>> From the Library of Congress in Washington, D.C. >> Nicholas Brown: Good afternoon and welcome to the Library of Congress. My name is Nicholas Brown, and I work with the Office of Special events and Public Programs. It is my great pleasure to welcome you here today to the historic Coolidge Auditorium. Today we are celebrating Hispanic Heritage Month at the Library of Congress, and we're very pleased to be joining hands with Discovery and Espanol and Verizon [inaudible] for today's events. These events are presented in conjunction with the library's semiannual main reading room open house which takes place several times throughout the year. You can visit our website for more information about that, loc.gov. Today's events have included [inaudible] story time and children's activities, tours of the Explorer, the Early America's Exhibit and also Treasures Displays relating to [inaudible] and National Hispanic Heritage Month. The library's Hispanic collections are curated by the Hispanic division whose chief is Georgette Dorian [assumed spelling]. This afternoon's film screening and interview will kick off shortly. We're going to present Discovery in Espanol's Documentary. Benito Juarez [inaudible] is a 45 minute television docudrama special directed by Carlos [inaudible]. The film is presented in Spanish. Immediately following the film, we will have an interview on the legacy of Benito Juarez and covering the film as well. The panel will be Michela Giorelli who is the Vice President of Production and Development at Discovery Communications, Barbara Tenenbaum, a retired Hispanic specialist at the Library of Congress' Hispanic Division and the moderator will be Talia Guzman Gonzalez who is a reference librarian and [inaudible] Brazilian specialist in the library's Hispanic division. The interview will be presented in English. Throughout the event and as you go home and ponder the film, we invite you to join us on social media with the hashtag lchispanic. I'd also like to draw your attention to some of the upcoming Hispanic Heritage Month events which are listed in your program. On Wednesday, October 11 at 3 o'clock p.m., we have a lecture with [inaudible] who is an art historian on Francisco [inaudible] in the United States. On Thursday, October 12, we have a lecture with Chrissy Arse [assumed spelling] from the University of Miami on Mexico's [inaudible] cultural legacy of the [inaudible] Mexican women. Finally on Friday evening at 7 p.m. in the Pickford Theater we will be screening Selena. All of these events are free and open to the public. Tickets are available. Visit us at loc.gov for more information. I'd also like to draw your attention to a new Hispanic themed podcast series that the library's Hispanic division has recently launched in the last week in conjunction with National Hispanic Heritage Month. It is fabulous, and it's a great insight into recording archives of Hispanic literature and culture as well as the physical archives here at the library. Without further adieu, thank you for being here and thanks to Discovery and [inaudible] of course in particular for working with his and to Verizon [inaudible] for supporting this program, and we look forward to seeing you at the end of the event. Thanks. [ Applause ] >> Talia Guzman Gonzalez: So I have a couple questions prepared for Barbara Tenenbaum, and Michela, and please feel free to -- at any point if you want to ask a question or would like them to develop any further to just jump in. There might be a microphone somewhere around here. If not, just raise your hand, and I think we're close enough that we can hear you. Thank you so much for allowing us to show this documentary here. I would -- the movie begins in [inaudible]. So we're already -- the conflict's already started. And later on one of the speakers mentions that Benito Juarez was democratically elected president. Can you, Barbara and Michela also as well tell us a little bit more about Benito Juarez and his rise to presidency? How did he get there? I know it's a big question, but [crosstalk] background and context for her. >> Barbara Tenenbaum: It's an amazing story, and one that Mexicans cherish very much. Benito Juarez was from the state of [inaudible] in the south, which is an indigenous state. He was Zapotec Indian both sides, although interestingly enough the Mexicans don't consider him to be an Indian because culturally he was not. At the age of three, he was orphaned. He lost both his parents. And he basically walked from his little village to the city of Oaxaca, and apprenticed himself to a lawyer, and he