After his long run on SMALLVILLE, Michael Rosenbaum is back on series television with the new TV Land project, IMPASTOR. He, and adorable co-star Sara Rue, talk about the show and show off the amazing chemistry that makes it work. Plus we begin our look at JUSTICE LEAGUE GODS AND MONSTERS, DC’s daringly different new DVD.
More in a few days with more on JUSTICE LEAGUE GODS AND MONSTERS. Be sure and follow us on Twitter now here.
After nearly forty years of reel independence, Troma Video’s Lloyd Kaufman is still going strong, back on the big screen with RETURN TO NUKE ’EM HIGH Volume 1 (set to be released in NY and LA on January 10th) and a tribute at New York’s Museum Of Modern Art on the 9th. Lloyd takes us back to how Troma began. the hassles of being and independent studio and how he has embraced the new forms of video in a big way. Plus Zack Snyder finds his WONDER WOMAN, and The X-Men plan an APOCALYPSE.
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Danger surrounds actress Kelly Hu today.
As the nefarious China White in Arrow, she plays the head of an assassins syndicate that goes head-to-head with Green Arrow; and in her new role as Cece on The CW’s The Hundred, she’ll be facing incredible odds in an enthralling, futuristic thriller.
But at no time was she in more danger than when she kissed Kirk Cameron in her debut role on Growing Pains.
Hu is among several notable actors whose careers took flight after taking their initial bow in a guest appearance during Season Three of Growing Pains. Four-time Academy Award nominee Brad Pitt played his first character with an actual name in the ninth episode of the season, “Who’s Zoomin’ Who?”; The Hangover star Heather Graham doubled that feat by portraying her first two “name” characters as Cindy in “Michaelgate” and as Samantha in “Some Enchanted Evening”; and Butch Hartman, best known as the creator of the popular Nick animated series The Fairly Oddparents, had one of his first credited roles in the “Michaelgate” episode.
Season Three of Growing Pains is now available as a three-disk DVD set through the Warner Archive Collection.
For Hu, Growing Pains was truly a launching pad for a very busy career. Fresh out of high school, Hu filmed the episode – a season-opening two-parter entitled “Aloha” – and then moved to Los Angeles before it aired.
“The day (the episode aired), I put a full page add in Variety and sent out letters to agents announcing that I was ‘now available for west coast representation’,” Hu recalls. “I got 20 calls from agents before the show even aired that night.”
She also got fan mail. More to the point, hate mail. In the episodes, the Seavers take a family vacation to Hawaii – where Mike (Kirk Cameron) became infatuated with a young local girl named Melia (Hu). The island romance sent Cameron’s legion of young female fans into a tizzy.
“Kirk Cameron was my first on-camera kiss,” Hu says with a knowing smile, “and I got all kinds of death threats from little girls who were jealous that I got to kiss him.”
Now a veteran of more than 40 primetime series, not to mention films like X2, The Scorpion King and The Doors, Hu says the Growing Pains experience represented one new lesson after another. Even at the craft services table.
“It was on the set at breakfast my first day shooting in LA that I saw my first bagel,” Hu says. “I pointed at it and asked out loud, ‘Is that a bagel?’ and Tracy Gold, in her very New York accent, replied, ‘You don’t know what a bagel looks like!?’ I didn’t. I was a little girl from Hawaii. There was a lot I still hadn’t been exposed to yet.”
Today I became president and publisher of DC Comics.
Shortly, I will be detailing my agenda which includes renaming DC, Milestone, the termination of all white people on staff as well as freelancers and moving the NY office to Harlem and the LA office to Compton.
To avoid any silly “racist” talk I will keep my white girlfriend.
Pro Se, a growing Publisher specializing in Heroic Fiction, New Pulp, and tales covering multiple genres, announced an open call today for a new series of books from Pro Se that mark the collaboration between the New Pulp Publisher and a classic Pulp Author!
Charles Boeckman, a 91 year old author/world traveler/jazz musician recently self published SUSPENSE, SUSPICION, & SHOCKERS. This collection of 24 stories was written by Boeckman, many of them under the name Charles Beckman, Jr. and were printed in Pulps such as Dime Detective, Detective Tales, Dime Mystery, and others as well as in digest mystery magazines such as Manhunt and Alfred Hitchcock’s Mystery Magazine. With a career ranging from the 40s into the modern era in fiction, much of it crime and mystery related, Boeckman is truly one of the last remaining true Pulp Authors today and has crafted characters that, although they only appeared once originally, have potential for further adventures, a potential Pro Se Productions plans to tap.
