LONELYPOND PRESENTS

Ha…that amused me. Enjoying the Olympics, although the curling tournament seems to take as long as the entire Winter Games (did you know a good set of curling rocks costs $1500 (acc. to Wikipedia) and there’s Curling for the Wii). But it’s fun to watch. Little Brother #2 only watches curling and hockey. The last Olympics he claims to have developed a crush on the Japanese curling team; I have yet to inquire about this year’s favorite.

Quick summary of stuff:

Really want to see Judy Dench as Titania in Midsummer. Once again, Sarah Hemming envy strikes. Midsummer is one of my favorite of Shakespeare’s plays and I’m developing a movie related project (or two).

There’s a new Stirfry Neon chapter. Current adventure: The Lady Lost or What Was I Thinking When I Turned That Corner.

Blink Kitty Love has been dormant for a month while I steep and work on tigers — Happy Year of the Tiger. Almost done with my tiger meditation period, including an excellent animation. Look for it here or the Twitter announcement (aka follow me @lonelypond).

I am considering some Blink Kitty Love changes, taking things a bit more experimental and exploring the world around the band…or just exploring the world and having fun with my unique animation style and humor. I’m much better at contained stories than an ongoing soap opera kind of thing and the best Blink Kitty Loves are when I’m inspired to comment/riff on something happening now. So I’m going to take that thought and see where it goes. I had a lot of fun putting in some hard work on my Year of The Tiger animation and I think it’s the best I’ve done yet. So I’ve been considering what I could do if I put the work into a longer story. The Olympics has me thinking: what’s my gold medal event.

The Lonely Pond annual meeting surprised me — it always does, but this year it wasn’t in the good way. I’ve been mulling over what happened for a couple of months now. We stalled right at the beginning with a restructuring discussion and didn’t get to my grand plans. The rest of Team Lonely Pond wants to be involved and doesn’t want to give up the company or the name, but they don’t want to commit the energy to take us to the level I wanted to go for reinventing Shakespeare on the web. So we’ve put the company on hold and I have consultants available. So I’m scaling back to one project at a time and dealing with the realization that I can do what I want, but I have to be certain that I have the enthusiasm to carry it through by myself. Which means I’m revisiting some earlier ideas that I once loved and are sitting on a shelf for no real reason at all.

Pop Culture Reviews + News:

I like Lady GaGa — I’ve been wandering around singing Paparazzi. It’s Little Brother #2’s fault; his taste in music sometimes surprises me. Caught Justin Bieber’s cover “Love Me” of The Cardigan’s LoveFool and it’s simply ludicrous. I hate when there’s an American Idol style remake of song that rolls on Radio FlashCatFlash (yes, I mean you Adam Lambert’s Mad World. Alison Iraheta’s Someone To Watch Over Me seems to be the only one that doesn’t cause me to twitch but that’s a song with multiple covers already and might be my weakness for brunettes showing.)

The Web Files is branching out with their new Buzz edition, covering events + news around the wonderful world of web series. Host Kristyn Burtt has great energy always, but especially when she’s prowling an event with a microphone, capturing the spark of the moment.

Smallville: took a break from the Olympics to catch the Wonder Twins episode. Not bad. I think we might be back on Team Smallville, although their color and emotional palette remains a bit dark for me.

My robot loving buddy @spacehospital is showing episodes from their first season on KoldCast TV. It’s insane fun with puppets, models and special effects.

Starstruck — bah, slow, boring, a really poorly paced + badly written version of It Happened One Night where Sterling Knight plays the spoiled heiress part. Well acted but characters not believable. And let’s be honest: Brandon Mychal Smith should have played the lead in a better written movie. He had one musical number and he brought enough energy to it for the whole movie. Disney once again loses points for their lack of showcasing multiracial actors.

Haven’t seen The Lightning Thief because Gayle wants to finish the book first. Oy. Love the How To Train Your Dragon Olympic themed commercials.

OK, curling calls. Enjoy the rest of your weekend. Thanks for stopping by.

Greetings, o most loyal and amazing blog visitors. Happy 2010. I’m going to give you a fairly thorough round up as I would really like to be taking a couple of weeks for some R + R while it’s cold and all my baser instincts are saying, “Stay under the covers, it’s warm.” I am not particularly good at the R + R things so I may be forced to resort to things like read all the Harry Potter books, read all the Sarah Caudwell books, read all the Terry Pratchett Watch themed books, read my MFK Fisher + Elizabeth David, dig out my Raymond Chandler and Peter Cheyney, read through the pile of newspapers, watch all the movies I’ve borrowed from friends (Tristram Shandy, Bubba Ho-Tep, Steam Boy), watch the movies I watch every year and skipped in ‘09 (the original 3 American Pies, Tomb Raider, Bring It On, The Bandwagon, Strictly Ballroom, etc.)