ultimately became a lawyer. The mythology says that he married the lawyer's daughter, but that's under dispute at the moment, but he certainly married Margarita, and he went on from there. He became governor of the state of Oaxaca, and he was an avowed opponent of Antonio Lopez de Santa Anna who you probably have heard of. And Santa Anna exiled him. And he was in the United States in New Orleans where he was a reader in a tobacco factory. Tobacco factories in those days had -- while people were making the cigars, they would have a reader read to them from books or the newspaper or whatever, and he performed that function. As soon as the revolution of Ayutla in 1854 was declared, Juarez and a lot of other Mexican exiles left the U.S. and went back to Mexico. Santana resigned from the presidency the following year in 1855 and Juarez became the Minister of Justice in the cabinet and he is responsible for a law called the Le Juarez in which the church and the army lose their special privileges, which was one of the first blows struck against the church in that period. Then very -- the head of the government, Juan Alvarez, resigned in favor of Ignacio Comonfort so everybody changed a little bit their positions and ultimately Juarez became the head of [inaudible] and then seated to the presidency. But Mexico goes through a horrible period from 1858 when the government was taken over by conservatives until 1867, which you saw in the film when they throw out the French. And from that point on except for a very small interlude during the revolution, the conservatives never ever take power again in Mexico or at least not by [inaudible]. You can make your own judgments about that. Benito Juarez died in 1872, and when you go to -- I'm not going to say if, when you go to Mexico City, you will see [inaudible] there is what is called the [speaking foreign language], which is dedicated to Benito Juarez. This was put together by his successor, Porfirio Diaz who was also from Oaxaca. >> Talia Guzman Gonzalez: Would you like to add anything to that, Michela? >> Michela Giorelli: Yes, I mean, what I want to add is that [inaudible] Espanol, we are always looking for subjects that are relevant to our Hispanic audience and 2017 marks the 150 year anniversary of the restoration of the republic. And we always had wanted to do something about Benito Juarez because he's like a national hero, a national icon in Mexico. He has become a single Mexican nationalist and also a symbol of resistance to foreign intervention, and he is also -- you were mentioning he's considered one of the propellers for the [inaudible] reform changes that took place in the 19th century. So it's still very relevant in present days, and he's the only president that has a public holiday. His birthday is a public holiday in Mexico, March 21. And but also what I think -- I think Mexico love a lot about him is that he fought for equalitarian rights, obviously had to fight against a lot of prejudice to become the leader of the country being a Native American himself. There were so many fascinating things about this character. That's why we wanted to tell a story, and I think we found the right angle with this historical anniversary. >> Talia Guzman Gonzalez: There was a question I had because of all the events that you could have chosen to address [inaudible] Benito Juarez, you chose this year, this very particular year for the docudrama. >> Michela Giorelli: One other reason why we chose this [inaudible] because we thought it was a very -- he's not that well known like [speaking foreign language] and other things that just came a couple of years before, but it's a very decisive moment for Mexican history and it's the end of foreign intervention, and it's a second -- it's like a second struggle for independence, almost a second defeat of European power. So it's significant, and I think it's a beautiful story. Republic [inaudible] ran for four years and so I think that's why we chose this story of -- >> Barbara Tenenbaum: And I want to congratulate you for the lovely film that you made. >> Michela Giorelli: Thank you. >> Barbara Tenenbaum: It really is an important story for the Hispanic public to see and also for the non-Hispanic public to see. And you did a beautiful job. >> Michela Giorelli: Thank you very much. >> Barbara Tenenbaum: You even gave Maximillian red hair. >> Michela Giorelli: That was difficult. >> Barbara Tenenbaum: I was so shocked because I said to myself, "They're not going to do that." And there it was. >> Talia Guzman Gonzalez: One of the images that really captured my mind as