My Thoughts On Working With Ron Silver
by Kevin KnoblockThe first time I talked to Ron Silver was in January of 2005. Executive Producer Dave Bossie had brought me in to produce, write and direct a feature-length documentary on the United Nations as it neared its 60th anniversary. Ron would be the narrator, but as I soon found out he would be much more. As everyone knew Ron was passionate and held strong opinions, and he wanted to hold the UN to the fire over many human rights issues and especially over their treatment of Israel. We decided to call the film “Broken Promises: The United Nations at 60.”
Over the phone from his New York apartment, Ron rallied me to the cause. He told me that as a kid, as a native New Yorker, how proud he was of the United Nations. He loved all the flags out in front, and reminded me that this was the world’s institution for peace when it was created out of the ashes of World War II. We both fondly remembered the work that Audrey Hepburn and Danny Kaye did for UNICEF. And we both knew that that UN no longer existed.
Ron would send me books and articles and late night emails. We finally met at the iconic UN headquarters on First Avenue and 46th Street in May. We had obtained a rare invitation to film inside the UN, and guess what? Ron charmed everyone, while pointing out oh-so-diplomatically the institution’s many failings – in Rwanda, in Bosnia, in the Congo, and, in Israel. They never knew what hit them.
We filmed through the summer of 2005. I went to Israel to film the security fence and interview Natan Sharansky about the UN partition that helped create Israel. Ron later went to the memorial for the dead at Potocari, near Srebrenica in Bosnia, where UN peacekeepers sent over 8,000 men and boys out of the ‘UN safe zone’ to their eventual death at the hands of Serbian forces.
Ron would call me often and talk about my script. One night we had dinner at this favorite Italian restaurant on the Upper East Side. There were martinis, lots of them, and wine with dinner. The next morning I dragged myself to his apartment on Park Avenue and there he was, making coffee, and bursting with ideas and energy and outrage over some particular UN scandal that I absolutely had to include in the script.
He kept it up right into the voice-over booth, long after the film, and script, had been locked. He wanted to make sure we’d given it our all – that this documentary was fair, and yet brutally honest.
That’s the Ron Silver I remember. He never quit.
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8 Comments
When Mr Silver first came to our attention it was Inauguration day for Clinton. As USAF fighter jets thundered overhead,he commented "What are they doing here?" to which the reply was "relax- they're ours now…"
Cut to 12 September 2001.
Like Dennis Miller and other luminaries, he had become uncomfortable with the inherent contradictions of chronic leftism. The attack on our shores and Hollywood's wimpy response (Richard Gere!) pushed him over the edge and he soon became one of the most passionate and convincing advocates for freedom and democracy (the real kind) in show business.
He was a delight to listen to, and will be sorely missed.
I never knew Ron Silver except through his movies and a few interviews. He seemed like an honorable and thoughtful man, even when I disagreed with him. I'm glad to hear that he actually lived the life he talked about — unlike so many in Hollywood. Thanks for sharing, and welcome. Ron Silver, RIP.
He had to have had a strong character – an inner self – to so publicly proclaim his political shift in Hollywood, and not fear any consequences.
On another note Kevin, did you grow up in Studio City, on Goodland Ave? My mother was friends with a Peggy Knoblock, who had a young son Kevin. She had a cool '58 T Bird as I recall
I remember seeing Broken Promises at the Liberty Film Festival, and being very impressed with Silver's obvious passion and intellectual honesty. That impression only grew as I saw subsequest interviews and read articles by Mr. Silver. We've lost a good one.
Ann Coulter has a nice tribute to him in her column this week.
"Broken Promises" and the Srebrenicia betrayal were real Truth to Power cases where Silver, and you, took the hits from your own people for what they knew to be honesty. It takes no stones to go along with the intellectual cognicenti or the Hollywood left, but going to the GOP convention is like "High Noon" Will Kane in the street in your own town, alone. Via con Dios, Mr Silver, "…Yea though I walk through the valley, I will fear no evil…"
Thanks for sharing your story about Mr. Silver's passion and fortitude. His legacy will live on through his work and the lives he touched. It is through the people who knew him that I have now become aware of his determination to be a positive force. Kudos to him.
I've come to have a lot of respect for Mr Silver. He's a great Patriot.
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