Week #46 The Making of the Making of… - Movie

While looking online the other evening at the upcoming movies I was taken aback by the high percentage of them that where either based on another medium (usually comic books or video games) or a straight up remake of another film. The one that made me wonder if I was living in an evil alternate reality was the Robert Zemeckis motion capture remake of “Yellow Submarine”.

Having just ranted about this for a while my girlfriend Kirstin suggested that this weeks project be something about this subject. Her idea was a remake of a “making of” movie.

I liked the idea a lot and immediately thought the perfect one to do would be Heart’s of Darkness, the making of Apocalypse Now. We’d cast a full group of people to play Francis Ford Coppola, Brando, the weird tribe of people who had to play severed heads then we’d direct based it entirely based on a transcript from the original documentary.

Another more ironic idea would be to do one of a lesser known movie. Netflix’s first response to a search for the phrase “The making of” was “The making of Westword”. I’ve never seen that particular documentary but I’ve seen Westworld and I can only imagine how awesome the making of it was.

Another idea, to get even more meta, would be to do a dramatized film based on the making of “RKO 281”, the movie about the making of Citizen Kane. Now that would be far out!

Week #45 James Call’s World - Conceptual Art

So I didn’t have any idea what to post for this week so I asked James Call if he had any ideas this was his response:

"Yeah I think the backgrounds in Super Mario Brothers 1 and other famous video games should be filtered out (like, filter out blue or black, etc.) and replaced with congressional hearings, documentaries about torture, etc. I also think old episodes of Love Connection should be randomly interspersed in the middle of any given television show, especially news programming, like someone needs to invent a machine that does that. I also think occupying an entire city block and populating it entirely with cats and dogs - only humans allowed are caretakers, who can only visit - should happen.”

My idea would be to either work this into my ideas for project #25 (The James Project) or #37 (Greg Travis James Call Greg Travis).

Either way I think the best way to do it is to document these ideas as if James had already done them complete with pictures of there completion and critical/popular responses to them.

Week #44 Mishap Trading Cars - Trading Cards

This is an idea that actually belongs to two other people.

The idea is simple and fairly self explanatory. Trading cards with pictures of all the various members of Mishap Productions. The front having a picture and name of the member on it and the back containing facts and statistics about the person.

The first person to attempt this was James Call. He made a bunch of them back when we where living in New York. He used to hand them out at German Cars Vs. American Homes shows. You can see mine here. Or the Beebe brother’s one below.

A couple months back Kirsten Goldberg (Aka KGB) had pretty much the exact same idea. She sent out an email about it and we bounced a bunch of ideas back and forth. Eventually we decided it would be cool to make them like Magic the Gathering cards where we’d all have weird statistics like “smarmyness” and special abilities “exeptional sleeping power”.

We never got around to making the actual cards but it’s never too late. The idea just keeps seeming better and better.

Week #43 - Monthly Dinner Parties - Event

A while back me and my close friend Kirsten Goldberg set up a private cooking company called Brandywine Cooking. Kirstin Cummings made an awesome website, we did one dinner party, even made business cards. Then we sort of ran out of steam.

This year at the Mishap Prom Kirsten brought up the idea of Brandywine doing a monthly dinner party. At first we’d just do it for friends and family, charging little over the cost of the food, then when we start to really figure it out, we’ll raise our prices a little and open it up to the outside world.

We had our first one of these parties last night.

This was the menu:

Local Dungeness Crab and Chick Pea Fritters with Persian Cucumber and Yogurt dipping sauce

Shaved Fennel and Honeycrisp Salad with Champagne Vinaigrette

Mushroom Braised Lamb with Gremolata

Tangerine and Honey Roasted Roots

Assorted California Cheeses Curated by Kirstin Cummings

Warm Spiced Quince with Ricotta and Pink Peppercorn Cream

and here’s a picture of Kirsten with the lamb:

The party went wonderfully, if it was maybe a little strenuous but we learned a lot. I think we need to bring in at least one more person to help with the cooking and serving.

I want to have another one in either late december or early January. Who want to come?

Week #42 The James Hughes Call Show - Performance Piece

For the past ten years or so I’ve been promoting and producing the music of James Call. Either in the guise of the Missing Teens, German Cars Vs. American Homes, James Call Erotic Photo Hunt or just plane James Call, I’ve booked show for him, produced albums & done pretty much every promotion thing I could think of.

Recently it occurred to me that maybe we’ve been going at the wrong way. Maybe James isn’t a rock star, maybe he’s a performance artist.

I’ve loved James’ recordings for years but what’s always really sold him is his performances. Nearly everyone who’s ever seen him has loved him and recently his performances have become a truly ecstatic experience. They’ve also become more and more conceptual.

My idea, which I’ve been running by James every time I see him recently, is to have James perform with semi-scripted banter between his songs. We’d bill him as a sort of musical motivational speaker and he’d perform every weekend for three or four weeks like a play. He’s be aided by video, a power point presentation and maybe even celebrity guests.

James of coarse would have to do most of the writing (hopefully aided by at least one of the Greg Travis’) so the content would really be up to him. I figure we could have either a band or pre-recorded music or a little of both.

Obviously this was all reliant on James but if we could pull it off I’d be totally down to produce it here in San Francisco and maybe in New York possibly even in connection in some way with Sleepwalkers Theatre.

Week #41 Larry’s Idea for a Comic - Web Comic

Originally when I started this blog I wanted to feature some projects by other people. Alas this never really worked out.

However last week I received the following email from my good friend and fellow comic book geek Larry Luna.

I decided to make it this weeks project:

“I was thinking a good idea for a comic strip would be for any group of us to all tell the same true story but all from our own perspective. For example, with out seeing or being influenced by each others strips we would each write/draw a strip telling a funny or interesting story we all experienced. So if there were four of us at said "story" we would end up with four different versions/strips of that story. I got the idea when I talked to james about the time I punched him in the balls. Hearing his perspective was hilarious, so I think that should be our first strip, The mishap prom where the prom king got socked in the balls mid performance by a drunk mexican and a dog ferociously barked from the audience. I think this should be one of many random web comics on a webcomic blog we need to finally start.”

