...and the road trip home that almost killed me three different ways!
Click me to skip the tale of
trip
TO Denver FROM Chicago
and get right to the STAR WARS
Action!
Click me to get right to the harrowing tale of THE TRIP HOME!
WEDNESDAY, April 28, 1999
We found the hotel, and checked in. The four of us went up to our room. Fred went to sleep, while Matt, Ginger, and I went for food. Afterwards, Matt took us past the convention site. Things were looking grim. The site was much smaller than we had expected, and most of it was to be held outdoors in tents, not under the roof of the nearby Air and Space Museum as we had all expected. The tents were leaking, and there was mud everywhere. The life-sized Naboo fighter that had been listed as an item available there for us to gawk at hadn’t arrived, so the convention organizers had quickly amended the program: “See the Naboo Fighter being built in front of your eyes all weekend long!”. The road back to the hotel took us down Alameda street, which was (of course) quickly renamed Amidala street (after a character in the upcoming movie).
I quoted Han Solo:
“I have a bad feeling about this”.
Matt and Ginger went to sleep, and I went for a short walk before
joining
them in slumber land.
Click me if'n you want to get right to the long and terrifying tale of the trip home!
Read on if you're a true Star Wars geek!
FRIDAY
Matt and Fred left for the con at about 6AM, as Ginger and I tried to catch up on sleep. Maikel Das enters the picture at this point. He came all the way from Germany for the event, but was unable to stay with us, as the room was already over-crowded with four people. Maikel showed up at our hotel at about 11 AM, and the three of us made the convention scene at about noon. I found out that the person who had agreed to let me sell Blue Harvest at their dealer's table was now unable to do so, and now my only option was to carry a bunch of them around with me and hope people noticed it and asked me about it.
We waited in a line of cars (in the rain) for quite a while, and were then pleased to find out that the parking was free, and was NOT in a slimy mudhole. Abandoning the car, we had to circumnavigate several giant mud zones in the pouring rain, only to end up shivering under the wing of a giant bomber in front of the Air and Space Museum, as we tried to get our bearings. There were lines everywhere. Lines to get into each of the tents, into the Museum building, into the porta-potties positioned in the middle of more mud lawns, and at the registration tables (which were outdoors too). All of the people, in all of the lines, were freezing in the 46 degree rain. Many were not even lucky enough to have found a shelter as flimsy as the bomber wing afforded us. It was very unclear where we had to go to register, since there were no signs at all. Any line we might have chosen meant leaving our B-52 umbrella.
I eventually suffered through the chaos of the three different lines to get our laminated three-day passes, complete with shoestring lanyard and striking red-and-black image of Darth Maul. Goodie bags were being handed out, but there wasn't much in them. There were no signs anywhere telling one what was where. It was all guesswork. “A” Stage? “B” Stage? Main Hall? Dealer’s Room? Your guess is as good as mine. The only signs put up, anywhere, all weekend, were reminders that video taping was forbidden. This didn’t stop many people who had intrepidly smuggled cameras past the tiny and inadequate convention staff. If any of you heroes want to make me copies...
We
then decided to hit the dealer’s room, because it was the only tent
with
no line. So we toured the very, very, small dealer’s room.
A sandbag was strategically placed right in the middle of the doorway,
so that most of the people trying to get inside (and out of the rain...
sort of...) tripped onto the green plastic carpet that unsuccessfully
attempted
to keep the water and mud from making the dealers room into a big
puddle.
The tent was leaking, and most of the dealers were in a really bad
mood,
because their merchandise was getting wet.
I heard one guy lament to a dealer: “Well, I’d like to buy this (poster), but it would be ruined as soon as I stepped out of this tent, if not sooner”. Matt and his dad were standing in an inch of water, and were moving Matt’s art work around so as to keep it from getting dripped on. We were all astounded at the lack of organization, planning, and communication that was taking place. The dealers were all obviously trying to ensure that their $500 was well spent: the prices I saw were, on the average, triple the going rate for any given item. I bought a book and some replacement weapons for some of my vintage action figures. Then I took a picture of Maikel near a literal river of muddy water that was flowing freely in a three-foot wide ribbon down the side of the room. Shortly thereafter, my camera decided it was too humid to trigger the attached flash unit, and gave up flashing. Fortunately, I had a spare, but I would much rather have covered the event with my high quality Yashika (with 110mm zoom to 25mm wide angle lens), than the little instamatic I had brought as a backup.
We decided to line up to see a show in the “A” tent. We could hear the people inside cheering, we could hear SW music blaring from the PA, and we could hear the tiniest snippets of what was being said inside the mysterious and inviting tent. After an hour in line, we learned that it would be 45 more minutes before the next show. Ginger gave up. She took a cab back to the hotel, leaving Maikel and I in line. After freezing a while longer, we decided that the line for the Main Exhibition Hall (in the actual Museum) was a little shorter, and was actually moving, so we jumped into that one.
I had 1000 copies of the preview issue of BH to hand out, so I decided that I’d give the people in line something to read. I started at the back, and handed one to each person or group in the line. Next thing I knew, I was in the front of the line, and I had made everyone waiting happy, as they now had something more substantial to read than the crappy excuse for a convention program they received when registering. Hmmmm...
Inside the Main Hall were more crowds. At least it was dry! After about an hour or two of walking around in wet clothes, I was dry too, if no longer the dashing figure I had left the hotel as. I visited our good friends at the Decipher area, where they were premiering their new game, Young Jedi. This game is completely different from the normal CCG (customizable card game), and is aimed at slightly younger players. Decipher was handing out free starter decks, and had a dozen tables set up with staff for teaching the game to anyone interested.
Del Rey were there, and I got the skinny on their plans for the future of Star Wars fiction. They have a five-year story arc planned out that will deal with a new order of Jedi. It begins shortly after Vision of the Future, or about 20 years after Return of the Jedi. All of the books will be written in order, to help alleviate some of the continuity errors that cropped up with Bantam’s policy of publishing their stories out of order. I also pointed out that this would give the authors more of a chance for character development, something sorely lacking in Bantam’s novels. I always thought that the static nature of Luke, Han, Leia and co. was due to a Lucasfilm policy, but the Del Rey rep told me that it was more due to the fact that the Bantam books were written out of order than anything else.
