originally published in Coastal Isles magazine, September 2012.
‘We All Have A Destiny’
The actor Gary Sinise and his Lt. Dan Band are headed back to Beaufort to play another charity concert for wounded military veterans and their families
It was ripping rendition of Stevie Wonder’s “I Wish,” two years ago at the Beaufort Shrimp Festival, and the actor Gary Sinise, fronting his 12-piece Lt. Dan Band, stood on stage in dark blue jeans and a light blue t-shirt, fingering his bass, stomping his feet, shaking his head back and forth, and smiling.
Sinise, it seemed, had no other countenance than the smile, which he wore constantly for the entire show—throughout the standard party tunes and the classic rock anthems—and which was a far cry from the crazed smile of the crippled Lieutenant Dan, perched in the crow’s nest of a shrimp boat, manically calling out to God in the 1994 classic film Forrest Gump.
The smile, in fact, appeared more like the unforgettable smile that a married, clean-shaven Lieutenant Dan breaks into when, at the end of the movie, he hobbles up to Forrest and Jenny’s wedding, taps his new legs with his cane, and says, “Custom made. Titanium alloy. Like they use on the space shuttle.”
Indeed, of all the characters in the film—the well-meaning and tragic Bubba, the rebellious and beautiful Jenny, even the lovingly gullible Gump himself—perhaps none are as memorable as Lieutenant Dan Taylor, the cantankerous Vietnam veteran who, as the movie progresses, slowly softens to the audience and to himself.
“It’s a story that’s very positive,” Sinise tells me one day while taking a break from the set of CSI: NY. “The story of Lieutenant Dan is the story of someone who wants to serve his country and to be a great leader. And that gets taken away from him, and he goes through the understandable anger and despair as to what he’s going to do. And at the end of the story he’s moving on with his life and looking forward. And he’s successful.“
It would have been equally understandable if Sinise, who has won an Emmy and a Golden Globe Award in his nearly 40 year acting career, had moved on from the role, spurning the fact that wherever he went people would shout out, in their best imitations of Forrest Gump’s Alabama accent, “Lieutenant Dan!” He has, after all, excelled as Detective Mac Taylor on the CBS crime drama CSI: NY, written and produced for television, and acted in dozens of TV movies and feature films.
But as the film became more popular—saturating itself into American pop cultural memory—Sinise recognized that he had an unprecedented opportunity to help raise awareness for military veterans and their families.
“The movie seems to be on television all the time,” he says. “It’s constantly being seen on TV. It’s lasting. It continues on. And therefore the character is seen over and over and over in the film.
“Prior to Forrest Gump, I don’t think Vietnam veterans had been portrayed as being able to rebound from their experiences in Vietnam and move on. And this was. It was a brilliant story line. I came to terms with the fact that there are many people, especially in the military, who recognize me, so I just accepted that and embraced it.”
And so the role allowed for Sinise, who has Vietnam veterans in his family, to partner with Disabled American Veterans (DAV), a non-profit organization with over 1.2 million members that helps wounded soldiers build better lives for themselves. He had done work with veterans organizations in the 1980’s, while working on a play for the Steppenwolf Theatre Company, the acting company that he co-founded in 1974.
Sinise had also been a musician since his early days in Chicago, but it wasn’t until 1997 when, during a Steppenwolf production of Tennessee Williams’s A Streetcar Named Desire, Sinise met the musician Kimo Williams. Recognizing a mutual love for music, the two of them began jamming together whenever they got the chance.
As Sinise became more committed to veterans issues—visiting the troops as part of the United Service Organizations (USO)—it became evident that the two could form a band to entertain US soldiers stationed overseas, and to play charity concerts that would benefit veterans.
And so the Lieutenant Dan Band was born. They now play approximately 30-40 shows per year, many of them with the USO on military bases all over the world. These tours, combined with Sinise’s acting career, make for a relentless travel schedule.
But it is all worth it, he says, because he witnesses firsthand the struggle that these veterans and their families face.
