The Shins

The Shins will perform on Jimmy Kimmel Live Friday, November 5.

Hot!

The White Stripes cover Dolly Parton's Jolene in this video shot live at Blackpool.

Bee Season

The screen adaptation of Myla Goldberg's novel Bee Season will star Richard Gere, Juliette Binoche, and Orlando Bloom's blue crush Kate Bosworth.

Political Speeches

Lincoln's Gettysburg Address
Martin Luther King's "I Have a Dream"
Roosevelt's speech in Milwaukee moments after being shot in the chest (Contrast that with Bush reading My Pet and staring into space on 9/11.)
JFK's Inaugural Address

Continuing the frenzy of Halloween-related posts

Linus: I've learned there are three things you don't discuss with people: religion, politics, and the Great Pumpkin.
(It's the Great Pumpkin, Charlie Brown '66)

The Soundtrack from An American Werewolf in London

Blue Moon, Bobby Vinton
Blue Moon, Sam Cooke
Moondance, Van Morrison
Bad Moon Rising, Creedence Clearwater Revival
Blue Moon, The Marcels

"On the moors, we were attacked by a lycanthrope, a werewolf. I was murdered, an unnatural death, and now I walk the earth in limbo until the werewolf's curse is lifted."

Random Music Bits

Rolling Stones' Weezer bio

Pop Vultures No. 1: Breakbeats & The White Stripes

Salon on Eminem's new video "Mosh," which is intensely anti-Bush and a direct link to the video. And a link to a really high quality version (47mb) (thanks, Patrick).

Dead Man

Director Jim Jarmusch answers questions about his film Dead Man ('95), which stars Johnny Depp as William Blake.

The Stuff of Dreams

No one wants to hear
what you dreamt about
unless you dreamt about them.
Don't let that stop you.
Tell them anyway
and you can make it up as you go.
Built to Spill, "Made Up Dreams"

FreakyDreams Dream Analyzer
The Interpretation of Dreams by Sigmund Freud
A-Z Dream Dictionary

"I've been to Vidal Sassoon."

IMDB has some great Rosemary's Baby-related trivia.

Don't Dream It's Over

A love letter to Neil Finn... ("Former Crowded House frontman Neil Finn still writes songs that can stun you with their beauty," Salon.com)

Thursday is the New Friday

The Big Foot Lodge is super chill on Thursdays (with great music) and they have a drink called the Flaming Toasted Marshmallow, which is perfect for the pretend autumn we're having right now.

Hollywood Forever Cemetery is screening Rosemary's Baby on Saturday night! (Please, please don't let it rain.)

Theatre West is reading Dorothy Parker's The Ladies of the Corridor on Sunday at 2pm. (via Flavorpill LA)

Adaptation Updates

Jake Gyllenhaal will star in the screen adaptation of Swofford's Gulf War novel Jarhead.

The Merchant of Venice, starring Joseph Fiennes (Shakespeare In Love), Jeremy Irons, and Al Pacino, opens on December 29.

From the Frontlines

McSweeney's Daily Reasons to Dispatch Bush
Vertical Hold
Salon's War Room '04
NPR reports that "under pressure from affiliates, shareholders and advertisers, Sinclair Broadcasting Group decides not to require its stations to broadcast a one-hour program highly critical of Sen. John Kerry. Instead, affiliates will carry excerpts from Stolen Honor as part of a news program." Wonder how partisan the "news" program will be.

Brit Backlash

The Guardian UK initiated a project to "help (their) readers have a say in the American election." The response was perhaps not quite what they expected?

Everything Is Illuminated

I finally got around to reading Jonathan Safran Foer's debut novel. It started out so funny that I actually couldn't read it in public and yet it became equally devastating. Liev Schreiber is directing the film adaptation which will star Elijah Wood (as Jonathan) and Jason Schwartzman. The scheduled release date is August, 2005. Also, if you've never seen Spring Forward ('99) starring Liev and Ned Beatty, you should add it to your netflix queue.

Special Halloween Edition of The Good Life! (10/28)

Turntable virtuoso Liza Richardson's lush, globally influenced grooves will be on display in the Tech House Room at The Halloween Edition of The Good Life's weekly DJ Lounge. Whether she's spinning the best of underground dance music on The Drop or serving as music supervisor on acclaimed soundtracks such as Y Tu Mama Tambien, KCRW's self-described chameleon is always at the forefront of groundbreaking tech and house. The evening will also feature renowned producer, remixer, and DJ John Tejada whose role as a pioneer of the electronic music scene has resulted in an astounding output of arrangements, from uber-chill to buoyantly energetic. The techno artist's singles, remixes, and film and TV contributions all form a venerable catalog of work that is influenced by a rich musical history, beginning with classical music. Eminent DJs Tony Powell, Howe Lin, Lars Behrenroth, and Dru Sullivan will also be on-hand to ensure that the beat never stops. $10 at the door or $7 at www.wantickets.com or go here for more details.

"You're partisan -- what's the word? -- uh, hacks."

Transcripts from John Stewart's Crossfire appearance are on Stereogum.

