Showing posts with label Skillset Screen Academy Wales. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Skillset Screen Academy Wales. Show all posts

Wednesday, 25 June 2008

Cardiff ATRiuM: This Week's Best Event: International TV, Film & Performance, Radio & New Media Adaptation Conference 26-28 June 2008



[Pictured above: The ATRiuM in coloured floodlights, as searchlights, limousines and and the celebrity redcarpet create a celebrity splash in sexy Cardiff city centre. Photography by Mark Leslie Woods © 2007]

Places are still available for anyone wishing to register.

For costs and registration please contact: Dr Márta Minier, Assistant Editor

Journal of Adaptation in Film and Performance

University of Glamorgan Atrium

86-88 Adam Street Cardiff CF24 2FN UK

Tel.: (0044) 1443 668548

Cultures of Translation:
Adaptation in Film and Performance

An interdisciplinary and international conference

University of Glamorgan, Cardiff
26-28 June 2008

‘Cultures of Translation: Adaptation in Film and Performance’

(26-28 June, ATRiuM)

Adaptation – the reworking of a verbal text or another artefact for a new audience in a different genre or media – is as old a practice as cultural production itself, yet its systematic study – adaptation studies – is only a recently emerging discipline.

The Cardiff School of Creative and Cultural Industries with its strengths in drama, music, media and communication and having strong links with the creative writing unit of the university is the editorial home of Journal of Adaptation in Film and Performance and is now hosting a major international and interdisciplinary conference that will shape the formation of this neglected field of research.

The event is open to scholars from as diverse, yet closely interconnected areas as the study of film, theatre, opera, music, dance, television, radio, games and graphic narratives.

Whereas some of the most recent research in the field focused on the connections between adaptation and appropriation, this conference also addresses analogies and differences between adaptation and translation processes.

The conference embraces a plethora of perspectives characteristic of the encompassed disciplines and facilitates a negotiation between these stances, whether they emphasise the creative or the interpretive aspect of translation and adaptation.

Both the concepts and independent cases of adaptation and translation will receive attention.

The event will provide room for the investigation of transformative strategies both against the respective cultural and historical settings and generic or media-based criteria.

Keynote speakers:

Jack Bradley (Literary Consultant; former Literary Manager, National Theatre, London)

Dr Deborah Cartmell (De Montfort University)

Professor Michael Cronin (Dublin City University)

Professor Steffen Hantke (Sogang University, Seoul, Republic of Korea)

Professor Graham Ley (University of Exeter)

Dr John Milton, (Universidade de São Paulo, Brazil)

Professor Jonathan Powell (Royal Holloway; former Head of Drama, BBC)

Professor Eckart Voigts-Virchow (University of Siegen, Germany)

The conference is organised by Professor Richard Hand (University of Glamorgan), Dr Katja Krebs (University of Bristol) and Dr Márta Minier (University of Glamorgan).

In addition to the main academic programme, there will also be a series of artistic events including:

Thursday 26th-Saturday 28th June, available throughout the conference, B (earth) : a painting – voice – light installation.

Thursday 26th June, 10.40am-6pm, Hotel – Two Rooms : a participatory performance.

Thursday 26th June, 6pm onwards – Cabaret performance by dirty fit grannies

Adaptation – the reworking of a verbal text or another artefact for a new audience in a different genre or media – is as old a practice as cultural production itself, yet its systematic study – adaptation studies – is only a recently emerging discipline.

The Cardiff School of Creative and Cultural Industries with its strengths in drama, music, media and communication and having strong links with the creative writing unit of the university is the editorial home of Journal of Adaptation in Film and Performance and is now hosting a major international and interdisciplinary conference that will shape the formation of this neglected field of research.

The event is open to scholars from as diverse, yet closely interconnected areas as the study of film, theatre, opera, music, dance, television, radio, games and graphic narratives.

Whereas some of the most recent research in the field focused on the connections between adaptation and appropriation, this conference also addresses analogies and differences between adaptation and translation processes.

The conference embraces a plethora of perspectives characteristic of the encompassed disciplines and facilitates a negotiation between these stances, whether they emphasise the creative or the interpretive aspect of translation and adaptation.

Both the concepts and independent cases of adaptation and translation will receive attention.

The event will provide room for the investigation of transformative strategies both against the respective cultural and historical settings and generic or media-based criteria.