It’s a good idea and one everyone involved in is really excited about. What I need to do my part of this comic is find someone to draw it. Preferably someone who wasn’t there and doesn’t know the people involved. That way we can add a whole new element the Rashomon angle of this project.

Week #40 Everyones Gay in San Francisco - TV Show

I was out to dinner in North Beach for Larry Luna’s birthday the other day. Somehow in the middle of dinner the topic of Homophobic attitudes toward the Bay Area came up and I developed this little idea for a police drama.

In my story a New York cop gets transfered to San Francisco after a misunderstanding regarding his sexuality leads to constant harassment by the other officers.

In San Francisco he reluctantly investigates a series of murders in the San Francisco gay community. Throughout the coarse of the show he slowly starts to discover that literally everyone in San Francisco is gay. It turns out the murders he’s been investigating are part of a large conspiracy against a group who want the whole city to “come out of the closet”.

In the end he catches the murderers but in the process he inadvertently forces the whole city to go public. Everything works out in the end and the cop ends up living happily as the only straight person in San Francisco.

The show would obviously be a satire of both the bay areas appearance to the rest of the world and the “slowly unraveling conspiracy” genre.

There’s probably no way I’ll ever make a TV show but if anyone else wanted to, even as “webisodes” I’d be totally stoked.

Week #39 Celebrity T-Shirts - Conceptual Art Project 0

For five years straight, from June 1st. 2002 to June 1st. 2007, I wore t-shirts with some sort of comment written on them in black sharpie. See week #29 for more details.

After five years of trying it explain to people why I was “ashamed to be white” or hearing about how I wasn’t a total “failure” because my sperm made it to the egg first I decided I’d had enough.

I still enjoy wearing my shirts from time to time however. I especially enjoy the ones that comment a bit on celebrity. One of the big things I was trying to explore with my shirts was why people wear what they wear. My thesis is that $30 band shirts are really just saying “I like this band, talk to me if you do to”. Why not just cut out the $30 and write the bands name on your shirt?

One of the last shirts I made took this idea one step further. I decided to make a shirt for a semi-celebrity that I loved but I would never by able to buy a shirt that celebrated. I made a shirt that simply said “Brian Doyle Murray”. I enjoyed wearing that shirt almost more than any of the others.

I’ve decided to start making my shirts again. Not wearing them every day, just now and then. All these shirts will just have the name of someone who’s work or life I wish to celebrate.

So far I’ve got one that says “Peter O’Toole”

Some more I’m gonna make:

Harry Dean Stanton
Shelly Winters
Shock G
Randy Quaid
The Man-Thing

Week #38 Mishap For Hire - Service

For the past fifteen years or so me and a bunch of my friends have put on shows and released records and books under the banner of “Mishap Productions”. Over all this time we’ve developed certain skills that aid us in the promotion of events and products.

We can take a poster or postcard from concept to printing in under a week. We know enough visual artists and graphic designers to create pretty much any promotional item. We know all the places to send a press release or put up a poster.

My idea is to offer these skills as a service to other independent artists out there. We’d offer any level of promotion you need. From developing and executing an entire campaign of print and web promotions to simply doing small amount of postering for you. Depending on how much you want to spend, what you’ve already done or can do yourself and how many people you want to reach we’d be able to accommodate pretty much anything.

All I’d need to really get this going is a dedicated website (maybe this one) and some fairly good copy for facebook and craigslist and I bet I could really get this thing rolling.

Week #37 Greg Travis James Call Greg Travis - The Emails from New York During the First Decade of the New Century - Book

Recently I received this email from a guy named Greg Travis who I’d only met once or twice:

Vermont

Will you write a song called vermont

Or will you waste your FREE TIME.

What an opportinity you have and you don't even realize it.

Make something. CREATE SOMETHING.

Draw a picture and give it to someone.

Take your time doing it.

Make it PERFECT.

Call someone on the telephone.

Remember These?

.

Make it a priority in your life to make it to Vermont at some point

To bask in the colors of the leaves.

-GT

Oddly enough Greg has a half-brother also named Greg Travis. This Greg Travis I know much better I got this email from him recently:

Dicko Asscock & The Mind Police
> Live @ The Paladium
> $8

Dr. Wehrner Milliner And The Atrocious Techniques
w/ opener Tilly Jones of Magna Carta Cumshot
http://com.com.com.com.com.com.com.com.com.com/index.htm

At the Williamsburg Hôpital, corner of Wythe & Tégument

(2,000 P.M. Twentieth drink free. May-December love affairs get in
free. Special all-night shows on quarterly tax deadlines. Sixtieth
drink free. Space heaters available on request. No clapping. 2.5
baths, eat in kitchen, access to good schools. Murder, she wrote.
Tilly Jones appears courtesy Children's Television Workshop. Caution:
earplugs. Four dead in Ohio. I can't believe it's not yogurt. What
the hell is up with Jarmusch these days? You can't find good help
anymore.)

That email was forwarded to me from James Call. Both Greg Travis’ where in James’ band at one time or another.

James sends me things like this:

July... a time when people's thoughts turn to hot eggnog and presents under the tree. But did you know that July is also Rick James Awareness Month?

Rick James was born in a city we call Buffalo, 30 degrees below, but he didn't remain there long, soon entering America's hearts and minds as one of our premiere recording artists.

Rick James recorded several of his finest records at the Record Plant in Sausalito, CA (in my very own Marin County, back before the yuppies took over), where later Huey Lewis & The News would record the album "Sports"*. He was famous for simply dictating his assorted bass, horn, guitar and synth lines to his backing band, a la "No, it goes duh-doodledoodledoodledoodle-duh-duh-duh-DOOT," etc. From such non-traditional directions, Hits were made.

Though James is well known for capturing a 24-year old girl in his basement, typing her up for 6 days, forcing her to perform sexual acts, and burning her with a crack cocaine pipe, often overlooked is his even more horrific torture of Motown group the Temptations. James kept the Temptations in an environmentally sealed chamber and would only release them to bark terrible commands at them, such as "TEMPTATIONS SING!" It is alleged that James kept the Temptations alive by feeding them the flesh of lesser Motown groups, including the Spinners and the original Bar-Kays.