The Pirates! In an Adventure with Scientists sounds like fun. Author Gideon Defoe tells EW that he wrote the first draft to impress a girl. (It didn't work.) And that his publisher made him wear a pirate costume to bookstores:

They would find these really tacky outfits and spend a good 50 pence on plastic eyepatches. I'm sure Salman Rushdie doesn't have to go about dressed as his lead character.

The Scarlet Pimpernel

Amy and I powered through Parts II and III (A&E miniseries, 1999) last night really because we couldn't turn it off. Richard E. Grant is the dashingly heroic Sir Percy Blakeney and Elizabeth McGovern is his French wife Lady Blakeney, the former actress Madame Marguerite. Grant isn't your typical leading man as far as looks go, but in the same way that Colin Firth IS Darcy, he's absolutely mesmerizing as The Pimpernel. Lady Blakeney is a strong female character who becomes an integral player in The Pimpernel's missions to rescue French aristocrats from the guillotine. The two of them had a fantastic chemistry that overcame the many implausible plot twists. (I won't even go into the whole accent issue except to say that it's so typical of an American production to screw that up.) The Bottom Line: We loved it.

Johnny Depp will play the second Earl of Rochester in The Libertine.

Passion, Poetry, and Poltergeists

This new biography about Lucrezia Borgia sounds fascinating.

The poem Freud by Billy Collins is featured in the current issue of The Paris Review. You can read it here.

The latest issue of Granta has Martin Amis's screen adaptation of Austen's gothic comedy Northanger Abbey, which he began for Miramax in 2001.

You can listen to Elliott Smith's final album From a Basement on a Hill here.

A Cristal Vision

Phillipe Starck designed The Cristal Room, an award-winning restaurant in the historic mansion that houses the Baccarat headquarters in Paris. You might also recognize it from the series finale of Sex In the City. In the 1920s the mansion was the salon of Marie-Laure de Noailles, who hosted such artistic luminaries as Dali and Man Ray. ("Razzle-Dazzle 'Em," The Washington Post)

Book Surfing

Lauren at Cupcake Series links to an interesting article on neglected Scottish women writers like Susan Ferrier, "the Scottish Jane Austen" which led me to add this, this, and this to my amazon wish list (which I use to keep track of all the books I want to go and buy at Book Soup on Sunset). The article also reminded me of Maria Edgeworth, an Irish author who was greatly esteemed by Austen. Her novels Castle Rackrent, The Absentee, and Belinda are a fantastic way to while away a weekend.

Completely Trivial Trivia

Did you know that Billy Crudup is the voice behind Mastercard's "Priceless" commercials?

At London's National Portrait Gallery

Read a brief introduction to Off the Beaten Track: Three Centuries of Women Travellers here.

An excerpt:

Victorian traveller Mary Kingsley defended herself with a canoe paddle when a crocodile attempted to board her boat, and was saved only by the thickness of her skirt when she later fell into a pit of sharp stakes. Penelope Chetwode made a remarkable river crossing in India using the traditional method of floating across on an inflated animal hide, propelled by a local man on top of whom she was required to lie.

Get the history of Silhouette-making here.

And an upcoming exhibit features two beautiful portraits of the Senior sisters, "the toast of London society in 1858." (Guardian UK)

The Weekend in Review

Michael (Jeff Goldblum): I'm going back to my novel. I'm going to write about this weekend.
Sarah (Glenn Close): What were you going to write about before?
Michael: Last weekend.
The Big Chill

Quick Post before the Weekend in Vegas

Austrian novelist Elfriede Jelinek is awarded The Nobel Prize in Literature.

Everyone is heaping praise upon Pamuk's Snow including the latest Boldtype, "The Translation Issue."

A home movie turned documentary, using Apple's iMovie, focuses on mental illness. ("Mother of All Home Movies," Salon)

Some of my friends could totally star in "Scenes from a Blockbuster Action Movie Featuring a Technology Expert with Approximately My Own Real-Life Skill Level." (Mcsweeneys.net)

Beige Is the New Pink

Sorry, I just couldn't look at it anymore.

Mega Mashup

Stereogum has posted a mashup that includes dialogue from Ferris Bueller, Pop/Hip Hop samples, and Queen. ("Kleptones are the new Dangermouse")

More Fun than a Mood Ring

Take this quiz to find the poem that matches your current state of mind (Guardian UK).

Mine is:

Sometimes you just feel like getting away from it all - to some pure, solitary mountain top where you can wander, free as a bird... but if you're stuck behind a desktop instead, take some solace in this.

Requiem

Under the wide and starry sky,
Dig the grave and let me lie.
Glad did I live and gladly die,
And I laid me down with a will.

This be the verse you grave for me:
'Here he lies where he longed to be;
Here is the sailor, home from the sea,
And the hunter home from the hill.'

Unknown

Fluff Pays the Rent

I'm working hard for the $$$ and that means my other blog at "teen fashion destination" fashionclub.com is live. Just don't start calling me Kimmie.

"And everything's cool in the mind of a gangster"

So I gave up waiting on IT to never show up and downloaded Mozilla. Thanks for the suggestion, Marc.

It's hard to find the...well, whatever, nevermind

Not really, it's just that I'm having massive computer problems at work (that's what comes of being forced to use a PC) and it's practically impossible to post under those conditions.

The Guardian on women falling for Mr. Darcy and directors falling for Hamlet.