it in 1887  He submitted it to Léon Carvalho, the director of the Paris Opéra-Comique, that year, but Carvalho declined to accept it on the grounds that the scenario was too serious  With the disruption of the fire at the Opéra-Comique and Massenet's work on other operatic projects (especially Esclarmonde), it was put to one side, until the Vienna Opera, pleased with the success of Manon, asked the composer for a new work  Werther received its premiere on 16 February 1892 (in a German version translated by Max Kalbeck) at the Imperial Theatre Hofoper in Vienna The French-language premiere followed in Geneva on 27 December 1892  The first performance in France was given by the Opéra-Comique at the Théâtre Lyrique on the Place du Châtelet in Paris on 16 January 1893, with Marie Delna as Charlotte and Guillaume Ibos in the title role, conducted by Jules Danbé, but was not immediately successful Werther entered the repertoire at the Opéra-Comique in 1903 in a production supervised by Albert Carré, and over the next half-century the opera was performed over 1,100 times there, Léon Beyle becoming a distinguished interpreter of Werther The United States premiere with the Metropolitan Opera took place in Chicago on 29 March 1894 and then in the company's main house in New York City three weeks later  The UK premiere was a one-off performance at Covent Garden, London, on 11 June 1894 with Emma Eames as Charlotte, Sigrid Arnoldson as Sophie, and Jean de Reszke in the title role 
Werther is still regularly performed around the world and has been recorded many times  Although the role of Werther was written for a tenor, Massenet adjusted it for a baritone, when Mattia Battistini sang it in Saint Petersburg in 1902  It is very occasionally performed in this version, in which the changes affect only the vocal line for the title character  There are no other changes to the words, to the lines for other characters, or to the orchestration 

Roles
Instrumentation
2 flutes (2nd doubling piccolo),
2 oboes (doubling English horns),
2 clarinets in B-flat and A,
alto saxophone,
2 bassoons,
4 horns in F,
2 cornets in B-flat and A,
3 trombones,
tuba,
timpani,
percussion (1) (bass drum, triangle),
harp,
strings 

Synopsis
Time: Within the period July to December, in an undefined year in the 1780s 
Place: Wetzlar in Germany 

Act 1
In July, the widowed Bailiff (a Magistrate, rather than one who comes to seize property), is teaching his six youngest children a Christmas carol ("Noël! Jésus vient de naître")  His drinking companions, Johann and Schmidt, arrive as Charlotte, the eldest daughter, dresses for a ball  Since her fiancé Albert is away, she is to be escorted by Werther, whom the Bailiff and his companions find gloomy  Werther arrives ("O Nature, pleine de grâce"), and watches as Charlotte prepares her young siblings' supper, just as her mother had before she died  He greets her and they leave for the ball  Albert returns unexpectedly after a six-month trip  He is unsure of Charlotte's intentions and disappointed not to find her at home, but is reassured and consoled by Charlotte's younger sister Sophie  He leaves after promising to return in the morning  After an orchestral interlude, Werther and Charlotte return very late; he is already enamoured of her  His declaration of love is interrupted by the announcement of Albert's return  Charlotte recalls how she promised her dying mother she would marry Albert  Werther is in despair 

Act 2
It is three months later, and Charlotte and Albert are now married  They walk happily to church to celebrate the minister's 50th wedding anniversary, followed by the disconsolate Werther ("Un autre est son époux!")  First Albert and then Sophie ("Du gai soleil, plein de flamme") try to cheer him up  When Charlotte exits the church, he speaks to her of their first meeting  Charlotte begs Werther to leave her, though she indicates that she would be willing to receive him again on Christmas Day  Werther contemplates suicide ("Lorsque l'enfant revient d'un voyage")  He encounters Sophie but the tearful girl does not understand his distressing behavior  Albert now realizes that Werther loves Charlotte 

Act 3
Charlotte is at home alone on Christmas Eve  She spends time rereading the letters that she has received from Werther ("Werther! Qui m'aurait dit     Ces lettres!"), wondering how the young poet is and how she had the strength to send him away  Sophie comes in and tries to cheer up her older sister ("Ah! le rire est béni"), though Charlotte is not to be consoled ("Va! laisse couler mes larmes")  Suddenly Werther appears, and while he reads to her some poetry of Ossian ("Pourquoi me réveiller?"), he realizes that she does indeed return his love  They embrace for a moment, but she quickly bids him farewell  He leaves with thoughts of suicide  Albert returns home to find his wife distraught  Werther sends a messenger to Albert, requesting to borrow his pistols, explaining he is going on an extended trip  After the servant has taken them, Charlotte has a terrible premonition and hurries to find Werther  An orchestral intermezzo ("La nuit de Noël") leads without a break into the final Act 

Act 4
"The death of Werther": At Werther's apartment, Charlotte has arrived too late to stop him from shooting himself; he is dying  She consoles him by declaring her love  He asks for forgiveness  After he dies, Charlotte faints  Outside children are heard singing the Christmas carol 

Noted arias
Recordings
A well-regarded recording of the complete opera was made in January 1931 by French Columbia with a French cast and the orchestra and chorus of the Opéra-Comique under the direction of Élie Cohen  Henry Fogel of Fanfare magazine, writing in 1992, counted 14 complete recordings and considered it the finest of the lot  His colleague, James Camner, reviewing the Opera d'Oro reissue in 2003, called it "one of the treasures of recorded opera      Unfortunately, the transfer is over filtered  The high frequencies are lost, giving the performance an unwarranted flatness  Happily, Naxos offers the same recording expertly transferred by Ward Marston, and acquiring it is a must " Alan Blyth, while giving a very positive review of the reissue of the recording with Albert Lance as Werther and Rita Gorr as Charlotte in 2004, nevertheless pointed out that "neither quite has the ideal subtlety of the best Massenet singers, such as Vallin and Thill on the classic, pre-war set, now on Naxos" In addition, many of the greatest French and Italian singers of the past century or more have recorded individual arias from Massenet's masterwork 
Passage 10:
The Novel of Werther
The Novel of Werther (French: Le Roman de Werther) is a 1938 French historical drama film directed by Max Ophüls and starring Pierre Richard-Willm, Annie Vernay and Jean Galland  It is based on the 1774 novel The Sorrows of Young Werther by Goethe The film was made by Nero Film, a company run by German exiles who had left following the Nazi rise to power 

Cast
Pierre Richard-Willm as Werther
Annie Vernay as Charlotte
Jean Galland as Albert
Paulette Pax as Aunt Emma
Jean Périer as President
Edmond Beauchamp as murderer
Georges Bever as chamberlain
Geno Ferny as portraitist
Fernand Blot as Werther's colleague
Denise Kerny as the right one
Henri Guisol as Schertz, the clerk
Roger Legris as Franz, valet
Jean Buquet as little Gustave
Maurice Schutz as le sonneur
Léonce Corne asle majordome
Philippe Richard as Grand Duke
Charles Nossent as le cocher
Léon Larive as comedian
Georges Vitray as bailiff
Génia Vaury as girl
Henri Beaulieu
Henri Darbrey
Pierre Darteuil
Maurice Devienne
Martial Rèbe
Robert Rollis
Context 2: Passage 1:
The Lives of a Bengal Lancer (film)
The Lives of a Bengal Lancer is a 1935 American adventure film starring Gary Cooper, directed by Henry Hathaway, and written by Grover Jones, William Slavens McNutt, Waldemar Young, John L  Balderston, and Achmed Abdullah  The setting and title come from the 1930 autobiography of the British soldier Francis Yeats-Brown 
The story, which has little in common with Yeats-Brown’s book, tells of a group of British cavalrymen and high-ranking officers desperately trying to defend their stronghold and headquarters at Bengal against the rebellious natives during the days of the British Raj  Cooper plays Lieutenant Alan McGregor, Franchot Tone, Lieutenant John Forsythe, Richard Cromwell, Lieutenant Donald Stone, Guy Standing, Colonel Tom Stone, and Douglass Dumbrille plays the rebel leader Mohammed Khan, who reads the now often-misquoted line "We have ways to make men talk "The film was produced by released by Paramount Pictures  Planning began in 1931, and Paramount had expected the film to be released that same year  However, most of the location footage deteriorated due to the high temperatures, and the project was delayed  It was eventually released in the US in 1935 
It met with positive reviews and good box office results, and was nominated for seven Academy Awards, winning Assistant Director, with other nominations including Best Original Screenplay and Best Picture  The film grossed $1 5 million in worldwide theatrical rentals 

Plot
On the northwest frontier of India during the British Raj, Scottish Canadian  Lieutenant Alan McGregor  (Gary Cooper), in charge of newcomers, welcomes two replacements to the 41st Bengal Lancers: Lieutenant John Forsythe  (Franchot Tone) and  Lieutenant Donald Stone  (Richard Cromwell), the son of the unit's commander, Colonel Tom Stone  (Guy Standing)  Lieutenant Stone, a "cub" (meaning a newly commissioned officer), eagerly anticipated serving on the Indian frontier, particularly because he specifically was requested and assumed that his father sent for him; Lieutenant Forsythe, an experienced cavalrymen and something of a teasing character, was sent out as a replacement for an officer who was killed in action  
After his arrival Lieutenant Stone discovers that his father keeps him at arms length, wanting to treat him the same as he treats all of the other men  He also reveals that he did not request his son serve in his regiment, a discovery that breaks his heart and leads to him going on a drunken bender  Attempting to show impartiality, the colonel treats his son indifferently  The Colonel's commitment to strictly military behavior and adherence to protocol is interpreted by young Stone as rejection  He had not seen his father since he was a boy and had looked forward to spending time with him 
Lieutenant Barrett (Colin Tapley), disguised as a native rebel in order to spy on Mohammed Khan (Douglass Dumbrille), reports that Khan is preparing an uprising against the British  He plans to intercept and hijack a military convoy transporting two million rounds of ammunition  When Khan discovers that Colonel Stone knows of his plan, he orders Tania Volkanskaya, a beautiful Russian agent, to seduce and kidnap Lieutenant Stone in an attempt to extract classified information about the ammunition caravan from him, or use him as leverage to attract his father  When the colonel refuses to attempt his son's rescue, McGregor and Forsythe, appalled by the seeming lack of concern the colonel has for his own son, leave the camp at night without orders  Disguised as native merchants trying to sell blankets, they successfully get inside Khan's fortress  However, they are recognized by Tania, who had met the two men at a social event  McGregor and Forsythe are taken prisoner 
During interrogation, Khan wants to know when and where the munitions will be transported so that he can attack and steal the arms  He has the prisoners tortured for the information  Bamboo shoots are shoved under their fingernails and set on fire  McGregor and Forsythe refuse to talk, but the demoralized Stone, feeling rejected by his father, cracks and reveals what he knows  As a result, the ammunition convoy is captured 
After receiving news of the stolen ammunition, Colonel Stone takes the 41st to battle Khan  From their cell, the captives see the overmatched Bengal Lancers deploy to assault Khan's fortress  They manage to escape and blow up the ammunition tower, McGregor manning a machine gun and dying in the assault  Young Stone redeems himself by killing Khan with a dagger  With their ammunition gone, their leader dead, and their fortress in ruins, the remaining rebels surrender 
In recognition of their bravery and valor in battle, Lieutenants Forsythe and Stone are awarded the Distinguished Service Order  McGregor posthumously receives the Victoria Cross, Great Britain's highest award for military valor, with Colonel Stone pinning the medal to the saddle cloth of McGregor's horse in the custom in the 41st Lancers 

Cast
Gary Cooper as  Lieutenant Alan McGregor, a highly experienced officer in his mid-thirties, who has spent a long time with the regiment  McGregor, a Canadian, is portrayed as a charming, open character who befriends most officers, but because of disregard for his superiors and habit of speaking his mind is regarded askance by his superiors, who nevertheless respect his military abilities 
Franchot Tone as  Lieutenant John Forsythe, an upper-class cavalryman in his mid-twenties from the Royal Military Academy Sandhurst  Transferred from the Blues, one of the two regiments at the time the movie was made tasked with guarding the Sovereign, Forsythe is presented as the  funny guy  of the main characters, and is noteworthy for his Sandhurst style in military exercise, something that earns him countless compliments from his superiors Richard Cromwell as  Lieutenant Donald Stone, a recent graduate of Sandhurst and a very young officer  As the son of a colonel with a famous name, he is treated respectfully but becomes frustrated and morose because of personal issues with his father 
Guy Standing  as  Colonel Tom Stone, a long-serving colonel who left his home in Britain to serve on the Frontier, and explains to his son in the film that the "service always comes first     something your mother never understood " He is considered to be a dyed-in-the-wool, by-the-book colonel who suppresses his feelings and never does anything without orders 
C  Aubrey Smith as  Major Hamilton, an old, very experienced major who serves as Colonel Stone's adjutant and Lieutenant Stone's second father and friend  He, along with his chief, planned and coordinated the big assault on Mohammad Khan's fortress 
Kathleen Burke as  Tania Volkanskaya, a beautiful and seductive young Russian woman who is Khan's ally  She is used as Khan's secret ace, who seduces young men when needed to forward Khan's plans  It was she who, with considerable ease, outwitted first Stone and then McGregor and Forsythe 
Douglass Dumbrille as  Mohammed Khan, a well-known, wealthy prince of the region, educated at Oxford and ostensibly a friend of the British  He is also the secret rebel leader who fights for Bengal's independence from the British Crown  He is portrayed as the film's villain and is responsible for the death and torture of many people 
Colin Tapley as  Lieutenant Barrett, a close friend of Lieutenant McGregor who has been ordered to infiltrate Khan's group of bandits and delivers vital information about the rebels' location and movement 
Lumsden Hare as  Major General Woodley, the man in  command of the British intelligence service in India  He is disliked by most of the regiment's officers, especially McGregor, because his orders usually involve training exercises in locations where the pig-sticking is good  He thought of and approved the attack on Khan's stronghold 
J  Carrol Naish as Grand Vizier
James Dime

Production
Stock crisis
Paramount originally planned to produce the film in 1931 and sent cinematographers Ernest B  Schoedsack and Rex Wimpy to India to film location shots such as a tiger hunt  However, much of the film stock deteriorated in the hot sun while on location, so when the film was eventually made, much of the production took place in the hills surrounding Los Angeles, where Northern Paiute people were used as extras According to Hathaway, Schoedack struggled with the studio so was replaced by Steven Roberts, who began spending more money than Paramount were willing to, so he was fired  Gary Cooper had director approval and he suggested Henry Hathaway, whose Westerns the actor admired - it was Hathaway's entry into big budget films  The director had been to India for nine months and remembered everything being white so insisted on that in the film 

Filming
Among the filming locations were Lone Pine, Calif , Buffalo Flats in Malibu, Calif , the Paramount Ranch in Agoura, Calif , and the Iverson Movie Ranch in Chatsworth, Calif  For the climactic half-hour battle sequence at the end of the film, an elaborate set was built in the Iverson Gorge, part of the Iverson Movie Ranch, to depict Mogala, the mountain stronghold of Mohammed Khan 

Release
Box office
The film was released in American cinemas in January 1935  It was a big success at the box office and kicked off a cycle of Imperial adventure tales, including The Charge of the Light Brigade (1936), Another Dawn (1937), Gunga Din (1939), The Four Feathers (1939), and The Real Glory (1939)  The film had theatrical rentals of about $1 million in the U S  and Canada, and $1 5 million worldwide  It was the second most popular film at the British box office in 1935–36  The film was successful enough that it led to Gary Cooper being booked to star in a number of films of similar plots that were also set in "exotic" locales, including Beau Geste, The Real Glory, North West Mounted Police and Distant Drums 

