Margaret writes: I just wanted to let your web site know that “Evilenko,” a feature film staring Malcolm McDowell, Marton Csokas (Celeborn) and Ronald Pickup was just shown at the Philadelphia Film Festival.
It is a thriller (loosely based on a true story) about a Russian serial killer/raper/eater of children and young women in the 1980’s. McDowell plays the villain, and Csokas plays a magistrate/detective Vadim Timorovic Lesiev, who hunts him.
Martin Csokas gets to show off his excellent physique in a bizarre nude scene. The film was more interesting than good, and not really for the faint of heart. Martin Csokas appeared both with McDowell at the first screening on Saturday, April 16, but also with the director on Sunday, April 17. I was unable to remain for the Q & A afterwards due to rushing to another film.
Daisy writes: It was a beautiful, sunny, 18-degree day in Toronto on Saturday April 16, yet die-hard LOTR fans turned their backs on it! 130 of us gathered at the world-renowned Cinesphere movie theatre at Ontario Place in order to spend the day watching Peter Jackson’s precious LOTR movies back to back to back. Full of anticipation, we all settled into our seats well before 11 am; no one wanted to miss a single moment of the movies! FOTR began playing to applause and within a few minutes the crowd rippled with excitement; FOTR:EE was onscreen instead of the expected theatrical release! We were off to a great start!
Fans used the ½ hour intermissions between movies to stroll outside by the water, grab much needed sustenance and mingle with old and new friends. We also got a chance to meet with volunteers from /The Gathering/, a LOTR fan event that is happening again in 2006. Here is their link: http://www.tolkiengathering.com/. They had a booth set up, providing information about /The White Tree Fund/, a special LOTR fan charity. For the day, fans raised $170, and all proceeds from this event, as well as the individual screenings of the movies, will be donated to /The/ /White Tree Fund,/ specifically for Tsunami relief efforts. For more information, here is their link: http://www.whitetreefund.org/.
The Cinesphere’s powerful sound system did justice both to the brilliant work of the LOTR production team and Howard Shore’s captivating musical score. From the clash and crash of multidimensional battle scenes to horses galloping across the plains of Rohan to water dripping in Ithilien, the quality of sound put us right in the middle of every scene that was happening onscreen. Audience participation became more evident as TTT and then ROTK progressed. We laughed, cheered, clapped and cried. Eowyn’s “I am no MAN!” received loud applause, and there was much laughter at Legolas’ brilliant observation “A diversion”. Merry and Pippin’s high-jinks brought great mirth, and we collectively held our breath as we waited for Frodo to let Sam rescue him.
While it was a long day, this fan went home thrilled to have seen the beloved LOTR trilogy on the big screen. If you missed out, the movies will be playing at the Cinesphere, once each over the next few weeks, and you can still get tickets. http://www.isometricprojections.com/.
CHRISTOPHER HUTSUL – Staff Reporter for the Toronto Star writes”: For a teenaged John Howe — a geeky kid who liked to draw “high fantasy” — there was no luminous epiphany that he would become the definitive Lord of the Rings artist.
In fact as a youngster Howe, whose LOTR illustrations were the visual basis for the hit films, was more confused than moved by the books.
“The first book in the series was always signed out at the school library, so instead of waiting, I started with the second book,” admits Howe, on the phone from his home in Switzerland. “I read The Fellowship of the Ring last, so you can imagine, it didn’t make a lot of sense to me.”
Luckily for J.R.R. Tolkien fans, moviegoers and director Peter Jackson, Howe later reconsidered his approach, and eventually forged a bond with the books that begat a lifetime of LOTR artwork. In designing the visual element of the movie, Jackson relied heavily on Howe, who’d been illustrating Tolkien’s world since the ’70s. Unless you’re a hardcore fan who has been collecting the illustrated LOTR volumes, calendars and other paraphernalia, including Howe’s new book Myth & Magic, The Art of John Howe, it’s very possible you might have missed the artist’s finely rendered illustrations. But that will change for audiences attending the Kitchener Waterloo Orchestra’s performances of Howard Shore’s The Lord of the Rings Symphony. The concerts — June 4 in Kitchener and June 5 at Roy Thomson Hall in Toronto — will be enhanced by large projections of Howe’s work.
