"Rolling With Virgil" -- An Interview With Writer/Actor Conrad Shaw -- By Allan Raible

Conrad Shaw has a dream.  He wants to make a movie called “Rolling With Virgil” and he wants your help to make it.

Shaw, an actor, was walking around New York one day when he saw a group of musicians playing.  The musicians in question make up a band known as The Dirty Urchins.  He heard them and immediately connected to their music.  He bought their CD and it became the soundtrack to his life. 

Riding the subway one day, one of their songs came on

Conrad Shaw

and he thought he had a potential idea for a music video.  As the album progressed, he realized he had a complete narrative forming in his head until eventually he had the idea that this could be a movie, with himself as the star and with the music acting almost like a Shakespeare-ian chorus.  Shaw’s idea was to almost make it like a silent film where the songs would tell the story using 16 of the band’s compositions.  These songs can be found on their two albums, “Late As Usual” and “Romance And Apocalypse.”  He also got access to a newer song and an older one that band member Freddie Stevenson recorded with his previous outfit. 

Shaw was nervous to approach the band to get their approval, saying, “My whole philosophy is to not to show up with anything as just an idea, half-assed as it were.”  He spent months working on the screenplay before he even approached them.  When he did, they were game. Shaw hired a lawyer and worked out a deal for the rights. The whole thing hinged on them saying yes.

Shaw also hired a storyboard artist to prep for the initial jump-off and another artist to design the images on his website.  The idea was to then launch a Kickstarter to get the film made.  That Kickstarter is now open and taking donations until the end of the month.  The hope is to raise enough money to get a director and others involved.  Shaw has a producer on board to help him budget everything out.  The budget is currently estimated as $350,000.  He’s hoping to raise $70,000 with the Kickstarter.  After fees, that means that he’ll probably clear $50,000 to begin shooting.  He’s hoping that will be enough to secure more investors along the way.

The film has five main characters and a lot of extras and Shaw plans to rely on his numorous acting friends to populate the movie.  He also is trying to secure one name actor. Once the film is made, he plans to go the festival route to try to sell the distribution rights.

If you click here, you can hear my conversation with Shaw where he goes into greater detail.  It’s a loose conversation, but it’s best to hear Shaw’s passion in his own words. 

If you find this interesting, please donate to his Kickstarter.  Please support independent artists.  

 

Poetry: The Symbols Beneath What We’ve Seen – By Allan Raible

There she sat,

Her eyes gazing out beyond,

Her fingers wrapped around a stained coffee cup.

She knew it was forever and yet she knew there were limits in time.

She gazed at me with a loss for words.

A forgotten sense of forethought

And a twisted sense of truth.

I focused on her lips.

Half parted as if they wanted to say something,

But hellbent on silence as she took an even breath. 

These wordless moments pass the time.

They remind us each where we have been.

And tell us about our context.

The Symbols Beneath What We’ve Seen.   

Observation: Has Technology Made Our Society Flaky? By Allan Raible

If I had to guess, I would estimate that nine out of the ten most recent appointments I had with friends were rescheduled.  And they weren’t just rescheduled.  They were rescheduled at the last minute.  Often times this warning would come via a text message or an email that would read some to the effect of, “Sorry, man.”  Have other people noticed this trend?  Is it just me?  Do I surround myself with people who can’t stick to plans?  I actually wouldn’t put the blame on my friends.  I put the blame on technology. 

Thirty years ago, before cell-phones and the Internet became chic and ubiquitous, when you made an appointment, there was pretty much one way to get in contact with someone if you wanted to cancel.  That method was the old, reliable landline.  Of course, your friend would have to be home to receive the message and if your friend wasn’t home, you’d have to leave a message, most likely on a clunky cassette.  For this reason, people probably stuck to their schedules more often than they do today. 

