document_title: Forrest Gump

question_text: who played forrest gumps mother in the 1994 film

text: Forrest Gump

text: Plot[edit]

text: In 1981, Forrest Gump recounts his life story to strangers who sit next to him on a bench at a bus stop in Savannah, Georgia.

text: On his first day of school in 1956 Greenbow, Alabama, Forrest meets a girl named Jenny Curran who, unlike the other children, immediately befriends young Forrest. Due to leg braces fitted to correct a curved spine, Forrest is unable to walk properly. One day, a young truck driver stays at the boarding house that Forrest lives in with his mother. The young truck driver turns out to be Elvis Presley who, while playing guitar for him, becomes enthralled at the jerky hip thrusting movements that the hobbled Forrest makes while trying to dance. Later on, Elvis becomes famous by imitating the dance.

text: Forrest is often bullied because of his physical disability and marginal intelligence. One day, while trying to escape some bullies chasing him, his braces fall off revealing the young Forrest to be a very fast runner. Jenny yells to him, "Run, Forrest, run!" Despite his low intelligence quotient, Forrest's new running ability leads to him receiving a football scholarship to the University of Alabama in 1963, becoming a top running back, being named on the All-American team, and meeting President John F. Kennedy. After his college graduation, he enlists in the U.S. Army, where he befriends a fellow soldier named Bubba, who convinces Forrest to go into the shrimping business with him when the war is over. In 1967, they are sent to Vietnam and, during an ambush, Bubba is killed in action. Forrest saves many of his platoon, including his Lieutenant, Dan Taylor, who loses both his legs. Forrest is awarded the Medal of Honor for his heroism.

text: While Forrest is in recovery for a gunshot wound to his buttocks received while saving his platoon-mates, he discovers a talent for ping pong. He becomes a ping pong celebrity and plays competitively against Chinese teams in ping pong diplomacy. At an anti-war rally in Washington, D.C., Forrest briefly reunites with Jenny, who has been living a hippie life. While in D.C. in 1972, Forrest meets president Richard Nixon and is put up in the Watergate hotel, where he accidentally reveals the Watergate scandal, ultimately forcing Nixon to resign.

text: Returning home, Forrest endorses a company that makes ping pong paddles. He uses the earnings to buy a shrimping boat, fulfilling his promise to Bubba. Taylor joins Forrest in 1974, they initially have little success. After their boat becomes the only one to survive Hurricane Carmen they pull in huge amounts of shrimp. They use their income to purchase a fleet of shrimp boats. Dan invests the money in Apple Computer (which Forrest naively thinks is "some kind of fruit company") and Forrest is financially secure for the rest of his life, but gives half of his earnings to Bubba's family. He then returns home to see his mother's last days.

text: In the late 1978, Jenny returns to visit Forrest and he soon proposes to her. She declines but slips into his bedroom and makes love to him that night before leaving early the next morning. Heartbroken, Forrest elects to go for a run. He decides to keep running across the country several times over three and a half years, becoming famous in the process.

text: In the present, Forrest reveals that he is waiting at the bus stop because he received a letter from Jenny who, having seen him run on television, asked him to visit her. Reunited with Jenny, she introduces him to his son, named Forrest Gump, Jr. Jenny tells Forrest she is sick with an unknown virus. The three move back to Greenbow, Alabama. Jenny and Forrest finally marry but she dies a year later. Forrest and his son await the school bus on Forrest Jr.'s first day of school.

text: Cast[edit]

text:
Tom Hanks as Forrest Gump: Though at an early age he is deemed to have a below average IQ of 75, he has an endearing character and shows devotion to his loved ones and duties, character traits which bring him into many life-changing situations. Along the way, he encounters many historical figures and events throughout his life. Tom's younger brother Jim Hanks is his acting double in the movie for the scenes when Forrest runs across the U.S. Tom's daughter Elizabeth Hanks appears in the movie as the girl on the school bus who refuses to let young Forrest (Michael Conner Humphreys) sit next to her. John Travolta was the original choice to play the title role and admits passing on the role was a mistake.[5][6][7] Bill Murray and Chevy Chase were also considered for the role.[8] Sean Penn stated in an interview having been second choice for the role. Hanks revealed that he signed on to the film after an hour and a half of reading the script.[9] He initially wanted to ease Forrest's pronounced Southern accent, but was eventually persuaded by director Robert Zemeckis to portray the heavy accent stressed in the novel.[9] Hanks agreed to take the role only on the condition that the film be historically accurate.

Michael Conner Humphreys portrayed the young Forrest Gump. Hanks revealed in interviews that after hearing Michael's unique accented drawl, he incorporated it into the older character's accent. Winston Groom, who wrote the original novel, describes the film as having taken the "rough edges" off of the character, and envisioned him being played by John Goodman.[10]

Robin Wright as Jenny Curran: Forrest's childhood friend with whom he immediately falls in love, and never stops loving throughout his life. A victim of child sexual abuse at the hands of her bitterly widowed father, Jenny embarks on a different path from Forrest, leading a self-destructive life and becoming part of the hippie movement in the 1960s and the 1970s/1980s drug culture. She re-enters Forrest's life at various times in adulthood. Jenny eventually becomes a waitress in Savannah, Georgia, where she lives in an apartment with her (and Forrest's) son, Forrest Jr. They eventually get married, but soon afterwards she dies of an unnamed illness.

Hanna R. Hall portrayed the young Jenny.

Gary Sinise as Lieutenant Dan Taylor: Forrest and Bubba Blue's platoon leader during the Vietnam War, whose ancestors have died in every U.S. war and who regards it as his destiny to do the same. After losing his legs in an ambush and being rescued against his will by Forrest, he is initially bitter and antagonistic towards Forrest for leaving him a "cripple" and denying him his family's destiny, falling into a deep depression. He later serves as Forrest's first mate at the Bubba Gump Shrimp Company, gives most of the orders, becoming wealthy with Forrest, and regains his will to live. He ultimately forgives and thanks Forrest for saving his life. By the end of the film, he is engaged to be married and is sporting "magic legs" – titanium alloy prosthetics which allow him to walk again.
Mykelti Williamson as Benjamin Buford "Bubba" Blue: Bubba was originally supposed to be the senior partner in the Bubba Gump Shrimp Company, but due to his death in Vietnam, their platoon leader, Dan Taylor, took his place. The company posthumously carried his name. Forrest later gave Bubba's mother Bubba's share of the business. Throughout filming, Williamson wore a lip attachment to create Bubba's protruding lip.[11] David Alan Grier, Ice Cube and Dave Chappelle were all offered the role but turned it down.[8][12] Chappelle said he believed the film would be unsuccessful, and also acknowledged that he regrets not taking the role.[8]
Sally Field as Mrs. Gump: Field reflected on the character, "She's a woman who loves her son unconditionally. … A lot of her dialogue sounds like slogans, and that's just what she intends."[13]
Haley Joel Osment as Forrest Gump, Jr.: Osment was cast in the film after the casting director noticed him in a Pizza Hut commercial.[14]
Peter Dobson as Elvis: Although Kurt Russell was uncredited, he provided the voice for Elvis in the scene.[15]
Dick Cavett as himself: Cavett played a version of himself in the 1970s, with makeup applied to make him appear younger. Consequently, Cavett is the only well-known figure in the film to play a cameo role rather than be represented through the use of archival footage like John Lennon or President John F. Kennedy[16]
Sonny Shroyer as Coach Paul "Bear" Bryant
Grand L. Bush, Michael Jace, Conor Kennelly, and Teddy Lane Jr. as the Black Panthers

text: Production[edit]

text: Script[edit]

text:
"The writer, Eric Roth, departed substantially from the book. We flipped the two elements of the book, making the love story primary and the fantastic adventures secondary. Also, the book was cynical and colder than the movie. In the movie, Gump is a completely decent character, always true to his word. He has no agenda and no opinion about anything except Jenny, his mother and God."