The conference therefore offers a range of platforms to participants, including plenaries, papers, workshops, masterclasses, exhibitions, screenings and performances so as to initiate dialogue between theoretical and more practice-based approaches to adaptation and translation.

Provisional keynote speakers include:

Dr Deborah Cartmell (De Montfort University)

Professor Steffen Hantke (Sogang University, Seoul, Republic of Korea)

Professor Graham Ley (University of Exeter)

Dr John Milton, (Universidade de São Paulo, Brazil)

Dr Anthony Minghella (British Film Institute, London, UK)

Professor Eckart Voigts-Virchow (University of Siegen, Germany)


[Pictured Above: A provisional list of the conference's keynote speaker's includes notable 'Adaptation' scholars including Dr Deborah Cartmell, Reader in English and Head of the Graduate Centre in the Faculty of Humanities at De Montfort University, Leicester.]

The conference is organised by Professor Richard Hand (University of Glamorgan), Dr Katja Krebs (University of Bristol) and Dr Márta Minier (University of Glamorgan).

Please send enquiries, abstracts for papers (max. 250 words) and proposals for masterclasses/workshops, book stalls, screenings, performances or any other platforms of presentation to afp2008@hotmail.co.uk by Friday 29 February 2008.

To inspect the inaugural issue of Journal of Adaptation in Film and Performance please visit http://www.intellectbooks.co.uk/journals.php?issn=17536421
or to order a hard copy please contact Luke Roberts: Luke@intellectbooks.com.

Submitted by:

Dr Márta Minier
Assistant Editor / Journal of Adaptation in Film and Performance
Atrium / University of Glamorgan
Adam Street Cardiff CF24 2XF UK
Tel: 01443 668548

And here's a related extract of another past post:



Dear Colleagues:

The first issue of this new Journal of Adaptation in Film and Performance has just been published by Intellect.

It is edited by Richard Hand and Katja Krebs with the help of Martha Minier and marks a step forward for Cardiff School of Creative & Cultural Industries (CCI/ATRiuM) in having an internationally refereed journal coming out of the faculty.

This is a fantastic achievement and is recognition of CCI/ATRiuM's growing stature in this field of research.

Congratulations to all concerned!

The first issue is available as a free download:

Journal of Adaptation in Film and Performance Volume 1 Issue 1

ISSN: 17536421



Editors:
Richard J. Hand
University of Glamorgan
rhand[at]glam[dot]ac[dot]uk

Katja Krebs
University of Glamorgan
kkrebs[at]glam[dot]ac[dot]uk

Adaptation, or the conversion of oral, historical or fictional narratives into stage drama has been common practice for centuries.

In our own time the processes of cross-generic transformation continue to be extremely important in theatre as well as in the film and other media industries.

Adaptation and the related areas of translation and intertextuality continue to have a central place in our culture with a profound resonance across our civilisation.



Aims and Scope:

Adaptation in the form of the conversion of oral, historical or fictional narratives into stage drama has been common practice for centuries.

In our own time the processes of cross-generic transformation continue to be extremely important in theatre as well as in the film and other media industries.



Adaptation and the related areas of translation and intertextuality continue to have a central place in our culture with a profound resonance across our civilisation.

As an academic discipline, Adaptation Studies has begun to establish itself in the last few decades as an important area of scholarship and research which continues to make significant contributions to our analysis and understanding of a complex and increasingly diverse world culture.



Journal of Adaptation in Film & Performance is a new, peer- reviewed journal designed to engage with specific issues relating to performance on stage, film, television, radio and other media.

Embracing comfortably these disciplines under the umbrella of adaptation theories and practices, it attempts to challenge widespread views of national cultural histories and global constructions of performance culture by analysing methods, histories and occurrences of adaptation across a range of media.



We would like to invite contributions that offer historical, theoretical or practice- based considerations and discussions of adaptation in performance in the context of one of the following topics:

Translation as adaptation / Theatre /
Film / Television / Radio / Gaming /
Graphic narratives
Submission Details

To submit to future editions, please, send your completed papers (4,000 – 6,000 words) accompanied by a short CV to the editors Richard Hand and Katja Krebs.



If you would like to discuss any specific proposals before submitting a completed paper, please contact the editors.

Short ‘Notes and Comments’ contributions (up to 1000 words) that facilitate debate and exchange will also be considered.

