The other day, I was feeling my introvert tendencies pretty darn hard the same time I needed to interact with people. So what if you “leaned in” to that whole “interact with people” thing and talked to strangers?
If you’re a Shakespeare fan who hasn’t enjoyed the simple, stick figure pleasures of Good Tickle Brain, you should definitely avail yourself of it. If you’ve been kicking yourself because you know you’re not as familiar with all the Bard’s work, Mya Gosling, the brain behind Good Tickle Brain has your back. Watch as she summarizes all of Shakespeare’s plays in five minutes.
Two of the podcasts I regularly listen to, Scriptnotes and Maltin on Movies, both note how a given actor or other creative artist regularly takes 10-20 years to become an “overnight success.” They note this, in part, because the whole idea of the precocious talent, the creative who does genius work just out of the womb, seems so engrained in our culture, you kind want to stop and say, “Wait? Is that really normal?” Nope.…
Big Bird, the character, will continue of course, but Caroll Spinney, the performer who gave both him and Oscar the Grouch life, is finally stepping away from Sesame Street after about 50 years. They’ve created a nice 5-minute tribute about Spinney’s work: If that leaves you too verklempt, enjoy the cast of Sesame Street participating in one of Wired’s “autocomplete” videos from last year: And hey, have a great weekend!
I’m not sure when I started using the W, A, S, and D keys playing first-person shooters on the computer, but I’m sure I wondered why that was the standard. In case you’ve wondered too, Phil Edwards over at Vox has your back.
It’s been a little while since a “Motivation Monday” post, so let’s just dive right in with UK author Mark Dawson’s piece on how to approach self-publishing, amply referencing his own experience from traditional publishing to now. It’s recent (from August of this year) and I appreciate how it’s not paint-by-numbers. The five steps aren’t particularly easy, in part because none of them can ever be fully completed (perhaps “five processes” might more sense to…
Not to be confused with Rogue Tyger, this is a rogue planet which is a real astronomical object, not just a dramatic sci-fi name. Recently, I learned that not only that our own solar system has a rogue planet, but it’s named “The Goblin.” I’m not sure who approved this, but I’m both amused and disturbed. I mean, you thought landing on Europa was bad, what about The Goblin?
As much about writing as it is about acting, here’s a 20-minute video for GQ with Monty Python’s Eric Idle explaining many of his acting roles over the past 50-odd years. Speaking for myself, this makes me want to go out and create something.
Star Trek, as an overall phenomenon, won a special Emmy a couple weeks ago and they had both a great gathering of cast and crew — as well as a pretty nice montage. Enjoy!
Many a creative doesn’t want to wear the business hat. I know, that’s me too a lot of days. But it helps to be confident in wearing the hat when it’s needed and when to bring in the hired gun (e.g., a lawyer) for the right situations. A legal eagle I use, Seth Polansky, posted this in a thread related to a particularly ridiculous film festival. I’ve seen it before, but in a sense, this about-40-minute…