Lately, I’ve had friends reschedule on me left and right.  I’ve had women reschedule dates.  I’ve had business contacts reschedule meetings.  It’s almost as if nothing happens when it originally is supposed to anymore.  I wake up on the day I am supposed to meet with someone and I think, “Well, I wonder if that’s ACTUALLY GOING TO HAPPEN.” 

Again, although I rarely reschedule MY appointments I find myself constantly rearranging my schedule to suit others.  That is frustrating, but a part of life I have accepted.  Now, with social media, people being able to reach us on cell phones 24/7 and the increasing size of the average work-week due to routine corporate downsizing, we are all stretched too thin.  We’ve lost the buffer of humanity that we once had.  And technology has made it easier to blow off our appointments.  If you have the mild inkling of not wanting to do something, you can now put a stop to it with a handful of keystrokes.  Lickety-split!  SEND!  DONE!

Again, this is probably a society-wide issue.  And if you are a friend of mine who has recently rescheduled on me, who is reading this, I don’t blame you.  It is part of a wider problem.  We are all pulled in too many directions these days.  There isn’t enough time to enjoy life.  There isn’t enough room in our heads for cherished memories because we have too many damn passwords to remember.  We have too many responsibilities.  We have too many commitments.  We are in a constant state of flux.

I miss the days of being able to just nicely have lunch with an old friend without having to reschedule five times.  I miss not having to rush through a date because we both have so many things to do.  I miss old friends I haven’t seen in years.  I miss spending whole days just relaxing with people I care about.  But, we are all so oversaturated and overstressed that those little personal connections have suffered in the process. 

The convenience technology has afforded us is priceless, but it has cost us a bit of stress in our interpersonal relationships.  We have bitten off more than we can chew and somehow this has become the societal norm.  This has inadvertently turned most of us into noncommittal, flakes.  Again, we don’t mean to hurt each other this way, but it is a given and has now become the standard. 

I miss the days of concrete plans! 

Op-Ed: An Open Letter To The New York City MTA – By Allan Raible

Dear NYC MTA,

As a lifetime rider of your service, I am grateful that you exist.  As a “differently-abled” person who sometimes has trouble getting around, you have often provided my only and/or easiest transportation option.  However, in the last few years, your level of service has declined considerably.  As someone who rides the F train every day to work, I can say that with each passing day I get angrier and angrier with your abusive relationship towards me and the rest of New York City’s subway riders. 

It currently takes me on average an hour and twenty minutes to get to work door-to-door.  I don’t work that far uptown and I don’t live that far into Brooklyn.  In fact, one night, I took a cab home and timed out my ride to thirty-five minutes!  There was a time when the subway provided the fastest service.  People would ride the train to avoid traffic.  Those days have apparently passed. 

Photo by Allan Raible

The F train in particular is shockingly abysmal.  I noticed the change a few years back when they extended the G line a few stops beyond Smith and 9^th. The G causes tremendous congestion on the F line.  As a result, in Brooklyn where the two trains meet, they often are reduced to a slow, painful crawl.  The G should be the local.  The F should be on the unused express tracks.  The F train should be rocketing its way forth.  But this has not happened.  Common sense would say that after a bit more construction is finished, this change might occur, but I’ll believe it when I see it. 

As the fares have risen to an astronomical $2.50, one might think the service would get better.  In fact, with every passing day, it gets increasingly worse.  The city and the subway system are taking advantage of the public.  The fact that the trains ran better in the late eighties and early nineties when the fare was a reasonable $1.00 seems to point to the fact that someone has to be scraping off the top.  The system is not being run efficiently.  Mayor Bloomberg hasn’t said a word about this.  He’s a billionaire.  He doesn’t seem to care.  I have no real proof that the books are being messed with, I’m merely speculating, but that seems to be a reasonable assumption given the drop in service combined with the routine requests for fare hikes. 