Critical reception and influence
Laura Elston from the magazine Canada wrote that The Lives of a Bengal Lancer did "more glory to the British traditions than the British would dare to do for themselves " In response to the film success, Frederick Herron of the Motion Picture Association of America wrote "Hollywood is doing a very good work in selling the British Empire to the world "Writer John Howard Reid noted in his book Award-Winning Films of the 1930s that the film is considered "one of the greatest adventure films of all time" and highly praised Hathaway's work by saying "the film really made his reputation " It also received a praised review in Boys' Life magazine, starting off the review with the words "You will be immensely pleased with The Lives of a Bengal lancer" and went on to compare the style and class of the three main characters to that of The Three Musketeers  The film holds an overall approval rating of 100% on the review aggregator website Rotten Tomatoes, based on 9 reviews, with a rating average of 8 out of 10 Critic Otis Ferguson said he was "taken by the show, imperialism and all " Andre Sennwald of The New York Times said the film "glorified the British Empire better than any film produced in Britain for that purpose "  Sennwald added that Paramount's "Kiplingesque" movie "ought to prove a blessing to Downing Street " The film proved so popular in the United States that it spurred a series of imperial films that continued throughout the decade and into the next decade  Frank S  Nugent, also of The New York Times, wrote that "England need have no fears for its empire so long as Hollywood insists upon being the Kipling of the Pacific " Nugent commented that movies such as The Lives of a Bengal Lancer and The Charge of the Light Brigade were far more pro-British than actual British filmmakers would ever dare to be: "In its veneration of British colonial policy, in its respect for the omniscience and high moral purpose of His, or Her, Majesty's diplomatic representatives and in its adulation of the courage, the virtue and the manly beauty of English soldiery abroad, Hollywood yields to no one—not even to the British filmmakers themselves "In Fascist Italy, Mussolini's motion picture bureau had the movie banned, as well as several other British-themed American movies, including Lloyd's of London and The Charge of the Light Brigade, on the grounds that they were "propaganda" 
According to Ivone Kirkpatrick, who met Adolf Hitler at Berchtesgaden in 1937, one of Hitler's favorite films was The Lives of a Bengal Lancer, which he had watched three times  He liked the film because "it depicted a handful of Britons holding a continent in thrall  That was how a superior race must behave and the film was a compulsory viewing for the S S "
Also, his valet recalled that Hitler enjoyed the film 
It was one of the eleven US movies that, from 1933 to 1937, were considered "artistically valuable" by the Nazi authorities 

Plot discrepancies
The film shares nothing with the source book, except the setting  Reid noted in Award-Winning Films of the 1930s that "none of the characters in the book appear in the screenplay, not even Yeats-Brown himself  The plot of the film is also entirely different "

Home media
The Paramount picture was distributed to home media on VHS on March 1, 1992 and on DVD on May 31, 2005  It has since been released in multiple languages and is included in several multi-film collections 

Awards
The film was nominated for the following Academy Awards, winning in one category:

See also
The Witching Hour
The Shepherd of the Hills
Now and Forever
Passage 2:
The White Haired Witch of Lunar Kingdom
The White Haired Witch of Lunar Kingdom is a 2014 Chinese wuxia-fantasy film based on the best-selected novel Romance of the White-Haired Maiden written by Liang Yusheng  Directed by Jacob Cheung and co-produced by Bona Film Group and Huang Jianxin with the creative consultant led by Tsui Hark, the film stars Fan Bingbing, Huang Xiaoming, Vincent Zhao and others among the supporting cast  Originally scheduled for release on 25 April 2014, the film was moved to 1 August 2014, then moved a day earlier to 31 July 2014 

Cast
Fan Bingbing as Lian Nishang
Huang Xiaoming as Zhuo Yihang
Vincent Zhao as Jin Duyi
Wang Xuebing as Murong Chong
Ni Dahong as Wei Zhongxian
Tong Yao as Ke Pingting
Li Xinru as Tie Shanhu
Cecilia Yip as Ling Yunfeng
Yan Yikuan as Huangtaiji

Production
The White Haired Witch of Lunar Kingdom was produced at a budget of 100 million yuan  Shooting started in November 2012 and ended in March 2013  During filming, Huang Xiaoming had a three-metre fall after a wire accident on the set and he fractured two toes on his left foot  He had to sit in a wheelchair for weeks, but resumed filming even though he had yet to fully recover  On 2 April 2013, Huang and Fan Bingbing attended a press conference in Beijing to talk about their experiences in filming White Haired Witch 

Reception
Box office
The film grossed US$61,900,000 in mainland China and a total of US$64 2 million internationally 

Critical response
The film received negative reviews from audiences  The review aggregator Rotten Tomatoes reports a 0 approval rating from critics, with an average score of 4 3/10, based on 6 reviews  The Hollywood Reporter said, "it's a shame that Cheung's first film in seven years is eventually weighed down by this rushed, uneven sprawl of a story credited to five screenwriters, each of whom possibly bringing their own references (ranging from political-parable historical dramas like last year's Life of Ming, to the contemporary dramas like Infernal Affairs) and their perspective in how to make The White Haired Witch connect with a new generation of viewers  Their attempt in reinventing this tale sits uncomfortably with the one central element that couldn't be moved — that is, the troubled (and sloppily presented) romance involving the title character "On Chinese movie review site Douban, the film has a rating of 3 8/10, based on 51590 viewers  On Mtime com, it has a score of 5 5 out of 10, based on 13137 viewers 
Passage 3:
Morgan Paull
Morgan Paull (December 15, 1944 – July 17, 2012) was an American actor most notable for playing Dave Holden in the Ridley Scott film Blade Runner 

Early life
Morgan Paull was born to a wealthy family in Wheeling, West Virginia and appeared in many high school plays  When he told his father that he wanted to attend Boston University to continue acting, his father disagreed with his plans and Morgan ran off  He went to the Barter Theatre in Abingdon, Virginia and then later appeared on Broadway in New Faces of 1965 and the off-Broadway show That Thing at the Cherry Lane 

Career
After moving to LA, he appeared in Muzeeka at the Mark Taper Forum and caught the attention of director Franklin Schaffner and producer Frank McCarthy  He made his acting debut in the 1970 film Patton playing Captain Richard N  Jenson  He was in the 1971 film Fools' Parade with Jimmy Stewart and the 1976 film The Last Hard Men with Charlton Heston  He is also known for playing the scheming Philip Wendell in the 1978 American television miniseries Centennial and a greedy businessman in the 1984 comedy Surf II 

Personal life
Until his death he resided in Lake Arrowhead in the mountains northeast of Los Angeles in the San Bernardino National Forest about 90 miles (140 km) from Hollywood  Paull was married four times, first to Gaye Huston in 1965 until they divorced in 1976  He was then married to Carmen Paull from 1976 to 1996, which ended in divorce  He was then married to April Paull in 1990 until that marriage ended in divorce  He later married Jenny Elam in 2004 until his death in 2012  Paull had two daughters Paull died on July 17, 2012 from stomach cancer in his home in Ashland, Oregon  He is buried in the Paull family plot, located in section 10 of Greenwood Cemetery, Wheeling, Ohio County, West Virginia 

Filmography
Film
Television
Passage 4:
Dirty O'Neil
Dirty O'Neil is a 1974 American film directed by Leon Capetanos and Lewis Teague 

Plot
Jimmy O'Neil (Morgan Paull), a cop in a small California town with a fondness for women, is forced into action when a trio of homicidal thugs invade the town 

Cast
Morgan Paull - Jimmy O'Neill
Art Metrano - Lassiter
Pat Anderson - Lizzie
Jeane Manson - Ruby
Katie Saylor - Vera
Raymond O'Keefe - Lou
Tommy J  Huff  - Bennie
Bob Potter - Al
Sam Laws - Clyde
Liv Lindeland - Mrs  Crawford
Kitty Carl - Bobby
Tara Strohmeier - Mary
Susan McIver - Helen

See also
List of American films of 1974
Passage 5:
The Man in the Iron Mask (1977 film)
The Man in the Iron Mask is a 1977 television film loosely adapted from the 1847–1850 novel The Vicomte de Bragelonne by Alexandre Dumas and presenting several plot similarities with the 1939 film version  It was produced by Norman Rosemont for ITC Entertainment, and starred Richard Chamberlain as King Louis XIV and his twin Philippe, Patrick McGoohan as Nicolas Fouquet, Ralph Richardson as Jean-Baptiste Colbert, Louis Jourdan as D'Artagnan, and Ian Holm as the Chevalier Duval   Jenny Agutter plays Louis XIV's mistress, Louise de la Vallière  Vivien Merchant appears as Queen Marie-Therese   It was directed by Mike Newell 

Plot
In this version, the twins' ages are swapped  Philippe is the firstborn and rightful king, who had been spirited away at birth and raised with no knowledge of his true identity in a plot by Cardinal Mazarin to manipulate Louis before his own death  Colbert and D'Artagnan plot to replace Louis (who is an ineffective king more interested in dancing and pleasure than the welfare of France) with Philippe, and in the process bring down the corrupt finance minister Fouquet, who has embezzled from the national treasury  Louis is repulsed by his own wife and makes repeated advances on Louise, who is in turn repulsed by him yet falls in love with Philippe 

Cast
Richard Chamberlain as King Louis XIV/Philippe
Jenny Agutter as Louise de La Vallière, Louis XIV's mistress
Patrick McGoohan as Nicolas Fouquet
Ralph Richardson as Jean-Baptiste Colbert
Louis Jourdan as D'Artagnan
Ian Holm as the Chevalier Duval
Hugh Fraser as Montfleury
Brenda Bruce as Queen Anne of Austria
Vivien Merchant as Queen Marie-Therese

Production
Filming
Although a made-for-TV movie, actual locations in France were used for filming, including the Château de Fontainebleau and Fouquet's actual chateau of Vaux-le-Vicomte for the final ball scene 

External links
The Man in the Iron Mask at IMDb
The Man in the Iron Mask at AllMovie
Passage 6:
Harrison Bergeron (film)
Harrison Bergeron is a 1995 cable science fiction television movie film loosely adapted from Kurt Vonnegut's 1961 dystopian  short story of the same name  It was produced for Showtime and first screened on August 13, 1995  It was released to VHS in 1998 

Plot
Harrison Bergeron lives in the fictional suburban town of Madison, Rhode Island in the year 2053  The audience is told that after the second American Revolution, which started during an ongoing economic depression that was a result of a combination of technological advancement and a widening disparity between the very rich and the very poor, it was mandated that all people be equal in all things  To this end, the social norm of this society has become dystopian egalitarianism  Citizens are pushed to strive to be of equal wealth, intelligence, athletic prowess and social status to all around them  Through a process of selective breeding, mankind is perfecting the perfectly average human being  What is not accomplished through arranged marriages is made up for through technological means, the most prominent of which are showing only mind numbing TV shows, and a headband device worn by all citizens which modulates intelligence, dialing a person's IQ up or down in order to arrive at a 'perfect' 100 
There are limits to the success of the devices, however, and Harrison Bergeron is one such case  He is a total failure in school, consistently receiving A's (C is the desired grade)  Even though he has been held back four years and his headband is consistently modified to dampen his intelligence, he still continues to excel to the embarrassment of him and his family 
Harrison goes to see a doctor about his intelligence problem, and after several tests it is determined that the headband is unsuccessful because Harrison's synaptic connections reroute themselves after each adjustment in order to overcome the inhibitions the headband is designed to place on the thought process  He is told that he will have to have an operation akin to a lobotomy in order to permanently lower his intelligence 
In his last day with a fully functioning brain, he goes to a "head house", where, in a parody of a bordello, men make plans to make high-end educational conversation with exceptionally smart women  Illegal device-free women are paid to play chess and conduct intelligent conversations with the clients  His first intelligent conversation ever with "mind whore" Phillipa is interrupted by a police bust  While the raid on the police station is underway Phillipa addresses a hidden camera saying not to take him away, and that she likes him  While being held captive in the police station, he is approached by a special agent who offers him an alternative to the lobotomy - to join what turns out to be the secret elite that runs the government 
Harrison falls in love with Phillipa there, but he illegally impregnates her and she is lobotomized for trying to escape   He feels he can no longer continue to betray his values and decides to take action  He breaks into a TV studio and reveals the truth about the secret society to the viewers  Eventually, the guards break through, and later on he is forced to make an appearance on TV and pretend the broadcast was not real  Instead, he uses his chance to commit suicide by shooting himself in front of the viewers  The story is framed by an additional perspective from Bergeron's parents, who are watching the incident on TV, but who, because of his father's handicapping due to his superior intelligence and his mother's less than average intelligence, cannot concentrate enough to appreciate what occurs nor remember it 
In a final scene, a young boy and his friend get together in his bedroom to watch the first four hours of Bergeron's broadcast, without their bands  Downstairs, one boy's mother looks up the stairs with a look of recognition on her face; she is seen to be Phillipa 

Cast
Sean Astin as Harrison Bergeron
Miranda de Pencier as Phillipa
Eugene Levy as President McCloskey
Mairlyn Smith as Janet Mckloskey
Howie Mandel as Charlie (of 'Chat with Charlie')
Andrea Martin as  Diana Moon Glampers
Christopher Plummer as John Klaxon
Nigel Bennett as Dr  Eisenstock
Peter Boretski as Newman
David Calderisi as Commissioner Benson
Emmanuelle Chriqui as Jeannie
Hayden Christensen as Eric
Cindy Cook as Weatherperson
Roger Dunn as George Bergeron
Jayne Eastwood as Ms  Newbound
Hal Eisen as TV Announcer - San Quentin
Matthew Ferguson as Garth Bergeron
Michael Fletcher - Technician
John Friesen as Frank the Plumber
Linda Goranson as Hazel Bergeron
Richard Monette as Eric Shockley
Quyen Hua as Wang

Production and release
Harrison Bergeron was filmed in Toronto, Ontario, Canada and the University of Toronto Scarborough campus 

Awards
Harrison Bergeron was nominated in four categories at the 1996 Gemini Awards for Best Direction, Best Performance by an Actor in a Supporting Role, Best Production Design or Art Direction and Best Sound 
Passage 7:
Blade Runner
Blade Runner is a 1982 science fiction film directed by Ridley Scott, and written by Hampton Fancher and David Peoples  Starring Harrison Ford, Rutger Hauer, Sean Young, and Edward James Olmos, it is an adaptation of Philip K  Dick's 1968 novel Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? The film is set in a dystopian future Los Angeles of 2019, in which synthetic humans known as replicants are bio-engineered by the powerful Tyrell Corporation to work on space colonies  When a fugitive group of advanced replicants led by Roy Batty (Hauer) escapes back to Earth, burnt-out cop Rick Deckard (Ford) reluctantly agrees to hunt them down 
Blade Runner initially underperformed in North American theaters and polarized critics; some praised its thematic complexity and visuals, while others critiqued its slow pacing and lack of action  It later became a cult film, and has since come to be regarded as one of the greatest science fiction films of all time  Hailed for its production design depicting a high-tech but decaying future, Blade Runner is often regarded as both a leading example of neo-noir cinema as well as a foundational work of the cyberpunk genre  The film's soundtrack, composed by Vangelis, was nominated in 1982 for a BAFTA and a Golden Globe as best original score 
The film has influenced many science fiction films, video games, anime, and television series  It brought the work of Philip K  Dick to the attention of Hollywood, and several of his works later became films such as Total Recall (1990), Minority Report (2002), and A Scanner Darkly (2006)  In 1993, it was selected for preservation in the U S  National Film Registry by the Library of Congress as being "culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant" 
Seven different versions of Blade Runner exist as a result of controversial changes requested by studio executives  A director's cut was released in 1992 after a strong response to test screenings of a workprint  This, in conjunction with the film's popularity as a video rental, made it one of the earliest movies to be released on DVD  In 2007, Warner Bros  released The Final Cut, a 25th-anniversary digitally remastered version  This is the only version over which Scott retained artistic control 
The film is the first of the franchise of the same name  A sequel, directed by Denis Villeneuve and titled Blade Runner 2049, was released in October 2017 alongside a trilogy of short films covering the thirty-year span between the two films' settings  The anime series Blade Runner: Black Lotus was released in 2021 

