Heartsgaard's lockin' and loadin'!

Things are moving right along on the Heartsgaard front. Yesterday, I finished reading the second draft of the Heartsgaard play, delivered to me by the talented Mr. Stead. Well...let me just say...things are rockin' and rollin baby!! Tennyson's prolific pen continues to amaze me like no other scribe I've met. The man's a machine and an efficient one at that! The script is 50% more active and twice as personal. It cuts me deep folks and the knife is pokin' out the other side. This has been one of the few scripts that I can read out loud by my self and not get tired of talking to myself. It is eloquent and beautiful and it feels like the words are my own. Simply put, I want to say these words!!

Towards that end, Tennyson has will be sending out the script for reads from various other actors we are interested in using and we hope to begin workshoping it in the very near future.

I would also like to thank the people who read the first draft and gave extremely valid and helpful feedback. Namely, Ms. Kelly Decker and my Mother Francine Marzilli. We truly couldn't have done it without you. Watch for more updates as they come and visit www.secondfrontfilms.com for all your heartsgaard swag needs!

Power to the People!

I'd just like to take a brief moment to say how proud I am of the Iranian protesters and how excited I am for their future. I could be being overly optimistic or naive. This whole thing could end like Tiananmen 20 years ago, but we have reason to hope. This is not Hungary or Poland 1956, Czechoslovakia 1968, or even China 1989. In 2009 information can travel with the click of a mouse, information that even 10 or 15 years ago would have to have been quintuple encrypted or sent out in a hidden compartment in a horse drawn cart over a mountain range. Now a protester can make a video on their phone and transmit it to millions in a flash. This is what makes what has gone on in Iran so astounding.

At the beginning of the 20th century, the forces of Tyranny seized the means of mass communication and production away from the people and had the sick, ironic gall to say it was in the name of the people. Now, the people have it back...

R.I.P. David Carradine 1936-2009

As many of you out there now know, yesterday, the world suffered the loss of an actor who Quentin Tarantino once described as "One of Hollywood's Mad Geniuses", Mr. David Carradine. Carradine, whose father John Carradine was a noted Hollywood actor himself, did not set out immediately to become an actor, dabbling in a myriad of art forms and arenas until receiving his big break at the age of 39 in the film Bound For Glory in 1976, in which he essayed the role of Woodie Guthrie. I myself had the pleasure of working with David in the film William Shakespeare's Richard III.

I received several phone calls and text messages from friends yesterday informing me of Carradine's death, just as I was about to go onstage for a performance. Words escaped me. Whenever someone you have known or worked with passes in that manner, it doesn't even seem real. I really didn't even know how to react. I had admired Carradine for years before working with him and found him to be pleasant and very content with his path in life. He seemed to be at the height of his career at the age of 72, working more now than ever. I have often thought to myself, "If I could be like that guy when I'm his age, I'll be all right!"

Since the initial news broke, there are now several theories regarding his passing from suicide to just a tragic accident. For all our sakes, I hope it was the latter. For if a man like David Carradine, who spent decades working in a career he loved and by all accounts was living life to the fullest, could be so overcome by personal demons that he saw no other option than to take his own life, that my friends has dark portents for us all.

I prefer to remember him as the man he was, a good natured, hard working guy with boundless energy and committment to his craft. Rest In Peace, brother. We'll miss you.