“There are multiple issues for returning veterans from Iraq and Afghanistan,” he says. “Clearly, if you stay in the service, after a deployment there’s a chance you’re going to go back in. The multiple deployments are putting a big stress on our military and our military families. If you’ve got a child who’s in a military family and his mom or dad has been deployed five times over the last ten or eleven years, there’s a good chance that you haven’t seen much of mom or dad.”
Understanding that the struggles are as much psychological as they are physical, the actor decided in 2010 to start the Gary Sinise Foundation, a charity whose mission statement is to serve the United States “by honoring our defenders, veterans, first responders, their families, and those in need.”
Together with his work fundraising for The Pentagon Memorial, serving as spokesperson for The American Veterans Disabled for Life Memorial, partnering with Building Homes For Heroes and the Stephen Siller Tunnel to Towers Foundation, as well as The Wounded Warrior Project and numerous other projects and organizations, Gary Sinise’s passion and commitment for veterans issues transcends any character in a film, even one as unforgettable as Lieutenant Dan.
But it was still this movie, much of which was filmed in the South Carolina and Georgia Lowcountry, that gave Sinise the platform he needed to change lives. And that, he says, makes for a special return trip to Beaufort, where many soldiers live and train at Parris Island and the Marine Corps Air Station Beaufort.
“I did something for the Independence Fund in South Texas years ago,” Sinise explains, “and then they wanted to do this Lieutenant Dan Weekend down in Beaufort, and they contacted me to see if I could come, and Beaufort was where we shot Forrest Gump. I hadn’t been back there since we made the movie. But going back to Beaufort for Lieutenant Dan Weekend to raise money for Wounded Warriors is right up my alley.”
It is time for Sinise to get back to the set of CSI: NY, but he clearly wants to emphasize this point.
“It is a perfect thing to be able to come there to support the Independence Fund and to raise money to help our wounded. It’s just something I couldn’t pass up. It fits right into my schedule and right into my mission, and the Gary Sinise Foundation and everything I’m trying to do with the bad to support men and women who are serving our country.”
Catch the Lieutenant Dan Band play in Beaufort’s Waterfront park on September 15th at 7:00 PM. More information and tickets are available at www.ldw3.com.
‘We All Have A Destiny’
The actor Gary Sinise and his Lt. Dan Band are headed back to Beaufort to play another charity concert for wounded military veterans and their families
It was ripping rendition of Stevie Wonder’s “I Wish,” two years ago at the Beaufort Shrimp Festival, and the actor Gary Sinise, fronting his 12-piece Lt. Dan Band, stood on stage in dark blue jeans and a light blue t-shirt, fingering his bass, stomping his feet, shaking his head back and forth, and smiling.
Sinise, it seemed, had no other countenance than the smile, which he wore constantly for the entire show—throughout the standard party tunes and the classic rock anthems—and which was a far cry from the crazed smile of the crippled Lieutenant Dan, perched in the crow’s nest of a shrimp boat, manically calling out to God in the 1994 classic film Forrest Gump.
The smile, in fact, appeared more like the unforgettable smile that a married, clean-shaven Lieutenant Dan breaks into when, at the end of the movie, he hobbles up to Forrest and Jenny’s wedding, taps his new legs with his cane, and says, “Custom made. Titanium alloy. Like they use on the space shuttle.”
Indeed, of all the characters in the film—the well-meaning and tragic Bubba, the rebellious and beautiful Jenny, even the lovingly gullible Gump himself—perhaps none are as memorable as Lieutenant Dan Taylor, the cantankerous Vietnam veteran who, as the movie progresses, slowly softens to the audience and to himself.
“It’s a story that’s very positive,” Sinise tells me one day while taking a break from the set of CSI: NY. “The story of Lieutenant Dan is the story of someone who wants to serve his country and to be a great leader. And that gets taken away from him, and he goes through the understandable anger and despair as to what he’s going to do. And at the end of the story he’s moving on with his life and looking forward. And he’s successful.“
It would have been equally understandable if Sinise, who has won an Emmy and a Golden Globe Award in his nearly 40 year acting career, had moved on from the role, spurning the fact that wherever he went people would shout out, in their best imitations of Forrest Gump’s Alabama accent, “Lieutenant Dan!” He has, after all, excelled as Detective Mac Taylor on the CBS crime drama CSI: NY, written and produced for television, and acted in dozens of TV movies and feature films.