Articles in the current issues include:

Art of the Past: Adapting Henry James’s The Golden Bowl
Authors: Sarah Artt

Adaptation as Education: A Lady Macbeth of the Mtsensk District
Authors: Freda Chapple

In Praise of Treason: Translating Calabar
Authors: Pedro de Senna

Uncle Tom’s Cabin as Dominant Culture
Authors: Jim O’Loughlin

Translating the City: A Community Theatre Version of Wim Wenders’ Wings of Desire in Newcastle-upon-Tyne
Authors: Duˇska Radosavljevic



It has been estimated that an overwhelming percentage of Welsh films and television dramas are intentionally based upon other literary sources.

This overwhelming dependence upon literary adaptation is primarily from important Welsh literary or cultural sources.

This suggests an attempt to ‘recall and recollect’ and to re-‘write the nation’, after a period of suppressed or neglected representations of Welsh-ness.

While Dave Berry’s book and other studies have attributed this Welsh dependence upon literary adaptation as ‘laziness’ (Berry 1994: 234), we see it as being related to issues of post-colonial ‘re-telling’ of a national story, or more related to the economics of production.



For example, Stephen Bayly directed Joni Jones (1982) as a well-received television series for S4C, an adaptation based upon the well-known children’s stories by R. Garallt Jones entitled Gwared y Gwirion or ‘Redemption of the Innocents’.

It is often the case in Wales, that directors will create a series which is actually suited to be converted into a feature film at a later date, should the funding and political will be present to effect the re-formatting.

Additionally, one of Wales's most famous sons is Andrew Davies, who is known around the world as the 'Prince of Adaptation'.

Andrew Wynford Davies (born September 20, 1936 in Rhiwbina, Cardiff, Wales) is a British screenwriter.

He is the creator of the children's Marmalade Atkins television series and A Very Peculiar Practice, and is also well known for his adaptations of classic works of literature, including the 1995 television adaptation of Pride and Prejudice starring Colin Firth and Jennifer Ehle and the 1998 adaptation of Vanity Fair.



Literary and stage adaptations have added clout with film production investors, who assume that a successful novel or stage play will naturally make a successful film.

Some screenwriters have been known to 'invent' a novel AFTER writing a film script, for purposes of marketing the film, and for raising venture capital.

In small nations, broadcasting drama department Commissioning Editors often opt for an adaptation. This satisfies several remits: nationalistic and cultural agendas are fulfilled, while it's assumed that an established audience exists for the new film or TV series.

My favorite book on film and literature in general is Tom Corrigan's 'Film & Literature' (1999, Prentic Hall Inc / Simon & Schuster).

Here's a pleasant Youtube tribute to Colin Firth in Pride & Prejudice:









'Adaptation: Studying Film and Literature' (Paperback) by John Desmond (Author), Peter Hawkes (Author) is concise and readable new text for courses in Film Adaptation or Film and Literature introduces students to the art of adapting works of literature for film.

'Adaptation' describes the interwoven histories of literature and film, presents key analytical approaches to adaptation, and provides an in-depth overview of adaptations of novels, short stories, plays, nonfiction, and animation.

The book concludes with an analysis of why adaptations sometimes fail.




For additional info please contact Dr. Mark Leslie Woods at mwoods[at]glam.ac.uk

AIM: ATRiuM Intelligent Media

AIM -- ATRiuM Intelligent Media, Cardiff, Wales, U.K. on Face Book

Cardiff School of Creative & Cultural Industries

mwoods[at]glam[dot]ac[dot]uk

Click here to go directly to my personal blog page called Welsh-American Family Genealogy, on the World Wide Web.

Click here to go directly to my personal blog page called Welsh Music, Film, and Books Symposium, on the World Wide Web.

Click here to go directly to my personal blog page called Celtic Cult Cinema on the World Wide Web.

Visit the UK Film Studies and World Cinema and Music Import Showcase

© 2007 Mark Leslie Woods

Smart & Sexy? Your Queer Advantage is waiting!

Click here to go directly to my personal blog page called Queer Advantage, on the World Wide Web.

Click here to go directly to my personal blog page called Mordechai Razing Ziggurats, on the World Wide Web.

Click here to go directly to my personal blog page called Mordechai's Post-Evangelical-Granola on the World Wide Web.