—director Robert Zemeckis[17]

tag: div

text: The film is based on the 1986 novel by Winston Groom. Both center on the character of Forrest Gump. However, the film primarily focuses on the first eleven chapters of the novel, before skipping ahead to the end of the novel with the founding of Bubba Gump Shrimp Co. and the meeting with Forrest, Jr. In addition to skipping some parts of the novel, the film adds several aspects to Gump's life that do not occur in the novel, such as his needing leg braces as a child and his run across the United States.[18]

text: Gump's core character and personality are also changed from the novel; among other things his film character is less of a savant — in the novel, while playing football at the university, he fails craft and gym, but receives a perfect score in an advanced physics class he is enrolled in by his coach to satisfy his college requirements.[18] The novel also features Gump as an astronaut, a professional wrestler, and a chess player.[18]

text: Two directors were offered the opportunity to direct the film before Robert Zemeckis was selected. Terry Gilliam turned down the offer.[19] Barry Sonnenfeld was attached to the film, but left to direct Addams Family Values.[20]

text: Filming[edit]

text: Filming began in August 1993 and ended in December of that year.[21] Although most of the film is set in Alabama, filming took place mainly in and around Beaufort, South Carolina, as well as parts of coastal Virginia and North Carolina,[9] including a running shot on the Blue Ridge Parkway.[22] Downtown portions of the fictional town of Greenbow were filmed in Varnville, South Carolina.[23] The scene of Forrest running through Vietnam while under fire was filmed on Fripp Island, South Carolina.[24] Additional filming took place on the Biltmore Estate in Asheville, North Carolina, and along the Blue Ridge Parkway near Boone, North Carolina. The most notable place was Grandfather Mountain where a part of the road is named "Forrest Gump Curve".[25] The Gump family home set was built along the Combahee River near Yemassee, South Carolina, and the nearby land was used to film Curran's home as well as some of the Vietnam scenes.[26] Over 20 palmetto trees were planted to improve the Vietnam scenes.[26] Forrest Gump narrated his life's story at the southern edge of Chippewa Square in Savannah, Georgia, as he sat at a bus stop bench. There were other scenes filmed in and around the Savannah area as well, including a running shot on the Richard V. Woods Memorial Bridge in Beaufort while he was being interviewed by the press, and on West Bay Street in Savannah.[26] Most of the college campus scenes were filmed in Los Angeles at the University of Southern California. The lighthouse that Forrest runs across to reach the Atlantic Ocean the first time is the Marshall Point Lighthouse in Port Clyde, Maine. Additional scenes were filmed in Arizona, Utah's Monument Valley, and Montana's Glacier National Park.[27]

text: Visual effects[edit]

text: Ken Ralston and his team at Industrial Light & Magic were responsible for the film's visual effects. Using CGI techniques, it was possible to depict Gump meeting deceased personages and shaking their hands. Hanks was first shot against a blue screen along with reference markers so that he could line up with the archive footage.[28] To record the voices of the historical figures, voice actors were filmed and special effects were used to alter lip-syncing for the new dialogue.[17] Archival footage was used and with the help of such techniques as chroma key, image warping, morphing, and rotoscoping, Hanks was integrated into it.

text: In one Vietnam War scene, Gump carries Bubba away from an incoming napalm attack. To create the effect, stunt actors were initially used for compositing purposes. Then, Hanks and Williamson were filmed, with Williamson supported by a cable wire as Hanks ran with him. The explosion was then filmed, and the actors were digitally added to appear just in front of the explosions. The jet fighters and napalm canisters were also added by CGI.[29]

text: The CGI removal of actor Gary Sinise's legs, after his character had them amputated, was achieved by wrapping his legs with a blue fabric, which later facilitated the work of the "roto-paint" team to paint out his legs from every single frame. At one point, while hoisting himself into his wheelchair, his legs are used for support.[30]

text: The scene where Forrest spots Jenny at a peace rally at the Lincoln Memorial and Reflecting Pool in Washington, D.C., required visual effects to create the large crowd of people. Over two days of filming, approximately 1,500 extras were used.[31] At each successive take, the extras were rearranged and moved into a different quadrant away from the camera. With the help of computers, the extras were multiplied to create a crowd of several hundred thousand people.[9][31]

text: Release[edit]

text: Critical reception[edit]

text: The film received generally positive reviews. The review aggregator website Rotten Tomatoes reported that 72% of critics gave the film a positive review, with an average rating of 7.2/10, based on a sample of 88 reviews. The website's critical consensus states, "Forrest Gump may be an overly sentimental film with a somewhat problematic message, but its sweetness and charm are usually enough to approximate true depth and grace."[32] At the website Metacritic, the film earned a rating of 82 out of 100 based on 20 reviews by mainstream critics.[33] CinemaScore reported that audiences gave the film a rare "A+" grade.[34]

text: The story was commended by several critics. Roger Ebert of the Chicago Sun-Times wrote, "I've never met anyone like Forrest Gump in a movie before, and for that matter I've never seen a movie quite like 'Forrest Gump.' Any attempt to describe him will risk making the movie seem more conventional than it is, but let me try. It's a comedy, I guess. Or maybe a drama. Or a dream. The screenplay by Eric Roth has the complexity of modern fiction...The performance is a breathtaking balancing act between comedy and sadness, in a story rich in big laughs and quiet truths...What a magical movie."[35] Todd McCarthy of Variety wrote that the film "has been very well worked out on all levels, and manages the difficult feat of being an intimate, even delicate tale played with an appealingly light touch against an epic backdrop."[36] The film did receive notable pans from several major reviewers. Anthony Lane of The New Yorker called the film "Warm, wise, and wearisome as hell."[37] Owen Gleiberman of Entertainment Weekly said that the film "reduces the tumult of the last few decades to a virtual-reality theme park: a baby-boomer version of Disney's America."[38]

text: Critics have compared Gump with various characters and people including Huckleberry Finn, Bill Clinton, and Ronald Reagan.[39][40][41] Peter Chomo writes that Gump acts as a "social mediator and as an agent of redemption in divided times".[42] Peter Travers of Rolling Stone called Gump "everything we admire in the American character – honest, brave, and loyal with a heart of gold."[43] The New York Times reviewer Janet Maslin called Gump a "hollow man" who is "self-congratulatory in his blissful ignorance, warmly embraced as the embodiment of absolutely nothing."[44] Marc Vincenti of Palo Alto Weekly called the character "a pitiful stooge taking the pie of life in the face, thoughtfully licking his fingers."[45] Bruce Kawin and Gerald Mast's textbook on film history notes that Forrest Gump's dimness was a metaphor for glamorized nostalgia in that he represented a blank slate by which the Baby Boomer generation projected their memories of those events.[46]

text: The film is commonly seen as a polarizing one for audiences, with Entertainment Weekly writing in 2004, "Nearly a decade after it earned gazillions and swept the Oscars, Robert Zemeckis's ode to 20th-century America still represents one of cinema's most clearly drawn lines in the sand. One half of folks see it as an artificial piece of pop melodrama, while everyone else raves that it's sweet as a box of chocolates."[47]

text: Box office performance[edit]

text: Produced on a budget of $55 million, Forrest Gump opened in 1,595 theaters in its first weekend of domestic release, earning $24,450,602.[1] Motion picture business consultant and screenwriter Jeffrey Hilton suggested to producer Wendy Finerman to double the P&A (film marketing budget) based on his viewing of an early print of the film. The budget was immediately increased, per his advice. The film placed first in the weekend's box office, narrowly beating The Lion King, which was in its fourth week of release.[1] For the first ten weeks of its release, the film held the number one position at the box office.[48] The film remained in theaters for 42 weeks, earning $329.7 million in the United States and Canada, making it the fourth-highest-grossing film at that time (behind only E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial, Star Wars IV: A New Hope, and Jurassic Park).[48][49] Box Office Mojo estimates that the film sold over 78.5 million tickets in the US in its initial theatrical run.[50]

text: The film took 66 days to surpass $250 million and was the fastest grossing Paramount film to pass $100 million, $200 million, and $300 million in box office receipts (at the time of its release).[51][52][53] The film had gross receipts of $329,694,499 in the U.S. and Canada and $347,693,217 in international markets for a total of $677,387,716 worldwide.[1] Even with such revenue, the film was known as a "successful failure"—due to distributors' and exhibitors' high fees, Paramount's "losses" clocked in at $62 million, leaving executives realizing the necessity of better deals.[54] This has, however, also been associated with Hollywood accounting, where expenses are inflated in order to minimize profit sharing. It is Robert Zemeckis' highest-grossing film to date.

