Inkwell: Authors and Artists

    
Ooops, Mike slipped.  I wasn't laughing at his post on writing, but at
his educational post on the historical windows of Northampton.
  

    
I just hope I didn't bore the audience, those who chose to stay.
  

    
    Mary -- i followed the context.  Go right ahead.
  

    
Dan and Martha- I'm glad the show went well:) Out of curiosity, do you
have a rough transcript of the Q&A?
  

    
Not unless someone in the audience was concealing a cassette recorder.
  

    
Since people kept asking you questions, I don't think you bored
anyone, Martha.
  

    
Damn. Where are all the pirates when you need them?;) No, I can't
picture Martha as boring, which is why I'm interested in what she had
to say about things. By rough transcript, I meant the gist of the the
conversations from memory. Really wish I could have been there.
Fiddlesticks.   
Why am I up at this ungodly hour?
Goodnight.
  

    
I'm afraid i couldn't produce anything remotely resembling a
transcript of what Martha said, although the above snippit was
particularly memorable.

On a different note, I got my very own copy of "The Mouse and His
Child" by Russell Hoban. Apparantly, it's been out of print in the US
for some time and has just recently come back into print. I've never
read it before, but the film version deeply influenced me and my
pirated (I can't find a legal copy) videotape of it is one of my prized
possessions.

Neil... that trick you mentioned on the blog.. about making a CD-R
which set your DVD player to Region 0... how do you do that? Is it
possible to set your player to Region 1 and then back to 0 and then to
1 , etc, etc, etc? I'd love to be able to get stuff on DVD that isn't
available in the states.
  

    
DanW - mmm... mouseys...

Actually, while on the subject of DVDs, does anyone know what region
Criterion Collection stuff is on? Is it multi-region or what?

erg, I was going to say something else... possibly along the lines of
'welcome back from Boskone'... but then I got distracted by my Monopoly
set and I'm thinking "oooh, shiny" and everything else in my brain is
stopped.

squeaks, who is always the thimble.
  

    
Mike Ford's window was one of the funniest things I've ever seen
posted...

Meanwhile and in haste:

1) DVD players are region encoded, Regions 1-5. So are DVDs, so the
DVD only plays in the right DVD player. US and Canada are Region 1.
Europe and Japan are Region 2. Australia and South America are Region,
er, 4 I think.

2) DVDs are also coded to play in different TV formats --NTSC or PAL

3) Region Zero DVD players will play anything.

4) But a *very* few Region 1 DVDs are set to only play in DVD players
that are set to Region 1 exclusively.

The Sampo DVE-611 is a multi-system DVD (so it will send stuff out to
the TV in NTSC or PAL -- useful if you want to play a PAL system DVD on
an NTSC TV). The firmware reset just consists of recording a CD-R with
just one file on it, called CREGIN.TXT containing just the following
text    TSDVDREG-2001-9629735-R0     (and then to reset it to other
areas, you'd change the last digit to a 1, for example.) This is
because they make the DVD players for all over the world in one factory
and then set them for their destination afterward.

Patrick N-H told me at Boskone of an even cheaper one that the Sampo
-- although the Sampo's available for about $119 if you shop around at
mysimon.com or similar -- and I see someone has 25 to sell at Ubid.com
for $100 each. (If you buy them "pre-hacked" you can expect to pay
about $500 for them, which is silly.)

The Criterion DVDs are Region 1 (US).

I did't know there was ever a film of MOUSE & HIS CHILD.
  

    
Neil- Yep. It's impossible to find. I was only able to find one copy
online to *rent* about four years ago and made my bootleg then. I just
met someone who has an original tape though. I could probably get
copies made, as she's extremely evangelical about the book. When I
casually mentioned that I had made a montage for a conference that
opened with a clip from the film, her eyes bulged and her jaw dropped.
She had only met one other person who even knew about the book, let
alone the film.

So, as for the DVD thing... in order for this trick to work, i would
need a Sampo DVD... as another brand might reset to 0, but it might
export in the wrong TV format. Hrm... I've copied and pasted these
details for later... but now I have to determine just what I can and
can't get here and how much it's worth for me to give my finger to the
regional encoding system....

Dan - who always is the scottie dog. Except when he plays using his
Star Wars Monopoly set... then he's Boba Fett because it's his game,
dammit!
  

    
Stagewalker - well, TNH mentioned the APEX system as well (if memory
serves). There apparently exists a huge DVD underground.
  

    
oops -- posted before I'd finished -- 

with websites brimming with information. Personally, I'm with the
Australian Government, who feel that it's a nonsensical restraint of
trade. 
  

