A Tea Party Symposium

I was delighted to be invited as the keynote speaker for St. Peter’s College’s recent Lewis Carroll Symposium.  English Club President Jonathan Brantley (wearing the stylish brown hare ears in the photo) and his fellow club members put together a great afternoon of events.  As requested, I gave an informal talk about how I “fell down the rabbit hole” and became a Lewis Carroll fan for life, ending up as President of the Lewis Carroll Society of North America.  Jonathan presented a very good paper giving attendees an overview of the creation of the two “Alice” books, and their continuing impact on our culture.  There was also a frabjous and bountiful buffet of Carrollian treats, including some elegant cupcakes bearing Cheshire Cat smiles, or quotes like “Eat Me” and “Drink Me”.  I was very impressed with all the organization that went into the afternoon, and had a great time talking with both students and faculty.  A brillig event!

My Voiceover Presentation Was a Hit!

I had a great time presenting my seminar about proper use of voiceovers in eLearning at the eLearning Guild’s Learning Solutions Conference in Orlando, Florida.  My audience was attentive and appreciative, and we had a great discussion.  Word of mouth and written feedback afterward was terrific–great to know my talk “hit the spot” with attendees!  My thanks to all who attended and participated.  I look forward to presenting my talk again at other venues.

February 2010

I had a number of good auditions this month, and a number of callbacks from those.  No bookings, but great feedback, and so I press on!  I also did more Lewis Carroll-related interviews in anticipation of the March release of the Tim Burton “Alice” film sequel.  Interviews included a recorded interview for NPR, and a phone interview Charlene Gianetti for her excellent site, womanaroundtown.com.  You can read the resulting article, in which I’m heavily quoted, here.  I also did an interview for a Polish publication that I was assured was a cross between Time and New Yorker magazine.  I’ll look forward to reading a translation of that article.

January 2010

I’m Giving A Voiceover Seminar in Orlando!

Some great news: I’ve been selected to offer a seminar on adding voiceovers to eLearning projects at the eLearning Guild’s Learning Solutions conference  in March 2010.  When I’m not acting, I’m consulting on the creation of eLearning and providing voiceovers for online courses.  This seemed like a topic companies would really appreciate, and I’m delighted the eLearning Guild agrees!  The conference will be at the Disney Hilton from 3/24-26, 2010, in Orlando, Florida.  I’ll be there under my consulting identity: Sellon Solutions LLC.

December 2009

Carrollian Interviews!

As current President of the Lewis Carroll Society, I occasionally receive requests for interviews or expert answers to various Carrollian questions.  I recently gave an interview to Glance magazine, and now this month I gave another to the Wall Street Journal in conjunction with the upcoming spate of adult-oriented movies based on children’s books, including Tim Burton’s upcoming riff on Alice in Wonderland, which opens 3/5/2010.  The WSJ journalist and I spoke for 90 minutes, and one sentence made it into the article.  That’s showbiz!  I also answered an expertise question for the staff of Who Wants to Be a Millionaire?  They wanted to know whether Lewis Carroll had coined the word “snark.”  Answer: To the best of our knowledge, yes!  I told them he also came up with the term “portmanteau word” to describe a word that in today’s lingo would be called a “mash-up” of two words.  Example: his word “slithy” could be a combination of “lithe” and “slimy”.  Carroll’s works, including the famous poem Jabberwocky, are full of portmanteau words.  Speaking of game shows, there’s a Carrollian question on Jeopardy and a clue/answer in the New York Times crossword puzzle about once a week.  His works are that much a part of our popular culture.

November 2009

ANDREW WITH JOHN LITHGOW FOR NEW YORK PUBLIC LIBRARY

Comedy Sketch with John Lithgow!

Sometimes really neat things happen really fast.  I just filmed a quick comedy sketch with John Lithgow as part of his introduction at the November 2, 2009 Lions Gala at the New York Public Library.  Mr. Lithgow could not have been nicer or more fun.  The entire production staff and crew was also composed of incredibly nice people.  It was all over much too soon, but everyone was very pleased with the end result, which played for an invited audience of literary and Hollywood icons at the Library’s major fundraising event for 2009.  I was delighted to be cast (thank you to my agent, Renée Glicker, and to producer Tim Miller!), and I had a great time.  I didn’t mention to Mr. Lithgow that he was playing opposite a fellow Harvard alumnus!  Tim Miller kindly invited my partner and me to come back that night and watch the clip being played out in front of the celebrity audience.  It was a blast, and the room was filled with a real who’s who of literary and film stars. 

CLICK THE IMAGE TO SEE THE FULL VIDEO; IT WILL TAKE A FEW SECONDS TO LOAD, BUT IT’S WORTH IT!

October 2009

Alice in Fort Lee, NJ!

I hosted the fall meeting of the Lewis Carroll Society of North America on 10/17.  The focus was on early film versions of the Alice stories, and the meeting included a screening of the rare “Bud” Pollard version — the first “talkie” Alice in Wonderland — filmed in the early 1930’s right there in Fort Lee, NJ!  Who knew Fort Lee was an early film capitol?  A fascinating meeting, and a great children’s reading at nearby Elementary School #4.

September 2009

A Vermont Stage Gala!

Vermont Stage Company invited me to take part in their 10th Anniversary Gala.  I was honored.  I presented scenes from our huge VSC hit productions of The Foreigner and King Lear, and helped narrate the entire evening, alongside Artistic Director Mark Nash, and his wife and Associate Artistic Director, Kathryn Blume.  I also read a scene from the sweet play Souvenir.  The audience of about 800 was fantastic, and at the end of the evening, alumni from VSC’s many years of productions filled the stage.  It was a wonderful evening, a lot of money was raised for a terrific theatre company, and it was great to see so many of my Vermont actor friends again.

August 2009

Busy, Busy, Busy!

The outdoor NYC parks production of King Lear was a great success in June and July, despite the record rainfalls.  The audiences at both Central Park and Battery Park were brave and wonderful.  The cast and crew were as nice a bunch of people as I could ever hope to meet.  And I’ve just received word that the film Free Man is nearing completion.