David Goodis: To a Pulp

Tonight Noircon will host a screening of Larry Withers's documentary David Goodis: To a Pulp. It's a terrific flick that explores the life of David Goodis through a relationship in Withers's life. I'm not just saying that it's great because I'm in it. Even if I'd ended up on the cutting room floor, I'd still be singing the film's praises.

The event takes place at 7PM at The Society Hill Playhouse (507 S. 8th Street, Philadelphia, PA 19147). If you're not able to make it out, the film is available for sale on DVD.

March is Mike White Month

It's official... March is Mike White Month.

March 5 brings the premiere of Larry Withers's David Goodis: To A Pulp to Philadelphia. I've not seen the final cut yet but I've been assured that I'm in it, pontificating about the film adaptations of Goodis's work. For details on the premiere screening check out DavidGoodis.com. And, if you can't make the premiere, the documentary is (available on DVD).

The SXSW Film Festival of March 12-21 brings the premiere of The People Vs. George Lucas by Alexandre O. Philippe. The documentary plays as part of the Spotlight Premieres and I've been told that I'm also in this film, ranting about the criminal treatment of Star Wars by its creator. For more information about the film visit PeopleVsGeorge.com.

Please be sure to support these projects!

David Goodis: To A Pulp

Readers may recall that I went down to Philadelphia back in 2007 for an interview about David Goodis. It was for Larry Wither's documentary, David Goodis: To A Pulp.

Now, I'm happy to announce that the project is complete. It's going to be premiered in March, 2010 in Goodis's native Philadelphia.

Here are the details from "The Writer In The Gutter":

What:
David Goodis: To A Pulp
Produced and Directed by Larry Withers

When:
Friday, March 5th, 2010 @ 8:30 PM

Where:
Society Hill Playhouse
507 South 8th Street Philadelphia, PA
215-923-0210

How Much:
Tickets are $10.00 at the door
Seating is LIMITED!
Q & A Session will follow the screening of this one-of-a-kind David Goodis Documentary!
DO NOT MISS THE STORY OF PHILADELPHIA'S UNSUNG NOIR WRITER AS IT HAS NEVER BEEN TOLD BEFORE!
http://www.thewriterinthegutter.com

If you can't make it to the premiere, be sure to check it out on DVD.

2008: Year in Review

2008 was a year filled with travel and new adventures.

January

Early in the year, Andrea and I were invited to Cancun to spend Christmas with her family. This prompted us to sit down with a calendar and go over all known and desired trips for the year. We sketched out quite a few long weekends for us and film festival trips for me. We didn't hit everything that we ended up doing but we were close. Rather than doing one long Mexican vacation in December we chose small trips throughout the year.

February

We started off February with a trip to Las Vegas and a stay at the Planet Hollywood Casino. We really lucked out on this. As (free) members of the Flamingo's "casino club" program, we were sent a postcard for two free nights at the newly-opened Planet Hollywood. "What's the catch?" I asked the customer service representative. She promised that there wasn't any and, wouldn't you know, she was right.

Two nights at the casino, a $50 credit for one of their restaurants, and a free show (their proprietary version of Stomp). We just had to get the flight out and I used miles for it, making this one of the cheapest trips we could do. I spent a lot of the trip reading The Lost One: A Life of Peter Lorre by Stephen D. Youngkin. It just about broke my arms (it's a weighty tome) but it definitely aided my appreciation of one of my favorite character actors.

March

It was in March when I made the fateful decision to finally give up the ghost and let Cashiers du Cinemart die a dignified death. I pulled the plug on my ailing publication and dedicated much more of my mental faculties to writing for pay. I had been losing money with my writing since 1994 and only made my first penny from a word of prose in late 2007. This felt pretty good and I wanted to keep getting checks (however paltry) for what I had been giving away (at a significant loss) for so many years in the pages of my zine.

By April I was still writing for Detour-Mag.com and added Detroit's Metro Times to my regular repertoire of places to contribute. I approached a few other publications but was thwarted at every turn, usually because my whacked-out sensibilities of cinema just don't play too nice with others.