text: Home media[edit]

text: Forrest Gump was first released on VHS tape on April 27, 1995, as a two-disc Laserdisc set on April 28, 1995, (including the "Through the Eyes of Forrest" special feature), before being released in a two-disc DVD set on August 28, 2001. Special features included director and producer commentaries, production featurettes, and screen tests.[55] The film was released on Blu-ray disc in November 2009.[56] Paramount will release the film on 4K UHD Blu-Ray on June 12 2018.[57]

text: Accolades[edit]

text: Forrest Gump won Best Picture, Best Actor in a Leading Role, Best Director, Best Visual Effects, Best Adapted Screenplay, and Best Film Editing at the 67th Academy Awards. The film was nominated for seven Golden Globe Awards, winning three of them: Best Actor – Motion Picture Drama, Best Director – Motion Picture, and Best Motion Picture – Drama. The film was also nominated for six Saturn Awards and won two for Best Fantasy Film and Best Supporting Actor (Film).

text: In addition to the film's multiple awards and nominations, it has also been recognized by the American Film Institute on several of its lists. The film ranks 37th on 100 Years...100 Cheers, 71st on 100 Years...100 Movies, and 76th on 100 Years...100 Movies (10th Anniversary Edition). In addition, the quote "Mama always said life was like a box of chocolates. You never know what you're gonna get," was ranked 40th on 100 Years...100 Movie Quotes.[58] The film also ranked at number 61 on Empire's list of the 100 Greatest Movies of All Time.[59]

text: In December 2011, Forrest Gump was selected for preservation in the Library of Congress' National Film Registry.[60] The Registry said that the film was "honored for its technological innovations (the digital insertion of Gump seamlessly into vintage archival footage), its resonance within the culture that has elevated Gump (and what he represents in terms of American innocence) to the status of folk hero, and its attempt to engage both playfully and seriously with contentious aspects of the era's traumatic history."[61]

text: American Film Institute Lists

text:
AFI's 100 Years...100 Movies – #71
AFI's 100 Years...100 Laughs – Nominated
AFI's 100 Years...100 Passions – Nominated
AFI's 100 Years...100 Heroes and Villains:

Forrest Gump – Nominated Hero

AFI's 100 Years...100 Movie Quotes:

"Mama always said life was like a box of chocolates. You never know what you're gonna get." – #40
"Mama says, 'Stupid is as stupid does.'" – Nominated

AFI's 100 Years of Film Scores – Nominated
AFI's 100 Years...100 Cheers – #37
AFI's 100 Years...100 Movies (10th Anniversary Edition) – #76
AFI's 10 Top 10 – Nominated Epic Film

text: Author controversy[edit]

text: Winston Groom was paid $350,000 for the screenplay rights to his novel Forrest Gump and was contracted for a 3 percent share of the film's net profits.[62] However, Paramount and the film's producers did not pay him, using Hollywood accounting to posit that the blockbuster film lost money. Tom Hanks, by contrast, contracted for a percent share of the film's gross receipts instead of a salary, and he and director Zemeckis each received $40 million.[62][63] Additionally, Groom was not mentioned once in any of the film's six Oscar-winner speeches.[64]

text: Groom's dispute with Paramount was later effectively resolved after Groom declared he was satisfied with Paramount's explanation of their accounting, this coinciding with Groom receiving a seven-figure contract with Paramount for film rights to another of his books, Gump & Co.[65]

text: Symbolism[edit]

text: Feather[edit]

text:
"I don't want to sound like a bad version of 'the child within'. But the childlike innocence of Forrest Gump is what we all once had. It's an emotional journey. You laugh and cry. It does what movies are supposed to do: make you feel alive."

—producer Wendy Finerman[41]

text: Various interpretations have been suggested for the feather present at the opening and conclusion of the film. Sarah Lyall of The New York Times noted several suggestions made about the feather: "Does the white feather symbolize the unbearable lightness of being? Forrest Gump's impaired intellect? The randomness of experience?"[66] Hanks interpreted the feather as: "Our destiny is only defined by how we deal with the chance elements to our life and that's kind of the embodiment of the feather as it comes in. Here is this thing that can land anywhere and that it lands at your feet. It has theological implications that are really huge."[67] Sally Field compared the feather to fate, saying: "It blows in the wind and just touches down here or there. Was it planned or was it just perchance?"[68] Visual effects supervisor Ken Ralston compared the feather to an abstract painting: "It can mean so many things to so many different people."[69]

text: Political interpretations[edit]

text: In Tom Hanks' words, "The film is non-political and thus non-judgmental."[41] Nevertheless, in 1994, CNN's Crossfire debated whether the film promoted conservative values or was an indictment of the counterculture movement of the 1960s. Thomas Byers, in a Modern Fiction Studies article, called the film "an aggressively conservative film".[70]

text:
"...all over the political map, people have been calling Forrest their own. But, Forrest Gump isn't about politics or conservative values. It's about humanity, it's about respect, tolerance and unconditional love."

—producer Steve Tisch[70]

text: It has been noted that while Gump follows a very conservative lifestyle, Jenny's life is full of countercultural embrace, complete with drug usage, promiscuity, and antiwar rallies, and that their eventual marriage might be a kind of reconciliation.[35] Jennifer Hyland Wang argued in a Cinema Journal article that Jenny's death to an unnamed virus "...symbolizes the death of liberal America and the death of the protests that defined a decade [1960s]." She also notes the film's screenwriter, Eric Roth, when developing the screenplay from the novel, had "...transferred all of Gump's flaws and most of the excesses committed by Americans in the 1960s and 1970s to her [Jenny]."[42]

text: Other commentators believe the film forecast the 1994 Republican Revolution and used the image of Forrest Gump to promote movement leader Newt Gingrich's traditional, conservative values. Jennifer Hyland Wang observes that the film idealizes the 1950s, as made evident by the lack of "whites only" signs in Gump's Southern childhood, and "revisions" [sic] the 1960s as a period of social conflict and confusion. She argues that this sharp contrast between the decades criticizes the counterculture values and reaffirms conservatism.[71] As viewed by political scientist Joe Paskett,[37] this film is "one of the best films of all time".[72] Wang argued the film was used by Republican politicians to illustrate a "traditional version of recent history" to gear voters towards their ideology for the congressional elections.[42] In addition, presidential candidate Bob Dole cited the film's message in influencing his campaign with its "...message that has made [the film] one of Hollywood's all-time greatest box office hits: no matter how great the adversity, the American Dream is within everybody's reach."[42]

text: In 1995, National Review included Forrest Gump in its list of the "Best 100 Conservative Movies" of all time.[73] Then, in 2009, the magazine ranked the film number four on its 25 Best Conservative Movies of the Last 25 Years list.[74] "Tom Hanks plays the title character, an amiable dunce who is far too smart to embrace the lethal values of the 1960s. The love of his life, wonderfully played by Robin Wright Penn, chooses a different path; she becomes a drug-addled hippie, with disastrous results."[74]