The concerts are just one more helping of exposure for Howe, who’s come a long way since his days as a fantasy-obsessed kid in rural British Columbia. In those days, he and his buddies scavenged for paperback fantasy books with cover art by Frank Frazetta, the “ultimate painter of action.” For Howe, who was enchanted by the likes of Conan The Barbarian, drawing fantasy was empowering.
“I suppose it was because I was thin, and wore glasses, and wasn’t any good at sports and was painfully shy — all the stuff that makes you not particularly popular in high school,” says Howe. “Drawing was one way I could express myself.”
His family moved often, and Howe didn’t settle into an art class until his senior high school years. But after graduating in ’76, he knew he had the skills to make a go of it in art. He studied it in Europe and one of his first gigs was to contribute to a Lord of the Rings art calendar.
As the years went on, Howe began to see the richness of Tolkien’s world, and developed a deep understanding of not only the physical world he’d created, but cultural layers that existed within it.
“LOTR just seemed to have an authenticity that you rarely find in fantasy,” says Howe. “Tolkien writes in nothing but images. Every sentence has an image in it, and every landscape has a symbolic weight that you rarely find in a lot of writers.”
One of Howe’s favourite passages in LOTR is when Legolas, Aragorn and Gimli arrive at the city of Edoras and find the tombs of the Kings of Rohan, engraved with names of an ancient language.
“It’s like the Anglo-Saxons and Normans,” says Howe. “You realize this isn’t just a fort with a bunch of guys and horses, it’s got depth and density. So many texts that you illustrate limit you because they’re limited in themselves.”
Though Tolkien himself did a series of drawings depicting the characters in his books, Howe’s paintings are, interestingly, considered to be more accurate depictions of the writer’s creations. Tolkien, says Howe, actually never wanted his drawings published and preferred to see his books published free of illustrations.
“Tolkien’s drawings are quite lovely, but I find them to be interesting as sources of information, not so much inspiration,” says Howe.
“There’s an element of draughtsmanship and rendering involved in depicting these things. I can line up two words together, but I certainly can’t write. Tolkien’s illustrations are a kind of visual shorthand.”
Unbeknownst to Howe, Peter Jackson and his team covered their office with prints of Howe’s art while working on scripts for the movies. When the film got the go-ahead, Jackson had no choice but to bring Howe onboard. By then, Jackson’s vision of Tolkien’s work was married to Howe’s imagery, and he’d need his input to tell the story in three dimensions.
Howe wasn’t entirely surprised to get a call from Jackson. “I’d heard rumours that something was in the works,” says Howe. “One day we got this phone call. Peter and his wife, and the producer … I couldn’t interrupt. I had to wait and listen to their sales pitch … And I thought, what a marvellous opportunity.”
He was whisked off to New Zealand to join artist Allan Lee on set.
“Peter didn’t want Hollywood design — the stuff that’s plastic and historically inaccurate and that wouldn’t work outside the movie set,” says Howe, who spent a year and a half on the island. “We were trying to work toward something that would feel more real.”
For Howe, who is married and has a musically inclined 17-year-old son, the most rewarding part of working on the film was having the resources to execute his vision on a grander scale. After two decades of toiling over watercolour paper in a studio, he was suddenly directing huge teams of craftsmen in the construction of weapons, sets and costumes.
“Rendering something on paper is all very nice, but what you’re really striving and yearning to do is depict the dimension you can’t have,” says Howe, who has since been involved in designing the upcoming animated adaptation of The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe. “It was like seeing drawings come alive.”
CHRISTOPHER HUTSUL – Staff Reporter for the Toronto Star writes”: For a teenaged John Howe — a geeky kid who liked to draw “high fantasy” — there was no luminous epiphany that he would become the definitive Lord of the Rings artist.
In fact as a youngster Howe, whose LOTR illustrations were the visual basis for the hit films, was more confused than moved by the books.
