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Scientists Go to Hollywood

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Scientists Go To Hollywood

BBC Radio 4 Extra - Scientists Go to Hollywood

Adam Rutherford talks to scientists who have left the lab for the glamour of Hollywood.

Adam Rutherford talks to scientists who have left the lab for the glamour of Hollywood to advise on film blockbusters. From August 2010. 

Adam Rutherford heads to tinsel town to talk to the scientists who have left the lab for the glamour of the film set.
Although the silver screen may not be known for its scientific accuracy, in recent years Hollywood does seem to have come calling, where science is concerned. A growing number of scientists seem to be taking time out of their day job to advise Hollywood directors and producers on the portrayal of science, and scientists, in some very well known films and TV series. 
Adam visits the set of one of the most well known science based TV shows, CSI New York to meet the writer and co-producer, himself a former forensic scientist. He talks to physicist Brian Cox about his role as science advisor to the Danny Boyle directed movie Sunshine. He meets the new wave of Hollywood movie makers who are turning to the real life scientists to help improve not only the image of science on screen, but to inspire some of their most fantastical plot line, and finds out whether factually incorrect science in the movies really matters?

According to the US National Academy of Science, it does. So much so that they have now set up a programme specifically designed to help their scientists work with the entertainment industry, to improve and foster a positive image of science on screen. Adam meets the producer of one of last year's biggest Hollywood blockbusters about his ambition to keep the science fact in the science fiction as accurate as possible, and how the scientists he worked with came up with some far more intriguing plot twists and turns than anything his writers could have dreamt up.
Presented by: Adam Rutherford; Produced by Alexandra Feachem 


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