First Person

2000 - 2001

Mr. Debt

16th February 2000

Episode 1

Andrew Capoccia is fighting in his own personal crusade against credit card companies. He is a lawyer that helps people that are ruined by debt coming from their massive use of credit cards. He wins a lot of cases, but at the same time he has been fined, sued and condemned by courts and other lawyers. Is he really a hero threatening the system of credit as we know it, or is he a fraud?

Eyeball to Eyeball

23rd February 2000

Episode 2

Clyde Roper has dedicated his life to become the first person to see a giant squid. He started off as a lobster fisherman, but then became a zoologist, and for 30 years he has been searching for this mythical creature. The giant squid is supposed to be the size of a football field with eyes as big as volleyballs.

Stairway to Heaven

Episode 3

A conversation with Temple Grandin. She is a university professor, a diagnosed autistic, and has designed 1/3 of the slaughterhouses in the United States. Temple Grandin understands and relates more easily to cattle than to people. She's renowned for her design "stairway to heaven," a curving, high-wall ramp system that utilises optical illusions to lead livestock calmly from the pen to the bolt gun and ultimately to a humane death.

The Killer Inside Me

Episode 4

A conversation with Sondra London. Her high school boyfriend was Gerald Shaefer, the same man that later became one of America's most notorious mass murderers. They broke up because of his wish to kill young women, but when she sees him in the papers she wants to see him again. They restart their relationship while he is in prison.

I Dismember Mama

15th March 2000

Episode 5

A conversation with Saul Kent. He is one of the pioneers in the field of cryonics, that being the freezing of persons for resuscitation in the future. He tells about his thoughts around life extension, and also about his personal experiences about this.

The Stalker

22nd March 2000

Episode 6

An interview with Bill Kinsley. He was once a promising post office worker on the brink of promotion to postmaster general. That was before he met Thomas McIlvane, kick boxer, mailman, gun freak and soon to become mass murderer. Kinsley survived the carnage that followed, but McIlvane died. Now Kinsley is living in fear, thinking that someone out there in the night is coming to kill him.

The Parrot

29th March 2000

Episode 7

This documentary is about an unusual murder mystery. Jane Gill is found murdered in her bedroom. Next to the body the police find Max, an African parrot with a highly developed ability to speak, and a vocabulary of 450 words. Max repeated the line "Richard. No, no, no..." over and over again. Gary Grasp is charged with the murder, and his only hope to escape the gas chamber is Max and his testimony.

Smiling in a Jar

Episode 8

An interview with Gretchen Worden. She is the director of Mütter Museum in Philadelphia. Here exists a unique collection of medical curiosities and deformations preserved in jars. Worden does not find the specimens monstrous, but thinks of them as having their own special and important stories to tell.

In the Kingdom of the Unabomber

12th April 2000

Episode 9

Gay Greenberg was a psychotherapist that wanted to become a writer. His career as a writer lead to nowhere, and he decided to seek help from a famous author. This is why he started to correspond with Ted Kaczynski, not knowing that he was the notorious Unabomber. Instead of finding help on his career as an author, Greenberg found himself dragged into Kaczynski's paranoid nightmare.

The Little Gray Man

19th April 2000

Episode 10

For 25 years Antonio Mendez worked as a secret agent for the CIA. He led two lives. To his friends he was a bureaucrat working for the American Ministry of Defense, but to the CIA he was the master of disguise. He could become whoever, wherever, at any time. To keep his identity hidden he had to stay gray and boring to his friends and to himself.

You're Soaking In It

Episode 11

After Joan Dougherty's son's shotgun suicide, she was left alone with a gruesome mess. Having no other choice, she started to clean up herself. Now she tries to help others in the same situation. She has started her own company for cleaning up after violent crimes where others don't even stand the sight.

Top Cast

Director

Errol Morris

Documentary News

First Person was an American TV series produced and directed by Errol Morris. The show engaged a varied group of individuals from civil advocates to criminals. Interviews were conducted with "The Interrotron", a device similar to a teleprompter: Errol and his subject each sit facing a camera. The image of each person's face is then projected onto a two-way mirror positioned in front of the lens of the other's camera. Instead of looking at a blank lens, then, both Morris and his subject are looking directly at a human face. Morris believes that the machine encourages monologue in the interview process, while also encouraging the interviewees to "express themselves to camera".

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Full Cast

Errol Morris Image

Errol Morris

Full Crew

Ian Kincaid

Cinematography

Shonda Burke

Editor

Doug Abel Image

Doug Abel

Editor

Ted Bafaloukos

Production Design

John Kusiak

Music

Errol Morris Image

Errol Morris

Producer

Chyld King

Editor

Steve McNulty

Art Department Coordinator

Errol Morris Image

Errol Morris

Director

J. Michael Williams

Producer

Dorothy Aufiero

Producer

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David Collins

Producer

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