Plot
In 2019 Los Angeles, former police officer Rick Deckard is detained by Officer Gaff, who likes to make origami figures, and is brought to his former supervisor, Bryant  Deckard, whose job as a "blade runner" was to track down bioengineered humanoids known as replicants and terminally "retire" them, is informed that four replicants are on Earth illegally  Deckard begins to leave, but Bryant ambiguously threatens him and Deckard stays  The two watch a video of a blade runner named Holden administering the Voight-Kampff test, which is designed to distinguish replicants from humans based on their emotional responses to questions  The test subject, Leon, shoots Holden on the second question  Bryant wants Deckard to retire Leon and three other Nexus-6 replicants: Roy Batty, Zhora, and Pris 
Bryant has Deckard meet with the CEO of the company that creates the replicants, Eldon Tyrell, so he can administer the test on a Nexus-6 to see if it works  Tyrell expresses his interest in seeing the test fail first and asks him to administer it on his assistant Rachael  After a much longer than standard test, Deckard concludes privately to Tyrell that Rachael is a replicant who believes she is human  Tyrell explains that she is an experiment who has been given false memories to provide an "emotional cushion", and that she has no knowledge of her true nature 
In searching Leon's hotel room, Deckard finds photos and a scale from the skin of an animal, which is later identified as a synthetic snake scale  Roy and Leon investigate a replicant eye-manufacturing laboratory and learn of J  F  Sebastian, a gifted genetic designer who works closely with Tyrell  Deckard returns to his apartment where Rachael is waiting  She tries to prove her humanity by showing him a family photo, but Deckard reveals that her memories are implants from Tyrell's niece, and she leaves in tears  Meanwhile, Pris locates Sebastian and manipulates him to gain his trust 
A photograph from Leon's apartment and the snake scale lead Deckard to a strip club, where Zhora works  After a confrontation and chase, Deckard kills Zhora  Bryant also orders him to retire Rachael, who has disappeared from the Tyrell Corporation  Deckard spots Rachael in a crowd, but he is ambushed by Leon, who knocks the gun out of Deckard's hand and beats him  As Leon is about to kill Deckard, Rachael saves him by using Deckard's gun to kill Leon  They return to Deckard's apartment and, during a discussion, he promises not to track her down  As Rachael abruptly tries to leave, Deckard restrains her and forces her to kiss him, and she ultimately relents 
Deckard leaves Rachael at his apartment and departs to search for the remaining replicants  Roy arrives at Sebastian's apartment and tells Pris that the other replicants are dead  Sebastian reveals that because of a genetic premature aging disorder, his life will be cut short, like the replicants that were built with a four-year lifespan  Roy uses Sebastian to gain entrance to Tyrell's penthouse  He demands more life from his maker, which Tyrell says is impossible  Roy confesses that he has done "questionable things" but Tyrell dismisses this, praising Roy's advanced design and accomplishments in his short life  Roy kisses Tyrell and then kills him by crushing his skull  Sebastian tries to flee and is later reported dead At Sebastian's apartment, Deckard is ambushed by Pris, but he kills her as Roy returns  Roy's body begins to fail as the end of his lifespan nears  He chases Deckard through the building and onto the roof  Deckard tries to jump onto another roof but is left hanging on the edge  Roy makes the jump with ease and, as Deckard's grip loosens, Roy hoists him onto the roof to save him  Before Roy dies, he laments that his memories "will be lost in time, like tears in rain"  Gaff arrives to congratulate Deckard, also reminding him that Rachael will not live, but "then again, who does?" Deckard returns to his apartment to retrieve Rachael  While escorting her to the elevator, he notices a small origami unicorn on the floor  He recalls Gaff's words and departs with Rachael 

Cast
Production
Development
Interest in adapting Philip K  Dick's novel Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? developed shortly after its 1968 publication  Director Martin Scorsese was interested in filming the novel, but never optioned it  Producer Herb Jaffe optioned it in the early 1970s, but Dick was unimpressed with the screenplay written by Herb's son Robert, saying, "Jaffe's screenplay was so terribly done     Robert flew down to Santa Ana to speak with me about the project  And the first thing I said to him when he got off the plane was, 'Shall I beat you up here at the airport, or shall I beat you up back at my apartment?'"The screenplay by Hampton Fancher was optioned in 1977  Producer Michael Deeley became interested in Fancher's draft and convinced director Ridley Scott to film it  Scott had previously declined the project, but after leaving the slow production of Dune, wanted a faster-paced project to take his mind off his older brother's recent death  He joined the project on February 21, 1980, and managed to push up the promised Filmways financing from US$13 million to $15 million  Fancher's script focused more on environmental issues and less on issues of humanity and religion, which are prominent in the novel, and Scott wanted changes  Fancher found a cinema treatment by William S  Burroughs for Alan E  Nourse's novel The Bladerunner (1974), titled Blade Runner (a movie)  Scott liked the name, so Deeley obtained the rights to the titles  Eventually, he hired David Peoples to rewrite the script and Fancher left the job over the issue on December 21, 1980, although he later returned to contribute additional rewrites Having invested over $2 5 million in pre-production, as the date of commencement of principal photography neared, Filmways withdrew financial backing  In ten days Deeley had secured $21 5 million in financing through a three-way deal between the Ladd Company (through Warner Bros ), the Hong Kong-based producer Sir Run Run Shaw and Tandem Productions Dick became concerned that no one had informed him about the film's production, which added to his distrust of Hollywood  After Dick criticized an early version of Fancher's script in an article written for the Los Angeles Select TV Guide, the studio sent Dick the Peoples rewrite  Although Dick died shortly before the film's release, he was pleased with the rewritten script and with a 20-minute special effects test reel that was screened for him when he was invited to the studio  Despite his well-known skepticism of Hollywood in principle, Dick enthused to Scott that the world created for the film looked exactly as he had imagined it  He said, "I saw a segment of Douglas Trumbull's special effects for Blade Runner on the KNBC news  I recognized it immediately  It was my own interior world  They caught it perfectly " He also approved of the film's script, saying, "After I finished reading the screenplay, I got the novel out and looked through it  The two reinforce each other so that someone who started with the novel would enjoy the movie and someone who started with the movie would enjoy the novel " The motion picture was dedicated to Dick  Principal photography of Blade Runner began on March 9, 1981, and ended four months later In 1992, Ford revealed, "Blade Runner is not one of my favorite films  I tangled with Ridley " Apart from friction with the director, Ford also disliked the voiceovers: "When we started shooting it had been tacitly agreed that the version of the film that we had agreed upon was the version without voiceover narration  It was a f**king [sic] nightmare  I thought that the film had worked without the narration  But now I was stuck re-creating that narration  And I was obliged to do the voiceovers for people that did not represent the director's interests " "I went kicking and screaming to the studio to record it " The narration monologs were written by an uncredited Roland Kibbee In 2006, Scott was asked "Who's the biggest pain in the arse you've ever worked with?" He replied: "It's got to be Harrison     he'll forgive me because now I get on with him  Now he's become charming  But he knows a lot, that's the problem  When we worked together it was my first film up and I was the new kid on the block  But we made a good movie " Ford said of Scott in 2000: "I admire his work  We had a bad patch there, and I'm over it " In 2006 Ford reflected on the production of the film saying: "What I remember more than anything else when I see Blade Runner is not the 50 nights of shooting in the rain, but the voiceover     I was still obliged to work for these clowns that came in writing one bad voiceover after another " Ridley Scott confirmed in the summer 2007 issue of Total Film that Harrison Ford contributed to the Blade Runner Special Edition DVD, and had already recorded his interviews  "Harrison's fully on board", said Scott 
The Bradbury Building in downtown Los Angeles served as a filming location, and a Warner Bros  backlot housed the 2019 Los Angeles street sets  Other locations included the Ennis-Brown House and the 2nd Street Tunnel  Test screenings resulted in several changes, including adding a voice-over, a happy ending, and the removal of a Holden hospital scene  The relationship between the filmmakers and the investors was difficult, which culminated in Deeley and Scott being fired but still working on the film  Crew members created T-shirts during filming saying, "Yes Guv'nor, My Ass" that mocked Scott's unfavorable comparison of U S  and British crews; Scott responded with a T-shirt of his own, "Xenophobia Sucks", making the incident known as the T-shirt war 

Casting
Casting the film proved troublesome, particularly for the lead role of Deckard  Screenwriter Hampton Fancher envisioned Robert Mitchum as Deckard and wrote the character's dialogue with Mitchum in mind  Director Ridley Scott and the film's producers spent months meeting and discussing the role with Dustin Hoffman, who eventually departed over differences in vision  Harrison Ford was ultimately chosen for several reasons, including his performance in the Star Wars films, Ford's interest in the Blade Runner story, and discussions with Steven Spielberg who was finishing Raiders of the Lost Ark at the time and strongly praised Ford's work in the film  Following his success in those two films, Ford was looking for a role with dramatic depth  According to production documents, several actors were considered for the role, including Gene Hackman, Sean Connery, Jack Nicholson, Paul Newman, Clint Eastwood, Tommy Lee Jones, Arnold Schwarzenegger, Peter Falk, Nick Nolte, Al Pacino and Burt Reynolds One role that was not difficult to cast was Rutger Hauer as Roy Batty, the violent yet thoughtful leader of the replicants  Scott cast Hauer without having met him, based solely on Hauer's performances in Paul Verhoeven's movies Scott had seen (Katie Tippel, Soldier of Orange, and Turkish Delight)  Hauer's portrayal of Batty was regarded by Philip K  Dick as "the perfect Batty – cold, Aryan, flawless"  Of the many films Hauer made, Blade Runner was his favorite  As he explained in a live chat in 2001, "Blade Runner needs no explanation  It just [is]  All of the best  There is nothing like it  To be part of a real masterpiece which changed the world's thinking  It's awesome " Hauer rewrote his character's "tears in rain" speech himself and presented the words to Scott on set prior to filming 
Blade Runner used a number of then-lesser-known actors: Sean Young portrays Rachael, an experimental replicant implanted with the memories of Tyrell's niece, causing her to believe she is human; Nina Axelrod auditioned for the role  Daryl Hannah portrays Pris, a "basic pleasure model" replicant; Stacey Nelkin auditioned for the role, but was given another part in the film, which was ultimately cut before filming  Debbie Harry turned down the role of Pris  Casting Pris and Rachael was challenging, requiring several screen tests with Morgan Paull playing the role of Deckard  Paull was cast as Deckard's fellow bounty hunter Holden based on his performances in the tests  Brion James portrays Leon Kowalski, a combat and laborer replicant, and Joanna Cassidy portrays Zhora, an assassin replicant 
Edward James Olmos portrays Gaff  Olmos drew on diverse ethnic sources to help create the fictional "Cityspeak" language his character uses in the film  His initial address to Deckard at the noodle bar is partly in Hungarian and means, "Horse dick [bullshit]! No way  You are the Blade     Blade Runner " M  Emmet Walsh portrays Captain Bryant, a rumpled, hard-drinking and underhanded police veteran typical of the film noir genre  Joe Turkel portrays Dr  Eldon Tyrell, a corporate mogul who built an empire on genetically manipulated humanoid slaves  William Sanderson was cast as J  F  Sebastian, a quiet and lonely genius who provides a compassionate yet compliant portrait of humanity  J  F  sympathizes with the replicants, whom he sees as companions, and he shares their shorter lifespan due to his rapid aging disease  Joe Pantoliano had earlier been considered for the role  James Hong portrays Hannibal Chew, an elderly geneticist specializing in synthetic eyes, and Hy Pyke portrayed the sleazy bar owner Taffey Lewis – in a single take, something almost unheard-of with Scott, whose drive for perfection resulted at times in double-digit takes 

Design
Scott credits Edward Hopper's painting Nighthawks and the French science fiction comics magazine Métal Hurlant, to which the artist Jean "Moebius" Giraud contributed, as stylistic mood sources  He also drew on the landscape of "Hong Kong on a very bad day" and the industrial landscape of his one-time home in northeast England  The visual style of the movie is influenced by the work of futurist Italian architect Antonio Sant'Elia  Scott hired Syd Mead as his concept artist; like Scott, he was influenced by Métal Hurlant  Moebius was offered the opportunity to assist in the pre-production of Blade Runner, but he declined so that he could work on René Laloux's animated film Les Maîtres du temps – a decision that he later regretted  Production designer Lawrence G  Paull and art director David Snyder realized Scott's and Mead's sketches  Douglas Trumbull and Richard Yuricich supervised the special effects for the film, and Mark Stetson served as chief model maker Blade Runner has numerous similarities to Fritz Lang's Metropolis, including a built-up urban environment, in which the wealthy literally live above the workers, dominated by a huge building – the Stadtkrone Tower in Metropolis and the Tyrell Building in Blade Runner  Special effects supervisor David Dryer used stills from Metropolis when lining up Blade Runner's miniature building shots The extended end scene in the original theatrical release shows Rachael and Deckard traveling into daylight with pastoral aerial shots filmed by director Stanley Kubrick  Ridley Scott contacted Kubrick about using some of his surplus helicopter aerial photography from The Shining 

Spinner
"Spinner" is the generic term for the fictional flying cars used in the film  A spinner can be driven as a ground-based vehicle, and take off vertically, hover, and cruise much like vertical take-off and landing (VTOL) aircraft  They are used extensively by the police as patrol cars, and wealthy people can also acquire spinner licenses  The vehicle was conceived and designed by Syd Mead who described the spinner as an aerodyne – a vehicle which directs air downward to create lift, though press kits for the film stated that the spinner was propelled by three engines: "conventional internal combustion, jet, and anti-gravity"  A spinner is on permanent exhibit at the Science Fiction and Fantasy Hall of Fame in Seattle, Washington  Mead's conceptual drawings were transformed into 25 vehicles by automobile customizer Gene Winfield; at least two were working ground vehicles, while others were light-weight mockups for crane shots and set decoration for street shots  Two of them ended up at Disney World in Orlando, Florida, but were later destroyed, and a few others remain in private collections 

Voight-Kampff machine
The Voight-Kampff machine is a fictional interrogation tool, originating from the novel (where it is spelled "Voigt-Kampff")  The Voight-Kampff is a polygraph-like machine used by blade runners to determine whether an individual is a replicant  It measures bodily functions such as respiration, blush response, heart rate and eye movement in response to questions dealing with empathy 

Music
The Blade Runner soundtrack by Vangelis is a dark melodic combination of classic composition and futuristic synthesizers which mirrors the film noir retro-future envisioned by Scott  Vangelis, fresh from his Academy Award-winning score for Chariots of Fire, composed and performed the music on his synthesizers  He also made use of various chimes and the vocals of collaborator Demis Roussos  Another memorable sound is the tenor sax solo "Love Theme" by British saxophonist Dick Morrissey, who performed on many of Vangelis's albums  Ridley Scott also used "Memories of Green" from the Vangelis album See You Later, an orchestral version of which Scott would later use in his film Someone to Watch Over Me Along with Vangelis's compositions and ambient textures, the film's soundscape also features a track by the Japanese ensemble Nipponia – "Ogi no Mato" or "The Folding Fan as a Target" from the Nonesuch Records release Traditional Vocal and Instrumental Music – and a track by harpist Gail Laughton from "Harps of the Ancient Temples" on Laurel Records Despite being well received by fans and critically acclaimed and nominated in 1982 for a BAFTA and Golden Globe as best original score, and the promise of a soundtrack album from Polydor Records in the end titles of the film, the release of the official soundtrack recording was delayed for over a decade  There are two official releases of the music from Blade Runner  In light of the lack of a release of an album, the New American Orchestra recorded an orchestral adaptation in 1982 which bore little resemblance to the original  Some of the film tracks would, in 1989, surface on the compilation Vangelis: Themes, but not until the 1992 release of the Director's Cut version would a substantial amount of the film's score see commercial release These delays and poor reproductions led to the production of many bootleg recordings over the years  A bootleg tape surfaced in 1982 at science fiction conventions and became popular given the delay of an official release of the original recordings, and in 1993 "Off World Music, Ltd" created a bootleg CD that would prove more comprehensive than Vangelis' official CD in 1994  A set with three CDs of Blade Runner-related Vangelis music was released in 2007  Titled Blade Runner Trilogy, the first disc contains the same tracks as the 1994 official soundtrack release, the second features previously unreleased music from the movie, and the third disc is all newly composed music from Vangelis, inspired by, and in the spirit of the movie 

Special effects
The film's special effects are generally recognized to be among the best of all time, using the available (non-digital) technology to the fullest  Special effects engineers who worked on the film are often praised for the innovative technology they used to produce and design certain aspects of those visuals  In addition to matte paintings and models, the techniques employed included multipass exposures  In some scenes, the set was lit, shot, the film rewound, and then rerecorded over with different lighting  In some cases this was done 16 times in all  The cameras were frequently motion controlled using computers  Many effects used techniques which had been developed during the production of Close Encounters of the Third Kind 

Release
Theatrical run
Blade Runner was released in 1,290 theaters on June 25, 1982  That date was chosen by producer Alan Ladd Jr  because his previous highest-grossing films (Star Wars and Alien) had a similar opening date (May 25) in 1977 and 1979, making the 25th of the month his "lucky day"  Blade Runner grossed reasonably good ticket sales in its opening weekend; earning $6 1 million during its first weekend in theaters  The film was released close to other major science-fiction and fantasy releases such as The Thing, Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan, Conan the Barbarian and E T  the Extra-Terrestrial, which affected its commercial success 

