Good morning. I’m Jane Pauley, and this is Sunday Morning.
Rock climbing tests strength, skill and nerves — and for Jesse Dufton it’s also a way of life. Born with rod-cone dystrophy and now blind, the 40‑year‑old Brit pursues some of the most demanding climbs on Earth. Jesse learned to climb as a child from his father and kept at it through the progressive loss of his sight. He leads routes — the riskiest role — placing protection and navigating the rock while relying on partner Molly’s voice, helmet radios and a finely tuned feel for the stone. The couple met in college; they climbed, fell in love and later married atop a Greenland peak. Jesse, an engineer by day, has set records — including a feared 450‑foot sea stack off Scotland — and resists being cast as a stunt performer. To him, climbing is simply what he does: a test of judgment and character, not a label of disability. He wants people to remember his choices, not just his blindness.
Amanda Seyfried spends much of her life in front of the camera, but she finds peace on her upstate New York farm where animals and chores offer grounding and routine. From Mean Girls to Mamma Mia to her Oscar‑nominated turn in Mank and her Emmy‑winning portrayal in The Dropout, Seyfried has long navigated roles that require range and vulnerability. She’s candid about anxiety and OCD and how therapy and medication have helped her channel those challenges into work. This year she has two new films: the thriller The Housemaid and The Testament of Anne Lee, a period musical about the founder of the Shakers in which Seyfried plays Anne Lee — a role that won ovations and renewed awards conversation. At home she values responsibility, family and the simplicity of tending animals and instruments, and says she’s worked hard but stayed true to herself.
James Cameron, the director behind Titanic and the Avatar saga, remains captivated by worlds he can only imagine and then build. His career moved from small‑town Canada, through truck driving and self‑taught effects study, to landmark projects that pushed technology: The Terminator, The Abyss, Aliens, Titanic and, most recently, the Avatar films. Cameron describes performance capture, the massive underwater tanks built for the Na’vi actors and the years of expeditions and experimentation that feed his filmmaking. His new film, Avatar: Fire and Ash, continues the story of Pandora and the Na’vi’s fight against colonization. He worries about generative AI replacing genuine performance capture and underscores his work as a celebration of actor and director collaboration. Even at 71, he’s driven by projects he doesn’t yet know how to accomplish.
Seth Doane sent a postcard from Aix‑en‑Provence, where the city celebrates Paul Cézanne, its most complicated and once‑rejected son. Cézanne’s unfinished brushwork and insistence on painting from nature made him radical in his era. Aix now embraces the painter with exhibitions, preserved studios and trails that trace emblematic motifs — Meravigliose Mont Sainte‑Victoire and the Bibémus Quarries — locations that reveal Cézanne’s study of light, color and geology. In Aix you can stand where Cézanne painted and try to see the world the way he did: waiting, observing, and letting nature “humanize itself” through the artist.
Luke Burbank profiles Metallica’s philanthropy through All Within My Hands, a foundation that supports workforce education and disaster relief with more than $10 million in grants. The band’s charity began modestly — donating leftover backstage food and checks to local food banks — and evolved into large grants for community colleges and trade programs, scholarships to obtain commercial driver’s licenses and disaster responses to fires and earthquakes. Members James Hetfield, Lars Ulrich and Robert Trujillo view the outreach as a responsibility rooted in humble backgrounds and blue‑collar respect; they say the band’s success obliges them to help and that philanthropy grows with age and perspective. For many, including scholarship recipients, Metallica’s support has been life changing.
We also look at Architectural Digest’s ongoing chronicle of notable homes. AD’s photography captures more than furnishings: it records the spirit of a house and the lives lived in it. From Dakota Johnson’s midcentury house to Sienna Miller’s cozy cottage and Liev Schreiber’s New York apartment, AD’s editors say what endures is a home’s warmth, personality and the particular way it reflects its occupants.
Nancy Giles considers life after Thanksgiving and the creative use of leftovers. Chef Chris Morocco of Bon Appétit and Epicurious shares ways to reinvent potatoes, rice, tamales and roasted vegetables into soups, nachos, stir‑fries and new weeknight dinners. Leftovers make practical sense: saving time, salvaging food and connecting to historical frugality — a practice once framed as moral or spiritual and now a tool against waste. Whether it’s mashed potatoes turned into soup or boiled potatoes reinvented as potato nachos, small creativity can turn yesterday’s plate into today’s highlight.
We follow the latest on Wednesday’s fatal shooting of two National Guard members in Washington, D.C. Weijia Jiang reports that the suspected shooter, Rahmanullah Lakanwal, was an Afghan national brought to the United States under an evacuation program. The case has prompted immediate political reaction, including policy proposals and temporary changes to visa and asylum processing. Officials say the U.S. faces a delicate balance between honoring resettlement commitments and addressing public safety concerns; advocates warn against painting entire resettled populations with the brush of one suspect.
That’s our broadcast for the final day of November. We leave you with a Thanksgiving history: the holiday season in the U.S. was shaped by Sarah Josepha Hale’s decades‑long campaign to create a national day of thanks. Her efforts culminated in Abraham Lincoln’s 1863 proclamation making Thanksgiving a unifying observance during the Civil War; later, in 1941, Congress made the holiday a permanent federal observance in November. Charles Osgood reminds us to be grateful for family and friends and the people around our table.
We close among the giant sequoias at Sequoia National Park — a reminder of endurance, scale and the quiet awe of nature.
I’m Jane Pauley. Please join us next Sunday.
