Lookbook #2- "Rivertown Rock!"

I've been wanting to put up this lookbook for some time...and I would've kicked the idea to the curb if it weren't for the way you responded to the "Really Old School" lookbook and its video counterpart.

In 1992, I wrote a screenplay called "Rivertown Rock!" In it, I wanted to take a look at how music's British Invasion affected teenagers here in America's Midwest in general...and one family in particular. Always wanted to take a look at it through a screenplay of mine.

I wouldn't have started a record collection if the invasion weren't a catalyst...and maybe you began collecting 45s and albums back then, too, because of groups like the Beatles and the Dave Clark Five and the Rolling Stones.

Well, after getting feedback through Stage 32, I decided to revise that script of mine (same for "Really Old School" and two others)...and now, through sources like Network ISA, I'm looking for a producer who'd like to film it. (I've already submitted five screenplays of mine through ISA...and got yet to hear from any producers. That's okay...that's the way the system is.)

Here's the "Rivertown Rock!" logline:

It's Sunday, 2-9-1964...when the Beatles' appearance on The Ed Sullivan Show inspires a Sioux City, IA teenager to start her own rock group and show that girls can play the music, too.

I'm Jim Boston...thanks so much for reading this blog!

The protests MUST continue

Last week, two encounters with coworkers at the plastics factory that employs me made it personally crystal clear why the worldwide protests against the brutality shown by America's police forces MUST continue.

Last Sunday, Omaha Mayor Jean Stothert issued a 72-hour curfew in light of the Big O being one of the many American cities holding demonstrations not only against police brutality, but also against the militarization of this country's police forces...and against vigilante brutality. In the curfew, people couldn't go out between 8:00 PM and 6:00 AM...unless they had vital jobs. (The company I work at makes, among other things, personal protective equipment...no, not coronavirus masks, but the masks worn by assembly-line employees at dairy factories and by soldiers.)

So...on 6-1-2020, as I got off my second-shift job at 11:00 PM and was heading for my car to drive home, a supervisor from another plant within the same building headed for his own car to go to his own home.

I held the door for him (just trying to be polite, that's all)...and he started talking about the local curfew.

And then he praised this country's chief White House occupant, talking about how "honest" this occupant is...and how this one-time reality-TV show host "says what's on his mind."

Guess what? 

Just because the former host of NBC's The Apprentice says what's on his mind doesn't make what's on his mind cool...especially when he declares war on the nation's own citizens by vowing to sic the military on protesters if governors don't do his bidding and "dominate the streets."

That's dictatorial talk...no ifs, no maybes, no buts.

Sorry, folks. The way I see it, we started having a dictator here the afternoon of 1-20-2017.

A couple of nights ago, a fellow second-shift employee of mine at the same plant I work at weighed in on the continuing protests.

She wondered when the demonstrators would get off the streets "so that people can get on with their lives." What's more, she wondered what good the protests are doing.

So I told her.

Not only did I tell this fellow machine operator that the demonstrations have, at long last, gotten the attention of some corporate leaders (one of the leaders took to the electronic billboard at 72nd and Pacific Sts. here in O and loaded a message: "We Need Each Other")...I told her I'm glad the protests continue to take place.

The sign on the east facade of Omaha's Do Space (at 72nd and Dodge Sts., in a building that previously housed a Borders book store) proclaimed: "BLACK LIVES MATTER."

By the way...some of the protests here in Omaha happened at 72nd and Dodge.

Hours before second shift began that day (6-5-2020), NFL commissioner Roger Goodell released a statement admitting that the league was wrong in the way it's been handling player protest ever since San Francisco 49ers QB Colin Kaepernick went to one knee in 2016.

Eleven days after George Floyd was killed by a Minneapolis cop named Derek Chauvin (with an assist from four other members of Minneapolis' Supposedly Finest), Goodell finally gave the okay for the NFL's players to speak out and peacefully protest.

What's more, he stated: "We, the National Football League, believe Black lives matter. I personally protest with you and want to be part of the much-needed change in this country."

Goodell also admitted that "Without Black players, there would be no National Football League." 

Now, Roger...if you and the league's 32 team owners get rid of that kneeling ban, I'll be glad to get back to spending Sunday afternoons and evenings (and any Monday night or Thursday night I can get off during the season) watching NFL action.

