JULIAN MUMFORD MYSTERIES Story Blog Launched

It seems like forever since I last posted here…I’ve been busy writing on Closing Night, the play I’ve been outlining for a couple of years, which is the last in my series of “groundbreaking” projects that I developed in order to experiment in different media and styles.  That’s going pretty well…fast, for sure.  I’m now halfway through Act One, and hope to finish by the first of the year. 

Julian Mumford Mysteries, another long-term project, has now finally been realized.  My original plan was to self-publish these stories in book form, but I decided instead to make them available in blog format, for free.  People are more likely to read them that way. 

The idea behind JMM was to create, first of all, the Julian Mumford character, who, I admit, is my alter-ego.  Then, I made him the narrator for the stories I developed, the mysteries within his small Ohio town of Autumn Woods.  The first half of each story is told in first-person, with Julian relating his personal experience with the characters and events involved in the mysterious events.  The second half is told in third-person, and is composed of Julian’s fictionalization of the events in question, a la Truman Capote’s In Cold Blood.  I added some stock and miniature photography-most notably the detailed map of Autumn Woods itself-to satisfy my craving for visualization, and the result is pretty neat, if I do say.  So far, there is only one story, “In Search of Ellen”, which involves the disappearance of a Paris Hilton-esque heiress who had been taking drama classes at the college near Autumn Woods.  I particularly enjoyed the process of grafting my own personality onto Julian, and letting him think with my mind and speak in my voice. 

The link for the blog is here:  http://julianmumfordmysteries.wordpress.com.  Below is the promotional trailer for it.

THE TERRIBLE MR. TEETH-A Trinket Production

Here it is at last…the project that has kept me occupied in between rehearsals of a play for the last month.  It was two months prior to that when I actually began writing the script and creating the artwork for this short film. 

 

This is a semi-silent short film composed of stills taken of hand-made miniatures and sets, stock photography, and actual video. The dialogue is relayed through title cards, but many of the sound effects, along with musical interludes, are on the soundtrack. You might, in essence, call it a multi-media movie. Its content is a homage to such silent classics as Nosferatu, Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde, and especially the lost 1927 film London After Midnight, which starred Lon Chaney and upon whose incredible makeup the look for my title character is based. The story itself centers on an unnamed girl who finds herself pursued by the terrible Mr. Teeth during a peaceful picnic with her boyfriend, who has just asked her to marry him. The sinister adventure which follows helps the young lady to face her own untapped self-esteem issues and to conquer her fears, represented by the titular villain.

I am featured as Mr. Teeth himself, and the put-upon heroine is “played” by silent film star Laura LaPlante, best remembered as the put-upon heroine in the classic old-dark-house thriller, The Cat and the Canary. Short-lived silent star William Haines appears as the boyfriend. Haines was the first openly gay actor in Hollywood, a fact which ended his career in its prime. He later became a successful interior decorator, who included among his clients (and friends) Joan Crawford, who commented that Haines and his longtime partner, Jimmy Shields, had the best marriage in Hollywood.

Enjoy…and now, I am about to commence on the final major project in the two-year line-up of creative works that I developed when I started writing seriously in 2009…a play titled Closing Night.  The irony.

An Ending, A Beginning, and a Reworking

At last, the time has come to submit the manuscript of WeeWee and Somebody to professional trade publishers.  Except that it’s no longer titled WeeWee and Somebody.  Even the two main characters no longer have those names.  I found myself wincing at the notion of real, flesh-and-blood people being addressed in the narrative by the names which were perfect for two whimsical cartoon characters created by an eight-year-old boy, so after a great deal of thought, I made the name change–along with many others–to “Colin” and “Sophia” for the leads.  It made an incredible difference, which was long overdue, because I think I had neglected to realize that the project had morphed into something different than originally intended; something deeper and, hopefully, better.  Following the revisions suggested by my proofreader, I also made a multitude of other changes, adjustments, and edits.  True to my word, thirty pages were cut, and I don’t miss them at all.  Their absence strengthens the central story–the development of the friendship between Colin and his once-famous film star Aunt Sophia–and quickens the pace like no tomorrow.  The finished manuscript is two hundred fifty pages…the perfect length for a coming-of-age story aimed at a juvenile/teenage audience.  I’m pleased with how it turned out, regardless of what the response is when I submit it to the first two publishers and agent I researched a year ago.  The book actually became much more than I ever hoped for.  My original thought was to write a children’s book based on the adventures of a living popsicle named WeeWee and his brassy Aunt Somebody.  My final product–at least before the rewrites and revisions suggested by the publishing faction, if they even show that much interest–is a much more sophisticated story about real people with real problems, set against the backdrop of my own childhood experience, and adult love of Old Hollywood.  It is now titled Alexander the Avenger and the Star-Struck Summer.  To understand the first part of the title, you’ll have to read the book.

