Inkwell: Authors and Artists

    
Jumping in late on the Ep2 thread...........

I would have to agree that Lucas should be confined to laying out the
bare bones of story and design, and then leave the movies to others,
but he has so much power and control these days that it will never
happen.  It's seems that, with the ability to put anything he desires
on screen, Lucas has lost the ability to see what is actually important
from a story standpoint.  Unfortunately, he seems to have surrounded
himself with "yes-men" (*cough* Rick McCallum *cough*) who lack the
ability to say,"George, that idea just doesn't work."

He seems to have lost most of his directing chops since "Star Wars",
instead fixating on all the technical difficulties of making these
movies.  It's seems like all the live-action shots are nothing more
than raw material to be tossed into the digital soup, and the
performances of the actors suggest that Lucas is satisfied with just
about any linereading, so long as he can get back to composing the rest
of the masterpiece he sees in his head.

On the script front, it's clear that he's lost any sense of the truth
of "show, don't tell" - the plot just plods along (whenever there's
nothing blowing up), and the dialog is, at times, just awful.

While it's true that Lucas likes to claim that these movies are "for
kids" (Hudsucker Proxy, anyone?), the plots don't seem to indicate that
- all the political stuff is dull for adults, after all, though mostly
because it's handled so poorly.

While it's unlikely that anyone could have lived up to the
expectations many of us had for the prequels, I am a bit stunned at how
comprehensively the first two have failed to live up to the promise of
a cursory reading of the main plot points.  I'm left with the feeling
that the idea of this backstory seemed an awful lot more compelling
than it has become in the telling.

Perhaps we should have based our expectations on "Return of the Jedi",
which was already pointing the way toward a George Lucas who was more
interested in spectacle, childish humor, and tying up loose ends, no
matter how unsatisfactorily.  A man who once championed the cause of
the "modern myth" - the ability of a seemingly simple story to have
deeper meaning - Lucas seems to have become just another modern
filmmaker who makes BIG MOVIES with little actual meaning.  Perhaps it
was inevitable, but it's still disappointing.
  

    
I have no explanation for the mysterious double appearance of the
phrase "It's seems" in the above post............
  

    <scribbled by dfowlkes Tue 3 Jul 12 10:14>
  

    
Email from Jouni:

Neil -- Yay for the Stoker! Yay for the Mousecircus site (loved the
ratsong)!

Now about that Sherlock Holmes meets Cthl... Chtl... Ctl... err...
Lovecraft's mythos -anthology... Would very very much have some info about
it. Neil, anyone... please?

Jouni (slightly pissed about the fact that the he is having sort of an
'illustrators block')
  

    
Email from Reg:

Hello All.

Maure, despite Michelle's claims, Tree and I are not in fact international
wildlife smugglers, although we do tend to carry rather a lot of plush
toys with us when we travel internationally.

And for the record, the platypus pool at Healesville Sanctuary has been
the highlight of the trip for every American visitor I have ever acted as
tour guide for in Australia.

Dan, with regards to the Star Wars Holiday Special, it gets even tackier.
That wasn't Mark Hamill, it was actually a lookalike.

And Neil, first of all, congratulations to the site designers at
mousecircus.com. It is a wonderful site.

Second, despite my best efforts, I have not come up with anything new
about Victoria Walker. I have not exhausted all my avenues of enquiry yet,
but I don't hold out much hope.

And finally, reading your journal entry today, I take it you were not
wildly extaic about Doris Lessing's attempts to reinvent the wheel.

Reg
  

    
Neil--suspect you are at ALA.  Hope Atlanta is not too godawfully hot,
and that you will not need our services.  If, however, you have hotel
or airline drama, please don't hesitate to call Brad Finkbeiner at the
Travel Desk.  He's a doll, and under strict orders to take care of you
(well, OK, I told him to try to cadge me a Coraline if he runs into
you, but close enough  ;-)  )

Mousecircus rules!!!  Have just sent off a raft of e-cards.  Whee!
  

    
Neil,  congratulations on the Stoker, and *very* sorry to hear about
the lack of new skills associated with the spider bite. 

Reg, ohhh. That's ok. I wouldn't know how to care for a platypus
properly anyway. And I'd have nowhere to put him. I envy Australia its
animals. Actually, I envy everywhere its animals -- I was just reading
about tapirs, and I would love to have one of those too. Maybe I should
scrap all my previous career ideas and just go to work at a zoo...

I got my artbomb.net teeshirt in the mail today, hooray hooray. Now I
just need a WELL one, and a million dollars, and I'll be set for life!
  