text: James Burton, a communication arts professor at Salisbury University, argued that conservatives claimed Forrest Gump as their own due less to the content of the film and more to the historical and cultural context of 1994. Burton claimed the film's content and advertising campaign were affected by the cultural climate of the 1990s, which emphasized family values and "American values"—values epitomized in the successful book Hollywood vs. America. He claimed this climate influenced the apolitical nature of the film, which allowed for many different political interpretations.[75]

text: Burton points out that many conservative critics and magazines (John Simon, James Bowman, the World Report) initially either criticized the film or praised it only for its non-political elements. Only after the popularity of the film was well-established did conservatives embrace the film as an affirmation of traditional values. Burton implies the liberal-left could have prevented the conservatives from claiming rights to the film, had it chosen to vocalize elements of the film such as its criticism of military values. Instead, the liberal-left focused on what the film omitted, such as the feminist and civil rights movements.[75]

text: Some commentators see the conservative readings of Forrest Gump as indicants of the death of irony in American culture. Vivian Sobchack notes that the film's humor and irony rely on the assumption of the audience's historical (self-) consciousness.[75]

text: Soundtrack[edit]

text: The 32-song soundtrack from the film was released on July 6, 1994. With the exception of a lengthy suite from Alan Silvestri's score, all the songs are previously released; the soundtrack includes songs from Elvis Presley, Creedence Clearwater Revival, Aretha Franklin, Lynyrd Skynyrd, Three Dog Night, The Byrds, The Beach Boys, The Jimi Hendrix Experience, The Doors, The Mamas & the Papas, The Doobie Brothers, Simon & Garfunkel, Bob Seger, and Buffalo Springfield among others. Music producer Joel Sill reflected on compiling the soundtrack: "We wanted to have very recognizable material that would pinpoint time periods, yet we didn't want to interfere with what was happening cinematically."[76] The two-disc album has a variety of music from the 1950s–1980s performed by American artists. According to Sills, this was due to Zemeckis' request, "All the material in there is American. Bob (Zemeckis) felt strongly about it. He felt that Forrest wouldn't buy anything but American."[76]

text: The soundtrack reached a peak of number 2 on the Billboard album chart.[76] The soundtrack went on to sell twelve million copies, and is one of the top selling albums in the United States.[77] The score for the film was composed and conducted by Alan Silvestri and released on August 2, 1994.

text: Proposed sequel[edit]

text: The screenplay for the sequel was written by Eric Roth in 2001. It is based on the original novel's sequel, Gump and Co. written by Winston Groom in 1995. Roth's script begins with Forrest sitting on a bench waiting for his son to return from school. After the September 11 attacks, Roth, Zemeckis, and Hanks decided the story was no longer "relevant."[78] In March 2007, however, it was reported Paramount producers took another look at the screenplay.[79]

text: On the very first page of the sequel novel, Forrest Gump tells readers "Don't never let nobody make a movie of your life's story," though "Whether they get it right or wrong, it doesn't matter."[80] The first chapter of the book suggests the real-life events surrounding the film have been incorporated into Forrest's storyline, and that Forrest got a lot of media attention as a result of the film.[18] During the course of the sequel novel, Gump runs into Tom Hanks and at the end of the novel in the film's release, including Gump going on The David Letterman Show and attending the Academy Awards.


document_title: Cigarette Smoking Man

question_text: when did we find out the smoking man was mulder's father

question_tokens: when did we find out the smoking man was mulder 's father

root

text: Cigarette Smoking Man

text: Character arc[edit]

text: "Musings of a Cigarette Smoking Man"[edit]

text: The birth date, birthplace, and most of the history of the Smoking Man is never categorically confirmed. One possible version of his past is provided during the fourth-season episode "Musings of a Cigarette Smoking Man", in which the conspiracy theorists known as The Lone Gunmen claim Smoking Man was first documented in Baton Rouge, Louisiana, on August 20, 1940. His father was an ardent communist activist and a spy for the Soviet NKVD who was executed under the Espionage Act of 1917 "before his boy could walk." His mother was a cigarette smoker who died from lung cancer, also when he was an infant. Since he had no surviving family, he became a ward of the state and was sent to various orphanages in the Midwest. He made no friends and spent most of his time reading.

tag: p

text: The same episode reveals that by the early 1960s he was a US Army captain involved in black ops and intelligence, and that he served alongside Fox Mulder's father, Bill. The Smoking Man was already involved in the arming of anti-Castro rebels in Cuba and the assassinations of Patrice Lumumba and Rafael Trujillo before he was enlisted by a secret cabal to assassinate President John Fitzgerald Kennedy in Dallas. The assassination was motivated by Kennedy's mishandling of the Bay of Pigs Invasion and the subsequent Cuban Missile Crisis. As part of the mission, the Smoking Man told the designated patsy, Lee Harvey Oswald, to bring the curtain rods as a way to frame him for the murder. Incidentally, it was Oswald himself who introduced the Smoking Man to cigarettes. By 1968, the Smoking Man had progressed enough in the hierarchy to push himself for the assassination of Martin Luther King, concerned that King was "talking like a Maoist" and a threat to the American war effort in Vietnam. He did the deed himself because he had "too much respect for the man," and chose to frame a white racist because of his own sympathy for the Civil Rights Movement.

text: At the same time, the Smoking Man was an aspiring writer of espionage (and later, science-fiction) novels starring a fictional version of himself, Jack Colquitt, and based on his own secret activities, but all his drafts were rejected or altered by publishers who found them unrealistic and poorly written. This left him no choice but to continue working for the United States government. By 1991, the Smoking Man's power was pretty much absolute. He was in direct talks with Saddam Hussein and involved in one way or another on the Anita Hill-Clarence Thomas controversy, moving the Rodney King trial to Simi Valley, keeping the US government from interfering in the independence of Bosnia-Herzegovina, the Academy Awards nominations, keeping the Buffalo Bills from ever winning the Super Bowl, drugging the Soviet goalkeeper Vladislav Tretiak before the Miracle on Ice, and executing extraterrestrials that survived landing on American soil.[3][4]

text: Nevertheless, X-Files writer Frank Spotnitz, has stated that this version of events is only one possibility and is not accepted canon.[5]

text: "My Struggle III"[edit]

text: In the eleventh-season episode "My Struggle III," the Cigarette-Smoking Man reveals his name to be Carl Gerhard Busch (the name of series creator Chris Carter's grandfather).[6]

text: Other episodes[edit]

text: In his first appearance in the series, he oversees FBI agent Dana Scully's (Gillian Anderson) briefing and debriefing, and later disposes of evidence Fox Mulder (David Duchovny) and Scully had brought back from their investigation of an alien abduction.[7] With the Smoking Man hiding truth from the public, Mulder seeks to reveal it to the public and the truth about the disappearance of his sister, Samantha. This leads to a rivalry that lasts until the end of the series.[8]