a librarian and as an archivist want to be probably is that the film opens up with the archive and it closes with the archive as well. It's an important -- it plays an important role throughout the movie. So I would like you both to address the archive as a narrative choice. Why did you choose it to be so? >> Michela Giorelli: Well for us it's like a late motif of the film. He sees himself as probably the guardian of the nation as a way of defending the nation, and it's interesting obviously for budget reasons we couldn't visualize that, but he left with 11 wagons of documents, among them the declaration of independence. So we just thought it was a beautiful way of showing his patriotism for Mexico. >> Barbara Tenenbaum: Well, he should be the patron saint of historians at least for Mexicans because I can hardly think of any dissertation or book that could have been written about Mexican history without the archive. And so we are incredibly indebted, and the archive has moved in many, many ways, many places in Mexico City. In fact, it's now housed in a prison [speaking foreign language], and it's sinking. So there's going to have to be another rescue. I don't think we're going to have to take the archives to Chihuahua, at least I hope not. I had to laugh because of course Benito Juarez had to go to Chihuahua and [speaking foreign language], but the thing that's so funny about it is to somebody from the south and even from the center to go to Chihuahua, I mean it's like -- >> Michela Giorelli: Desert. >> Barbara Tenenbaum: You can't possibly imagine what that means, and Chihuahua -- there's a lot of desert there, and it's not exactly considered -- I mean, when you say [inaudible] Chihuahua, I mean that gives you a sense of how they feel about it, and I love the part in the movie where it shows U.S. on this side and Mexico on the other side because if he had set foot in the U.S., that would have been the end, and he knew it very well. And the movie conveys that extraordinarily that he couldn't get any further north. Now of course, he could have. He could have gone to the west and go into Baja, California. But luckily he never had to do that. But then how would he have gotten -- I'm trying to think -- yeah, he would have had to cross into the United States in order to get the archives. So luckily depression stirred up trouble just at the right moment. >> Talia Guzman Gonzalez: How is the research process for a documentary like this made? >> Michela Giorelli: Yes. Once we define the topic, we hire a historical consultant and in this case it was one from the [inaudible] de Mexico. And then -- >> Erica? >> Michela Giorelli: Yeah, correct. And then we did pre-interviews with all the experts, different specialties, some people from the specialty of the second empire. We had there a military historian [speaking foreign language]. So the different disciplines, and we did a pre-interview with all of them. Once we had the pre-interview, we write a script. Then we do the official interview. We recorded the interview with the official already recorded interview. We do the recreation so we know exactly -- we have already chosen certain moments we want to visualize, and after that, we have again the consultant reviewing everything is fine and even doing the recreation obviously for all the costumes, the location, we have [inaudible] involved in the project. And then doing the postproduction [inaudible] but it's process that takes three to six months to preproduction. >> Talia Guzman Gonzalez: Can you talk a little bit about the effectiveness of docudrama versus a more traditional [crosstalk]. >> Michela Giorelli: I mean, I love traditional documentary, but I do see an advantage of doing docudrama for the viewers. It's a very engaging way of telling a story and also I think you can humanize your character better. In the case of Benito Juarez, many people have seen a picture of him, the photograph that we see here, and there's a lot of stature, but in this case we really wanted to show him as the man of the family and father and husband, and you could only have done it through dramatization, and I think it's a very engaging way of telling the story. You take some freedom sometimes, but that makes it more accessible for our viewers, and we love to make history accessible and entertaining to all the views. >> Talia Guzman Gonzalez: Barbara, you have studied extensively the relationship between the U.S., Mexico and we see that the U.S. plays an important role even in this -- during this intervention. Could you elaborate a little bit on it? >> Barbara Tenenbaum: