The Vancouver Sun from Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada • 24

MOVIE HOUSES C5 TV SCHEDULE C6 ENTER! C4 EDITOR CHARLES CAMPBELL 605-2120 FAX 605-2521 E-mail cjcampbellpacpress.southam.ca THE VANCOUVER SliN TUESDAY, AUGUST 25, 1993 Surprisingly, ill i tX f-'i 1 V' Guccionejr. shifts some thought in Gear Marke Andrews i -if A MIAN if MMW in i i.w I il lit -iri. m.k MAGAZINES Though it contains many predictable elements, Gear is more substantial than most men's magazines. "The exciting thing about starting this magazine," Bob Guccione Jr. writes in an open urns kWr letter to readers, "is that we have no idea where we're going." One look at the inaugural issue of Gear, Guccione's "new magazine for men," suggests otherwise.

For starters, it bulges with colourful ads for big-name clients (Armani, Versace, Bacardi, The Gap), indicating Guccione had a demographic in mind when he pitched his glossy creation to advertisers. Gear also follows the formula adopted by men's magazines of the '90s: a babe on the cover (TV actress Peta Wilson), fashion spreads (suits, denim, casual office wear), the ubiquitous celebrity profiles (Wilson, actress Denise Richards) and the usual short pieces on pop-culture arts, sex and sports. So what makes this different from, say, Maxim or Loaded? A noticeable difference is the generous length of some articles. Journalistnovelist William T. Vollmann, who spent several weeks in Iraq, writes about the day-to-day life there since the Gulf War.

His observations about life in Iraq under U.S. sanctions paint an ugly picture Vancouver Sun files KNOWING HIMSELF BY HIS FRIENDS: Oliver Sacks' patients appreciate his often unorthodox approach to medicine, and his attempts to see the world as they do. Neurologist, author, traveller and friend to many of his patients, Oliver Sacks is the host of a new four-part BBC series about extraordinary people he has come across and helped in his life. the humane treatment of live--stock. And the parents of Jessy Park of Williamstown, an autistic artist profiled in The Mind Traveller.

Like the other people whose for the BBC (the three others have not yet been scheduled to air here). He also produced the British TV documentary that led to Awakenings and was the librettist for an unusual operetta based On research ethics stories Sacks has told, all knew they were sacrificing their privacy. "I wondered on The Man Who Mistook His Wife for a Hat, Sacks' 1985 collection of case histories. The woman "Hit's no indignity to look at what might be happening in the brain. Nothing comes out of the blue." Oliver Sacks about the propriety of filming patients, sfor the folks back home.

At a pediatric hospital, there are no antibiotics, no equipment for 'blood tests, often no anesthetic of the title, who became his close friend, called "a masterpiece of medical literature." The book was made into a British documentary, then a play by Harold Pinter, then a 1990 film. In the movie, Robin Williams played Sacks (called Malcolm Sayer) and Robert DeNiro played Leonard, a patient who awakens from a decades-long coma after taking L-Dopa, which had helped victims of Parkinson's disease. Like the other people Sacks was treating then, Leonard had contracted encephalitis lethar-gica sleeping sickness during a worldwide outbreak after the First World War. Producer-director Chris Rawlence made seven instalments of The Mind Traveller for patients undergoing surgery. logical problems.

They are people with Usher's, Asperger's, Korsakoff's, Tourette's and Williams syndromes, Alzheimer's and Parkinson's diseases, amnesia, autism, aphasia, agnosia, mama, paralysis and disorders created by strokes, tumours or disease. There are people who are deaf andor blind, colour-blind or languageless. At the same time, they also may be artists and musicians and chefs, such as those who appear in a four-part, BBC-made series Oliver Sacks: The Mind Traveller, starting Wednesday at 10 p.m. on KCTS, the Seattle PBS affiliate. Sacks wrote of his limited success in 1966 with patients suffering encephalitis in Awakenings, which poet W.H.

Auden, PATRICIA BRENNAN WASHINGTON POST Neurologist and author Oliver Wolf Sacks recalled with amazement and delight that 200 of his patients and friends had come to his 65th birthday party on a boat in New York Harbor. "I'm not a party person," he explained, "but in a sense, I think you know yourself by knowing your friends." This from a man who as a boy of 10 so distrusted people that he took refuge in mathematics and inorganic chemistry. Sacks' friends include many of his patients, who perhaps most appreciate his often-unorthodox methods and his approach to see the world as they do. But many of them have neuro Standing next to a girl dying of leukemia, Vollmann weakly offers a comment to the child's mother: "She has beautiful whom Sacks calls "Mrs. and who is now 93, and Rawlence were among those attending the party arranged by Sacks' assistant, Kate Edgar secretary, my right hand, my editor, my memory, my Also attending was Temple Grandin, an autistic woman who earned a Ph.D in animal science, teaches at Colorado State University and advises the meat-packing industry on but these Awakenings patients were very conscious of having been abandoned and said to me, 'Tell our he recalled.

So when Rawlence suggested making the series, Sacks agreed. "It seemed to me as we were doing the filming that it didn't intrude on relationships much," said Sacks. "And it's no indignity to look at what might be happening in the brain. SEE SACKS, C6 eyes." The mother replies, "If Gem -Jp Mather named co-host of Global news Jennifer Mather The new Job: Jennifer Mather, former Weekend News Hour appointment was the culmination of a two-month search. "When Jennifer's name surfaced, there was no contest as far as I was concerned," Froehlich said.

