NEXT STOP - NEW YORK CITY, 1942. BARRYMORE

Now, how cool a year has this been so far? Our third Bradbury production about to be released - we just worked with a STAR TREK legend, and now, we are embarking on a project with another legend - this one from Broadway - the great William Luce (remember the Belle of Amherst, anyone?). Mr. Luce is working with CRT to bring his amazing work, BARRYMORE, to life as an audio drama. I have played JB in Mr. Luce's play onstage over the past six years, and I am BEYOND thrilled to be recording it. Mr. Luce is also writing some new scenes to make the transition to audio clearer, and he has been just fantastic to work with. I am hoping to perform the show onstage again next spring/summer. If you know of a good theater in your town - let me know, and we might pay you a visit!
CRT's BARRYMORE will record Aug. 20,21, and 23rd, and we are hoping for a Christmas release - but more on that later.

BUCK ALICE RECORDED!

On Aug. 2,3 and 4th, CRT recorded Walter Koenig's Sci-Fi epic, BUCK ALICE AND THE ACTOR-ROBOT in Ipswich, MA. Mr. Koenig flew into Boston's Logan Airport on Friday evening, and arrived in Ipswich (at the beautiful Ipswich Inn B&B) around midnight. The show was, without question, CRT's biggest undertaking to date. Sure, we have recorded large productions before, but they were all done over many sessions, spanning several weeks (CAPTAIN BLOOD was done in 8 sessions); and here, we did it all in three days.
Each session day ran for 10 hours - pretty much non-stop.
35 Actors on site.
20 hours of sound was recorded!
Chris Snyder, our chief editor since 2006 flew in from Arizona and handled the engineering. Mr. Koenig directed the CRT players, and our music director Jeffrey Gage was on site as well to get a feel for the show and the music that will be needed.
Many CRT vets were in the production, including Bill Hammond, Joe Zamparelli, J.T. Turner, Amy Strack, Diane Capen, Marcia Friedman, and many, many more. We also had some new performers joining us for the first time - including Jerry Rudasill (who came up from PA), Jonathan Zungre (from NYC) who is also the new Chekov in the popular fan film series, STAR TREK - PHASE 2, Cydney Newman, Jordan Rich of WBZ Radio, and ken Carberry from Boston's Chart Productions.
This is going to be a mammouth production to post - but we are up for it! I know we got a good one here, and I am very excited to get it out and into the publics hands! Walter Koenig, best known as Chekov in the original STAR TREK series, and seven of the motion pictures that followed, was amazing to work with, and I know his fans are going to love this production. I'll keep you posted on the editing progress!

CRT's THE HALLOWEEN TREE gets an early start

Although the CD release date isn't until October 1st, Blackstone Audio has released our production of Ray Bradbury's THE HALLOWEEN TREE to several download sites; AUDIBLE.COM, and POWELLS BOOKS are two of them. I think iTunes has it as well, and Audio Editions, but not sure. Check it out! It's a fun show!

COOL PROJECTS

We're finally set with the script and casting for BUCK ALICE AND THE ACTOR ROBOT, which will record next week! Walter Koenig will be flying in for the recording session, which he will also star in, and direct! Very exciting project, and I am hoping we do it justice.Scripts are going out later than I had hoped, but it's the largest script we've ever had, clocking in over 400 pages. I think we got a good one here, and I can't wait to record it and send it into editing! We're planning a December 1st release.

Also, I'm so excited to be working with the great Broadway playwright William Luce on a new project we'll be announcing very soon!!!

KING SOLOMON'S MINES comes to SPOKEN NETWORK

Our production of KING SOLOMON'S MINES which had a July 1st CD release, has been released on SPOKEN NETWORK for download. Spoken Net is my favorite download site, as it gives you options for download once you make a purchase - you can get the fast version, at a lower bit rate, that sounds like the quality on Audible.com (which is not too good), or the top quality which sounds like the original master recording. So for downloads, Spoken net is the best bet in my my book. Released without any fanfare on CD, KING SOLOMON'S MINES should show a healthy life in the download world.

