Richard Chapman

Good Morning, Belarus

By Richard Chapman

Belarus finally declared independence in 1990 but it was a republic ruled by Vladimir Putin’s puppet president, Alexander Lukashenko—the last of the old-school ironfisted dictators, whose reign continues to this day. For me that day in 2002 was the beginning of a mashup of Fear and Loathing in Minsk meets Planes, Trains and Oxcarts as I got a guided tour of the no man’s land just across the Pripyat River from the decaying, hulking skeleton of the Chernobyl Reactor Dome.

“Lights, Camera … Money!”

By Richard Chapman

At the center of almost every film is a cast of great actors. But it is money—its loss, gain, theft or lawful earning—that so often decides who gets cast.