Versions
Several versions of Blade Runner have been shown  The original workprint version (1982, 113 minutes) was shown for audience test previews in Denver and Dallas in March 1982  Negative responses to the previews led to the modifications resulting in the U S  theatrical version  The workprint was shown as a director's cut without Scott's approval at the Los Angeles Fairfax Theater in May 1990, at an AMPAS showing in April 1991, and in September and October 1991 at the Los Angeles NuArt Theater and the San Francisco Castro Theatre  Positive responses pushed the studio to approve work on an official director's cut  A San Diego Sneak Preview was shown only once, in May 1982, and was almost identical to the U S  theatrical version but contained three extra scenes not shown in any other version, including the 2007 Final Cut Two versions were shown in the film's 1982 theatrical release: the U S  theatrical version (117 minutes), known as the original version or Domestic Cut (released on Betamax, CED Videodisc and VHS in 1983, and on LaserDisc in 1987), and the International Cut (117 minutes), also known as the "Criterion Edition" or "uncut version", which included more violent action scenes than the U S  version  Although initially unavailable in the U S  and distributed in Europe and Asia via theatrical and local Warner Home Video releases, the International Cut was later released on VHS and The Criterion Collection Laserdisc in North America, and re-released in 1992 as a "10th Anniversary Edition" Ridley Scott's Director's Cut (1992, 116 minutes) had significant changes from the theatrical version including the removal of Deckard's voice-over, the re-insertion of the unicorn sequence, and the removal of the studio-imposed happy ending  Scott provided extensive notes and consultation to Warner Bros  through film preservationist Michael Arick, who was put in charge of creating the Director's Cut Scott's definitive The Final Cut (2007, 117 minutes) was released by Warner Bros  theatrically on October 5, 2007, and subsequently released on DVD, HD DVD, and Blu-ray Disc in December 2007  This is the only version over which Scott had complete artistic and editorial control 

Reception
Critical response
On Rotten Tomatoes, the film holds an 89% approval rating based on 126 reviews, with an average rating of 8 50/10  The website's critics consensus reads, "Misunderstood when it first hit theaters, the influence of Ridley Scott's mysterious, neo-noir Blade Runner has deepened with time  A visually remarkable, achingly human sci-fi masterpiece " Metacritic, which uses a weighted average, assigned the film a score of 84 out of 100 based on 15 critics, indicating "universal acclaim" Initial reactions among film critics were mixed  Some wrote that the plot took a back seat to the film's special effects and did not fit the studio's marketing as an action and adventure film  Others acclaimed its complexity and predicted it would stand the test of time  Negative criticism in the United States cited its slow pace  Sheila Benson from the Los Angeles Times called it "Blade Crawler", and Pat Berman in The State and Columbia Record described it as "science fiction pornography"  Pauline Kael praised Blade Runner as worthy of a place in film history for its distinctive sci-fi vision, yet criticized the film's lack of development in "human terms"  Ares magazine said, "Misunderstood by audiences and critics alike, it is by far the best science fiction film of the year "

Cultural analysis
Academics began analyzing the film almost as soon as it was released  One of the first books on the film was Paul M  Sammon's Future Noir: The Making of Blade Runner (1996), which dissects all the details concerning the film making  He was followed by Scott Bukatman's Blade Runner and other books and academic articles  In Postmodern Metanarratives: Blade Runner and Literature in the Age of Image, Décio Torres Cruz analyzes the philosophical and psychological issues and the literary influences in Blade Runner  He examines the film's cyberpunk and dystopic elements by establishing a link between the Biblical, classical and modern traditions and the postmodern aspects in the film's collage of several literary texts The boom in home video formats helped establish a growing cult around the film, which scholars have dissected for its dystopic aspects, questions regarding "authentic" humanity, ecofeminist aspects and use of conventions from multiple genres  Popular culture began to reassess its impact as a classic several years after it was released  Roger Ebert praised the visuals of both the original and the Director's Cut and recommended it for that reason; however, he found the human story clichéd and a little thin  He later added The Final Cut to his "Great Movies" list  Critic Chris Rodley and Janet Maslin theorized that Blade Runner changed cinematic and cultural discourse through its image repertoire and subsequent influence on films  In 2012, Time film critic Richard Corliss surgically analyzed the durability, complexity, screenplay, sets and production dynamics from a personal, three-decade perspective  Denis Villeneuve, who directed the sequel, Blade Runner 2049, cites the film as a huge influence for him and many others It has also been noted for its postmodernist approach and that it contributes to the historical development of modern dystopia in film  Furthermore, the futuristic version of Los Angeles has been widely discussed by academics with some comparing it to Milton's descriptions of hell in Paradise Lost  A 2019 retrospective in the BBC argued that elements of the film's socio-political themes remained prescient in the real year of the film's setting, such as its depiction of climate change  From a more philosophical perspective, Alison Landsberg described Scott's direction of the film as a "prosthetic memory"—an action that has never happened and appears to be divorced from lived experience, yet it defines personhood and identity within the wider Blade Runner universe 

Awards and nominations
Blade Runner won or received nominations for the following awards:

Themes
The film operates on multiple dramatic and narrative levels  It employs some of the conventions of film noir, among them the character of a femme fatale; narration by the protagonist (in the original release); chiaroscuro cinematography; and giving the hero a questionable moral outlook – extended to include reflections upon the nature of his own humanity  It is a literate science fiction film, thematically enfolding the philosophy of religion and moral implications of human mastery of genetic engineering in the context of classical Greek drama and hubris  It also draws on Biblical images, such as Noah's flood, and literary sources, such as Frankenstein and William Blake  Although Scott said any similarity was merely coincidental, fans claimed that the chess game between Sebastian and Tyrell was based on the famous Immortal Game of 1851 Blade Runner delves into the effects of technology on the environment and society by reaching to the past, using literature, religious symbolism, classical dramatic themes, and film noir techniques  This tension between past, present, and future is represented in the "retrofitted" future depicted in the film, one which is high-tech and gleaming in places but decayed and outdated elsewhere  In an interview with The Observer in 2002, director Ridley Scott described the film as "extremely dark, both literally and metaphorically, with an oddly masochistic feel"  He also said that he "liked the idea of exploring pain" in the wake of his brother's death: "When he was ill, I used to go and visit him in London, and that was really traumatic for me "A sense of foreboding and paranoia pervades the world of the film: corporate power looms large; the police seem omnipresent; vehicle and warning lights probe into buildings; and the consequences of huge biomedical power over the individual are explored –
especially regarding replicants' implanted memories  The film depicts a world post ecocide, where warfare and capitalism have led to destruction of 'normal' ecological systems  Control over the environment is exercised on a vast scale, and goes hand in hand with the absence of any natural life; for example, artificial animals stand in for their extinct predecessors  This oppressive backdrop explains the frequently referenced migration of humans to "off-world" (extraterrestrial) colonies  Eyes are a recurring motif, as are manipulated images, calling into question the nature of reality and our ability to accurately perceive and remember it These thematic elements provide an atmosphere of uncertainty for Blade Runner's central theme of examining humanity  In order to discover replicants, an empathy test is used, with a number of its questions focused on the treatment of animals – seemingly an essential indicator of one's "humanity"  Replicants will not respond the same way humans would, showing a lack of concern  The film goes so far as to question if Deckard might be a replicant, in the process asking the audience to re-evaluate what it means to be human The question of whether Deckard is intended to be a human or a replicant has been an ongoing controversy since the film's release  Both Michael Deeley and Harrison Ford wanted Deckard to be human, while Hampton Fancher preferred ambiguity  Ridley Scott has stated that in his vision, Deckard is a replicant  Deckard's unicorn-dream sequence, inserted into Scott's Director's Cut and concomitant with Gaff's parting gift of an origami unicorn, is seen by many as showing that Deckard is a replicant – because Gaff could have retrieved Deckard's implanted memories  The interpretation that Deckard is a replicant is challenged by others who believe the unicorn imagery shows that the characters, whether human or replicant, share the same dreams and recognize their affinity, or that the absence of a decisive answer is crucial to the film's main theme  The film's inherent ambiguity and uncertainty, as well as its textual richness, have permitted multiple interpretations 

Legacy
Cultural impact
While not initially a success with North American audiences, Blade Runner was popular internationally and garnered a cult following  The film's dark style and futuristic designs have served as a benchmark and its influence can be seen in many subsequent science fiction films, video games, anime, and television programs  For example, Ronald D  Moore and David Eick, the producers of the re-imagining of Battlestar Galactica, have both cited Blade Runner as one of the major influences for the show The film was selected for preservation in the United States National Film Registry in 1993 and is frequently taught in university courses  In 2007, it was named the second-most visually influential film of all time by the Visual Effects Society  The film has also been the subject of parody, such as the comics Blade Bummer by Crazy comics, Bad Rubber by Steve Gallacci, and the Red Dwarf 2009 three-part miniseries "Back to Earth"  The anime series Psycho-Pass by Production I G was also highly influenced by the movie Blade Runner continues to reflect modern trends and concerns, and an increasing number of critics consider it one of the greatest science fiction films of all time  It was voted the best science fiction film ever made in a 2004 poll of 60 eminent world scientists  Blade Runner is also cited as an important influence to both the style and story of the Ghost in the Shell franchise, which itself has been highly influential to the future-noir genre  Blade Runner has been very influential to the cyberpunk movement  It also influenced the cyberpunk derivative biopunk, which revolves around biotechnology and genetic engineering The dialogue and music in Blade Runner has been sampled in music more than any other film of the 20th century  The 2009 album I, Human by Singaporean band Deus Ex Machina makes numerous references to the genetic engineering and cloning themes from the film, and even features a track titled "Replicant" Blade Runner is cited as a major influence on Warren Spector, designer of the video game Deus Ex, which displays evidence of the film's influence in both its visual rendering and plot  Indeed, the film's look – and in particular its overall darkness, preponderance of neon lights and opaque visuals – are easier to render than complicated backdrops, making it a popular reference point for video game designers  It has influenced adventure games such as the 2012 graphical text adventure Cypher, Rise of the Dragon, Snatcher, the Tex Murphy series, Beneath a Steel Sky, Flashback: The Quest for Identity, Bubblegum Crisis video games (and their original anime), the role-playing game Shadowrun, the first-person shooter Perfect Dark, the shooter game Skyhammer, and the Syndicate series of video games The logos of Atari, Bell, Coca-Cola, Cuisinart, Pan Am, and RCA, all market leaders at the time, were prominently displayed as product placement in the film, and all experienced setbacks after the film's release, leading to suggestions of a Blade Runner curse  Coca-Cola and Cuisinart recovered, and Tsingtao beer was also featured in the film and was more successful after the film than before The design of Tesla's Cybertruck was inspired by the film  Prior to its release Elon Musk promised that it would "look like something out of Blade Runner"  Besides referring to the truck as the "Blade Runner Truck", Musk chose to debut the truck in order to coincide with the film's setting of November 2019  The film's art designer Syd Mead praised the truck and said he was "flattered" by the homage to Blade Runner 

Media recognition
American Film Institute recognition
AFI's 100 Years   100 Thrills – No  74
AFI's 100 Years   100 Movies (10th Anniversary Edition) – No  97
AFI's 10 Top 10 – No  6 Science Fiction Film

In other media
Before filming began, Cinefantastique magazine commissioned Paul M  Sammon to write a special issue about Blade Runner's production which became the book Future Noir: The Making of Blade Runner  The book chronicles Blade Runner's evolution, focusing on film-set politics, especially the British director's experiences with his first American film crew; of which producer Alan Ladd, Jr  has said, "Harrison wouldn't speak to Ridley and Ridley wouldn't speak to Harrison  By the end of the shoot Ford was 'ready to kill Ridley', said one colleague  He really would have taken him on if he hadn't been talked out of it " Future Noir has short cast biographies and quotations about their experiences as well as photographs of the film's production and preliminary sketches  A second edition of Future Noir was published in 2007, and additional materials not in either print edition have been published online Philip K  Dick refused a $400,000 offer to write a Blade Runner novelization, saying: "⁠[I was] told the cheapo novelization would have to appeal to the twelve-year-old audience" and it "would have probably been disastrous to me artistically"  He added, "That insistence on my part of bringing out the original novel and not doing the novelization – they were just furious  They finally recognized that there was a legitimate reason for reissuing the novel, even though it cost them money  It was a victory not just of contractual obligations but of theoretical principles " Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? was eventually reprinted as a tie-in, with the film poster as a cover and the original title in parentheses below the Blade Runner title  Additionally, a novelization of the movie entitled Blade Runner: A Story of the Future by Les Martin was released in 1982  Archie Goodwin scripted the comic book adaptation, A Marvel Comics Super Special: Blade Runner, published in September 1982, which was illustrated by Al Williamson, Carlos Garzon, Dan Green, and Ralph Reese, and lettered by Ed King Blue Dolphin Enterprises published the film's screenplay combined with selected production storyboards as The Illustrated Blade Runner (June 1982); a book of original production artwork by Syd Mead, Mentor Huebner, Charles Knode, Michael Kaplan, and Ridley Scott as Blade Runner Sketchbook (1982); and The Blade Runner Portfolio (1982), a collection of twelve photographic prints, similar to the artist portfolios released by their Schanes & Schanes imprint There are two video games based on the film, both titled Blade Runner: one from 1985, a side-scrolling video game for Commodore 64, ZX Spectrum, and Amstrad CPC by CRL Group PLC, which is marked as "a video game interpretation of the film score by Vangelis" rather than of the film itself (due to licensing issues); and another from 1997, a point-and-click adventure for PC by Westwood Studios  The 1997 game has a non-linear plot based in the Blade Runner world, non-player characters that each ran in their own independent AI, and an unusual pseudo-3D engine (which eschewed polygonal solids in favor of voxel elements) that did not require the use of a 3D accelerator card to play the game  Eldon Tyrell, Gaff, Leon, Rachael, Chew, J  F  Sebastian and Howie Lee appear, and their voice files are recorded by the original actors, with the exception of Gaff, who is replaced by Javier Grajeda (as Victor Gardell) and Howie Lee, who is replaced by Toru Nagai  The player assumes the role of McCoy, another replicant-hunter working at the same time as Deckard The television film (and later series) Total Recall 2070 was initially planned as a spin-off of the film Total Recall (based on Philip K  Dick's short story "We Can Remember It for You Wholesale"), but was produced as a hybrid of Total Recall and Blade Runner  Many similarities between Total Recall 2070 and Blade Runner were noted, as well as apparent influences on the show from Isaac Asimov's The Caves of Steel and the TV series Holmes & Yoyo 

Documentaries
The film has been the subject of several documentaries 

Blade Runner: Convention Reel (1982, 13 minutes)
Co-directed by Muffet Kaufman and Jeffrey B  Walker, shot and screened in 16 mm, featured no narrator, was filmed in 1981 while Blade Runner was still in production and featured short "behind-the-scenes" segments showing sets being built and sequences being shot, as well as interviews with Ridley Scott, Syd Mead and Douglas Trumbull  Appears on the Blade Runner Ultimate Collector's Edition On the Edge of Blade Runner (2000, 55 minutes)
Directed by Andrew Abbott and hosted/written by Mark Kermode  Interviews with production staff, including Scott, give details of the creative process and the turmoil during preproduction  Insights into Philip K  Dick and the origins of Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? are provided by Paul M  Sammon and Hampton Fancher 
Future Shocks (2003, 27 minutes)
Directed by TVOntario  It includes interviews with executive producer Bud Yorkin, Syd Mead, and the cast, and commentary by science fiction author Robert J  Sawyer and from film critics 
Dangerous Days: Making Blade Runner (2007, 213 minutes)
Directed and produced by Charles de Lauzirika for The Final Cut version of the film  Its source material comprises more than 80 interviews, including extensive conversations with Ford, Young, and Scott  The documentary is presented in eight chapters, with each of the first seven covering a portion of the filmmaking process  The final chapter examines Blade Runner's controversial legacy 
All Our Variant Futures: From Workprint to Final Cut (2007, 29 minutes)
Produced by Paul Prischman, appears on the Blade Runner Ultimate Collector's Edition and provides an overview of the film's multiple versions and their origins, as well as detailing the seven-year-long restoration, enhancement and remastering process behind The Final Cut 
 Blade Runner Phenomenon (2021, 53 minutes)
Directed by Boris Hars-Tschachotin and made by the France and Germany European public service channel ARTE, this documentary informs viewers using behind-the-scenes material from various sets, photos, original locations in Los Angeles, and interviews with those involved in the production 

Sequel and related media
A sequel was released in 2017, titled Blade Runner 2049, with Ryan Gosling alongside Ford in the starring roles  It entered production in mid-2016 and is set decades after the first film  Harrison Ford reprised his role as Rick Deckard  The film won two Academy Awards, for cinematography and visual effects The world of Blade Runner has also come to be explored in animation  Blade Runner 2049 was preceded by the release of three short films that served as prequels, where the chronological first, Blade Runner Black Out 2022, was anime (the other two, 2036: Nexus Dawn and 2048: Nowhere to Run, were live action, not animated) In November 2021, a Japanese-American anime television series called Blade Runner: Black Lotus was released  The series tells the story of a female replicant protagonist, rather than that of a male Blade Runner one Dick's friend K  W  Jeter wrote three authorized Blade Runner novels that continue Rick Deckard's story, attempting to resolve the differences between the film and Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? These are Blade Runner 2: The Edge of Human (1995), Blade Runner 3: Replicant Night (1996), and Blade Runner 4: Eye and Talon (2000)
Blade Runner cowriter David Peoples wrote the 1998 action film Soldier, which he referred to as a "sidequel" or spiritual successor to the original film; the two are set in a shared universe  A bonus feature on the Blu-ray for Prometheus, the 2012 film by Scott set in the Alien universe, states that Eldon Tyrell, CEO of the Blade Runner Tyrell Corporation, was the mentor of Guy Pearce's character Peter Weyland In late 2022, Amazon announced a Blade Runner 2049 sequel series would be produced  On October 12, 2022, an apparent official approval to actually make a Blade Runner 2099 TV series was reported 

See also
Blade Runner (franchise)
Arcology
Biorobotics
List of dystopian films
List of fictional robots and androids
Synthetic biology
Tech noir

Notes



ground_truth: no

prompt_front: Answer the question based on the given passages. Only give me the answer and do not output any other words.

