Month: September 2003

  • Photoblog

    I am adding photos to the “LA Pics Album” as often as I can. Guess that makes it a “photoblog”, right? These pics are in chronological order: Oldest top left; newest bottom right. 

        
    nice pic of Eddie & me | with Sandra | Keith, Jorge & Rafael

    Thanks for sending these photos, Sandra!!!
    (larger higher-res versions are in the album)

    Underworld


    Downtown LA – freeway

    Last night we took the clean and shiny subway train (no one really uses it in L.A.) to Union Station, Downtown. 

    Had dinner with Joel at the super popular Shabu Shabu House restaurant in Little Tokyo… a fun dining experience where each person cooks/boils their own meat & veges. We then took the Hollywood-Highland stop on the way back, and saw Underworld.

    Filmthreat’s review is far from glowing (and there are many other scathing reviews out there) but I think most people must have different expectations of the movie; wanting the ‘Vampire vs Werewolves’ story to be more like Blade or some sort of super high-tech horror spoof. As Len Wiseman says, defending the seriousness of this movie:

    I was obsessed with combining Old World with New World elements. I wanted a very classic vibe to a lot of the film to offset the actual characters, the vampires and the Lycans, so that you feel they are a bit Old World. They have a bit more of a classic vibe about them, the way they talk. We wanted to go a bit more “Interview with a Vampire” with the vampires, more Anne Rice than Blade.

    We really liked Underworld and we thought he succeeded in melding the old with the new. Slick production design, cool black rubber outfits, and I liked the ”goth genre” sensibility. Much much better than Matrix 2 – which sucked.

    Upcoming LUCHA stuff

    • October 10th: There’s a lucha match between El Hijo del Santo and La Parka at the Toreo de Tijuana! (bullring!) We gotta go to this. Also on the card will be Perro Aguayo Jr, El Dandy, Dos Caras, Dos Caras Jr, Cobarde, Cobarde Jr and Villanos IV y V.
    • October 17th: There’s a lucha match in Compton…? Will get more details soon.


  • on Kingsley (Hollywood/Los Feliz)

    We thought we’d found the PERFECT apartment yesterday. It was affordable, spacious, bright, airy and clean with great views. The other residents are mostly artists, movie producers, actors, students. We liked that it was an old-style building on a quiet street within walking distance of Vermont Ave. Other plusses: Double Indemnity was filmed here and the manager was a really really nice guy. So you can imagine how we felt when he told us there’s NO PARKING.

    “I have to be honest with you.” he said. “If you are lucky, you might find street parking north of Franklin in the residential areas. (ie, long walk to the apartment) But on the weekends, forget it”.

    I think I am going to ring up westside rentals tomorrow. 

    We have our Lucha Va Voom tickets!
    available at Wacko, Hollywood Blvd.

    More later…

  • The new car!



    Here it is! Eddie’s new pride and joy. Now we can return the crappy rental car and travel in luxury This will be a long weekend: We have several apartment viewings and we’ll be working on our new “project in development”. 





    *Update 


    Thanks for the comments about the car! It was a stroke of good luck that we got it so soon.


    Last Sunday, we visited the Mini dealers’ (Lankershim Blvd, Universal City)  and were told about this one being shipped in from the UK… due to arrive in 1 – 5 days. Seeing that this red and white one was the ONLY car they had ready to go (the next shipment was at least 1 month away) Eddie snapped it up. Price tag? $22K. Cheaper than any of the quotes we had received online.


    Turns out that there were other people in the store at the same time, also filling in forms for the above car. But we beat them to it!! Had we arrived a single minute later, we would’ve lucked out.


    (Getting insurance however, was not so easy as neither of us have a Californian Drivers License.)


    Eddie’s:



    Okay, let’s get one thing straight – I am really NOT a car person!  If I had my way, I would probably spend the afore mentioned sum of money on a half-dozen Vespas…but this is LA, and as everyone living here knows, a scooter just doesn’t cut it.