Williams had their new Star Wars pinball machine on display. This thing kicks big bantha booty. Go play it! If you are a video gamer though, you missed a real treat. Lucasarts had a dozen stations set up where one could play a variety of the new SW video games, both home and arcade versions. I also noticed a sort of vintage arcade, with the SW and ROJ arcade games, and both of the older SW pinball machines (1992 and 1997 models). There was also an ESB arcade game that I had never seen before. The graphics were of the vector-type (like the original SW arcade game, or like Tempest, Battlezone, or Asteroids), and the controls were the same, but in this version you are flying across Hoth, shooting at AT-ATs. Is this a game that was scrapped in development, or did I just miss it completely back in the day?
There
was a life-sized X-wing on display, Anakin’s Pod Racer (just the Pod,
no
engines), the new C-3PO (that is to say, the old C-3PO, or the new
model
of C-3PO as he was when he was old and newly rebuilt by Anakin), and
some
other props. Flash photography was forbidden in the dim light of
the museum, of course. But do you think that stopped anyone?
These people were wet, cold, angry, and felt gypped. Anyone
enforcing
the no-flash rule was likely to get a mouth full of fist.
Topps were there, and if one wanted to, one could flip through one of two notebooks containing the entire series of Phantom Menace widevision trading cards. I declined. So far, there was very little unavoidable spoilerism here. However, anyone who wanted to know anything about TPM merely had to wander over to the Del Rey table, and read through the novel, the storybook, the Making Of TPM, the Art Of TPM, or any of a dozen other tomes. I declined to do so, once again.
Dark Horse were there, Hallmark, Scholastic, Lego, Hasbro, and many other major Lucasfilm Licensees. All were showing their products for your careful examination, but none were selling anything. It was not allowed. To buy this stuff, you couldn’t go to the main dealer’s room, you had to go the THE STORE.
THE STORE was a three hour wait. THE STORE was mythical. THE STORE required more of a commitment than getting to Denver in the first place. THE STORE contained all of the TPM merch you might want, at inflated prices, before it was available elsewhere. THE STORE. Every con has a legend...
I didn’t bother... on Friday.
Maikel
and I met up again and decided to finally wait in line for a show in
the
“A” stage tent. Back into the rain, we jogged through the mud and
soaked our pant legs only to have to wait outside of the tiny shelter
that
those in the very front of the line enjoyed. We were finally
admitted
in to see Ben Burtt and Rick McCallum in the leaky tent. Anthony
Daniels was to be the MC for this tent all weekend. After a
recorded
introduction by James Earl Jones and a blast of music from the PA (very
good Apogee PA equipment, BTW, but whoever was running it was deaf at
somewhere
around 2.5-4 Khz, resulting in their overcompensating certain high
frequencies
that made the sound very harsh and unpleasant) Daniels took the stage,
strutting out Threepio-like in a gold jacket. He “noticed” an
audience
member bowing to him in reverence, and he decided that he liked
it.
So, he demonstrated the “Ewoks worshipping C-3PO bow”, and insisted we
ALL do it. He ordered the tech staff to reset the music, dim the
lights and start over. Jones’ voice boomed forth once more, the
same
uncomfortably harsh recording of Star Wars: Main Title blared
forth, and Daniels appeared
again, this time to the sight of 998 fans bowing in quasi-religious
ecstasy
(Maikel and I didn't participate). We were then treated to a
short
film, “A Day in the life of Episode I”, which showed the cast and crew
goofing off on the set. Highlight: George Lucas riding a golf
cart
with two Twi’lek (Bib Fortuna’s race) babes. This was followed by
two of the five “tone poems” currently airing on TV. These are
30-second
spots featuring a major character performing a voice-over that does NOT
appear in the film. Sort of little character studies, and much
more
innovative than a third standard trailer would have been.
Daniels then stroked his own ego a bit more before introducing one of my personal heroes, the single person associated with the SW trilogy who has had the biggest affect on my career, Mr. Ben Burtt. Ben spoke for a while about doing sound effects for all four SW films (man it sounds weird to say FOUR SW films!). It was fairly interesting, but he didn’t dish out much that I hadn’t heard before. There was Q and A afterwards, and as would become the norm for the weekend, most of the questions were pretty inane. Anytime someone asked a question that contained spoiler material (or plot information about the new film), 90% of the crowd would drown it out with a sustained baritone “Nooooooo!!!!”. This was to became a common sound all weekend - most of the people don’t want to know!
After
Burtt spoke, Rick McCallum took the stage to thunderous applause.
He announced that the final three special effects shots had been
completed the
previous day, and that the film is now DONE. Of course, this news
brought the house down! His best quote: “It’s fucking
unbelievable!”.
Big news: The classic trilogy will appear on DVD next year, with “some
great stuff on it” (I assume he means stuff in addition to the films! (NOTE:
it seems as though McCallum was
misinformed. These discs didn't show up until 2004!).
Maikel and I then went back to the hotel. Matt and Fred arrived at the same time we did, and the four of us found Ginger in the room. Her friend Pat, a Denver native, came by, as did Jeff Cioletti, who is currently filming a documentary for which I was interviewed about six months ago. He interviewed Ginger, Maikel, Pat, and Fred. Matt had left to go to a licensee party, but arrived home fairly early, complaining about corporate greed. We all sat around the room talking Star Wars, and this evening was perhaps more fun than any official aspect of the convention. We had a little bit of beer and whisky, but no one was drunk. We all hit the road for some food, sans Fred and Matt, around midnight. The conversation continued to rock while we ate a midnight dinner. Pat then drove Maikel to his hotel, while Ginger and I drove Jeff to his place, getting horribly lost on the way. By the time we got there, I was exhausted, and we barely made it back. I gratefully passed out by 2:00.
SATURDAY
Once again, Matt and Fred left early to set up shop, while Ginger and I planned to hit the con by noon. Ginger was in a better mood, and had borrowed cold weather wear from Pat, but I still had the same thin jacket and my nicer shoes, as opposed to the boots I wear most of the time. Bad call for me on the wardrobe packing tip. Parking this time was a half-mile away from the con, and we were soaked before we even got to the leaky tents.