Question: Morgan Paull played Dave Holden in a 1982 film loosely adapted from a novel by what author?

The following are given passages.
Context 4: Passage 1:
Sabal Trail Transmission Pipeline
Sabal Trail Transmission Pipeline is a natural gas pipeline that runs from central Alabama through southwest Georgia to Orange County, Florida  A minority stake in the venture is owned by NextEra Energy and Duke Energy  The pipeline has been being planned since before 2011  In July 2013 it was announced that Florida Power & Light Company (FPL) jointly awarded its parent corporation, NextEra Energy and Spectra Energy the bid to build the pipeline  In May 2015, Duke Energy bought an interest in the venture  Construction began in September 2016  The pipeline is currently scheduled to be in service by June 2017 

Environmental concerns and federal agency permission
The construction of the pipeline has drawn concern from the communities through which it is planned to be built  Protests in Albany, Georgia and Valdosta, Georgia have occurred in response to the plans to build the pipelines  The threat of eminent domain and the environmental impact are among the concerns that have been voiced by citizens 
In late October 2015, the United States Environmental Protection Agency recommended to Federal Energy Regulatory Commission that the pipeline be rerouted away from the Floridan aquifer because of the karst geology that is prone to sinkholes and also contains wetlands Environmental concerns have also been raised regarding threats to endangered species habitat along the route including crocodile, manatee and sea turtle breeding and nesting grounds  Others including Sanford Bishop, Hank Johnson, David Scott and John Lewis have voiced concern over the construction of a proposed compressor station near an already disadvantaged African American community in Albany, Georgia Despite the recommendations of Environmental Protection Agency, the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission approved the pipeline's route in February 2016  In August 2016, the Army Corps of Engineers approved the route through North Florida  Some citizens from the areas of the route continued to voice concerns about the environmental impact the pipeline would have the environment after it was approved by the various governmental agencies 
The federal permits require the companies constructing the pipeline to engage in mitigation banking 

Protests
The construction of the Sabal Trail resulted in extensive protests from environmentalists  On November 12, 2016, fourteen protesters were arrested at a pipeline construction site in Gilchrist County, Florida after one protester locked himself to truck on site and the others obstructed its path  They had been inspired by the Dakota Access Pipeline protests and used similar protest signage  In February of 2017, two protestors locked themselves inside a section of the pipeline, citing the danger to people and the environment which would result from a pipeline leak  On February 26, 2017 an apparent protester was seen firing a high powered rifle at the pipeline construction site  The man fled and was chased by police until he crashed and was killed by a deputy after he tried to engage police in a gunfight

Construction
In September 2016, construction began on the pipeline  
In late October 2016, drilling mud seepage began leaking into the Withlacoochee River at construction along the border of Brooks County, Georgia and Lowndes County, Georgia from a pilot hole that had been drilled underneath the river in preparation for the horizontal directional drilling hole  After the leakage was discovered, the Sabal Company installed containment booms at the site and posted a vacuum truck to capture the mud seepage  The spill prompted protests from concerned local citizens on November 16, 2016 As part of the company's biweekly report for the week ending on November 27 to the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission, it was reported that a sinkhole had developed 165 feet (50 m) southeast of the horizontal directional drilling (HDD) hole exit point at the work site near the Withlacoochee River  The sinkhole had been identified on November 5 by workers in the field 

Owners
Spectra Energy
NextEra Energy
Duke Energy (7 5%)

See also
Spectra Energy
Passage 2:
Duke Energy
Duke Energy Corporation is an American electric power and natural gas holding company headquartered in Charlotte, North Carolina 

Overview
Based in Charlotte, North Carolina, Duke Energy owns 58,200 megawatts of base-load and peak generation in the United States, which it distributes to its 7 2 million customers  The company has approximately 29,000 employees  Duke Energy's service territory covers 104,000 square miles (270,000 km2) with 250,200 miles (402,700 km) of distribution lines  Almost all of Duke Energy's Midwest generation comes from coal, natural gas, or oil, while half of its Carolinas generation comes from its nuclear power plants  During 2006, Duke Energy generated 148,798,332 megawatt-hours of electrical energy 
Duke Energy Renewable Services (DERS), a subsidiary of Duke Energy, specializes in the development, ownership, and operation of various generation facilities throughout the United States  This segment of the company operates 1,700 megawatts of generation  240 megawatts of wind generation were under construction and 1,500 additional megawatts of wind generation were in planning stages  On September 9, 2008, DERS updated its projections for future wind power capacity  By the end of 2008, it would have over 500 MW of nameplate capacity of wind power online, and an additional 5,000 MW in development 

Subsidiaries
Duke Energy Carolinas (formerly Duke Power)
Duke Energy Ohio (formerly Cincinnati Gas & Electric Company, via Cinergy)
Duke Energy Kentucky (formerly Union Light, Heat & Power, via Cinergy)
Duke Energy Indiana (formerly Public Service Indiana, via Cinergy)
Duke Energy Florida (formerly Florida Power Corporation, via Progress Energy)
Duke Energy Progress (formerly Carolina Power and Light, via Progress Energy)
Duke Energy Renewables
Duke Energy Retail
Duke Energy International
Duke Energy Sustainable Solutions
Duke Energy One

History
The company began in 1900 as the Catawba Power Company when Walker Gill Wylie and his brother financed the building of a hydroelectric power station at India Hook Shoals along the Catawba River near India Hook, South Carolina  When he needed additional funding to further his ambitious plan for construction of a series of hydroelectric power plants, Wylie convinced James B  Duke and his partner James Blaney to invest in the Southern Power Company, founded in 1905 
In 1917 James Blaney was the founder of the Wateree Power Company that was formed as a holding company for several utilities that had been founded and/or owned by Duke, and Blaney his associates, and in 1924 the name was changed to Duke Power  In 1927, most of the subsidiary companies, including Southern Power Company, Catawba Power Company, Great Falls Power Company, and Western Carolina Power Company were merged into Duke Power, although Southern Public Utilities, 100% owned by Duke Power, maintained a legally separate existence for the retail marketing of Duke-generated power to residential and commercial customers  Southern Public Utilities also operated transit systems, which Duke eventually converted from streetcars to buses 
In 1988, Nantahala Power & Light Co , which served southwestern North Carolina, was purchased by Duke and is now operated under the Duke Power Nantahala Area brand  In 1990, Duke sold its remaining transit operations  Duke Power merged with PanEnergy, a natural gas company, in 1997 to form Duke Energy  The Duke Power name continued as the electric utility business of Duke Energy until the Cinergy merger 

With the purchase of Cinergy Corporation announced in 2005 and completed on April 3, 2006, Duke Energy Corporation's customer base grew to include the Midwestern United States as well  The company operates nuclear power plants, coal-fired plants, conventional hydroelectric plants, natural-gas turbines to handle peak demand, and pumped hydro storage  During 2006, Duke Energy also acquired Chatham, Ontario-based Union Gas, which is regulated under the Ontario Energy Board Act (1998) 
On January 3, 2007, Duke Energy spun off its gas business to form Spectra Energy  Duke Energy shareholders received 1 share of Spectra Energy for each 2 shares of Duke Energy  After the spin-off, Duke Energy now receives the majority of its revenue from its electric operations in portions of North Carolina, South Carolina, Kentucky, Ohio, and Indiana  The spinoff to Spectra also included Union Gas, which Duke Energy acquired the previous year In 2011, Duke Energy worked with Charlotte's business leader community to help build Charlotte into a smart city  The group called the initiative "Envision Charlotte"  At the time, the group decided on a goal to reduce energy use in the "urban core of the city by 20 percent"  To do so, the group focused on making energy consumption changes to commercial buildings larger than 10,000 square feet On July 3, 2012, Duke Energy merged with Progress Energy Inc with the Duke Energy name being retained along with the Charlotte, North Carolina, headquarters Duke announced on June 18, 2013, that CEO Jim Rogers was retiring and Lynn Good would become the new CEO  Rogers has been CEO and Chairman since 2006, while Good was Chief Financial Officer of Duke since 2009, having joined Duke in the 2006 Cinergy merger  Rogers' retirement was part of an agreement to end an investigation into Duke's Progress Energy acquisition in 2012 In 2016, Duke Energy purchased Piedmont Natural Gas for $4 9 billion to become its wholly owned subsidiary   Duke Energy completed selling its remaining power operations in Central and South America for $1 2 billion months afterwards   At one point Duke Energy had more than 4,300 megawatts of electric generation in Latin America  It operated eight hydroelectric power plants in Brazil with an installed capacity of 2,307 megawatts The company expects to spend $13 billion upgrading the North Carolina grid from 2017 On December 3, 2022, an attack was carried out on two Duke Energy substations located in Moore County, North Carolina  Damage from the attack left up to 40,000 residents without electrical power for several days, with officials closing schools and declaring a state of emergency  The Federal Bureau of Investigation supported local investigators in case the incident met the definition of domestic terrorism under the Patriot Act 

New nuclear power plant
On March 16, 2006, Duke Power announced that a Cherokee County, South Carolina site had been selected for a potential new nuclear power plant  The site is jointly owned by Duke Power and Southern Company  Duke plans to develop the site for two Westinghouse Electric Company AP1000 (advanced passive) pressurized water reactors  Each reactor is capable of producing approximately 1,117 megawatts  (See Nuclear Power 2010 Program )
On December 14, 2007, Duke Power submitted a Combined Construction and Operating License to the Nuclear Regulatory Commission, with an announcement that it will spend $160 million in 2008 on the plant with a total cost of $5 billion to $6 billion  The plant was approved in 2016 In August 2017, Duke decided to seek permission from the North Carolina Utility Commission to cancel the project due to the bankruptcy of Westinghouse and "other market activity", although they will retain the option of restarting the project at some point in the future if circumstances change This site would have been adjacent to the old site, which was never completed and abandoned in the early 1980s, and used by James Cameron as a film set for the 1989 movie The Abyss 
In 2018, Duke Energy decided not to include new nuclear power in its long-range plans 

Headquarters buildings
J A  Jones designed the first headquarters building, known as the Power Building, which was completed in 1927 at 440 South Church  It was five stories and 503,000 square feet (46,700 m2)  The Electric Center at 526 South Church Street opened in 1975 with an addition in 1988  State Farm Insurance sold the Power Building in 2004 for $8 million to The Dilweg Cos , who anticipated significant development  Novare Group bought 5 13 acres (20,800 m2) at 408 South Church Street for $17 million from The Dilweg Cos  in a deal announced March 27, 2006   The Power Building was demolished February 24, 2007 Duke Energy Center at 550 South Tryon Street was announced as the company's headquarters in 2009  The company announced May 17, 2021 that the headquarters will move in 2023 to Duke Energy Plaza, across the street from the current headquarters  Childress Klein is developing the new building, which will allow Duke to sell its Church Street and College Street buildings, and end its lease at 400 South Tryon  Previously named Charlotte Metro Tower, the 40-story building will be purchased when completed for up to $675 million by Childress Klein and CGA Capital, in the largest real estate deal in the city's history, announced in December 2019 

Finances
For the fiscal year 2017, Duke Energy reported earnings of US$3 059 billion, with an annual revenue of US$23 565 billion, an increase of 3 6% over the previous fiscal cycle  Duke Energy's shares traded at over $79 per share, and its market capitalization was valued at over US$58 8 billion in November 2018 

Environmental record
In 1999, the United States Environmental Protection Agency commenced an enforcement action against Duke Energy for making modifications to very old and deteriorating coal-burning power plants without getting permits under the Clean Air Act  Duke asserted that a "modification" under the Clean Air Act did not require a permit  Environmental groups asserted that Duke was using loopholes in the law to increase emissions  Initially, Duke prevailed at the trial court level, but in 2006 the case was argued before the Supreme Court (Environmental Defense v  Duke Energy Corp  (05-848))  The Court unanimously ruled on April 2, 2007 that the modifications allowed the power plants to operate for more hours, increasing emissions, so Clean Air Act permits were needed In 2002, researchers at the University of Massachusetts Amherst identified Duke Energy as the 46th-largest corporate producer of air pollution in the United States, with roughly 36 million
pounds of toxic chemicals released annually into the air  Major pollutants included sulfuric and hydrochloric acid, chromium compounds, and hydrogen fluoride  The Political Economy Research Institute ranks Duke Energy 13th among corporations emitting airborne pollutants in the United States  The ranking is based on the quantity (80 million pounds in 2005) and toxicity of the emissions  This change reflects the purchase of fossil fuel-heavy Cinergy, which occurred in 2005 

In early 2008, Duke Energy announced a plan to build the new, 800-megawatt Cliffside Unit 6 coal plant 55 miles (89 km) west of Charlotte, North Carolina  The plan has been strongly opposed by environmental groups such as Rising Tide North America, Rainforest Action Network, the community-based Canary Coalition as well as the Southern Environmental Law Center, which has threatened to sue Duke if it does not halt construction plans  On April 1, activists locked themselves to machinery at the Cliffside construction area as part of Fossil Fools Day 
Duke Energy has been "one of the most vocal advocates" for a "cap-and-trade" system to combat global CO2 emissions, "and the company's CEO, Jim Rogers, thinks the company will profit from cap-and-trade"  The company left the National Association of Manufacturers in part over differences on climate policy In a joint venture with the French-based global energy firm AREVA, under the nominal name of ADAGE, Duke Energy has planned a "Green" biomass burning facility in Mason County, Washington and is negotiating with forestland owners to secure the 600,000 tons of wood debris it needs yearly to fuel its $250 million biomass plant 
The joint venture between electric power company Duke Energy and global nuclear services giant AREVA was created to build wood waste-to-energy power plants around the country 
ADAGE president Reed Wills announced the first Northwest outpost will be in the struggling timber town of Shelton, Washington 
The following pollutants are provided by DUKE-AREVA-ADAGE in their application for permit to the Department of Environmental Protection for a similar type of plant in Florida 

248 tons per year – particulate matter
288 tons per year – particulate matter 10
233 tons per year – particulate matter 2 5
249 tons per year – NOx (nitrogen oxides)
246 tons per year – SO2 (sulfur dioxide)
248 tons per year – CO (carbon monoxide)
40 tons per year – H2SO4 – (sulfuric acid mist)
63 tons per year – VOC (volatile organic compounds)
29 tons per year – F (fluorides)

Generating facilities
This list is partially complete due to the July 3, 2012, merger with Progress Energy 

Biomass fired
Shelton Biomass Facility (proposed)

Nuclear
Catawba Nuclear Station
McGuire Nuclear Station
Oconee Nuclear Station
Shearon Harris Nuclear Power Plant
H  B  Robinson Nuclear Generating Station
Brunswick Nuclear Generating Station
Crystal River Nuclear Power Plant (retired February 2013)
William States Lee III Nuclear Generating Station - Future

Coal-fired
Allen Steam Station
Belews Creek Steam Station
Beckjord Power Station
Cayuga Generating Station
Crystal River Energy Complex
East Bend Station
Edwardsport Station
Gallagher Station
Gibson Station
Marshall Steam Station
Mayo Plant
Miami Fort Power Station (purchased by Dynegy, 2014)
Riverbend Steam Station (retired)
Roxboro Steam Plant
Wabash River Station
William H  Zimmer Power Station (purchased by Dynegy, 2014)