© 2007 Mark Leslie Woods

Saturday, 19 January 2008

Cardiff ATRiuM to Host International TV, Film & Performance, Radio & New Media Adaptation Conference 26-28 June 2008



[Pictured above: The ATRiuM in coloured floodlights, as searchlights, limousines and and the celebrity redcarpet create a celebrity splash in sexy Cardiff city centre. Photography by Mark Leslie Woods © 2007]

FIRST CALL FOR PAPERS

Cultures of Translation:
Adaptation in Film and Performance

An interdisciplinary and international conference

University of Glamorgan, Cardiff
26-28 June 2008

Contributions are invited to an international conference which focuses on various aspects of adaptation into film, performance, television, radio and other media.

Adaptation – the reworking of a verbal text or another artefact for a new audience in a different genre or media – is as old a practice as cultural production itself, yet its systematic study – adaptation studies – is only a recently emerging discipline.

The Cardiff School of Creative and Cultural Industries with its strengths in drama, music, media and communication and having strong links with the creative writing unit of the university is the editorial home of Journal of Adaptation in Film and Performance and is now hosting a major international and interdisciplinary conference that will shape the formation of this neglected field of research.

The event is open to scholars from as diverse, yet closely interconnected areas as the study of film, theatre, opera, music, dance, television, radio, games and graphic narratives.

Whereas some of the most recent research in the field focused on the connections between adaptation and appropriation, this conference also addresses analogies and differences between adaptation and translation processes.

The conference embraces a plethora of perspectives characteristic of the encompassed disciplines and facilitates a negotiation between these stances, whether they emphasise the creative or the interpretive aspect of translation and adaptation.

Both the concepts and independent cases of adaptation and translation will receive attention.

The event will provide room for the investigation of transformative strategies both against the respective cultural and historical settings and generic or media-based criteria.

The conference therefore offers a range of platforms to participants, including plenaries, papers, workshops, masterclasses, exhibitions, screenings and performances so as to initiate dialogue between theoretical and more practice-based approaches to adaptation and translation.

Provisional keynote speakers include:

Dr Deborah Cartmell (De Montfort University)

Professor Steffen Hantke (Sogang University, Seoul, Republic of Korea)

Professor Graham Ley (University of Exeter)

Dr John Milton, (Universidade de São Paulo, Brazil)

Dr Anthony Minghella (British Film Institute, London, UK)

Professor Eckart Voigts-Virchow (University of Siegen, Germany)


[Pictured Above: A provisional list of the conference's keynote speaker's includes notable 'Adaptation' scholars including Dr Deborah Cartmell, Reader in English and Head of the Graduate Centre in the Faculty of Humanities at De Montfort University, Leicester.]

The conference is organised by Professor Richard Hand (University of Glamorgan), Dr Katja Krebs (University of Bristol) and Dr Márta Minier (University of Glamorgan).

Please send enquiries, abstracts for papers (max. 250 words) and proposals for masterclasses/workshops, book stalls, screenings, performances or any other platforms of presentation to afp2008@hotmail.co.uk by Friday 29 February 2008.

To inspect the inaugural issue of Journal of Adaptation in Film and Performance please visit http://www.intellectbooks.co.uk/journals.php?issn=17536421
or to order a hard copy please contact Luke Roberts: Luke@intellectbooks.com.

Submitted by:

Dr Márta Minier
Assistant Editor / Journal of Adaptation in Film and Performance
Atrium / University of Glamorgan
Adam Street Cardiff CF24 2XF UK
Tel: 01443 668548

And here's a related extract of another past post:



Dear Colleagues:

The first issue of this new Journal of Adaptation in Film and Performance has just been published by Intellect.

It is edited by Richard Hand and Katja Krebs with the help of Martha Minier and marks a step forward for Cardiff School of Creative & Cultural Industries (CCI/ATRiuM) in having an internationally refereed journal coming out of the faculty.

This is a fantastic achievement and is recognition of CCI/ATRiuM's growing stature in this field of research.

Congratulations to all concerned!

The first issue is available as a free download:

Journal of Adaptation in Film and Performance Volume 1 Issue 1

ISSN: 17536421



Editors:
Richard J. Hand
University of Glamorgan
rhand[at]glam[dot]ac[dot]uk

Katja Krebs
University of Glamorgan
kkrebs[at]glam[dot]ac[dot]uk

Adaptation, or the conversion of oral, historical or fictional narratives into stage drama has been common practice for centuries.

