The new high flying drones are utilized for all kinds of missions from surveillance to backyard play. But Doug Thron uses them to save the lives of animals. Thron is an aerial cinematographer who has adopted drone photography for his art. But he elevated that art when he discovered infrared drones that could pierce the devastation left by wildfires and hurricanes, revealing wildlife trapped in their wake.
“I'm a pioneer of using infrared drones with spotlights and zoom lenses to rescue animals,” he says.
“I've been somewhat, for lack of a better word, on a crusade, not only to rescue the animals from natural disasters that just keep getting bigger and bigger, but also to get this incredible technology known by the world. Because my hope is that one day these infrared drones rescuing animals will be as popular and as common as say, helicopters are for rescuing people.”
Thron’s exploits are the subject of CuriosityStream’s new series, “Doug to the Rescue.” Thron travels all over the world where disaster strikes, illuminating lost pets, stranded koalas and terrified wildlife.
He first got the idea when a filmmaker united Thron with a man who was using an infrared scope to rescue cats after the Santa Rosa, California, fires.
“We were both chatting about it, and we were like, ‘God, if we could put one of these infrared scopes on a drone it would be unbelievable.’ Fast-forward, about a year later, I was just volunteering with the Sea Shepherd boat out in the Bahamas, and I was using a drone to rescue animals out there. And I found it exceedingly hard to find the animals because of debris piles,” he says.
“Imagine hundreds of houses all being smashed up and debris piles 30 feet tall, and boards and nails and everything. I found it super hard to find the animals. So then I thought back about an infrared scope and thankfully, one had been invented for public use that would potentially work on this drone.
“So I mounted it on the drone, and it worked incredibly well, and from there I started putting spotlights on drones and putting 180 times zoom lens cameras as well. That’s basically how I got started with it was from those events in my past,” he says.
Thron’s first rescue was a dog, a Royal Bahamian Potcake. “He was right in the middle of Hurricane Dorian, a 40-hour-long hurricane with winds up to 180 miles per hour and 30-foot deep water and hundreds of houses smashed; hundreds of people passed away. And he was literally smack dab in the middle of this ... with a snapped leg and banged-up face,” Thron recalls.
He not only saved the dog, he kept him, crowning him’ Duke’. “He was super sentimental to me being the first one,” says Thron.
“For the first six or eight months he wouldn't bark. He wouldn't wag his tail. He was just, I think, pretty shell-shocked — probably had all sorts of muscles torn. He had a super bad case of heartworm. And now when you see him, he's like the most loving dog. Jumps all around, licks, barks and yeah, you would never even know that he had ever been through a hurricane. And it’s pretty miraculous to see.”
Sometimes animals are unable to flee, and Thron finds them alone and abandoned. “In Louisiana when we were doing the rescues, I was uncovering dogs that were chained and left for dead, chained to a car,” he says.
“And through this series, we get to see animals months later that were chained to cars and left for dead and starved, pretty much just about ready to die. And then you see them months later and they're jumping around licking you and super happy in their new adopted home. So, it blows me away how these dogs can recover and turn out to be everyday normal dogs in a short period of time.”
It's not only dogs he salvages, but an array of wildlife, including cats. Thron recalls one special rescue of a badly burned black cat. “I had to grab him underneath some burned stuff. And he bit and clawed and everything like that, but he was so burned up that if I didn't grab him, he was likely to die and run off to the woods.
“And a couple of months later it was interesting because the vets were putting honey on these wounds that were almost burned down to the bone. A couple of months later the wounds are just about healed, and the cat’s the most loving, purring cat. And I was kind of like, ‘Oh, damn. I wish I had adopted this little black cat because it’s just like my little Mittens when I was a kid.’”