Hydroelectric
Conventional hydro
Following is a list of Duke Energy's thirty conventional hydroelectric facilities, in order of average electric production   All properties are 100% owned by Duke, and all but Markland are located in North Carolina and South Carolina (Markland is located in southern Indiana) 
Blewett Falls Hydroelectric Plant
Cowans Ford Hydro Station, 350 MW average capacity
Keowee Hydro Station, 158 MW
Walters Hydroelectric Plant, 112 MW
Tillery Hydroelectric Plant, 87 MW
Rocky Creek & Cedar Creek Hydro Stations, combined 73 MW
Great Falls & Dearborn Hydro Stations, combined 70 MW
Markland Hydro Station, 65 MW
Mountain Island Hydro Station, 60 MW
Lake Wylie Hydro Station, 60 MW
Wateree Hydro Station, 56 MW
Fishing Creek Hydro Station, 37 MW
Oxford Hydro Station, 36 MW
Bridgewater Hydro Station at Lake James, 31 5 MW
Rhodhiss Hydro Station, 26 MW
Lookout Shoals Hydro Station, 26 MW
Blewett Hydroelectric Plant, 22 MW
Ninety-Nine Islands Plant, 18 MW
Gaston Shoals Plant, 9 MW
Tuxedo Plant, 5 MW
Marshall Plant, 4 MW
and ten clustered locations at Nantahala, in mountainous southwestern North Carolina, producing a cumulative 99 MW

Pumped-storage hydro
Bad Creek Hydroelectric Station
Jocassee Pumped-Storage Generating Station

Oil and gas-fired
Anclote Station
Asheville Combustion Turbines
Bartow Combined Cycle Station
Buck Steam Station
Buzzard Roost Station
Cayuga Combustion Turbine Station
Cliffside Steam Station
Connersville Peaking Station
Dan River Steam Station
Darlington County Electric Plant
Henry County Peaking Station
Hines Energy Complex
H F  Lee Energy Complex
Lee Steam Station
W S  Lee Steam Station
Lincoln Combustion Turbine Station
Madison Peaking Station
Miami-Wabash Peaking Station
Mill Creek Combustion Turbine Station
Noblesville Station
Rockingham Station
Smith Energy Complex
Sutton Combined Cycle Plant
Wabash River Repowering Station
Wheatland Peaking Station
Woodsdale Station

Solar farms
Citing the falling cost of building solar farms, Duke Energy announced plans in 2017 to launch three new such projects in Kentucky  Two will be in Kenton County and one will be in Grant County  Together the three plants will create more than 6 7 MW of power  These join several other solar farms including:

Davidson County Solar Farm
Martins Creek Solar Farm 1 MW (Murphy, NC)
Culberson Solar Farm 1 MW (Murphy, NC)
Osceola Solar Facility 4 MW (St Petersburg, Fla)Additionally, Duke Energy added 451 MW of solar capacity to North Carolina’s grid in 2017 
Hamilton Solar Power Plant 74 9 MW (Jasper, FL)
Columbia Solar Power Plant 74 9 MW (Fort White, FL) (opening in 2020)
Live Oak Solar Power Plant ? MW (Live Oak, FL)In 2020 Duke Energy began commercial operations of several farms in Texas, operating alongside its Farm from 2010 
Blue Wing Solar Project (San Antonio, TX)
Lapetus Solar Project 100 MW (Andrews County, TX)
Holstein Solar Project 200 MW (Nolan County, TX)
Rambler Solar Project 200 MW (Tom Green County, TX)

Wind farms
Los Vientos Wind Farm
Shirley Wind

Electric vehicles
Duke Energy announced in October 2018 that it would install 530 electric car charging stations around Florida  Ten percent of the stations will go into low income communities 

Awards
Duke Energy has been chosen as one of The 50 Best Employers In America by Business InsiderIn 2002, Duke Energy was awarded the Ig Nobel Prize in Economics for "adapting the mathematical concept of imaginary numbers for use in the business world" 

Criticism
In December 2000, Cinergy Corp agreed to pay $1 4B to settle allegations that its coal plants illegally polluted the air  Duke Energy completed its acquisition of Cinergy Corp in 2006 In July 2004, Duke Energy agreed to pay $208M to settle allegations that it had engaged in price gouging in California during the energy crisis of 2000 and 2001 In December 2009, Duke Energy agreed to spend approximately $93M to resolve violations of the Clean Air Act  Duke became obligated to make investments that were expected to reduce sulfur dioxide emissions by 86% On February 14, 2011, Greenpeace launched a campaign in which Phil Radford called on Duke Energy to abandon mountaintop removal coal, produce a third of its energy from renewable sources by 2020, and abandon coal altogether by 2030 "In May 2011, Duke agreed to pay $30M to resolve allegations that changes made to the company pension plan disproportionately harmed employees over 40, costing many of them up to half of their accrued benefits In December 2011, the non-partisan organization Public Campaign criticized Duke Energy for spending $17 47 million on lobbying  It also criticized Duke for not paying any taxes from 2008 to 2010 and receiving $216 million in tax rebates, in spite of turning a $5 4 billion profit and extensively raising executive compensations In 2012, Greenpeace protested Duke's lobbying of the Democratic Party, including its funding of the 2012 Democratic National Convention In July 2012, Duke Energy was criticized for paying former Progress Energy CEO Bill Johnson $44 7 million in compensation, including a $10 million severance, for something close to 20 minutes on the job as Duke's CEO In 2012, Duke Energy sued Citrus County, Florida claiming its tax bill was too high  The county hired an outside appraiser who found that there were a lot of unreported and underreported items and the tax claim was actually too low In May 2013, university students launched a campaign for Brown University to divest fossil fuels, specifically referring to Duke Energy and other coal plant operators On February 2 2014, the massive Dan River coal-ash spill led to a grand jury investigation into Duke Energy  The initial investigation was overseen by Governor Pat McCrory, who was accused of intervening on Duke's behalf as he had been a Duke Energy employee for 28 years  Prosecutors went looking for any cash or items of value that might have been given to Governor McCrory and members of his administration in exchange for cheap settlements  Duke Energy was prosecuted, pled guilty to nine charges of criminal negligence, and agreed to pay $102 million in fines and restitutions  Duke Energy was also ordered to close all of its 32 ash ponds in the state of North Carolina by 2029 In September 2016, the Government Pension Fund of Norway, then worth $900 billion, excluded Duke Energy and its subsidiaries from the fund, citing "risk of severe environmental damage" In August 2020, environmental watchdog EWG released a report accusing Duke Energy of charging Indiana ratepayers for $12 billion worth of failed projects  This was the direct consequence of a controversial bill passed in Indiana earlier that year  Projects included two natural gas pipelines and two retired nuclear power plants 
In 2021, investigative reporting by the Orlando Sun Sentinel revealed that Duke Energy, FPL (Nextera Energy), and TECO Energy put forth more than $3 million to promote "ghost" spoiler candidates in key Florida legislature races  The scheme involved former senator Frank Artiles and was effective in costing the Democrats at least one election In January 2021, Duke Energy agreed to a settlement, which the company proposed, to absorb $1 1 billion worth of coal-ash pond closure and cleanup costs, in North Carolina, between 2015 and 2030  The parties involved also waived all rights to challenge the “reasonableness and prudence” of Duke Energy’s coal ash management practices and costs before March 2020  Duke estimates the costs to be between $8 and $9 billion, the settlement reduces the cost on the ratepayer by 60% In August 2021, Indiana city officials from Bloomington, Carmel, and West Lafayette, and other lawmakers sent a letter to Duke Energy deploring its progress towards renewables and asking it to stop overcharging low-income homes for electricity 

December 2022 rolling blackouts
In December 2022, a major winter storm impacted much of the United States  On December 24, 2022, Christmas Eve, Duke Energy implemented rolling blackouts for the first time in their history, due to unprecedented energy demand  The rolling blackouts came without warning and lasted hours  In addition to facility failures, Duke reported failures related to the software that regulated the controlled blackouts  The Federal Energy Regulatory Commission initiated an investigation in response to the blackouts 

See also
2005 Atlantic Power Outage
Harlan County USA—1976 Academy Award-winning documentary film covering the efforts of 180 coal miners on strike against the Duke Power Company in Harlan County, Kentucky, in 1973 
Fixed bill
Holiday Junction
Passage 3:
Duke Energy Florida
Duke Energy Florida, formerly Florida Power, was the generation, transmission, and distribution sector of Florida Progress Corporation   The company distributed power over much of central and north Florida  Their service area covers approximately 13,000 square miles  Along with that, the company supplies electric service to approximately 1 8 million residential, commercial and industrial customers in the state  Florida Progress merged with Carolina Power & Light in 2000 to form Progress Energy  Progress Energy merged with Duke Energy in 2012  Today the Florida operations operate as Duke Energy Florida 

History
In 1899, Frank A  Davis founded the St  Petersburg Electric Light and Power Company in the newly founded town of St  Petersburg, Florida 
In 1911 it started offering 24 hour service to their customers 
After a series of expansions, in 1927 St  Petersburg Electric Light and Power Company became Florida Power Corporation 
Reddy Kilowatt became the company's mascot in In 1939 
The Honner family received free television from Florida Power Corporation in 1952 in celebration of the company installing its 200,000th meter 
In 1963, the company installed a specially designed underwater cable in the Gulf of Mexico  It was believed to be the longest one-piece installation in Florida back then  Land was also purchased to build their first nuclear power plant in Citrus County 
Andrew H  Hines became the company's president in 1972 
In 1977, the nuclear power plant was finally built in Citrus County 
In 1982, in hopes of diversifying beyond utility operations, Florida Power reorganized as a holding company, Florida Progress Corporation 
Louie the Lighting Bug became the mascot for their television ads in 1983



ground_truth: Philip K. Dick

prompt_front: Answer the question based on the given passages. Only give me the answer and do not output any other words.

Question: Which American actor portray Steve Urkel in "Family Matters"

The following are given passages.
Context 3: Passage 1:
American Nerd
American Nerd: The Story of My People is a book by Benjamin Nugent  The book discusses the history and origin of the term "nerd", as well as what the term means in today's age  Some of the important topics discussed include the racial differences for the term "nerd", such as how race played into Urkel, a nerdy character played by Jaleel White on the TV series Family Matters 

Appearances
The book and the author were featured on Last Call with Carson Daly as well as The Sound of Young America on NPR 
Passage 2:
Steve Urkel
Steven Quincy Urkel is a fictional character on the American ABC/CBS sitcom Family Matters, portrayed by Jaleel White  Although originally slated to be a one-time-only character on the show, he broke out to be its most popular character and gradually became its protagonist   Due to the Urkel character's off-putting characteristics and the way he would stir up events and underscore the plot or even move it along, he is considered a nuisance by the original protagonist's family, the Winslows, though they come to accept him over time 
The character is the epitome of a geek or nerd of the era, due to traits such as large, thick eyeglasses, flood pants held up by suspenders, multi-colored cardigan sweaters, saddle shoes, and a high-pitched voice  He professes love for his neighbor Laura Winslow, who is a character in the main family of the series, but this love of his is written as an accent on or trigger for events and crises and is therefore unrequited until the series' end 
Throughout the series, starting from Urkel's debut, he is central to many of its running gags, primarily property damage and/or personal injury resulting from of his inventions going awry or his outright clumsiness  He becomes known by viewers and characters alike for several catchphrases uttered after some humorous misfortune occurs, including "I've fallen and I can't get up!" "I don't have to take this  I'm going home " "Did I do that?" "Whoa, Mama!" and "Look what you did!" (on occasions when someone else caused the damage, though usually the accident was indirectly caused by Urkel) 

Character development
In syndication, Steve Urkel first appeared on the 4th episode of the first season, "Rachel's First Date" (as the show staff wanted to more naturally introduce him to audiences upon repeated viewings)  In the 12th episode of the first season, "Laura's First Date", he reappears as a nerdy young boy who takes Laura Winslow out on a date  Despite him being madly in love with her, Laura finds Steve grating and doesn't return his affection  
While initially intended to be a minor character, Urkel became very popular for his oddball antics, soon becoming a recurring character and joining the main cast, beginning with the season-two premiere "Rachel's Place" Family Matters co-creator Michael Warren named the character after his friend, writer, and director Steve Urkel  Due to the show and the character's tremendous popularity during the early 1990s, Erkel encountered difficulties using his own name; he received many prank phone calls from "Laura" asking for "Steve", and businesses found his name to be suspicious  Warren stated that had he known if the character would reappear for years, he would not have named him after his friend 

Portrayal
Steve Urkel embodies the stereotype of a socially inept intellectual who means well but often messes things up  Despite his intelligence, his actions often come across as clumsy and foolish  He is fiercely protective of and obsessed with his unrequited love, Laura Winslow, and this admiration extends to the rest of the Winslow family  However, Steve is comically clumsy and inept, and his attempts to help the Winslows often go awry  This puts him at odds with the family patriarch, Carl, who routinely throws Urkel out of his house  He has been shown to take responsibility for his own mistakes and reimburses the Winslows for the damages he's done  Steve is close to Harriette Winslow, who is delighted each time he comes over, much to Carl's chagrin 
Later episodes suggest that Steve's attachment to the Winslows stems from his bad relationship with his own family  Urkel often hints that most of his relatives, including his (never seen) parents, despise him and refuse to associate with him  This culminates in the two moving to Russia without him, whereupon he moves in with the Winslows  The show has also revealed that Steve has at least four relatives who care about him who are Uncle Ernie who owns a horse trailer; Uncle Cecil who, despite his gambling problems, visits the Urkel home to keep an eye on him; Aunt Oona from Altoona, (played by singer, Donna Summer), who is like a mother to him; and cousin Myrtle  In the series finale, Steve responds to Carl talking about how proud he is of his future son-in-law by saying "Thanks, Dad "
Urkel dresses unfashionably for someone his age (he is most commonly seen wearing suspenders, brightly colored shirts, and high water pants) and has a number of hobbies and interests, including polka dancing and accordion playing  His motor vehicle of choice is the small three-wheeled Isetta  Unlike his friends, he has little interest in popular culture and athletic endeavors, though he enjoys playing basketball, once attempting to join the school team  This has caused Myra to be attracted to Urkel himself due to them not being interested in pop culture  However, Steve has shown little interest in her mainly due to her stalker behavior 
While he is unpopular with his schoolmates, Urkel is a brilliant student and is on a first-name basis with his teachers  He is a genius inventor as well, and his fantastical but unreliable gadgets (including a transformation device and a time machine) are central to many Family Matters plots and gags 
Urkel also has an adept sense of lawbreaking that involves peer pressure  This was explored four times, mainly with Eddie, since he often has to learn his lesson the hard way when he finds himself in situations outside of his control 

Stefan Urquelle
During the season five episode "Dr  Urkel and Mr  Cool", in a takeoff on The Nutty Professor films, Urkel devises a plan to win Laura's heart: transforming his DNA using a serum, which suppresses his "nerd genes" and brings out his "cool" genes  This results in the alter ego known as Stefan Urquelle, played by Jaleel White in more casual attire  Initially, Laura is enamored with the smoother Stefan, but asks that he turn back into Steve when Stefan's self-centeredness makes itself apparent 
Steve improves the formula in the season five episode "Stefan Returns" to reduce its negative effects on his personality, and invents a "transformation chamber" allowing him to become Stefan at will  He would change into Stefan several times – even while dating Myra – but some circumstance would force Steve to turn into his normal self again  With his narcissistic tendencies toned down, Laura falls deeply in love with Steve's alter-ego 
In the seventh-season finale "Send in the Clones", Steve creates a cloning machine and winds up creating a perfect duplicate of himself  Myra is initially excited, but eventually realizes that two Steves are just too much  To clear up the situation, Laura proposes that one of the Steves be permanently turned into Stefan, so that she and Myra can both be with the one they love  This Stefan becomes a recurring character and eventually proposes to Laura in the ninth season  After weighing her choices in the episode "Pop Goes the Question", Laura chooses Steve over Stefan  Stefan leaves and does not appear again 

Cultural impact
In 2010, Westside Middle School in Memphis, Tennessee, outlined its dress code policy on sagging pants, asking students to pull them up or get "Urkeled", a reference to the character  In this practice, teachers would forcibly pull students' pants up and attach them to their waist using zip ties  Students would also have their photo taken and posted on a board in the hallway, for all of their classmates to view  In an interview with NBC affiliate WMC-TV, Principal Bobby White stated that the general idea is to fight pop culture with pop culture  One teacher at the school claimed to have "Urkeled" up to 80 students per week, although after five weeks the number dropped to 18 

