Kurt Vonnegut

The Daily Show

Self

The World's Fakest News Team tackle the biggest stories in news, politics and pop culture.

The Civil War

Various (voice)

A documentary on the American Civil War narrated by Ken Burns, covering the secession of the Confederacy to the assassination of Abraham Lincoln.

Back to School

Self

Self-made millionaire Thornton Melon decides to get a better education and enrolls at his son Jason's college. While Jason tries to fit in with his fellow students, Thornton struggles to gain his son's respect, giving way to hilarious antics.

Mother Night

Sad Man on Street

An American spy behind the lines during WWII serves as a Nazi propagandist, a role he cannot escape in his future life as he can never reveal his real role in the war.

Breakfast of Champions

Commercial Director

A millionaire car salesman who runs the biggest dealership in Midland City, Dwayne Hoover is a celebrity, loved and trusted by everyone. Then one day, he wakes up and realizes that his life is a total mess! But between the headaches posed by his pill-popping wife, a mistress who won't leave him alone, and a cross-dressing sales manager, Dwayne has picked a bad week for a midlife crisis.

Howard

Self (archive footage)

Though legendary lyricist Howard Ashman died far too young, his impact on Broadway, movies, and the culture at large were incalculable. Told entirely through rare archival footage and interviews with Ashman’s family, friends, associates, and longtime partner Bill Lauch, Howard is an intimate tribute to a once-in-a-generation talent and a rousing celebration of musical storytelling itself.

Kurt Vonnegut's Monkey House

Kurt Vonnegut, the author of a collection of short stories called "Welcome to the Monkey House", hosts a series that displays dramatizations of several of his short stories. The anthology series aired on Showtime network from 1991 to 1993. The first three stories were produced as a television pilot in British Columbia, Canada, and broadcast together from 9:00–10:30pm on May 12, 1991. The later four were filmed and produced in New Zealand in 1992, as a co-production with South Pacific Pictures.

Brooklyn Bridge

Self (voice)

Today it's a symbol of strength and vitality. 135 years ago, it was a source of controversy. This documentary examines the great problems and ingenious solutions that marked the construction of the Brooklyn Bridge. From conception to construction, it traces the bridge's transformation from a spectacular feat of heroic engineering to an honored symbol in American culture.

Never Down

Robert

Rico reunites with his ex-wife after serving a five year prison term for armed robbery. Upon Rico's release he encounters old and new forces conspiring to bring him down and tear him between what he holds dear and what he most fears.

New Nightmares

Himself

About visions of the future drawing on the work of leading writers of science fiction and leading experts in science fact.

Kurt Vonnegut: Unstuck in Time

Self (archive footage)

A documentary 33 years in the making. A director and friend of Kurt Vonnegut seeks through his archives to create the first film featuring the revolutionary late writer.

Will Eisner: Portrait of a Sequential Artist

Arguably the most influential person in American comics, Will Eisner, as artist, entrepreneur, innovator, and visual storyteller, enjoyed a career that encompassed comic books from their early beginnings in the 1930s to their development as graphic novels in the 1990s. During his sixty-year-plus career, Eisner introduced the now-traditional mode of comic book production; championed mature, sophisticated storytelling; was an early advocate for using the medium as a tool for education; pioneered the now-popular graphic novel, and served as inspiration for generations of artists. Without a doubt, Will Eisner was the godfather of the American comic book.

Nelson Algren: The End Is Nothing, the Road Is All...

An in-depth feature length documentary of one of America's greatest and least understood authors, Nelson Algren. This never before told compelling life story reveals a unique literary voice through rare interviews, archival footage and the gritty noirish voice of Algren on Algren. Kurt Vonnegut and Studs Terkel, literary giants in their own right, sing songs of praise along with many of his old friends, which makes this film seem like a hymn from the grave. This stylishly produced film embeds us in the 1950's cold war world when Algren worked. Algren's touching love affair with Simone de Beauvoir weaves it's way through the film along with the damaging impact of FBI and CIA surveillance.

Kurt Vonnegut’s Indianapolis: A Writer’s Roots

Self (Archive Footage)

"Kurt Vonnegut’s Indianapolis: A Writer’s Roots" is a documentary examining how Kurt Vonnegut’s upbringing in Indianapolis shaped his life and work, drawing on archival material and interviews with family, friends, and fellow writers.

Kurt Vonnegut, Jr.: A Self-Portrait

Kurt Vonnegut, Jr., discusses his development as a writer, including references to some of his major novels, his themes and their meaning, his relationship to other writers, problems in sustaining his special vision of American life, and his future. Accompanied by photographs that chronicle the author’s life and selections from home movies taken during his youth.

The Painted Boy

Self/Writer

"Malowany chlopiec" - The first major mystification of the Holocaust was the novel "The Painted Bird" by Polish Emigrant Jerzy Kosinski, who in his book describes himself as an abandoned child who became mute, ended up in an orphanage and only later discovers his Jewish origin. "The Painted Bird" has since its publication in 1965 been the subject of discussion on its authenticity.

Kurt Vonnegut: So It Goes

Himself

A documentary featured on BBC's Arena series in 1983. The author discusses his life, his work and his thoughts and opinions.