Oh oh

There's a lot of fog today . . . or is that mist?

THE MIST!!!!!?!?!?!?!?!

Stephen King's THE MIST

Regular readers of my blog know of my love for supernatural/horror movies. Bela Lugosi and Boris Karloff reign supreme from the time I was six to this day.

And for a few years now, Stephen King is among those I revere for talent and tenacity. As King gets older (and faces daunting odds regarding his deteriorating eyesight and recovery from a car accident that nearly killed him) he only gets better. "The Mist" is one of the best movies I've ever seen. The writing and directing is flawless. This novella of King's was in good hands.
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I don't want to talk too much about the movie because to do so would reveal too much. When the film started, I recognized it as King's salute to the creature features of the 1950s and early 1960s along with a nod to the kind of unseen terror "The Fog" had given audiences years ago. So I thought I knew how the film would end but as long as old material was given some new life, I would go along for the ride.

I was wrong. King breathes bold life into this story bringing theological and philosophical elements into the mix that throws the audience off enough that the ending comes as a big surprise. I was not prepared for it at all.

I can get very restless at a movie, even a good one but "The Mist" held my attention for two solid hours. The special effects were great but did not overwhelm the story. There was quite a story a tell too.

By all means go see this flick on the big screen before you add it to your DVD collection. It's a great ride.

Golden Days and Nights

Next to the Spring, Fall is my favorite season.

Here on the mid-Atlantic coast, the early days of Fall seemed to be lousy as the trees didn't have the usual color changes. I drove up to Canada in October for a meeting at Frid's house and enjoyed the upstate New York foilage, believing that was all of the visual Fall joy I would see.

Not so!

In our area, the trees have not only turned into glorious colors late in the season, the leaves are still on the trees! It's been quite glorious. While running errands over the weekend I was able to enjoy the foilage colors just on local streets, never mind driving down Route 40 or Route 13 and looking at the clumps of trees on the either side of the road.

My favorite scent in the Fall is the smell of burning wood in fireplaces. I had lovely fires in my wood burning fireplace all week and this weekend was no exception. I sat and worked on business and writing while seated near the fireplace enjoying the warmth and subtle smells.

I'm gearing up for the next few months which are full of projects to be completed and others reviewed with others and then completed, not to mention getting the house in shape for the holidays and taking on more and more responsibility at the law firm job. It appears I will get the full-time status between now and the new year.

I still am thinking about starting up my own acting an playwrighting "school" in the evenings. I have to do some more thinking on that.

Painful Dialogue

For the past thirty years I have taught writing in many forms, sometimes only basic composition skills.

I've seen how mangled the language can be in the hands of the ignorant and inexperienced. I feel good coming to their rescue and showing them the path to literary enlightenment and shaking off the shackles of inept communication chains.

But there is a dialogue trend in movies and television that greatly upsets me. When I hear it, I feel my stomach churn and my brain moving inside my skull in a frenzy shouting "Make it stop! Make it stop!"

I know you've heard the painful dialogue too. Here it is:

"You don't get it, do you?"

And lines that end with "okay?" "I'm trying to figure it out, okay?" "I didn't see her coming, okay?"

I first became aware of this alarming trend while watching low budget horror movies. Whenever I moved to major motion picture or prime-time TV fare, I started hearing the painful dialogue again.

So why painful? It's an opportunity missed to put more texture in a scene, to engage the characters in the scene in dialogue that defines them for us. Instead of saying "You don't get it, do you?" the character speaking could further explain the situation or find fault with the other character; either choice raises the stakes in a scene and engages the characters. "You don't get it, do you?" tells us nothing of value.

The statements that constantly end with "okay?" as if asking permission to be however the character is at that moment or in explainment himself/herself likewise is an opportunity lost for the character to tell us why he or she did something and how he or she feels now about it. It can express fear or loss of hope - so many possibilities to put in the place of "okay?" in a character's dialogue.

If you see a movie or TV show with either of these painful lines, pray for the writer and the character. It could have been so much better with at least one more rewrite.

Simplify and thus multiply!

I'm working through a short biography of Ben Franklin and not for the love of American history either. At least that is not the purpose for this read. Franklin founded and created umpteen different entities during his life (I don't mean just illegit children) and his ability for high productivity was the result of organizing his daily life in such a way he spent time on several different projects. The Franklin method of organization is nothing more than having a Day Runner, blocking in time to do what you need to get done and then sticking with it. The "sticking with it" is the critical component that gets dropped, of course.





Creatively, I've never felt so good about the various projects I am working on. A delightful result of getting Jonathan (Frid) to let one of his reader's theater performances be put on DVD is that he wants to do more only, this time, fresh readings. I didn't expect that outcome. He needs to work on his voice since it has been out of shape for a good many years. That will come with the daily diligent rehearsals Jonathan will do in preparation for the reading.