So to tide you over, there’s the new Blink Kitty Love, all the old Blink Kitty Love, the band website and this:

Lunch With Tristram Stuart who feeds people from discarded food to highlight wastage.

Article about really cool jazz pianists CD collections I can’t afford.

The FT’s this year in culture quiz…

Stefan Stern’s suggestions for movies to watch and pick up business tips from this season (for the rest of you who don’t do R + R).

Very cool story about a native Gypsy theatre experiment/troupe in Spain. I am always amazed by the effect theatre can have on both audience and performers.

Umberto Eco’s latest looks to land on a list of fun reads.

Hoping to catch Nine at the local cinema…doesn’t look like Orson Welles and Me or The Station will make an appearance here; bumped Moon to the top of the Netflix queue and may soon give in to the buy Star Trek and/or Wizards of Waverly Place The Movie DVD urge…also on that list, the Cary Grant double feature — The Bachelor and The Bobby Soxer and Walk, Don’t Run, which I just saw on TCM and laughed at the frequently priceless moments.

TV: Zeke and Luther’s I, Skatebot episode looks cool, a bit worried about Wizards vs. Werewolves (Wizards of Waverly Place) — perhaps too soon after Wizards vs. Vampires and what will be left for Max, Wizards vs. really grumpy mythological creatures left out of the Twilight series — not really watching much on Nick at the moment except for late night What I Like About You, Top Gear kicks off a new season soon (Gayle very excited), I still miss Warehouse 13 and I really need to spend more time reading.

Merchant of Venice (#merven) planning not kicking into gear — but it’s early yet. Trying to get an artist for the logo, Gayle’s scheduling shows, I’ve decided to have people audition with their cool electronic gear (cell phones, laptops, etc.) Need to read through the play again; concerned about the Bassiano/Antonio axis –and no, I don’t mean in the gay way, just in the everybody’s always so concerned about Portia and Shylock, but hey without these two, I’ve got two right side wheels on a vehicle that needs two on the left as well.

The Lonely Pond Productions, Inc. annual meeting went in unexpected directions. But Google Wave worked well when the snow prevented travel. I need to put together scripts for a short live action adaptation and a few animations. And mull over movie related issues some more.

And Sarah Hemming’s “Twelfth Night” review left me grumping about people who weight down comedies with misery so I have been considering exactly how tragic the characters of Malvolvio, Sir Andrew, Wile E. Coyote, Elmer Fudd, et al are. And her Rope review makes the show sound like an excellent experience to have in a theatre.

Speaking of Hitchcock, there was a Vanity Fair photospread (thanks @njtam, a fellow Hitchcock fan) of modern stars in classic Hitchcock scenes…the women do better than the men, who seem to suffer from not being Cary Grant or Jimmy Stewart.

My current favorite breakfast is oatmeal with hot apple cider for a drink, my current most likely to be worn shirt is this one (it amuses Gayle) and I heard this amazingly goofy song at one of our favorite restaurants that Google has been no help with finding the title of…the lyrics as we can remember go something like this: “you’re good cause you don’t do things like (or that) you should…you’re cool cause (cuz?) you don’t do things by the book.” Sounded like a guy singing, it was a Spanish-Peruvian restaurant where music usually has spanish lyrics, it was chanty, and if you drop the title/artist in the comments, there will be a reward.

And I think that gets you up to date — and should tide you over for awhile. Wishing you the best of 2010’s. Stay warm.

P.S. Cool toasters…I need one.

Haven’t been posting here as much because I’ve been having fun finishing my Christmas themed (ELVES! The Fat Man! Danger!) holiday noir short spoof, Which List For The Mrs.?

Lively Peter Aspden interview with Christian McKay, Orson Welles of Me and Orson Welles.

I think this will be a good year for Oscar hosting as Steve Martin’s and Alec Baldwin’s performances in It’s Complicated were great — with remarkable mischief on Baldwin’s part and excellent reserve on Martin’s. Funny, solid movie. We’re skipping the Squeakquel as all reviews indicate redone, tired and stole plot from High School Musical and I can’t see it being worth matinee prices. Which is a shame because I liked the first one and I thought they had more pride in the franchise.

