Understanding the Scientist’s Obsession

The Directors of Naturally Obsessed, Richard Rifkind and Carole Rifkind

Having retired after a 50 year career as a cell and molecular biologist (Carole lived through it at the kitchen table), we grabbed the opportunity to do something we were passionate about – to help people outside of science understand what I do as a scientist. What goes on in a lab? What is the process of discovery?  How is the skill of a scientist passed down through the generations?  We wanted to do it on film.

New times, new questions
My work spanned the second half of the 20th century: I had seen anatomy grow into cell biology and biochemistry transform into molecular biology, a revolution that shifted the research focus from organs to molecules.  I was intrigued by new technologies that were radically changing the kind of questions that young scientists were able to ask in the 21st century.

Putting it on film
Having made one previous film together, we knew that filmmaking is about telling stories. Excited by the promise of structural biology, we imagined plots showing how the use of x-ray crystallography was making it possible to visualize the atomic structure of proteins, the micro-machines of all life-processes, and so determine just how they work.

We searched New York City for labs where this story could play out and finally selected that of Dr. Lawrence Shapiro of the Department of Biochemistry and Molecular Biophysics at Columbia University Medical Center. His study of the mechanism of the protein AMPK — pertinent to new treatments for obesity and diabetes — would surely have wide public appeal.  Not only was Larry exceedingly welcoming to us – access is the sine qua non of documentary filmmaking – he was young, good-looking and articulate – and so were the students who were working for their PhD degree in his lab.  We returned to shoot them again, and again, and again, and then edited for another year, until we felt the story was told.

Audience reaction
Fast forward four years. The film finished, we screened it first at home base, Columbia, apprehensive about how a packed auditorium of scientists, Larry’s colleagues, would receive it.  We were more than surprised by the peals of laughter that erupted when a student clumsily dropped a reagent on the floor.  Or the deep sighs over failed experiments. Or the roll of applause that greeted a technical breakthrough.  We understood that it wasn’t only the science that was grabbing this audience. It was empathy — a word bandied about a lot these days. Empathy for the gamble of science; empathy for how one learns to deal with failure; empathy for the total commitment that science demands. A comment from one member of the audience summed it up: “Finally someone has told my story, and it feels good.”

Richard Rifkind
Co-producer, co-director
Naturally Obsessed: the making of a scientist

The Directors with Rob and Kil, featured Naturally Obsessed scientists, on opening night.