And what about US Sen. Willard Mitt Romney (R-UT), the most recent Republican to lose a presidential election, marching with protesters in the nation's capital?

We'll see what happens in the days/weeks/months/years to come...but Romney's and Goodell's actions are a start. So are those taken by corporate bigwigs everywhere.

So if you're still upset because the protests, as this fellow machine operator of mine put it, prevent people from going "on with their lives," let me tell you something:

Floyd, Breonna Taylor, Ahmaud Arbery, Sandra Bland, Eric Garner, Philando Castile, Michael Brown, 17-year-old Trayvon Martin, 12-year-old Tamir Rice, and too damned many others weren't allowed to get on with their own lives.

Vigilantes took it upon themselves to snuff Martin's and Arbery's lives out.

FOR NOTHING.

And I'd like to ask you something:

Do you REALLY believe in freedom for all to live their lives peacefully...to go about their everyday business just as you do?

Do you REALLY believe people have a right to petition this country's government...especially this current garbage fire of a government, one built on hatred and bigotry?

 

It sure didn't have to be this way

On Wednesday, 5-24-2020, according to data from Johns Hopkins University, the United States became the first country to suffer 100,000 deaths due to COVID-19, the disease caused by the coronavirus.

That's just about like wiping a Billings, MT off the map...or a Davenport, IA...or a Sparks, NV.

Think about that.

And it sure didn't have to be this way.

I read an online article at theintercept.com that stated America's first confirmed case of COVID-19 was made public on 1-20-2020. That same article said that Vietnam saw its first case of the disease three days later.

Vietnam still has yet, as of 5-24-2020, to record its first COVID death.

Yes, yes, yes...Vietnam doesn't have as many people in it as the US; the 2020 edition of "The World Almanac" states that Vietnam has 97.9 million people in it compared to America's 327.2 million people (a 2018 estimate).

Now take a look at the world's most heavily-populated country, China.

Not counting Hong Kong or Macao, China's population is 1.39 billion people. Billion. 

If you go right now to worldometers.info, you'll find that the latest figures show that 4,634 Chinese have died from COVID.

Nope. That's not a typo. 

As far as I'm concerned, it all comes down to the White House's totally inadequate and completely halfhearted response to the coronavirus pandemic.

And yes...it's an utterly racist response.

Maybe you've heard that deaths from the disease have been disproportionately Black and Brown...the two biggest ethnic groups America's Republicans love to defecate on.

If you're thinking about cutting out on this post, just understand that the same article from theintercept.com yielded a quote from HHS Secretary Alex Azar: "Unfortunately, the American population is...very diverse."  

That's Azar trying to justify the world's highest COVID casualty total.

Remember: Azar is part of the first White Supremacist administration in Washington since Woodrow Wilson slept at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue. 

The Republicans- especially those in the White House- made this whole coronavirus pandemic political. They, not I.

To them, it's all about winning on 11-3-2020. The Con Artist in Chief knows that the fewer people out there casting ballots this year, the better his chances of staying in the Oval Office.

And to The Adolf...oops, I mean The Donald, the pandemic is just another weapon in the GOP arsenal. Just like the call to keep the country's meatpacking facilities running, labeling meat as a vital item.

A significant percentage of immigrants and non-White people works at those plants.

And too many of the employees at those plants have complained about the lack of coronavirus (or any other kind of) protection at too many of those facilities.

Listen, if protein's the issue, cookinglight.com lists 21 other sources of protein.

For instance, you can get protein from peanuts, yogurt, cottage cheese, kidney beans, peanut butter, veggie burgers, lima beans, and all kinds of cheeses from Swiss to mozzarella to Colby Jack.

Okay...is social distancing the issue?

I get that millions of us are chafing to Get Back to Normal...even if it's not going to be all that simple. Millions are chafing to hear the nation's cash registers "KA-CHING!" at the same rate as when 2020 began and we were looking forward to a whole new decade.

Coming back to the article from theintercept.com, epidemiologists Britta L. Jewell and Nicholas P. Jewell said that about 90% of America's COVID-19 deaths could've been prevented if social-distancing policies had been put into effect on 3-2-2020.

At that time, only 11 Americans had died from the biggest global pandemic since the Spanish flu outbreak of 1918-20.

In response to COVID, social spacing finally got placed into effect on 3-15-2020.

