Kurt Sayenga
Encyclopedia
Kurt Sayenga is a writer, director, and producer living in the Los Angeles
area. He was originally active in the Washington, D.C.
punk scene, and created, edited, and was the head writer of Greed Magazine
in the late 1980s, one of the first magazines to fuse coverage of underground music, literature and "high" and "low" art. On the pop culture side, Greed featured interviews with acts such as Sonic Youth
, Pussy Galore, Daniel Johnston
, The Swans, Wire
, Plasticland
, Rites of Spring
, Live Skull
, and Robyn Hitchcock
, plus comics figures Los Bros Hernandez
, Charles Burns
, Peter Bagge
, Chester Brown
and Clive Barker
. Greed featured the debut of Evan Dorkin
's Milk and Cheese in its final issue.
Sayenga also designed albums for the Dischord Records
label, most notably Fugazi's first six packages: "Fugazi (EP)
," "Margin Walker
," "13 Songs
," "Repeater
," "Steady Diet of Nothing," and the 7" "3 Songs."
Meanwhile, Sayenga was also building a career as a documentary filmmaker. After a tenure as a writer at C-SPAN
, Sayenga went on staff at the Discovery Channel
, where he wrote, directed and produced the special "Nighthawk:Secrets of the Stealth Fighter," the mini-series "Wings Over the Gulf," and the 13-part series "Fields of Armor," a survey of mechanized warfare in the 20th Century. He won an Emmy
for the design of the opening credits of "Fields of Armor," along with several writing and producing awards.
During his time running the production company Arcwelder Films (which he founded with Martha Adams), Sayenga wrote, directed and produced many more documentaries, including "Spies Above," "Robots Rising," "Explosive Situations," "High Speed Impacts," "Inside the Kill Box" (made on the tenth anniversary of the first Gulf War
and featuring interviews with players such as George H. W. Bush
and Dick Cheney
), and the engineering series "Skyscrapers: Going Up," "Bridges: Reaching Out," and "Tunnels: Digging In." He was also show runner of "Animal Nightmares," a 13-part series for National Geographic International, and "Microkillers," a mini-series about pandemic diseases that fused fictional scenarios with documentary content.
In 2006 Sayenga formed a new production company called Command and Control Creative Services, through which he has created promotional films for the third installment of the X-Men franchise, X-Men: The Last Stand
; the film Lions for Lambs
with Robert Redford
, Meryl Streep
, and Tom Cruise
and the remake of The Day the Earth Stood Still. The short films for "Lions" included interviews with such luminaries as Ralph Nader
, the Archbishop Desmond Tutu
, Amartya Sen
, and General Sir Mike Jackson
, former head of the British Army. In 2008 Sayenga worked with Bill Nye
, the Science Guy, as Executive Producer/Show Runner of "Stuff Happens," for Discovery Communications' Planet Green. He is currently writing and directing films on high-energy particle physics and the Theory of Relativity for the Science Channel series "Through the Wormhole with Morgan Freeman," premiering in 2010.
Los Ángeles
Los Ángeles is the capital of the province of Biobío, in the commune of the same name, in Region VIII , in the center-south of Chile. It is located between the Laja and Biobío rivers. The population is 123,445 inhabitants...
area. He was originally active in the Washington, D.C.
Washington, D.C.
Washington, D.C., formally the District of Columbia and commonly referred to as Washington, "the District", or simply D.C., is the capital of the United States. On July 16, 1790, the United States Congress approved the creation of a permanent national capital as permitted by the U.S. Constitution....
punk scene, and created, edited, and was the head writer of Greed Magazine
Greed Magazine
Greed Magazine was a music, comics, and culture periodical published in Washington, DC, by Kurt Sayenga from 1986 to 1989. It lasted six issues, and included interviews with such luminaries as Robyn Hitchcock, the Hernandez brothers , Sonic Youth, Bob Burden , Rites of Spring, and Chester Brown...
in the late 1980s, one of the first magazines to fuse coverage of underground music, literature and "high" and "low" art. On the pop culture side, Greed featured interviews with acts such as Sonic Youth
Sonic Youth
Sonic Youth is an American alternative rock band from New York City, formed in 1981. The current lineup consists of Thurston Moore , Kim Gordon , Lee Ranaldo , Steve Shelley , and Mark Ibold .In their early career, Sonic Youth was associated with the No Wave art and music scene in New York City...
, Pussy Galore, Daniel Johnston
Daniel Johnston
Daniel Dale Johnston is an American singer, songwriter, musician, and artist. Johnston was the subject of the 2006 documentary The Devil and Daniel Johnston. He currently lives in Waller, Texas....
, The Swans, Wire
Wire
A wire is a single, usually cylindrical, flexible strand or rod of metal. Wires are used to bear mechanical loads and to carry electricity and telecommunications signals. Wire is commonly formed by drawing the metal through a hole in a die or draw plate. Standard sizes are determined by various...
, Plasticland
Plasticland
Plasticland is an American Neo-Psychedelic and Garage rock band, formed in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, in 1980 with two members of Arousing Polaris, Glenn Rehse and John Frankovic....