    
Maure - believe me, I've been with you on the "dropping out and
working at a zoo" idea for years.  Still can't figure out how to make
it work economically, though.

Instead, I've taken up walking around the quieter parts of my
neighborhood (which is surprisingly semi-rural in places) with my new
pair of compact Nikon binoculars, acquainting myself with the local
birds, rabbits, and squirrels (three of which were peeking out of a
hole about 12 feet up a tree at me this evening - very cute).  Mind
you, I've already been questioned twice by residents as to what I'm
doing - I stay in the street and don't walk on anyone's property - but
they seem to calm down when I tell them "birdwatching".
  

    
See, if it was me, I'd probably tell them (in my best 'elmer fudd')
"shhhh! be vewy vewy quiet... i'm hunting wabbits!" But then, I rarely
make sense when confronted by neighbors.

Maure - I have a friend who works at the San Francisco Zoo and she
seems to be making a reasonable living. She's also told me minor horror
stories about how some of the animals treat her there, so I guess you
have to decide if it's really worth it to get whapped across the chest
by a wallaby's tail and then decide your career options from there.

squeaks, who WILL take a nap, damnit!
  

    

I bought a very cite silver platypus charm this weekend, speaking of 
platypuses.
  
  

    
Would that be . . . platypi? 
What a strange word. Roll it around in your mouth for a bit: platypi.
hmm.
  

    

That should be "cute" not "cite" of course.

At first I thought platypi and then I thought platypussies, and then I 
looked it up.  %^)
  

    
Reg - that was a lookalike?
God... weird to weirder....
  

    
Here I am, jumping in late about just about everything, despite being
nearly half a day ahead of most of you...

Ep2--Well, since I appear to be the only one on earth who would rather
eat a plate of live spiders than see that film again, I shall merely
agree with the point made earlier that I wanted a film that made me
feel the way Star Wars did when it came out. Ep 2 didn't. It made me
want to hurt George Lucas very badly for quite a prolonged period of
time. As for Natalie Portman's nipples, perhaps she was using them as a
distraction?

Mr Ford--they made a cartoon out of Gay Purree? Or, perhaps more
correctly, my favourite Little Golden Book in the whole wide world was
a cartoon? "Mewsette, Mewsette, my love, my pet..." Now I must
instigate a search online for a copy immediately!

Maure--have no fear, Dot not only exists, she spawned a series of not
terribly memorable films including 'Dot in Space'. I recall being
subjected to the film at the end of the school year when the teachers
had run out of steam and just stuck us in front of 'Dot & the Kangaroo'
and 'Herbie the Love Bug'. I tried to do a search for the lyrics to my
favourite song from the movie, the platypus song, strangely enough.
But I can't find it. And anyone who can find a rhyme that scans for
'ornithorhynchus' gets points in my book.

They also made us watch a traumatising bit of film called 'Little Boy
Lost' in which a small toddler goes wandering in the bush. The film
broke not long after he had fallen down a cliff and was bloodied and
bruised and I never found out whether he died of exposure, was eaten by
a bunyip or was rescued in time. As a six year old with an over active
imagination, I went for the worst case scenario and was subsequently
terrified every time we went camping.

The Waterbabies--I seem to recall that not only did the movie bear
little to no resemblence to the book, but that it contained Rolf
Harris, which is never a good thing. But perhaps Elise is right and the
movie is simply the book without all the diversions.

Neil--mousecircus is fabulous fun, except my mousing skills are so
crap I can't catch the roaches and the rats' song is playing internally
on repeat... [shudder]

Tree
"We are small but we are many..."
  

    <scribbled by dfowlkes Tue 3 Jul 12 10:14>
  

    
Jinx -- GAY PURR-EE was indeed a cartoon, from UPA.  As i recall now,
Jones didn't direct it, Abe Levitow did (Jones and his wife scripted
it).  Judy Garland and Robert Goulet voiced the principals, Red Buttons
is the sidekitty.  The songs are by Harold Arlen and Yip Harburg, who
also did THE WIZARD OF OZ.

Ornithorhynchus
Wasn't as pink as
All of that ink was
Once spilled to prove.
Blink and you'll miss as
History dismisses
Ornithorhynchus --
Still it does move.
  

    
Almost forgot . . . 

"Bring me a platypus, and bring me another platypus, and put them
between this octopus and that octopus."
  

    
A few things from Neil's interview on Slush Factory:
"Currently the last e-mail that I heard from Gilliam is that Tony
Grisoni is doing a rewrite to try and get the budget down to $45
million."