    
I have a little portable multisystem multiregion DVD player.  It's not much
bigger than a Walkman so I could take it to someone else's house and plug it
in to the front AV jacks on their TV.  Cost $200-odd, but it was necessary.
I bought it at a store south of Market that specializes in multivoltage
appliances and components.
  

    
E-mail from Kathy Li:

Ok, that's it.  You guys have done it.  Pushed me over the edge and into 
buying a Sampo.  And a dvd of OKLAHOMA! from amazon.co.uk just so I can see 
Hugh Jackman as Curly singing "Oh What a Beautiful Morning!" (well, *and* 
Maureen Lipman playing Aunt Eller).  Probably not the wisest purchase. :-)

Musicals on the brain.  Wanted to boast about getting to see INTO THE WOODS 
at the Ahmanson this weekend.  Third time's the charm.  Lapine *finally* 
fixed the death of the Baker's Wife.  I never liked the killer trees as 
much as death by Snow White's apple, but this new version's even 
better.  There are lots of little tweaks and polishes, tightenings and 
smoothings (and yes, three little pigs, another wolf, and "Our Little 
World", plus a new verse and blocking for "Boom! Crunch!", and wait'll you 
see what they've done with Milky White!), and it works even better than 
before.  It's gotten so much richer.  Kickass production.  But you knew 
that from the reviews.

Mike--just wanted to point out that the director of the musical OZ episode 
("Variety") was Roger Rees.
  

    
    Kathy -- A Sampo?  One of those Finnish things from the KALEVALA
that mills out gold?  Does Alan Greenspan know about this?

    Roger Rees/Wonders of Live Theatre story: a number of years ago I
saw his HAMLET at the RSC.  Somewhere up in the balcony were a couple
of young, uh, ladies who were convinced they were at the mulitplex:
talked and giggled nonstop, used their flash cameras at will, stop me
if you've heard all this.
    Anyway, during "To be or not to be," they started giggling
-loudly- and snapping away.  Rees stopped, walked downstage, and smiled
at them while they took his picture.  Then an usher took constructive
possession of the cameras, Rees went back upstage and restarted the
speech, and we got through the rest of the matinee without serious
further incident.
   
    One more and I'll quit for the evening: one is always touched by
the faith people have in the illuminating power of one flashbulb.  I've
seen people attempt to light darkened theatres, The Cathedral of St.
John the Divine, innumerable outdoor venues (even God can only do this
for a really short exposure, and he has to use a thunderstorm to charge
up).  I can understand someone new to cameras and film speed not
understanding the limitations of the medium, but you'd think after the
first few rolls came back from Fotomat the idea would sink in.
  

    
Martha - I'll just have to have you come over if I want to do a movie
night with something that I can't play otherwise... the only things I
wanted on DVD that I thought I couldn't get were Eddie Izzard DVDs...
which aren't even available in the UK yet, and the Wallace and Gromit
DVD.. which is now available and is freshly ordered via Amazon...

Talking with you people is bad for my bank account.

Kathy - for some reason I find the idea of watching an Australian cast
doing a musical based on the American Midwest extremely funny...

It's the accents, mostly...

As for Into the Woods... how wonderful and odd! I know that the very
early versions of Into the Woods had the three little pigs and such in
it, but they got cut because it was all getting too convoluted. I
wonder if they're producing an early version of the script, or if
Sondheim decided to put it all back in... 

Mike - The first time my mom came to see me in a somewhat professional
production, I noticed she had her camera in her purse. "Don't even
think about it" I told her. I was only partially successful. She held
off until the curtain call.
  

    
well that's it, now i HAVE to go see Into the Woods.  ASAP.  i didn't
realize they actually did more revisions.  and being a former Rapunzel
who got to do "Our Little World," i am quite excited to see it added in
again.  ohboyohboyohboy!
  

    
The thing is, trying to take a picture of a well-lit stage isn't even so
bad! It's just trying to use the flash rather than the light that already
exists that causes a problem - your mom could have done fine if she'd
convinced the camera not to *use* the flash - or at least had a slightly dim
picture of you rather than a great picture of the backs of the heads of the
next row in the audience.  Sigh.

Neil, I apologize for being so gentle that I didn't even say 'hi' at
Boskone, though I was there.  That line for the signing was awful long, and
you left sometime before the Flash Girls finished playing, and I was really
more interested in hearing them at the time.   ooh, the Flash Girls concert
was great.  Lots of fun.   Have survived my first con intact, by treating it
as  a small shopping trip, a small chance to hear some of my favorite
authors speak on interesting topics, and a concert, and leaving plenty of
time for doing other stuff at home in the middle.
  

