Ken Berwitz
Alan Rickman, the actor and theatrical producer/director, died today of cancer, at the age of 69.
Usually I put up either an R.I.P (Rest In Peace). with news of someone\’s death, or an R.I.H. (Rot In Hell).
With Rickman I\’m putting up neither, because I\’m somewhere in between.
On the R.I.P. side, Alan Rickman was a successful actor, with a unique, understated style. He is probably best known as the villain in Die Hard, and the somewhere-between-good-and-bad Professor Snape of the Harry Potter movies.
On the R.I.H. side, Rickman edited, directed and tirelessly promoted a play called “My Name Is Rachel Corrie”, about the 24 year old pro-Palestinian Arab activist who died in Israel when she was killled by a bulldozer taking down a house – which, according to Israel, had a smuggling tunnel in its basement. The bulldozer either ran over her intentionally, or by accident because, due to how far above the ground the bulldozer operator was and how much of the equipment was in front of him, he did not see her.
An Israeli court ruled her death an accident.
But regardless of what you believe about how she died, “My Name Is Rachel Corrie” is a nonstop hate-attack on Israel – which was just fine with Rickman.
Incidentally, in researching this blog entry, one of the places I looked was Wikipedia. It has a link to something called “Rachel Corrie Facts”, which, we are told, gives a very different view of who she was than the play. When I clicked on it, however, instead of getting information about Rachel Corrie I got what appears to be a soft-core Korean sex site. Not a proud moment for Wikipedia…but very funny if you click on “translate” and see how badly whatever was supposed to be written there has been mangled.
Anyone who wants this kind of information – for real – can click here.
In any event, Alan Rickman is dead. Maybe he can spend eternity thinking about his successful movie career, or chatting with Ms. Corrie about what a terrible place Israel is. Either way, I don\’t much care.