Though most well known for his super-hit "Superfreak," which would later be sampled by Stanely "M.C. Hammer" Burrell in the form of "U Can't Touch This," Rick James has produced countless hits along similar lines. Today, we present to you two quality examples of Mr. James' more frenetic work. Enjoy.

* August is Huey Lewis awareness month.

I’ve been receiving emails like this from the three of them for a long time. I’ve been keeping them in a little folder on my computer called “web art”. I wasn’t sure what else to call it.

After receiving Greg’s “Vermont” email I was inspired to put them all together as book for the rest of the world to enjoy. I thought I’d bind it and market it sort of like one of those books of letters between famous people.

The fact that two of the people where named Greg Travis just made it that much better.

All I’d really need to put this together would be copies of illustrator and photoshop and maybe someone who actually knows how to use them. Then I just need to wait until the end of the decade and I’ll print up some short runs of them.

Week #36 The Apartment - Comic

Way back in the early days of 2001, shortly before 9/11, I was living in New York City with Adam Beebe, James Call and James’ then girlfriend Barbara P. King. Three very creative people.

One night, right after we’d finished showing Barbara the last episode of Twin Peaks, we all got inspired and huddled together in front of my computer to create a surrealist story of our own.

We had all recently become very interested in comic books so we decided our story would be a comic. Although James and Adam we’re very good artists neither of them had the patients to draw and entire realistic comic book so we decided we’d create a photo comic. A comic book made up entirely of posed photographs and word bubbles.

The comic we developed was pretty awesome. It starred the four of us as roommates who wake up every morning in our apartment with no memory of how they got there or exactly who they where.

We did a couple of shoots for it but never got very far. I’ve included the whole script we came up with for the first issue below. It’s pretty awesome stuff.

Considering that we all live in different cities now (except me and Adam) there’s little chance we’ll ever finish it the way we wanted to. Still if we got some interest or inspiration we could always “recast” or have someone draw it as a normal comic.

“HOUSE” or “APARTMENT”

NO THOUGHT BUBBLES, NO NARRATIVE

We are stuck inside house : we never know what is going on and we always forget things.

There is something very bad outside, keeping us in!!!

Every morning, a different character is reading the newspaperr about a terrorist attack, India-Pakistan War, etc. This ALWAYS IS NEW to the characters, and the reactions of the characters to the news is revealing about their character, but always an “initial shock”

Perhaps there is a House of Consciousness to match the House of Ignorance?

Hearing screaming, but never recognizing it; as if screaming is alien to the charac ters, as infants

Characters are terrorized by outside weather

Barbara realizes hunger, and enters outside, sees an evil small girl. Upon returning, there is food in the house; Barbara begins to realize something about outside world, but the other characters deny it, and even to Barbara it is a mystery. For example, when she returns, the others say, “But, you were just in the bathroom,” and then she begins to doubt herself. Thus she is left with a sense that something is wrong (e.g., spidey sense), but cannot quite place it...

Children are evil. Animals are good.

Other characters enter and exit the household

plate breaking randomly in four pieces

CHARACTERS

Characters often use nicknames: “Dad,” “The Girl,” “That Asshole,” and “Junkie”

James (Enron)
- level headed, silent, strong
- Christian (moderate); strong moral system
- right wing; prepared for whatever happens
- Speaks many languages and knows literature; reads a lot

Damian (Ratso)
- drug addict; genuinely unhealthy
- feels dread when not on drugs

Barbara (Miss)
- high alert; curious; alarmed; “danger sense”; haunted by demons; ESP; i.e., archetype of “aware” hero (Dale Cooper, the Matrix guy, Peter Parker, etc.)
- visions

Adam (Sim)
- aloof jerk; cynical and bitter (like Jason Hogg or Albert)
- Manipulative. It is a habit and he manipulates without reason.
- Spontaneous, irrational
- Adam arranges chairs and other objects. Perhaps reflective of personality?

Relationships:

NO ONE EVER KNOWS why they relate to each other as they do, and the actions stemming from their relationships often come as surprises

Barbara and James are in a romantic / sexual relationship; adolescent
Barbara once had romance with Damian; Barbara (unconsciously) wants to maintain friendship but Damian (also unconsciously) wants to put the past behind.
Barbara and Adam = Brother and Sister
James is caring towards Adam, who tries to manipulate him but cannot, because of feelings of latent guilt
James and Damian disapprove of each other’s character.
Adam is slowly ruining Damian’s life, but Damian thinks he’s a great guy

When certain things are said (in presence of all characters), every character leaves the room and forgets what has just happened. Perhaps this reminds them of past disturbing incident?

Someone finds toilent clogged; all go into bathroom to stare. Someone then says, “Can you please leave? I’m trying to take a shower.” They’ve all forgotten what happens

Regional slang distinct to house

People occasionally raise memories, which scares them all who stop

It does not occur to the characters that they were children! The demons are all children... if childhood memories emerge, they upset all the characters

Talking dogs?

James turns into bowling ball?

Barbara sees face in window

People who come over are treated innoculously
They live outside “the city”; which city is never noted

As story continues, Barbara gains more consciousness, the story heats up... as it does, James, Damian and Adam vanish or go away.

One recurring character continues to check for Barbara’s pregnancy. These shots are MINIMAL, OFFSCREEN and MYSTERIOUS (completely to audience and even to most of the characters!)

Bill Clinton as potted plant?

Ana? as recurring character who brings basket of drugs. Relationship with Damian? (he would be ignorant, but not her)

Adam is always alone.

