The new Japanese Mad Max: Fury Road trailer is half the length of the English-language trailer released in December, and because I have no idea what those scrolling characters mean it’s practically like watching an anime.
See if you don’t prefer it yourself!
By Brandon Engel: The world is still mourning Leonard Nimoy. While he will be remembered by fans of the original “Star Trek” for his role as Mr. Spock, he was also a man who had established himself as a poet, photographer, and songwriter in his own right, and was also something of a “science communicator” along the lines of Carl Sagan and Neil deGrasse Tyson. He will also be warmly remembered for his many guest appearances on various programs.
The Daily Show
Friends and family of Nimoy claim that the loved nothing more than a good laugh. Here, he parodies his In Search Of series, by using his deadpan narration skills to aid Jon Stewart in a mockumentary of the 2012 Republican Presidential candidate Mitt Romney. He even croons a little, for good measure.
The segment, entitled “Mitt Romney: A Human Being Who Built That,” parodies the usual flag-waving, heart-warming biopics shown at national political conventions – Democrat or Republican. The four minute film lampoons Romney’s life and the 2012 election itself.
The Big Bang Theory
It was inevitable that a show about geeks, The Big Bang Theory, would nab Nimoy for a memorable cameo appearance as Sheldon’s conscience. After-all, the award-winning comedy had previously nabbed many other former Star Trek cast members.
However, only Nimoy’s distinctive voice would appear as a Mr. Spock action figure talking to Sheldon. The show paid tribute to Nimoy shortly after his passing, by showing a static image of Nimoy along with this caption: “The impact you had on our show and our lives is everlasting.”
Columbo
Just one more question, ma’am – when was Leonard Nimoy on the beloved detective series Columbo, starring Peter Falk? He starred as the baddie in a two-hour episode called “A Stitch in Time.” He played a dapper surgeon who is so narcissistic, that he thinks he can get away with murder. He attempts to kill a rival surgeon by mending his heart post-surgery with dissolving sutures.
Nimoy wasn’t the only Star Trek actor to appear in Columbo. Both William Shatner and Walter Koenig also appeared, but unfortunately not in this episode. Anyway, the point is that Nimoy could actually play a human being. Thankfully, you can stream both episodes through Netflix.
The Simpsons
Nimoy appeared twice on the seemingly eternal animated series The Simpsons. Nimoy’s voice was synched up to a Simpsonesque animated caricature. His first appearance was the 1993 episode “Marge Vs the Monorail” (penned by a young Conan O’Brien) where Nimoy rambles aimlessly like a parody of Spock.
Nimoy’s second appearance was the 1997 episode “The Springfield Files” a spoof on The X Files. Nimoy book-ends the episode with a faux In Search Of narration. The episode also featured guest appearances from X Files stars David Duchovny and Gillian Anderson.
“Marge Vs. The Monorail,” incidentally, is regarded by many fans as among the all-time best episodes of the Simpsons (click here to see where IGN ranked it), and both episodes are still shown regularly on the FXX Network (click for DirecTV listings).
Saturday Night Live
Although SNL has had many forgettable sketches in recent years, arguably one of the best was an appearance to tie into the 2009 Star Trek film featuring extremely young mutations of Kirk, Spock and the Enterprise gang. During the news segment, stars Chris Pine (Kirk) and Zachary Quinto (Spock) try to allay the fears of older fans about Star Trek’s newest incarnation.
The pair clearly is clueless, until Nimoy appears behind them to steal the show – to the delight of the hard-core ST fans in the audience. It perhaps is the only time Nimoy says “d***heads” on tape. That makes this appearance priceless. SNL also paid tribute to Nimoy shortly after his passing.
By James H. Burns: She was one of the very first film actresses who mesmerized me.
And it wasn’t in Dr. No.
But She, from Hammer Films, based of course, on the H. Rider Haggard novel.
Somehow, the 1960s film had wound up in a syndication package on a local New York TV station just a few years later, and as a toddler, I was introduced to some more wonders of fable–
And the enchantments of:
Ursula Andress.