text: In later seasons, it is revealed that he is a member of a group known as the Syndicate, a shadowy organization within the United States government.[9] The episode "Two Fathers" reveals his birthname or alias as C.G.B. Spender, and that he was formerly married to Cassandra Spender, with whom he had a son, Jeffrey Spender. He recruits FBI Special Agent Diana Fowley to be a subordinate of his because she has a close relationship with Mulder.[10] In "One Son", Jeffrey finds out that his father, the Smoking Man, forced his mother Cassandra to undergo medical treatments that led to several nervous breakdowns during his childhood years. When the Smoking Man finds out, he seemingly kills Jeffrey. Knowing of the colonization plan, the Alien rebels return to Earth to try to persuade the Syndicate to join their side against their war with the Colonists. Not believing in the strength of the Alien rebels, the Syndicate members meet at El Rico Air Base to be transported to a spaceship to survive the colonization. However, the rebels appear instead of the Colonists and kill all remaining chief members of the Syndicate. Together with Fowley, the Smoking Man escapes the destruction of the Syndicate.[11] Later in the sixth season, there is more evidence that suggested that the Smoking Man is Mulder's biological father. Eventually in "The Sixth Extinction II: Amor Fati", Fowley comes in disagreement with him. Because of his plans to kill Mulder, Fowley helps Scully in her investigation to locate Mulder, which leads to her death. After the destruction of the Syndicate, the Smoking Man starts to operate as he wishes.[1] However, his cancer resurfaces, and he begins using a wheelchair and has a tracheotomy. In the end, Alex Krycek and Marita Covarrubias betray him in the episode "Requiem", throwing him down a flight of stairs, where they presume him to be dead.[12]

text: Until the ninth season episode "William", the Smoking Man is presumed dead. It is learned that his attempted murder of his son failed, which led him to subject his son to terrible experiments.[13] In the series finale, "The Truth", Mulder and Scully travel through remote New Mexico and reach a pueblo where a "wise man" reputedly lives: he is, in fact, the Smoking Man. His condition has worsened since his disappearance, and he lives a primitive life in hiding from the "New" Syndicate. After taunting Mulder and Scully, he reveals to Scully what Mulder already knew, that the alien re-colonization of Earth is set for December 22, 2012. Shortly after, Smoking Man is again apparently killed by a rocket shot from a helicopter ordered by Knowle Rohrer.[14]

text: For the next 14 years, he is presumed dead. However, he appears again alive but seriously burned and disfigured at the end of "My Struggle" (2016), the first episode of The X-Files miniseries, stating that the X-Files have been reopened. In the season finale, "My Struggle II", the Smoking Man puts into motion the conspiracy he had been working on all these years, releasing chemtrails into the atmosphere which trigger immune system breakdowns throughout the American population, which had been infected by the Spartan virus through mandatory flu vaccinations. Out of fondness for Mulder, he offers him the cure to the disease, but is rebuffed. The United States is thrown into chaos as the Syndicate plan for depopulation gets underway. However in "My Struggle III", this is shown to be a vision experienced by Scully. It is revealed that the Smoking Man is trying to find Scully's son William in order to fulfill his plans, and that he is in conflict with a group lead by two other surviving Syndicate members, who want the Smoking Man dead in order to carry out their own agenda. The Smoking Man approaches Walter Skinner to make him a deal, and offers him a chance to survive the end of humanity in exchange for Skinner helping him find William. The Smoking Man also reveals he was responsible for the creation of William, as he impregnated Scully with the use of alien technology.

text: In the season 11 finale "My Struggle IV", the Smoking Man and Reyes follow Mulder, Scully and Skinner to an abandoned factory where they are chasing down William. Skinner points a gun at them and shoots Reyes dead, and the Smoking Man runs Skinner over in his car. The Smoking Man confronts "Mulder" (who is actually William in disguise) by a waterfront, and during the standoff shoots him in the head and causes him to fall into the water. The real Mulder appears and shoots the Smoking Man, who realizes that he has killed William, and he falls off the edge and into the water, with his body then carried away by the currents.

text: Spin-off media[edit]

text: Prior to the tenth televised series of The X-Files in 2016, Chris Carter worked with IDW Publishing in 2013 to produce a comic-book continuation of the show. It hints that the Smoking Man is alive and indirectly feeding information to both Mulder and The Lone Gunmen.[15] Carter later said that the story from these comics would be disregarded in future television productions.[16] A variation of the comic-book continuation was made canonical with The X-Files: Cold Cases, an Audible adaptation of the series set between the events of the ninth and tenth seasons of The X-Files, in which the Smoking Man presented in the series is revealed to be a shape-shifting alien imitating him.

text: Characterization[edit]

text: Kim Manners, a director of several X-Files episodes, said that the Smoking Man was the show's version of Darth Vader.[8] Some X-Files fans have categorized the Smoking Man as evil, making him out to be the villain. Series creator Chris Carter once called him "the devil", producing a mixed reaction among fans. Some fans, along with the portraying actor, see him as a hero, as he is forced to make choices others are not.[17]

text: The Smoking Man is involved in the Syndicate, a shadow organization which includes members of the United States government that exists to hide from the public the fact that aliens are planning to colonize Earth. The Smoking Man often ruthlessly protects the secrets of the conspiracy, and serves as the main antagonist to Mulder, who has an equally consuming devotion to reveal the truth in the first seven seasons.[18] His stated justification is a desire to prevent the alien colonization for as long as possible; in the episode "One Breath", he tells Mulder that he is in the conspiracy (which he calls "the game") because he believes that the secrets he keeps could, if publicly revealed, threaten the social order that preserves society: "If people were to know of the things that I know... it would all fall apart". He is at times shown working towards that goal, particularly in connection with developing a vaccine to protect people from the "black oil", a parasitic agent which the alien Colonists use to propagate themselves.[11]

text: Development[edit]

text:
"I tried to put myself in the character’s shoes and see the world from his point of view. After all, villains don’t think they are villains".

— William B. Davis talking about his character.[19]

tag: table

text: When first cast for the role, portraying actor William B. Davis thought a show about the paranormal would not last for long.[20] Before joining The X-Files cast, Davis had not smoked a cigarette in twenty years. For the first two episodes he appeared in, he smoked "real" cigarettes, but later changed to herbal cigarettes, giving the reason that smoking was dangerous for his health.[21] In at least one early script draft from the "Pilot", a Special Agent named Lake Drazen is present at the meeting near the start of the episode, having chosen Scully for an assignment to evaluate the validity of Mulder's work on the X-Files. The scene was eventually deleted and replaced, and several crew members have hinted that Agent Drazen became the Smoking Man.[22]

text: Kim Manners said that it seemed all the prominent pieces created for The X-Files were created by "accident". According to Manners, Davis was nothing more than an extra leaning on a shelf. At the start, the producers of the show were not sure about making the Smoking Man the main antagonist. Paul Rabwin commented once that he did not know if Davis could handle the role, because he was not sure if he was a "good enough" actor for the role. Manners later commented that Davis knew that the Smoking Man had two different characters, the first being the one played by Davis and the second was the cigarettes. He further stated that the cigarette smoke could tell a "whole story" by itself, thanks to Davis' talent.[8]

text: Fans of the series were active in debating if the Smoking Man was actually dead after the events of the season five premiere "Redux". In his first response, Chris Carter said he had left clues in the episode, and he later officially announced that the character would appear in The X-Files movie. In one of his last comments on the matter, he said, "Not that we haven't brought deceased characters back before, in flashbacks or more paranormal ways. The great thing about The X-Files is that anything can happen."[23]

text: The Smoking Man is the only character in the series, in addition to Mulder and Scully, to appear in both the first episode, "pilot" and the last, "The Truth" of the series.[original research?] Portraying actor William B. Davis was listed as CIA Agent in the first season episode "Young at Heart", instead of his usual character, the Smoking Man. Actor Chris Owens for a time portrayed the Smoking Man as a young man in flashbacks. He later plays his son, Jeffrey Spender.[24] Young Cigarette Smoking Man was first played by Craig Warkentin, with Davis's voice dubbed over in "Apocrypha".[25]

text: Reception[edit]

text: While not being nominated for any of his work alone on The X-Files, William B. Davis and several other cast members were nominated in the category "Outstanding Performance by an Ensemble in a Drama Series" by the Screen Actors Guild Awards in 1997,[26] 1998[27] and 1999 but did not win.[28] The character was regularly voted "The Nastiest Villain" on television polls during the 90s. TV Guide listed Cigarette Smoking Man 20th in their "25 Greatest TV Villains" list. According to the portraying actor, the character had garnered protest from "pro-smokers".[29] Entertainment Weekly writer Jennifer Armstrong cited the character as an example of the old tradition of having only "bad guys" smoking on television.[30]