April

My trip to Philadelphia for the first annual Noircon gathering was rather fateful. I was on a discussion panel for David Goodis's "The Professional Man" with the ever-eloquent Howard A. Rodman and met a number of folks who would appear later in starring roles in 2008 including Noircast.net podcasters Shannon Klute and Richard Edwards. I also finally met Megan Abbott. She's writing novels now, but I remember reading her stuff in the Michigan Daily back when I was in college. And, I also had the pleasure of making the acquaintance of Melanie G. Dante who's since invited me to be a part of a book project for 2009.

Speaking of books... Cashiers du Cinemart wasn't even cold yet when I decided to start picking flesh from its bones; cannibalizing my past and putting together a "Best of" collection in book form. This started the ball rolling on a project that would fill many hours for the rest of the year.

I also stopped by the Toronto branch of my employer where I hung out for a couple days and spent the evenings with friends. Rita Su and I checked out Evil Dead: The Musical and had a blast.

May

The month started off with a bang as I headed down to Baltimore to partake in the Maryland Film Festival where I moderated a panel on the state of film criticism in this cyber age as well as watched a lot of movies and hung out with some dear friends. It's always a treat to be in Charm City.

I ended the month with an equal bang, heading back to New York City after many years. Andrea and I did the "tourist thing"; taking a tour of the city via double-decker bus. It was a hoot. We also caught Avenue Q and even managed to have dinner with my old friend Leon Chase. I still regret that I missed the performance of his new band, Sister Anne.

June

Andrea and I took one of those mini-trips in June over to Niagara Falls. It was a blast. We did all the touristy things you can do without going broke; Maid of the Mist, Journey Under the Falls, the Butterfly House, et cetera. We stayed away from the tourist trap center of town until the last day when we did the overly expensive Ripley Museum. Fun, but pricey! Again, we got to hang out with a good friend. Dion Conflict drove down from Toronto and we all went to the Flying Saucer restaurant. Excellent.

July

Shannon and Richard from Noircast.net asked myself and Howard A. Rodman to participate in their show. Together we did an episode on Jean-Pierre Melville's Bob le Flambeur. It was a hoot.

I continued to work on proofreading/cleaning up of old articles and gathering them for inclusion in the Cashiers du Cinemart book.

August

The month started with a whirlwind trip to San Francisco/Berkeley where I introduced Shoot the Piano Player as part of the Streets of No Return film series - films all based on the works of David Goodis. This tied in nicely to the feature I did on Goodis in the last issue of CdC.

This year I gave up another thing I had been doing for years - I stopped running SuperHappyFun.com, a bootleg DVD site.

September

I would say, "As usual, I went up to Toronto for the Toronto International Film Festival," except that this year may be my last TIFF. I was so disappointed in their lineup and they way that the festival was run; I'm looking into other, better fests that will fit my schedule and tastes more. I've got a short list going but, so far, none are as convenient as TIFF.

I did have fun at the B-Movie Celebration in Franklin, Indiana in September, too, and that's definitely on the short list. It was there/then that I finally got to meet fave director Greydon Clark.

October

With the fall, I began my annual hibernation. The Cashiers du Cinemart book manuscript was in the hands of Lori Higgins all month as she continued to finesse and polish the prose from me and my fellow contributors. I finally got down to work on the piece I'm contributing to a journal in 2009. I'm still not giving too many details about it, in case it falls through. Suffice to say, I spent every weekend watching Fetish/BDSM-related films to expand upon an article I had done earlier in 2008 for the Metro Times. I actually started to get burned out on watching people flog one another. LOL.

November

Research on my articles continued. Weekends were spent taking care of family stuff with my Grandmother passing away the second week of the month.

I got the foreword to the book and was absolutely floored. News on that should be coming in early 2009, I hope. Lori wrapped up her layout and handed the project back to me at the end of the month.