But as the film became more popular—saturating itself into American pop cultural memory—Sinise recognized that he had an unprecedented opportunity to help raise awareness for military veterans and their families.
“The movie seems to be on television all the time,” he says. “It’s constantly being seen on TV. It’s lasting. It continues on. And therefore the character is seen over and over and over in the film.
“Prior to Forrest Gump, I don’t think Vietnam veterans had been portrayed as being able to rebound from their experiences in Vietnam and move on. And this was. It was a brilliant story line. I came to terms with the fact that there are many people, especially in the military, who recognize me, so I just accepted that and embraced it.”
And so the role allowed for Sinise, who has Vietnam veterans in his family, to partner with Disabled American Veterans (DAV), a non-profit organization with over 1.2 million members that helps wounded soldiers build better lives for themselves. He had done work with veterans organizations in the 1980’s, while working on a play for the Steppenwolf Theatre Company, the acting company that he co-founded in 1974.
Sinise had also been a musician since his early days in Chicago, but it wasn’t until 1997 when, during a Steppenwolf production of Tennessee Williams’s A Streetcar Named Desire, Sinise met the musician Kimo Williams. Recognizing a mutual love for music, the two of them began jamming together whenever they got the chance.
As Sinise became more committed to veterans issues—visiting the troops as part of the United Service Organizations (USO)—it became evident that the two could form a band to entertain US soldiers stationed overseas, and to play charity concerts that would benefit veterans.
And so the Lieutenant Dan Band was born. They now play approximately 30-40 shows per year, many of them with the USO on military bases all over the world. These tours, combined with Sinise’s acting career, make for a relentless travel schedule.
But it is all worth it, he says, because he witnesses firsthand the struggle that these veterans and their families face.
“There are multiple issues for returning veterans from Iraq and Afghanistan,” he says. “Clearly, if you stay in the service, after a deployment there’s a chance you’re going to go back in. The multiple deployments are putting a big stress on our military and our military families. If you’ve got a child who’s in a military family and his mom or dad has been deployed five times over the last ten or eleven years, there’s a good chance that you haven’t seen much of mom or dad.”
Understanding that the struggles are as much psychological as they are physical, the actor decided in 2010 to start the Gary Sinise Foundation, a charity whose mission statement is to serve the United States “by honoring our defenders, veterans, first responders, their families, and those in need.”
Together with his work fundraising for The Pentagon Memorial, serving as spokesperson for The American Veterans Disabled for Life Memorial, partnering with Building Homes For Heroes and the Stephen Siller Tunnel to Towers Foundation, as well as The Wounded Warrior Project and numerous other projects and organizations, Gary Sinise’s passion and commitment for veterans issues transcends any character in a film, even one as unforgettable as Lieutenant Dan.
But it was still this movie, much of which was filmed in the South Carolina and Georgia Lowcountry, that gave Sinise the platform he needed to change lives. And that, he says, makes for a special return trip to Beaufort, where many soldiers live and train at Parris Island and the Marine Corps Air Station Beaufort.
“I did something for the Independence Fund in South Texas years ago,” Sinise explains, “and then they wanted to do this Lieutenant Dan Weekend down in Beaufort, and they contacted me to see if I could come, and Beaufort was where we shot Forrest Gump. I hadn’t been back there since we made the movie. But going back to Beaufort for Lieutenant Dan Weekend to raise money for Wounded Warriors is right up my alley.”
It is time for Sinise to get back to the set of CSI: NY, but he clearly wants to emphasize this point.
“It is a perfect thing to be able to come there to support the Independence Fund and to raise money to help our wounded. It’s just something I couldn’t pass up. It fits right into my schedule and right into my mission, and the Gary Sinise Foundation and everything I’m trying to do with the bad to support men and women who are serving our country.”
Catch the Lieutenant Dan Band play in Beaufort’s Waterfront park on September 15th at 7:00 PM. More information and tickets are available at www.ldw3.com.