POWDER RIVER on IMAGINATION THEATER

You can hear this months POWDER RIVER episode on IMAGINATION THEATRE! It will be streaming for the neext two weeks. For those of you who know the series, this month's presentation is made up from two episodes in season 3; JUST LIKE HOME (ep.03-03) and JUDGE PARKER (ep.03-04). These are the last two episodes I edited for the series - Chris Snyder took over the producing chores with THE AWFUL TOOTH (ep.03-05).
These two episodes have been edited together to fir the 1 hour time slot I.T. has on their broadcast stations. So, even it you heard them before, you might notice they move along a bit faster. You can hear the show by going to www.harrynile.com and then click on the IMAGINATION THEATRE link!

Back to work

Spent July 3,4, and part of the 5th in Bloomington, MN for the MARK TIME / OGLE AWARDS, where, as I had mentioned earlier, CRT won the Silver Ogle for SOMETHING WICKED THIS WAY COMES. It was nice meeting Jerry Stearns (Great Northern Radio) after all these years, and also nice meeting other audio producers - something I have never done before (Jeffrey Adams from Ice Box Radio Theatre, Christiana Ellis who won the Gold mark Time for her wonderful SPACE CASEY series, and David Hinde Chapman who won the Silver Mark Time for ANDROIDS AND YOU)! These awards are given out at the CONvergeance Convention, and it was the first Sci-Fi convention I have attended. My thanks to Jerry Stearns and the Mark Time Committee for showing me a great time, and also the magnificent suite at the Sheraton Bloomington (How cool is it to have Peter Mayhew, Chewbacca from STAR WARS just a few doors down!), and also for the great breakfast with all the other award winners the following morning. Many, many thanks for a wonderful few days in MN!


I also had stops in Baraboo WI (Circus World) , Madison WI, Jamestown NY, and Buffalo NY; so all in all, a nice trip. Mary Rogers took some great pictures on the trip.

Now, back to work on JERRY AND THE PIRATES, writing six new scripts for our recording sessions on July 21 and 28th. Got one finished today, so now we need five!

Also, we started pre-production work on BUCK ALICE AND THE ACTOR ROBOT, which is shaping up to be our biggest production to date - with 45 actors voicing close to 200 speaking roles in the 420 page script. We are still doing voice casting, and I am very happy that Walter Koenig is very much involved with the audio dramatization of his book. He has been involved with the voice casting, as well as some extensive work on the script! Very exciting stuff! He will be starring in the show as well.
Jordan Rich, from WBZ Radio's THE JORDAN RICH SHOW will also perform in the show, as well as host the "Special features" interviews with Mr. Koenig and some of the other key members of the production. Taping in August, the show is scheduled for a December 1st release.

All in all, a VERY busy month!

Madison Wi

Tonight I am at a hotel in Madison, WI (Comfort Inn), and about to start writing episode 10 of Jerry and the Pirates. Busy day having been in Buffalo NY last night, and Chicago this afternoon! tomorrow I'll be in Bloomington Mn for the Mark Time Awards, which is exciting, and I'm looking forward to it. Stops after the awards include Baraboo, WI, Jamestown, NY, and another spot I can't remember at the moment.

More recording and travel

Another great night last evening as we recorded episodes 7,8, and 9 of JERRY AND THE PIRATES. Our three lead actors - Rob Cattell, Connor Doherty, and Ricky MacDonald are quite amazing; they get better with every show (and they were great to begin with). They really have the timing and the knack for comedy.

This morning I'm off to Minneapolis for the MARK TIME AWARDS, and probably will not make any more blog entries until next week sometime.

Next recording session is July 16th for another FATHER BROWN mystery! This will be our 15th episode (one to go)! Then six more episodes of JERRY AND THE PIRATES taping July 21 and 28 - I'll be writing the scripts on the trip. Adios!

JERRY AND THE PIRATES Episode 1 Released

We decided to release the first episode of our new comedy series, JERRY AND THE PIRATES to Spoken Network! The series goes on the air Sept. 19th, and we will release a new episode for download each week, after it is broadcast. This is the pilot episode, and we thought we would send it out early and see what kind of feedback it gets. We have already recorded 6 episodes, and a total of 24 episodes are planned for season 1. Here is the LINK - check it out!