December

I'm back to going over the manuscript for the Cashiers du Cinemart book. One final polish, I hope. There should be some more announcements about this project soon. It sounds like the journal I'm writing for will be out around the same time as the book which will be nice. I'm wondering if I should hold off on taking much more than my January vacation(s - to Las Vegas and Cleveland) and seeing about doing some kind of "book tour" later in 2009.

2008 has been one hell of a ride.

Another Great Goodis Article!

Writer Max Goldberg recently penned a great article on David Goodis for MOMI - read it here and prepare to be blown away!

(Oh, and because I'm such a geek, I created a "Fan Page" for Goodis on FaceBook)

More on Shoot the Piano Player

Michael Guillen of The Evening Class graciously reprinted the notes from which I worked on Saturday night in my introduction for Shoot the Piano Player. You can find them here. (I was determined not to read anything but talk through things instead, meaning that I derivated quite a bit from my notes but they provided a good way for me to collect my thoughts beforehand.)

Thanks, Michael!

In Other Words...

Michael Guillen describes the events of the first night of the David Goodis series much better than I could ever hope. He does so here and here. Enjoy!

Goodis Film Series Kicked Off

It's official! The David Goodis film series at BAM/PFA in Berkeley, CA has kicked off. The opening film, Dark Passage, was a stellar choice. It represents the highest point in Goodis's short-lived Hollywood career and, moreover, it's one of the few of the pulp author's works set outside of his native Philadelphia. This time 'round the exteriors were shot in nearby San Francisco, prominently featuring Telegraph Hill, Coit Tower, etc.

Introduced by Barry Gifford, the author/screenwriter brought Goodis to the masses via his Black Lizard publishing imprint. Gifford pulled some great quotes from Geoffrey O'Brien's words about Goodis to give the audience some insight on the elusive author. Gifford also gave a few anecdotes about David Lynch's reaction to Goodis's work ("Those books are too scary!") and Gerard Depardieu's remembrance of Moon in the Gutter ("Please don't mention this movie, it might give me another heart attack."). A very entertaining/off the cuff beginning to the series.

Barry Gifford (Left) with programmer Steve Seid (Right)

Both Dark Passage and The Unfaithful (co-adapted by Goodis as one of his few completed Hollywood gigs) were lovely prints straight from the Warner Brothers vaults. Likewise, the print of Shoot the Piano Player was absolutely spotless, a brand new strike from Janus. This is a real testament to programmer Steve Seid's dedication to quality when putting together this series. I've been talking with Seid for a few months now via email. He's been tirelessly researching and tracking down prints for this month-long extravaganza.

Saturday evening Steve took Andrea and I out to dinner in downtown Berkeley at a great Cajun place.

I'd never been to Berkeley before. From what I heard, I expected that the streets would be knee-deep in crusty hippies. Luckily, that wasn't the case. There were a few odd birds, to be sure, but the atmosphere that of a pleasant college town during the doldrums of summer. The weather couldn't have been better in Berkeley or San Francisco (where we spent our days). For some photos from our trip, click here (only visible to facebook members).

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I was nervous as hell before my introduction -- and a bit during. The turn-out for Saturday's screening of Shoot the Piano Player was terrific. It was a packed house. I didn't want to read what I'd written about the film nor did I want to sound completely unprepared. I wanted to end up somewhere in the middle, allowing my enthusiasm for the film and Goodis to come across. Apparently I did an okay job, though Andrea tells me that I said "Um" a lot. I didn't go into the idea of adaptation at all, though I wanted to bring up how much the Fido character rings untrue compared to the Goodis book.

Overall, I think I did a fair job for my first proper film introduction. I hope that I've asked to do more as the years wear on.

There's a lovely write-up on the series and an interview with Steve available at Michael Guillen's The Evening Class blog.

Goodis Film Series Officially Announced

It's official! The David Goodis film series is coming to Berkeley. I'll be kicking it off that first weekend along with Barry Gifford and Eddie Muller. For all the details click here.

David Goodis - To A Pulp

A clip from Larry Withers's upcoming documentary about David Goodis. Here's hoping it will be ready for Noircon 2010!