We spent the day in much the same way as Friday, walking the main room, listening to the dork at the Pepsi display continually mispronounce SW-related nouns (did you know that Hoth rhymes with 'both'?), and freezing while waiting in line for events. We found the video screening room, where four one-hour videos played continually, in rotation. There was some great stuff there, such as “Troops”, SNL skits, vintage toy commercials, and original screen tests for Mark Hamill, Harrison Ford, and Carrie Fisher. The screen tests were very interesting because there was a lot of dialogue used in the tests that was later changed or deleted. It was almost like reading the 2nd or 3rd draft of the script (the 4th made it to the final film), but in this case, Ford and Fisher were acting it out for us right on the screen. Very cool.
I handed out more copies of the free Blue Harvest Episode 16.5, and whenever I got tired of smiling and telling people very quickly what it was, I remembered the last quote from the trailer for The Phantom Menace: Darth Sidious, in his slow and evil drawl instructing Darth Maul to “Wipe them out... all of them!”. In my twisted mind, with 1000 Blue Harvests in hand, I kept hearing Sidious giving me similar instructions: “Pass them out... all of them!”. And that I did!
We caught John Morton (who played Luke’s gunner Dack in The Empire Stikes Back), giving his talk on the “B” Stage. He was personable enough, but it did stand out sorely that none of the more visible SW actors who are continually making appearances at comic book and SF cons were present at this one - Jeremy Bulloch, Peter Mayhew, Dave Prowse, Kenny Baker, etc. I’ve even seen Mark Hamill make an appearance or two - you’d think this would’ve been one of the occasions on which they dragged him out of cartoonland to yap at his fans. As a matter of fact, Morton was the only Classic Trilogy actor to show up, out of the dozen or so who usually work the con circuit. Well, Warwick Davis was there too, but he was being featured as an Episode I actor, having played no less than three roles in The Phantom Menace.
The whole wet and rainy weekend was starting to feel like a big commercial for The Phantom Menace, rather than the “by the fans, for the fans” “celebration” that had been hyped. There was very little attention paid to the Classic Trilogy. All of the banners that hung next to Stages A and B were The Phantom Menace-related, as were the skimpy program booklets and all of the other decor. If The Phantom Menace and even Episodes II and III are to feel like parts of an overall 6-part sextet, this segregation has to stop NOW. One would think there WAS NO Classic Trilogy based on what was happening at the con... at least on an official level. Luke, Han, Leia, and Chewbacca were all completely absent from any “official” decor, merchandise, or advertising.
The
fans were in costume, as can be expected, and there were some
exceptionally
well done ones. Several Boba Fetts were walking the floor, one in
a nearly perfect outfit, and another toting a boom box blaring awful
home-made
techno music. Boba Fresh? Most of Rogue Squadron was there
- rebel pilot costumes must be easy to make. I saw Stormtroopers,
several Vaders, plenty of Jedi, and even a girl who had the guts to
wear
a Princess Leia costume (yes, the 'metal bikini' one!). She was
hanging out with a guy dressed in Hoth
attire. Another brave young woman showed up as a Twi’lek
dancer.
Four Tusken Raiders had great outfits, and the guy in the Chewbacca
suit
was actually on stilts! Two Klingons looked a little lost.
A beanpole Han Solo hung out with a chubby Lando, making the pair look
more like Laurel and Hardy. A trio of Imperial officers paraded
around
proudly, but one of them needed to lose his glasses to really look
convincing.
A squadron of Snowtroopers menaced the crowd too. The clear
winner
however, in terms of sheer repetitiveness, was Darth Maul. I must
have seen six or eight Mauls there, one of whom was so authentically
dressed
that I naively asked if he was indeed Ray Park. His answer: "I wish!".
Speaking
of Park, we caught his talk in the “B” stage, but he was unable to do
his
martial arts exhibition there. For that we would have to catch
him
again in the “A” Stage later on. Ray was a good looking young guy
(24) who was absolutely thrilled to be there. He seemed genuinely
overwhelmed at the attention he was getting, and really appeared to be
having the time of his life. When he demonstrated the evil glare
of Maul, the crowd went nuts. The women in the audience were...
well
let’s just say that most of them are hoping Park gets some roles that
don’t nescessitate all of the make up that Darth Maul requires.
Something that I found a little nauseating was the sheer number of people who stood in the question line, wasting everyone else’s time, just to tell Park (and to a lesser extent, Ahmed Best) how wonderful they were, and how Darth Maul (or Jar Jar Binks) was their favorite character in The Phantom Menace already. Most of these morons didn’t even ask a question, or if they did, it was something completely inane like “How does it feel to know George Lucas?”.
The part that was most disturbing though, was the simple fact that none of these people had seen the film yet. They were drooling all over Park and telling him how great he (and/or his character) is, based on photographs and exactly two lines of dialogue in the trailers. I am undecided as to whether this is evidence of an extraordinary performance on Park's part, or (more likely) something far more mortifying. Can all of these people be so shallow that they are prepared to prostrate themselves in front of a 24-year-old kid based on the fact that he gets to wear a cool costume and knows some kung fu? We know absolutely nothing about Park’s performance or the character of Darth Maul. Park doesn’t even do Maul’s voice in the film. No one has seen the guy in action for more than 10 seconds of trailer footage, and we already have grown-ups telling this guy that they worship him. Geez, people, at least see the movie before you embarrass yourselves in this manner!
Ginger
went to see Jake Lloyd speak, while I went to hang out with Matt and
Fred
a little. I ran into Maikel, and he and I dragged Matt into the
“A”
stage to see the other Ray Park show. After suffering through
Anthony
Daniels pulling the same tiresome “Ewok worship stunt” that he had been
pulling before every show all weekend, we got to see a video on the
costume
designs for The Phantom Menace, and then Ray came out
again. The undisputed star
of the weekend, Ray is fast becoming a favorite among fans. He
answered
essentially the same questions as he had answered a few hours earlier
in
the “B” Stage, but this time he was able to do a short martial arts
demo.
To the sound of some great Japanese music, he leaped and flipped and
jumped
around the stage with a big sword in his hand. Rick McCallum
waited
in the wings, like a proud father.
