National Day of Prayer for Hollywood Join Entertainment Industry Professionals in praying for our country, our community, our projects and our people. Thursday, May 6th, 2004 7:00 pm-10:00 pm CBS Studio Center 4024 Radford Avenue, Studio City Stage 2 (parking in CBS parking structure) Everyone is welcome, but space is limited, so please rsvp. www.hollywoodprayernetwork.org /(323) 462-8460 x 117 Read more

MORE SPICY BITS The 2004 MTV Movie Award noms are out and – I LOVE it! – Jim Caviezel is nominated for Best Male Performance for his role as Jesus in TPOTC! He is up against Tom Cruise for Last Samurai, Johnny Depp for Pirates, Adam Sandler for 50 First Dates and Bill Murray for Lost in Translation. These awards are completely fueled by the MTV audience which really, really adds to Hollywood’s headache about trying to figure out who... Read more

YEAST IN THE CULTURAL LUMP I’ve been brooding a lot lately over the idea of being leaven in the lump. It’s such a great metaphor for the lay apostolate. I rediscovered it in Vatican II’S Apostolicam Actuositatem a couple of weeks ago while preparing my RCIA class. The document is mandatory reading for my students — who are getting the best $#@! preparation to be Catholics on the planet. (One of my former students, as it happens, Barbara Hall, the... Read more

[PLEASE CUT, PASTE, FORWARD AND LINK! HELP US GET THE WORD OUT…THANKS!] act one inc. and Artists for a Renewed Society present, Making a GOOD Writer GREAT A Creativity Workshop Saturday, May 22, 2004 Featuring: Linda Seger, PhD (Making a Good Script Great,The Art of Adaptation, Web Thinking, Creating Unforgettable Characters) Plus: Barbara Nicolosi Tom Provost Join Hollywood insiders Linda Seger, Tom Provost and Barbara Nicolosi for an intensive, day-long workshop focused on the writer as artist. What’s holding you... Read more

BLOGGER HELP! And can somebody tell me why Blogger is suddenly only offering me a spell check option but no bold, italics or hyper-text options? Is this because of my Mac? Distressed. P.S. [Tibby: Feed me.] P.S.S. It MUST be the Mac. On my work PC, blogger is fine. rats…. Read more

SEE ME IN S.D. Go here for information about my talk for the San Diego Christian Writers Guild this Friday. I love speaking to this particular group of writers. They are really a model community to help writers understand and embrace their vocation in the Church and in the world. Read more

EMILY MONDAY #1090 I am afraid to own a Body — I am afraid to own a Soul — Profound — precarious Property — Possession, not optional — Double Estate — entailed at pleasure Upon an unsuspecting Heir — Duke in a moment of Deathlessness And God, for a Frontier. Read more

BACK IN L.A. Thanks to everyone who came to my talks in Philadelphia and NJ. Thanks especially to Juli et al for forgiving me for not loving LOTR and bringing two pews worth of family members to Philly. Altogether, they tell me about 200 people were at the speech. I finally left the reception somewhere around midnight. There were still people milling in impassioned discourse. My feet were killing me because I was wearing my cool light tan boots which... Read more

GREETINGS FROM PRINCETON I’m here in this lovely university town for a Legatus talk later tonite. What is it about some towns that make you want to walk through the streets reading Aristotle and humming Gaudeamus Igitur? Walking around the quaint shops spotted by Free Tibet bumper stickers, anti-Bush petitions and selling things like environmentally responsible clothing took me back to my days of working in Cambridge, MA at another center of the privileged proletariat. It’s certainly in the family... Read more

TARANTINO ON THE PASSION Unmitigated Blatherskite has reproduced a recent interview with Quentin Tarantino that the street paper L.A. Weekly is running. I’ve never been a real fan of Tarantino, but he wins huge points with me for his honest take on the high art in Mel Gibson’s film. He notes, “I think it actually is one of the most brilliant visual storytelling movies I’ve seen since the talkies — as far as telling a story via pictures. ” Go... Read more