You
know, I never did get around to eulogizing the great Hunter
S. Thompson on my blog
as promised...so although it's not Bait Shop news per se, I'll just
say this about Raoul Duke: as an Aquarius born in 1967, I always
felt a little ripped off that I missed the Revolution (although,
in retrospect, I suppose it's just as well...who wants to go to Woodstock
and watch Nixon self-destruct only to have Reagan and the Bush boys ride
into town and do their level best to reverse all your victories?).
At any rate, in the years from high school to college graduation, I made
my own psychic journey from the 50s through the Summer of Love to my own
personal Altamont and beyond, and Dr. Gonzo was my guide and literary companion,
along with fellow travellers Ken Kesey, Tom Wolfe, Gary Trudeau, William
S. Burroughs, Harlan Ellison, Herman Hesse and, of course, Neal Cassady
and the Kerouac Kid. Like most people, I probably read Fear
& Loathing in Las Vegas first...but for those who only know
Hunter S. Thompson as Doonesbury's
drug-addled Uncle Duke caricature, I highly recommend Hell's
Angels, The
Great Shark Hunt, Fear
and Loathing in America (the second volume of his collected letters)
and especially Fear
and Loathing: on the Campaign Trail '72 for an example of the great
writer behind the wild man image. True, the wild man may have eventually
eclipsed the writer, but his style and perspective had a huge influence
on a lot of people, including me, and his political analysis is still right
on the money from my humble perspective:
Sound familiar?"If Nixon wins again, we're in real trouble." He picked up his drink, then saw it was empty and put it down again. "That's the real issue this time," he said. "Beating Nixon. It's hard to even guess how much damage those bastards will do if they get in for another four years."I nodded. The argument was familiar. I had even made it myself, here and there, but I was beginning to sense something very depressing about it. How many more of these goddamn elections are we going to have to write off as lame but "regrettably necessary" holding actions? And how many more of these stinking, double-downer sideshows will we have to go through before we can get ourselves straight enough to put together some kind of national election that will give me and the at least 20 million people I tend to agree with a chance to vote FOR something, instead of always being faced with that old familiar choice between the lesser of two evils?"
Anyway, so much for that, as HST would say. Meanwhile, in more timely and personal news, I'm currently preparing a retrospective of Burt Wood student horror films (including the 2005 premiere ASSASSIN) for the Herring Run Arts Fest in Middleboro, MA on the afternoon of September 10, 2005 -- followed, later that night, by A MIDSUMMER NIGHT'S FEVER, the quasi-original show I'm doing as this year's production for the Pinehills Players. While my schedule always seems to be nonsensically hectic despite my best efforts, this double-booking is something of a stress milestone, and I expect I'll be ready for a nice long vacation on September 11, assuming I survive these back-to-back cultural events...
...but, of course, there will be NO vacation in September, only more stress as I continue the Master's program at U-Mass, teach a bunch of acting, screenwriting and filmmaking courses around the greater Boston area and launch a brand new comedy writing class at the Tufts University Ex College...all while preparing for my upcoming nuptials with the Polish Princess, sure to be an All-Star Sweeps Week Very Special Episode for the ages.
Meanwhile,
Jed Weintrob's "ficumentary" feature The
F-Word is now a going concern following its well-received premiere
at the Tribeca Film
Festival...and,
unless I've been punk'd, Jed informs me that Joel
Silver's Dark Castle Entertainment is planning to option a script the
Jed and I wrote last year that managed to catch the eye of Gordon Gekko
himself, Mr. Michael "Catherine
Zeta-Jones" Douglas. And, in even farther-fetched show biz news,
yours truly threw a couple of Hail Mary passes recently, to John
Waters and Zalman King,
respectively. No word from the Prince of Puke yet (except for the
breaking news at the P-Town Film
Festival that he'd acquired a copy of Hick
Flicks from somewhere but hadn't read it yet), however the Big Z seemed
to dig the groovy gals of Prick
and said he'd make some calls on their behalf, so who knows?
Anyway,
I'm sure I won't be updating this site again until New Year's Day 2006,
what with all the nuptial and edu-tainment obligations on the Bait Shop
horizon, so keep your eye on the
Ol' Blog Shop for all the latest news and Survivor
geekery in the meanwhile and, as always, stay tuned!