“This book,” Tommy Hancock, Editor in Chief and Partner in Pro Se, states, “is truly a fantastic read. Mr. Boeckman’s words sing with the huskiness and weight of a torch singer and the stories deliver blows like gunshots from all sides. He breathes life into every character, every locale, and every situation these hard luck heroes find themselves in. And one of the great things about his stories is, although there are definitely heroes between the beginning and end, they’re not cast in bronze or refined from gold. These are bruised, battered, often broken souls who have talents for music, in a lot of cases, or mystery and are almost as talented in getting themselves in trouble that most people would have to die to get out of.”
“After reading his book,” Hancock continues, “I contacted Mr. Boeckman and, following drowning him in compliments and fanboy like sentiments, I identified several characters that I felt like could have life in new stories and would appeal to a modern audience, both for nostalgic reasons as well as the fact that these characters, even the ones written back in the 1940s, were definitely written with a sensibility that makes them viable to modern readers. I requested the permission to put together anthologies and books based around these characters in a series of digests that sport Mr. Boeckman’s name and he agreed to that.”
Pro Se will begin publishing the CHARLES BOECKMAN PRESENTS line of digest sized anthologies and novellas featuring characters originally created and featured in stories written by Boeckman. Although each individual digest may focus on a different theme or character, they will all appear under the CBP banner, and will feature new stories based on Boeckman’s work.
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| Charles Boeckman |
“This is an open call,” Hancock states, “to any and all writers who might be interested in trying their hand at Mr. Boeckman’s characters. The first step in this process will be for interested writers to look over the brief descriptions of the characters provided and email proseproductions@earthlink.net with any and all they may be interested in. Based on that interest, story bibles and other information will be sent to interested authors who will then be required to draft a proposal for a story, length being minimum 8,000 words to a full novella length of 30,000. The proposal must be no more than a page long and, if the writer has never submitted to Pro Se before, a writing sample of at least 3 pages of narrative must be supplied as well. One thing to note, also. Although these characters were originally created by Mr. Boeckman and Pro Se will be insuring that they remain true to the source material, we are not wanting any writer to ape or copy Mr. Boeckman’s style. We will be great stewards of these classic ideas as well as the skills and styles of the modern writers pouring life into them.”
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| Charles Boeckman |
Detective Mercer Basous from ‘The G-String Corpse’- A homely 1970s New Orleans Detective who knows three things very well- New Orleans, the people that make it up, and how to do his job.
Big Lip from ‘The Last Trumpet’-A piano player on1950s Broadway who solved the murder of his great friend and one of the greatest horn players the world has ever known who moves onto further tales and adventures in a band in a world without The Earl.
Buddy Gardner and Frank Judson from ‘Blind Date’- Frank, a mid 1960s small town reporter, and Buddy, a deputy in the small town with detective skills to spare, find new stories and cases to follow and crack in Kingsbury after their initial tale, where Frank finds a dead woman in his trunk that all evidence said he had an affair with, then murdered, but he’d never met her before.
Lt. Mike O’Shean and Lil Brown of the Daily Herald from “I’ll Make The Arrest”-Mike O’Shean, a passionate two fisted cop of the early 1950s who sinks his teeth into a case and won’t let go, even if it kills him, and Lil Brown, the reporter who knows her job and city better than anyone…and knows O’Shean better than that. These two are at the beginning of what may be a beautiful relationship if crime and corruption don’t get in the way!
Doc and Sally from ‘A Hot Lick for Doc’-Fresh in 1950s LA from their debut tale, Doc, a washed up clarinet player who found his music again following being involved and solving a murder, and Sally, the recovering heroin addict who accompanied him, would be ready to write new tunes and chop a new life out of whatever life and LA throws at them.
Johnny Nickle from ‘Run, Cat, Run’-A trumpet player who’s claim to fame was having played on a supposedly haunted Jazz Classic that led to him being on the run from a curse and a murderer for years, Johnny Nickle is now back on top in the early 1950s blowing his horn and finding trouble almost everywhere he finds a stage to stand on.
The stories will be set in the periods mentioned for each of the characters. If a writer wishes to go beyond that period, then that must be clearly mentioned in the proposal.
Deadline for initial proposal submissions is November 1st, 2012.
Other characters from Mr. Boeckman’s many stories may be added to the available list to write from at a later date, Hancock points out, but these are currently the only characters discussed thus far.
“This,” Hancock says, “is not only a great opportunity for Pro Se, but it is truly an honor to have not only made the acquaintance of such a great writer and part of Pulp history as Mr. Boeckman, but to have the privilege of giving new life to these classic friends of his, there’s no real words for that except We intend to make him proud.”
