Category: Shakespeare

  • Everybody’s a Muggle in Rowling’s “A Casual Vacancy”

    As I type these words I have reached page 160 of J. K. Rowling’s new novel, “A Casual Vacancy,” so I’m about one third done and have made enough progress to know that I’ll finish the book and that I can draw early conclusions. Note: there are no plot spoilers here past the first five…

  • Why Avengers ROCKS + Top 5 Superhero Movies

    Yesterday my almost-seven-year-old son and I took in a 3D matinee of “The Avengers” and had a blast. We loved it so much that we plan to see it again in iMax. The movie has everything—Joss Whedon directing off a terrific screenplay he co-authored, a huge budget with huge stars, and, startlingly for a popcorn…

  • Simile Search: Please Help This Writer!

    I’m looking for evocative comparisons that talk about how one thing so automatically comes with another that we take the pairing for granted. Like, “the juice comes with the meat” (except it often doesn’t) or “the warmth that comes with the fire” but preferably less flabby.  Something taste or smell related (for its Proustian oomph)…

  • Super Storytelling Smackdown: “Smallville” vs. “Thor”

    This is a post about the difference between experiencing a story and remembering it later, a distinction that we pay too little attention to in the media world.  I’ll talk about theater, movies, TV, Superman, Thor and Shakespeare, and there will be spoilers… lots of ’em about the “Smallville” series finale, but I’ll be careful…

  • Interesting Tidbits for March 16th

    Things worth reading for March 4th through March 16th: The State of the News Media 2011 – Here’s the direct study from Pew that Reuters summarized in the next link. Online readership and ad revenue overtake newspapers | Reuters – Reuters Summary: “For the first time, online readership and advertising revenue has surpassed that of print…

  • The Shakespeare Brand: Yesterday’s iMedia Talk now UP on YouTube

    UPDATE: More of the talk now embedded below. Yesterday I had the great pleasure of speaking at the iMedia Brand Summit– an event that I’ve been intimately associated with for years but at which I’ve rarely presented while wearing my research hat.  This talk is the seed of my next book length project, and I…