Well, dear readers, the weird feeling went away and therefore all was well with my world and environs. Oh, it was a very busy day, but sans weird. I don’t have time to dilly-dally or even dally-dilly for I must write these here notes in a hurry and get to bed because I must be up very early. So, my non-weird yesterday was quite enjoyable for the most part and for the most part it was quite enjoyable. I got up. That was quite enjoyable, sort of. Then the tape transfer guy came by and picked up some tapes to transfer. That should be done by this evening, or so I’m told, because I told him there was not time to dilly-dally. After he left, I did a two-mile jog, after which a lot of the sheet music I needed arrived via e-mail – in fact, it was everything but three songs, and I’m still waiting on those – hopefully they’ll be here today, as singers are coming by to pick up stuff. After that, I went and had an omelet and two bagels for the meal o’ the day.
After that, I went to the mail place and picked up one package but not the VERY errant and truant package. Since I’ve now written this egghead twice with no response, I’m done. I wrote the ABE and gave them all the information, then I called Paypal and opened a claim, since you have to do that within thirty days of the payment. Unfortunately, the claim is against the ABE and not the actual seller because when you purchase through the ABE they process the payment and then send the seller money. Paypal has already refunded me the dough and I haven’t heard a peep from the ABE. IF the package ends up arriving, then I’ll contact the ABE (although as soon as they find out there’s been a charge back I’m sure they’ll respond) and allow them to process the payment, presuming the book is as described. Then I made all the CDRs, printed out all the music I had, and Melody and Mom came over and picked up her stuff. Melody is totally up for trying the weird song, Political Science. So, what I’m doing is having her and one of the other gals learn that and another song, and then at the first rehearsal I’ll figure out what’s going to work best, although I really suspect Melody will make something really funny out of Political Science, and it’s just so outré to have her do it that it makes me smile just thinking about it. After that, I did two Facebook event pages – one for the upcoming Kritzerland show, and one for the book signing in New York, which is now confirmed and happening. It’s on June 15 at the Drama Book Shop from five to seven, and I’m hoping that unlike my last trip, that this time I’ll get to see a lot of our East Coast denizens at the signing and then hopefully for a fun meal and get-together after. I must say that within an hour of the event page going up we already have ten people who’ve said they’re coming. I’m going to try and have a singer or two there and Lanny Meyers has said he’ll play for them – that way, if I’m reading a particular section of the book and talking about an arrangement or song choice, then we can have it sung. I invited every Facebook friend that’s ever worked for me – none of them, of course, have responded. But I’ll also make some calls and send out my own eBlast. If Brent Barrett is in town I’ll ask him to do something, I think. Anyway, I’m excited about doing it. Also, I hope some of our East Coast denizens can come see the East Coast Singer’s act at the Metropolitan Room that Sunday. But we’ll figure it all out as we get closer to the date, so mark your calendars. Then I finally sat on my couch like so much fish.
Last night, I finished watching a motion picture entitled DOA. I’d seen it when it was released and hadn’t liked it at all – in fact, I thought it was dreadful. But since then, I’ve become close pals with its credited writer, Mr. Charles Edward Pogue. So, I decided to get the Blu and Ray and give it another try. Well, it’s still dreadful, maybe even worse than back then. What went wrong? Apparently, the script that Mr. Pogue turned in was loved by Mr. Michael Eisner. But, as usual, the Hollywood Way is to change it all and that’s what happened, according to Pogue. They changed a lot of the dialogue, which is obvious if you know Pogue at all and his love of language. They took his snowy setting and made it take place in sweltering, sweaty heat – except when they needed thunder and lightning and rain – then suddenly it wasn’t so sweltering and sweaty anymore. They hired a directing duo who were beyond inept, from the world of MTV. All it was about for them was to show off their “cleverly” weird camera angles and camera moves, none of which make any sense whatsoever. In fact, they do everything but one thing – tell the damn story in a clearcut and clean way. That seems to be beyond them. So, the poor writer is at the behest of hacks, of a studio that has to change things even though they bought a script they loved – they have to justify what they do there, and they do so by mucking up the writer’s work, rarely for the better, because these people are so unrelentingly stupid and ill-equipped to criticize or change anything, let alone know what makes a movie work or not. As if that isn’t glaringly obvious, the movie tanked. Did they learn? Of course, not, they just moved on and screwed up more films and writers’ work. That is, after all, the Hollywood Way. It’s a bloody wonder that any film ends up being great and what the writer can be proud of. I’m told that the two stars, Dennis Quaid and Meg Ryan (when she still looked like Meg Ryan) had really loved Pogue’s script, and were not thrilled with all the changes, and therefore didn’t do much publicity for the film. As if the direction wasn’t wretched enough, we also have the score, which is far more suited to a Nightmare on Elm Street than a modern film noir. These directors are so inept, by the way (BTW, in Internet lingo), that there is no question as to who the villain is – all one has to do is watch how all the characters are presented, and pick the one with the least amount of screen time given the sort of importance of the performer’s role, and then watch the lighting and the way in which the directors have the normally excellent performer play the scenes. The transfer replicates the awful look of the film pretty well. Charles Edward Pogue deserved better – it was actually a clever idea to remake the original film. Too bad it couldn’t be with a creative team who were actually creative. I must say, Touchstone Films made some of the worst movies ever. They made some good ones, too, like Splash, but more often than not they came a cropper. The two directors, if you’d like to know, only made two films – this and then Super Mario Brothers. And that was the end of their feature career.
Well, why don’t we all click on the Unseemly Button below because I really must get as much beauty sleep as possible.
Today, I shall be up early because the helper will be bringing by some stuff and I have to ship something out by nine. Then our musical director comes at nine-thirty to pick up his stuff, then during the day hopefully the singers will get to me. I have some errands and whatnot to do, hopefully some packages to pick up, and then I’m having an early supper with Vini Cirilli – I’ll give him a lovingly inscribed book and I’m sure it will be fun to catch up.
Tomorrow, more of the same, Saturday I’m having dinner and seeing a play by Doug Haverty, Sunday I begin writing liner notes for the next release, and we’ll hopefully announce our latest come Monday.
Well, dear readers, I must take the day, I must do the things I do, I must, for example, do a jog, ship, give people their music and CDRs, hopefully pick up packages, and then sup. Today’s topic of discussion: What are your favorite low-budget science-fiction movies from the 1950s? Let’s have loads of lovely postings, shall we, whilst I hit the road to dreamland and not dream at all of the Hollywood Way.