“The first book in the series was always signed out at the school library, so instead of waiting, I started with the second book,” admits Howe, on the phone from his home in Switzerland. “I read The Fellowship of the Ring last, so you can imagine, it didn’t make a lot of sense to me.”
Luckily for J.R.R. Tolkien fans, moviegoers and director Peter Jackson, Howe later reconsidered his approach, and eventually forged a bond with the books that begat a lifetime of LOTR artwork. In designing the visual element of the movie, Jackson relied heavily on Howe, who’d been illustrating Tolkien’s world since the ’70s. Unless you’re a hardcore fan who has been collecting the illustrated LOTR volumes, calendars and other paraphernalia, including Howe’s new book Myth & Magic, The Art of John Howe, it’s very possible you might have missed the artist’s finely rendered illustrations. But that will change for audiences attending the Kitchener Waterloo Orchestra’s performances of Howard Shore’s The Lord of the Rings Symphony. The concerts — June 4 in Kitchener and June 5 at Roy Thomson Hall in Toronto — will be enhanced by large projections of Howe’s work.
The concerts are just one more helping of exposure for Howe, who’s come a long way since his days as a fantasy-obsessed kid in rural British Columbia. In those days, he and his buddies scavenged for paperback fantasy books with cover art by Frank Frazetta, the “ultimate painter of action.” For Howe, who was enchanted by the likes of Conan The Barbarian, drawing fantasy was empowering.
“I suppose it was because I was thin, and wore glasses, and wasn’t any good at sports and was painfully shy — all the stuff that makes you not particularly popular in high school,” says Howe. “Drawing was one way I could express myself.”
His family moved often, and Howe didn’t settle into an art class until his senior high school years. But after graduating in ’76, he knew he had the skills to make a go of it in art. He studied it in Europe and one of his first gigs was to contribute to a Lord of the Rings art calendar.
As the years went on, Howe began to see the richness of Tolkien’s world, and developed a deep understanding of not only the physical world he’d created, but cultural layers that existed within it.
“LOTR just seemed to have an authenticity that you rarely find in fantasy,” says Howe. “Tolkien writes in nothing but images. Every sentence has an image in it, and every landscape has a symbolic weight that you rarely find in a lot of writers.”
One of Howe’s favourite passages in LOTR is when Legolas, Aragorn and Gimli arrive at the city of Edoras and find the tombs of the Kings of Rohan, engraved with names of an ancient language.
“It’s like the Anglo-Saxons and Normans,” says Howe. “You realize this isn’t just a fort with a bunch of guys and horses, it’s got depth and density. So many texts that you illustrate limit you because they’re limited in themselves.”
Though Tolkien himself did a series of drawings depicting the characters in his books, Howe’s paintings are, interestingly, considered to be more accurate depictions of the writer’s creations. Tolkien, says Howe, actually never wanted his drawings published and preferred to see his books published free of illustrations.
“Tolkien’s drawings are quite lovely, but I find them to be interesting as sources of information, not so much inspiration,” says Howe.
“There’s an element of draughtsmanship and rendering involved in depicting these things. I can line up two words together, but I certainly can’t write. Tolkien’s illustrations are a kind of visual shorthand.”
Unbeknownst to Howe, Peter Jackson and his team covered their office with prints of Howe’s art while working on scripts for the movies. When the film got the go-ahead, Jackson had no choice but to bring Howe onboard. By then, Jackson’s vision of Tolkien’s work was married to Howe’s imagery, and he’d need his input to tell the story in three dimensions.
Howe wasn’t entirely surprised to get a call from Jackson. “I’d heard rumours that something was in the works,” says Howe. “One day we got this phone call. Peter and his wife, and the producer … I couldn’t interrupt. I had to wait and listen to their sales pitch … And I thought, what a marvellous opportunity.”
He was whisked off to New Zealand to join artist Allan Lee on set.
“Peter didn’t want Hollywood design — the stuff that’s plastic and historically inaccurate and that wouldn’t work outside the movie set,” says Howe, who spent a year and a half on the island. “We were trying to work toward something that would feel more real.”