Tore as James’ incredibly right wing friend? dressed in fatigues.. SCRIPT - Story breakdown

1. Adam by himself, waking
2. Damian by himself, waking
3. James and Barbara by themselves, waking
4. Adam gets newspaper, sits in kitchen
5. Damian enters, and Adam says “blah di blah” (about the news event)
6. Damian says, “What’s news?” and looks inside empty cabinet (back of head shot)
7. Adam reacts “blah di blah” while Damian opens refrigerator; we see it is empty
8. Shot of Adam opening empty milk carton, while Damian responds dully from off-panel
9. Barbara’s hand
10. Barbara and James, silent; hand in same position. Barbara is contemplating hand.
11. Barbara’s face, confused (wondering if she is married)
12. James and Barbara, looking at each other, confused, feared. Barbara states “We’re not married.”
13. Another silent panel. SAME SHOT as last panel, as both characters contemplate situation.
14. Same shot. James says, “There’s a pain in my stomach,” and gets up out of bed.
15. James enters kitchen, and greets the others. All four characters are seen (Barbara seen through door). I.e, this shot is from hallway outside of bathroom. James says “Hello,” and the other two respond.
16. James tells others, “The young lady is in my bed.” The others respond. The dialogue should show that this event was unexpected and a revelation.
17. Barbara enters kitchen. She is surprised to see Adam and Damian. Adam, Damian and James are having a conversation about what they are going to do today (although they have no idea, and no idea what there is to do)
J: “So, what are you gentlemen going to do today?”
A: “Same thing I always do: Nothing!”
D: “There’s something I have to do today.”
18. Barbara walks into Adam’ room, looking for the bathroom.
A: “Do you have work?”
D: “I don’t think so, not today.”
A: “I’m not going to work today either. My stomach hurts.”
19. Barbara exiting Adam’s room.
B: (outloud, but not to others) “I thought this was the bathroom!”
20. Barbara walks to real bathroom.
D: “Way to go, Einstein!”
J: (laughing) “I can’t remember the last time either of you went to work!”
21. Three guys, uncomfortably laughing. (Barbara in bathroom)
J: “Or myself for that matter.”
A: “Where do you work?”
J: “The city.”
22. Barbara exits bathroom.
B: “I tried to vomit, but nothing came out of my mouth.”
A: “Do you have a problem with vomiting?”
J: “Mind your manners.” (to A)
D: (jokingly) “Yeah, shut up punk.”
23. All of them in the kitchen.
D: “I feel like I haven’t eaten in three days.”
B: “You haven’t eaten for three days. None of us have.”
24. All walk silently into living room.
25. All have sat down, and all are quite serious.
J: “None of us have eaten in three days.”
A: “Yep.”
B: “Well, shouldn’t we do something about it?”
A: (condescending) “We should eat.”
26. Same shot. Barbara alarmed.
B: “Wait. Where is the food?”
A: “The food’s outside, lady.”
J: “Some respect.”
D: “Someone has to go get food.”
27. Adam’s face. Angry, shocked.
28. James’ face. Concerned.
29. Damian’s face. Worried, queasy.
30. Barbara’s face. Alarmed.
B: “Well I am not going outside!”
31. James’ face.
J: “I don’t think it prudent for any of us to leave.”
32. Damian’s face.
D: “Fuck no.”
33. Adam’s face.
A: “Why don’t you guys go. I’ve got something to do.”
34. Same shot as 25-26.
D: “You don’t even know what you have to do!”
J: “Be considerate. We all have things to do.”
A: “Listen General, you don’t even know what ‘doing something’ is!”
B: “Be quiet be quiet be quiet!”
35. Same shot. Silence.
36. Same shot.
J: “Miss, are you alright?”
D: “Yeah, what is it?”
A: “That time of month again, or just crack?”
37. Damian gets up and goes to bathroom. James gets up and heads towards kitchen (Barbara looks at him). Adam goes as well, to finish reading newspaper.
D: “I’ve got to take my medication.”
A: “Maybe I should take your medication too.”
38. Barbara and James.
B: “Enron, where are you going?”
J: “Just... to...”
39. Damian emerges from bathroom with pills in hand
D: “Where is my tequila?”
B: (Holding bottle, very confused.) “Right here...”
40. Kitchen. Adam reading newspaper with James looking over shoulder.
J: “Say friend, what’s in the news today?”
A: “Nothing you’d like, understand or be interested in.”
J: “What is of interest to one man is of interest to all men. No value can be assigned to knowledge.”
A: “Totally. Write a book.”
41. Damian takes pill with liquor, as he walks back into living room. Barbara watching intently. Damian does not look at her.
42. Damian and Barbara in living room. Damian is irritated that she is watching him.
D: “I do this everyday, you know.”
B: “You do?”
D: “Oh.”
43. Barbara thinking.
44. Damian and Barbara, still in living room. Damian is leaving to another room.
D: “Where are my cigarettes?”
45. Barbara thinking.
46. Shot of the door.
47. Closer shot of door.
48. Still closer shot of door.
49. Damian re-entering living room.
D: “It’s time for you to go get the food. And get me some cigarettes while you’re out there.”
50. Barbara enters kitchen and begins putting on coat, etc.. James is still looking over Adam’s shoulder.
J: “Will you be doing the crossword?”
51. Barbara has put on coat and the others notice her. Damian enters from living room.
J: “That coat looks very becoming on you.”
A: “If I was on you, I’d be coming too.”
52. Different angle shot. Adam, Damian and Barbara laughing hysterically. James with arms crossed.
J: (under his breath) “Honestly.”
53. Laughing ends. Barbara nervous.
54. Barbara and door. Barbara looks at it.
55. Barbara’s face.
B: “Well, I’m going now.”
56. Shot of the others. All are nervous.
D: “It’s for the best.”
J: “Yes, that’s true.”
57. Shot of the handle of the door.
B: “Goodbye.”
58. ALL BLACK.
B: “See you later.”
59. Diagonal shot of hallway. Barbara is walking through it.
60. Same shot. Barbara is getting closer.
61. Same shot. Barbara is incredible close; perhaps so close that not her entire body appears in the shot (i.e., just her arm, face, etc.)
62. Shot of front door, from inside perspective. Perhaps with back of Barbara’s head?
63. Barbara’s hand on front door doorknob
64. Adam, Damian and James are standing and looking at each other. Their look should suggest that they are either concerned and worried, or perhaps conspiring!
65. Outside shot of front door. Barbara is sticking her head out, looking around.
66. Shot of Barbara’s face. She is stunned; she is looking up at other floors of building.
67. Shot of upper floors. Shot from Barbara’s perspective (i.e., person standing outside of front door looking immeadiately up)
68. Shot of Barbara’s eyes. (concerned; she senses something)
69. Same shot; Barbara’s eyes now blink, or seem weary.
70. Blurry shot of Barbara’s eyes, closing.
71. Shot of Barbara passed out on porch from little girl’s perspective. A small tuft of hair - the top of the girl’s head - can be seen at bottom of shot to establish her presence.
72. Upwards shot of little girl from from ground. Perhaps Barbara’s body can be seen on the ground from this perspective.
73. Close up on Barbara, waking up dizzily. Body or upper body.
74. Same shot. Barbara is horrified.
75. Straight-on shot of little girl. Now she holds a birthday cake.
76. Shot of Barbara with hand on the door.
77. Shot of hallway. Barbara entering door in haste.
78. Shot of Barbara stumbling to the ground.
79. Barbara crawls forward along ground. (upsetting angle perhaps)
80. Barbara reaches up to open apartment door.
81. The door is wide open. Barbara can be seen on the ground. The others are there in the kitchen. They are sitting around a table laden with good food. They look overjoyed.
J: “Just in time for dinner!”
A: “Manga manga!”
82. Shot of turkey carving or salad being tossed. Wine glasses are being toasted.
83. Shot of Barbara standing. She picks up a glass of wine but looks confused.
84. Same shot. Barbara is standing with a grin on her face and her glass of wine.
85. Toast? The toast should either be an old corny toast or perhaps foreshadowing.