At the same time that the journey with Colin and Aunt Sophia has ended, I have begun putting together my third short film, titled The Terrible Mr. Teeth.  I worked for almost a month on the various sketches, sculptures, and miniatures to be used in it, and recruited the help of my best friend, Troy, in shooting some actual video starring yours truly as Mr. Teeth!  I created his look based on that of Lon Chaney in the lost silent film London After Midnight, which has had its influences in some of my other works, most notably the Play with Pictures Oz After Midnight.   The actual shoot went smoothly, and I am now engaged in editing all the pieces together into a (hopefully) cohesive whole.  I really don’t know what to say about this one except that it is proving to be one of the most fun projects I have ever worked on, and because of the multi-media approach, which includes actual footage, shots of miniatures, stock photography, and a myriad of music and sound effects, the finished result will be as much of a surprise to me as to anyone who checks it out on YouTube, where it will be posted by October seventh, just in time for the Halloween season. 

Not long ago, I returned to Julian Mumford Mysteries, and reread the first of these novellas focusing on the titular “reconstructor” of baffling and sinister events in his hometown of Autumn Woods (based on myself and Brewster, Ohio, respectively), and found some real potential there–much too much to just be tucked away on my hard drive.  So here’s what.  I have decided, in a couple of months, to publish this first story in the format of a blog devoted to Julian Mumford Mysteries, illustrated with stock shots and some miniature setups to satisfy my urge for visuals.  Over time, I will probably add more segments dealing with myriad other mysterious and macabre events in the town of Autumn Woods, and offer this blog as a free example of my writing…which most successful published authors would agree is necessary to build a platform of readers. 

And there you have it.  Oh, by the way, I sent my Christmas children’s book, No Room at the Inn, to the Moonbeam Children’s Book Award Contest.  Will share any developments as they occur.  No word yet on the Youngstown production of Below the Surface…hopefully I will have an update on that to share soon, as well.

And then there’s Closing Night, the play I’m set to begin writing next month, but I’ve written about that enough in past entries.  I’m thoroughly enjoying my present projects and endeavors, but I look forward to settling down to direct my energies into this final work spawned by my first burst of inspiration and ambition as a (serious) writer.

JULIAN MUMFORD MYSTERIES Postponed

During the summer, my creative energies are not usually at their zenith.  The heat and humidity take their toll on my energy and attitude, plus I suffer from Seasonal Affective Disorder (SAD), which complicates things further in that I get depressed during the warmer months.  Sometimes, work is good therapy for someone in that condition, and I am no exception…but after I wrote the first of the three stories I had planned for this trilogy, I just couldn’t get into writing any more at this time.  In Search of Ellen, the story I did complete, turned out fine, but for the first time, I’ve experienced a project going stale on me.  No amount of discipline or drive seems to be able to overcome this roadblock, so I’ve officially shelved JMM for a later production date.  No idea when that will be, but I do know that it’s no use forcing it when the muse isn’t around.  Perhaps mine is on vacation, like everybody else.

This is not to say that I have writer’s block.  I don’t.  I simply have no initiative to work on the project at hand.  I was halfway through writing Her Father’s Name, the second story in the trilogy, and my momentum slowed to a dead halt.  Maybe it’s that I’m more of a dialogue/playwright than a prose writer.  Frankly, it’s a lot of work describing things and people’s movements and dressing it up so that it’s as entertaining as the action and speech of the characters.  I guess I would rather just focus on the brass and tacks of what makes a scene.  There are writers who work almost entirely in dialogue–in short story/novel format–so I might look into reading some of their books and try adapting their style to mine, eventually.

For now, I have decided to dust off the manuscript of WeeWee and Somebody, and to revise and edit it.  This draft will incorporate the changes and suggestions offered by my proofreader, as well as my own, and will involve thirty pages total of cuts.  First manuscripts, according to my research, are almost always too long, so I aim to do something about that before I move on to submission.

In August, I would like to do another Trinket Production–either a short book or a short film.  I need a fresh project, a new perspective, and renewed inspiration, and I have several ideas tucked away in the Trunk.  In September, I plan to start writing the play for which I have been laying groundwork for two years, Closing Night.  I’m very excited about that.