‘Bosch’ returns to Prime
Amazon Prime’s fantastic cop series, “Bosch,” will be back for its seventh and final season on June 25. All eight episodes will drop then. Based on Michael Connelly’s book, “The Burning Room,” the season finds homicide detective Harry Bosch determined to capture the arsonist who ignited the fire that killed a 10-year-old girl. The series stars Titus Welliver as the redoubtable Bosch.
“When I read the script for ‘Bosch’ it was like not wanting to like the pretty girl too much at the dance feeling that she wouldn’t accept your invitation,” he says.
“So I didn’t want to want it too much. Because of scheduling issues, I kept trying to meet with (the producers). Meetings didn’t happen. I thought, ‘Too much time has passed, and that boat’s sailed.’ I was deeply disappointed. Then I was back in Los Angeles between locations on ‘Transformers: Age of Extinction’ and sat in a room with them all.
“And within minutes of just having the conversation I thought, ‘Now I really, really want it, and now I DON’T want it.’ And it’s just one of those Cinderella stories where the feelings were mutual. It was just too good to be true. I thought, ‘This is a role as an actor, these kinds of roles come along few and far between. And to read a character that I knew was going to present a tremendous challenge to me as an actor, but was so well written, I just thought it’s really a dream come true. I still can’t believe it ... I’ll stay as long as they’ll have me, I’ll still feel that way. I'm reading the books and knowing the trajectory and history of this character, there’s so much yet to do that I’ll never have a moment of being tired of this guy.”
It’s a good thing because IMDb TV is plotting a spinoff starring – you guessed it – Titus Welliver.
Murphy gets even with new role
Annie Murphy, fresh of the success of “Schitt’s Creek,” is starring in a new sitcom, “Kevin Can F**k Himself,” premiering on AMC Sunday. She plays a housewife who’s had it with tradition. And though the producers certainly could have chosen a more elegant title, Murphy says she’s thrilled with the opportunity. “I picked this part because it is such a departure from what I’ve done before,” she says.
“But I also picked, I chose, or was so excited when I got to do the show, because it was so important to me to do — for my next project to be about something and about something that’s important.
She plays Allison, “a character that people are going to be able to really, really identify with, because she has just absorbed so much frustration and so much anger and pushed it down and pushed it down, because that’s what you’re supposed to do as a woman, and (she) has put up with so much of the world around her and just kind of smiled through it,” says Murphy.
“And I really truly do think that so many women are going to be able to identify and see themselves in this character.”
Netflix uncorks 'Pop' special
Everybody listens to pop music, but usually doesn’t admit it. Most of us can recite the words to that popular song that reigned when we were young. So Netflix is going to cure that malady with its seven-part special, “This is Pop,” premiering June 22.
The doc will explore the history and backstory of some of the world’s most famous acts like Shania Twain, Boyz II Men, ABBA’s Benny Andersson, T-Pain, Brandi Carlile, Public Enemy’s Chuck D, and Neil Sedaka.
Sedaka, who started in the ‘50s, says he had a rough time being accepted in the world of pop later. “They said: ‘Neil Sedaka is a ghost from the ‘50s, and he’ll never come back.’
“I was working in England and Elton John was a big fan of my records. He looked me up. He came to the apartment and my son was a big Elton fan, and he had pictures all over the apartment.
“I didn't tell him. I said, ‘Marc, why don’t you answer the door.’ And he opened the door and there was Elton with his big glasses and his outfit. Marc was 9 or 10 years old. Elton sat at the piano and played ‘Candle in the Wind,’ which he'd just written, and he said, ‘Play me the songs you've just recorded, I’m very interested because I'm starting a record company.’
“He said, ‘You could be as big a Carole King, maybe bigger.’ She'd just done 'Tapestry.' He said, ‘I'm going to sign you to the label.’ I said, ‘There's a built-in resentment; they remember me as a '50s artist.’ He said, ‘I'm going to write the liner notes on the LP.’ I said, ‘If you can write the liner notes, then I have a shot’. He wrote them, and they were marvelous. He called me a genius. I loved him.”
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