After telling us AGAIN how great Anthony Daniels is, Anthony Daniels introduced both The Phantom Menace trailers, back to back. Then they treated us to the world premiere of the video for “Duel of the Fates”, the section of John Williams’ score that has been used to make a music video. The video was basically the same footage as the two trailers, but with two very spectacular and memorable new shots added in. Additionally, it shows more behind the scenes footage, and shots of Williams conducting.
Ginger reported that Jake Lloyd’s show consisted of little more than Jake and Daniels exchanging insults, followed by Jake’s mom reprimanding him.
Maikel,
Ginger, Fred, Matt and I went back to the hotel after getting some
food.
We ate in one of those tacky diners, loosely styled after the
1950’s.
I had to explain to Maikel that the place was sort of a caricature,
sort
of an exaggeration of what people who were born in the 1970’s remember
the
1950’s as being like. It was all neon and chrome, with James Dean
and
Marylin Monroe posters on the wall. People who are seriously into
retro culture would gag at an embarrassment like this place.
Also,
the waiter was awful, and on top of that, the kitchen took 45 minutes
to
get our food out. They gave it to us for free. At that
news,
Matt magnanimously offered to buy us all dinner, and with a grin, he
left
the $5 tip and thanked the manager for the freebie.
Jeff had called to tell us that Dave (Darth Vader) Prowse was in town, doing a private signing, not affiliated with the con. This led to further speculation as to why no actors from the Classic Trilogy were present (aside from ol’ Dack, and Daniels, of course). Here’s one theory, but it only explains half of this oversight: At a normal SF or comic con, you have your SW fans, your Marvel Comics fans, your Star Trek fans, etc. Any actor or author or artist who may show up is going to get a certain percentage of the crowd who are interested in meeting them and/or getting an autograph. But no one single convention guest at a nromal convetion is going to be interesting to all of the attendees. In this case, however, 100% of the crowd of up to 25,000 people per day are Star Wars fans (except for the two lost Klingons). Therefore, if one of the guests were to do a signing, the line would be insane, and the guest would end up with carpal tunnel syndrome from trying to handle all of those autographs all damned day long. So it was simply unfeasible to do standard con-style autograph lines at this particular con. Fine, I can understand that. There were enough lines, in the rain, as it was! But why exclude the entire Men Behind the Masks posse altogether? Think of the long list of talent from the SW films who regularly do cons all over the country (under the name ‘Men Behind the Masks’) : Dave Prowse, Jeremy Bulloch, Peter Mayhew, Kenny Baker. Plus less-known but no less welcome Trilogy thespians such as: Kenneth Colley, Caroline Blakiston, Maria D’Aragon, Phil Brown, Hal Wamsley, Femi Taylor, John Hollis, Mike Carter, and all the rest. Fine, don’t let them do their normal autograph routine. But I still would like to have seen them on stage along with the six or eight Episode I actors who made the scene. What gives? Further reinforcement of the theory that the con was a big commercial for The Phantom Menace?
Anyway, we also wanted to check out Ahmed (Jar Jar Binks) Best’s band, who were performing that night. So we hauled like Maul over to the signing hall, where the line to meet Prowse was insanely long. Thus, with one element of my previous paragraph demonstrated to be true, we briefly debated whether or not to wait. I have met Dave Prowse on several occasions dating as far back as 1983, so I didn’t care if we left. Ginger, on the other hand, is a HUGE Vader fan who has never met the man. She wanted to stay. Maikel broke the tie when he said “let’s fly”. So we boogied on over to where Best was playing, but we missed the gig - people were filing out just as we arrived. Strike Two. I had been to a really fun bar last time I was in Denver, while on tour with a certain band. We decided to try to find it, and eventually we did. The place was not so fun this time - there were no seats and the band were out of tune and too loud. We walked half a block and settled in to a lame sports bar where we finally were able to relax after spending the past few hours running all over Denver in an unfruitful search for fun.
SUNDAY
We didn’t see Maikel again after we dropped him off Saturday night. He had to catch a plane first thing in the morning. Ginger’s plane was due out by 2:00, so after a quick trip to the con to get in line at THE STORE, I ran her back to the hotel and her rendezvous with the airport shuttle. Back to wandering around the con after that, I got kind of bored. I ran into Jeff Cioletti, and we hung out for a while, watched the idiot at the Pepsi booth ramble on over his mic, and sold some BH issues. The weather had finally cleared up, and the “C” Stage which had been completely canceled on Friday and Saturday was open. There was a guy talking about Jawa collectibles. I decided that I hadn’t seen enough of the major shows all weekend, so I caught Terry Brooks with RA Salvatore, Hugh Quarshie, and Ahmed Best all in a row, all on the relatively easy to get into “B” Stage. I didn’t bother with the “A” Stage again all day - I had seen Tony Daniels pull his repetitive gags enough times already. The MC of the “B” Stage, Scott Chernoff, was almost as tiresome, continually trying to salvage morale for the weekend by telling us (in reference to both the crowds and the mud) that this was “our Woodstock”. Well Scott, YOU didn’t have to wait in any of the lines, did you?
Brooks and Salvatore (a new country band?) were entertaining as they talked about their respective novels. Brooks probably fielded more questions about his Episode I novelization than Salvatore did about his upcoming novel (Vector Prime, the first of Del Rey’s new Expanded Universe entries). Brooks was well-spoken and came off as intelligent and witty, while Salvatore’s rough demeanor and New York accent made him seem like an Oscar Madison to Brooks’ Felix Unger. Don’t get me wrong though - Salvatore was just as funny, and just as interesting, it’s just that the two authors had very different personalities, and perhaps that is what made their talk more enjoyable. They also seemed completely nonplused by Jake Lloyd running through the room while they were speaking, followed by a huge entourage that paraded around the con behind him like rats behind the Pied Piper. Little Lloyd scooted around, secure in his stardom and enjoying every second of it, followed by a half dozen other kids. Behind them were Lloyd’s tired parents, and bringing up the rear were a group of other adults who seemed exhausted, bored, and not at all happy to be there. In feathered hair, day-glo sunglasses, and huge white puffy sports shoes, I expected this branch of the family to have the bitchin’ Camaro parked outside. Obviously the Appalachian branch of the Lloyd clan. This was also where I ran into Chris from Cinescape; he and I had met while being interviewed by Jeff Cioletti in Chicago a few months earlier.