text: Davis was included in Entertainment Weekly's list of the 50 Biggest Emmy Snubs, the list's author saying that the presence of the "Cigarette Smoking Man" was as important as "black oil, alien implants, and Scully's skepticism".[31] The Malaysian newspaper the New Straits Times called the Smoking Man one of the most "intriguing" characters of the show.[32] However, Christianity Today said that the mystery behind the Smoking Man had evaporated by the late season episodes.[33] Likewise, Ken Tucker from Entertainment Weekly felt that "the monotonous evil of Cancer Man" had "become actively annoying" in later seasons of the show, being that his lurking presence did not seem as mysterious anymore.[34] Salon reviewer Jeff Stark felt the show was at its best when you "didn't exactly know the motivations of the Smoking Man".[35]


document_title: New York City water supply system

question_text: where does new york drinking water come from

text: New York City water supply system

text: Responsible agencies[edit]

text: Responsibility for the city water supply is shared among three institutions: the New York City Department of Environmental Protection ("DEP"), which operates and maintains the system and is responsible for investment planning; the New York City Municipal Water Finance Authority ("NYW"), which raises debt financing in the market to underwrite the system's costs; and the Water Board, which sets rates and collects user payments.

text: New York City Department of Environmental Protection[edit]

text: The DEP has a workforce of over 6,000 employees. It includes three bureaus in charge of, respectively, the upstate water supply system, New York City's water and sewer operations, and wastewater treatment:

text:
The Bureau of Water Supply manages, operates and protects New York City's upstate water supply system to ensure the delivery of a sufficient quantity of high quality drinking water. The Bureau is also responsible for the overall management and implementation of the provisions of the city's $1.5 billion Watershed Protection Program.
In addition to operating and maintaining the water supply and sewerage system, the Bureau of Water and Sewer Operations is also responsible for the operation of the Staten Island Bluebelt, an ecologically sound, cost-effective natural alternative to storm sewers, which occupies approximately 15 square miles (39 km2) of land in the South Richmond area of Staten Island. This project preserves streams, ponds and other wetland ("bluebelt") areas, allowing them to perform their natural function of conveying, storing and filtering storm water.
The Bureau of Wastewater Treatment operates 14 water pollution control plants treating an average of 1.5 billion US gallons (5,700,000 m3) of wastewater a day; 95 wastewater pump stations; eight dewatering facilities; 490 sewer regulators; and 7,000 miles (11,000 km) of intercepting sewers.[3]

tag: ul

text: New York City Municipal Water Finance Authority[edit]

text: The NYW finances the capital needs of the water and sewer system of the city through the issuance of bonds, commercial paper, and other debt instruments. It is a public-benefit corporation created in 1985 pursuant to the New York City Municipal Water Finance Authority Act. The Authority is administered by a seven-member Board of Directors. Four of the members are ex officio members: the Commissioner of Environmental Protection of the City, the Director of Management and Budget of the City, the Commissioner of Finance of the City, and the Commissioner of Environmental Conservation of the State. The remaining three members are public appointments: two by the Mayor, and one by the Governor.[4]

text: New York City Water Board[edit]

text: The New York City Water Board sets water and sewer rates for New York City sufficient to pay the costs of operating and financing the system, and collects user payments from customers for services provided by the water and wastewater utility systems of the City of New York. The five Board members are appointed to two-year terms by the Mayor.[5]

text: Infrastructure[edit]

text: New York City's water system consists of aqueducts, distribution pipes, reservoirs, and water tunnels that channel drinking water to residents and visitors. A comprehensive raised-relief map of the system is on display at the Queens Museum of Art. Until the early 21st century, some places in southeastern Queens received their water from local wells of the former Jamaica Water Supply Company.[6]

text: Reservoirs and aqueducts[edit]

text: The water system has a storage capacity of 550 billion US gallons (2.1×109 m3) and provides over 1.2 billion US gallons (4,500,000 m3) per day of drinking water to more than eight million city residents, another one million users in four upstate counties bordering on the water supply system, and visitors to the region. Three separate sub-systems, each consisting of aqueducts and reservoirs, bring water from Upstate New York to New York City:

text:
The New Croton Aqueduct, completed in 1890, brings water from the New Croton Reservoir in Westchester and Putnam counties.
The Catskill Aqueduct, completed in 1916, is significantly larger than New Croton and brings water from two reservoirs in the eastern Catskill Mountains.
The Delaware Aqueduct, completed in 1945, taps tributaries of the Delaware River in the western Catskill Mountains and provides approximately half of New York City's water supply.[7]

text: The latter two aqueducts provide 90% of New York City's drinking water. Water from both aqueducts is stored first in the large Kensico Reservoir and subsequently in the much smaller Hillview Reservoir closer to the city.

text: Brooklyn Reservoirs[edit]

text: Brooklyn has had many water reservoirs; they can be seen on an 1864 map of Brooklyn Waterworks.[8] They are listed below, from east to west:

text:
Hempstead Reservoir
Smith's Pond
Rockville Reservoir
Valley Stream Pond
Watts Pond
Clear Stream Reservoir
Brookfield Reservoir
Conselyea Pond
P. Cornells Pond
Springfield Pond
One Mile Pond
Jamaica Reservoir
Ridgewood Reservoir
Mount Prospect Reservoir

tag: ol

text: Tunnels and distribution system[edit]

text: From the Hillview reservoir water flows by gravity through three tunnels under New York City, where water rises again to the surface under natural pressure, through a number of shafts. The three tunnels are:

text:
New York City Water Tunnel No.1, completed in 1917. It runs from the Hillview Reservoir under the central Bronx, Harlem River, West Side, Midtown, and Lower East Side of Manhattan, and under the East River to Brooklyn where it connects to Tunnel 2. It is expected to undergo extensive repairs upon completion of Tunnel No. 3, in 2020.
New York City Water Tunnel No. 2, completed in 1935. It runs from the Hillview Reservoir under the central Bronx, East River, and western Queens to Brooklyn, where it connects to Tunnel 1 and the Richmond Tunnel to Staten Island. When completed, it was the longest large diameter water tunnel in the world.[9]
The uncompleted New York City Water Tunnel No. 3, the largest capital construction project in New York City's history (see below).[10]

text: The distribution system is made up of an extensive grid of water mains stretching approximately 6,500 miles (10,500 km).

text: Ongoing repairs and upgrades[edit]

text: In order to comply with federal and state laws regarding the filtration and disinfection of drinking water, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) and the New York State Department of Health called on the city to create a treatment plan to serve the Croton System. The underground filtration plant is under construction in Van Cortlandt Park. While the Bloomberg administration originally budgeted the project at $992 million in 2003, an audit by the city's comptroller placed the actual costs at $2.1 billion in August 2009.[11]

text: The New York City water supply system leaks at a rate of up to 36 million US gallons (140,000 m3) per day.[12] A complex five-year project with an estimated $240 million construction cost was initiated in November 2008, to correct some of this leakage.

text: The construction of Water tunnel No. 3 is intended to provide the city with a critical third connection to its Upstate New York water supply system, allowing the city to close tunnels No. 1 and No. 2 for repair for the first time of their history. The tunnel will eventually be more than 60 miles (97 km) long. Construction on the tunnel began in 1970, and its first and second phases are completed. The latter opened with a ceremony under Central Park, in 2013. Completion of all phases is not expected until at least 2020.[13]

text: In 2018, New York City announced a US$1 billion investment to protect the integrity of its municipal water system and to maintain the purity of its unfiltered water supply.[14]


document_title: Silent Witness

question_text: how did leo dalton die in silent witness

text: Silent Witness

text: Background[edit]

text: The main character in the original series was based on Professor Helen Whitwell, a forensic pathologist based in Sheffield, whom McCrery had known while serving as a police officer. The programme followed the activities of pathologist Sam Ryan, played by Amanda Burton, until she departed early in the eighth series.