For Howe, who is married and has a musically inclined 17-year-old son, the most rewarding part of working on the film was having the resources to execute his vision on a grander scale. After two decades of toiling over watercolour paper in a studio, he was suddenly directing huge teams of craftsmen in the construction of weapons, sets and costumes.
“Rendering something on paper is all very nice, but what you’re really striving and yearning to do is depict the dimension you can’t have,” says Howe, who has since been involved in designing the upcoming animated adaptation of The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe. “It was like seeing drawings come alive.”
CHRISTOPHER HUTSUL – Staff Reporter for the Toronto Star writes”: For a teenaged John Howe — a geeky kid who liked to draw “high fantasy” — there was no luminous epiphany that he would become the definitive Lord of the Rings artist.
In fact as a youngster Howe, whose LOTR illustrations were the visual basis for the hit films, was more confused than moved by the books.
“The first book in the series was always signed out at the school library, so instead of waiting, I started with the second book,” admits Howe, on the phone from his home in Switzerland. “I read The Fellowship of the Ring last, so you can imagine, it didn’t make a lot of sense to me.”
Luckily for J.R.R. Tolkien fans, moviegoers and director Peter Jackson, Howe later reconsidered his approach, and eventually forged a bond with the books that begat a lifetime of LOTR artwork. In designing the visual element of the movie, Jackson relied heavily on Howe, who’d been illustrating Tolkien’s world since the ’70s. Unless you’re a hardcore fan who has been collecting the illustrated LOTR volumes, calendars and other paraphernalia, including Howe’s new book Myth & Magic, The Art of John Howe, it’s very possible you might have missed the artist’s finely rendered illustrations. But that will change for audiences attending the Kitchener Waterloo Orchestra’s performances of Howard Shore’s The Lord of the Rings Symphony. The concerts — June 4 in Kitchener and June 5 at Roy Thomson Hall in Toronto — will be enhanced by large projections of Howe’s work.
The concerts are just one more helping of exposure for Howe, who’s come a long way since his days as a fantasy-obsessed kid in rural British Columbia. In those days, he and his buddies scavenged for paperback fantasy books with cover art by Frank Frazetta, the “ultimate painter of action.” For Howe, who was enchanted by the likes of Conan The Barbarian, drawing fantasy was empowering.
“I suppose it was because I was thin, and wore glasses, and wasn’t any good at sports and was painfully shy — all the stuff that makes you not particularly popular in high school,” says Howe. “Drawing was one way I could express myself.”
His family moved often, and Howe didn’t settle into an art class until his senior high school years. But after graduating in ’76, he knew he had the skills to make a go of it in art. He studied it in Europe and one of his first gigs was to contribute to a Lord of the Rings art calendar.
As the years went on, Howe began to see the richness of Tolkien’s world, and developed a deep understanding of not only the physical world he’d created, but cultural layers that existed within it.
“LOTR just seemed to have an authenticity that you rarely find in fantasy,” says Howe. “Tolkien writes in nothing but images. Every sentence has an image in it, and every landscape has a symbolic weight that you rarely find in a lot of writers.”
One of Howe’s favourite passages in LOTR is when Legolas, Aragorn and Gimli arrive at the city of Edoras and find the tombs of the Kings of Rohan, engraved with names of an ancient language.
“It’s like the Anglo-Saxons and Normans,” says Howe. “You realize this isn’t just a fort with a bunch of guys and horses, it’s got depth and density. So many texts that you illustrate limit you because they’re limited in themselves.”
Though Tolkien himself did a series of drawings depicting the characters in his books, Howe’s paintings are, interestingly, considered to be more accurate depictions of the writer’s creations. Tolkien, says Howe, actually never wanted his drawings published and preferred to see his books published free of illustrations.
“Tolkien’s drawings are quite lovely, but I find them to be interesting as sources of information, not so much inspiration,” says Howe.
“There’s an element of draughtsmanship and rendering involved in depicting these things. I can line up two words together, but I certainly can’t write. Tolkien’s illustrations are a kind of visual shorthand.”
Unbeknownst to Howe, Peter Jackson and his team covered their office with prints of Howe’s art while working on scripts for the movies. When the film got the go-ahead, Jackson had no choice but to bring Howe onboard. By then, Jackson’s vision of Tolkien’s work was married to Howe’s imagery, and he’d need his input to tell the story in three dimensions.