, Rites of Spring
Rites of Spring
Rites of Spring was an American post-hardcore band from Washington, D.C. in the mid-1980s, known for their energetic live performances. A part of the D.C. hardcore punk scene, Rites of Spring increased the frenetic violence and visceral passion of hardcore while simultaneously experimenting with...
, Live Skull
Live Skull
-Overview:Live Skull created abrasive no wave music not unlike their 1980s contemporaries Sonic Youth, Swans, Rat at Rat R, The Chameleons, Mars, Teenage Jesus and the Jerks and Band of Susans. Their music featured angular guitar parts interspersed with bleak, quieter passages, for a haunting...
, and Robyn Hitchcock
Robyn Hitchcock
Robyn Rowan Hitchcock is an English singer-songwriter and guitarist. While primarily a vocalist and guitarist, he also plays harmonica, piano and bass guitar....
, plus comics figures Los Bros Hernandez
Los Bros Hernandez
Los Bros Hernandez is the collective name given to the Hernandez brothers responsible for the acclaimed independent comic series Love and Rockets. The artists behind the series are Jaime and Gilbert , and, to a lesser extent, Mario....
, Charles Burns
Charles Burns (cartoonist)
Charles Burns is an American cartoonist, illustrator and film director.-Life:Burns is renowned for his meticulous, high-contrast and creepy artwork and stories. He lives in Philadelphia with his wife, painter Susan Moore, and their two daughters Ava and Rae-Rae.His father was an oceanographer for...
, Peter Bagge
Peter Bagge
Peter Bagge is an American cartoonist. He is the creator of Buddy Bradley, Hate, Neat Stuff, Martini Baton, and Sweatshop, Apocalypse Nerd and Other Lives. His stories often use black humor and exaggerated cartooning to dramatize the reduced expectations of middle-class American youth...
, Chester Brown
Chester Brown
Chester William David Brown , is an award-winning, best-selling Canadian alternative cartoonist and, since 2008, the Libertarian Party of Canada's candidate for the riding of Trinity-Spadina in Toronto, Canada....
and Clive Barker
Clive Barker
Clive Barker is an English author, film director and visual artist best known for his work in both fantasy and horror fiction. Barker came to prominence in the mid-1980s with a series of short stories which established him as a leading young horror writer...
. Greed featured the debut of Evan Dorkin
Evan Dorkin
Evan Dorkin is an American comics artist and writer. His best known works are the comic books Milk and Cheese and Dork...
's Milk and Cheese in its final issue.
Sayenga also designed albums for the Dischord Records
Dischord Records
Dischord Records is a Washington, D.C.-based independent record label specializing in the independent punk music of the D.C.-area music scene. The label is co-owned by Ian MacKaye and Jeff Nelson, who founded Dischord in 1980 to release Minor Disturbance by The Teen Idles...
label, most notably Fugazi's first six packages: "Fugazi (EP)
Fugazi (EP)
Fugazi is the first EP by the American post-hardcore band of the same name. Unlike all other Fugazi releases, Guy Picciotto did not contribute guitar to this record; all guitar present was performed by Ian MacKaye...
," "Margin Walker
Margin Walker
Margin Walker is an EP by the American post-hardcore band Fugazi. It was originally released in June 1989 on vinyl and again in the same year on the compilation release 13 Songs along with the debut EP Fugazi...
," "13 Songs
13 Songs
13 Songs is a compilation of all the songs from the American post-hardcore band Fugazi's first two EPs. It was released in September 1989.-Background:...
," "Repeater
Repeater
A repeater is an electronic device that receives asignal and retransmits it at a higher level and/or higher power, or onto the other side of an obstruction, so that the signal can cover longer distances.-Description:...
," "Steady Diet of Nothing," and the 7" "3 Songs."
Meanwhile, Sayenga was also building a career as a documentary filmmaker. After a tenure as a writer at C-SPAN
C-SPAN
C-SPAN , an acronym for Cable-Satellite Public Affairs Network, is an American cable television network that offers coverage of federal government proceedings and other public affairs programming via its three television channels , one radio station and a group of websites that provide streaming...
, Sayenga went on staff at the Discovery Channel
Discovery Channel
Discovery Channel is an American satellite and cable specialty channel , founded by John Hendricks and distributed by Discovery Communications. It is a publicly traded company run by CEO David Zaslav...
, where he wrote, directed and produced the special "Nighthawk:Secrets of the Stealth Fighter," the mini-series "Wings Over the Gulf," and the 13-part series "Fields of Armor," a survey of mechanized warfare in the 20th Century. He won an Emmy
Emmy Award
An Emmy Award, often referred to simply as the Emmy, is a television production award, similar in nature to the Peabody Awards but more focused on entertainment, and is considered the television equivalent to the Academy Awards and the Grammy Awards .A majority of Emmys are presented in various...
for the design of the opening credits of "Fields of Armor," along with several writing and producing awards.