Ratings effect
In syndication, Steve is incorporated into the teaser scene of "Rachel's First Date"; his first appearance in the original broadcasts is in the 1989 episode "Laura's First Date", in which Carl and Eddie separately set up dates for Laura for a dance or party (both terms are used in the episode), and the first thing known about him is that he allegedly ate a mouse, and he later makes reference to a mouse when speaking to Carl, implying that it might be true  Prior to Steve Urkel's introduction, the show was on the brink of cancellation due to mediocre ratings  After Urkel was introduced, several scripts had to be hastily rewritten to accommodate the character, while several first-season episodes that had been completed had new opening gag sequences filmed featuring Steve trying to push open the Winslows' front door while the family holds it shut  The addition of Steve immediately helped the show boost its modest ratings  White was credited as a guest star in the first season and became a regular member of the cast in season two  In the opening credits for Seasons 5-9, White was the only regular whose character's name appeared alongside his own during the opening credits (Season 9 did not have the same credit sequence showing all the actors, it simply listed their names across the bottom of the screen, but White was listed "as Steve Urkel" there as well) 
Jo Marie Payton, who played Harriette Winslow, admitted that she felt the Urkel character had hogged much of the show's attention and disrupted the close family relationship she had formed with the rest of the cast  Payton took particular umbrage when youngest sibling Judy Winslow was dismissed as a disposable character and her portrayer, Jaimee Foxworth, was fired to make room for more Urkel stories, because she felt particularly close to Foxworth as the baby of the cast  Payton experienced increasing burnout over the course of the show, became increasingly upset over the production staff allowing White free rein to misbehave, and felt that the overbearing focus on Urkel had made the show jump the shark; she very nearly quit when the show moved to CBS but agreed to stay for the first several episodes while a new actress, Judyann Elder, was cast as Harriet  In an interview with Entertainment Tonight, Payton recalled an instance where White insisted upon inserting something that would have violated Broadcast Standards and Practices, to the point where he and Payton nearly came to physical blows with each other  White is one of the few living members of the cast with whom Payton no longer speaks regularly  She nevertheless speaks well of her experiences and appreciates the effect that Urkel had on the show's popularity and thus the residuals everyone receives from the show  Reginald VelJohnson, in a 2022 interview with Entertainment Tonight, acknowledged that White could be difficult to work with on set but attributed the difficulties to White's young age and being surrounded by other teenagers, which VelJohnson (who himself never had children) found overwhelming  On the whole, VelJohnson had "nothing but good memories" of working with White 

The Urkel Dance
The Urkel Dance was a novelty dance that originated in the season two episode, "Life of the Party"  It was based around the character of Steve Urkel and essentially incorporated movements that made the dancer's posture more like his 
The dance was popular enough to appear on another show, Step by Step, when the Steve Urkel character appeared in a crossover in the season one episode, "The Dance" 
Jaleel White also performed the song, in character as Steve Urkel, on the 5th Annual American Comedy Awards  Bea Arthur (from Maude & The Golden Girls) joined him on stage to "Do The Urkel", after which she said, "Hey, MC Hammer, try and touch that!"A promotional cassette single of the song that accompanies the dance was produced and distributed in limited numbers  A T-shirt was also produced featuring lyrics and Urkel's likeness 
Rick Sanchez pays some form of homage to The Urkel Dance with "The Rick Dance" in the Rick and Morty episode "Ricksy Business" 

Appearances on other shows
Full House – In the 1991 episode, "Stephanie Gets Framed", Steve is called in to help Stephanie Tanner (Jodie Sweetin) deal with her anxieties after she has to get glasses  He was cousin to a friend of D J  He also jams with Uncle Jesse and gives Michelle a penny for her piggy bank, telling her that "with prevailing interest rates, that penny will be worth three cents by the turn of the century"  Incidentally, Family Matters did not air on the night of the episode's original airdate (January 25, 1991)  It is implied that he found himself in San Francisco in the Full House universe before paying a visit to the Lambert household from Step by Step 
Step by Step – In the series' second episode, "The Dance", Steve lands in the Lambert-Foster family's backyard after launching himself with a rocket pack from the living room of the Winslows' house in the Family Matters episode "Brain Over Brawn" (the two scenes being shown in uninterrupted sequence, as Family Matters and Step by Step aired back to back on ABC's TGIF lineup at the time)  He then helps his science-fair pen pal, Mark Foster (Christopher Castile), and lifts Alicia "Al" Lambert (Christine Lakin)'s spirits after her potential date dumps her just before a school dance  White reprises his "Do the Urkel" dance in the scene where Al gives the boy that dumped her his comeuppance  White also makes a brief two-second cameo as Steve in the 1997 episode "A Star Is Born", snapping a clapperboard on the set of the movie that Al was cast in over her two sisters 
In the Family Matters episode "Beauty and the Beast", Steve sends a chain letter to his friend Cory Matthews, who lived in Philadelphia  The reference is to Ben Savage's character from Boy Meets World, but there were no on-screen crossovers  In an episode of Boy Meets World, Cory says he receives a chain letter from his friend Steve 
Fuller House - In the Season 3 finale, Urkel was mentioned by D J   In a January 2018 interview with TVLine's Andy Swift, series creator and former show runner Jeff Franklin mentioned that they have talked about White reprising the role and that they had some ideas for the character if White decides to reprise the role (Franklin was dismissed from the show before this materialized, and Urkel never appeared in the series) 
Scooby-Doo and Guess Who? - White reprised his role on the animated series Scooby-Doo and Guess Who? in the episode "When Urkel- Bots Go Bad!"

Merchandise
At the height of his popularity, Urkel's name was branded to several products including a short-lived fruit flavored cereal known as Urkel-Os and a Steve Urkel pull string doll, which were both released in 1991  There was also a T-shirt line that was created in 2002, but was discontinued shortly after its inception In 2021 White launched his own cannabis brand that featured a strain called "Purple Urkel"  He reprised the role of Urkel in a skit with Snoop Dogg to promote the strain 

Reception
In 1999, TV Guide ranked Urkel #27 on its list of the "50 Greatest TV Characters of All Time"  In 2004, he was listed at #98 in Bravo's 100 Greatest TV Characters 


== Notes ==
Passage 3:
Family Matters
Family Matters is an American television sitcom that debuted on ABC on September 22, 1989, and ended on May 9, 1997  However it moved to CBS, where it was shown from September 19, 1997, to July 17, 1998  A spin-off of Perfect Strangers, the series revolves around the Winslow family, an African-American middle class family living in Chicago, Illinois  Midway through the first season, the show introduced the Winslows' nerdy neighbor Steve Urkel (Jaleel White), who was originally scripted to appear as a one-time character  However, he quickly became the show's breakout character (and eventually the main character), joining the main cast Running for nine seasons, Family Matters became the second-longest-running live action U S  sitcom with a predominantly African-American cast, behind only The Jeffersons (11 seasons)  It aired for 215 episodes, being ranked third, behind only Tyler Perry's House of Payne (280+ as of 2021), and The Jeffersons (253)  Family Matters was the last live-action scripted primetime show that debuted in the 1980s to leave the air; the only scripted show that started in the 1980s and lasted longer in continuous production was The Simpsons 

History
The series was a spinoff from the ABC sitcom Perfect Strangers; both shows aired Friday nights on ABC's primetime slot called "TGIF"  Jo Marie Payton played Harriette Winslow, the elevator operator at a newspaper where Larry Appleton and Balki Bartokomous also worked  Reginald VelJohnson, who was coming off of growing fame from his role in Die Hard, made an appearance on the show as Harriette's husband Carl Winslow, a Chicago police officer  ABC and the producers loved the character Harriette for her great morale and quick-witted humor and decided to create a show that would focus on her and her family, husband Carl, son Eddie, elder daughter Laura, and younger daughter Judy (who appeared until the character was retconned after season four as having not existed) In the pilot episode, "The Mama Who Came to Dinner", the family had also opened their home to Carl's street-wise mother, Estelle (Rosetta LeNoire), usually known as "Mother Winslow"  Prior to the start of the series, Harriette's sister, Rachel Crawford and her infant son, Richie, had moved into the Winslow household after the death of Rachel's husband  The Winslows' nerdy teenage next-door neighbor, Steve Urkel (Jaleel White), was introduced midway through the first season in the episode "Laura’s First Date" and quickly became the focus of the show The popular sitcom was a mainstay of ABC's TGIF lineup from 1989 until 1997, at which point it became part of the CBS Block Party lineup for its final season  Family Matters was produced by Bickley-Warren Productions (1991–1998) and Miller-Boyett Productions, in association with Lorimar Television (1989–1993) and later Warner Bros  Television (1993–1998)  As the show progressed, episodes began to center increasingly on Steve Urkel, and other original characters also played by White, including Steve's suave alter-ego, Stefan Urquelle (who is Jaleel White's real-life self), and his female cousin, Myrtle Urkel 

Network change
In early 1997, CBS picked up Family Matters and Step by Step in a $40 million deal to acquire the rights to the programs from ABC  ABC then promised to pay Miller-Boyett Productions $1 5 million per episode for a ninth and tenth season of Family Matters  However, tensions had risen between Miller-Boyett Productions and ABC's corporate parent, The Walt Disney Company (which had bought the network in 1996 as part of its merger with ABC's then-parent Capital Cities/ABC Inc )  Miller-Boyett thought that it would not be a big player on ABC after the network's recent purchase by Disney Miller-Boyett Productions agreed to a $40 million offer from CBS for a 22-episode season for both Family Matters and Step By Step  CBS scheduled Family Matters along with Meego and Step By Step as a part of its new Friday lineup, branded as the CBS Block Party  The network scheduled the family-oriented block against ABC's TGIF lineup, where the two series originated  Jo Marie Payton's contract had just expired and she was reluctant to continue, feeling the show had jumped the shark years prior  She agreed to stay to keep continuity but left midseason shortly after very nearly getting into a physical altercation with White in what would be her last regular episode; in that episode, White (playing a gangster instead of his usual Urkel) was attempting to insert material that violated Broadcast Standards and Practices  The resulting dispute between White and Payton escalated to the point where Darius McCrary had to separate the two  Payton would appear in only one more episode after that—a Christmas episode that also brought back several former characters from the ABC run who had been written out on CBS—before Judyann Elder took over as Harriette for the remainder of the season 
While Family Matters continued to lose viewership compared to previous years, it was initially a modest success on CBS, beating the show that replaced it, You Wish  Meego, however, was a ratings failure and was canceled after six weeks  Near the end of the ninth season, the cast was informed that a tenth and final season was planned, so scripts and plot synopses were written for the show  After the holiday special season, CBS replaced Meego with Kids Say the Darndest Things, and with that show's child-centered focus, it was placed in Family Matters' 8/7c time slot, with Family Matters pushed an hour later and paired with Step by Step  The ratings for Family Matters fell even further in this later slot, and the entire block except for Kids Say    was canceled in spring 1998, with the remaining episodes burned off in the summer,  On November 28, 2019 Bryton McClure who played the 2nd version of Richard "Richie" Crawford Sayed To OWN  "it was about time, relationships gone a little south and time to move on", on November 28th, 2020  TV One Did a Thanksgiving Marathon called Family Matters: Turkel 
Marathon, Michelle Thomas went to talk to fellow co-star Reginald VelJohnson that she was sick, and the rest of the main cast never said their goodbyes after 25 years of her passing

Cast
Episodes
Production notes
Family Matters was created by William Bickley and Michael Warren (who also wrote for, and were producers of, parent series Perfect Strangers) and developed by Thomas L  Miller and Robert L  Boyett (who also served as executive producers on Perfect Strangers); all four also served as executive producers of the series  The series was produced by Miller-Boyett Productions, in association with Lorimar Television who co-produced the show until 1993, when Warner Bros  Television absorbed Lorimar (a sister company under the co-ownership of Time Warner) 
Starting with season three, the series was also produced by Bickley-Warren Productions  The series was filmed in front of a live studio audience; the Lorimar-produced episodes were shot at Lorimar Studios (later Sony Pictures Studios) in Culver City, California, while the Warner Bros -produced episodes were filmed at Warner Bros  Studios in nearby Burbank 
The show's original theme was Louis Armstrong's "What a Wonderful World"; it was scrapped after the fifth episode of season one ("Straight A's"), though it was heard only in the pilot episode in syndicated reruns  The second theme, "As Days Go By", written by Jesse Frederick, Bennett Salvay and Scott Roeme and performed by Frederick, was the theme for the majority of the series until 1995  The sixth season's opening credits was last used in the season seven episodes "Talk's Cheap" and "Fa La La La Laagghh", the only two episodes during the final three seasons to feature the theme song (this was heard in season one episodes in ABC Family and syndicated airings)  A longer version of "As Days Go By" was used during the first three seasons, though in syndicated reruns the short version is heard (in ABC Family airings, the long theme was used for all of the episodes during the first three seasons) 
Family Matters is set in the same fictional universe as several other TV shows related to ABC's TGIF or CBS's Block Party  Before Family Matters, Harriette Winslow was originally the elevator operator at the Chicago Chronicle newspaper office in the third and fourth seasons of Perfect Strangers  Family Matters was a spin-off series given to this character in 1989  Characters from Family Matters appeared on other shows, including Full House, Boy Meets World, Step by Step and Meego 

Syndication
In September 1993, Warner Bros  Television Distribution began distributing Family Matters for broadcast in off-network syndication; most television stations stopped carrying the show by around 2002, though some stations in larger markets such as WTOG in Tampa, Florida continued to air Family Matters until as recently as 2005 and New York's WPIX as 2006  In 1995, reruns of the series began airing on TBS Superstation, where it ran until 2003  TBS would air two episodes of Family Matters each weekday afternoon from October 1995 to September 1999   From 1999 to 2003, TBS only aired the series once per weekday typically playing in the early mornings  The series would return to TBS 17 years later on February 3, 2020 and airs in the early morning time slots paired with George Lopez 
From 1997 to 2003, reruns of the series aired on WGN America  In 2003, ABC Family picked up the series and aired it for five years until February 29, 2008  From 2004 to 2006, UPN aired the show for 2 years  BET aired reruns briefly in December 2009 and began airing the series on a regular basis on March 1, 2013; the series returned to BET in mid-February 2023  MTV2 also began airing reruns on September 7, 2013  The show aired on Nick at Nite from June 29, 2008 to December 31, 2012  ABC Family and Nick at Nite airings cut the tag scenes at the end of all episodes, despite the fact that many episodes during the series have tag scenes during the closing credits  The series also currently airs on TV One since 2019  In Canada, the series also aired on CTV, CBC and currently airs on Family Channel 
On September 29, 2017, Family Matters became available for streaming on Hulu  In the UK it aired on Sky One whilst Perfect Strangers aired on BBC One 
Reruns of the series also started airing on Cartoon Network's ACME Night block on September 19, 2021 
On October 1, 2021, Family Matters began streaming on HBO Max after its streaming rights expired from Hulu, but has since returned to the Hulu platform 

International airings
In France, it aired as La Vie de famille (Family Life) as part of the show Club Dorothée on January 1, 1995 and on RTL9 (from August 28, 1995), France 2 & M6 (from June 1, 2000) 
In Italy, it aired as Otto sotto un tetto (Eight under one roof) on Canale 5, Italia 1 in 1992, with subsequent airings on Fox Retro & Sky Atlantic 

Home media
Warner Home Video has released the first four seasons of Family Matters on DVD in Region 1 while the remaining five seasons were released by the Warner Archive Collection  On February 4, 2014, Warner Home Video released season 4 on DVD, but consumers complained when it was found that the season 4 set contained syndication edits rather than the original broadcast masters  Warner Bros  responded to the complaints, offered a replacement program to receive corrected discs and reissuing the set with corrected broadcast copies on April 4, 2014  All episodes are the original broadcast form, except for the episode "Number One With a Bullet", disc 1, episode 6  The entire series is also available for digital download on Amazon com and the iTunes Store, all but season 6 remastered in both SD and HD 

Animated Christmas TV movie
On September 1, 2021, it was announced an animated Christmas film Did I Do That to the Holidays? A Steve Urkel Story would air on Cartoon Network as part of the block ACME Night in 2022  It was set to be released on HBO Max  However, on August 22, 2022, it was announced the film will not be moving forward on HBO Max and will be shopped elsewhere due to the Warner Bros  Discovery merger  Current bidders are Apple TV+, Hulu and Netflix 

Accolades
Notes
Passage 4:
Michelle Thomas
Michelle Doris Thomas (September 23, 1968 – December 23, 1998) was an American actress  She was known for her roles as Justine Phillips on the NBC sitcom The Cosby Show (1988–90), as Myra Monkhouse on the ABC/CBS sitcom Family Matters (1993–98), and as Callie Rogers on the CBS soap opera The Young and the Restless (1998) 

Early life and education
Michelle Thomas was born in Brookline, Massachusetts, on September 23, 1968, to Phynjuar "Penwah" Thomas, a stage actress, and musician father Dennis "Dee Tee" Thomas, a saxophonist and founding member of the band Kool & the Gang  Thomas grew up in Montclair, New Jersey, and graduated from West Essex High School in 1987 As a child, she would accompany her mother to her theater rehearsals and performances  Her mother was her first acting coach, and coached her throughout the course of her career  A friend of her mother who had heard Michelle Thomas sing before had requested that she enter Miss Talented Teens  Thomas was crowned Miss Talented Teen New Jersey at the state's Hal Jackson's Talented Teen pageant, and then in July 1984, at the age of 15, she was crowned Miss Talented Teen International in Montego Bay, Jamaica from among 35 state and national representatives 