Howe wasn’t entirely surprised to get a call from Jackson. “I’d heard rumours that something was in the works,” says Howe. “One day we got this phone call. Peter and his wife, and the producer … I couldn’t interrupt. I had to wait and listen to their sales pitch … And I thought, what a marvellous opportunity.”
He was whisked off to New Zealand to join artist Allan Lee on set.
“Peter didn’t want Hollywood design — the stuff that’s plastic and historically inaccurate and that wouldn’t work outside the movie set,” says Howe, who spent a year and a half on the island. “We were trying to work toward something that would feel more real.”
For Howe, who is married and has a musically inclined 17-year-old son, the most rewarding part of working on the film was having the resources to execute his vision on a grander scale. After two decades of toiling over watercolour paper in a studio, he was suddenly directing huge teams of craftsmen in the construction of weapons, sets and costumes.
“Rendering something on paper is all very nice, but what you’re really striving and yearning to do is depict the dimension you can’t have,” says Howe, who has since been involved in designing the upcoming animated adaptation of The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe. “It was like seeing drawings come alive.”
Ian writes: I thought you might find this interesting as I am sure that there are many New York University students who are fans of this site.
Flight of the Conchords (Jemaine Clement and Brett McKenzie aka Figwit) will be performing in a FREE taping of HBO One NIght Stand at New York University’s Skirball Center for the Performing Arts. IT IS ONLY OPEN TO NYU STUDENTS. They will be performing on Friday April 22nd. (Box Office: 212.992.8474)
Below is the How, Where, and When (very important info on how to get tickets)
HBO Comedy Series at the Skirball Center @ NYU
The Skirball Center is bringing HBO STAND-UP COMEDY to campus and you have a chance to be a part of this great experience. On April 21, 22, 23, 25 & 26 Skirball will co-present with HBO, One Night Stand, a series of performances by some of todays great comedians. These performances will be recorded and broadcast on HBO at later dates.
We are offering you the first opportunity to get tickets for you and your residents to this FREE event. Look at the dates and comedians below and decide which day you and your floor would like to attend. For groups call or stop by the Skirball Center Box Office (212-992-8474) and pick up some vouchers for the performance(s) you would like. Each voucher is good for two tickets. Please only ask for the number of vouchers that you will use. This event will be televised and the audience will be recorded so we need to fill all the seats. For every voucher you take, you should know two students who will be attending the performance. On the evening of the performance, you will want to arrive a little early and exchange your vouchers for tickets. The box office will only wait so long, so if you are not on time for the performance, your tickets could be given away.
Tickets are available now, but will only be available until 5 business days before each performance. If you want to attend the April 21st performance you need to call and get tickets by Thursday, April 14th. The Skirball Box Office is open Tuesday – Saturday from 1:00 – 6:00pm.
HERE IS A LIST OF THE PERFORMERS AND THE TIMES YOU MUST BE ON LINE BY:
Thursday 4/21, 5:00PM LOUIS C.K. AND EARTHQUAKE Thursday 4/21, 8:15PM LOUIS C.K. AND EARTHQUAKE Friday 4/22, 5:00PM Flight of the Conchords and Bonnie McFarlane Friday 4/22, 8:15PM Flight of the Conchords and Bonnie McFarlane Saturday 4/23, 5:00PM Omid Djalili and Caroline Rhea Saturday 4/23, 8:15 PM Omid Djalili and Caroline Rhea Monday 4/25, 5;00 PM Bill Burr and Patrice ONEAL Monday 4/25, 8:15 PM Bill Burr and Patrice ONEAL Tuesday 4/26 5:00 PM, Kevin Brennan AND JIM NORTON Tuesday 4/26, 8;15 PM Kevin Brennan Tuesday 4/26, 9:30 PM Jim Norton
Don’t miss out on this great opportunity! Get your vouchers today!!
Skirball Center for the Performing Arts @ NYU 566 LaGuardia Place New York, NY 10012 www.skirballcenter.nyu.edu