There were an amazing amount of people at the movies on Sunday. The late afternoon It’s Complicated showing was nearly sold out and other movies had lines and there were even more people coming in as we left. It’s already been a record breaking year and those in the know are expecting it to finish off even stronger.

Enjoy your New Year’s Eve and three day weekend. Stay safe, warm and sober (if you’re driving). Thanks for stopping by. My plans? Trying to finish a New Year’s themed Blink Kitty Love (holiday related humor = built in time stress) and a weekend full of some of our favorite movies (plus Pineapple Express, the current Netflix offering).

And please don’t forget to vote for Blink Kitty Love as a Best Experimental Web Series nominee. Thanks!

But with a title like that, we’ll pull a switch and start off with James Altucher, who has a WSJ.com blog post telling us what to expect in 2010. Mr. Altucher posted the link on Facebook, which is the only place I keep track of him anymore.

Switching to Twitter as a launching point, rebooted Tweetdeck after a reading a review that mentioned it incorporating the Twitter list feature. I’d been spending more time on the Twitter proper site because checking my conversationalist list was more effective than sorting back through twhirl. Plus, I love the translating feature and the lovely green I’ve turned the backdrop. Anyway, I had it search for the term robot; I’ve since had it stop searching for the term robot since the dominant account was @Fart_Robot or how to learn a lot about the bodily functions of strangers, their animals, their friends and the people standing near them in a short yet too long period of time. @NoteRobot was more fun; collecting “note to self” tweets.

Peter Aspden had a column prompted by Guy Ritchie’s Sherlock Holmes take. I think I’ll skip it but at least Aspden’s column made me almost put it on my movie list.

My movies to see out list currently includes Me and Orson Welles, Nine (neither of which is in the area — BOO), Invictus and, of course, Alvin and the Chipmunks, the Sqeakquel. I think the next movie Netflix is sending our way is Pineapple Express, after the Christmas in Connecticut double feature. First one much better and did you know Arnold Schwarzenegger directed the second. Re: second version — the quiet Kristofferson/Cannon moments work + the live broadcast is funny but I probably won’t be watching it next year. In the original, love story not much, but you’re SO happy when the priggy architect doesn’t marry her and Felix (S.Z. Sakall) is a HOOT. Plus, nice, not too threatening Sydney Greenstreet turn. Just discovered Jennifer Garner is apparently doing a third version.

Good article from Gizmodo about Orson Welles and his appetite for new technology.

And the Christmas song I was reminded of today: Christmas Wrapping by The Waitresses. It’s also a hoot (word of the day apparently).

And my post Solstice t-shirt: “O Holey Night.” And a Christmas Robot poster.

And if none of that gets you in the mood, have some stale eggnog and enjoy your “bah humbugs”

And, if you have yet to acquire my Christmas present, voting Blink Kitty Love for Best Experimental Web Series in the Streamys will do nicely. Vote here, put in this url: http://www.blinkkittylove.blip.tv and then come to the party — there will be one. Tammy’s also planning to throw one for New Year’s; that should be interesting ; )

Thanks for stopping by; enjoy your Christmas.

There haven’t been Financial Times links because my deliveries have been interrupted by incompetence somewhere in the chain. Twice in two weeks I’ve had to call about no deliveries for three days. I miss reading the newspaper.

More positive notes: My friends @mymhm had over one million hits on their Movies You May Have Missed blog for December. Congratulations. Check them out if you haven’t. If you have, nominate them for a Streamy Award as Best New Show. The other shows/people on my help get a nomination slate are: Movies You May Have Missed for Best New Show, The Web Files for Best Hosted Web Series, Kristyn Burtt of The Web Files for Best Web Series Host, Space Hospital for Best Comedy Series, Rob Poe of Space Hospital for Best Art Direction and the cast of Life With Kat & McKay for Best Ensemble Cast in a Web Series. I’ve only started exploring what’s out there on the web, guided partly by the excellent choices made by my friends at The Web Files (Movies You May Have Missed was their 9th episode). It’s a whole new world for entertainment: brave, different and daring.