DOT’S JOURNEY Reviewed by Baum Bugle, Int’l Wizard of Oz Club Magazine

Here it is at last…two and a half years after it was promised!  It’s a great review.  I’ve uploaded it here in the form of a PDF.  Just click on the link below and wait for it to load.

DOT’S JOURNEY Review

JULIAN MUMFORD MYSTERIES Underway

At last…a bit of breathing space, and a chance to sit back and enjoy all I’ve created in the past four years. 

It’s been hectic…projects to work on constantly, one right after the other…then promo trailers…edits of promo trailers…edits of published projects…remakes of promo trailers…endless revisions of my writing/artwork itinerary to adapt to new ideas, projects added and dropped.  I’ve enjoyed the ride, but I’m glad it’s coming to an end.  Even for someone who does what he does for love, it’s been just a tad too much, all at one time.  And again, this has gone on for years, as I buckled down, took the bull by the horns, and determined to make something tangible–and marketable–out of all the ideas I had collected, developed, and tinkered with since adolescence, even childhood.

I won’t be “finished” with this array of works for a while, yet.  I’ve just begun writing the first volume of Julian Mumford Mysteries, the anthology of mystery stories set in the fictional town of Autumn Woods, Ohio, and featuring the alter ego of yours, truly as the protagonist in the first half of each.  The idea is to do a buildup, a first act, in which Julian relates the actual facts and details of crimes and disappearances and the like which occur in his town.  Then, in the second act, he will present a dramatized account of each case, based on these facts.  He is not an amateur sleuth.  This isn’t Murder, She Wrote, or The Hardy Boys, much less Nancy Drew.  What Julian is, is a successful memoirist who, having excavated his own life in search of stories for his bestselling first book, is now occupied with recreating semi-fictional accounts of events from his hometown.  I am currently working on the first story of the three in the first volume of the anthology.  Titled In Search of Ellen, it deals with the disappearance of the young heiress to a pharmaceuticals fortune, Ellen Cartwright, who had come to Autumn Woods to attend the local college, Northeast Ohio Tech, for drama studies.  Who is behind it?  Her boyfriend?  A jealous classmate?  The mysterious lady who owns the house where Ellen was renting a room, or perhaps her unbalanced daughter? 

It’s coming along…and I think in the end it will be well worth reading.  Julian himself is great fun to write, as I don’t have to look far to find revealing aspects of his thoughts, behavior, and attitudes…OR those of his best friend, Todd. 

The next two stories in the anthology will carry me through the summer, and then I’ll take a break to revise my novel, WeeWee and Somebody, which has already gotten a professional proofreading, and I will most likely find a professional editor for it as well.  Ditto Julian Mumford Mysteries, when it’s complete.   Next fall, from September to December, I aim to work on the last entry in this long, long series of experimental projects, Closing Night, aptly titled.  Sort of a Noises Off meets Gosford Park.  After that, I will see what I can do about lining up some professional marketing for my self-published works, and a full-scale production of my play Below the Surface may be in the offing around the first of next year, or possibly in the spring of 2012.  If I’m lucky, perhaps I can get one for Closing Night as well.

In the meantime, I will be scribbling down ideas and sketches and the like for new ideas for projects, but I have absolutely no concrete plans for anything new after Closing Night.  This summer, I would also like to try a little “microphone marketing” via open-mike nights at my local coffee shop, and perhaps talking to the proprietors of a nearby art gallery about displaying my books.

Life is good.

RESPONSE, a Short Film

This project tackles the subject of evil in the abstract, and the various “responses” by human beings to it; these are represented here by the four characters. Does one cower in fear from the presence of evil, as Violet does? Or show indifference, like Mr. Gray? What about actively fighting it, as Lance chooses to do? And then there are those who join its cause with relish, as in the case of Madame Dragovitch. Evil itself is symbolized in Response by a sinister sculpture in a museum gallery, created by an unseen artist named Midnight Soul…

Work on this was quite fulfilling for me.  I planned the characters, inside and out, and proceeded on to the script, then referred to that to do the animation.  The finished film is composed of both drawings (for the close-ups and action shots) and dioramic shots. 

Two Projects Published, Promoted

Well…another month has gone by, and I haven’t been idle.  Last month, I made the decision to go ahead and self-publish two projects that had been shelved for a few years.  These were Oz After Midnight and The House Down the Lane, both Plays with Pictures, that I had been waiting to make available after they had been mounted and produced.  After what I went through with Below the Surface, however, I decided that it might be for the best if I just put them out there as they were.  The Oz play would be a very big production, and technically challenging.  The other is too similar to Below the Surface in its themes and characters.