She turns 79, today, which somehow seems extraordinary, for someone who lives in so many of our minds as an exquisite image of feminity, and one of the icons of that era’s unique blend of fantasy and science fiction.
She had been pals with James Dean in Hollywood n the 1950s… But more unknown is the tale that when offered the first James Bond movie, she and her then husband John Derek were paying a visit to Kirk Douglas in Paris… Andress was unsure whether to take the role of Honey Rider, and it was the great Douglas who suggested it could only be fun to film in Jamaica, and an opportunity…
There was The Tenth Victim, based on the Robert Sheckley story, and more memorable imagery…
…Red Sun, a Western, with Charles Bronson and Toshiro Mifune, which while not “genre,” still seemed otherworldly.
And then she played Aphrodite, in the Ray Harryhusen opus, Clash of the Titans, which actually had a small impact on my personal life: I wound up dating, shortly, just before that film’s premiere, the gal the movie’s star, Harry Hamlin, broke up with, she told me, when he fell in love with Ursula.
Was I a cad, as a teenager, to wish I had also been seeing this SCREEN goddess?
Andress’ particular charm, and talents, included seeming to break past such usual, and casual, depictions.
Unusual for any film actor, she seemed to transcend even the magic of the screen, and somehow, once she appeared, always been part of our pop cultural and interior mindscapes.
There were other fantasy films, and some very strange ultra-B movies, along the way.
But perhaps the best revelation across the decades, from virtually everyone Andress has known, is that she is as simply as lovely a person, as any illumination she ever cast through the light and shadow of celluloid.
In the “Bond Women” documentary produced and hosted by Maryam D’Abo, there’s a delightful sequence where the elder Andress takes D’Abo by the arm, as she’s showing her the streets of Rome…
To become immortal, and beloved, in one lifetime, is surely a transcendence that suggests a very particular gift, from whatever heavens, one may believe in.
Whether you’re in Ayesha’s realm, somewhere around Olympus, or right here on Earth.
Never mind Mozart in the jungle. You can have Mozart on “strange new worlds”! That’s where the Pacific Opera Project takes audiences in its Star Trek-themed version of Abduction from the Seraglio.
This true space opera, with an English libretto by Josh Shaw, recently completed a limited engagement at the El Portal Theater in North Hollywood. The Turkish sultan is transformed into the Klingon warlord of a distant moon. His 18th-century harem is filled with a gaggle of screaming, multi-hued slave girls. And two Starfleet officers, Captain Belmonte, and a Vulcan, Mister Pedrillo, are on hand hoping to rescue their love interests.
Reviewer Courtney Blackburn of the Pasadena Independent praised the actors to the skies.
I do want to mention the fantastic performances–each player, from the absolute ham Captain Belmonte to the straight-faced-with-a-hint-of-struggle Pedrillo to the glowering and lanky Osmin to the cutesy slave-girl Blondie to the emotional and strongly feminine Lt. Constanza, absolutely embodied the character given to him or her. Some received more straight-up laughter (Brian Cheney’s overblown mannerisms really killed), but it was the ensemble as a whole that sole this riotous, rowdy comedy set in space.
Watch an 8-minute clip of the finale on YouTube.
If you’re hooked, view the video of the group’s Southern Illinois festival performance, about two hours long.
Crystal Huff
The Ada Initiative has announced its new executive director is Crystal Huff. The Ada Initiative supports women in open technology and culture through activities such as producing codes of conduct and anti-harassment policies, advocating for gender diversity, teaching ally skills, and hosting conferences for women in open tech/culture.
Huff brings to the organization her experience in the software industry as the Chief Coherence Officer of Luminoso, a Boston-area startup, and her conrunning experience as a director and past chair of Readercon, and past chair and officer of Arisia.
The Ada Initiative is a non-profit organization currently employing three staff and half a dozen contractors.
The Horror Writers Association announced a series of honors this week.
Rena Mason has been named the recipient of HWA’s 2014 Silver Hammer Award, given to an HWA volunteer who has worked diligently for the organization, often unsung and behind the scenes. Mason currently serves as Co-Chair of the Bram Stoker Awards®. She has also worked as a compiler for the awards process, and arranged and supervised HWA events, such as a recent panel at the Vegas Valley Book Festival.