The girl skips away. then she will re-enter to find her happy roommates with a huge dinner. She will suddenly be fine again, without knowing why, and remembering little.

Week #35 Zombie Town Opening - Play

This week is another project that’s well on it’s way to completion. In fact it’s a play that opens this Friday.

Zombie Town!

This is a Mockumentery play about a town overtaken by Zombies written with amazing a skill by Tim Bauer (The writer of last years hit “Magic Word”, otherwise known by the line I repeated over and over “Machesco”).

As far as a project for me this week, besides just opening the show and saying my lines, my real goal is to try and sell out our opening weekend.

So if you wanted to know what weekend to come... this is the one.

There will be Jello Shots!!!!

You can buy tickets here

Zombie Town
A documentary play, by Tim Bauer
Developed by the Catharsis Collective
& the people of Harwood, Texas

Watch our trailer video here
Exclusive promo comic by Larry Luna here & here

Opening Weekend Only!, a special pre-play screening of:
Hum Pop, a zombie short film by Yuri Baranovsky
Zombie Town
Fridays & Saturdays
Oct. 9th - Nov. 7th

The Exit Stage Left
156 Eddy @ Mason

(close to bart,
google maps proves it)

Shows: 8pm tix: $14 - 20
$1 zombie cocktail jello shots
Zombie Pin-up calenders for sale!

Reservations:
415 913 7272

www.sleepwalkerstheatre.com/tickets
($16 online)

Directed by
Tore ingersoll-thorp

with Alex Curtis,
Drew Lanning,
Damian Lanahan-Kalish,
Ariane Owens,
& Ian Riley
Special Guest Zombie:
Clay Robeson

Musical Accompaniment:
Emily Haltom (fiddle)
Ryan Beebe (banjo)
Lights: Ty McKenzie
Set: Ariane Owens
Costumes: Sarah Roland
Resident Texan:
Susan Brashear
Zombie Museum
curated by:
Hillary Frederich
Publicity: Erica Lewis
Artwork: Rob Sachetto
Video Trailer:
Sam Barnett

"zombie attacks are all fun and games... until they happen to you"

This production made possible in part due to generous contributions from Michael and Natalie Riley, Lucy and Larry Parks, David and Amy Kalish, Steven Cummings, and Ingrid Woods. We love you guys!

Week #34 - Zombie Comic - Comic Book

This ones kinda cheating since it’s actually pretty much finished so it’s not a project I want to do, it’s a project I’ve done.

Still I’m excited about it because, short as it is, it’s the first time I’ve had anything I’ve written turned into a comic (Drawn by the exemplary Larry Luna).

It was also made to promote a Sleepwalker’s play I’m in that I’m super excited about:

Zombie Town: A documentary play about Zombies! Running at the Exit Stage Left,156 Eddy St. San Francisco Fridays & Saturdays Oct. 9th - Nov. 7th

Here’s the comic:

Week 33 Experimental/Naturalism - Play

Last week we closed a show at the San Francisco Fringe festival. Our “sister” company Dark Porch was also doing a show called “Cockroach”. I went and saw it last week and it gave me an idea.

There show was an experimental movement piece with text, a meditation on homelessness and schizophrenia. It was very well thought out and performed. Still these sort of shows aren’t really my bag, I found myself drifting during performance.

The idea that came to me while I was watching there show was this:

A play in two acts. The first act is a sort of experimental performance thing like the Dark Porch show. All poetry and dance, an abstract meditation on a few characters and there relationships. Then the second act is all naturalism. The same characters, the same relationships presented the way sleepwalkers does best; a realistic slice of life.

I’m not sure what relationships and situations would work best for this but I find the structure totally intriguing. It would be an awesome thing for for Sleepwalkers and Dark Porch to do together. Or if anyone reads this maybe they could find a way to do it.

Week #32 Through the Looking Glass - Novel

A few months back I took a trip to New York city to attend a concert for my friend James Call’s 30th birthday. As a matter of coincidence that also turned out to be the same weekend that another old friend of mine, Mike Garlington, was passing though the city on his way back from Europe.

The trip was chaotic, fascinating, nostalgic, debaucherous and quite painful all at the same time. I slept so little and consumed so many damaging substances that I was having auditory hallucinations on the plane ride home.

The events of the trip seemed to all fit into a basic theme for me. They all reflected something I’d been thinking a lot about recently. What happens to all of us who’ve been spending our twenties behaving like it was a second adolescence when our bodies can’t keep up? What happens when the illicit desires we’d been slave to in our youth start to fade away and lose there luster?