I’m also voting Blink Kitty Love for Best Animated Web Series…why, you ask? Well, although you will find animated series with more polished animation, I think Blink Kitty Love gives you a total entertainment package with the music, food and other random conversations on the band’s website and the continuing shenanigans on their Twitter feed. Plus, it’s my baby and I’m proud of it. I occasionally think about using a more sophisticated animation program but the simplicity of FlipBoom suits the band and my art style, which always tends to the abstract. FlipBoom is fun to work with without me having to spend weeks with the 500 page instruction manual (hello ToonBoom Studio). And the first or fifth rule of Blink Kitty Love is no stress puppies allowed so keeping it fun is important. Should you choose to vote, I’d appreciate it. Or just continuing following along with my adventures into animation. UPDATE: I’ve decided to push for Blink Kitty Love in the category of Best Experimental Web Series because it is a very grand experiment. Jump on the Blink Kitty Love train; crush just a little, that’s all we ask. A couple clicks here and enter this url: http://blinkkittylove.blip.tv/ and we’ll be your biggest fan.

Speaking of animation, ToonBoom is offering animators preparing a pilot to pitch to the industry access to Harmony and Storyboard Pro for three months. Sounds like a chance for a great collaboration. My latest vision (no, you don’t know what it is yet) isn’t a traditional character driven series but if yours is, check it out.

Lonely Pond Productions’ annual meeting happens this weekend. I’m excited about new ideas and directions. It will be interesting to get feedback from the rest of the Lonely Pond crew. They always surprise me.

Me and Orson Welles isn’t in the area, but I am considering Invictus. Need to see a few more movies before the year’s end. And there’s a couple of exhibits in Baltimore I’d like to hit. Hope you’re enjoying your holiday season, whatever holiday you celebrate. Thanks for stopping by.

Me and Orson Welles (yes, the Zac Efron movie) is being lauded for Christian Mackay’s breakout performance as Orson Welles. Nigel Andrews’ review also includes a vote for the powers of live actors over digitized versions.

Snuck out to see Planet 51 (Gayle voted for that over Cloudy With a Chance of Meatballs). Cute, nice retro feel, although I think there should have been a diner. Seems like it’s not the 50’s without a diner. The two main characters, voiced by Dwayne Johnson and Justin Long had a nice rapport. Pretty solid story, not much unnecessary humor thrown in just for extra sauce and a little too long spent on the anti-government/police/British scientists beats. Enjoyable…I was amazed at how much expression you get out of noses (aliens did not move their antennas enough to substitute) and how much I like it when things go “VROOOM” in an animated fashion.

Caught the new Nick teen show Big Time Rush last week. Liked the guys in the band and the talent scout, some good physical humor, didn’t like the grafted on hints of non teen stories for the sake of giving pre teens some connection. Gayle really hated the producer. So we’re leaving it at has potential.

My Favorite Shout It Out song.

Mahjong is one of my favorite games to play with friends; @SyFy has an online Ninja Mahjong tile matching version.

Robots playing soccer/football (non US).

Sarah Hemming’s profile pieces. This one’s Alfred Molina, who is playing painter Mark Rothko on stage. Molina claims his fans break down into two groups: those who mention Diego Rivera from Frida and those who mention Dr. Octopus. Alas, for my cool street cred the first Molina mental flash I get is Snidely Whiplash in Dudley Do-Right. Don’t you have all the costs $5 at Target Brendan Fraser movies? It’s one of our favorite at home film festivals.

Looking for a new Christmas album and Gayle came home with the Straight No Chaser suggestion. Check out their website for “Who Spiked the Eggnog” and follow them on Twitter @sncmusic

There’s a new Blink Kitty Love in the universe (your FAVORITE crazy crushing cartoon band); they sit for headshots in a perfect meet the band opportunity. Do it; we double dog dare you.

And that’s enough for a December start. Enjoy! Stay warm. Drink tea. I just found my two favorites at this time of year: Stash’s White Christmas and Tazo’s Joy.

Peter Aspden on the problem defining cool + if Miles Davis is the solution.

Fashion Bloggers in the front row…Nicola Copping on how bloggers (example @bryanboy) are gaining influence with designers. Fashion Blogs I follow, well @meandmarisa found me on Twitter and I’ve been enjoying their photos and fashion thoughts.

Sarah Hemming talks to set designers about…set design.

Mexican left-wing printmakers took on church, politics + culture. Review of exhibit at British Museum.

Christine Lagarde, French Finance Minster, ranks #1.

Vanessa Friedman on how dressing for the EU President job will be almost as difficult as landing it.