text: There was a succession of regular supporting characters, changing almost every series, but Dr Leo Dalton (William Gaminara) and Dr Harry Cunningham (Tom Ward), who were introduced in the sixth series, continued as lead characters following Ryan's departure, with Dalton replacing her as professor.

text: A new character, Dr Nikki Alexander (Emilia Fox), was introduced in the eighth series. While working as a forensic anthropologist, she appropriates facilities and software in the pathology department to analyse an Iron Age find, with the belated, bemused and begrudging approval of Dalton. Dr Alexander is able to assist in a set of cases being investigated by the team, as it turns out she has "worked in forensic pathology in Johannesburg for six months" and is certified by the Home Office to practise. She eventually overcomes Leo's reluctance and, with Harry's support, is offered and accepts a position on the team.

text: During the fifteenth series Dr Cunningham leaves to accept a position in New York City. He is replaced by forensics expert Jack Hodgson (David Caves) and his assistant Clarissa Mullery (Liz Carr). During the sixteenth series Dr Dalton is killed in an explosion. His replacement, Dr Thomas Chamberlain (Richard Lintern), is introduced at the start of the seventeenth series.

text: Although the show focuses heavily on areas of pathology, the police also have a presence in each case. During later series of the show detectives and investigators tend to differ from episode to episode, with guest artists appearing in these roles. However, during the early years of the show several characters appeared regularly to investigate each case.

text: The first three series were set in Cambridge. This changed to London from the start of the fourth series, following Sam as she took up an academic position.

text: Each series is typically made up of a series of two-part stories. The first nine series typically featured eight episodes (four two-part stories), increased to ten episodes (five two-part stories) from the tenth series onwards.

text: In 1998 the writer John Milne received an Edgar Award from the Mystery Writers of America for the second series episode "Blood, Sweat and Tears". In the United States the series airs during 'Mystery Monday' on BBC America.

text: The series airs in Norway under the title "Tause vitner" on the Norwegian Broadcasting Corporation NRK[7] and in Sweden on TV4 under the name "Tyst vittne".[8] Both the Norwegian and Swedish titles are direct translations. The show is also broadcast in the Netherlands by public broadcaster KRO, Belgium on VRT channel Canvas and in Finland on the Finnish Broadcasting Company Yle using the name "Hiljainen todistaja", which is also a direct translation of the original title.[9]

text: The theme music featured in the series is entitled Silencium and is performed by John Harle. The arrangement, for chamber orchestra and soprano saxophone solo, was first performed as part of the Canterbury Festival on 22 October 2011.[10] The vocal section is performed by Sarah Leonard.[11]

text: The incidental music used in the series is written by the BAFTA-nominated composer Sheridan Tongue.

text: In August 2012 the series came under criticism for being "unduly gruesome". Controversy was specifically focused on the fifteenth-series episode Redhill, written by Ed Whitmore. The BBC responded with the following:

text: "As programme makers we take our responsibility to the audience extremely seriously and try to make sure we strike the right balance between compelling drama without being unnecessarily graphic. Towards the end of the first episode, we had established that DI Bridges and Officer Kessler had previously worked together and that he was the one very much in control. The final scene was not an attempt to gratuitously shock the audience; it was rooted in character and research, showing just what DI Bridges was prepared to do for her colleague for the sake of her family, as well as the brutality that Kessler was capable of.

text: We acknowledge that certain scenes may have been challenging, but we filmed and presented them in such a way as to make sure that although as a viewer the implication was there, it was never actually shown.[12]

text: Silent Witness is now in its fifteenth series, and we believe the general tone and content is widely recognised by its regular audience. It’s fair to say the show is known for tackling challenging stories and exploring adult themes and we don’t feel the content of these episodes would have gone beyond viewers' expectations. As well as scheduling the series after the watershed, we made sure the content was widely publicised and gave a warning before both episodes."[13]

text: Episodes[edit]

text: Characters[edit]

text: Main[edit]

text:
Actor
Character
Series

1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21

Amanda Burton
Professor Sam Ryan
Main
Absent

William Gaminara
Professor Leo Dalton
Absent
Main
Absent
Guest
Absent

Tom Ward
Dr. Harry Cunningham
Absent
Main
Absent

Emilia Fox
Dr. Nikki Alexander
Absent
Main

David Caves
Jack Hodgson
Absent
Main

Liz Carr
Clarissa Mullery
Absent
Main

Richard Lintern
Dr. Thomas Chamberlain
Absent
Main

text: Main characters[edit]

text:
Professor Sam Ryan (Amanda Burton) – Series 1–8. Sam originally lived and worked in Cambridge, but moved to London at the end of series three after she was offered the job of professor at a university. Sam departed in the first episode of series eight, "A Time To Heal". Sam returned home to Ireland after a member of her family was implicated in a murder.
Professor Leo Dalton (William Gaminara) – Series 6–16. Leo first appeared in the episode "The Fall Out", where he was nothing more than a simple doctor. However, he was promoted to professor after former professor Sam Ryan left. In the episode "Ghosts", both his wife, Theresa, and his daughter, Cassie, are killed in a car accident. He began a relationship with fellow professor Janet Mander in "Death's Door", but ended their relationship in the episode "Domestic". Leo often took a strong opinion on cases and became emotionally involved. He died in the series 16 finale "Greater Love", when he sacrificed himself to save many others from a terrorist bomb explosion. He briefly appeared in a flashback in the last episode of series 20.
Dr. Harry Cunningham (Tom Ward) – Series 6–15. Harry started out life as a junior doctor, who worked as an apprentice alongside Sam and Leo. However, he soon qualified as a pathologist, and has worked on equal footing with the team for a number of years. Harry was single, and lived alone, but has had several romantic relationships, including an ongoing 'will they-won't they' relationship with his colleague Nikki. Harry left the team to accept a professorship in New York at the end of series 15. As this was decided after filming was completed, and the stories were reordered, with "And Then I Fell in Love" airing last, where it was originally scheduled as the second episode, his departure was never on screen.
Dr. Nikki Alexander (Emilia Fox) – since Series 8. Originally appearing in the episode "Nowhere Fast", Nikki was originally assigned to the Lyell Centre to defuse the tension between Harry and Leo after Sam's departure. However, Nikki soon became a permanent fixture within the team, and although she features more prominently in the series, holds a lower rank in pathology than Leo. Despite her native home being South Africa, Nikki regards the United Kingdom as her second home, as the reason for her departure from the country lies solely in the hands of her father, Victor, as explained in the episode "Double Dare". Nikki often flirted with colleague Harry, and even invited him to stay at her house after his flat blew up in an explosion. Nikki and Harry were in an ongoing 'will they-won't they' relationship until he left in Series 15. As well as this, she developed a close relationship with Leo and looked up to him as a father figure.
Jack Hodgson (David Caves) – since Series 16. Before his arrival at the Lyell Centre, Jack was a forensic scientist for the police, working on regular murder investigations. However, when he is called out to the scene of a man's suspicious death in "Change", both Nikki and Leo spot his potential, and looking for a senior colleague to replace Harry, decide to offer Jack a job as the centre's forensic expert. Jack is close friends with colleague Clarissa Mullery, whom he invites to work with him at the Lyell Centre, much to Leo's surprise. In his spare time, Jack is a cage fighter, and splits his home life between forensic research and training for his next fight.
Clarissa Mullery (Liz Carr) – since Series 16. Clarissa is Jack's personal lab assistant, who first appears in the episode "Change", when Jack invites her to work at the Lyell Centre with him, much to Leo's surprise. She is a disabled by an unspecified condition and uses an electric wheelchair. She has a very cheeky side, first making a quip at Leo after he fails to recognise who she is on her first arrival. Clarissa had clearly worked for Jack for a long period before his appointment at the Lyell Centre; however, the exact period of time is unknown.
Dr. Thomas Chamberlain (Richard Lintern) – since Series 17. Thomas Chamberlain has taken over as head of the Lyell Centre from Leo who died at the end of series 16. He is an experienced forensic pathologist with a renowned reputation in toxicology and is described as charming, charismatic and socially shrewd. His first encounters with Jack, Nikki and Clarissa did not go well but they were gradually warmed to him. It is revealed in the last episode of his first series that his wife has left him just before he started working at the Lyell Centre, and has taken their daughter with her.