In our own time the processes of cross-generic transformation continue to be extremely important in theatre as well as in the film and other media industries.

Adaptation and the related areas of translation and intertextuality continue to have a central place in our culture with a profound resonance across our civilisation.



Aims and Scope:

Adaptation in the form of the conversion of oral, historical or fictional narratives into stage drama has been common practice for centuries.

In our own time the processes of cross-generic transformation continue to be extremely important in theatre as well as in the film and other media industries.



Adaptation and the related areas of translation and intertextuality continue to have a central place in our culture with a profound resonance across our civilisation.

As an academic discipline, Adaptation Studies has begun to establish itself in the last few decades as an important area of scholarship and research which continues to make significant contributions to our analysis and understanding of a complex and increasingly diverse world culture.



Journal of Adaptation in Film & Performance is a new, peer- reviewed journal designed to engage with specific issues relating to performance on stage, film, television, radio and other media.

Embracing comfortably these disciplines under the umbrella of adaptation theories and practices, it attempts to challenge widespread views of national cultural histories and global constructions of performance culture by analysing methods, histories and occurrences of adaptation across a range of media.



We would like to invite contributions that offer historical, theoretical or practice- based considerations and discussions of adaptation in performance in the context of one of the following topics:

Translation as adaptation / Theatre /
Film / Television / Radio / Gaming /
Graphic narratives
Submission Details

To submit to future editions, please, send your completed papers (4,000 – 6,000 words) accompanied by a short CV to the editors Richard Hand and Katja Krebs.



If you would like to discuss any specific proposals before submitting a completed paper, please contact the editors.

Short ‘Notes and Comments’ contributions (up to 1000 words) that facilitate debate and exchange will also be considered.

Articles in the current issues include:

Art of the Past: Adapting Henry James’s The Golden Bowl
Authors: Sarah Artt

Adaptation as Education: A Lady Macbeth of the Mtsensk District
Authors: Freda Chapple

In Praise of Treason: Translating Calabar
Authors: Pedro de Senna

Uncle Tom’s Cabin as Dominant Culture
Authors: Jim O’Loughlin

Translating the City: A Community Theatre Version of Wim Wenders’ Wings of Desire in Newcastle-upon-Tyne
Authors: Duˇska Radosavljevic



It has been estimated that an overwhelming percentage of Welsh films and television dramas are intentionally based upon other literary sources.

This overwhelming dependence upon literary adaptation is primarily from important Welsh literary or cultural sources.

This suggests an attempt to ‘recall and recollect’ and to re-‘write the nation’, after a period of suppressed or neglected representations of Welsh-ness.

While Dave Berry’s book and other studies have attributed this Welsh dependence upon literary adaptation as ‘laziness’ (Berry 1994: 234), we see it as being related to issues of post-colonial ‘re-telling’ of a national story, or more related to the economics of production.



For example, Stephen Bayly directed Joni Jones (1982) as a well-received television series for S4C, an adaptation based upon the well-known children’s stories by R. Garallt Jones entitled Gwared y Gwirion or ‘Redemption of the Innocents’.

It is often the case in Wales, that directors will create a series which is actually suited to be converted into a feature film at a later date, should the funding and political will be present to effect the re-formatting.

Additionally, one of Wales's most famous sons is Andrew Davies, who is known around the world as the 'Prince of Adaptation'.

Andrew Wynford Davies (born September 20, 1936 in Rhiwbina, Cardiff, Wales) is a British screenwriter.

He is the creator of the children's Marmalade Atkins television series and A Very Peculiar Practice, and is also well known for his adaptations of classic works of literature, including the 1995 television adaptation of Pride and Prejudice starring Colin Firth and Jennifer Ehle and the 1998 adaptation of Vanity Fair.



Literary and stage adaptations have added clout with film production investors, who assume that a successful novel or stage play will naturally make a successful film.

Some screenwriters have been known to 'invent' a novel AFTER writing a film script, for purposes of marketing the film, and for raising venture capital.

In small nations, broadcasting drama department Commissioning Editors often opt for an adaptation. This satisfies several remits: nationalistic and cultural agendas are fulfilled, while it's assumed that an established audience exists for the new film or TV series.

My favorite book on film and literature in general is Tom Corrigan's 'Film & Literature' (1999, Prentic Hall Inc / Simon & Schuster).