I still say that he just needs to cast a bunch of unknowns like me and
Adriana... we'll work for food and lodging! (Well, maybe a bit more
than that.. but considerably less than say, James Spader (who I get
compared to a lot).

On the Coraline movie:
"DE: Jennifer Connelly. [laughs]
NG: She was on our list but it’s someone actually odder. I think
Coraline may be in production very soon."

I haven't read the book yet, obviously... but from the snippits I've
seen and what I've heard about it... something tells me that I want to
see Joan Cusack as Mommy Buttoneyes...
  

    
Dan - Being a huge fan of the entire Cusack family I heartily agree!

Favorite line from the interview? 
"That's the single most frustrating thing. You want to walk around
Hollywood asking everyone where are their balls."

Just...just laughing at the horrible truth of it...

-Shawn
  

    
Dan, we should market ourselves with that slogan:
"Dan and Adriana: We're Cheaper Than James Spader."

Mr. Ford:  I knew you would rise to the challenge.  
  

    
From the journal:

This just in from Amy Burton who is doing publicity for Coraline. 

.........

NEW YORK (June 11, 2002) - HarperCollins Children's Books announced
today that New York Times best-selling author Neil Gaiman will launch
his first-ever novel for children, Coraline (July 2002; $15.99; ages 8
up), in the Bay Area. 

Cody's Books of Berkeley will host the exclusive West Coast launch
event on Tuesday, July 2 at 6:30 p.m. (doors open at 5:30 p.m.) at the
First Congregational Church of Berkeley on 2345 Channing Way. 

Starting at 6:30 p.m., Gaiman will do a rare complete reading of
Coraline, which has been called "bittersweet and playful" (San
Francisco Chronicle), "magnificently creepy" (Kirkus Reviews) and is
being likened to a modern-day Alice in Wonderland. Signed copies of
Coraline, selected backlist titles and audio will be available for sale
at the event. 

Tickets are $10 for adults, $5 for children, and go on sale beginning
June 17 at both Cody?s Books locations (2454 Telegraph Ave. at Haste;
1730 Fourth St.); www.codysbooks.com; telephone orders to 510-845-7852;
email orders to info@codysbooks.com. All major credit cards are
accepted. The purchase of a ticket entitles the holder to a $3 discount
on Coraline books and audio. 

A separate East Coast launch event for Coraline is scheduled for 6:00
p.m. on Thursday, July 11 at Barnes & Noble, Union Square in New York
City. There will be no other U.S. events until the fall. 
.................................................

And going mainly from feedback from here, we've elected to make this
one a reading, rather than a signing. So it'll be three hours of
comfortably listening to a story, rather than five hours of standing in
a long line for thirty seconds of hello. We'll have an interval
half-way through, in case any of the kids can't keep going, and for
people to get lemonade and cookies etc. 

As you can see, it's a ticketed event, to cover the cost of renting
the hall, but the tickets are cheap and easy to get (and will count
against the purchase of a Coraline). We also got somewhere with enough
seating that we're not worried about it selling out. 

Spread the word across the West. 
  

    

I started by spreading it around the WELL!
  

    
Neil - Re: Coraline reading, Hoorah!! So glad to have you back in the
Bay Area! I have already sent the news on to friends! 

Who else is planning on going? It would be lovely to meet you all. I
will be the one all in black, with the bright blue hair... well, one of
them at any rate -- one can never be TOO sure about standing out in a
crowd, without the assistance of loud proclamations of impending doom
whilst carrying great, blinking signs.
  

    
I'm pleased for your wrist that it's a reading instead of a signing.
Besides that it's a higher-quality experience to listen to you read at an
unhurried pace than to stand in line forever and get a scribble of ink on a
book.
  

    
Last time Neil was out this-a-way, I got there insanely early, and
thus had front row seats and stood up frequently so that people would
see the tall shaggy redhead in the leather jacket... and that's how I
met Madman and Castle, who went "Ooooh! He's one of us!"
I have short red hair now, so I don't know that I will stand out so
much. So I suggest that we either get scary trousers shirts, or
something... 

Short of that, I'll wear something easily identifiable and post it
here that morning. I imagine that if you find me, you'll find Madman,
Castle and (if they're not backstage hobnobbing with the bloke who
doesn't sit around moodily making pronouncements about adolescence)
Squeaks and Martha. We should also figure out how many of us are going
so that whoever gets inside first can save enough seats for us to sit
together.