Photo by Allan Raible

But the fact that there isn’t more of a fuss being raised is something I find distressing.  This morning, my commute took nearly two hours.  Why?  Well, I waited for the F for a half hour.  A fuzzy voice came through the speakers announcing that the delay was due to a “signal malfunction.”  Accidents happen.  Things break. But there is a new excuse every day.  And sometimes you crawl or stop for long periods of time with no explanation whatsoever!  I’d accept this “signal malfunction” if it hadn’t become the norm.  The days I actually make decent time on my trip to work are rare!  More often than not, I find myself going stir-crazy sitting in a train car awaiting barely-audible instructions.  Seriously MTA, what has happened to you? 

I’ve also noticed all summer that they’ve been running older F trains.  I don’t know why this is, but it is a mistake for several reasons.  Firstly, these trains seem to have less standing room.  This means you end up getting a virtual lap-dance from the smelly stranger in front of you.  It also means that the guy insisting on reading his ipad while holding his coffee in his other hand is likely to accidentally smack you in the skull if you are sitting below him.  People insist on carrying a lot of stuff with them these days.  There’s always the person with the oversized backpack, unaware of the amount of space it takes up, or the person who insists on taking a full-sized bicycle onto a crowded rush hour train.  Modern passengers need space.  It’d be nice if they’d be considerate and adapt but who are we kidding? That isn’t going to happen. 

Photo by Allan Raible

The second problem with the older trains is that they don’t stop very smoothly.  As a passenger, one often finds oneself lurched about like a rubber ball.  As I’ve stated, I am “differently-abled.”  My walking is affected.  I often get a seat because of this, but when I’m standing, my balance isn’t all that great.  So, in these older cars, I find myself gripping onto the pole for dear life every time the train comes to a jolting halt.  And getting a seat doesn’t guarantee a lack of injury risk.  One time, I was sitting on an older train and we stopped and my shoulder got jammed into the patrician at the end of the seat.  It hurt. 

My hope in bringing this up is that it will become more of a topic of conversation.  It seems to be something the leadership of the city is ignoring.  The decline in the subway system’s performance is not something we should blindly accept as a given. One hopes the next mayor will do something to fix the problem.  In any case, the system is no longer as efficient as it should be.  We, the public are being held hostage by the powers that be as they gouge us while delivering lackluster service.  It’s time someone spoke up.

Thank you!

Sincerely,

Allan Raible – Brooklyn, New York

1915 Armenian Genocide: My Family's Story - By Lia Parisyan

“I should like to see any power of the world destroy this race, this small tribe of unimportant people, whose wars have all been fought and lost, whose structures have crumbled, literature is unread, music is unheard, and prayers are no more answered. Go ahead, destroy Armenia . See if you can do it. Send them into the desert without bread or water. Burn their homes and churches. Then see if they will not laugh, sing and pray again. For when two of them meet anywhere in the world, see if they will not create a New Armenia.”


― William Saroyan

Aleppo, Syria WWI 

April 24th commemorates the 98th anniversary of the Armenian Genocide in 1915. In 2012, France recognized the Armenian Genocide yet the United States refuses to accept the atrocities and systematic massacres and deportations of 1.5 million Armenians in Turkey.

Growing up, I attended a small parochial Armenian school in Woodside, New York. St. Illuminator's was a bilingual school, which placed great importance on Armenian language and culture, and is the reason I am still able to converse and write in my mother's tongue over a decade after graduating the sixth grade.

I am a Syrian-Armenian. I have a story.

Sateneeg, Mustapha, My Grandfather (Fuad) to right of his father 

My great-grandmother, Sateneeg and her Armenian-American husband (born in New York City) and their two children, Souren and Araxi (also born in New York City), were on vacation in Turkey, when the Genocide broke out. They were visiting Sateeng's first husband's kilim (rug) factory, when he was shot point blank in front of her and his children.

Sateeneg became a widow in an instance and was in her teens with two children. The options were slim: face a march through Der Zor (known as Ad-Deir to Syrians and neighboring countries), which has become synonymous with Armenian Auschwitz or swallow poison to escape capture.