The Next David Goodis Film

Of all the David Goodis works that have come to the silver screen, it's remarkable that one of his most popular, Cassidy's Girl, eluded adaption. Not so fast, hardboiled/film fans. Photographer/filmmaker Edward Holub has been working fervently to bring the tawdry tale to a theater near you.

Duane Swierczynski interviewed Holub back in March 2007 over at his Secret Dead Blog. I have yet to see Holub's film NIGHT RUNS RED (it's on order) but I'm very familiar with his photographic work, having done scads of covers for Black Lizard and other publishers. One of his images has been appropriated by at least one video seller on iOffer for their film noir selections. If Holub brings his photographic eye to his film work, we'll all be in luck when CASSIDY'S GIRL gets off the ground. Keep up to date at CassidysGirl.com.

David Goodis Film Festival in Berkeley, CA

In a bit of serendipity, the Pacific Film Archive at University of California Berkeley will be showing a series of films based on the works of David Goodis in August, 2008! Based on my article about the filmic adaptations of Goodis's work, I've been invited out to introduce a film. As noted on the schedule below, I'm going to be speaking a bit before Truffaut's SHOOT THE PIANO PLAYER. I intend on doing a better job than when I introduced Eddie Muller at the Philly Festival earlier this month.

I'll be flogging this for a few months, just FYI.

Friday, August 1
Dark Passage (Delmer Daves, 1947)
Introduced by Barry Gifford

The Unfaithful (Vincent Sherman, 1947)

Saturday, August 2
Shoot the Piano Player (Francois Truffaut 1960) - Brand New Print!
Introduced by Mike White

Tuesday, August 5
Shoot the Piano Player (Francois Truffaut 1960)

Thursday, August 7
Nightfall (Jacques Tourneur, 1957)
Introduced by Eddie Muller

The Burglar (Paul Wendkos, 1957)
Introduced by Eddie Muller

Sunday, August 10
Descent Into Hell Francis Girod, France, 1986)

Thursday, August 14
The Burglar / Le Casse (Henri Verneuil, France, 1971)

Thursday, August 21
The Professional Man x Two (Directed by Nicholas Kazan & Steven Soderbergh)
Introduced by Nicholas Kazan

And Hope to Die (Rene Clement, France/Canada/U.S., 1972)

Saturday, August 23
Moon in the Gutter (Jean-Jacques Beineix, France, 1983)

The Hunt Continues

Just when I thought that I had tracked down every television adaptation of David Goodis's work that there could be, I came across three more. Another episode of "The Edge" from HBO and two episodes of "Lux Video Theater":

• "The Edge" - "Black Pudding" (23 August 1989) with Alan Sharp teleplay from the 1953 Goodis short story, features Brad Davis as an ex-prisoner seeking revenge on his former boss and unfaithful ex-wife (Kelly Lynch).
• "Lux Video Theater" - "Ceylon Treasure" - (14 Jan 1952) with Irwin Lewis teleplay, directed by Seymour Kulik. Starring Edmund O'Brien and Maria Riva. Adapted from the short story "The Blue Sweetheart"
• "Lux Video Theater" - "The Unfaithful" - (12 Jan 1956) directed by Earl Eby. Starring Jan Sterling. Benjamin Simcoe adapted the Goodis-James Gunn story and screenplay for the hour-long play.

This blog entry does a great job bringing up a few other dark alleys like an adaptation of Nightfall on "Sure as Fate."

And, so, I dive back into this dark David Goodis world to keep on researching the adaptations of his work for the screen. My research never stops, even after the article's been put to bed.

Return to Philadelphia.... Again

When I was in Philadelphia for Goodiscon I was lucky enough to meet Larry Withers. He's making a documentary called DAVID GOODIS: TO A PULP. I got to chatting with him about the article I'm writing on the film and TV adaptations of David Goodis's works. More than chatting, I talking his ear off. Eventually he stopped me and asked if I was going to be around for a while. He wanted to get me on tape for his flick. Alas, I was off to the airport shortly thereafter.

