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December 19, 2019:

A LOOK BACK AT 2019, PART ONE

Bruce Kimmel Photograph bk's notes

Well, dear readers, my goodness, we really are getting towards the end of 2019, aren’t we?  So, perhaps it’s time for the annual look back at what the highlights of the year were, me-wise.  Back on January 1 I, of course, began writing my new novel, Murder at the Magic Castle.  I had fun with it, and I think it came out very well.  It was fun to get back to Adriana, mom Margaret, friend Billy, cat Furball, Patrick Bronstein, and Detectives Ramirez and Coyne, and to write a whole slew of new characters.  There were also all of our Kritzerland shows, which were fun.  We not only celebrated Kritzerland show 100, but our ninth anniversary.  That’s really something, when you think about it.

I also made the decision to do two audio books – one for Murder at the Magic Castle, which I did through ACX, finding a very good gal to do it, and then GEE, which remains one of my favorites of all that I’ve written.  For that one, old pal Diana Canova asked if she could submit and audition, which she did, and I hired her instantly.  She came to LA to do it, we were in a studio for two days, and I think she really did a great job.  If you like audio books, I recommend giving them a try.

I directed a little cabaret benefit for the Group Rep that was a lot of fun.  And I continued to work with the authors of a new musical that we’ve been going back and forth on for three years.  Ultimately, the composer left the project and it was simply expedient for me to take over, which I did.  And so, over the summer I wrote the music for many songs, also working with the show’s lyricist, Adryan Russ, to really focus the lyrics, make them work for the characters who are singing them, and also working with the book writers on the structure of the show and laying out the scenes.  It’s veered a bit from the film it’s based on, and for the better, I think.

I know I’m forgetting things and I don’t feel like going back through the notes to see what.  Then there was the major business of doing The Creature Wasn’t Nice for DVD.  I’d been wanting to do it forever, the original director’s cut, so people could finally see what the film we actually made was supposed to be.  But I only had a three-quarter-inch video done off the answer print of my version – that is literally all that existed, and it was done at a time long before tape transfers of 35mm were all that common, as home video was in its infancy.  And I’d hard-matted the answer print, so we were dealing with a letterbox image inside a 4×3 frame.  I had the tape transferred to hi-rez digital and handed that off to my friend and wonderful editor Marshall Harvey, as I really wanted to futz with my cut just a bit, to do things I would have done had I a) had the time, and b) been allowed to.  We decided to add a fair amount of music to help move certain sequences along, and he had good ideas for tiny lifts to help the pace.  Considering what we were dealing with, he was able to do more than I would have ever thought possible.  But each time I’d watch the latest, I’d want more, so that process took a while.

Then came the endless authoring tests – they did one right away to see if blowing up the image to 16×9 was even feasible – it wasn’t – it was just a horrible smeary mess.  So, we mushed on, but at the eleventh hour a new technology came into play, tests were done, and even though it seemed like a long shot, it worked and the 16×9 image did not degrade from its source – in fact, in one way it improved it, as it got rid of all the video scan lines.  So, that was a happy moment.  The Indiegogo campaign to fund it went fabulously well and we raised well over the 5K that was our goal – and a good thing, too, as raising more than twice that amount was a good thing, since the price of everything went up hugely all along the way, especially the cost of doing the three commentary tracks, which was a huge expense I was not quite expecting, almost quadrupling the original projected cost of that.  We’ll leave off there and pick up in tomorrow’s notes.

Yesterday wasn’t so bad a day.  I got about six hours of sleep, had to deal with a few things I’d rather not have dealt with, announced our new titles, got orders but haven’t done what we need to do for me to get through the end of the year, so hopefully they’ll keep coming in, then I picked up some packages, got a quick meal from McDonald’s, came home, ate it, and then tried to relax before going to audition more actors. I sent two new tunes to Adryan, so she can write some lyrics – these two songs should be the last of them until we get the rewritten second act.

I watched about forty-five minutes of the critics’ darling, Little Women.  Since I’m not really a fan of its director, and no, I didn’t really buy into or care about Ladyboy – sorry, Lady Bird – and so far, Little Women is exactly what I would have suspected it would be – a quirky heroine just like the film’s director – spunky, played by Saorise Ronan, and I’m just not really enjoying it very much, but will stick with it until the end.  She also resorts to some really silly directorial affectations – suddenly going into slow motion for no discernable reason, then speeding up the motion – every time it just took me right out of the movie.

Then I moseyed on over to the theater and auditioned four actors, then came home.  I tried to watch twenty minutes of Motherless Brooklyn – it has a nice 1950s production design and the first sequence is okay, but the thing is two-hours- and twenty-six minutes long or something like that – and it already feels that long this early on.  Clearly a project that was important to Edward Norton, its star, writer, producer, and director.  I’m not sure I’ll finish that one, since I have to stream it on the computer, which is not all that comfortable.

After that, I opened the new book document and did a little more preliminary writing on its opening.  I think I’ll enjoy doing this one, even though it’s going to require a lot of work in certain ways.  But it feels right for what will be my twentieth book.  Then I listened to music and relaxed.

Today, I really do get to have a complete ME day and boy do I need it.  I’ll try and get up by eleven, I’ll do the usual morning stuff, and hopefully we’ll have some more orders, I’ll eat something light but fun, I’ll hopefully pick up some packages, and then I’ll relax and listen to music and watch a motion picture or two.

Tomorrow, I may have to audition an actor before we do our show, but the daytime should be mine all mine, then I’ll do the pre-show announcement, and maybe stay to see the show, although that will depend on the audience size and reaction to the first ten minutes.  Saturday, she of the Evil Eye comes, and I think we may audition more people that morning.  Then I’m dining with Peyton and her mom, and then seeing the Saturday night performance of our show.  I must say, our reviews have been incredible, but I don’t take much of that too seriously.  We did get a WOW from Steven Stanley, and we did luck out with a rave from Stage Raw, which regularly does give some pretty terrible reviews – no guarantees with them.  Here’s the link to that one.

http://stageraw.com/2019/12/17/the-man-who-came-to-dinner-theater-review-2/

Sunday, I’ll be at our matinee, as I know lots of folks who are coming.  Monday, I’ll do my big shopping for the Christmas Eve Do, and then on Tuesday we do the Do and then it’s Christmas.

Well, dear readers, I must take the day, I must do the things I do, I must, for example, be up by eleven, hopefully have a LOT more orders, eat, hopefully pick up packages, relax, watch stuff, and listen to stuff.  Today’s topic of discussion: What are the highlights of your 2019?  Let’s have loads of lovely postings, shall we, whilst I hit the road to dreamland, happy to have taken a look back at 2019, Part One.

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