Mustapha Chelebi

As luck or fate would have it, my great-grandfather, Mustapha Chelebi, an ophthalmologist from Aleppo and close friend of Sateneeg's husband, found my great-grandmother and her two children, and lied to Turkish authorities. He was a doctor in the Turkish Army and risked his own life by claiming Sateneeg and her two children were his own. He wrote a letter to his mother and sisters in Syria, and sent Sateneeg, Souren and Araxi to Aleppo. Souren and Araxi would be known as Ali and Fatima and would begin living as Muslims with a family they never met, living on my great-grandfather's word.

The war persisted for 4 years, and for 4 years they lived behind a veil of secrecy. During this time, Mustapha saved 23 Armenian women, by claiming he needed nurses to treat wounded Turkish soldiers. One by one, he sneaked these women out to safety. I still have letters from the American Red Cross (dated 1917), thanking Mustapha for all of his efforts. His heroic rescue of the Armenian women is captured in an Armenian book called, "Antranig."

During the course of the World War I, Mustapha was eventually captured by the Russians; seeing his value as a doctor educated in Lyon, he spent part of the war in St. Petersburg, where he taught himself how to speak and read Russian.

My mother used to tell me that she would find him reading this strange language,when she was a child, and he would tell her that it was Russian. Even after the war, my great-grandfather remained fascinated by Russia; I still have a samovar (literally "water-boiler" used to make tea) that's traveled and survived the Diaspora to make its way into my dining room.

After the Treaty of Versailles was signed, and peace was restored, Mustapha returned to Aleppo. He told his mother and sisters the truth; four years had passed since he had sent Sateneeg and her children to safety. Mustapha gave my Sateneeg a choice (a fiery redhead, who had been somewhat of a free spirit, who went on hunting excursions, was outspoken, the prized and rebellious only daughter of a wealthy Armenian coal mine owner): she could return to New York City or she could do him the great honor of becoming his wife.

The Chelebi Family, Aleppo Syria 

Sateneeg chose to become his wife. She and Mustapha would have 5 children, and lived a highly eccentric and uncharacteristically modern and Western life. Santeneeg became his right hand in the desert. Though illiterate, my grandmother said that she knew all of the medicines and would join Mustapha in his safari hat and his Jeep to go out ton treat the poor free of charge. Mustapha was somewhat a modern-day Robin Hood: he'd overcharge the rich, and treat the poor for free. Their cook, Mahmoud was a man who would have gone completely blind had it not been for treatment. My grandfather took a liking to him, and offered him a cook's position, which he accepted. My mother grew up with Mahmoud, who listened to the radio as he cut onions, she'd ask him questions, and grew up in a highly unusual environment due to the cultural influences that were penetrating the Middle East in the late 1950s.

Eventually, my grandfather, Fuad (Frank) would become involved in politics; my mother, her brother and my grandmother would move to Lebanon during the outbreak of the war, while my grandfather was imprisoned. His sister, Belkis would help him escape by distracting the prison guards; he would leave the country in the back of a car trunk, and with the help of the American Government, would enter New York as a stateless citizen.

This is a story of Hope. My maternal great-grandmother's side wasn't so lucky. All of her family members were massacred save for herself and her father. The atrocities are documented by several foreign observers at the time, there are photographs, and their survivor stories.

The Chobanian Family (my maternal grandmother's family: next post will feature her story)

2015 is the centennial anniversary of the Armenian Genocide; I would like to spend the next two years, collecting stories and photographs of survivors and their families. Perhaps, the United States will not recognize the genocide, but my generation, and the generations that follow will have their histories: the stories of our grandparents and great-grandparents so that we NEVER FORGET.