"She has reputation, ability, she's a known commodity in the market and she's a strong journalist. "It's becoming increasingly difficult to chor, Gloria Macarenko. In June, VTV late-night anchor Kimber-ly Halkett left the station for an anchoring job in Washington D.C., while former LiveSix anchor Monika Deol resigned to spend more time with her family. VTV's late-night anchoring duties have been shared by Jina You and John Ven- anchor at BCTV, has been appointed co-anchor of Global-TV's Global News at Six with Russ Froese. Her first broadcast will air Aug.

31. The resume: Mather joined CKNW Radio in 1986 and worked as a producer and reporter specializing in community affairs. She joined BCTV in 1990, was appointed Weekend News Hour and News Hour Final anchor in 1992, and helped es tablish BCTV's Saturday Mom- find really, really good anchors, both male and female. We know a lot of people want to be anchors, but unfortunately they don't have the skills. Anybody can sit there and look good.

But what we were looking for was a combination of factors, and we found that in Jennifer." Mather's move is the latest in a recent flurry of resignations and hirings in the Lower Mainland TV-news scene. navally-Rao since Halkett's departure. Before they left, Mather and Lee were considered to be among BCTV'S brightest proteges. The Burnaby station enjoys a commanding lead in the local-news ratings, partly due to its high-profile anchoring tandem of Tony Parsons and Pamela Martin. Ironically, last week's takeover of BCTV-parent Western International Communications by CanWest Global Communications means that, if the deal is approved by the Canadian Radio-television and Tele Former BCTV Weekend News Hour anchor Jennifer Mather will join longtime Global anchor Russ Froese in the host's chair Aug.

31. ALEX STRACIIAN SUN TELEVISION CRITIC Jennifer Mather, who weighed anchor last month from BCTV's flagship News Hour, has found a safe harbour with Global TV. Beginning Monday, Mather will co-anchor Vancouver's Global News with veteran newsman Russ Froese. She succeeds former Global anchor Suzette Meyers, who is leaving broadcasting for a career in documentary film-making. Mather said the opportunity to co-anchor a nightly newscast, as well as work on a day-to-day basis with a journalist as experienced as Froese, made the decision easy.

"It seemed to be the right thing to do and the right time to do it," Mather said. "BCTV gave me amazing opportunities, and I enjoyed working there. But it was time to move on." After anchoring BCTV's Weekend News Hour on her own for several years, the prospect of co-anchoring presents Mather with a new challenge. "I've watched Russ for a very long time and I think we will complement each other very well," she said. Froese said it is critical for co-anchors to be able to respect each other.

"I have a lot of respect for Jennifer, for her talent and for the way she worked to get where she is," Froese said. "It's important that one person doesn't try to dominate the other, that they complement each other. I have a feeling that's going to be the case here." Global-Vancouver's executive producer for news, George Froehlich, said Mather's Ing News and Saturday's Noon News Hour in 1993. For six months in 1997, you praise her on her beauty, don't praise her. Help her." Another fine piece is a profile of New York Yankee pitcher Orlando Hernandez, who fled Cuba for the United States in a fishing boat.

The story illustrates what happens in that country when you fall out of favour. Hernandez was Cuba's dominant pitcher, but after his brother (another pitcher) defected to the U.S., Hernandez was banned from playing he wasn't even allowed to attend games as a spectator and was regularly harassed in the street. Among the arts pieces, Emma Forrest launches an attack on Vancouver's Sarah McLachlan that borders on personal vendetta. It dismisses her music, her image and makes light of the fact McLachlan has reported being stalked. "Why not go the whole hog and stalk a sachet of camomile tea?" writes the acid-penned Ms.

Forrest. The magazine also contains a lengthy profile of Playboy publisher Hugh Hefner, a longtime business rival of Guccione's father, publisher of Penthouse. In the morass of new men's mags, Gear has more content than most. The bi-monthly magazine sells for $3.50. Mather juggled her TV duties with hosting CKNW talk shows The World Today with 1 Philip Till and Jon McCombi and The Fanny Kiefer Show.

Family background: 29. was born in London. Ene- PARTNERS: Russ Froese, Jennifer Mather. land. Her mother is English, her father Asian.

Her parents moved to St. Louis, Missouri, a before settling in Vahcouver in 1972. Mather graduated from Carson Graham secondary communications Commission, Global will have control of both stations. Since the CRTC prohibits ownership of two TV stations in the same market, Global will have to sell either BCTV or Global-Vancouver. In the meantime, Froelich says Global will compete for audience share as though the deal never happened.

Mather's signing should be taken as a signal Global is serious about challenging BCTV's lead, he said. Earlier this month, occasional BCTV anchor Mi-Jung Lee jumped to Vancouver Television, where she joined Paul Mennier as co-anchor of VTV's Vancouver IiveSix. Lee has been succeeded at BCTV by Jill Krop. Also this month, former anchor Kevin Evans resigned from CBC's Broadcast One for a position with the Retail Council of B.C. Broadcast One now uses a single an- scnooi in Nortn Vancouver in 1985 and studied broadcast journalism at the B.C.

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