Ken Burns

Part of the dilemma, the trap, the mistake of argument is that we become so dialectically preoccupied, one side or the other.

We see things in simple binaries that don't exist.

And so Richard Powers, the novelist, said, the best arguments in the world won't change a single person's point of view.

The only thing that can do that is a good story.

A good story is a good story is a good story.

I think the story of the American Revolution is a really good story.

Conservatives are supposed to love the series Yellowstone.

And that is a film about a rancher.

They did just scrub the word Enola Gay, which is the mother of the pilot who dropped the first atomic bomb, and that was the name of his plane, the Enola Gay, because it had the word gay in it.

And I'm disappointed...

that we at this present moment, and it's not everyone, feel compelled to take the simplified version of things and try to make it all morning again in America.

We don't operate that way.

I don't think a good story operates that way.

And my argument about Yellowstone is that it's telling about all the stories.

They're black and gay and female and white and poor and Native American.

And greed is one of the main objects of it.

And the main character is a murderer,

in addition to this big patriotic, and it's just beloved, good stories about human beings, whether it's William Shakespeare or Kevin Costner or, God forbid, a documentary about the Revolution, can have complexity and nuance, and people get it.

And I'll tell you that I couldn't have made any of the films we've made outside of public broadcasting.

I've lost a great deal, millions of dollars, as a result of the rescission, which, as you know, clawed back two years of money that had been authorized and appropriated and promised, and it's gone away.