Now, I could have someone up here in Detroit shoot me with a digicam and shoot the tape down to him but I don't know anyone who does. Completely self-absorbed and flattered as hell that someone would actually give a shit about what I have to say, I'm going to take off back to Philly the last weekend of February. It won't be a long trip -- I think I'll be gone for 26 hours in total. Oh, the efforts I make to stoke my own ego.

I'm just about done with the rough draft of my Goodis piece. I finally got the episode of Bourbon Street Beat that was based on a Goodis story. I ordered one back in Mid-November that I paid far too much ($40) for. The other one I traded for in early January. Of course I actually got two versions of the same episode on the same day and the one that was a trade was a few hundred times better than the other one.

It feels like I'm missing one thing for every major article I'm penning for the next issue. I went ahead with my Travis McGee piece in Cashiers du Cinemart #14 despite missing a relatively crucial component, a script by Terry Rossio & Ted Elliot. It was about two months after that issue came out that I got a response from Rossio's secretary and she graciously sent me a copy of the script. I'll write about it in the next issue but, gosh, how I hate to be anything less than definitive. That's where my obsessive nature really comes in handy for my readers, I hope.

Speaking of readers, it was quite a nice feeling to get an email from a buddy of mine that actually addressed some of the stuff I had brought on here, on my myspace blog, and on taintfilm.com. You mean someone actually reads this stuff? According to Google Analytics there are either five people that read this blog or it's simply me hitting this URL when I go to sign up or see if I have feedback. I vote for the latter.

Good News from Goodiscon

Finally made it into Phily. I'm having bad luck getting to this town via Northwest Airlines ("NWA fucking up the program" as Ice Cube would say). Seems that each time I try to get here I actually leave at the time that the flight was scheduled to arrive. Good thing I padded my timetable a bit.

The good news on Goodiscon (Day 1) is that the agenda is far more packed than the agenda lead me to believe. I was kind of afraid that I was coming down for three little "events." No, tomorrow is packed full of stuff starting at 9 AM and going until 5 PM. Some of the stuff sounds like it might be kind of cheesy (a city official recognizing one of Philadelphia's favorite sons -- perhaps declaring "David Goodis Day"?) but, for the most part, it seems spot on.

There's a nifty program booklet (I should have asked if I could contribute), a tote with some paperback cover reproductions, and they even had hor'dourves and a free drink waiting when I arrived. Muy bueno. I chatted with a few fellows, including Duane Swierczynski, author of a few pulp novels (The Blonde and The Wheelman) and editor of the Philly City Paper.

There were about two dozen folks at the Society Hill Playhouse. We were situated in the "Red Room", a cozy cabaret. There's a table touting books from some of the authors involved in conference including some new paperback reprints of Goodis's work that I had not seen before. I finally got a chance to thumb through the new reprint of Black Friday to see what (and how many) of Goodis's short stories are in there. Looks like a bunch. I'll probably pick this up.

I "discovered" South Street on my way to the theater tonight. It's a pretty hip little area -- lots of bars, coffee shops, record stores, et cetera. Walking down it reminded me of walking down Yonge Street in Toronto. I stopped off at a comic store where I wished I had Mike Thompson to guide me in the ways of the force and tell me which books, if any, I needed to read. This was a very nicely stocked place (Atomic City Comics) and I picked up probably too many books. Got some Bizarro comix that I'd not seen before along with an interesting-looking Superman book. Why is it that I couldn't stand D.C. comix when I was a kid but now they make up half, if not more, of my preferences?

I'm planning on making South Street my preferred route tomorrow to and fro. I felt just like Peter Riegert tonight as I crossed Delancey -- wrong city, I know. With so much exotic cuisine along my path, I hope that something is open for breakfast on the way other than Starbucks.

P.S. I can't believe that it's January 5th and too warm to wear a jacket while walking around at 10 o'clock at night. I think that President Gore might be on to something...

Geeky Weekend

I'm sitting in Metro Airport where I'm waiting for my flight to Philadelphia. It's been delayed for over an hour and I'm not quite sure why. Those loudspeakers are so easy to hear, aren't they?