Think where we'd be right now if the United States had REAL leadership at the top...instead of the con job that commenced on 1-20-2017. 

For now, let's think about saving lives first.

Then we can worry about saving the economy.  

"Really Old School" video lookbook (2020)

Lookbook #1- "Really Old School"

Things have gotten to the point in the movie-and-TV industry where writers trying to break in (and those who've already established themselves) need to put together a collection of photos serving as an expression of the writers' vision of how a movie or TV series is supposed to look. (Directors have been using this tool for quite some time.)

This collection of pictures is called a lookbook. 

Well, anyway...here's my very first attempt at a lookbook, and it's connected to my very first attempt at a screenplay since 1994, "Really Old School."

The screenplay's logline: 

Inspired by a piece of 1910s sheet music, a modern-day Omaha, NE teenager wants to honor and emulate the tune's author: Her newly-deceased great-grandmother, a ragtime-era composer-musician-bandleader-arranger.

Hope you like this lookbook...and wishing you all the very best!   

 

I'm ready to retire...right now!

But my wallet isn't ready for me to retire right now.

Even with a company 401(k) and a personal retirement fund, the money still isn't plentiful enough right now for me to say: "That's it, I quit, I'm moving on!"

Last week marked the first time I ever told any of my superiors at my present place of work that I was ready to hang it up.

Anyway...it all stemmed from heat I took on 3-17-2020 from the machine operator I was supposed to replace as first shift (hers) morphed into second shift (mine).

"You're late," she told me.

It was 2:56 PM (Central time).

If you're on second shift where I work, you're supposed to report at 2:55 PM. (And I manage to do so the vast majority of the time.)

For the last several years, things had gotten to the point where I end up eating lunch at the factory before I get to my machine(s).  And this did happen this past St. Pat's Day.

Thank you, Internet.

Previously, I'd eat my lunch right here at home prior to shoving off for my plastics-factory job. (By the way...since I work second shift, and the second half of second shift is when most Americans watch prime-time TV, I call the meal break we get on second shift "dinner." Or else I just call it a "meal break," anyway.)

Since the incident, I've been trying to leave earlier for the factory...and been trying to eat lunch at home again before going to work.

On alternate Mondays, I go to the laundromat...and 3-23-2020 was one such Monday.

I clocked in at 2:45 PM (something I strive to do each and every workday), ended up eating lunch at the factory (because of the laundry load before that), and hurried to get to my machine on time.

Got there at 2:55 PM...right on the dot.

Still, I was unable to escape the wrath of the same coworker from first shift: "Why you in such a hurry?"

I let it all hang out and confronted her.   

I was still upset the next day about the two incidents...and told her to get off my back and leave me alone. 

What's more, I mentioned the two incidents to the supervisor on first shift and the supervisor on second shift. Plus: The chief on first shift reported the two incidents to the company's human resources department.

All of that helps.

But then, I've been thinking about the increasingly demanding nature of work at the factory...and about the fact that I'll turn 65 this November.

And I've even been thinking about the effects the coronavirus pandemic has had on people's lives. (For instance, the three places I've been going to to practice music- one of them the church I go to- have abandoned or cut their office hours for the time being.)

As a result, I've found myself with extra time for writing...especially screenplays.

And blog posts, too!

We're getting ready to slam into a new workweek at the factory...and I'm going to gear up to go through it. 

And I'll keep trying to build up that retirement chest so that I'm ready. 



 

They kept writing 'em like that anymore

My childhood fell between the middle 1950s and early 1970s...and for television fans here in the United States, that meant that variety shows were all over the dial. If you watched, for example, The Ed Sullivan Show, you'd more often than not get to see your favorite rock/R&B act...about a half hour after Ed introduced one of those smooth pop crooners on the show.

In fact, my first eight years of life (1955-1963) were a period when America's music industry was trying to figure itself out. In early April 1957, for instance, Perry Como's "'Round and 'Round" was Billboard's Number One pop hit...only to be displaced a week later by "All Shook Up," by Elvis Presley.

And "All Shook Up" rode high for nine weeks...until knocked off the top spot by "Love Letters in the Sand," by Pat Boone, a man whose records, by then, had one foot in the Presley ethos and the other in the Como system.

Industry leaders, as a group, loved the old Tin Pan Alley styles...but knew the newer styles were where the money was.