ChiZine Publications is the winner of the HWA 2014 Specialty Press Award, which recognizes a publisher outside the mainstream New York City publishing community that specializes in dark-themed fiction.
ChiZine Publications (CZP), founded and run by Brett Alexander Savory and Sandra Kasturi, sprang out of the successful chizine.com, which began presenting fiction and reviews in 1997. Since its inception in 2008, CZP has published more than 90 books by authors including Christopher Golden, Stephen Graham Jones, Geoff Ryman, Robert Shearman, Melanie Tem and Steve Rasnic Tem.
Finally, HWA will give its 2014 Richard Laymon President’s Award for Service to the organization’s publicity team of Doug Murano, Tom Calen, and Brock Cooper. The Award is presented to a volunteer who has served HWA in an especially exemplary manner and has shown extraordinary dedication to the organization. The recipients were selected by HWA President Lisa Morton.
“These three gentlemen have completely re-created HWA’s promotion and publicity, taking it from almost zero to sixty in record time,” Morton said. “Thanks to this amazing trio, we’ve received hundreds of thousands of hits on campaigns like our ‘Horror Selfies’, our press releases have been receiving international attention, and more readers than ever know about the Bram Stoker Awards®. Our former President Rocky Wood held Doug, Tom, and Brock’s work in the highest standing, and I share that admiration and appreciation.”
All three of the awards will be presented to recipients on May 9 at the Bram Stoker Awards® Banquet in Atlanta, held as part of World Horror Convention 2015.
[From the press releases.]
The shortlist has been posted for the 2015 Norma K. Hemming Award, given by the Australian Science Fiction Foundation for thought-provoking approaches to race, gender, sexuality, class and disability in Australian speculative fiction:
| The Female Factory | collection by Lisa L Hannett and Angela Slatter | Twelfth Planet Press |
| Nil By Mouth | novel by LynC | Satalyte Publishing |
| North Star Guide Me Home | novel by Jo Spurrier | HarperVoyager |
| Razorhurst | novel by Justine Larbalestier | Allen & Unwin |
| The Wonders | novel by Paddy O’Reilly | Affirm Press |
The winner will be announced April 5 at Swancon 40, the 54th Australian Natcon in Perth.
Click on the link to see more information about Norma K. Hemming.
On April 8, Larry McMurtry’s collection of H.G. Wells items will be auctioned. According to Rare Book Week —
Highlights include a true first edition of The Time Machine and a first edition of The Invisible Man, signed by the author. [Also] a first edition of Tales of Space and Time (London and New York: Harper & Brothers, 1900), inscribed by Wells to Henry James with an original drawing of Ugh-lomi, protagonist of “A Story of the Stone Age.”
McMurtry, winner of a Pulitzer for Lonesome Dove and an Oscar for his co-adaptation of Brokeback Mountain, is also a legend among booksellers as the owner of Booked Up in Archer City, TX. Edd Vick wrote about his visit there in 2012 when the business still occupied four buildings around the town square. That year McMurtry auctioned off 300,000 books, however, Booked Up No. 1 is still open today with a vast inventory of more than 150,000 volumes.
Separate from his bookstore business he has assembled many collections, including the Larry McMurtry Collection of H. G. Wells, part of Heritage Auction’s Rare Book Auction #6117 in New York on April 8-9. As Zachary Stacy explained in a recent article —
The collection was developed by Nina Matheson with help from Serendipity Books and added to by McMurtry. It contains items to highlight any Wells collection, including the true first edition of The Time Machine (New York: Henry Holt, 1895) with H. G. Wells’s name misprinted on the title page, The Island of Doctor Moreau (London: William Heinemann, 1896) in trial binding, and a signed first edition of The Invisible Man (London: C. Arthur Pearson, 1897).
Also going under the hammer are numerous association copies once owned by Wells, such as a first edition copy of the 1937 novel Star Maker presented to him by Olaf Stapledon.