During his time running the production company Arcwelder Films (which he founded with Martha Adams), Sayenga wrote, directed and produced many more documentaries, including "Spies Above," "Robots Rising," "Explosive Situations," "High Speed Impacts," "Inside the Kill Box" (made on the tenth anniversary of the first Gulf War
Gulf War
The Persian Gulf War , commonly referred to as simply the Gulf War, was a war waged by a U.N.-authorized coalition force from 34 nations led by the United States, against Iraq in response to Iraq's invasion and annexation of Kuwait.The war is also known under other names, such as the First Gulf...
and featuring interviews with players such as George H. W. Bush
George H. W. Bush
George Herbert Walker Bush is an American politician who served as the 41st President of the United States . He had previously served as the 43rd Vice President of the United States , a congressman, an ambassador, and Director of Central Intelligence.Bush was born in Milton, Massachusetts, to...
and Dick Cheney
Dick Cheney
Richard Bruce "Dick" Cheney served as the 46th Vice President of the United States , under George W. Bush....
), and the engineering series "Skyscrapers: Going Up," "Bridges: Reaching Out," and "Tunnels: Digging In." He was also show runner of "Animal Nightmares," a 13-part series for National Geographic International, and "Microkillers," a mini-series about pandemic diseases that fused fictional scenarios with documentary content.
In 2006 Sayenga formed a new production company called Command and Control Creative Services, through which he has created promotional films for the third installment of the X-Men franchise, X-Men: The Last Stand
X-Men: The Last Stand
X-Men: The Last Stand is a 2006 superhero film and the third in the X-Men series. It was directed by Brett Ratner and stars an ensemble cast including Hugh Jackman, Halle Berry, Patrick Stewart, Ian McKellen, Famke Janssen, Kelsey Grammer, Anna Paquin, Shawn Ashmore, Aaron Stanford, Vinnie Jones,...
; the film Lions for Lambs
Lions for Lambs
Lions for Lambs is a 2007 American drama film about the connection between a platoon of United States soldiers in Afghanistan, a U.S. senator, a reporter, and a California college professor. It stars Tom Cruise, Robert Redford and Meryl Streep...
with Robert Redford
Robert Redford
Charles Robert Redford, Jr. , better known as Robert Redford, is an American actor, film director, producer, businessman, environmentalist, philanthropist, and founder of the Sundance Film Festival. He has received two Oscars: one in 1981 for directing Ordinary People, and one for Lifetime...
, Meryl Streep
Meryl Streep
Mary Louise "Meryl" Streep is an American actress who has worked in theatre, television and film.Streep made her professional stage debut in 1971's The Playboy of Seville, before her screen debut in the television movie The Deadliest Season in 1977. In that same year, she made her film debut with...
, and Tom Cruise
Tom Cruise
Thomas Cruise Mapother IV , better known as Tom Cruise, is an American film actor and producer. He has been nominated for three Academy Awards and he has won three Golden Globe Awards....
and the remake of The Day the Earth Stood Still. The short films for "Lions" included interviews with such luminaries as Ralph Nader
Ralph Nader
Ralph Nader is an American political activist, as well as an author, lecturer, and attorney. Areas of particular concern to Nader include consumer protection, humanitarianism, environmentalism, and democratic government....
, the Archbishop Desmond Tutu
Desmond Tutu
Desmond Mpilo Tutu is a South African activist and retired Anglican bishop who rose to worldwide fame during the 1980s as an opponent of apartheid...
, Amartya Sen
Amartya Sen
Amartya Sen, CH is an Indian economist who was awarded the 1998 Nobel Prize in Economic Sciences for his contributions to welfare economics and social choice theory, and for his interest in the problems of society's poorest members...
, and General Sir Mike Jackson
Mike Jackson
General Sir Michael David "Mike" Jackson, is a retired British Army officer and one of its most high-profile generals since the Second World War. Originally commissioned into the Intelligence Corps in 1963, he transferred to the Parachute Regiment, with whom he served two of his three tours of...
, former head of the British Army. In 2008 Sayenga worked with Bill Nye
Bill Nye
William Sanford "Bill" Nye , popularly known as Bill Nye the Science Guy, is an American science educator, comedian, television host, actor, mechanical engineer, and scientist...
, the Science Guy, as Executive Producer/Show Runner of "Stuff Happens," for Discovery Communications' Planet Green. He is currently writing and directing films on high-energy particle physics and the Theory of Relativity for the Science Channel series "Through the Wormhole with Morgan Freeman," premiering in 2010.
External links
- http://books.google.com/books?id=vkUbP1G1hmkC&pg=PA719&lpg=PA719&dq=meese+is+a+pig&source=web&ots=Z9D4TAsP_0&sig=El9GFWK_djhELTRwe0wzrWfcvhk&hl=en
- http://books.google.com/books?id=CU1jKq0TlvQC&pg=PA252&lpg=PA252&dq=dischord+sayenga&source=web&ots=1isZIQuM5E&sig=RuG1T3kCClCJ3_0a7ZuSBnI1Dj8&hl=en&sa=X&oi=book_result&resnum=6&ct=result
- Arcwelder Films http://www.imdb.com/company/co0049855/
- http://kurtsayenga.com/