Hugh
Quarshie was surprisingly interesting. Having played a character
who’s action figure didn’t even make the initial wave of 18, you’d
think
a forum with the actor behind Captain Panaka might not be very
exciting.
Quarshie was a pleasant surprise, however. Speaking softly in a
British
accent, he was extremely intelligent, and managed to say some things
other
than the tired reiterations of the The Phantom Menace press
releases we had suffered through
all weekend. He had some refreshingly individualistic opinions,
which
he was not afraid to express. Maybe we should get him to write
for Blue Harvest! An experienced stage actor, he spoke of
exactly why
Shakespeare stinks. He was even bold enough to mention in passing
that “the failure of modern religion is so disappointing” and how
George
Lucas’s fables and the teachings of Jospeh Campbell are an important
replacement,
in that they help people come together and give us role models.
He
also had a few things to say about Ahmed Best - it appears that there
is
a tongue-in-cheek rivalry building between the two. According to
Quarshie, Best can’t spell “philosophy”, and there is speculation as to
whether “Best” is his real surname. These two statements, and
others,
were made in jest. That didn’t stop Best from commenting on them
though.
Ahmed
Best may be as different from Hugh Quarshie as RA Salvatore is from
Terry
Brooks. Perhaps more so - I’d say that my Odd Couple analogy is
even
better suited to this pair of African actors than to the writers
mentioned
earlier. Slouched in his chair and speaking in an abrupt inner
city
manner, Ahmed Best was most certainly a product of the large American
city.
Gesturing wildly with hands that seemed to want to gravitate towards
his
belt buckle, he was uncouth, rude, and funny as hell. He had very
little compunctions about soliciting romance from female audience
members,
and had plenty of stories to tell about walking around the TPM set with
“a duck on his head” (the Jar Jar mask). Fielding a question from
the audience about his spelling abilities, the crass and comical Gungan
demanded that Quarshie be brought to the stage. Presently, Hugh’s
taunting voice came over the PA, and after driving Best nuts in trying
to locate the body behind the voice, Quarshie took the stage. The
two exchanged banter, a repartee of Quarshie’s English wit vs. Best’s
coarse
comebacks, before a touching reconciliation and a brotherly hug ended
the
battle between cinematic allies.
Asked
about Jar Jar’s voice, Best was unable to perform any quotes from the
film,
except for the one line that appears in the trailer. His “Yousa
people
gonna die...?” received almost the same applause that Ray Park’s evil
glare
had solicited on Saturday. He was able to tell us that the scene
in which he spoke that line was the first one he filmed. He was
then
persuaded to speak some lines from the Classic Trilogy in Jar Jar’s
voice.
Frankly, Jar Jar doing Yoda isn’t that different from Yoda doing
Yoda.
Best was hilarious in telling us how he used the old “Jedi Mind Trick”
to convince George Lucas to let him be Jar Jar’s voice as well as his
stand-in.
Yes, I guess that’s all Best is - a stand-in for a digital
creation.
So it is good that Best was allowed to do Jar Jar’s voice, after
designing
so much of the performance and movement style that was eventually
replaced
by computer graphics. Hungry to bum rush the stage for
autographs,
a crowd was forming in the aisles. Chernoff had to insist that
Best
sign no autographs, and the crowd dispersed. I wandered out to
the
“C” Stage (in the middle of a parking lot), and listened to Warwick
Davis
for a few moments.
I
went to inspect the progress of the Lego Naboo fighter in the Lego
tent.
It was unfinished, and the guys who had been working on it had
apparently
given up at the 11th hour. They were no where in sight.
Here's
a pic of them working their behinds off on Saturday.
Then I helped Matt and Fred pack up a little, and talked with no less than two other artists - Jeffrey Carlisle and James Cukr - about their great work. Jeffrey is an illustrator who’s rendering of Yoda and Obi Wan sparring was most impressive, done in the style of an ancient Japanese screen print, complete with columns of lettering on the corners, done in the “Jedi Symbol Font”. Cukr’s bounty hunters painting appeared in SW Insider #42. His rendering of AT-AT’s and a dewback (manned by a biker scout) marching across Tatooine was one of the most striking new SW paintings I’ve seen in years. Finally, it was time to go. I had checked out of the hotel that morning, and Matt had paid me for his share, as had Ginger. I ended up giving Matt’s share back to him in exchange for some of his art, a rendering of Princess Leia in a foxy grey spacesuit that was used on the cover of Snowfire magazine, a fan fiction ‘zine published by my Blue Harvest co-publisher, Mary Jo.
Some of the Force.net guys were hanging out with Matt too, so I finally got to meet some of the fellas who so graciously put a link to Blue Harvest up on the #1 SW web page.
And now there was nothing to do but hit the road. I saw Anthony Daniels in the parking lot, and as his bodyguard escorted him away from a throng of fans, I put a copy of Blue Harvest in his hands. Not the mini-issue, but the real deal. Over the weekend, I had also handed copies of the latest issue to Terry Brooks, Hugh Quarshie, RA Salvatore, John Morton, Ray Park, Scott Chernoff, Rick McCallum, and various licensees.
So
before I hit the road - and let me tell you , you’re only halfway done
reading this thing - let me mention THE STORE. THE STORE is my
most
incriminating evidence that this event was not held as a place for fans
to meet and have a good time so much as it was an excuse for all of the
licensees and the Fan Club to get together and sell us The Phantom
Menace stuff.
On Friday, the line for THE STORE snaked around and through the main
convention
hall, through Star Wars exhibits and under the WWII bombers that live
there
in the Museum permanently. Finding the back of the line was a
challenge,
and getting to the front was more so. I worked the line on
Friday,
handing out BH freebies, and dug up some dirt. Essentially, THE
STORE
was to sell The Phantom Menace merchandise before it went on
sale to the public.
Now, keep in mind that all The Phantom Menace merch was to be
available on Monday, May
3rd, only a day or two later. But these people couldn’t
wait.
You’d think that THE STORE was the only reason they came to
Denver.