I’d been wanting to write a novel about this for sometime. I’d written a few parts of a screenplay a while back about this subject. Interestingly a good part of the screenplay took place during the main characters return to New York. I suppose the city represents to me the hight of my youthful hedonism.

To add a little structure to this project I thought it would be good chance to do another thing I’d always wanted to do; base a story on Lewis Carroll’s less read sequel to Alice in Wonderland, “ Through the looking Glass and What Alice Found There”. I always had a soft spot for this book and it’s dream like plot with less well know characters made it an easier choice then it’s more popular predecessor.

Right now this idea is still mostly a nebulous blob existing more as few journal entries than anything else. I think the idea would be to follow the structure of the Carroll book for the stuff taking place during the weekend but also to include extended flash backs on my past with these people. The chances of me ever writing a whole novel are fairly slim but still writing the idea here makes it actually feel doable. Who knows!

Week #31 Breakupocalypse Fringe Show - Play

This weeks project is one that’s well under way and will in fact be presented to the public this Friday.

My theatre company Sleepwalkers Theatre is putting up a show at the San Francisco Fringe Feastival called “BREAKUPOCALYPSE”. It’s two plays in 30 minutes, both written by Maria Ferrari and both dealing with the subject of break ups.

I get to play a sort of stoner slacker dude, it’s the first time in years I’ve got to use my own mannerisms in a show. It’s a lot of fun.

Here’s our press release blurb for this thing:

Two exploding relationships in under twenty five minutes.

Written by Maria Ferrari

Runners [funny :)]

In the middle of a marathon, recent exes Hunter & Liz have one last knock down, drag out fight. While running. The whole time.

Directed by Tore Ingersoll - Thorp

With: Ariane Owens & Ian Riley

The Ugly City Game - [sad :(]

“The thing about cities is- you feel like they love you back…”

After a colossal heartbreak, Paul takes solace in the parts of Chicago others overlook.

Directed by Amy Marie Haven

With: Mallory gross, Tore Ingersoll - Thorp, Damian Lanahan - Kalish, & Leia Layus

The unjuried format of the Fringe Festival allows the artists to have total creative freedom when producing their work and provides for a unique theatre going experience. As a result of this boundary-free approach to creating theatre, the Fringe has become a popular development tool; encouraging artists to take risks, explore ideas, pose questions and tell their stories in new and exciting ways.

The complete schedule and descriptions of Fringe shows are available at www.sffringe.org

Please come see it! It’s Awesome!

Week #30 Reviewing the Reviewers - Website, book

I was pretty swamped last week with the Mishap Prom so that's why there was no post. But now I'm back (if maybe a day later than I would have hoped.)

This week's project is one that's still very much in it's larval stages. I came up with it a while back when I was looking for the phone number for the Li Po Lounge. The Li Po is a drinking establishment in Chinatown very close to my heart; after all this is where my theatre company Sleepwalker's Theatre was essentially formed. Still it is not a place oozing with swankyness, nor does it try to be.

It is my belief that all forms of criticism should be based on whether a project or place succeeds in what it's attempting to do. Therefore I was a little peeved when I saw on the Li Po Yelp page, next to some glowing semi-ironic ones, a few reviews disparaging it's dingyness, criticizing it's bathroom and even one that mentioned the "pervy chinatown ruffians".

After my initial irritation I began to wonder a little about the people who wrote these things. Where did there impulse to criticize come from? Where does that impulse come from in any of us?

To answer these questions, as well as give reviewers a little taste of there own medicine, I thought it would be cool to create a website where we review the reviewers. As a start I thought we'd review each person who's posted regularly to Yelp in a very methodical way. Read all their reviews and point out recurrent themes and make thesis's about where there impulses and quarks came from.

The natural extension of this would be to write a small book where you review famous critics in mainstream media the same way they review movies, books, food and music.

I'm not sure how hard this would be to do as a website but I do know the amount of work it would take to actually write the reviews might not be worth it. Still if this website existed I'd read it.

Week #29 The Anti-Fashion T-Shirt Project - Conceptual Art

For five years straight I wore only T-shirts adorned with something I’d written on them in black marker. The things I wrote on the shirts fit into two basic categories. The first category was self-deprecating remarks like “I feel vaguely guilty all the time”, “I’m weak” or simply the word “Ugly”. The others where things I wanted to express to the world but had some sort of fear that kept me from doing so; comments like “I’m ashamed to be white”, “I do Drugs and I Vote” or “I want to Kill Tom Hanks”. All the comments where stated as “I” statements, these where my feelings not facts about the external world, there was no way anyone could disagree with them.

The essential concept behind these shirts was two-fold. The first thing I was trying to do was examine the nature of fashion. I came to the conclusion that fashion was a way we non-verbally tell the world something about ourselves. My idea was to see what happens if we bypass all subtlety and just write what we feel on ourselves.

The second level was based on my belief that most of what we try to express to the world through fashion are positive traits. We are trying to tell people “I’m confident”, “I’m interesting” “I’m well adjusted”. These are usually things that are not entirely true about ourselves. With my project I wanted to make fashion that expressed the opposite, that said things about ourselves we maybe didn’t want the world to know. Thus “Anti-Fashion”.

The project it’s self is long over, it ended on July 1st, exactly five years after is started. The project was both entertaining and enlightening but after a while I just didn’t want to explain myself all the time.

I still have the shirts though and I still wear them from time to time (There’s over fifty of them in my closet). There’s pictures of models wearing them, videos of Anti-Fashion shows I’ve done even an award I got for “Best use of First Amendment Rights of 100% Cotton” from the North Bay Bohemian. I even sold some of them to people on eBay.

What I’d like is to find some way to show the project to people as a finished product. An experiment that ran it’s coarse. I’m not sure how to go about it but it would be nice to have something to show for it

Week #28 Better Biographies - Book

This weeks project is one I just thought up but I'm kind of exited about it. Three separate things inspired it:

1) When I was in New York recently I bought a tiny little hard cover book from a street side book seller about Sarah Michelle Gellar. Despite my deep love for buffy, the mere existence of the book was ludicrous. Also Sarah Michelle Gellar had just about the most boring life story ever.