And to end w/ a dinner tomorrow thought: a pumpkin risotto recipe. Also must make single serving apple crisps in these deep, white ramekins we have — feeling inspired by the season and the big nubbly apples sitting in our fruit bowl.

Saturn picture.

Stefan Stern on underappreciated management thinker Russ Ackoff; next time I hit the library, I’ll track down Management f-Laws.

Do The Chump, yes do The Chump, chump (amusing myself, no offense intended)…my friends @TheWebFiles interviewed Jeremy Redleaf of Odd Job Nation last week so I checked out his show and darn funny. Watched all three episodes and by the time they were doing The Chump at the end, I wanted more.

James Altucher, yes James Altucher has not disappeared; he has immigrated from the FT to a column for the New York Post, Huffington Post and various other venues. You can also find him on Twitter.

And I’m in the middle of a conversation about Shakespeare with new Twitter friend @feignedmischief who reviews plays and other fancies here.

So, this’ll have to cover you for a bit…TV reviews later. The Big Bang Theory both hits and misses (or should I say fumbles) and has iCarly lost all of its charms in a cloud of mean mischief and shouting. You’ll want to know. Stay tuned.

Have been meaning to write a post about Merchant of Venice (#merven) and costuming thoughts for awhile, definitely since Vanessa Friedman’s excellent coverage of this year’s Paris + Milan Fashion Weeks. Gayle and I have been talking clothes. We’re thinking very modern so we may have to add an iron to our usual touring gear and hit up consignment shops in Baltimore and Philadelphia for some suitable ties, if not entire suits. I can imagine the thrill that will be felt by the actors wearing business suits outdoors in the end of July heat.

Merchant of Venice is striking me more and more as a sleek, ruthless play of marble chess pieces in sharp edged modern suits, always on the go, accumulating, communicating, sifting, betting, collecting, judging. I ordered the Oxford edition . The Pelican, my choice in the past, is only available as a Kindle download. And there is always the Riverside as a constant, but it’s not portable. So the Oxford is my carrying around copy. I don’t remember liking the Arden or the Folger and I won’t have anything to do with an edition that has anything to do with Harold Bloom. I do not like his commentaries. I’m a Northrop Frye kind of director.

The Oxford’s simple cover graphic — a balance/scales — also appealed. From a quick perusal of the commentary, that item is an excellent choice because Merchant seems to be more about capital letter CONCEPTS: Justice, Mercy and their cousins, than it is about any of the individual characters. Perhaps that’s another reason for Portia’s disguise: not only can she save the day, she can represent a quality.

I am directing/exploring Merchant because I have had so many reactions to it. As a child, Portia was my favorite Shakespearean heroine. I loved how she manipulated logic and legal concepts while riding in to save the day (I also loved the Lone Ranger). So I had good memories of Portia. Then, several years ago, I reread Merchant as a possible choice for the next summer’s Theatre Under The Trees (”yes, sir, that’s my baby”) and was repulsed by Portia’s cruelty. I had this sudden vision of Alicia Silverstone in Clueless and Reese Witherspoon in Legally Blonde but without any warmth or heart or humor — shearing sharpened pink sabers.

Plus, there’s the Jew thing. You can’t get around the “gentle Jew” problem. Once I had a vision of doing an indoor adaptation titled Merchant of Hong Kong, with dark woods, harbor motifs, Chinese Mandarin robes and a British Shylock. Jew switched for Brit. There’s high concept for you.

York has a troubled history with racial and other forms of discrimination so the inciting a race/religious war concern will remain present. I know I’ll have to be prepared for cast questions/discussions. And honestly, I don’t know what to say. That’s why I want to direct Merchant. Shylock has this incredible speech that not only humanizes him but explains his behavior is as the Christians taught him. Gayle’s theory is that the play is anti-banker, although she hasn’t read it recently. Bankers are right now, here in 2009, the villians of nearly every piece. The only way I know to figure out if my first or second impression of Portia is the more accurate one is to direct the play, with no idea how it will turn out. Shakespeare’s truths show in performance.

I think Merchant might turn on Bassiano, the character I’d forgotten. There’s always a character who matters more than you think, the way in for the audience, the point everything pivots around, the weather for the play. In Twelfth Night, it’s Olivia; in Midsummer, it’s Oberon. They’re the characters who bring all the pieces together. And I had forgotten Bassiano. You remember Shylock, Portia, even Antonio. But I think Bassiano might be the one who makes it all work. But that’s just my first THIRD impression, after a quick read. I’m sure there’s a few more to come.