For more information on Pro Se Productions, go to www.prosepulp.com. To get a copy of SUSPENSE, SUSPICIONS, AND SHOCKERS go to http://www.amazon.com/Suspense-Suspicion-Shockers-Charles-Boeckman/dp/1479238732/ref=sr_1_6?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1350269187&sr=1-6.
Well, that was really quick:
Thursday July 19 midnight shows for The Dark Knight Rises: The IMAX Experience have already sold out at New York’s AMC Loews Lincoln Square theater. The AMC Loews Universal City cineplex in Los Angeles has sold out all seats and all but two wheelchair slots, according to seating charts for advance sales via Fandango. No additional screenings have been scheduled yet.
via Deadline.com.
I don’t think we’ve ever had movies sell out over six months in advance, have we? This film could be a MONSTER– and that’s saying a lot for the Batman franchise.
Tippin’ Hancock’s Hat-Reviews of All Things Pulp by Tommy Hancock
FUN & GAMES
by Duane Swierczynski
Mulholland Books
287 Pages
Published June 2011
The debate is settled. The argument is over. The conundrum has been solved.
There can be New Pulp that satisfies all sides of the ‘Classic Feel versus Modern Relevance’ discussion that some of us have been involved with for a tentful of Sundays. Yes, the perfect expression of New Pulp does exist in between two covers, Virginia.
Duane Swierczynski, noted author and comic scribe, released “the first of three explosive Pulp thrillers” this past June under the title FUN & GAMES. And I’ll tell you, it’s definitely both. Swierczynski hits all the points that Pulp has to hit to be Pulp. Even with that, though, he presents us not with a perfect hero, but one replete with flaws, weaknesses, and scars. Charlie Hardie’s inherent goodness, however, is the perfect part of him, the piece that even when he himself doubts it, does not crumble and break away. This gives him the steel and nerve he needs to be the perfect Pulp hero.
Hardie, as he’s introduced, is a Housesitter on his way to sit the house of a major player in the movie business. A few years prior, he’d been a ‘consultant’ of sorts for the Philadelphia Police Department and used various skills to help his best friend end some of the crime and corruption in the city. Tragically, Charlie’s best friend and family are killed when Charlie is basically set up to birddog them for the bad guys. Nearly killed himself (he earns the nickname Unkillable Chuck because it seems like he’s almost impossible to kill. He earns that nickname time and again in this book), Charlie makes sure his own wife and child are protected and dives headfirst into a bottle and the life of a housesitting gypsy, which is how he ends up in LA in FUN & GAMES.
The book opens with a B movie actress with quite a history of wild times and drug use racing in her car around the twisted back roads of LA, another car in hot pursuit. She’s sure they are trying to kill her, but it simply might be coincidence. Until she’s rear ended and someone approaches her and sticks a syringe in her arm. She stumbles off the road and out of sight.
Hardie gets to his current assignment, has issues getting in as the key left for him is gone, and is stabbed almost immediately in the chest by a mike stand being projected at him from a somewhat high, beaten up, dirty but beautiful lady hiding in the house. As she rambles about a group of people trying to kill her and make it look like an accident and how she barely escaped after they rear ended her and drugged her with something, Hardie has to decide rather quickly how to handle all of this. Why? Because the people who are trying to kill the actress are already outside the house and determined to get in.
Much of FUN & GAMES takes place IN the house. It feels very much like a compact version of Die Hard as Hardie and his new charge fight with each other, then the baddies just to stay alive. Once the action moves beyond the domicile, it amps up even more. The pacing of this book is frenetic, but well focused and controlled. Swierczynski knows each and every character inside and out and this allows him to inject them into this breakneck, high octane ride that he’s concocted around one of the coolest concepts I’ve seen in fiction lately.
That concept? The bad guys. Good Pulp needs Great Villains and Swierczynski gives Hardie the best. An organization nicknamed ‘the Accident People’ by the actress they’re pursuing is actually a well peopled, extremely connected group that essentially deals with people, especially celebrities, when they become a problem for someone with enough funds to pay the Accident People. Overdoses, suicides, car accidents, all the tragic things that befall people in the limelight are basically due to the manipulations and machinations of the Accident People. Filled with mostly directors, actors, and others from the film industry, this group approaches each job like a movie, insuring the narrative goes the destructive way they want it to. At every turn, Hardie finds victory only to get handed more defeat by the director of the narrative he fell into, a lady by the name of Mann. The Accident People are clearly a great template for what Pulp Villains should be.