Even so, some of the biggest hits of the late 1950s through, really, the middle 1970s, owed something to the way pop music sounded in the 1890s-1920s period...when ragtime, followed by jazz, caught America's attention.

With that in mind, here's a list of ragtime/honky tonk-influenced rock/R&B/pop songs recorded from 1956 to 1974:

1. "The Green Door," Jim Lowe (Dot 14586; r*5, *1, 1956)/2. "When I See You," Fats Domino (Imperial 5454; r*14, *29, 1957)/3. "Sugartime," McGuire Sisters (Coral 61924; *1, 1958)/4. "The Stripper," David Rose (MGM 13064; r*12, *1, 1962)/5. "Alley Cat," Bent Fabric (Atco 6226; *7, 1962)/6. "Those Lazy-Hazy-Crazy Days of Summer," Nat King Cole (Capitol 4965; r*11, *6, 1963)/7. "Washington Square," Village Stompers (Epic 9617; r*22, *2, 1963)/8. "(Down at) Papa Joe's," Dixiebelles (Sound Stage 7 2507; *9, 1963)/9. "Southtown, USA," Dixiebelles (Sound Stage 7 2517; *15, 1964)/10. "Java," Al Hirt (RCA Victor 8280; *4, 1964)/11. "Daydream," Lovin' Spoonful (Kama Sutra 208; *2, 1966)/12. "Spanish Flea," Herb Alpert and the Tijuana Brass (A&M 792; *27, 1966)/13. "I Love Onions," Susan Christie (Columbia 43595; *63, 1966).

14. "Winchester Cathedral," New Vaudeville Band (Fontana 1562; *1, 1966)/15. "Lady Godiva," Peter and Gordon (Capitol 5740; *6, 1966)/16. "Words of Love," Mamas and the Papas (Dunhill 4057; *5, 1967)/17. "Hello Hello," Sopwith "Camel" (Kama Sutra 217; *26, 1967)/18. "I Was Kaiser Bill's Batman," Whistling Jack Smith (Deram 85005; *20, 1967)/19. "Like an Old-Time Movie," Scott McKenzie (Ode 105; *24, 1967)/20. "Cab Driver," Mills Brothers (Dot 17041; *23, 1968)/21. "The Ballad of Bonnie and Clyde," Georgie Fame (Epic 10283; *7, 1968)/22. "Cinderella Rockefella," Esther and Abi Ofarim (Philips 40526; *68, 1968)/23. "Indian Lake," Cowsills (MGM 13944; *10, 1968)/24. "Those Were the Days," Mary Hopkin (Apple 1801; *2, 1968)/25. "Goodbye," Mary Hopkin (Apple 1806; *13, 1969)/26. "Abergavenny," Shannon (AKA Marty Wilde) (Heritage 814; *47, 1969).

27. "Is That All There Is," Peggy Lee (Capitol 2602; *11, 1969)/28. "Rag Mama Rag," Band (Capitol 2705; *57, 1970)/29. "Gimme Dat Ding," Pipkins (Capitol 2819; *9, 1970)/30. "Mississippi," John Phillips (ABC Dunhill 4236; *32, 1970)/31. "In the Summertime," Mungo Jerry (Janus 125; *3, 1970)/32. "Rubber Duckie," Jim Henson's Ernie (Columbia 45207; *16, 1970)/33. "Honky Cat," Elton John (Uni 55343; *8, 1972)/34. "Tie a Yellow Ribbon 'Round the Ole Oak Tree," Tony Orlando and Dawn (Bell 45,318; *1, 1973)/35. "Say, Has Anybody Seen My Sweet Gypsy Rose," Tony Orlando and Dawn (Bell 45,374; *3, 1973)/36. "Who's in the Strawberry Patch with Sally," Tony Orlando and Dawn (Bell 45,424; *27, 1973)/37. "Last Time I Saw Him," Diana Ross (Motown 1278; r*15, *14, 1974)/38. "Nothing from Nothing," Billy Preston (A&M 1544; r*8, *1, 1974)/39. "Steppin' Out (Gonna Boogie Tonight)," Tony Orlando and Dawn (Bell 45,601; *7, 1974).

The chart positions were taken from Joel Whitburn's "Record Research," compiled from Billboard's Pop chart, unless indicated otherwise; r*= the record's position on Billboard's R&B chart.

See you next time, and thanks for reading "Boston's Blog!"