Brighten The Corner

Artist Josh Cochran has been kicking ass as an illustrator for a while. Not long after we’d gotten him to agree to provide illustrations for the second volume of our Two Letters anthology series, he was featured on the cover of Communication Arts, which is a kingpin of magazine coverage on design and advertising. And since then, he’s been creating art for everyone from the Discovery Channel to McSweeney’s to Wired to the New Yorker.

Tomorrow he’ll be accepting three awards—that’s right, count ‘em for a hat-trick—from the Society of Illustrators for his work, including one for his cover for the Criterion Collection DVD of John Huston’s Wise Blood adaptation. (Full details here.)

Josh provided the wrap-around cover art (pictured above) and illustrated several stories for our anthology, which you can pick up from the Narrow Books webstore.

Smart Gals are now in their tenth year of organizing events that celebrate books and the artists and authors who make them. They’re commemorating the anniversary with an unusual sort of installation piece at the Barnsdall Art Park, and I’ll be privileged to help out with a “quiet” reading.

The Smart Gals have installed their Reading Preserve—a “sanctuary for the endangered act of reading actual books”—before at the WeHo book fair; this time the preserve will be part of both the Los Angeles Municipal Gallery’s ongoing “Actions, Conversations, and Intersections” exhibition and Smart Gals’ own anniversary. (They’ll also be showing all of the awesome bookmarks Smart Gals commissioned their Speakeasy reading events over the years—shown here at left is the bookmark Esther Pearl Watson made for our event a few years back.)

On Thursday, February 4th, 2-3 pm, I’ll be quietly a book (from my library, but not written by me) in the preserve, surrounded by comforting pillows. You can join me or… watch me?

Other participating authors include Janet Fitch (White Oleander), Aimee Bender (The Girl in the Flammable Skirt), and Cecil Castellucci (Boy Proof). You can find more from the reading preserve author schedule.

One cool thing is that on Sunday the 7th, the Smart Gals will include writing from the participating authors (for example, from me, an excerpt from my novel in progress) on hand-made pillows that will become permanent elements of the reading preserve. Outstanding, right? Forever printed on a pillow…

A feature film I wrote recently (in story collaboration with the producers) is now going into financing and pre-production.

The film’s called RIDE THE NINE. Taking it on was interesting, to be sure… A prime reason (why it was interesting, that is) was because the main character’s a long time pool hustler. We’re talking decades. So I get to play with a lot of fun ideas: noirish dark corners and dangerous men… But then there’s also this game, right? Pool.

Then on top of the game, there’s the very fact of the game, which is to say: if there’s a game in a movie, there’s an assumption that the game’s going to be played on film… unless of course you’re so timid as to totally cop out and, for example, make a movie about a football player that has no football in it.

So there’s a game, and the game’s definitely going to be in the movie… How much?

A lot, actually. We’re not using pool (nine ball, specifically) as a prop or “colorful backdrop” for this story. It’s pretty integral… So let me be the first to say that there’s a whole lot of pool in the film. There are so many long games, ugly opponents, tables and halls, cue sticks, chalky blue cubes, wooden triangles, smoky lights, and bankrolls of greasy dollar bills that you could be as intimate with them as if you’d spent decades standing around the table yourself… disturbed yet?

Anyway, we’ve just put together a site at ride-the-nine.com to be a home for news and updates about the picture.

In the past week, we’ve gotten word that TEXAS 1960 has been accepted in three great festivals:

1. The Lone Star International Film Festival is held in Fort Worth, Texas. I can’t tell you how excited we are to screen in the state after using it as our fictional setting. We’d come close with the Dallas Video Fest, but there was some confusion, as you can read about here. The cool thing is: it’s the Lone Star organizers who had recommended us to the Dallas fest, and now have invited us to screen in Fort Worth.

2. The Zero Film Festival is designed to support “authentically” independent movies. If you’re wondering “authentic” means in this context, it’s really no puzzle: the key is that all films are self-financed by the filmmakers. Based in Brooklyn, but they’re putting together tours of the fest’s films to other cities.

3. NewFilmmakers NY doesn’t have a typical “fest” structure—rather, they put on ongoing film programs at the Anthology Film Archives in Manhattan. TEXAS 1960 was chosen for the winter series and will screen in February.

Gotta announce these events coming up on the calendar; if you’re in Los Angeles, hope you can make it out.

First: Freak City / October 25th

A sale event at Freak City’s grand opening of their amazing 5000 square foot space on Sunday, October 25th. Featuring vendors and participants including Dim Mak, Flock Shop, Evil Genius, Delicious Vinyl and Rojas.