2) I was reading my book of short film biographies, the biographical dictionary of film, and I came across of the director “George Stevens”. He directed Fred and Ginger in Swing Time, Montgomery Clift in "A Place in the Sun" and the story of christ in the Greatest Story Ever Told. He also shot some of the 16 mm footage of the liberation of Dachau.

3) Recently, with my Cultures of Wonder project and a few others in this blog, I’ve gotten more and more interested in creating fictions and presenting them as part of the real world.

I thought “what about writing fictitious biographies for real people?”. That way we could make Sarah Michelle Gellar as interesting to read about as George Stevens. After all public peoples life stories are usually told with an eye for entertainment, why not just cut out the editorializing and invent the entire thing.

I’d want to do about 20 of them and present them as a book. I’d love to have twenty different writers work on it, one for every celebrity. Maybe I’d even get someone to illustrate it with portraits supposedly commissioned by the celebrities, although that might be too silly.

Week # 27 Shows at Lobot - Event

Ryan Beebe, my old friend and co-conspirator asked me recently if I’d be interested in booking shows with him at Lobot Gallery, a venue and art space where he lives.

The idea is simple enough. He’s got a great space and it’s open most weekends, we might as well start filling it with people and music.

We’ll be starting small, one show a month starting in early October and then moving to a biweekly thing in the beginning of the year. These wouldn’t be huge shows just something to keep us busy and keep the art/music world in Oakland thriving.

We met the other day and we both agreed that the thing to do would be to make them theme show. Kinda like the Mishap shows but way more layed back.

We need bands, art and films. Oh and we need a name for our project something simple that doesn’t commit us too much to any one aesthetic.

Here’s the themes we’ve come up with so far:

Tropical (in the Winter of coarse)
Black Coffee (Where we serve coffee)
Jumpsuit Party (Me and Ryan got thrown out of one these once)
Outer-space Cocktail Party
County Fair
Dance Contest
Dance Marathon
South of the Border Party
Talent Show (Ryan did one of these for his birthday it was bad ass)
Roller skate Party
70’s Porno Party (Biggest mustache contest)
Movie Monster/Vampire Party (Not around Halloween)
Christmas Party (In summer)
Art’s and Crafts
American Gladiators
Bouncy house (in the house)
Laser Tag (All we needs the equipment)
007 Party

Let me know if you guys can think of anything else.

Week #26 Written on the Bathroom Wall - Blog

I don’t know how to drive. I never learned. Because of this I spend a lot of time walking around and sitting in coffee shops. I also spend a lot time in bars but that has nothing to do with driving or not driving.

During my adventures in the outside world I end up visiting a lot of public restrooms. And one thing almost all public restrooms have is graffiti.

Pope John Paul II (The good pope) once refereed to graffiti as “the soul crying out against indifference”. I’ve always loved this quote but really if all you have to “cry out” is “Rakkyr2” or “Suck a dick” then maybe you deserve to a little indifference.

Still, out of all the graffiti I see, at least once a week I see something truly amazing like the this:

Inspired by my girlfriend Kirstin’s blog and my new digital camera I’ve decided to start a new blog where I post something I’ve seen on a bathroom wall once a week. I’m working on a backlog right now so I won’t end up in a situation where I’m searching public restrooms for graffiti. I’m also working on figuring out how to get my photos off my camera. I’ll probably start this thing in a month or so.

I’ll let you all know.

Week #25 (Now with Pictures!) The James Project

I’ve known James Call for a good deal of my life. I met him in high school. I’ve lived with him for four years in Queens. I’ve traveled with him to China. I’ve spent way too much time talking about comic books with him.

Seeing James perform recently in New York I was struck as I usually am by what a truly unique creature he is. It reminded me of a project I’ve wanted to do since my last days living with him.

James creates endless amounts of things. Music, drawings, writing, scraps of paper with strange notes on them. He once made a large flow chart of all the ways he knows his friends. He’s also responsible for shit like the map below.

What I want to do is take all the stuff James has created in his entire life and, in the tradition of a few of my recent projects, invent an entire history as if we didn’t know James. Like an anthropological study of who we think this person is based entirely on all the object and documents we found in his room.

Or alternatively and even better we can give all his creations to someone who truly doesn’t know him and have them come up with a biography for him. We should be able to find someone I mean isn’t that what the internet is for?

Week #24 The Mishap Movie - Film

Having recently watched Rock & Roll High School again I got inspired to make a rock & roll movie. Films like Help, The Girl Can’t Help it, Tougher than Leather even Spice World have alway held a special place in my heart. Movies with flimsy plots and often just as flimsy acting. Films set up to highlight the music of whatever artist or artists it was made for. Movies that, although not the best craft wise, are always fun to watch because you can see the people making them are having so much fun.

I want to make one of these for Mishap Productions. My only real concrete idea of what I want it to be is that I’d like to have all the people even vaguely connected to Mishap both play a role and perform in some way.

A couple of ideas I came up with while talking to James Call about it over the past few days:

A classic film noir where all the Gomorran’s play gangsters and the Missing Teens play cops

A gangster story about a power struggle due to the death of the mob boss “God”

Shooting on both coasts but presenting them as one city so characters would get in the subway in NYC and get out in San Francisco.

Stealing overdramatic lines from other films to insert in at inappropriate times.

Most of these where just stuff we came up with while bullshitting. I’d really like to make one of these movies some time. We wouldn’t have to come up with much of a script just some basic ideas then start shooting. I have a camera. What I really need is a very patient editor.

Week #23 New York Food Blog - Blog

Starting today I’ll be in New York City for the next two weeks. I’m subletting a place in Williamsburg with my girlfriend Kirstin of little art project blog.

The four years I spent living in New York city where the years my love and fascination with food grew the most. This fact combined with the fact combined with the fact I’ve always wanted to become a better food writer lead to this weeks project.

For the next two weeks me and Kirstin will each post a daily review of the food we ate that day to our new blog “the eating project”. I hope to cover everything we eat from our dinner at Nobu we already have reservations for to the trip I plan on taking to my favorite souvlaki stand in Queens.

