Wednesday, August 29, 2018

MAGIC UNDER GLASS Review

The Baltimore Sunpapers wrote this wonderful review of the musical 'Magic Under Glass,' based on the novel by Jaclyn Dolamore, that I have been working on. I want to thank Michael Kline for inviting me onto the project and everyone, especially the talented young cast, who made this performance a success. I plan to write a longer blog on the production, but, for now, check out this review.

Read it here:  Review.  Or below.  

(Reprinted without permission.)

Isabella Lopez plays the heroine Namira in "Magic Under Glass"
at Howard Community College on Aug. 2-4. (Courtesy photo / Jeri Tidwell)
Stars align for presentation of 'Magic Under Glass'

By Carolyn Kellman

August 2, 2018, 12:00PM

Last summer, Toby’s talented teens performed “Magic Under Glass” as a concert version with no big sets, minimal costumes and little movement on stage. Yet, the show – especially the passionate singing – brought the audience to its feet.

This time around, a “wow” factor has been added to the Columbia Center for Theatrical Arts revised production at Howard Community College on Aug. 2-4.

International designer Lee Anderson created special costumes for cast members who play “spirits” and “magic trees.” Anderson’s efforts, together with Kristin Clark’s original outfits, add yet another dimension to the fantasy rock musical. Picture a 20-foot shrouded tree swaying to the beat of music. Or a spiffy Victorian lass twirling her umbrella covered with colorful flowers and a cloaked pianist attached to a bizarre instrument that magically awakens him to play on command.

You don’t need a magnifying glass to see the impact Anderson and other local artists have made on the new version, based on a popular book by Jaclyn Dolamore. Emmy-winning author Sean Paul Murphy* is credited as screenwriter. Columbia’s own ASCAP award-winning Michael Kline scored the music.

The plot takes place in a fairy kingdom at war with a neighboring monarchy. Nimira, a dark-haired beauty from an aristocratic family, accepts an invitation from a mysterious magician, who invites her to sing with a robot that can only be turned on with a silver key. She soon learns that evil magic surrounds her and Erris, a cursed prince who is trapped in a robot body. Choreographer Christen Swingos keeps the large cast on its toes in some upbeat and jazzy numbers, a brief respite from gloom and doom.

CCTA’s go-to gal, Isabella Lopez, plays the heroine with grace and aplomb. Her voice calms the chaos that surrounds the Holland household where Spencer Franco keeps that special key and a lot of secrets. Stephen Dransfield has grown into his automaton character with a powerful presence. You almost believe he is part of his piano. Kudos to Isabella’s younger sister, Alessandra Lopez, a scene-stealer with her poignant singing.

Indeed, this project is a big deal for all involved.

As co-directors Toby Orenstein and Jessica Binder began to tackle their dreams of taking an original musical to the world stage, the first step was to call on Ross Scott Rawlings to serve as musical director. Allan Nason, a noted music supervisor for major Hollywood films, came aboard and American Latino TV featured the musical, interviewing CCTA cast members and hosting a live performance in New York City.

Now, word has it that Hollywood producers are interested and are expected to attend the Columbia performances.

Even with all the hullaballoo surrounding the show, Orenstein remains grounded and clearly focused on the mission of all her shows. She points a finger towards a young performer during a recent rehearsal, and in her gruff, yet loving voice, bellows, “Tell the story...singing is extended speaking…and always remember you’re telling a story.”

And what a story it is!

Columbia Center for Theatrical Arts Teen Professional Theatre performs “Magic Under Glass” at Howard Community College Smith Theatre, 10901 Little Patuxent Parkway, Thursday and Friday, Aug. 2-3, at 7 p.m. and Saturday, Aug. 4, at 2 p.m. and 5 p.m. Tickets are $15 online and $20 at the door. The show now has a Website www.magicunderglass.com where fans can download the professionally recorded single, “Down in the Field.”

*Just to set the record straight: I am not an Emmy Award winning writer. I have merely written some true crime films for the FBI that won Emmys on the Pentagon Channel.

While you wait for the next performance, feel free to check out my memoir The Promise, or the Pros and Cons of Talking with God, published by TouchPoint Press.

Chapter 15 - Quarter To Midnight

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Friday, August 24, 2018

Top 10 Horror Movies of the 1960s

I am a horror fan. Always have been. Always will be. I grew up on a steady diet of late night horror films in the bygone era of Friday and Saturday night horror hosts. I wanted to write a blog about my Top 10 Horror Films, but I had far too many favorites to choose from. Therefore, I am writing a series of blogs dealing with specific decades. Now we're examing the 1960s.