    The Mini Cooper was really the only car out there that appealed to me.  Here’s some first thoughts…


    As expected, it handles really well.  Actually, it drives like a dream.  Weirdest thing is the automatic transmission; you get the option of clicking the lever and switching into some kinda quasi/manual mode, so you can drive an automatic like a stick shift!  Bizarro – I bought an automatic just so I DIDN’T have to drive a stick!


    Overall, I’m happy – especially as I don’t have to drive that crappy Chevy metro we hired!


    And there’s 6-CD changer which would be perfect on our first road trip!

  • ¡Mucha Lucha! Newsflash

    Kids WB press release:

    For the morning, Latin-flavored ¡Mucha Lucha!, at 10:30 a.m. ET, topped the competition to rank as the #1 broadcast program in Kids 2-11 (4.4/19), Kids 6-11 (4.7/21) and Girls 2-11 (3.2/14), and ranked as the #2 program among all competition in Boys 2-11 (5.5/23), tying with Pokémon: Master Quest (5.5/22), only behind Yu-Gi-Oh! The irreverent comedy ranked #4 overall for the morning in Boys 6-11 (6.3/26), and among the top five programs in Tweens 9-14 (4.8/20) and Male Tweens 9-14 (7.5/29).

    This refers to last Saturday’s episode: “Nightmare on Lucha Street” & “Revenge of the Masked Toilet”.

    The ML Harper-Collins books!

    Rikochet: “How is the Flea like a nose?”
    Buena Girl: “They both smell.”

    Why did the wrestler propose to his girlfriend?
    Because he luch-adored her.

    What did Masked Dog do when his tail fell off?
    He took it to the tailor.

    Note: Eddie and Lili take no responsibility for these jokes.

  • Los Straitjackets at Spaceland –
    Very cool (gringo) surf instrumental band with a
    Mexican wrestling gimmick.
    also added to LA pics album

    Check it out… Cholo Mascaritas

    This flyer was designed by Ricky Garduno (ML Storyboard artist) for the in-house “Premiere screening” of ML Season 2 for the crew. We’re posting it here ‘cos we think the grown-up “homies” versions of Rikochet, Buena Girl, The Flea and Masked Dog are muy funny.

    *Mucha Lucha Season 2 is currently airing on Kids WB 9.30am Saturdays.

  • The apartment search continues… Below is a house for rent that we checked out yesterday. What Tim calls a “Snow White and the Seven Dwarves” house. There’s a whole bunch of these olde thatched cottages on Griffith Park Blvd in Silverlake, built for Walt Disney studio employees, back in the days when the Disney studios were located in this area.


    House for Rent in Los Feliz/Silverlake

    The door was unlocked so we wandered in and had a look around. Very cute and very quaint. There’s an old fireplace with 1 BR and an attic. Unfortunately, priced outside our budget and we’re better off with an apartment anyway…

    Lucha Libre – L.A.

    Tonight we’re going to our first live Los Straitjackets gig at Spaceland. Having a ‘lucha’ night with Jorge, Sandra, Rafael and Mr Unknown. Maybe El Carmen for drinks afterwards…

  • This morning was the very first time we’d seen Mucha Lucha on US television (Kids WB)! Second season is looking very cool. Next Saturday: Calling All Monsters.


    Finley Street near Hillhurst

    Then we spent the rest of the morning walking around in Los Feliz (Hillhurst, Vermont, Franklin) keeping an eye open for “For Rent” signs, getting ourselves acquainted with the locale, taking down notes and phone numbers of rental agencies. It felt like a hundred degrees in the bakey heat, so much so we gave up. Will continue search on Monday…

    Tiki-Ti!

    Last night was our first visit to the fabulous Tiki-Ti on Sunset Blvd. We had lethal Polynesian cocktails with Miles (artist, and character designer on ML DTV) and his two cool friends, whom we thought were very “LA”. Jim Cherry is a writer/designer who is working on a screenplay. Dale is tiki afficionado whose home/tiki-pad has been featured in Pad: The Guide to Ultra-Living. 