Career
In 1983, Michelle Thomas appeared in her first television commercial  In December 1984, she appeared with Hal Jackson on Soul Train after having won the Miss Talented Teen International pageant earlier in the year From 1988 to 1990, Thomas portrayed Justine Phillips, the girlfriend of Theo Huxtable, on The Cosby Show  She appeared on various television programs, including A Man Called Hawk in 1989 and Thea in 1994  Thomas had a role in Dream Date in 1989 and had a small role in Hangin' with the Homeboys in 1991 
Thomas appeared in music videos for Mint Condition, Chubb Rock, and Dru Hill  Her publicist was Kahdijah Bell, daughter of Ronald Bell of Kool & the Gang  Thomas was a guest host of the weekly music series Soul Train in May 1996 and March 1997 From 1993 to 1998, she portrayed the role of Myra Monkhouse, the girlfriend of Steve Urkel, on Family Matters  After the sitcom ended in 1998, Thomas portrayed Callie Rogers, an aspiring singer and love interest of Malcolm Winters, on the daytime soap The Young and the Restless  In October 1998, Thomas took a medical leave from the series due to her ill health  Thomas had been in the studio recording music before her sudden turn in health  She appeared posthumously in the role of Anne in the film Unbowed in 1999 

Health and death
In August 1997, Thomas was diagnosed with a rare cancer, an intra-abdominal desmoplastic small-round-cell tumor (DSRCT)  Thomas never smoked or drank alcohol, and was a vegetarian  Her mother added that "they'd give her a sedation that was supposed to put her out for 20 minutes and she'd be asleep for four days  Her body couldn't take it " Thomas underwent surgery to remove a lemon-sized tumor shortly before landing her The Young and the Restless role in the spring of 1998  She underwent surgery again in October 1998 after a second cancerous growth ruptured  After being released from the hospital, Thomas flew home to New Jersey to spend Thanksgiving with her family in Weehawken, New Jersey On December 23, at age 30, Thomas died in New York City at Manhattan's Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center  Malcolm-Jamal Warner, Thomas' longtime friend and former boyfriend, was among those at her bedside  On December 26, 1998, a Muslim funeral service was held, per her request  She was buried in New Jersey 

Filmography
Film
Television
Music videos
Honors
Passage 5:
Boy Meets World (season 2)
The second season of the television comedy series Boy Meets World aired between September 23, 1994 and May 19, 1995, on ABC in the United States  The season was produced by Michael Jacobs Productions and Touchstone Television with series creator Michael Jacobs as executive producer  It was broadcast as part of the ABC comedy block TGIF on Friday evenings  This is the last season to have Lily Nicksay portray Morgan Matthews   (She would be replaced by Lindsay Ridgeway in season three )

Cast
Main
Ben Savage as Cory Matthews
William Daniels as George Feeny
Betsy Randle as Amy Matthews
Will Friedle as Eric Matthews
Rider Strong as Shawn Hunter
Danielle Fishel as Topanga Lawrence
Lily Nicksay as Morgan Matthews
Anthony Tyler Quinn as Jonathan Turner
William Russ as Alan Matthews

Episodes
Passage 6:
Twenty Vicodin
"Twenty Vicodin" is the eighth season premiere episode of the American television medical drama series House and the 156th overall episode of the series  It aired on Fox on October 3, 2011  The episode introduces a new regular cast member to the series, Odette Annable, who plays Dr  Jessica Adams  Jaleel White, who played Steve Urkel on the ABC show Family Matters, makes a guest appearance in the episode  In the episode, the storyline picks up eleven months after the season seventh finale with House in prison 

Plot
Eight months after being imprisoned for driving his car into Cuddy's living room, House has five days before he is granted parole, to which he has become eligible due to space issues and relatively good behavior  He is faced with prison bullies, mainly their leader (Jude Ciccolella), who extorts him into paying them "twenty Vicodin" as "exit tax", and meets Jessica Adams (Odette Annable), a young prison doctor who becomes fascinated with his medical skills  When a fellow prisoner collapses due to mysterious symptoms, House races against the clock and the head prison doctor to find the cure   During his imprisonment period, House has not had any phone calls or visitors; as House explains, human contact is what brought him there to begin with   In the end, House cures the man, but not without punishment from the parole board 

Production
"Twenty Vicodin", the eighth season premiere of House, was written by Peter Blake  It debuted actress Odette Annable as Dr  Jessica Adams, a doctor working at the prison where Dr  House is incarcerated  David Shore stated that it was a challenge for him to appropriately punish House for the deed in the season 7 finale without turning the series into a prison show or changing House's characteristics (while changing the environment around him, i e  removing Cuddy and "chilling" his relationship with Wilson), and that is why he decided to pick up the story eight months after House's incarceration 

Reception
Critical reception
The episode was received with generally good reviews  The A V  Club initially gave this episode a B− rating  Anthony Ocasio of ScreenRant com gave the episode a positive review, stating "the House season 8 premiere presents a wonderfully crafted case study, penned by executive producer Peter Blake, on the man that is House, in which Hugh Laurie masterfully traverses a new environment filled with intriguing challenges and compelling characters " Joseph Oliveto from screencrave com gave the episode a very good review, awarding the episode 9/10  Oliveto commented that Twenty Vicodin was "A tense season-opener [that] assures us that “House” hasn’t lost the magic" 

Ratings
With 9 78 million viewers, "Twenty Vicodin" was the 8th most watched program of the night  This was a decrease of 0 76 million viewers from the season seven premiere, but an increase of 0 67 million from the season 7 finale  The episode was the 14th most watched program of the week for adults 18-49  The season premiere was the second most watched program of the week in Canada with 2 81 million viewers 
Passage 7:
Shawn Harrison (actor)
Shawn Harrison (born December 28, 1973) is an American actor best known for his role as Waldo Faldo, the dim-witted but lovable chef-in-training on the ABC sitcom Family Matters from 1990 to 1996 Before sixth grade, he appeared in seven commercials such as Fruity Pebbles and Burger King  In 1986, Harrison made an appearance in the Kidsongs video "I'd Like to Teach the World to Sing" in the role of Mike  His mother died when he was 17 
Harrison has also made occasional appearances as the hairstylist Peaches on the UPN sitcom Girlfriends, and made several guest appearances on other series prior to that, including Moesha 
He provided the voice of Timber Wolf on the animated series Legion of Super Heroes, which premiered in fall 2006  He was also in an episode of Punky Brewster  He also played William K in two episodes The Ms  Pat Show 

Filmography
Film
Television
Passage 8:
Total Blackout
Total Blackout is an American game show airing on Syfy that features contestants that have to complete challenges such as: identifying things with either their hands, nose, or mouth; gathering items; or getting from point A to Point B while being totally in the dark (hence the name "Total Blackout")  The host of the show is Jaleel White, known for roles like Steve Urkel on the ABC/CBS sitcom Family Matters, and Sonic the Hedgehog in three animated shows  Each episode has four players competing to win $5,000  On occasion, episodes will feature four teams of two  The player or team who either takes the longest to do a certain task or identifies the fewest items in the allowed time is eliminated at the end of each round  The show was renewed for a second season by SyFy that started on October 30, 2012  Season 1 and 2 are now available on iTunes 
The show is originally Danish and first aired in Denmark (created by Henrik Nielsen) on Kanal 5 in 2011, where Uffe Holm was host of the show  The show was later adapted to a U S version 

Episodes
Season 1 (2012)
Season 2 (2013)
Passage 9:
Jaleel White
Jaleel Ahmad White (born November 27, 1976) is an American actor  He is best known for his role as Steve Urkel on the sitcom Family Matters  The character was originally intended to be a one-time guest appearance on the show; however, he was an instant hit with audiences and White became a regular cast member  The series aired for a total of nine seasons, from 1989 to 1997 on ABC, mostly on its Friday night TGIF lineup, and from 1997 to 1998 on CBS, again on Friday nights, via their short-lived CBS Block Party attempt  White then reprised his role as Urkel for the first time in 21 years in the 2019 series Scooby-Doo and Guess Who? 
White is also the first actor to voice the popular Sega video game character Sonic the Hedgehog in animated media, doing so in Adventures of Sonic the Hedgehog, Sonic the Hedgehog (also known as Sonic SatAM) and Sonic Underground, all of which were produced by the now-defunct DIC Entertainment studio  He then reprised his role as Sonic in the 2013 Sonic fan film 
After Family Matters ended, White went on to star in the short-lived UPN comedy series Grown Ups (1999–2000)  White then took brief hiatus from acting to attend UCLA in Los Angeles, California, where he graduated in 2001, earning a degree in film and television  He returned to acting with supporting roles in Dreamgirls (2006), and cameo appearances on another ABC series, Boston Legal, Fox's House, ABC's Castle, and USA's Psych  In 2010, he portrayed Dr  McCormick in the sci-fi film Mega Shark Versus Crocosaurus  In March 2012, White was a contestant in season 14 of Dancing with the Stars before he was voted off in May of that year, leaving him with a 7th place finish overall  In April 2012, White hosted the Syfy game show Total Blackout  In January 2017, White appeared in Bones as Officer Adams  In 2020, White had a recurring role in the one season-long Netflix series The Big Show Show 

Early life
White was born in Culver City, California, the only child of Michael White, a dentist, and Gail White, who was a homemaker  His mother later became his manager  White attended John Marshall Fundamental High School in Pasadena, California, and South Pasadena High School before graduating from UCLA in 2001  On the advice of his preschool teacher, White began acting as a child  He got his start on TV commercials at age three  One of White's notable commercial appearances was for Jell-O pudding pops alongside Bill Cosby 

Career
After starting his career at the age of three, White's first television role was a guest stint on The Jeffersons, in 1984  He later auditioned for the role of Rudy Huxtable on The Cosby Show  According to White, he was cast in the role (the character was originally intended to be male) but was replaced by Keshia Knight Pulliam when Bill Cosby decided to mirror his television family after his real life family  The following year, he was cast as the son of Flip Wilson and Gladys Knight on the CBS sitcom Charlie and Company  The series was intended to be CBS' answer to the highly rated Cosby Show which debuted on NBC in 1984  Unlike The Cosby Show, Charlie and Company did not catch on with audiences and was canceled in May 1986  In 1987, he appeared in the pilot episode for Good Morning, Miss Bliss, and had a guest role on Mr  Belvedere  In 1988, White had a supporting role in Cadets, a sitcom starring Soleil Moon Frye  The pilot episode aired during a preview special on September 25, 1988, on ABC  The series, however, was not picked up by the network  Also during the 1980s, he appeared in a few segments of NBC's One to Grow On 
White had a role in the NBC television film Camp Cucamonga  The film features an ensemble cast including Sherman Hemsley, Jennifer Aniston, and Brian Robbins  Several other child actors of the era including Chad Allen, Candace Cameron, Danica McKellar, Josh Saviano, and Breckin Meyer also appear 

Family Matters
At the age of 12, White originated his most famous role, Steve Urkel, on Family Matters   The role was initially conceived as a one-time guest appearance, but the character proved to be popular and White was given a full-time starring role  He also played several other members of the Urkel family, including his alter ego Stefan Urquelle and Myrtle Urkel  During the height of Family Matters' popularity, the character of Urkel was marketed with breakfast cereal (Urkel-Os) and an Urkel doll  In addition to starring in the series, White also wrote several episodes, including one, at age 19, that was the series' highest rated for that year  The series was a staple of ABC's TGIF lineup and became one of the longest-running sitcoms with a predominantly black cast in television history In 1992, he was featured in The Jaleel White Special, in which he played a fictionalized version of himself making a film, while also playing Steve Urkel By the time the series ended in 1998, White, who was then 21 years old, was disillusioned with the role, and had been shaken by the death of his close friend and co-star Michelle Thomas from an aggressive form of stomach cancer  Shortly after the series' cancellation, he stated in a 1999 interview, "If you ever see me do that character again, take me out and put a bullet in my head and put me out of my misery " Due to the character's popularity, White was so tightly defined by his Urkel character that he encountered difficulty finding other roles In later years, White came to terms with the character  In a 2011 interview with Vanity Fair, he addressed the 1999 "bullet" quote stating, "It's one of those things that it's very unfortunate how quotes are taken out of context  I remember that interview very vividly  I loved playing those characters     But the fact is that I was maturing      To be honest, I was retarding my own growth as a man to maintain the authenticity to what I thought that character should be " When asked if he would ever reprise the Steve Urkel role, White said, "I'll always say never say never; I'm a pretty creative person  I can't envision how I could do it in a way that would be irreverent and fun for both me and the viewing audience" 

Other career highlights
White was the original English voice of the popular video game character Sonic the Hedgehog, having been cast in 1993 (pre-dating Martin Burke and Ryan Drummond)  He voiced the character in all of the DiC-produced animated series: Adventures of Sonic the Hedgehog, Sonic SatAM, and Sonic Underground, as well as the Christmas special, Sonic Christmas Blast  In Underground, White also voiced Sonic's brother and sister, Manic and Sonia  White did not return to voice Sonic when Sonic X was released in 2003 
In 1999, White returned to television in the UPN sitcom Grown Ups  The series was based around White as a young man striking out into adulthood  He also co-produced and wrote some episodes for the show, in which he starred as "J", a college graduate struggling to establish his role in life as an adult  The pilot episode featured another former child actor, Soleil Moon Frye, known for her role as Punky Brewster, as the girl whom he chose as a roommate  The show received poor reviews from critics but debuted in second place in the ratings upon its premiere  However, ratings soon dropped and UPN canceled the series after one season White's acting roles have not been restricted to sitcoms  He has provided his voice to several animated projects including Warner Bros ' 1998 film Quest for Camelot  In 1999, he provided the voice for a teenaged Martin Luther King Jr , in Our Friend, Martin 
In 2001, White graduated from UCLA with a degree in film and television  He has continued acting and has had small parts in the films Big Fat Liar (in a cameo role) and Dreamgirls, and was featured as the lead role in the direct-to-DVD comedy Who Made the Potatoe Salad? in 2006  In 2007, he guest-starred on the CW series The Game, followed by a role as a law school graduate interviewing for a job at Crane, Poole and Schmidt in the ABC legal drama Boston Legal In June 2009, White began appearing in the web series Road to the Altar  In the series, White stars as Simon, a 30-something black man marrying a young Jewish girl named Rochelle  In September 2009, White guest starred on the USA Network series Psych, as an estranged college singing buddy of the character Gus 
In June 2010, White starred in the web series Fake It Till You Make It  He also serves as writer and producer of the series  The series, which premiered on Hulu, follows the exploits of former child star Reggie Cullen (White) turned image consultant and his three protégés as they hustle to navigate Hollywood  In March 2011, White guest starred on the TBS sitcom Are We There Yet?, which reunited him with fellow Family Matters cast member Telma Hopkins  Later that same year, White appeared as the star in Cee-Lo Green's music video for his song "Cry Baby" In October 2011, White appeared in the season 8 premiere of House, titled "Twenty Vicodin", where he appears as a well-connected inmate, occasionally helping Hugh Laurie's character Gregory House to sneak contraband into the prison  In April 2012, White began hosting the Syfy game show Total Blackout In March 2012, White began competing on the 14th season of Dancing with the Stars  He was partnered with two-time dance champion Kym Johnson  In the opening night's performance, White and Johnson danced the Foxtrot to "The Way You Look Tonight"  They earned a total of 26 points out of 30  White was voted off the series in May 2012 In 2015, White appeared in a Scion commercial In 2017, it was announced that CBS picked up his single camera comedy series Me, Myself & I with Bobby Moynihan, that premiered in September 2017  After six episodes, it was pulled from the fall schedule, leaving seven episodes unaired, with the network airing the remaining episodes in the summer 

Personal life
White dated actress Christine Lakin from fellow TGIF show Step by Step in the early 90s 
White has one daughter, Samaya (born in 2009), with ex-girlfriend Bridget Hardy In 2021, White announced the launch of his ItsPurpl line of cannabis products featuring the Purple Urkle strain, set for debut on April 20 at California dispensaries White has a memorial set up in his home for his Family Matters co-star Michelle Thomas, who died in 1998 of stomach cancer, shortly after the series had wrapped  He has described Thomas as a 'big sister' who was, for a period of time in the early seasons of the show, his closest friend on set, and has stated that his childhood seemed to officially end with her death 

Filmography
Film
Television
Web
Awards and nominations



ground_truth: Jaleel Ahmad White