This was a good decade for horror films, but not quite as good as I expected. Much like the 1950s, a great number of horror movies were produced for the drive-in market, but the drop off from classic to schlock is rather sudden and steep. Once again, according to the ground rules I laid down in my first list, I do not include crime films about torture or murder, such as Psycho or Silence of the Lambs, that do not feature a supernatural aspect. Nor do I include films about animal attacks like Jaws.

So here's the list:
Written and Directed by Herschell Gordon Lewis

Travelers from the North find themselves the guests of honor at a Centennial Celebration in a small Southern town only to be killed in grotesque ways.

Director Herschell Gordon Lewis is called The Godfather of Gore. His work in the early 1960s definitely earned him that title. It could be said he established the school of over-the-top gore with his 1963 film Blood Feast. However, I included this film instead because I found it more amusing. This film is essentially a demented rip-off of Brigadoon, but, instead of having Gene Kelly dancing and singing around a mystical Scottish town, in this film the ghosts of a Southern town wiped out during the Civil War rise every hundred years to slaughter some Yankees.

BTW, I had the good fortune to edit Herschell Gordon Lewis in the film Chainsaw Sally.  He was a very nice guy!  RIP.


Directed by Herk Harvey
Written by John Clifford

A woman, Candace Hilligoss, survives a car accident but finds herself haunted by a ghostly figure as she heads to Utah to work as a church organist.

Industrial filmmaker Herk Harvey, who also plays the ghostly figure, created a genuine low-budget cult classic. This is a creepy and haunting little movie, if a little reminiscent of the hitchhiker episode of The Twilight Zone. This film has mood and atmosphere to spare. Plus, while driving through Utah, my wife and I stopped at the place where the final sequence was filmed. It remains just as creepy! Here's the whole film:

"FIVE MILLION YEARS TO EARTH"
Directed by Roy Ward Baker
Screenplay by Nigel Kneale based on his original story

While working on the subway, a mysterious item is uncovered. The military believes it is an unexploded Nazi secret weapon, but Dr. Quatermass believes it is a spaceship that proves that aliens originally stimulated human intelligence for their own purposes.

This film covers some of the same thematic territory as 2001: A Space Odyssey and the later Alien sequels crediting human evolution and intelligence to alien forces. When I first saw this film, I didn't realize that it was part of a series of films about the Quatermass character. I have yet to see any of the others, but I should check them out.

I am surprised that this is the only Hammer film on my list.

Directed by Roger Corman
Screenplay by Charles Beaumont and R. Wright Campbell
Based on the story by Edgar Allan Poe

Edgar Allan Poe's tale of a corrupt nobleman partying while the plague ravishes his land gets the upscale Corman treatment.

Roger Corman made his reputation on schlock, but he deliberately strove for filmmaking credibility with a series of high budget (for him) Poe adaptations. This one is my favorite. It was beautifully shot by Nicholas Roeg and features a literate script by the great Charles Beaumont, who also wrote more than his share of classic Twilight Zone episodes. Vincent Price hits all the right marks, and we get to see Paul McCartney's main squeeze at the time Jane Asher. When is her tell-all coming out?


"BLACK SABBATH"
Directed by Mario Bava
Screenplay by Marcello Fondato
in collaboration with Mario Bava and Alberto Bevilacqua
Based on stories by Anton Chekhov, Aleksei Tolstoy and Guy de Maupassant

Italian maestro Mario Bava treats us to three tales of terror by renown authors in this anthology film hosted by Boris Karloff, who also stars in a segment.

This film really scared me late one night when I watched it as a child. At the time, I thought the scariest episode was A Drop of Water, about a nurse who steals a ring off the hand of a dead woman. Now I tend to favor The Wurdulak where Boris Karloff plays the patriarch of a family who returns home after hunting a vampire changed. Now he preys on his family. I consider Karloff the best actor who worked predominately in the horror field. This is one of his last great roles.

Now, I also prefer to watch the film in its native Italian.


5. THE BIRDS, 1963
Directed by Alfred Hitchcock
Screenplay by Evan Hunter
Based on the story by Daphne Du Maurier

The coastal town of Bodega Bay is plagued by an increasingly violent series of bird attacks after the arrival of a socialite played by Tippi Hedren.

Okay, okay. I know what you're thinking (or at least I know what my nieces are thinking.) According to my stated rules, animal attack films like Jaws don't qualify as horror films. True. Jaws doesn't qualify because its about a shark doing what sharks do. In this film, the birds aren't simply doing what birds do. There is something utterly unnatural about their behavior. That's why I include this film in the horror category.

