Cemetery Dance ARC Giveaway Winners!

[Dan Hocker]

Its huge. I thought itd be smaller than smoke and mirrors since there's fewer in it but judging by Roberts pictures its thicker.

Yep it's slightly thicker than smoke and mirrors.

[Teriw]

Its huge. I thought itd be smaller than smoke and mirrors since there's fewer in it but judging by Roberts pictures its thicker.

[Tito_Villa]

Congrats Teri!

[Teriw]

Finally got screamplays. Will post pics in my collection later when I have time.

[Dan Hocker]

In the ARC, page 16 of the Showdown script is repeated on pages 46 and 47 of the book. I wonder if this is an error on CD's part, of if the mistake was in Darabont's orginal file, as all the scripts are shown in "the author's own formatting"

Yep we caught that. The arc's are made off of the first phase of book design. After the manuscripts have been proof read, but the actual design work hasn't been proof read yet. Unless for some reason the arc's where made late in the game, which doesn't happen often.

[Robert Fulman]

The script for "The Joy of Living" was produced as an episode of "Norman Corwin Presents" (http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1566276/), a Canadian anthology series. The script was interesting, and I would watch it if I came across it on TV one night. However, the real stars of this piece are the introduction and set report, both also written by Nolan. The introduction briefly tells about how "The Joy of Living" was Mr. Nolan's first story sale (to IF magazine in 1954) and his first TV sale. The set report, "With Corwin and Company in Canada: A Television Odyssey" describes Nolan's experiences on the set of the show, where he spent a week writing and re-writing, observing the taping, and even co-starring (to an extent). This fascinating description of the process of making a TV show was written for Coast magazine, which folded before the story was published. The context provided by these pieces increased my appreciation of the script dramatically, but also accentuate the fact that the context is missing from all of the other stories/scripts/etc. that I have read so far. My enjoyment of the script was also enhanced by its raw nature: words are whited-out and replaced hand-written ones, and pages are inserted (as described in the set report).

[Robert Fulman]

I read the first three scripts/teleplays in the book today and enjoyed all three. The first is "The Magic Shop" by Neil Gaiman, based on the story by H.G. Wells. I had never read the Wells story before, but I am intrigued to do so now. The other two were "Tales from the Crypt" scripts by Frank Darabont, "Showdown" and "The Ventriloquist's Dummy". I definitely remember watching the ventriloquist episode, and I'm pretty sure that I remember Showdown as well. I was able to picture the action pretty closely, even though I saw the shows 20 years ago.

In the ARC, page 16 of the Showdown script is repeated on pages 46 and 47 of the book. I wonder if this is an error on CD's part, of if the mistake was in Darabont's orginal file, as all the scripts are shown in "the author's own formatting".

Up next, I think I'll try "The Joy of Living" by William F. Nolan.

[Robert Fulman]

I've been working on the assumption that the pieces in Smoke and Mirrors were all unproduced, but William Peter Blatty's "Faith" was produced for the TV show Insight in 1975. I had never heard of Insight before, but I was surprised to learn it was a made by Paulist Productions (an explicitly Catholic/Christian/Religious organization that "creates films and television programs that reveal God's presence in the contemporary human experience.") I just found that to be an interesting bit of info, given that I am reading a horror/fantasy compilation. Within the context of the collection, it is an allegory (to an extent) of a man from space who tries to convince American to get rid of their nuclear stockpile. Within the context of the TV show, it's not really an allegory at all. I would be willing to give it a watch. Interestingly, the title was originally "The Man from Inner Space" but someone scratched it out on the title page and replaced it with "Ambassador", "Envoy", "The Visitor", and finally "Faith". However, according to IMDB, the episode was produced under the title "The Man from Inner Space".

Blatty's "Hell Hospital" is a two-page film premise that might be one of the most ridiculous things I have ever read. I would totally watch it if they could somehow actually get Harrison Ford to star in it.

[Robert Fulman]

I read two of the sections this morning, which I'll comment on below. The book is a collection of scripts, treatments, and the like, and they are presented in the original format provided by the writer. This includes typos and edits/notes made with pen or pencil. Overall, I think it's a really neat idea. My main problem is that the 13 stories make up the entire contents of the book. There is no introduction that describes the theme, and there is context provided for any of the individual stories. For example, Joe Hill's "Freddy Wertham Goes to Hell" is a comic book script that tries to introduce a new "host" for what I assume would have been a re-imagining of "Grave Tales". But I have no idea of when the script was written, or if they decided to use a different story or if the whole idea of a new "Grave Tales" series was scrapped. Similarly, "SOFTWAR" by Stewart O'Nan is a 4-page treatment of what I assume is an unproduced movie/TV show. It would be nice to know what exactly is was written for, and why is hasn't been fleshed out beyond the treatment. Up next, I'm going to read the two pieces by William Peter Blatty, just because my sister and his daughter were roommates in college.

Edit to add:I enjoyed Hill's comic script. I've never actually bought a comic book, but I do read trade collections. I would read this comic, if only to see how the artist could possibly cram it all into such a small number of panels. This has me excited to read my SubPress Locke & Key, which also contains the scripts by Hill. SOFTWAR was also good, but fairly vague, as treatments tend to be (he says, hoping noone will challenge him to name another treatment he has ever read). It would work as an episode of an anthology series.

[Teriw]

Here it is, compared with SoD II:

[ATTACH=CONFIG]5197[/ATTACH]

And here is what one of the scripts looks like:

[ATTACH=CONFIG]5198[/ATTACH]

Did you read it yet? I'm curious what you thought?

[bookworm 1]

Guess I better reinforce my book shelves

Yeah, I think the SMOKE & MIRRORS and SCREAMPLAYS review copies had to be printed at smaller trim size (8.5 X 11, maybe?) because of the limitations of our ARC printer. These are going to be BIG books.

Brian

[Dan Hocker]

Yeah, I think the SMOKE & MIRRORS and SCREAMPLAYS review copies had to be printed at smaller trim size (8.5 X 11, maybe?) because of the limitations of our ARC printer. These are going to be BIG books.

Brian

Yea that makes sense.

[Brian James Freeman]

Yeah, I think the SMOKE & MIRRORS and SCREAMPLAYS review copies had to be printed at smaller trim size (8.5 X 11, maybe?) because of the limitations of our ARC printer. These are going to be BIG books.

Brian

[Teriw]

Apparently it takes 3 or more days for the Md usps offices to sort their international mail. Mines still in Baltimore. I hate waiting..lol.

[Martin]

You sir are not the only one!

Smoke and Mirror and Screamplays are going to be two huge books when they are done. The ARC's are at least twice as thick as the SOD V2 arc. Which means the book is probably going to about twice as thick as SOD V2 at that large trim size. I can't wait.