    Another Eddie + Cocktail picture. This one’s called a “Blood and Sand”. There is half a bottle of tequila in that glass and the whole bar chants “OOOOOOOOOOOO….” for as long as the tequila is poured. Count 15-20 seconds worth of tequila

    “So are there any tiki-bars in Sydney?” was one question that we had to keep answering in the negative. Australia is in Oceania after all… but sadly, no tiki bars.

    By 11pm we were totally wasted, but also totally inspired to get our shit together and finish off our Super Mahi Tiki cartoon.

    *more photos added to the LA pics album

    Weekend plans:

    • Take advantage of the sunshine and heat – find a swimming pool
    • Frys/Circuit City - buy some cables to hook up Jukebox Mp3 player to PC
    • Dinner with Joel in Old Town Pasadena (maybe)
    • Do some work on new project in development - Boy Lobster
    • See “Once Upon a Time in Mexico”

     

  • So Far…

    • Moved into Joel’s apartment (interim) in Studio City.
    • Met ML Direct-to-Video crew: Ron Hughart (Creative Supervisor), Miles Thompson (Character designer) and had dinner with Rafael (storyboard artist)… and there are still MANY MORE people to meet!
    • Lunch with Jorge, Sandra and Gabe
    • The ML story meeting yesterday morning with Peter and new story editor, Mitch Watson was productive and FUN…

    Mission this week…

    • Catch up on scripts, designs, meeting people…
    • Search for an apartment in Los Feliz…
    • Search for a car. Eddie still has his eye on a Mini-Cooper but there’s a NINETY DAY (!) wait period with dealers we have contacted …
    • Get local mobile phone accounts
    • Tiki Ti! I can’t believe we still haven’t been there.

    *Update -  photo album! (will be added to from time to time)

    This article is 2 weeks old, but I’ve only just found it online:

     Mercury News: Masked wrestlers making mark in U.S. by Mark de la Viña.

  • 1st Day: L.A.

    We arrived in L.A. around midday. The flight was OK. 

    Spotted in a copy of Time Magazine (at the airport) a “trendspotting agency” has selected Lucha Va Voom as the next coolest thing. Wow. Mexican wrestling is really going mainstream fast… We watched Whale Rider on the plane. A great movie but what a tearjerker. 

    It’s 7pm …Checking email in our WBA office. We’re really about to drop off into the Land of Nod but are forcing ourselves to stay awake so that our body-clocks will adjust to this timezone.

    Tomorrow is first day at work. Too sleepy… more later…

  • Departing Sydney
    Sept 15th. Monday 2.45pm
    (9pm Sunday, L.A. time)

    Arriving LAX
    Sept 15th Monday 11.10am
    (4am Tuesday, Syd time)

    We’ll be staying at Joel’s in Studio City until we find an apartment. There will be minimal blogging for a little while… until we settle in.

    Things We Will Miss About Sydney:

    1. All our friends!
    3. It’s almost Summer here! And we’ll be heading into Fall/Winter USA.
    4. The coffee at ‘Grumpy Baker’, Darlinghurst (although Mr.Grumpy really does need to lighten up a little)
    5. Getting my hair cut by Tori at Platform 2 (means I gotta break a new hairdresser in!) - eddie. Yeah, and me too with Kylie at Synergy Hair! - lili
    6. Sussex Street foodcourt - our regular stomping ground.
    7. Dr What video, Bondi Junction
    9. Sydney Thai food
    10. Drinkies with harbour views

    Things We Won’t Miss About Sydney:

    1. Commercial TV. Yes, screw you AND your endless schedule of home renovation shows. - eddie
    2. Where DO we get a decent meal after 11PM?
    3. John Howard note: this isn’t really his website
    4. Online shopping & long waits for overseas shipping
    5. Sydney Mexican food