One of the recurring themes of my digital life has been bringing old projects back to life. One of the manifestations of this was “Gilbert the Goldfish,” which began as a short story and ended up as a web-based story with my scanned illustrations. You can see it here. (I guess the Flash animated version doesn’t work anymore with the current technology.)
Speaking of short stories, I wrote one entitled “American Dream Girl,” about a 21-year old version of me running into a high school classmate at a bar. While “me” was maturing at college, the friend became a prostitute after a failed marriage. (While the weekend visits to the hotel bar for drinks and live music are based in reality, this encounter came entirely from my imagination.) Recently, I turned the story’s prose into a script and am working on turning it into a short video with AI graphics and voice acting.
Incidentally, “my” friend who accompanies me in the bar is based on Walt Kruger, a real-life friend who I hung out with during that time. We met in Young Adult Ministry (a religious organization for some, a social group for others), and hung out a lot. We went to movies (Animal House and Tootsie among them, as I recall), but lost touch with each other after he got his girlfriend, Colleen, pregnant, so they married. (Part of the story which would make for a good short film—when they announced she was pregnant, Colleen’s father, a Protestant, asked why they didn’t use protection, thus horrifying his Catholic wife who was opposed to birth control.)
While at Berkeley, I did my first intensive cutting and editing of a Shakespeare play: Love’s Labour’s Lost. Prepared for a lunchtime series that required a maximum of 50 minutes, I managed to get it down to 52 minutes. A few years later, I submitted it to a publisher who wasn’t interested unless I sent them a paraphrased version. But that’s not really Shakespeare then, is it? I held on to it until this year when I hope to direct it in a local park here in Latrobe, PA.
Finally, I am still trying to locate the audio file I recorded for “EOE,” a short sketch about Bellephon Omega applying for a job but being insulted by the HR person for being a mutant. I think it’s perfect for AI but I really want to find the original recording. Why re-invent the wheel when there’s one in storage?
MUSOFYR 