Here's a pleasant Youtube tribute to Colin Firth in Pride & Prejudice:









'Adaptation: Studying Film and Literature' (Paperback) by John Desmond (Author), Peter Hawkes (Author) is concise and readable new text for courses in Film Adaptation or Film and Literature introduces students to the art of adapting works of literature for film.

'Adaptation' describes the interwoven histories of literature and film, presents key analytical approaches to adaptation, and provides an in-depth overview of adaptations of novels, short stories, plays, nonfiction, and animation.

The book concludes with an analysis of why adaptations sometimes fail.




For additional info please contact Dr. Mark Leslie Woods at mwoods[at]glam.ac.uk

AIM: ATRiuM Intelligent Media

AIM -- ATRiuM Intelligent Media, Cardiff, Wales, U.K. on Face Book

Cardiff School of Creative & Cultural Industries

mwoods[at]glam[dot]ac[dot]uk

Click here to go directly to my personal blog page called Welsh-American Family Genealogy, on the World Wide Web.

Click here to go directly to my personal blog page called Welsh Music, Film, and Books Symposium, on the World Wide Web.

Click here to go directly to my personal blog page called Celtic Cult Cinema on the World Wide Web.

Visit the UK Film Studies and World Cinema and Music Import Showcase

© 2007 Mark Leslie Woods

Smart & Sexy? Your Queer Advantage is waiting!

Click here to go directly to my personal blog page called Queer Advantage, on the World Wide Web.

Click here to go directly to my personal blog page called Mordechai Razing Ziggurats, on the World Wide Web.

Click here to go directly to my personal blog page called Mordechai's Post-Evangelical-Granola on the World Wide Web.

© 2007 Mark Leslie Woods

Friday, 5 October 2007

Channel Four Online Documentary Broadband Channel Offers Unique Venue To Launch New Welsh Film Talent


FOURDOCS

FourDocs is a broadband channel from Channel 4 that is THE place to watch and upload four-minute documentaries.

This is the first time a major broadcaster has offered this kind of opportunity to everyone, and for free. Make your film and upload it. It's as simple as that.

The FourDocs Guides to Documentary Making - 1. Get Thinking



What you get:

Step-by-step guides on how to plan, shoot, edit and compress your fact-based documentary.

Access to an archive of documentary greats and interviews for inspiration and the chance to have your film uploaded for the whole world to view.



Then what?

Apart from a great opportunity for any filmmakers to get their work out there, other FourDocs users can review your film, offering their comments and constructive criticism.



And Channel 4's very own Kate Vogel - commissioning editor for 3 Minute Wonder - keeps a close eye on all uploaded films to spot talented filmmakers she can commission for this innovative strand.

FourDocs filmmaker Tomas Leach has recently been commissioned to make a series for 3 Minute Wonder after he showcased his film, The Glass-Eye Maker on the site.



Deadline:

There is no deadline. You can upload and view films whenever you want.

So what are you waiting for?

For more information about Channel4 on FACEBOOK go to

4Talent

For more information go to

channel4.com/fourdocs




For additional info please contact Dr. Mark Leslie Woods at mwoods[at]glam.ac.uk

AIM: ATRiuM Intelligent Media

AIM -- ATRiuM Intelligent Media, Cardiff, Wales, U.K. on Face Book

Cardiff School of Creative & Cultural Industries

mwoods[at]glam[dot]ac[dot]uk

Click here to go directly to my personal blog page called Welsh-American Family Genealogy, on the World Wide Web.

Click here to go directly to my personal blog page called Welsh Music, Film, and Books Symposium, on the World Wide Web.

Click here to go directly to my personal blog page called Celtic Cult Cinema on the World Wide Web.

Visit the UK Film Studies and World Cinema and Music Import Showcase

© 2007 Mark Leslie Woods

Smart & Sexy? Your Queer Advantage is waiting!

Click here to go directly to my personal blog page called Queer Advantage, on the World Wide Web.

Click here to go directly to my personal blog page called Mordechai Razing Ziggurats, on the World Wide Web.

Click here to go directly to my personal blog page called Mordechai's Post-Evangelical-Granola on the World Wide Web.

© 2007 Mark Leslie Woods

Thursday, 21 June 2007

Sexy Welsh God Again Tops America's Summer Weekend Hollywood Boxoffice



Pictured above: Welsh actor Ioan Gruffudd, star of the Fantastic Four (2007)

Welsh actors dominate as Hollywood's Libido Lifeblood for four decades . . .