Well, I would like to be able to say that this was the last intervention into Mexico. But unfortunately, the United States intervened twice in the 20th century in Mexico, once to -- it's a very confusing story that needs to be really written more extensively. Once in [inaudible] where we were there for probably almost a year and the other was when [inaudible]. Yes, went into Columbus, New Mexico and shot up the town and killed some people and so General Pershing went with General Patton as his [inaudible] into Mexico which was a dress rehearsal for World War I for the U.S. intervention into World War I. On the other hand, to put in a note, a positive note for a change, about the United States and Mexico, if it hadn't been for Woodrow Wilson, Lord knows what would have happened to Mexico because Woodrow Wilson refused to accept [inaudible] who was a conservative as president because he had gotten the presidency through assassination and thanks to his refusal to recognize [inaudible] fell and so Mexico became a democratic state again, and it's really quite remarkable. Mexico is a very remarkable place. For example, and this is something that people don't make enough hay about as far as I'm concerned, in 1920 -- excuse me in 1829, President [inaudible] abolished slavery in Mexico. Now you can see there's a big difference between 1829 and 1865 when the United States did it. Now for sure, there were a lot fewer slaves in Mexico but still it's the concept. And if you think about it hard, you'll realize that it cost Mexico ultimately 55 percent of its territory because the Texans were not going to accept a nonslave republic and so they won their freedom in 1836. Now, so the relationship with the United States -- Porfirio Diaz famously said poor Mexico, so close to the United States and so far from God. And he had a point. But on the other hand, Mexico had as the United States some superb leaders, and in this particular case, they were at the same time. So you had Lincoln in the United States and Juarez in Mexico and both of them saved the nationality of their respective republics, and that was wonderful. Now the fact that the United States -- you see it in the film, President Johnson says America for the Americans. What he meant was the south of the United States for the United States. But he did help in important ways to save Mexican sovereignty, and that was a very big and wonderful thing. So -- >> Talia Guzman Gonzalez: Did Benito Juarez ever visit the United States as President of Mexico? >> Barbara Tenenbaum: Well, I mean he was there during his exile, but he wasn't president at the time. No, he did not, not as president, the United States as president, no, no. And he never met with President Lincoln, although a lot of people think he did. >> Talia Guzman Gonzalez: I have two more questions, but I want to see if someone else has questions for our specialists and our executive producer from the audience? >> Barbara Tenenbaum: While you're thinking of questions -- >> Talia Guzman Gonzalez: Don't be shy. >> Barbara Tenenbaum: Let me tell you about Cinco de Mayo. Many, many people -- >> Michela Giorelli: We did that -- by the way, we did a documentary, a docudrama about Cindo de Mayo. >> Talia Guzman Gonzalez: Oh, you're producing it? >> Barbara Tenenbaum: I want to see it. >> Talia Guzman Gonzalez: Excellent. >> Barbara Tenenbaum: Now many of you or maybe none of you think that Cinco de Mayo was Mexican Independence Day. It is not. Cinco de Mayo represents a battle that took place in 1862 between the Mexicans and the French. And in this case, Ignacio Saragosa [assumed spelling] who was head of the Mexican Army and by the way born in Texas, defeated the French. It was one of those few cases in which a Latin American power defeated a European power. And that is why it is celebrated in California and in the United States. Usually it's an opportunity for us to have tacos and beer, neither of which is a bad thing. But it commemorates something very, very serious and important. In Mexico, of course, they don't commemorate. >> Talia Guzman Gonzalez: Could you tell us something about that documentary that you're producing. >> Michela Giorelli: Yeah, we did it for the 150 year anniversary of [inaudible], and we used very similar -- we sort of took a couple of the military both from the French side and the Mexican side to humanize the story, and then we -- it was a coproduction with the state of Puebla. So we had 200 army at our disposal for the scenes. It was a military -- it was more of a battle. So it was -- it was every single different moment