By Saturday, THE STORE had opened up a franchise in the main Dealer’s
room.
The wet floor and the mud river didn’t stop yet another line from
forming
to give people a crack at getting most of what was
available
in the main store. Of course, the four best items - three of the
new action figures, a “pod Racer” jacket, a Darth Maul Jacket, and the
new The Phantom Menace Legos - were NOT available in the
Dealer’s Room sub-store.
However, the souvenir posters, hats, and pins were, as well as the
limited
edition $85 version of the novel. Terry Brooks, by the way, had
shown
distaste on two occasions during his lecture at the high price tag for
a $25 book in a slipcase with his autograph. You could also get a
“Big Little Book” that would effectively spoil the whole film if you
were
to read it, and a few other goodies at the sub-store. I bought
the
poster, Ginger got the book, Maikel got a whole bag full o’ stuff to
take
back to Germany. One could also buy a $20 CD of Anthony Daniels
telling
anecdotes about his adventures while playing C-3PO in the Classic
Trilogy.
Anyway, by Saturday, the geniuses who were running the show decided that the way to take care of the line problem inside the Museum was to move the line outside. So now the three-hour wait was a three-hour wait in the rain. That didn’t stop the shoppers! As I hopped over a huge puddle near the line on my way somewhere else, I muttered somewthing about "Slimy Mudhole", and got a laugh out of a section of the intrepid shoppers. It was probably the only time anyone smiled all weekend.
By Sunday, late afternoon, the wait was down to about 1/2 hour, but some of the stuff was sold out (like the Darth Maul jacket). I handed out BH freebies to everyone in the line, and soon made it into THE STORE. Two tiny rooms, containing piles of Legos and stacks of action figures at $9 a pop (Wal Mart: $5.74). I was out of there in less than five minutes. So here’s the big pun for this report:
What do you call a big evil store that only sells Star Wars stuff?
The Darth Mall, of course!
And now, friends, we hit the road. If you don’t care about
the convention,
this is the scary part you’ve been waiting for.
US 87 is a 2-lane black ribbon that connects southern Colorado with Amarillo, TX. One lane each way, and no posted speed limit. No towns, no cops, no gas, no nothin’. Just coyotes, tumbleweeds, and sand. I didn’t mind driving at night, because there was nothing to see. I would do my sight seeing on Monday and Tuesday on Route 66. Or at least that was the plan. I drove at insane speeds through the night, never needing to turn off my hi-beams for oncoming traffic, because there was none. The little oval of blacktop that I could see in my headlights sped past at dizzying speed, mesmerizing me. I could see lots of stars, if I had dared to lok up for more than a few seconds while driving so fast on this narrow and lost highway. Once or twice a truck sped by going the opposite way. I had to slow down and veer over to my right, to the very edge of the road. Still, my car quaked and trembled for a few tense seconds each time an eighteen wheel behemoth hurled past. By 4:30 AM, I was asleep in the car in a parking lot near Amarillo, clothes hanging over the windows for privacy. I decided that after buying all those toys, the hotel would have to be cut out of the budget.
I have my priorities.
MONDAY
I got a book showing maps of where Route 66 used to be, which sections of it still exist, and which roads I should take to simulate Old 66 on the sections where it is gone. Just after Amarillo, I started my exploration, and promptly got lost on a wide expanse of dull grey wasteland. Looking at a map, I saw that there was a good long stretch of 66 that was still well-preserved running between Oklahoma City and Tulsa. So I got un-lost and headed towards Oklahoma City on the interstate. It was raining.
I managed to find part of Route 66, and I re-started my exploration of the past. I saw a lot of dead armadillos, who don’t seem to bleed, they just go flat like an old tire. I also saw a tortoise truckin’ down the shoulder of the road, but I was going to fast to stop and say hi. Aside from dead armadillos and a live tortoise, I saw enough road kill to populate possum heaven. A stiff dog too, it’s legs straight up in the air like in a cartoon.
Driving
down an abandoned stretch of highway in nowheresville, north east
Oklahoma,
I found an old gas station that had been turned into a junk market
(Watto's?).
I stopped to check it out, but all of the tables in front of the
building
were covered with big blue tarps. There didn’t seem to be anyone
around, and the door to get inside was locked. But, all of the
merchandise
outside was just sitting there. I poked though it, but I didn’t
find
anything interesting. Still no signs of life, either. The
wind
was picking up and was quite noisy, but over the din, I thought I heard
someone calling out
to me. The only other building for miles and miles around was a
tiny
house right across the street from the ex-gas station. There was
a little old lady out in the yard, a blanket clutched to her
chest.
She was shouting at me, but I couldn’t hear a word she was saying over
the sound of the wind, the odd truck going by, and her German Shepherd
doing it’s best to either scare me off, or break it’s tether and kill
me.
I got closer and closer, but I still couldn’t hear her. She was shouting and pointing, and I finally jogged across the street to her fence, but no too close, because old ladies usually tend to be afraid of young men wearing black clothing who stand six foot four. I didn’t want her to panic and sic Rin Tin Tin on me. She eventually communicated that there was a bucket that had come loose across the street and was blowing into the road. I ran back over to the junk shop, secured the crappy old plastic bucket in a pile of old tires, and went back to the old lady. She started telling me that she had owned the junk shop for 50 years, but that a family had recently taken it over. They lived in a cabin back in the woods behind the erstwhile service station, and had four daughters. The daughters, it seemed, were not allowed to leave the premises, and were schooled by the parents. The shop was closed on Mondays, but if I wanted anything, the old lady would gladly make the sale for them.
I’m sure.
Grandma wanted to chat some more, and kept asking me if I was a doctor, with the blanket clutched to her chest the whole time, the dog barking, and the wind blowing. She wanted me to see her flower garden behind the house, but I couldn’t come through the front gate because it was locked. I noticed an ancient chain wrapped around the latch, rusted to the point that the links were all one solid piece. Either she had a back way in, or she hadn’t left the premises in decades. I told her I could see her flowers just fine from the road, and craned my neck around a bit to illustrate that I was interested, and that yes, I could see them. This was becoming very much like a scene in a David Lynch move, so I decided to reboot my reality and get the funky monkey out of there.
Good
thing I didn’t stay for tea, as you will soon discover.
