'Above and Beyond': Rory Kennedy on her new movie, NASA's 60th and the moonshot needed to save Earth

October 12, 2018

When director Rory Kennedy set out to make a documentary about NASA's first 60 years of space exploration, she did not expect that she would definitely turn back towards Earth.

Kennedy, the President of John F. Kennedy, has delivered in "Above and Beyond: NASA's Journey to Tomorrow" an informative and engaging look at how the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) (and, as the title suggests, beyond) since 1958, but has also revealed the changing state of our home planet.

"NASA and all of its many accomplishments," said Kennedy in an interview with collectSPACE. "I grew up in the aftermath of the Apollo program and with the excitement of sending out to the moon, what the implications of that was, and the thrill of that effort, and so I was excited to look back and make a film that hopefully reminds people today of all NASA has done and continues to do. "

"It was more about doing interviews for the movie and understanding NASA better than I came to really appreciate what it was telling us about the health of this planet," she said.

"Above and Beyond: NASA's Journey to Tomorrow" debuts on Saturday (Oct. 13) at 9 pm EDT on Discovery Channel and Science Channel. collectSPACE spoke with Kennedy about the movie, her personal connections to NASA's history and what she's coming to see the space agency's next "moonshot."

collectSPACE (cS): You have an obvious family connection to NASA's history, but what are your earliest memories of the space program? How closely did you follow NASA's activities while growing up?

Rory Kennedy (Kennedy): I was aware of a very young age of NASA and Jack's [JFK’s] vision to get to the moon and that was certainly a very important moment for our family.

I grew up in a house where we had great admiration for astronauts. John Glenn was good friends with my parents and would come to the house often. He did campaigning for my father, Robert Kennedy, and was somebody who was kind of, excuse the phrasing, in our orbit. And we would watch movies about astronauts and astronauts as they were heroes.

It was mostly in that I felt most connected to NASA. I was not a space geek. I was not obsessed with space, but I have always had an admiration for NASA and for the astronauts and for the people who go to space.

csNASA staff and officials to put together this documentary. Was there one more person from across NASA's 60-year history that you wanted to interview but could not find it?

Kennedy: John Glenn. He unfortunately died during the early stages of the making of this film. I was hoping to interview him and was sorry I was not able to do that. But we were able to interview a lot of astronauts who work at NASA and Jim Lovell who was on the Apollo missions.

Also, obviously, Neil Armstrong would have been nice to interview, but that was not possible.

cs: But you do include Armstrong in the movie through the use of an audio clip at one point.

Kennedy: Yes, because I wanted to be a movie starter and I thought it was a good time when we were going to Earth. He's such an icon and hero of the space race and the first man to walk on the moon, so it would have been nice to include him, but we represent his story.

csScott Kelly and Peggy Whitson, and they comment on the film about Earth from space. Is that how "Above and Beyond" Earth is it a retrospective on NASA's 60 years?

Kennedy: All of the astronauts talked about this time of going up in space, looking back at Earth and feeling this connection to our planet, the preciousness of our planet and seeing that thin atmosphere that protects us from the vacuum of space.

And then, from talking with the scientists who are focused on the Earth's science missions came to the understanding that we were doing a good amount of damage to Earth through the human release of carbons. And that science was methodical and iron-clad and factual and very concerning.

And so with a deeper understanding of that, the film kind of drew in a natural narrative arc.

cs: There is a quote from Apollo 8 astronaut Bill Anders that you do not include in the movie, but that you quoted in your recent editorial for The New York Times: "We're all here to explore the moon and the most important thing is that we discovered the Earth. " From what you learned making "Above and Beyond" and from your understanding of space history, do you think we would be aware of our changing environment today?

Kennedy: I do not think we would. I do not think we would have the understanding of what was happening on Earth if we had not gone to the moon. It is having that perspective, of having a little distance from our planet, which helps us understand how precious is our planet is. And that's important.

And then on the very practical level, it is because we have had such a huge part of the direction of the world that it was 5 percent of the budget and we have invested a huge amount in the infrastructure of NASA, that we have been able to make sure of that ever since, even though we have not invested at that same level since. As a result, I think it is easier to continue exploring and applying that same infrastructure to the study of Earth.

cs: Looking forward to the next 60 years, NASA is currently working on a return to the moon and plans to continue on to Mars. Given how the Apollo missions changed our perspective on Earth, do you see that happening again as we go back to the moon? Or do you think NASA should be focused on Earth from the start?

Kennedy: With this recent IPCC [Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change] I have had a long time in the world, having had an understanding of it, having a relationship with it, and having a relationship with it. We have such a small window to deal with it, which is really just the next 12 years and then it's going to be too late. So it's now or never, and I feel like we need to focus on getting a healthier place on planet Earth.

cs: That United Nations' report describes the effort that will be needed over the next 12 years – a little more than a decade – as having "no historical record." Do you think there are lessons that can be applied to your uncle's "within this decade" moonshot goal?

Kennedy: For me, part of the experience of going back to NASA's history is appreciating the importance of leadership.

You see it at that moment [in 1961] when Jack is giving that speech at Rice University and he talks about getting to the moon within the decade. That we're going to do it. We do not know what benefits we are going to do it anyway because it's just our natural curiosity and we're going to go into the stars and we're going to learn things that we do not know we did not know.

And that is aspirational. It is pulling us. It is tapping into the best in all of us. And it's saying it's going to be great risk. And there is going to be loss. And we're still going do it. It's that charge, it's that leadership, it's going to be more important than us as individuals.

I'm not seeing that leadership today. I'm ready to go to battle. I'm ready to go fight that fight. But it is very hard to do it without leadership. So there's an opportunity, a fantastic opportunity for somebody to step into that role. And I'm hopeful that somebody will.

cs: So do you hope, in addition to celebrating NASA's 60th and being entertaining that "Above and Beyond" can be used as a rallying call to save the planet?

Kennedy: There is no political agenda in this film. It is a movie that only presents the facts. There is nothing sensationalist about it. There are no words used to ignite fear in some untethered way. There are only the facts.

The facts about what's happening to Earth are conveyed in the film, along with the facts of what we're learning about our solar system and what's new. Hubble is doing and all sorts of exciting, aspirational ventures that NASA is embarking on. It is within this context that this information is conveyed.