Is there ever a time when the 'Land of Song' doesn't dominate and control the starring roles of Hollywood?

Ifor Novello, Richard Burton, Anthony Hopkins, Jonathan Pryce, Christian Bale, Siân Phillips, Emlyn Williams, Catherine Zeta Jones -- I'm running out of breath!

And now Ioan Gruffudd's sexy comic book character is 'stretching' across America!

According to the Hollywood Reporter

'Fantastic Four' scores with $57.4 million debut weekend
By Gregg Kilday
June 18, 2007

"20th Century Fox's "Fantastic Four: Rise of the Silver Surfer" rode a commanding wave to the top of the North American boxoffice during the weekend, finding a broad-based audience with the help of a family-friendly PG rating."

"The original "Fantastic Four," with a PG-13 rating, opened to $56.1 million in 2005, and its sequel didn't lose any momentum and outgrossed its predecessor with an estimated bow of $57.4 million."

Didn't anyone see Ioan Gruffudd speaking Welsh on the Graham Norton Show a couple months ago?

More on the sexy Welshman later . . .

Here's one for your summer reading list: Professor Peter Stead's "Acting Wales, Stars of Stage & Screen" (2002) University of Wales Press.



Gyda bob hwyl i bawb, Mark

Click here to go directly to my personal blog page called Welsh-American Family Genealogy, on the World Wide Web.

Click here to go directly to my personal blog page called Welsh Music, Film, and Books Symposium, on the World Wide Web.

Click here to go directly to my personal blog page called Celtic Cult Cinema on the World Wide Web.

Visit the UK Film Studies and World Cinema and Music Import Showcase

© 2007 Mark Leslie Woods

Smart & Sexy? Your Queer Advantage is waiting!

Saturday, 16 June 2007

The Welsh and New York's Ellis Island -- Take your mini-cam!


Looking for your Welsh cousins in America?

Visit the New World Celts website!

In the shadow of the Statue of Liberty, legend tells us that Ellis Island was named for a Welsh pub owner who gave the Island his name!

Fancy a quick trip to the States while the dollar is still so low against the pound? Why not make your own amateur Welsh home movie, and share it with the world?

This is a perfect year to visit New York City, and while you're there, check out the Welsh history at Ellis Island. There's an electronic board where you can select 'Welsh' to see where all the Welsh immigrants to America are living today -- pretty cool!

Take a Welsh flag and a mini-cam along, and take some video or photos of you and your mates in front of Niagara Falls, the Empire State Building, The statue of Liberty, etc., and we'll post the streaming video here in the Welsh Music, Film, and Books Symposium at the end of the summer, just for fun!

Zoom Airlines now has cheap charter flights, non-stop Cardiff to Toronto. Spend a night in Toronto and visit the Welsh Speaking Canadian Chapel, celebrating their 100th Anniversary this summer with lots of festivities!

I suggest you get the Canadian Trains/Amtrak train from Toronto to New York City -- the scenic travel across New York State is worth the time and price! Either go to Montreal first, and then travel south along the Hudson River, or take the train past Niagara Falls and then via Buffalo to NYC.

Visit Zoom Airlines Here.

George Bush is bringing Ellis Island into the news again, with the Immigration Reform Bill that he's trying to pass. He's a lame duck, and the bill is flawed, but Ellis Island rocks!

According to Reuters:

Ellis Island's past returns in immigration row

By Daniel Trotta Thu Jun 14, 10:47 AM ET
ELLIS ISLAND, New York (Reuters) - Ellis Island, once the gateway to America for millions of immigrants, is having a make-over after years of neglect that nearly allowed nature to destroy a national treasure.

But experts caution that, in all of the nostalgia, the country should remember past debates over who should be allowed into the United States.

The restoration of the back end of the 32-acre (13-hectare) island in New York harbor comes as the immigration debate rages anew and President George W. Bush's reforms are stalled.

"I do think it's interesting that we worship Ellis Island and the Statue of Liberty and yet we want to pull up the gang planks now that we're here," said Kenneth T. Jackson, a history professor at New York's Columbia University.

Some 12 million immigrants, nearly all European, passed through Ellis Island before entering the United States, mostly from 1892 to 1924, though it remained operational until 1954.

