Press Releases

Feb 01, 2002
Alec Baldwin's "Artist as Activist" Attracts Standing-Room-Only Crowd

Issues Included Campaign-Finance Reform, Nuclear Power, Hollywood

Contact:
Darren Johnson (PR@southampton.liu.edu)
(631) 287 8313
Fax: (631) 283 4081

Southampton, NY - Actor Alec Baldwin and Southampton College Dean James Larocca discussed several public-policy issues and even a few tidbits about Hollywood before a standing-room-only crowd in Southampton College's Avram Theater on Thursday night. The talk, titled "The Artist as Activist," was a part of the Dean's Special Lecture Series and the Honors Program at the College and attracted over 500 people. Baldwin interspersed humorous anecdotes with serious issues, including campaign-finance reform, protecting the environment and the politics of being a well-known actor who is involved with such issues. Dean James Larocca, who is also a public-policy professor, moderated the event.

Southampton College is located on Long Island's East End, where its 110-acre campus overlooks Shinnecock Bay. With a full and part-time faculty of 200 and a student population of 1,500, the college offers a total of 37 undergraduate and graduate degrees in a varied curriculum of liberal arts and sciences. The college is especially strong in the marine and environmental sciences, and its students have earned 35 Fulbright Scholarships over the past 25 years. The school is also rich in the social sciences and arts and media, and its writing programs offer a faculty of world-renowned writers. Southampton operates the SEAmester program aboard a 125-foot schooner, and the campus is home to the Friends World Program of global education with seven overseas centers.