Narrow Books will be there offering hardcover titles from Megan Whitmarsh and Esther Pearl Watson, T-shirts by Mark Todd, and this awesome Travis Millard poster courtesy of Blood is the New Black.

2PM to 8PM, followed by an after-party till 2AM with DJs, drinks and… a taco bar!? Yeah.

But also: DesignerCon / November 21st

DesignerCon at the Pasadena Convention Center on Saturday, November 21st.

[Save the date on this one-- I'll have more information on this show soon.]

You might have noticed last week we had a notice up about Texas 1960 being selected for the Dallas Video Fest.

We were recommended for inclusion to the fest organizers on short notice… Unfortunately, it turned out we were selected as part of their “Texas Show” showcase on the final night of the fest. Though it pained me to do it, I had to come clean that we weren’t from Texas. Our cast includes folks from Lousiana, New Mexico, Georgia, even Hawaii… I’m from Missouri… but no Texans.

Of course the film was de facto disqualified, but the organizers were very gracious about the mix-up… they even told us their jurors took an extra bit of time looking for a way to include the film, which was great for us to hear.

But anyway, you heard it here first, and now, if you will, you can un-hear it. Congratulations to our little crew anyway, especially the actors! If a Texas-based festival liked the film enough to include it on short notice, that’s quite a kudos to their performances with regard to dialect and accent. Jessie Birschbach, one of our actresses, took the time to prepare and share a digital package including MP3s of West Texas dialect, and I think her work paid off.

This might be a situation where I created work for myself. I’d seen friends place their films into festivals without bothering about rights clearance, and a lot of festivals have a “not my problem” attitude towards rights, so they keep mum… But I wanted to have my bases covered…

The steps involved are pretty simple, and they’re summed up nicely here: “Getting Clearance, DIY”.

There are two types of clearance you’ll need, synch rights and master rights… The first pertains to the rights of the song’s author, the second to the actual recording being used.

(Just so you know, once you’ve asked to negotiate a price for a song, the rights owner probably won’t forget about you. I decided to wait on final negotiation and payment of music rights on TEXAS 1960 (which uses two period songs, one by Marty Robbins and one by Chet Atkins) and was surprised when the rights owners (a mighty music conglomerate) contacted me (relatively speaking, a fly speck) again recently to find out when I was going to pay. Don’t get me wrong, they were totally friendly, and agreeable when I told them I planned to finalize only after the film was accepted into a festival… but once on their radar, well, you’re on their radar.)

I wouldn’t bother trying to make a special plea for cheaper rates on your song use, at least not initially. I’d had guidance from a friend who used to work in rights clearance, and most of the time, things are pretty rote… They look at how long you plan to use the song, what your budget is, how popular the song is… Don’t bother with a lengthy explanation of how you can’t afford much, that you’re on a shoestring… Later on, if you do get sticker shock, then maybe try to ask for leniency… Ultimately, though, I thought the figures I was quoted were fair.

Next time though, we’ll record all the music ourselves. Just to be extra safe. And cheap.

A trailer is up on Vimeo now for our recently completed short film, TEXAS 1960, written and directed by Christopher Lepkowski.

Starring Milly Sanders, Shawn Petersen, Dixie Perkinson, and Jessie Birschbach.

From a synopsis: In West Texas circa 1960, two men stumble into the hills after a robbery gone wrong. Witnesses recount details of the crime, but the more the Sheriff hears, the less he really gets.

Back from a trip to NYC and some Narrow Books store visits.

Highlights:

Cinders gallery, where I got to meet Sto, the head man in charge of a gallery that shows work from a lot of our favorite artists like Mark Todd, Esther Pearl Watson, Megan Whitmarsh… I was going to hit him up with Hey Fudge but he already had a copy on the shelf behind me!

Desert Island book and comic store, who recently put out the “Smoke Signals” comics mag with cover and comics inside by Travis. Great store, run by the friendly Gabe Fowler, who also gave me an awesome trade– I walked out with the new David Mazzucchelli book, Asterios Polyp.

Word bookstore in Greenpoint. When I was walking up I saw a sign in the window, a sort of friendly manifesto on supporting independent publishers. And it was no lie! The manager, Stephanie, was super-hospitable. I think they’d even invite Narrow Books for an event there if I could figure out how to coordinate one from here in LA.

Also got to attend a book event at ArtBook at X for For the Love of Vinyl: The Album Art of Hipgnosis, put out by PictureBox, and scored a copy signed by Aubrey Powell for a friend of a friend who designs album covers.

Ah, NYC, the city of friendly people. Now I just need to remind people LA isn’t all suck.