In addition to this, I have in the works proposals for several new CD titles representing the audio of Jonathan's reader's theater. I will be editing together the material for the proposed CDs and having Jonathan approve it or make other suggestions, or even do a new reading. So much to do. Fortunately, I have learned how to make the 40 minute SEPTA train commute to and from work beneficial. I have put together all the ideas for the pieces to use, the pieces to ask Jonathan to consider recording and the artwork to ask my favorite artist, Sherlock, to do. She designed the cover for the first DVD which was released in August. The sale of this DVD has been better than I expected. However, I do have to warn people that this DVD was taken from a video shot in 1992 and also on a video camera left unmanned; the recording was only for Jonathan's purpose so he could watch himself afterwards and make any "directing" notes for himself. Visually, it's not art.




About every six weeks we (meaning the team behind these DVD/CD projects) get together at Jonathan's place for a day or weekend long meeting. The last meeting took place in October and the leaves were a brilliant color. The photo you see up top was taken in JF's yard under his prized tree.



From left to right: Bobbi, Mark (webmaster), me, JF, and Athur (not Arthur).

The Burning Brain

I subscribe to a few magazines geared towards writers, one of them being Writer's Digest. The recent issue was quite valuable to me for it addressed a problem I've had ever since I started writing as a wee thing: too many ideas at once.

Many writers would not see having too many ideas at once being a significant problem.

It is.

Too many ideas burning the brain for crafting and expulsion is as bad as having writer's block. You become paralyzed because you do not know which direction to move into next or you spend a lot of time trying to make sense of all the ideas, many of them vastly different from each other, and see how it all fits together.

It doesn't all fit together, that't the first lesson. It doesn't all have to fit together to be useful. I have experimented with various software packages geared towards writers in order to find a way to capture the quicksilver thoughts that inconveniently come to me when I am working on something else. I keep several writing projects open at a time as I work better this way and, oddly enough, get more done.

Last night I experimented a bit with two software packages - one called "Writer Blocks" and the other an index card system designed for the computer. The Writer Blocks assists with keeping consistency in a story and a working outline. The index card software can be used to type ideas as they come to you and be placed with the material the idea belongs with. I find the act of putting an idea in a certain place helps get it out of my head for the moment without fear of using it and without it interferring with what I am doing at tha time. So far, this combined system seems to be working quite well. I had great fun with it last night. I even backed up the system to ensure that nothing gets lost in a computer crash.

I am working on the third draft of a novel a literary agent is waiting to read. she's been waiting for about five years but she is still willing to ready what I write.

I am working on what's called a chapbook of poems entitled Breaking Bones, Mending Souls which is autobiographical. This project has been the most challenging and enjoyable.

I started a series of short stories based on real life accounts of ghostly doings. This has been a ton of fun.

Finally, a screenplay I am working on with Kay about the Jersey Devil legend. We have a fantasic idea and started fleshing it out. We need to visit the Jersey pinelands again for the sole purpose of soaking up the feel of the place and maybe collecting more stories/accounts about this myth. It's my first collaborative effort since working with Jonathan Frid on developing the narrations for his one-man shows.

It's great to have these ideas and strategies for appropriately dealing with them instead of, as the article in the writer's magazine pointed out, trying to fit every single idea into the current writing project only because it is a good idea you don't want to lose.

Open up the Adoption Records!

Imagine what it must be like to not know anything about your blood relatives, particularly your parents. Imagine what is must be like to not be related by blood to anyone you know. Not ever.

I cannot imagine what that must feel like. I know some of those children who were given up for adoption learn to adjust to this difference between themselves and most people. Still others are not only haunted by the fact one or both birth parents put them up for adoption, but they have no idea of their family history; no idea of the family medical history. The concept of feeling abandoned is one that has destroyed many lives or at least put a significant wound in an adopted person's psyche. The reasons for being put up for adoption may or may not have been noble, in the best interest of the child, however emotionally, it can leave an open wound that never heals.

This is why I am very excited about the prospect of adoption records finally being made available in more and more states for adopted children to research their blood relatives. To my mind, it is a basic human right for an adopted child to know the identity of his or her birth parents. How can it be otherwise?

The potential negative reprecussions to such access has been minimal in the states that already allow open access to birth records to adoptees. Yes, it does violate the right to privacy that birth mothers expected when they initially gave up their child for adoption but that was not a right that should have ever been exclusively offered. A child should have the right to know who is responsible for bringing him or her into the world under whatever circumstances. If an adoptee can discover the identity of one or both birth parents, the adoptee has the opportunity to make contact. That contact can be rejected, of course. But at least the opportunity exists and maybe, at the very least, the birth parent can provide some important medical history and other information so the adoptee has an understanding of a family background. And don't tell me most people who give up their babies for adoption don't wonder what's become of that child?
According to an article today released by the Associated Press, most birthparents welcome contact by the children they bore. There has not been any overt history of problems created when adoptees try to contact birth parents.

Can you imagine what is like to not know your identity? Where you are from? Your family history? Not have a clue what your birth parents look like?

Please support this proposal in this state.