With any luck it should be interesting to see our different perspectives on our shared experiences. At the very least me and Kirstin will become better food writers and you readers will have some great recommendations and some vicarious food thrills.

Check it out here: http://theeatingproject.blogspot.com/

Week #22 A Biographical Dictionary of Comic Books - Book

Anyone who’s ever lived with me or spent a long period of time at my house is familiar with the Biographical Dictionary of Film by David Thomas. It’s been in my bathroom for about 10 years.

For those of you not familiar with it. It’s a book that covers, in alphabetical order, everyone who made there life in films. These lives are covered as sort of critical biographies. There criticisms more than they are lists of facts from peoples lives. Therefore of George Lucas’ later Star Wars films he has this to say “maybe someday robots will watch them” of Michael Bay he has opens thus “In the summer of 2001 there was a story going around hollywood that Michael Bay was seriously depressed.” and ends like this “We may respect his suffering, but we know this: ours is greater. And he has millions as medicine.”

There’s positive ones as well. Some beautiful writing on Welles and even Chronenberg. But the nasty stuff is really the best.

My idea is to create the same thousand page epic but for lives made in comic books. Create a true critical analysis of comic book creators from Stan Lee to Art Spiegelman to Rob Liefeld.

Just like the film book I’d attempt to cover everyone who’s really made there life in the art form. Naturally I couldn’t get everyone but there’s easily over a thousand I could name right now who’ve made the medium what it is.

There’s already a great book by called Slings & Arrows: Comic Guide, a critical assessment of over 2500 titles. But there’s nothing out there to cover the people that made these comics.

Naturally this is a huge undertaking and also a rather expensive one. I’ve read more comic books than most people on earth but still there’s some major gaps in my reading. It would make sense to have a partner or partners but what makes the film book so good is that it’s all writen in one voice. Maybe we could get away with two distinct voices.

Week #21 More Music No One Will Ever Hear Redux - The Boxed Set

So after my last post I got an email from the esteemed Greg Travis #1; former member of German Cars Vs. American Homes and co-creator of this crazy shit: http://narrative-inscription.com/.


Greg had tried to get me to make a Mishap Boxed set a couple of years back. His idea was to make it real classy and try and pass it off as an art item. At the time I put it down to him slightly fucking with me.

When Greg emailed me again after my last post to re-assert his need for a Mishap Boxed set I got a sort of idea.

What if I combined my last two projects? Made a mishap boxed set where we entirely made up our history and identifies. Along with CD’s of all our music there would be a large full color book explaining the history of the bands, the inspiration for the songs and the bio’s of the artists; all entirely fictional.

Naturally there’d still be a pretty limited market for it. Still I really like the idea more of the compilation or boxed set as a conceptual art project then just a collection of songs. It would be even cooler if we could get people we don’t know to write the stories about us.

Week #20 - More Music No One Will Ever Hear - Album

The title is one Mishap Productions has used a few times for compilations of music made by people involved with us. Some day I’d like to put out a semi-real record under this title, a sort of retrospective of the entire mishap musical history.

It would include everything from music we made in high school to the tracks from the newest Gomorran Social Aid and Pleasure Club and Missing Teens Albums plus a few tracks from bands who’ve played the prom. I’d like to get it mastered and print a small run of it.

The ideas not really the most original or complex. Probably something that only a small group of people would be interested in but still it would make me really happy to have made it and to own a copy.

Week #19 The Music Review as Fiction

Here and there throughout my life I’ve tried my hand at music reviewing. A while back I actually did it pretty regularly for a fairly main stream blog. It occurred to me while I was reviewing that, in trying to keep my review interesting, I’d always seek some sort of context usually related to the band’s past or there “story” sometimes related to the place I perceived them as taking in the musical landscape.

I got better at reviewing but I always felt a little creatively stunted by the form. I couldn't find an original approach to it. Then it hit me; why not just make up an entirely fictitious context for the review and use that to explore the effects of the music. The idea would look something like this:

The Missing Teens- Music for Young Adults

The Missing Teens originally hail from the badlands of South Dakota where front man James Call’s family were the first to own any sort of musical instrument. The Call’s used this advantage to corner the musical world in the Northwest creating the core-core genre and guarding there monopoly on it using the most cut-thought of business practices.

The youngest and brightest of the current Call clan, James Hughes Call, splits his time evenly between living as a much loved New York impresario and acting as CEO of Core-Core InCorePorated in Sioux Falls, South Dakota.

The missing teens, a group James put together from the greatest musicians in the Northwest and the most promising socialites of New York City, have released there debut album with the much awaited “Music for Young Adults” a return to the families core-core roots.

The subject matter of the album spans all facets of the Core-Core magnets well documented life. From “Drive Up Hill” about James’ time working on the peace process in Sri Lanka to “Andy and Miranda” a song rumored to be about the lost weekend he spent in Morocco with Brad and Angelina.

and so on....

Hopefully I’d could get a venue with an already built in audience to start doing these. The other option would be, if someone else was interested in doing this with me, we could create a website devoted to just doing these reviews. Or maybe I could just start posting them to the Mishap Blog. Anyone got a CD they want reviewed?

Week #18 Bay Area Alphabet - Poetry series and book

For the past few years I’ve been working on a series of poems, one for every letter of the alphabet. Much like my past Subway Poems (published as Crippled by Depression #1) these are all little snapshots of people I see as I wander around. Unlike the Subway Poems these aren’t exclusively girls and there all people from the Bay Area.

All the poems are based on alliteration here’s a few examples:

F
Four foreign girls
Heading for the beach
Too frilly and fresh
For the F bus

S
Silly sleeping girl
Slightly seems like she might
Be giving herself
Scoliosis

T
Tired two-year-old toddler
Trying to tell me something terrific
But she doesn’t know how to talk

I’ve got at least two of most letters and more of some (and no x’s or z’s). I hadn’t really thought about these in a while but recently a new magazine asked me if I had any locally themed stuff and I thought of these. Taking a look at them now I’d love to finish them, all I really need is someone to help me edit and someone to illustrate them. Maybe I could get 26 different artists, one for each letter. That would be awesome!