What It Takes®

There’s one person who can claim to have played harmonica with Willie Nelson AND been awarded the Nobel Prize in Medicine… and that's James (Jim) Allison. Dr. Allison is the scientist who unlocked the secrets of the immune system, to develop a wildly successful treatment for melanoma and several other kinds of cancer.  Immunotherapy is now considered the “fourth pillar” of cancer treatment, alongside surgery, radiation and chemo.  For years, he faced the doubts and derision of the cancer establishment. But for Dr. Allison, the race to come up with a better approach to curing cancer was deeply personal.  His mother and uncles and brother all died of cancer. And he himself has had cancer three times. He talks here about his earliest aspirations to become a biologist, growing up in a town where evolution wasn’t taught in school. He movingly describes the first time he met a patient whose life was saved by his research.  And yes, he explains how it is he came to play with Willie Nelson. (c ) American Academy of Achievement 2020

The most decorated regiment in US history was the 442nd, a segregated Japanese-American unit that fought in Europe after the bombing of Pearl Harbor. But while they were bravely risking their lives for their country, 120,000 of their fellow Japanese-Americans were languishing in internment camps, simply because of their ethnicity. U.S. Senator Daniel Inouye was in the first group. Representative Norman Mineta was in the second. Both have stories that are profoundly disturbing, but are also a testament to the triumph of the human spirit.(c ) American Academy of Achievement 2020

For 50 years, he has carried the torch for the blues. Buddy Guy learned by listening to the greats that came before him, and then he made the blues his own.  He is one of the greatest guitarists of all time, and an extraordinary showman, who inspired a generation of rock n' rollers, including Jimmy Hendrix, Eric Clapton, Jimmy Page, and countless others.  He talks here about his early days picking cotton in rural Louisiana, about making his first guitar with strings pulled from a window screen, and about his abiding friendship with BB King.  As Buddy Guy says: "If you haven't had the blues, just keep living." (c ) American Academy of Achievement 2020

Two of the most daring and celebrated playwrights working today talk about their lives, their work, and why they love writing for the stage. Both Lynn Nottage and Suzan-Lori Parks have won the Pulitzer Prize for plays that portray the struggles of African-Americans and working class people, but their approaches are quite different. Nottage talks here about the extensive research that grounds her, whether she's writing about Congolese women in wartime or laid-off workers in the Rust Belt. Parks talks about freeing her imagination, and entertaining her wildest ideas as if they were guests at a dinner party.(c ) American Academy of Achievement 2020

This son of a sharecropper tells the story of how he grew up to become a legendary leader of the Civil Rights Movement and a 17-term Congressman from the state of Georgia. He describes his political and spiritual awakenings, and recounts how he learned to live fearlessly and non-violently, despite the many beatings and arrests he endured -- at lunch counter sit-ins and during the march from Selma to Montgomery.  You'll hear archival sound from those events as well, and an excerpt of John Lewis speaking at the March on Washington when he was just 23 years old.   Some of the musical excerpts in the episode, including "We Shall Overcome," are from the Charlie Haden & Hank Jones album, "Steal Away," on Verve Records.(c ) American Academy of Achievement 2020

These three visionaries changed the way we live our daily lives. You'll hear remarkable archival recordings of each, when they were young successful entrepreneurs, but before history had proven the scale of their impact. Bill Gates, co-founder of Microsoft, describes how, as a teenager, he first envisioned the potential for computers to become fixtures in our homes. Larry Page and Sergey Brin, founders of Google, talk about their accidental discovery of the algorithm that would allow us to search and make sense of the new world-wide web's information explosion. And they all talk about taking risks to embrace the future.(c ) American Academy of Achievement 2020

He has won more Grammy Awards than any other male country singer, but Vince Gill never set out to be a star. He just wanted to play guitar and sing, and you can hear his reverence for music in this intimate interview. He describes his first guitar - a Christmas gift from his father, and his early days playing music in Oklahoma. He explains why he's always been happiest collaborating with other musicians, and he shares a wonderful tale about recording with Eric Clapton. He also walks us through the musical components of his first hit song. (c ) American Academy of Achievement 2019

It’s undisputed: Andrew Lloyd Webber has written more blockbuster musicals than any composer alive. He talks here about falling in love with musical theater in the 1950’s, and about writing his first hit at the age of 19 (Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat).  He also reveals fascinating behind-the-scenes stories about Jesus Christ Superstar, Evita, Cats, and Broadway’s longest running show (by far): The Phantom of the Opera.(c ) American Academy of Achievement 2019

She is a Renaissance Person extraordinaire: a lawyer, an inventor, a biotech innovator, a futurist, a transgender activist, and one of the most successful female CEO's of all time.  Martine Rothblatt talks here about founding Sirius/XM radio. She talks about how her daughter's terminal illness led her to develop a treatment, as well as a biotech company to manufacture it (saving thousands of lives so far). She describes her newest missions -- developing an endless supply of transplantable organs, and the electric helicopter technology to deliver them. She explains why she's been able to accomplish such wildly varied things in her life (she's also an amateur musician, pilot & astronomer), and why she refers to herself as transcender rather than transgender.  She  also lays out her vision for the not-so-distant future, when humans, she says, will be capable of digitizing their consciousness and doubling the capacity of their minds. (c ) American Academy of Achievement 2019

He is one of the most compelling storytellers of our time... a novelist who addresses broad societal themes while plumbing the depths of intimate human relationships. Ian McEwan, the author of "Atonement," "Amsterdam" and recently, "Machines Like Me," talks here about beautifully constructed sentences. He explains the "pleasure principle" of literature. And in describing how much research it takes to create his characters, he tells a delightful story about the time he was mistaken for a neurosurgeon. He also talks about a deep family secret - a brother he didn't know existed until he was in his 50's. McEwan reads passages from "Atonement," and from his new novel "Machines Like Me." And he talks about the need for solitude in a writer's life.You can see the Academy of Achievement's video archives at www.achievement.org. #WhatItTakesNow(c ) American Academy of Achievement 2019