    
Email from Kathy Li:

Mike -- Not Finnish from the KALEVALA, alas, Swedish
from Ikea. It comes in birch, beech, and black. :-)  I
have never gotten to see Roger Rees on stage, but I do
remember watching Alec Guinness and Edward Herrmann in
A WALK IN THE WOODS at a matinee, and someone in the
third row, center, falling asleep and snoring fit to
beat the band, and Guinness, just getting to a line
about the entire world being oblitered in nuclear
holocaust aiming the line like a laser at that one
seat...  without breaking concentration, mind you.

DanW, ummmm, that OKLAHOMA! is not Australian, it's the
National (UK).  How Jackman got there, I have no idea.  
I find the thought of NT actors under Trevor Nunn
direction doing apple-pie-American just as funny,
though.  (Footnote: go read Helene Hannf's UNDERFOOT IN
SHOW BUSINESS for a great story on the original
production. It's the part where they decide they have
to add an exclamation point that always gets me.) Oh,
and the Ahmanson INTO THE WOODS is not an old workshop
version as far as I know, and is being directed by
James Lapine. Boasting rights: I *did* see the Old
Globe workshop of WOODS way back when, and my favorite
cut moment was when one of the stepsisters gets
squished by the Giantess, Rapunzel starts weeping
AGAIN, and someone grabs the other stepsister, drags
her over to Rapunzel, who obligingly tilts her head so
the tears will fall and--"I can see!"

Adriana: Paul Gemignani is manning the pit!
  

    
Eddie Izzard DVDs, hmm.  The only non-US + PAL DVDs I have right now are the
first three seasons of Buffy, and Eraserhead.
  

    
Martha- Does your "Eraserhead" have the bonus short films? I love "The
Cowboy and the Frenchman"...

I'm confused. So I need a special DVD player to play foreign DVDs? I'm
very new to this DVD madness. Should get off here and go read the
manual.

Erynn, who is always Yankee Doodle (the guy on the horse)
  

    
No, damn, no bonus short films.
  

    
Mike--did you ever see the MST3K where they're watching some godawful
Norwegian film, and they don't translate the word "Sampo" in the
reprehensible dubbing?  They keep using the word, and there's no real
context, so if you don't know what a sampo is, it's completely
confusing.  Eventually they take a commercial break, and Crow and Tom
Servo start defining "sampo"--"it's a dog food--it's a chair--it's a
dentifrice--it's a tasty beverage treat"  until Tom says "It's a
strapless evening dress".  To which Crow replies, "You think
everything's a strapless evening dress".

One of the three funniest things I've ever seen, though perhaps you
had to be there.  Anyway, that's all I've been able to think about
through this entire discussion of Sampo.  Strapless evening dresses.

I saw Roger Rees as the Doctor, and Sir Derek Jacobi as Vanya in Uncle
Vanya in NYC a couple of years ago.  *I* thought it was delightful,
though the critics were not so impressed.  What do they know?

Father Ed Foley, the theologian, is speaking at my church for four
Wednesdays starting tonight.  Utterly delightful.  He defined
"liturgist" as an affliction sent by God to the people, so that if any
had been free of affliction, they might share in the benefits of
suffering.....ah, Catholicism.  I do love the teachings of Cathol.

V.v. jealous of people who get to see faboo new productions of Into
the Woods.  Thanks for sharing, though!  Also jealous of people with
new DVD players, but thanks for all the info!  I will be much better
prepared when the time comes to purchase.

OK, pooped, crashing.  G'night, John-boy!   M.
  

    
Stagewalker -- well, the Sampo is out there on ebay new for $50, on
ubid for $100 and in online stores for $120.

Mine was stuttering and freezing a little, so I went to the Sampozone
website and downloaded the latest version of the firmware which sorts
that out -- and it did.

Kathy Li -- I was signing with the scheaffer you gave me at Boskone...

That INTO THE WOODS sounds wonderful. Terry Gilliam was telling me
that he was interested in directing a film version until he was told
that it was just going to be the first half, not the second.

I've seen it three times now -- the london West End was my favourite
-- Nicholas Parsons as the narrator, and "Our Little World..."

Abbess -- yes, those signing lines were long. And the Sunday one had
to be limited to 100 people, so I could make the plane.

Erynn -- I've never seen The Cowboy and the Frenchman...


Mary -- I keep looking at your post and slipping into a John M Ford
world in which Roger Rees played the Doctor and Derek Jacobi played the
head of the Vanya, who are faintly insectoid Russians. Probably
francesca Annis would have been the Companion.