Newcomers marveled at views of the New York skyline and the Statue of Liberty on a nearby island, providing memories passed down through the generations.

As many as 100 million Americans have ancestors who passed through Ellis Island, where a French renaissance-style brick palace built in 1900 welcomed hardscrabble immigrants who left the Old World behind.

That main building, with its cavernous arrivals area and soaring ceiling, was repaired in the late 1980s and attracts ferries full of American and foreign tourists.

A new project led by a group called Save Ellis Island is attempting to raise public and private funds for a $250 million rehabilitation of a labyrinth of 30 buildings that were part of a 750-bed hospital for sick newcomers.

This follows the restoration unveiled in April of the ferry building, where processed immigrants boarded boats to New York City and the New Jersey shore.

Private donations for the restoration have come from rich Americans whose ancestors arrived through Ellis Island.

Read more here.


Gyda bob hwyl i bawb, Mark

Click here to go directly to my personal blog page called Welsh-American Family Genealogy, on the World Wide Web.

Click here to go directly to my personal blog page called Welsh Music, Film, and Books Symposium, on the World Wide Web.

Click here to go directly to my personal blog page called Celtic Cult Cinema on the World Wide Web.

Click here to go directly to my personal blog page called Mordechai Razing Ziggurats, on the World Wide Web.

Click here to go directly to my personal blog page called Mordechai's Post-Evangelical-Granola on the World Wide Web.

© 2007 Mark Leslie Woods

Tuesday, 12 June 2007

Canadians and Cymru Share Film Culture for Young Welsh Filmmakers at Newport and Glamorgan



Skillset Screen Academy Wales hosted two days of crash seminars for young Welsh film school students and new graduates.

Masterclasses were held on the Caerleon and Trefforest campuses for Welsh film students.

The sessions were led by Canadian Film & TV expert Sherry Lawr, who is also a professor in the Media Arts Depratment of Canada's world famous Sheridan Insitute School of Arts, Animation and Design.

Sherry Lawr has worked as a producer in the Canadian television industry for more than 20 years.

Specializing in news and current affairs programming, Sherry spent 12 years with the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation working in Toronto as an Associate Director, Line Producer and Coordinating Producer on a number of award winning programs including The Journal, The 5th Estate and Marketplace.

In 1994 Sherry left CBC to help launch Studio 2 at TVOntario. As Coordinating Producer she was responsible for all production aspects of the show. In 1997 she launched her own lifestyle program with host Maureen Taylor, and in 1998 became the Head of Production for TVOntario.

For the past 8 years she has been a Professor and Program Coordinator of the Media Arts program at Sheridan College in Oakville. Sherry continues to work in the industry on a freelance basis and last year line produced CTV’s The Next Great Prime Minister.

Professor Lawr 'Sherry' led the Newport and Glamorgan film students in a session on Monday considering pre-production planning. The cutting edge technology of Pre-Viz was discussed, as well as the rudiments of the film business.

Toronto has emerged in the past two decades as a world class centre for film and the arts, and the industry and academic ties between Ontario and Wales go way back. The Welsh speaking church in Toronto is among the largest in North America, and will celebrate its 100th anniversary this summer.

Accompanying Professor Lawr was Sandy McKean, ‘Sandy’ McKean, Sheridan Institute's Associate Dean of Media and Journalism programs. Sandy talked with Welsh film students after the sessions about their careers. Sandy told the Newport and Glamorgan students about his distinguished career in television and journalism.

Dean McKean 'Sandy' headed development and the management of CBC Newsworld and his most recent title was Director, CBC TV News, Administration and Staff Development, Canadian Broadcasting Corporation.

Sheridan Institute

Academi Sgrin Cymru Skillset / Skillset Screen Academy Wales (SSAW)

Cardiff School of Creative & Cultural Industries

Gyda bob hwyl i bawb, Mark

Click here to go directly to my personal blog page called Welsh-American Family Genealogy, on the World Wide Web.

Click here to go directly to my personal blog page called Welsh Music, Film, and Books Symposium, on the World Wide Web.

Click here to go directly to my personal blog page called Celtic Cult Cinema on the World Wide Web.

Click here to go directly to my personal blog page called Mordechai Razing Ziggurats, on the World Wide Web.

Click here to go directly to my personal blog page called Mordechai's Post-Evangelical-Granola on the World Wide Web.

© 2007 Mark Leslie Woods