All week at work I've been asked what I'm up to this weekend; why I would take Friday off on this crucial Press Weekend of the North American International Auto Show. The best I can come up with is, "I'm going to a writer's conference." That sounds a lot better than, "I'm going down to Philly to celebrate an obscure pulp writer and to sit around discussing him with a few dozen other ardent fans."

Though the book I'm reading currently, Prisoner of X: 20 Years in the Hole at Hustler Magazine, is very entertaining, I can only take so much in one sitting. I love work stories and I love smut and this memoir by Allan MacDonell combines the best of both worlds. Please don't confuse this book for an X-Man comic title. I'm certain that there has to be an X-Man book named that.

Still not what the agenda of Goodiscon is going to be like. I'm excited to meet Adrian Wootton, I've been a fan of his for a while. Took a lot for me to get a Xeroxed copy of his "For Goodis' Sake!"

I'm also looking forward to seeing Temple University. I only wish that my friend Bill Van Wert were still around that I could meet up with him. That was where he taught for years. How I wish that he was still around to see the work we have done with Japanese New Wave Cinema Classics. He was the guy that got me into Nagisa Oshima and hooked me up with many of the films that I cherish today.

Back to my book and the hope that my flight will leave soon.

Savage Cruel Barbaric

I'm just a few weeks away from heading back down to Philadelphia for the Goodiscon -- a celebration of all things David Goodis (one of my favorite authors).

I was hoping to be sporting a newly English subtitled copy of RUE BARBARE (I'm calling it SAVAGE STREET since it's based on Street of the Lost). I've been working on subbing it from a horribly dubbed version from Video Search of Miami (which they're calling "CRUEL AVENUE" -- that reminds me of Steve Martin's Cruel Shoes too much). I'm 20 minutes in to its 103-minute running time and spending a little bit each evening I can working on it. It's drudge work but how happy I'd be if it could make a premiere amongst Goodis fans.

I'm now down to just three more films I need to review for my Goodis piece along with three TV shows that he penned (or that were based on his work). I'm still hoping against hope that I'll be allowed to see some of his unpublished screenplays when I'm at this convention. <fingers crossed />

Nightfall

Good news. The Goodis folk are allowing me to register late for their shindig. Now it's off to the races trying to find a good package deal to Philly. Odd that I've never been to Philadelphia before but now I'll have been there twice within five months. Looks like my schedule's going to be pretty packed or else I'd be heading over to the Mutter Museum again. I just hope that I can get another delciious Philly Cheesesteak sammiches.

Again, looks like I'm going to miss hooking up with my "Philly boys" but there's always hope.

Return to Philadelphia

Wow. I can't believe it. I was looking online today to see if there's such a thing as a "David Goodis Archives" like those of John D. MacDonald or Charles Willeford -- both of whom were very friendly when I asked for help with my articles for past issues of Cashiers du Cinemart. Low and behold, Google turned up a "Goodiscon" happening in Philadelphia in early January 2007. Sure, I missed the entrance deadline by ten days but I'm hoping they'll forgive me on that and allow me to attend this event. It sounds right up my alley and the perfect way to wrap up my long overdue Goodis piece.

I'm hoping, too, to give them a copy of my subtitled copy of SECCION DES DISPARUS -- the rarest of the Goodis films. At the moment, I think I'm the only person with this and I hope they'll be able to appreciate it. :)

Wish me luck!

Halfway There (Living on a Prayer)

Sometimes the hardest part of writing is figuring out a structure. I often treat the articles I write as exercies in architecture. Almost as much as what to say comes the issue of how to say it. Rewrites for me often are more about changing the placement of text (and trying to pare down my wordiness).

That's how it was, mostly, for the article I've been wanting to pen about David Goodis for the last six or seven years. I knew what I wanted to write, I just didn't know how to say it. Now that I've got the stucture down, I've finally been able to start plowing through this piece. Moreover, I've managed to get it halfway done with the "easiest" films left to go.