Continuing
east, I found another tortoise at the side of the road. It had
two
big cracks in it’s shell, it was bleeding, and it had ants already
crawling
into it’s shell to feast on it’s remains. It had all of it's
limbs pulled into it’s
ruined carapace, still alive, peeking out at me and very scared.
I moved it off of the shoulder it into some rocks and water a few yard
off the road, to die decently. Drowning, the ants abandoned
ship.
I questioned myself: Why do I pass dozens and dozens of mamillian road
pizzas without a thought, but get so choked up when I see a reptile in
need? Hand me that field guide to native mammals. I’ve seen
every species in it, at the side of the road, all dead, in the past 24
hours. Birds too. Who cares? It’s part of travelling
the road. But the tortoise had me bummed out. Poor thing.
I came across another town as the sky grew grey. There was a Chinese restaurant that advertised “Tropical Drinks” on it’s sign, and since that is often an indication that an old Tiki Bar is hidden inside, I stopped for a peek. It was just a Chinese Restaurant, but there were a few token Tiki mugs behind the tiny bar, in case anyone might ever want a Tropical Drink. I didn’t get the idea that many people did. I got some chicken fried rice for lunch and moved on.
I bought some old 1950’s movie and fashion magazines $0.50 each at an antique mall on 66, then lost the Route again. The Route 66 book I had bought earlier that day was a little unclear, and it was designed for the westward traveler. I had to translate all of the directions into an eastward configuration, and it often got confusing. The rain pouring down didn't help much either. Getting frustrated, I saw an even longer stretch of old 66 going through most of Missouri. A friend in Chicago had told me that 66 through Missouri was the best part of 66. So I got onto the Interstate, planning to pick up Old 66 in Missouri and skip Oklahoma, just as the rain picked up some more. As I headed northeast on I-44, the rain steadily increased, until it was almost impossible to drive. Then I saw the tornado.
Yes, THAT tornado.
Well, friends, I am still here to write this, but let’s just say
that
it was a close one. I saw that damned thing in my rear view
mirror,
and had one thought: GAS. And lots of it. Pedal to
the
metal, I studiously ignored everything I have ever heard about the art
of driving in a tornado, which is to get out of the car under a bridge
and lay down with your hands over your head. “Fuck that", I
thought.
"I am getting OUT OF HERE”. If I am going to die, it is not going
to happen while laying in the mud next to a freeway in Oklahoma while
some
fucking tornado blows my ass straight to Oz. Having just spend
three
days with a bunch of people who quote Yoda all day long, I was well
versed
in Jedi philosophy.
"Do or Do Not".
I did.
Wipers on "full" did absolutely nothing to help clear away the deluge I was driving under. I couldn't see a thing. The sky wasn't the deep grey one might expect, but rather it was a sickly bruised color. Under other circumstances, I might have found it fascinating. I drove as fast as I felt I was able to go while still maintaining control of the car, and then I went just a little faster. Fortunately, the weather was moving in a direction perpendicular to the direction which I was driving, and I therefore watched it go from left to right across my tail as it also receded into the distance due to my foolhardy velocity. The wind and rain were intense, but the twister was several miles away. I was hardly in the worst part, but it still scared the shite out of me. Eventually, I left it behind me.
Arriving
in Joplin, Missouri, I found a $19 hotel room. It had no phone
(whadda
ya expect for $19), but it did have free cable. The average
American
traveler obviously has priorities. It was 9:00 PM, and I was not
in the mood to sit in the hotel. Normally, I would drive until at
least midnight, or later, but I was a little shaky due to the weather,
and I also didn’t want the spectacular retroness of Missouri 66 to fly
by at night. I wanted to drive it the next day. Unfortunately
Joplin isn’t very big, so there was no
where to eat other than fast food. All of the bars in Missouri
close
on Sunday and Monday, so my only option was to hang out at a bowling
alley.
I drank shitty beers for $2 each and talked to some of the local kids,
who were almost as boring as those kids way back in Omaha. It
started
raining again. No, it started monsooning again.
Midnight and closing time rolled around, and half shitfaced, I had to get back to the hotel in the deluge that was giving me flashbacks from that afternoon. I stopped at a 7-11 to get a sandwich, and these two girls were buying lottery tickets. For some reason, I told them that they ought to buy me one, and they did! But, they told me that if I won, I would have to split the money with them. As it turns out, I won $10. But, the cashier wasn’t allowed to pay me at that hour. Not even a piddly tenner. So I went to the girl's car, and made their boyfriends give me $5. They resisted, even after I explained things to them. I gave them the ticket and told them they could cash it in the next day for their $10. They still didn't get it. One of the dames finally coughed up a lincoln, and I forked over my winner and went back inside. Then I bought my sandwich, just as a big fat guy with a big fat wife and two fat kids in a mini van pulled up and ran inside, instantly soaked in the downpour.
The guy was half hysterical, and shouted “It’s coming this way! They said on TV to evacuate!”. I looked a the cashier, and knowing the answer, I asked what was coming this way. He said: “The tornado that killed 50 people in Oklahoma City today!”. Well, that was the first I had heard about how big and bad this thing was. I had never been in a tornado before, and I had no idea that my first one was like the 2nd biggest ever. F5? Isn't that a photography term? I had no way to judge how far away it had been from me that afternoon, but apparently it had been further away than I thought. Good!
So I want back to my hotel. What else could I do? Outrun this thing again, and in the dark? I didn’t even know which way to go. For all I knew, I'd be driving right into it this time. The drive to the motel was short, but intense. Stoplights weren’t working, cops were rushing about in all directions, trees were bent over 45 degrees in the gale. I made the hotel, parked the car in the little mini-garage next to my room, and went inside. I stood in the doorway watching the chaos, almost enjoying the terror. The TV behind me was showing death and destruction in the town I had consumed lunch in that afternoon, just as the announcer was urging people to evacuate the town I was in at the moment.
What could I do? I went to sleep in the world’s shittiest hotel room. I looked at the 1970’s pinstriped wall paper contrasting the once gold and now grey carpet, cigarette burns and beer stains providing texture. The bed cover was another color again. The lack of a phone, and the mirror on the wall across from the bed gave me a clue as to the normal clientele here. If this was to be the end, then so be it.