of the battle were visualized. So it was a different document than this one. It covered less time, but it was very effective, and it did very well with our audience. >> Talia Guzman Gonzalez: Excellent. How does Discovery choose their topics for the documentaries and for the -- >> Michela Giorelli: Documetnary or -- >> Talia Guzman Gonzalez: What is docudrama? >> Michela Giorelli: Well, generally we look at anniversaries because it's always good to be talking about something that is relevant with the present, and we try to find sort of meaningful anniversary for our Hispanic audience. We have done two specials already in [inaudible], one about the attack of Columbus that you were just mentioning before. It was on last year. We did something about a conspiracy of the assassination of Pancho Villa. That was -- we did [speaking foreign language]. We did something about independence for the 200 year anniversary of the independence of Mexico. And we did -- that was a little more difficult. We did a biography on Porfirio Diaz. It was difficult because he's a very controversial figure in Mexico. >> Barbara Tenenbaum: Oh yes. >> Michela Giorelli: And so we had to really balance the story and we started from the present because there's a movement in Mexico that would like his body to be returned to Mexico because it's buried in Paris. >> Barbara Tenenbaum: In the [inaudible] cemetery. >> Michela Giorelli: Yes. So we look for fascinating stories relevant, and they have been working very well, especially with our Mexican Hispanic audience here in the U.S. I particularly love to do them. I learn a lot. >> Talia Guzman Gonzalez: Is there a docudrama that you would like to produce that you're thinking this is a moment we need to -- >> Michela Giorelli: There is a lot of them. I have a long list. I would love to do the history of Maxilimillian and Carlota from their perspective about this moment of history. I think that's fascinating too. Something about the Mexican American wars will be interesting too. We have never done something specifically about the revolution of Mexico. >> Barbara Tenenbaum: There's a lot of stories for the revolution. That's for sure. >> Talia Guzman Gonzalez: Very many stories to tell. >> Barbara Tenenbaum: Can I -- I'd like to make a note here about two effects of the French intervention that were permanent. One of them is that that term Latin America comes from the Napoleon III. It is an imperialist term. So if you call yourself Latino and Latina, you should think about it because that -- Napoleon said after all, the western hemisphere is mostly Catholic and Romance language speaking so therefore it's Latin American. The other thing is really quite funny. When you think of Mexico, there are several things that come to mind. Tequila, for example, but also what comes to mind are mariachi, and the mariachi is -- there's a lot of dispute but there is a school of thought that says the mariachi came from marriages that were performed during the empire, and the French word marriage became mariachi. So and that has stuck. So when you see a guy playing an instrument whose got silver up his leg, remember that might have come from a French wedding somewhere in Mexico. >> Talia Guzman Gonzalez: Good story. Maybe a story of the mariachi [inaudible]. Before we go, Barbara, why don't you tell our audience of the marvelous -- you were the Mexican specialist for many years at the library and our holdings have so many treasures. Would you like to tell them a little bit of our collection in the library? >> Barbara Tenenbaum: I mean, our collection in the -- the wonderful thing about the Library of Congress is that it's a vehicle for surprise. You say to yourself, oh they can't have something on that. And you look it up, and yes they do. My favorite of those is when I was -- we had to do something about -- oh yeah. We had to do something about the [inaudible] and the Spanish versus the indigenous and I said, "They don't have anything on Santiago de Compostela the pilgrimage route that people are still taking to go to El Camino." And low and behold in our rare book division, there's a piece of parchment that says you have -- because you have walked the pilgrimage route, it's a Santiago de Compostela, you will receive the following indulgences, and it stays in the 13th century. It's just amazing the stuff that you could find in the Library of Congress. For Mexico, we have a book for example that was a legal case that the founder of La Paz Baja, California. His wife was trying to get a noble title, and there's a [inaudible] piece that's in four