This film features some amazing sequences which show Hitchcock at the peak of his powers. However, there are problems. The pace is very slow. Also, the ambiguities of the film, such as the cause for the attacks, diminish the effectiveness. Additionally the film just stops more than it ends (though it is a great shot.)  The Birds might not be peak Hitchcock, but it definitely deserves its place on this list.


4. THE INNOCENTS, 1961
Directed by Jack Clayton
Screenplay by William Archibald and Truman Capote
with additional scenes and dialogue by John Mortimer
Based on the novel by Henry James

A prim and proper governess, Deborah Kerr, at a sprawling country manor home begins to think her charges, one boy and one girl, are becoming possessed by the spirits of two licentious former servants who died mysteriously.

This is a beautifully shot and literately scripted version of the oft filmed novella A Turn of the Screw by Henry James. Deborah Kerr gives a great performance as the sexually-repressed governess who slowly becomes unhinged. But are there really ghosts? Or are they simply manifestations of her own repressed mind? You be the judge.

One of the best ghost stories ever, but the best is yet to come.


3. ROSEMARY'S BABY, 1968
Written and Directed by Roman Polanski
Based on the novel by Ira Levin

A young couple moves into an expensive apartment building and become befriended by elderly neighbors. The wife Rosemary, played by a wide-eyed Mia Farrow, discovers that their neighbors are occultists and fears they have designs on her unborn child.

This film serves as a trial run for many of the themes of 70's cinema. It was this film, followed later by The Exorcist, that really put Satanism on the map in horror. The film also provided a foretaste of the paranoia endemic to the cinema of the next decade. This is a serious film, like The Innocents and The Haunting, made for adults, by a filmmaker with a degree of gravitas.

Of course, the director of this film, Roman Polanski, gives me pause. Even before the #MeToo movement, I was already semi-boycotting his work. (I generally avoided the films he made after the rape charges.) But is it fair to boycott a film simply because of the director? A studio film is the work of hundreds, if not thousands, of people. Should their work be invalidated because of the behavior of one person? No doubt Roman Polanski receives residuals for his work. I certainly wouldn't want to reward him by buying the Blu Ray of this film. But is it fair to deprive Mia Farrow of her residuals by doing so?

Tough questions.....


Directed by George A. Romero
Written by John A. Russo and George A. Romero

The dead begin to rise and trap a group of terrified and confused survivors in a rural farmhouse.

In this film, George Romero invented the modern zombie genre. There had been zombie films before, such as the classic White Zombie with Bela Lugosi and late night fare like Zombies of Mora Tau, but Romero set up the modern paradigm. Zombies are slow-moving, flesh-eating, non-speaking and can only be killed by destroying the brain. Some filmmaking heretics have opted for fast-moving zombies, but, other than that, the rules have stuck. (All three films in Romero's original zombie trilogy have made my lists in their respective decades.)

It's hard to over estimate the effect this film has had on me. I originally saw this film on Super 8mm. My friend Bob Kuzyk reviewed movies for a film collectors magazine and he lent me the print. The description sounded corny. I wasn't very enthusiastic about watching it, but it grabbed me from the beginning. It was shot in B&W 16mm with a documentary feel. Although the acting was hit and miss, the first act is very scary and suspenseful. The second act was slower but peppered with then state of the art gore. The third act left me speechless.

The more I write about this film, the more I am surprised I didn't make it the top horror film of the decade. But it's hard to beat the next film.

Meanwhile, here's the whole film (which sadly fell into public domain):


1. THE HAUNTING, 1963
Directed by Robert Wise
Screenplay by Nelson Gidding. Based on the novel by Shirley Jackson

A paranormal researcher invites two women, played by Julie Harris and Claire Bloom, to help him investigate a haunted mansion.  Tragedy ensues.

This is the granddaddy of ghost films. It is the definitive masterpiece of the genre. More importantly, in my opinion, it is also the most realistic. I grew up in a haunted house, and this film most accurately conveys what I experienced during the height of our haunting. Nights filled with noises and bangings and footsteps. Objects moving. A palpable feeling of utter malevolence and dread. But, in the sunlight the next morning, your rational mind can dismiss everything as only your imagination. Still, you knew you would be facing it again that night....

The Haunting captures the feeling of a true haunting, without all of the over-the-top bells and whistles filmmakers feel the need to include today in these stories.

Speaking of over-the-top bells and whistles, avoid the Jon De Bont remake at all costs!


