How often do you get to see an architect with his own firm and his TV show? Architect Danny Forster's show “Build it Bigger”, where he goes around the world demystifying architectural wonders, has been a runaway success, with over five seasons on the Discovery Channel.
That's not all, Danny has co-produced a documentary on the rebuilding of “Ground Zero”, the re-named site of the 9/11 attacks in New York. The documentary, titled “The Rising - Rebuilding Ground Zero” will be aired in a six-part mini-series in the Discovery Channel between September 12 and September 17 at 9 p.m.
“As we approach the tenth anniversary of the attack, one of the biggest rebuilding projects in the world is being constructed and no one knows what's happening behind the scenes. People have not looked inside for a long time,” says Danny in a telephonic interview.
The documentary took a few years to make. It involved a lot of effort from Danny and his co-producer, Steven Spielberg.
“The process began three years ago, when we started talking to government officials about it. Once we got the permission, we had to sift through over 1000 hours of footage and bring it down to six hours. The site itself occupies over 13 acres and is complicated. The best thing is to just be there and meet the architects and the construction workers.”
“The Rising” will narrate the tale of the “complicated” site from an architectural, engineering perspective and people's perspective. Like in “Build it Bigger”, Forster visited sites in over 55 countries, including Mumbai's Chhatrapati Shivaji airport.
The construction itself is massive — with four World Trade Centre Towers, a museum, a memorial at the site of the twin towers and a transportation hub connecting New York's subway trains.
“Every building has a take on the political, social, economic and emotional issues around it, but in the case of Ground Zero, the project has never been more intense and the challenge to satisfy political, social, economic and emotional issues has never been greater. I have never seen a building that has the responsibility that this building has,” says Danny, who hopes to continue filming the site until the construction is finished.
What did Steven Spielberg add to the project? “Steven Spielberg is one the greatest storytellers of history what with his vision of the characters. He tells the tale of the building through the eyes of the people.”