Kurt and Layne – By Allan Raible

19 years ago today, we lost Kurt Cobain.  11 years ago today, we lost Layne Staley.  Two men lost before their time.  Two men in a lot of pain and a lot of trouble.  One, I considered one of my musical heroes, changing my view of music forever.  The other was less of an influence but still someone I looked at with great respect.

I was in high school when Kurt died.  His death hit me hard.  It was a sudden shock as a huge Nirvana fan.  It was unthinkable.  I listened to “Nevermind,” “Incesticide” and “In Utero,” as if on a continuous loop for an extended period  of my teen years.  I expected to look forward to more music from someone who had enlightened me what pop music could be.  To have him cut himself down in his prime was a true tragedy I could not fathom.  I wanted to hear what was next.  I didn’t know it was the end of the line.  Today, it still is quite upsetting.  He missed out on what could’ve been a bright future and we missed his now absent potential output. 

I was an adult when Layne died.  I listened to him less than Kurt, but nevertheless, he still stood large among the Seattle-grunge luminaries.  His death was sadly less of a surprise.  It was as if he withered and wasted away for a number of years.  He’d faded a little from public consciousness at the time of his death. At that time, Alice In Chains hadn’t released a proper studio album in seven years. And yet, I remember during my teen years being impressed by his versatility.  He had a very different approach than Kurt.  I remember being impressed by the many intricate sonic layers of “I Stay Away,” whereas Kurt was able to make something really brutal come out like a pop song.  Layne had a more traditional, brooding approach. 

Both men managed to get groundbreaking music on Top Forty radio. Both men exuded angst. Both men used their music as mouthpieces to spell out their pain and their struggles.  Both men were ultimately done in by their demons.  Both men are legends who deserve the artistic respect of generations to come.  Both men should still be here.  We are weaker and sadder in their absence. 

Remembering Roger Ebert: 1942-2013 - By Allan Raible

The lights are a little dimmer tonight.  Hollywood has lost one of its biggest fans.  In fact, Roger Ebert approached movies in a very cerebral way.  One could argue that modern cinematic criticism was built around a framework that Ebert and Gene Siskel established.  And now, sadly they are both no longer with us.

I was a huge fan of Ebert’s work.  I remember being a small child, first discovering film and coming across random episodes of “At the Movies.”  I would pay very close attention to the well-thought-out “thumbs up” or “thumbs down” reviews.  I, of course, wouldn’t take them as gospel.  They would serve as mere background foundation to make an informed decision about which movies to see.  If I really thought I wanted to see a film, a “two thumbs down” review wouldn’t deter me.  There were times, in fact, when I disagreed with Ebert’s reviews, but more often than not, he was a respectable barometer whose love of his medium showed through.  You could tell he really lived for those celluloid images.  It wasn’t about building people up or cutting them down.  It was about wanting to see excellent movies.  Gene Siskel died in 1999, and this was still the case in later years with Richard Roeper by his side.  When you watched “At The Movies” (or any one of his similarly branded shows)or read one of Ebert’s columns, you knew you were in for a master class on criticism.  The man won a Pulitzer Prize for an obvious reason. 

Drawing by Allan Raible.

In fact, when I think about it, Roger Ebert was one of the reasons I got into criticism in the first place.  His love for the movies was a big influence on me.  In my case, I write more about music than movies, but loving both mediums just about equally, in Roger Ebert I still saw a kindred spirit.  He was no one’s hack.  He didn’t mince words and he wasn’t out for an easily quotable tagline.  He was a man who viewed entertainment in a scholarly way. 

I would guess the majority of movie, music and book critics working today owe a debt of some kind to Roger Ebert.  I really hope his reviews will be studied for generations to come.  For more than forty years, his opinions mattered.  So few of his peers approached the medium with the love and respect he gave.  Many try and many leave their marks, but there will sadly never be another Roger Ebert. 

So, dim the lights, sit in the middle of the theatre and please let’s put out an extra popcorn bucket for Roger.  Without him, the cinematic experience will never be the same.