.
The “other” famous Green candidate.
There’s one name that comes to many people’s minds when they think of
Celebrity Green candidates. This is about the “other” famous Green Candidate.
Grandpa Munster – Al Lewis – Green Party of NY 1998 Gubernatorial candidate.
In 1998 I asked Activist / Actor Al Lewis to run as the Green Party Candidate for Governor of New York. To many he was known as Grandpa Munster of the “Munsters” and Officer Scnauzer of “Car 54 Where Are You?” hit comedy series of the early and mid 1960s. Some of us also knew him as an activist show host on Pacifica’s WBAI in NYC. Few knew that he also had a doctorate in Child Psychology from Columbia University
He was a life long activist, a profession that stretched far beyond his acting career. From Sacco & Venzetti through the Black Panthers to fighting to overturn the Rockefeller Drug laws, Al was a dedicated activist.
It seems many Greens as well as the public, knew little of his history as an activist. Some Greens ridiculed us for asking him to run. His political credentials dwarf Arnold Schwarzenegger.
We shot and edited this 35 minute video in May 1998. It includes excerpts from his radio show, examples of his politics, exhortations from listeners to run. We interviewed Al and Karen, his activist wife, on in his personal activist history, positions on current issues in NY State, His familial background and how he learned the importance of activism and political awareness from his mother. Far too many Greens had stereotyped him as a light comedic actor. It was important for us to inform Greens about Al’s formidable
history.
I’m posting this link to the above video. It’s broken into four parts. Please step away from your TV sets for 35 minutes and learn why Al Lewis, the “other” famous Green candidate, was so important to us in NY. The video is poorly shot on consumer equipment with mismatched cameras and you may need to turn up the audio a bit to hear it clearly but I’m sure you’ll both appreciate and actually enjoy the message. Please do forward the link to other lists. It provides insight into Al Lewis, activist and Green, never seen on mainstream TV.
The files are MPEG4 and run at about 500mbps. You may need Quicktime for Mac http://www.apple.com/quicktime/download/mac.html Quicktime for Windows
http://www.apple.com/quicktime/download/win.html
Or the open source VLC Media Player for Unix, Windows, Mac to play the video.
http://www.videolan.org/vlc/
Go to the page to Play the Al Lewis Video in 4 parts http://thirdplanetvideo.com/AlLewis.html
Craig Seeman
Filed under: Green Party Websites, New York State Politics Tagged: | Uncategorized
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