This is not to say that I doubt the merits of these two works; rather, I am as fond of them–especially Oz After Midnight–as I am of anything I’ve ever written.  I started work on OAM shortly after I moved into the apartment I occupy now, and began a new phase of life with much hope and optimism.  That feeling, I think, transferred into the finished product.  It is pure, unadulterated creativity from Craig, in that, while it is unique and entertaining, it is also a wee bit self-indulgent.  That’s my estimation, anyway.  The premise is a retelling of the Oz fable (like Dot’s Journey, which was published first but written second), and Dorothy, who is a lover of old movies, is transported to an Oz torn by terrorism–much like the U.S. she left behind–and populated by film stars who bear more than a passing resemblance to the ones she has always known (i.e., Humphrey Bogart, Lauren Bacall, Bette Davis, Joan Crawford, etc.).  The tale takes some very strange–even Hitchcockian–twists and turns, but never strays all that far from the source material by L. Frank Baum.  As with many of my other projects, the illustrations feature miniature sculpted characters in dioramic settings, which I created myself.

The House Down the Lane shares this format, but it is a shorter and more concentrated piece; a thriller in which two young women, Priscilla and Ardis, find themselves stranded when their car breaks down, and must seek shelter at an old house at the end of a nearby lane.  Ardis quickly disappears in the clutch of a terrifying mutant of a man who pops out of a cabinet, leaving the panicked Priscilla to search for her friend even as various members of the eccentric household emerge from the woodwork and deny knowing anything about Ardis’s whereabouts.

I created promotional trailers for both projects; they may be viewed here.

Both works are available for purchase here, in both print and ebook format.  http://stores.lulu.com/store.php?fAcctID=3027613

Moving on to my next project…a short silent film, composed of my own “animated” characters, dealing with the various responses to evil as a kinetic force, represented in this case by a sinister sculpture in a museum.

Deep.

Next Project Finalized

I’ve been really bored lately, which is probably why I’ve been really grumpy, too.  March has been a month of more prewriting and editing existing projects, and I feel ready to begin a fresh challenge, which will come in April.  I’ve settled on a story I roughed out last fall, titled “Response”.  I’m going to tell it in the format of a silent movie, with a combination of my own pen-and-ink artwork and photography of miniatures, and some stock photography to round it out.  The story itself will be different from anything I’ve ever done before.  I’m not much of a philosopher, but I had the idea to create a sort of morality play around the concept of evil in the world, and various responses to it–hence the title.  Four characters will each symbolize a particular response…cowering, fighting, ignoring, and joining.  Evil in the abstract will be symbolized by a sculpture in the art museum where the story is set, and around which the action revolves.  I think it could be pretty cool if it turns out.

Other than that, I’m just plugging along on the prewriting for Julian Mumford Mysteries  and Closing Night, as well as working on the essays for What a World, What a World.  Revisiting your past is exhausting (and depressing).  I never would have believed how much so.  I also just sent the manuscript for WeeWee and Somebody to a local proofreader for a once-over before I do my final edit and send it out to a couple of the agents/publishers I researched last year.

Boring…boring…boring…

“Not Morbid…Intense…”

The cast of "Below the Surface", presented as a staged reading at the North Canton Playhouse Youth Theatre, February 19th

And so concludes the saga of the staged reading of Below the Surface by the North Canton Playhouse.  Last night–the night of the reading’s single performance–was both more and less than I had expected it to be.  The house was quite full and the cast performed at full throttle.  I could sense them wanting to leave their chairs and take wing as the characters they were playing.  The intensity of this admittedly dark and grim play was palpable thanks to their dedication and commitment.  I have only the best to say about them.  After twelve years of hard work, especially in the beginning, they helped BTS realize its full potential, even without staging or props or sets.  So, the experience proved a positive one, even if it wasn’t how I pictured it when NCP first told me, about a year ago, that they were interested in doing BTS as part of their 2010-2011 season.  Yes, I had visualized it as a full-scale production, complete with sweeping stairway and atmospheric lighting.  Yes, I was disappointed when the December audition failed to yield the actors necessary to pull it off (with a couple of exceptions who eventually wound up in the reading version).  But the final result was about as good as I could have hoped for.  And again, my gratitude for this is entirely with the cast.  My hope is that a full production may be in the offing within the next year or so, perhaps even with the same people as the reading; at least some of them.