Producing Various and Sundry

Business, Heal Thyself

I know a lot of self-employed and small business folk who are hurting during this pandemic. And for my own business, we’ve needed to rethink how and what we’re doing. One of those entrepreneurial, self-employed friends, Russell Nohelty, wrote a post about how he retools his business… as he has done many times. It’s a non-trivial amount of time –especially if you haven’t done it before– and figuring out how to best attribute the costs…

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Acting Producing Writing

Theater in the Time of Coronavirus

All sorts of physical businesses are suffering during this global pandemic and I know many people, dependent on in-person gigs for their livelihood who now have no income stream (to say nothing of creative freelancers, as one Nation article notes). So this video posted last week by Joseph Haj, artistic director of the Guthrie Theater resonated: I was lucky enough to grow up going to the theater and live performances frequently, something I’ve tried to…

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Acting Producing Writing

Have you made your movie yet?

Online creativity is abounding, and it’s not just clever memes and personable actors giving us a positive news boosts. People are making movies. In the past month, the 48 Hour Film project, a competition I’ve frequently done, has had a series of stay-at-home competitions. So now indie filmmaker extraordinaire Roger Corman, who’s still sharp as a tack in his 90s, wants to see your short film. Seriously. He said so. But better do it quick.…

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Producing

Behind-the-Scenes Show Biz Superstars

I’ve been pleased to see all the memes on social media reminded everyone that they’re taking solace in the output of artists, whether it’s books, music, or films. So many of my friends are not only creative freelancers, but ones involved with film, theater, and television: creative pursuits where they have to go someplace to do their gig and get paid. And those places are, by and large, now closed (film and TV production has…

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Producing Rants Raves Reviews Site Update Various and Sundry Writing

Wouldja Believe? It’s a Five-Year Blogiversary!

Back on March 1st, 2015, I re-entered the web world with a personal website, something I really hadn’t had since the 90s, which in Internet terms is ancient history. Perhaps because March 1st doesn’t correspond with any other anniversaries in my life, I keep on meaning to do an annual retrospective about posts and such on the blog, but keep on forgetting. This year, however, I made sure to set a reminder for myself. As…

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Acting Producing

Rule of Law: Theatrical Edition

I haven’t been in a stage production for an age, but I was both on stage and backstage enough times to lose count — and I was a theatergoer long before that. So I greatly appreciated Mark Evanier sharing actor, director, and all-around theatrical Larry Blyden‘s theatrical laws. Laws, do you hear? Okay, to be honest, I haven’t always followed Law #5 or Law #10, but I definitely do my best with Law #17. Law…

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Producing Writing

2019 By the Indie Numbers

I’ve mentioned author and indie published Russell Nohelty a couple times on the blog, both specifically about his book on selling your work and in his detailing his efforts to build his business. So, as a bit of follow-up, all last year he did a monthly income and expense report about his business, often detailing what worked and what didn’t, what his predictions were, and what the basis of those predictions was. It was wonderfully…

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Producing Writing

New Year, New Works in the Public Domain

Public Domain is a topic I periodically cover here on the blog and what with works beginning to enter said domain once again in the United States as of last year, I suppose this might become a January tradition. Thousands of works from 1924 are now yours for the re-imagining as detailed here in Smithsonian Magazine, Vice news, and art news site Hyperallergic. I expect a heavy metal version of “Rhapsody in Blue,” stat. Get…

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