Equally, Hardie is a perfect example of a New Pulp Hero. An angel by no means, Hardie wars with himself as much as he does the villains after him. He’s definitely in a pit of despair and destruction and doesn’t really climb out of it before the book ends. But he is clearly heroic. He will not admit he’s an expert in anything, but he does have what he refers to as his ‘lizard brain’, something that he relies on when he simply cannot easily get out of a situation. This innate primal instinct turns Charlie into a juggernaut of terror against any who stand in his way.
FUN & GAMES simply is the best example of New Pulp at its best I have ever read. The beginning of the book will jar you, the ending will blow you away…and force you to go out and get the second one.
FIVE OUT OF FIVE TIPS OF THE HAT-Oh yeah.
Two business stories making for an interesting juxtaposition.
First, ComicsBeat reports:
More and more ch-ch-changes at DC, as various folks in the online department have announced they are heading to the West Coast office as the DC Online department moves to Burbank next summer. Ron Perazza will become VP of Online for DC Entertainment, Dave McCullough will become Director of Online for DC Entertainment, and Kwanza Johnson is Digital Editor. Heading up the department, you may recall, is Hank Kanalz, Senior Vice President, Digital of DC Entertainment These are the first announced westward personnel changes, although at least two DCU editors are also moving west to work more closely with CCO Geoff Johns.
Of course, by the time they get there, Diamond will have shut down their west coast warehouse.
Diamond Comics Distribution has informed comic stores that the warehouse will be closed from next March.
It’s been a good long while since Diamond closed any such warehouse.
In 2008 they consolidated a few into the new massive Olive Branch
centre, but at one point they used to have 24 warehouses. Now they’ll
have 4. The impact of this move will mean there will be no storage
facility for comics and their like on the West Coast.Affected retailers will notice a change immediately in the new year,
with January the fifth delivering the last shipment from Diamond Los
Angeles. The next week, all deliversies will come from their new,
expanded Olive Branch center in Mississippi. Customers who pick up from
the Los Angeles warehouse can continue to do so until March, and then
will move over to a new LA-based pick up point.
Merry Christmas to everybody who’s losing a job right before the holidays.
One additional problem, not discussed or considered: there are a lot of books that are coming from Asia– not just manga and manwha, but a lot of books from DC, Marvel, and IDW that are printed overseas. One has to wonder what this will do to shipping times and costs for trades, etc.
Over at AICN, Moriarty has posted a very long analysis of Y: The Last Man creator Brian K. Vaughan’s script for a feature film currently titled Roundtable, which Dreamworks recently won after a long bidding war.
Apparently, the man behind Runaways and Ex Machina (and now a writer for the comic-posing-as-a-television-series Lost) has turned in a script that’s being celebrated as one of the best to hit Hollywood in quite some time, earning comparisons to classic science-fiction comedies such as Ghostbusters and Back to the Future by even the most jaded readers.
So when my friend sent over ROUNDTABLE and suggested I read it, I was surprised by his enthusiasm. That’s not the way it normally goes. Keep in mind, there’s a sport in LA that’s very popular. Writers get hold of a script that just sold for a ton of money. And then they read it so that they can reassure theselves that it’s terrible and if that piece of shit sold for a lot of money, then that masterpiece they’re tinkering with in the off-hours is going to be set a new record for how much money someone can make on a script. It’s only fair. It’s a bitter, angry game, but it’s been going on since at least when I moved here in the early ‘90s, and it hasn’t changed in that entire time. Almost any script can be torn apart by the determined and the bitter if they try, but I’m guessing that they’ll find themselves tied in knots as soon as they all get hold of this script, because it is indeed a tightly-constructed and hilarious commercial script that is most probably going to make DreamWorks a small fortune when they finally release the film.
Moriarty goes on to describe some of the casting Vaughan seems to have had in mind for characters, as well as a basic synopsis of the story.
(via PopCandy)
It’s probably not much of a secret that I’m a huge fan of Brian K.Vaughan’s comic book series Y: The Last Man. If I wasn’t, why else would I be posting about it so much? So, in my continuing effort not to disappoint those of you who are also fans of the series, here now is yet another bit of news about it.
This time, the news comes to us in the form of exclusive video from the Y:The Last Man wrap party courtesy of Variety’s Bags and Boads site. The party, which took place a couple of weeks ago at Meltdown Comics here in LA, was held to celebrate the final issue of Y: The Last Man and as a benefit for the Comic Book Legal Defense Fund — a worthy cause indeed.
The video showcases some of the many guests in attendance, including Brian K. Vaughan, Pia Guerrra, Geoff Johns, Mark Waid and my personal hero, Joss Whedon.
Check it out at the Bags and Boards site. Or, if, as the post says, you have trouble watching it there, it’s also available at Myspace Comics. Enjoy.
Columns / Glenn Hauman / News
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