Honorable Mention:

PSYCHO, 1960. Scary. Influential. However, it does not fit my definition of a horror film.  It is a psychological crime thriller. Sorry. PLANET OF THE APES, 1967. A number of sci-fi films have overlapped into my horror lists, but this film remains firmly in the sci-fi category. With a script by Rod Sterling, it remains superior to all sequels. 2001: A SPACE ODYSSEY, 1968. This is one of my favorite films of all time, but it too remains firmly in the sci-fi camp despite the malevolent computer villain. THE LAST MAN ON EARTH, 1964. Vincent Price plays the titular fellow battling a race of vampires. This isn't great, but it is perhaps the most faithful version of Richard's Matheson's great novel I Am Legend. I am still waiting for the definitive version. DRACULA: PRINCE OF DARKNESS, 1966. I think I like Christopher Lee's quiet, animalistic portrayal of Dracula better than any of the individual films themselves. Ditto the next film:  DRACULA HAS RISEN FROM THE GRAVE, 1968.  Of course he has! That's sort of what makes him Dracula. WHATEVER HAPPENED TO BABY JANE? 1962. This film is often listed as a horror film, but it isn't one. REPULSION, 1965. This film also made a lot of horror lists, but I am happy to exclude a Roman Polanski film about rape, despite his expertise on the subject.

Other Lists:



My novel Chapel Street is now available! You can currently buy the Kindle and paperback at Amazon and the Nook, paperback and hardcover at Barnes & Noble.


Learn more about the book, click Here.

Watch the book trailer:

  

Listen to me read some chapters here:


Let's stay in touch:

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Wednesday, August 22, 2018

Little Red now on Amazon Prime


Little Red was the first feature film I edited that was officially released. Earlier that same year I had edited another Super 16mm feature called Charm City. It never found a distributor, but that's another story.

Little Red was written and directed by my old friend Clay Valenti. I originally met Clay at the much-storied advertising agency Smith Burke & Azzam. I worked in Broadcast. Clay hung his shingle in Account Services. One of his first accounts was the Midwest fast food chain Rax Restaurants, which earned him the nickname among old-timers as "The Rax Man."  Not a bad nickname, if you ask me.

Clay's heart wasn't in Account Services. He spent most of his free time with us in the Broadcast Department, despite a dire warning from one of his supervisors that he would never get anywhere if he "hung out with those people in broadcast." I don't think he hung around with us entirely because of our legendary three hour lunches. (Now don't think badly of us because of that. When we worked, we REALLY worked. And when we didn't work, we REALLY didn't work.)  Clay wanted more. He wanted to make movies.

Clay Valent, seated left, during our Ad Men period.
Clay's supervisor was right. He never did get anywhere in Account Services. He never got anywhere in the Broadcast Department either. He went to California and got in the movie business. He found his niche in the camera department and worked on films like The Horse Whisperer, Brokedown Palace and Liberty Heights. Nice work if you can get it, but he wanted to do more.

Clay read a poem by a Baltimore City student named Darrell Collins which used the tale of Little Red Riding Hood as a metaphor for the drug dealing he saw on the mean streets of Baltimore all around him. Clay was inspired and decided to dramatize it in a short, black & white film.  Here it is:



BTW, the poet Darrell Collins plays himself in the short.

The success of the short inspired Clay to make a feature film version. I was very busy with commercial work so I had little involvement with the shooting of the feature, except when it came to me. I lent the production my house as the location for Little Red's mother's home. It led to a moment of deja vu when I watched the film later. I was sitting on my sofa watching Red and her mother sitting on my sofa watching television. Weird. The experience also taught me that I really don't have enough electrical outlets for a film shoot.

One of my favorite moments of the project happened right after the shoot at my house. The cinematographer Chuck Regner, another old friend of mine who now shoots news for WBOC, and Clay and I sat around watching Psycho on DVD with the daughter of a neighbor. We didn't realize the girl hadn't seen the film before and we got to vicariously relive the initial shock the original audiences felt at Janet Leigh's death in the shower. (I never experienced that shock myself. I had heard all about "the shower scene" long before I actually saw it!)

When the shooting ended, my work began. I had edited the short and I was only too happy to take time out of my commercial schedule to edit the feature. After all, I didn't get in this business to make commercials, did I? I was assisted by young Michael J. Walls, who had also acted as second assistant camera on the shoot. Mike warned me about a scene that everyone knew would be difficult to edit. He called it The Kobayashi Maru, after the unbeatable test at the Star Trek Fleet Academy. I decided to cut that scene first and get it out of the way. The Kobayashi Maru soon became a tradition on all of the subsequent feature films I edited. I always edited the worst or most complicated scene first, before proceeding to cut the rest of the film in a sequential manner.

