Fall makes me happy. The crispness of the air, the crunch of the leaves under my feet, the smell of Autumn in the air. HALLOWEEN! I wish it could be fall all year long! I have a few shows and events coming up soon and thought I would share all of the dates and details!
The Redhead Revue: is a cabaret style show starring Lizzie Violet, Heather Babcock, Neil Traynor and Zoltan Du Lac. Each show has storytelling, music, a pre-code movie and trivia with prizes!
Killer B Cinema: Join Lizzie Violet & Zoltan Du Lac for a monthly double bill of b-moves from the 1950s to 1970s! There will also be trivia with prizes & much more! Our first show will be on October 7th at the Imperial Pub’s performance space located at 54 Dundas Street East. More details coming soon!
Music Makers: Portraits at the Great Hall: I was honoured that I was able to help edit Lisa MacIntosh’s stunning book! The book launch will be on October 14th, at the Great Hall. There is also a concert with some of Canada’s best loved musicians!
CIUT Halloween show: On October 31st, I will be reading something scary at the CIUT Halloween show! I may or may not be dressed as a Zombie! More details soon!
On June 10th, 2017 join two swell dames and sassy redheads Heather Babcock and Lizzie Violet at The Imperial! You will be treated to an evening of storytelling, music and a movie.
Starring alongside Heather and Lizzie, will be musician Neil Traynor, who is just the bees knees and our Emcee for the night is that charmer and extra swell fella Zed Dulac.
Oh, now just hold your horses, that’s not all. For an extra swell time, we will be having a special screening of Barbara Stanwyck in Lady of Burlesque and there will be trivia and prizes?
This is a night of entertainment you don’t want to miss!
Doors at 8 pm
Show at 8:30
Cost: $10 at the door
Address: 54 Dundas Street East. You’ll find us in the performance space (main floor)
Movie info: Lady of Burlesque is a 1943 American musical comedy-mystery film starring Barbara Stanwyck and Michael O’Shea and is based on the novel The G-String Murders written by Gypsy Rose Lee (with ghost-writing assistance from mystery writer Craig Rice) and was directed by William A. Wellman, produced by Hunt Stromberg, costumes by Edith Head.
For more information on The Redhead Revue, please visit out Facebook page.
“There are people who have seen The Room and those who haven’t seen The Room.” Neil Traynor
*** There will be spoilers.***
I love terrible movies. They are my happy place. The schlockier the movie the happier I am. I show no prejudice for genres and have watched them all from horror to sci-fi to romantic; silent; film noir; b-movies; romance; expressionist; westerns and comedy. If it’s considered a badly made movie, I want to see it. My current two favourites are Plan 9 From Outer Space and The Screaming Skull. In my heart of hearts I never thought any movie could knock either of those off the top of my list. Who could possibly beat Ed Woods and take his title? Always up for a bad movie challenge, I was ready, willing and open to seeing if this could take the reigns.
For MONTHS now, our good friend Neil Traynor (1) has been telling us about The Room, insistent that once we watch it, we would never be the same again. Finally we were able to arrange a viewing and as Neil said, it was life changing. It might actually be the best movie of all time. How could this be, you ask? The Room has it all. Love, sex, romance, action, violence, blood, family values, long drawn out sex scenes, drug intervention, x-files style disappearance of actors, belly button fucking, more long, drawn out sex scenes and best of all, no plot.
I’m serious. There is no plot. None. Nada. Zilch. Zero! Not only is there no plot, I personally feel that one of the reasons this movie has become such a cult hit, is you cannot, in anyway, describe to someone what the storyline is. There is an amazing Wikipedia page that has a very thorough breakdown of the movie, the characters, many of the issues with the movie and the production of The Room. However, even after reading the page, you still have no idea what exactly this movie is about. You just need to watch it.
The Room is Tommy Wiseau’s directorial debut and what a debut it is. Oh… did I mention that he also produced it, wrote it and stars in it. Mr. Wiseau is a bit of a mystery man himself. He is famous for keeping his past and personal life secret. Even the Wikipedia page about Tommy Wiseau, doesn’t reveal very much. Who is this mystery man? Is he even real? A figment of our imagination? Only way to find out, is to attend one of the many Love is Blind events happening across North America. If it comes to Toronto or even a city near here, I will be first in line to get tickets. After all, I need to know why Tommy Wiseau wears two belts. Although… he does have his own YouTube channel, called Tommy Explains It All (https://www.youtube.com/user/TommyExplainsItAll), yet… he explains nothing.
Social Media platforms such as YouTube and Facebook have helped The Room’s infamy grow.
There are many memes.
Quotes
Montages
and videos of critique.
All of this is helping to keep The Room alive. You could literally spend hours, hell, even days watching the many videos being created to celebrate this cult hit. Oh, and I can’t forget there is a Star Wars Mashup!
The Room has a huge cult following and fan-base. It also has a play, a book , a video game, a Facebook page dedicated to it, a-soon-to-be-released mocumentary, a documentary called Room Full Of Spoons and there is a movie being made about it, that James Franco is producing, directing, writing and starring in. Sound familiar! How did this movie become such a huge hit? It rivals movies such as Plan 9 and it’s huge fan base is dedicated and steadily growing. It is a phenomena with many, many unanswered questions. Like the ones I have, such as:
What happened to Peter the psychologist? Where can I rent that green screen? Where can I find that 1880’s industrial shot? How can it be sunny and smoggy at the same time? Where did that new guy come from? Will Denny survive without Johnny? Will Lisa ever find love again? Did Claudette survive the breast cancer?
Sooooooo many questions!
Back to my opening statement about this movie possibly being the best movie of all time. Let’s take a moment to think about this. When I say best movie of all time, what I mean is best terrible movie of all time. When I watched it, I laughed till I was laugh crying. I was laugh crying till my stomach hurt so bad, that I thought I was going to throw up. We discussed this movie indepth, for hours afterwards, my love and I talked about it as we were going to sleep and woke up talking about it. All of our conversations for the next several hours have been dominated by it AND we have been quoting the movie. I have spend all of my time researching the movie, Tommy Wiseau and am agonizing over what happened to the actors, needing answers to my questions and searching to find out if a “Love is Blind” event is coming to a place near us. I have been feeling all of the emotions you would after seeing a movie that blows your mind.
How does this movie compare to my current top favourites Plan 9 From Outer Space and Screaming Skull? The Room is definitely comparable in cult status to both these movies and over the top in terrible. Does it knock either of them off the top. No, but it definitely ties for top spot.
You have to see this movie. It was even shot so you can watch it 2D or 3D. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V10Px9xbrbU Apparently it wasn’t shot to be a 3D movie, Tommy Wiseau just decided to shoot with two cameras, because he could. When you watch the movie, don’t forget to say hi to Mark.
(1) Neil Traynor is a Toronto born singer/songwriter guitarist/multi-instrumentalist.
After an exciting and fulfilling 2013, I am looking forward to an even bigger and crazier 2014! I ended the year and am starting the year Lizzie style. I spent all day yesterday and will be spending today working on the second draft of a play I wrote. I’m looking forward to many more projects like this in 2014, including finishing scripts!
So… let’s get this party started and with some amazing events!
We’re just inviting you to take a timeout into the rhythmic ambiance of our breakfast, brunch and/or coffee selections. We are happy whenever you stop by.