colors in gold leaf dating from the 17th century. The amount of materials that we -- we have, for example, a poem by Pabo [inaudible] that was written on the remnants of the linen from shirts during the Spanish Civil War because they didn't have paper so they had to use this linen. It's just absolutely amazing what the Library of Congress has. We have a gift in the reading room. Come see the Hispanic Reading Room. >> Talia Guzman Gonzalez: We have a picture of Benito Juarez in our reading room. >> Barbara Tenenbaum: We have a picture of Benito Juarez that was given to us by President [inaudible] in the 70's. We have the only murals in the Library of Congress that were done by a Brazilian artist, [inaudible]. That, of course, I don't say this in front of her, but that's because Nelson Rockefeller was paying, and he wasn't going to let Diego Rivera, God forbid, paint the murals. And of course if Diego Rivera had painted the murals, we would have lines around the block waiting to see. >> Talia Guzman Gonzalez: Come on. >> Barbara Tenenbaum: We would. We would. >> Talia Guzman Gonzalez: Having [inaudible] murals is absolutely fantastic, and Michela, you should come and see them definitely. >> Michela Giorelli: I will. >> Talia Guzman Gonzalez: and the portrait by Benito Juarez. It's wonderful because people walk in -- >> Michela Giorelli: I have a question for you. Do you know if it's true that Bernito Mussolini was named after Benito Juarez? Have you ever heard this story? >> Barbara Tenenbaum: No. I don't think that's true. >> Michela Giorelli: His parents were socialists and -- I don't know, it's just I heard this story, and I wondered if -- >> Barbara Tenebaum: I'm going to ask the Italian specialist. >> Michela Giorelli: Okay, thank you. >> Talia Guzman Gonzalez: Is it something you've heard then that -- >> Barbara Tenenbaum: I've never heard it. >> Michela Giorelli: I heard these rumors, and I was just curious. >> Barbara Tenenbaum: I doubt it. But I will check on it for you. >> Michela Giorelli: Thank you. >> Talia Guzman Gonzalez: Interesting. >> Barbara Tenenbaum: You have to give me -- did you give me your card? >> Michela Giorelli: I will. >> Talia Guzman Gonzalez: Do we have any questions from -- oh, there's one, one all the way to the back. There's a microphone. >> Barbara Tenenbaum: I can't see. >> Do you have any comment about Hollywood's version of Juarez, the film Juarez that was made in 1930 starring Paul Mooney? And how inaccurate or accurate was that? I know it wasn't based on primary sources and everything, but the film Juarez starring Paul Mooney. >> Michela Giorelli: I haven't seen it. >> Barbara Tenenbaum: I haven't seen it. >> Talia Guzman Gonzalez: I haven't seen it. >> Michela Giorelli: I heard, but I know the -- we didn't see it for this. >> Barbara Tenenbaum: No. None of us have seen it. >> Talia Guzman Gonzalez: Sorry. Anyone else? Catalina? >> I'm curious about where the scenes -- the docudrama scenes are filmed. Did you guys go to Mexico to the different places or did you have a set here? >> Michela Giorelli: Yeah, I mean, we did most of them in the area close to the effect, some of the colonial haciendas and for the desert sequence, we went to which is not too far from Mexico City also, Hidalgo and there is a couple of scene in the area of Pueblo. So [inaudible] is one, but they were just around the -- not to far from the effect. Yes. >> Talia Guzman Gonzalez: Don't be shy. >> Thank you for your comments. Recognizing the Hispanic heritage is not only Mexican heritage, is discovery planning other Latin American countries films and documentaries and doc dramas? >> Michela Giorelli: We would love to. We did a few. We did [inaudible], the wife of [inaudible]. We -- yeah we would love to explore more characters. We will eventually I think. >> Talia Guzman Gonzalez: There's audience for -- >> Michela Giorelli: Yes, yes. >> Barbara Tenenbaum: Absolutely. >> Michela Giorelli: For sure. And there are countless stories and countless characters. >> Barbara Tenenbaum: Definitely. >> Talia Guzman Gonzalez: Well, I think this is it. Thank you so much, Michela, for the wonderful film and for allowing us to show it here at the Library of Congress. I'm sure we'll have people come and ask questions. >> Michela Giorelli: We actually would like to make a donation to the Library -- the original script. >> Talia Guzman Gonzalez: Oh wonderful. Fantastic. >> Michela Giorelli: Of the docudrama. >> Talia Guzman Gonzalez: That's great. Thank you. [ Applause ] >> This has been a presentation of the Library of Congress. Visit us at loc.gov.