The film was shot beautifully on Super 16mm. Man, I regret the death of film. Not only do I miss the aesthetics, I also miss the focus it forced on filmmakers. Film was expensive. An independent filmmaker could not afford to shoot endless takes or use multiple cameras. Directors really had to think about what they needed. Little Red had about a four-to-one shooting ratio, if I remember correctly. That meant we could easily assemble a rough cut in about a week. You can't do that nowadays. Not with the video rolling endlessly. I am not exaggerating when I say there was more raw footage in the scene in Marriage Retreat where the couples first talk with the counselors than there was for the entire film of Little Red! Film made you focus on exactly what you needed!

Perhaps my favorite memory of this film was the screening at the New York Film Festival. I had just started dating my future wife Debbie, and I thought this would make an impressive date. I picked her up after work and drove up to the Big Apple for an unforgettable night. After the screening, we went dancing on a ship converted into a nightclub. The night finally ended around seven in the morning with eclairs at a bakery near the apartment a friend had lent me. Debbie was impressed enough to marry me!

Guess what: The film even got released! It was picked up by DEJ Productions, the in-house production arm of Blockbuster. The deal had its pros and cons. On the positive side, Clay made a profit and the film got stocked at every location. On the negative side, it was only released in the 4:3 standard format, and, when Blockbuster disappeared, so did the film.

But not anymore. Clay managed to get the rights back and now you can rent it on Amazon Prime.  Click here to check it out:  Little Red

I have nothing but fond memories of this little film that gave the world a taste of the streets of Baltimore before The Wire. The local casts of unknowns* mostly acquitted themselves well, and I would work with a number of the crew members many times in the future.

Here's the trailer:



*One of those unknowns was my own mother Clara. Clay needed someone to play the bitter mother of one of the drug dealers. He picked my mother, who delivered a classic off-camera rant. I should rip it from the DVD and post it.

Speaking of Amazon, have you read my book yet.  Give it a try.



Here are some sample chapters of The Promise:
Chapter 7 - Mission Accomplished

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Tuesday, August 21, 2018

Happy Death Day, Y'all!

Yours Truly, Post Death
On August 10, 2011, I went to the hospital for a routine biopsy procedure and died on the table.

Temporarily.

Fortunately, they brought me back.

My brush with death was a great experience that put my life in crystalline perspective. It allowed me to take a step back and look objectively at the foolishness and vanity of life. Not just life in general, my life in particular. I have often asked myself afterwards before starting an endeavor: "Did I really come back from the dead to do this?' The answer is often no. And I move on.

The experience was so profound I was tempted to change my birthday to August 10th, at least on Facebook. I refrained from doing so because my mother was not amused. (Amusing my mother is one of the endeavors I still consider worthwhile.)

Still, I usually acknowledge August 10th in some manner but this year the day got away from me. That shouldn't be surprising. I have been incredibly busy. I was decompressing from the short but glorious run of my rock musical based on the book Magic Under Glass, negotiating with an agent concerning my novel Chapel Street, preparing to teach a screenwriting course at my alma mater, and working on the pitch for a series for NetFlix. And let's not forget my daily work on the television shows 90 Day Fiance: Before The 90 Days and OutDaughtered.

It's not surprising my Death Day got lost in the shuffle. But I don't want to forget it, but for different reasons now. Originally, I used the occasion to remind myself to live every day to the fullest. Now I want to use it as an opportunity to be grateful for everything I have subsequently experienced. Had I died that day, I would have missed out on seven wonderful years with my lovely wife Debbie. Nor would I have had the opportunity to even meet my newest grandchildren. I cherish all of the time I have spent with my family and friends. I'm glad I had this time with them!

Do I want to make another movie? Sure. But I'm cool if it never happens. I've done my share.

Do I want to publish another book? Sure. But it won't break my heart if it doesn't happen. The pleasure comes in the writing, not the acknowledgement.

Am I going to allow myself to be stampeded by the political outrage of the day and view the people who disagree with me as enemies?

Not a chance.

Life's too short for hate, but let's hope there's always another day for kindness and grace.

Happy Belated Death Day, folks.

Me and my lovely wife*
Here's the blog I wrote soon after my near death experience:  Me, Post Death.

Things were touch and go health-wise after the incident, so I decided to make a short film for my funeral.  Here it is:


I also wrote a memoir that Sheri Williams at TouchPoint Press found worthy of publication.  You can find it Amazon here:


And here's a special chapter about my first brush with death:
Chapter 15 - Quarter To Midnight

*photograph by Bryan Barnes.

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