BRUCE CHARLESWORTH
DATELINE FOR DANGER
FILM AND VIDEO
Video still from Dateline for Danger, 1987
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DATELINE FOR DANGER was made by the artist as a daytime TV show to be shown within the installation, Private House. It was also meant to fit into a short 16mm film that was shot in the installation while it was installed at the Walker Art Center. Some characters were later adapted for a television clip within the feature film, Private Enemy - Public Eye. None of the scenes in Dateline for Danger appear in the later film.
As opposed to a more naturalistic mode of acting and dialogue in his earlier videos, Charlesworth conceived Dateline for Danger as grand opera. It is what overwrought television melodrama might be within the broader context of his work, much like the use of prop paintings and sculptures in the stylized worlds of the installations Wrong Adventures and Abstraction.
The story line follows the undercover police commando/test pilot Rafe as he tracks down the charming, murderous gangster Vago – the video's narrator.
Script, Direction: Bruce Charlesworth
Music: John Franzen
Lighting Director: Michael Murnane
Camera: Skip Davis
Editor: Alexei Levine
Production Manager: Dan Satorius
CAST: Bruce Charlesworth (Vago), Scott Thun (Rafe), Elizabeth Stifter (Erica), Scott Taylor (Doug), George Muschamp (Major Zorax), Buffy Sedlachek (Ginny), Michael Freeman (Vago's Bodyguard), James Muirhead (Waiter), Joe Aiken (Miami Beach Tourist)
Production Assistants: James Muirhead, Steven Bekkum
1987, 3/4 - inch video, 20 minutes
See the related installation