text: Other characters[edit]

text:
Dr. Trevor Stewart (William Armstrong) – Series 1–3. As well as being a pathologist in his own right, Trevor was Sam's business partner, owning half of the morgue and its facilities. Trevor decided to stay in Cambridge with his friends and family when Sam accepted the professorship position at a university in London and moved away at the end of series three.
Dr. Fred Dale (Sam Parks) – Series 1–3. Fred was Sam's main assistant during post mortems and on visits to crime scenes, often identifying DNA samples at the scene of the crime, and linking them to those responsible. He was also notable for not having many speaking lines, and regularly appearing without speaking. His fate at the end of series three was not revealed.
Professor Janet Mander (Jaye Griffiths) – Series 12–15. Janet is a psychological profiler who assists the police in cases of serial offences. She began a relationship with Leo in the episode "Safe", and they lived together as partners until Leo ended the relationship in "Redhill". She recurringly worked alongside the team to provide them with information in order to get an idea of the suspect they are looking for. Janet decided to move away from London after Leo ended their relationship.
Dr. Charlie Gibbs (Wunmi Mosaku) – Series 13. A junior doctor and lab technician, who was appointed to work with the team by Professor Dalton.
Dr. Zak Khan (Arsher Ali) – Series 14. A junior doctor who worked his forensic science apprenticeship with the team, to learn the ropes of the profession.[14]
Wyn Ryan (Ruth McCabe) – Series 1–3. Professor Ryan's sister, who, after coming over to visit her from her home in Ireland, ended up living with her on a permanent basis.
Ricky Ryan (Matthew Steer) – Series 1. Wyn's son and Sam's nephew, who regularly got into trouble and was expelled from school for very poor behaviour.
Rosemary Mason (Jane Hazlegrove) – Series 6–7. The main receptionist at the Lyell Centre, before the change in focus from university department to purely commercial pathology.

text: Police[edit]

text:
Superintendent Helen Farmer (Clare Higgins) – Series 1. A superintendent, and Tom Adams' boss and mentor, who accompanied him on investigating several cases during his time in the force.
Detective Chief Inspector Tom Adams (John McGlynn) – Series 1. An investigator with the Cambridgeshire police force, who had an affair with Kerry Cox, before her death.
Detective Constable Kerry Cox (Ruth Gemmell) – Series 1. A junior trainee detective who had an affair with Tom Adams, but was later killed in a freak accident in a hospital basement.
Detective Constable Marcia Evans (Janice Acquah) – Series 1. A fellow junior trainee detective for the Cambridgeshire police force, who resigned after Kerry Cox's death.
Superintendent Peter Ross (Mick Ford) – Series 2. A superintendent, and an ex-boyfriend of Sam's, who believed in a strong relationship between the police and the pathology lab.
Detective Chief Inspector Rachel Selway (Nicola Redmond) – Series 2. Tom Adams' replacement, following his resignation from the force. She joined the team alongside junior sergeant Tony Speed.
Detective Sergeant Tony Speed (Richard Huw) – Series 2. A junior sergeant, who joined the team alongside his superior officer, Rachel Selway. He knew Peter Ross from a previous posting.
Detective Chief Inspector Michael Connor (Nick Reding) – Series 3–4. A detective chief inspector, and old friend of Sam's, whom she met during her junior years at university.
Detective Sergeant Rob Bradley (Mark Letheren) – Series 3. A detective sergeant, who as Connor's junior officer, accompanied him with the investigating in the cases which he was assigned to.

text: Novels[edit]

text: During the early years of the show, series creator McCrery wrote and published a number of tie-in novels relating to the series, following Sam Ryan (Amanda Burton) and Trevor Stewart (William Armstrong), as well as former main character Superintendent Tom Adams (John McGlynn), and brand new character DS Stanley Sharman, with Burton generally appearing on the front cover of each novel. The fifth novel, due to be published in 2003, was placed on indefinite hold, and has never been released.

text:
Title
No.
Publication Date

"A Case for the Defence"
1
9 September 1996

Walking home from a night out, Sam stumbles upon the remains of a mutilated body on a footpath in the Northwick graveyard. Evidence suggests that the killing may be linked to a particularly ritualistic form of the black arts, but Sam is unconvinced as the murder bears an uncanny resemblance to another murder committed in the same town many years ago. When a second body is discovered, Sam's evidence is called into question, and is used to create the information that the police need to solve the case, before the killer strikes again. As Sam and Trevor uncover information surrounding the circumstances of the murders, elements that once seemed like coincidences soon appear to belong to a more horrific plan.

"Strange Screams of Death"
2
3 August 1998

Sam is tasked with investigating the circumstances surrounding the death of a woman whose body is discovered in a disused shed at a former American airbase on the outskirts of Cambridge. The post mortem reveals that she had been violently raped, before being tortured, and viciously murdered. When a second body is discovered in similar circumstances, Sam finds herself dealing with a serial killer, who has the hunger to slaughter again. Can her profile of information find the identity of the killer before it is too late? Meanwhile, as Tom Adams closes in on his prime suspect, Sam discovers that he may not be working alone, and a search is launched to find the accomplice of a dangerous criminal.

"The Spider's Web"
3
2 August 1999

Sam is asked to perform a second autopsy on a teenage boy who was killed in a tragic joyriding accident, when despite his parents' protests, the results of the autopsy seem clear—he died of multiple injuries consistent with a high-speed car crash. However, as Trevor performed the post mortem, Sam is reluctant to go up against her friend and colleague, in an attempt to find the answers that the family are looking for. However, reading Trevor's post mortem report prompts Sam to go ahead with the second autopsy, and her findings seem to suggest that the accident may have been no such thing. But neither Trevor nor Superintendent Tom Adams accepts her findings, and believe that she is reading between the lines.

"Faceless Strangers"
4
3 September 2001

When the wife and beau of a local member of parliament is found dead in her own home, Superintendent Tom Adams calls upon Sam and the entire resources of the Cambridge Constabulary, in an attempt to further his career, and solve the case as quickly as possible. However, his investigation is halted by the discovery of the decomposed body of a homeless drug addict in the local underground toilet block. When Adams dismisses the death as an open and shut case, one of his juniors, DS Stanley Sharman, decides to enlist Sam's help, to discover the identity of the dead woman—and discover just who is responsible for her death. Meanwhile, Adams is determined to crack his case.

"In Search of Evil[15]"
5
3 November 2003

When the body of elderly widow Violet Thorpe is discovered beneath the floor of her own cellar, Sam quickly establishes that she had been poisoned, and died more than a year prior to the discovery of her body. Meanwhile, the victim's contact with an old friend living in Brighton, appears to be a vital piece of evdidence in discovering who is responsible for her murder. When Sam and DS Stanley Sharman visit the address of the old friend in Brighton, they find themselves on a bizarre trail of a mentally deranged killer, who appears to be travelling up and down the country in search of lonely old ladies to kill, and Sam finds herself in a race to discover the identity of one of the country's most prolific serial killers.