Several other sf collectibles will be sold at the April 8 auction, such as a first edition, first printing of Dune, inscribed to John Pierce by Frank Herbert. And a presentation copy of Slaughterhouse-Five inscribed to the owner of Lord John press, Herb Yellin by Kurt Vonnegut, with a little improvised decoration: “Around this inscription, Vonnegut has drawn ten stars.” (Yellin, who passed away in 2014, published limited editions, some of them by Ursula K. Le Guin, Stephen King, Dan Simmons and Ray Bradbury.)
Francis Hamit will speak about his Christopher Marlowe film project to the Los Angeles chapter of the Association of Former Intelligence Officers on March 19.
The upcoming film about the poet, playwright and spy who helped to defeat the Spanish Armada is a thriller based on the 1988 stage play about Christopher Marlowe’s service as a secret agent for the Crown. The film will be shot in the UK later this year and Francis Hamit will serve as the Executive Producer.
Hamit, a member of AFIO since 1987, says: “’Former’ spooks are a core audience and I write what I know.”
Chi-Fi arrives in Chicago this weekend in its now-accustomed style – as a publicity trainwreck.
Con chair James Dobbs’ acrimonious response to losing two guests in the past 72 hours has attracted far more attention to the developments than they otherwise would have gotten.
Steve Jackson, of Steve Jackson Games, announced March 15 on Twitter that he was pulling out of Chi-Fi for reasons explained on his blog the next day — “due to bad communications and non-payment. If you had hoped to see me at that show, I’m very sorry – but the con chair is no longer returning my calls or mail, I haven’t even been reimbursed for the plane ticket…”
Dobbs’ unprofessional reaction was to immediately publish a copy of Jackson’s agreement with Chi-Fi:
@brradke Here is the agreement he accepted. We were suppose to pay him at the event, we have been emailing each other pic.twitter.com/IwE0q6XmcT
— Chi-Fi (@ChiFiCon) March 16, 2015
The controversy continued today when Geek Girl Chicago’s Lauren Faits announced she would not appear:
https://twitter.com/GeekGirlChicago/status/578176561796395009
She repeated her announcement in a Geek Girl Chicago post —
I will officially NOT be appearing as a guest at Chi-Fi 2015. I know this decision is late, as the convention is this weekend. The truth is, I was giving Chi-Fi as long as possible to make right. Sadly, the laundry list of communication and compensation issues is too long.
She needed four paragraphs just to outline them…
And Dobbs’ public relations instincts played him false once again, because within a few hours Geek Girl Chicago was airing another grievance —
At this point, Con Chair James Dobbs has attempted to contact ChicagoNow in hopes of bringing down this post. He calls it inflammatory, defaming, and false. I stand by the truthfulness of my work. If anything, James’s arguments have uncovered even more communication and publicity issues within the Chi-Fi organization. At the time of this post, I wished Chi-Fi the best of luck- even without me. Now, I feel James is wasting time censoring bloggers instead of executing his convention. I can no longer recommend this event to my readers.
Toxic publicity has plagued Chi-Fi from the beginning.
As Steve Davidson reported on Amazing Stories (Pushing Fannish Buttons: Chi Fi vs The Westin River North Hotel of Chicago), the inaugural Chi-Fi was called off in January 2014 for reasons calculated to raise fans’ ire, with Dobbs telling a reporter a senior Westin employee had said, “‘Costumed freaks are not in keeping with the reputation’ [of the hotel]” and blaming the cancellation on the Westin’s “non-cooperation, disparagement of the fan community and the questioning of their anti-harassment policy.”
However, Westin management answered that “…it was not about any claimed disparagement, which didn’t happen, or about their anti-harassment policy, which we never objected to in any way only asked whether there was history of problems that necessitated it. It was about economics and a straightforward contract issue. With a short time until the event, very few guest rooms had been booked and we do not allow any group to use the suites as party rooms.”
As it turned out, Chi-Fi 2014 did not stay cancelled. Dobbs found a new home for it at the Palmer House Hilton and salvaged the event by changing it from a weekend convention to a 12-hour Saturday-night fest, which Dobbs glossed as a “mid-flight coordinate correction.”