I wondered if my trunk was leaking. Can’t have the toys getting wet...
TUESDAY
The
first thing I noticed when I woke up at 10:00 on Tuesday was that I had
indeed woke up. That meant that I was alive. I looked in
the
mirror. Unfortunately, the mirror was designed to be viewed by
people
laying in the bed, so I was only able to see mid-belly and below.
Everything important was still there, and I assumed my head was still
on
too. I looked outside at the car, and it seemed unscathed.
“Oh good”, I thought. “I’m not dead”.
I showered(!), dressed, and hit the road.
I found 66 near Springfield, and followed it for a while into the depths of Missouri, or ‘misery’, as I had taken to thinking of the Show Me State.
I found an old diner that had been abandoned many years before. Sometimes the ruins on a trip like this are as fascinating as the elements of the past that have been successfully preserved. This diner was built at the height of the atomic era, and had atoms and rocketships painted on the sides of the building. All of the windows and doors were gone, and the gas pumps had long ago been dismantled. I went inside. It was creepy as hell. I found four old postcards on the floor that had almost certainly been laying there for 40 years. There was also a lot of other crap, which I left undisturbed for the archaeologists of the future.
Back at the car, I noticed that my right front tire was in critical condition. The steel belting was poking through the rubber, and an entire layer of rubber was missing completely from about 1/4 of the tire. I guess when one is outrunning a tornado, they don’t notice their tires going bad. I could have had a blowout at any moment, I realized. I was lucky to have come this far without losing the tire. It was not as if I was in a well populated area - I had chosen the backroads of 66 on purpose, and I hadn’t seen a town for an hour or so! The rain picking up yet again, I got back onto I-44, intent on finding a service station who could sell me a tire.
I soon found a garage. Being only 2:30 PM, they were still
open.
If this had happened on US87 hauling ass through Texas on Sunday night,
I
would have been completely fucked. The friendly middle aged man
who
looked like the actor Brian Denehey and his hillbilly helper
(whom
I dubbed “Mongo”) were quick to help. They had just taken over
this
station three days earlier, and were eager for business. The
owner’s
wife was trying to get the other half of the building, a restaurant, in
order. Mongo poked through their tire inventory for half an hour
trying to find my size. Finally he found one that was close
enough,
but a little wider than my dead old tire. It would do the trick
though. On being quoted $28 for the tire, I decided to buy two,
as my other front tire was
pretty bad too. As an afterthought, I told them to do an
alignment
for $29.95, as my lack of alignment is probably what killed my old
tires
so thoroughly and so quickly. So I was looking at bout $86 plus
tax.
Acceptable indeed for two tires and an alignment. They got right
to work.
I sat in a booth in the unfinished restaurant. I helped myself to a beverage. I sat staring at the rain for hours. The afternoon was waning, and I was in the middle of Missouri. I had to be in Chicago that night, which meant getting back on the Interstate. I had hardly seen any of 66 at all. Just a few glimpses, such as the dilapidated Atomic Cafe. In the booth next to me, a huge black spider slowly crawled out from under the napkin dispenser. Normally, I would have jumed up in revulsion. But it was as far away from me as my tired mind was from anything of real importance. I watched it slowly climb and explore the napkin dispenser. It was a flat black color, and it looked almost like it was made of stone or hard plastic. It wasn't hairy. It was like teflon. And it was the size of a half-dollar. It was one creepy sonofagun. Finally it dissapeared under something. A sudden bout of arachnophobia sent irrational images into my head of Mr. Spider appearing in my own booth, crawling into all sorts of places much too close to my person, so I evacuated the booth and went to check on the car. Four hours had passed, the monsoon had fired itself up again, the garage was flooding, Mongo had left and was replaced by Barney Google, and my car wasn’t fixed. When it was finally declared done, I was asked how much money I had. They were not yet equipped to take credit cards, I didn’t have a check on me, and the tires had inflated in price just as they were inflated with air a few hours earlier... before the marathon alignment. I told them I had $139. They took it. All of it. Otherwise, it was tacitly implied, my car could remain on the lift, and I could wander off into the monsoon by my own damned self. The rain was coming down so hard I couldn’t see the street 25 feet away, and I knew that aside from a(nother) bowling alley about 1/4 mile away, there was no shelter until the next freeway exit... a few miles at least, on foot and in impenetrable rain... and then what? So I gave them every penny I had, thankful for two credit cards to get me gas and food on the way home. The tires were the wrong width, which is OK, but I later found them to be the wrong circumference too, so the front end of my car is now a bit higher than the rear. And the alignment is still a little off. But I was on the road, on I-44, and doing a good 25 miles per hour under the sea in my submarine. The rain slowed down, I made time, interstates were the key - no more time for Route 66 or sightseeing. The garage and the weather had sucked up all of my time. And my cash. Now it was about getting home, and fast. But not too fast. Just outside of St. Louis, I was pulled over and awarded a ticket for doing 72 in a 60. The speed limit all the way across Nebraska, Iowa, Colorado, Texas, Oklahoma, and Misery had been 70 or 75, except while near large cities. The limit dropped to 60 just south of St. Louis, and I missed the sign, obscured by a truck, or perhaps the miserable rain, or a yuppie in a SUV. The cop didn't seem to care. I limped onward. Mississippi River. I remember a park on the Illinois side where I stopped to prolong my 1994 road trip. It flew by unvisited this time. | & |
Joliet. Home of the Blues Brothers, a prison, and not much else. Stopped for gas an hour from home. I was pulled over by another cop while coming out of the gas station. Headlight is out. It worked an hour ago! I swear! The officer let me go. Could he see the past two days in my eyes?
Chicago.
Alive.
Midnight.
We’ll unpack the car tomorrow.
| I
have
maintained
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1995. I write and create photos because I enjoy it. People tell me they enjoy reading this site, so I keep it going. However... This site has cost me a lot of hours, and a lot of money. And, unlike my writing for magazines or books, there is no publisher sending me checks for the work I do on this site. So... | Tydirium
Multimedia Left Orbit Temple Tiki Road Trip Big Stone Head Send e-mail to James Last updated on February 15, 2005 |
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