The Dreaming

The Last Angel Tour features Gaiman giving dramatic readings from his work, including short stories, poems, passages from his novels, as well as a few surprises. Gaiman has been performing a completely different set for each stop of the tour, unveiling many new pieces and bringing out some Guardian Angel Tour standards for a final reading. The highlight of each event has been the extended passages from Gaiman’s forthcoming novel, “American Gods.” Gaiman also takes time during the evening to answer questions from the audience. Each reading is preceded by a private cocktail RECEPTION with the author open to CBLDF Members and Premium Ticket holders.

Tickets are available for Gaiman’s final tour stop at the WRITERS’ GUILD THEATRE in LOS ANGELES on Thursday, OCTOBER 26. Demand for tickets for the tour’s finale was so high that the event was RECENTLY MOVED to the Writers’ Guild Theatre from the smaller Pacific Design enter. All tickets purchased for the Pacific Design Center will be honored at the new venue. The move to a larger theatre means that additional tickets, both Premium and General Admissiontickets, are now available.

Tickets can be purchased from TICKETMASTER by calling 213-480-3232 or by visiting http://www.ticketmaster.com

General Admission ticket holders who would like to upgrade to Premium Tickets may do so by requesting a refund from Ticketmaster for the original ticket, and then purchasing a new Premium Ticket.

The Writers’ Guild Theatre is located at 135 South Doheny Drive in Beverly Hills, just over a mile from the event’s original venue. The reception begins at 6:00 pm, but the reading itself has been pushed back to 8:30 to allow for extra travel time and for a slightly longer reception. For complete tour information, please visit http://www.cbldf.org or call the Fund toll-free at 1-800-99-CBLDF.

In conjunction with the Last Angel Tour, the Comic Book Legal Defense Fund is featuring a special LAST ANGEL AUCTION on EBAY, http://www.ebay.com The centerpiece of this all-Gaiman auction is the author’s ORIGINAL SCRIPTS for “NEVERWHERE,” the television series he created for the BBC. In addition to the scripts, the portfolio contains the first chapter of what would become the “Neverwhere” novel, written out in long-hand by Gaiman while on the set of the show. To find out more about this unique auction, which includes many other items as well, please visit http://members.ebay.com/aboutme/cbldf.org

# # #

Co. to finance, sell pic along with Dworet-adapted ‘Alamos’

By ADAM DAWTREY

Terry Gilliam will direct the $50 million comic fantasy “Good Omens,” and Nicholas Hytner will helm the $25 million romantic thriller “Los Alamos,” both for Renaissance Films.

Gilliam and Tony Grisoni are adapting “Good Omens” from the worldwide bestseller by Terry Pratchett and Neil Gaiman. Charles Roven’s Atlas Entertainment is co-producing the pic with British producers Marc and Peter Samuelson.

The film is slated to shoot in the U.K. toward the end of 2001. It’s a knockabout story of an angel and a demon who are sent together on a mission to track down the Antichrist, who has been misplaced somewhere on Earth.

Laurence Dworet will adapt “Los Alamos” from Joseph Kanon’s novel. Ted Hope and James Schamus at Good Machine are developing and producing the project.

Story concerns a murder investigation set against the backdrop of the race to develop the nuclear bomb in early 1945. Pic reteams Hytner with Renaissance, the company that produced his first movie, “The Madness of King George.”

London-based Renaissance will finance and sell both movies. In the case of “Good Omens,” which reunites Gilliam with Roven for the first time since “Twelve Monkeys,” pic will also go through Roven’s own output deals in selected territories. Renaissance itself has an output deal with Entertainment Film Distributors in the U.K.

The Gilliam pic, which has been long in negotiation, reps the first fruit of Renaissance’s policy to make larger A-grade projects, co-financed through its newly inked $210 million credit line with the bank Dexia BIL. Renaissance is picking up all the development costs.

Gaiman, creator of the graphic novels “The Sandman” and “Neverwhere,” and Pratchett, author of the “Discworld” series, both have huge cult followings. “Terry Gilliam, Neil Gaiman and Terry Pratchett are all certifiable geniuses; we have now set the fuse on behalf of their millions of fans around the world,” said Marc Samuelson.

Neil Gaiman (neilgaiman) Fri 20 Oct ’00 (01:39 AM):
—
A brief request — any of you who’ve been to the Chicago or the New York readings:

Get the word out. Tell people you liked them, and how much — particularly tell people in LA or who can go to LA. Spread the word, or post reviews to mailings lists and newsgroups and whatevers.

Between Ticketmaster, and having to change the venue from a sold out 300 seater to a not-sold-out-at-all 600 seat theatre, I’m really concerned that the place will be half empty. And it’s the last one of the tour, and it’s the last tour, and I really want it to go out with a bang.

The new theatre also means there are more premium seats available in LA. — they were also sold out for a while there.

The fantasy writer did a reading last night in NY and both ‘Matthew’ and ‘Jason’ have reports:

“I was at Neil Gaiman’s “Last Angel” reading in New York City last night and picked up some tidbits for you. Gaiman again confirmed that Gilliam is “signed, sealed and delivered” for Good Omens. He also mentioned that there will never be a sequel to the book, because the first one was about fun and this one would be about money.
The other thing that was brought up was the Death movie, currently at Warner Bros. Gaiman said that the execs at Warners were ticked at him because he promised that he’d start on the script for the film after completing his new book “American Gods” in March. Apparently, he’s still not done with the book, but he is on page thirty seven of the Death movie script which he described as being “essentially Death: The High Cost of Living, but bigger.”

“Last night I attended Neil Gaiman’s NYC stop on his Last Angel Tour, and he did a Q&A session during which he answered a bunch of questions about his various movie projects. Here’s a rundown:

• He had agreed to get started on the Death movie as soon as he completed his novel, American Gods. That was about six months ago, and he thought it was on the verge of completion when he said that. He’s just completed the first draft of the novel, and says he’s on page 37 of the Death screenplay. He described it as, “The High Cost of Living – only much larger.”

• Terry Gilliam is set to do Good Omens as soon as he finishes his current movie (Don Quixote, I believe). This is signed, sealed and locked in stone.
• He just read a draft of the screenplay for The Books of Magic – and he says it’s great.
• He was working on a strange detective story with David Lynch, although he says he couldn’t keep working on it…David was a little too strange for him. He would like to work with him again in the future, though.”

Luke Cage Checks In With All Sorts Of NEIL GAIMAN Goodies!!

Hey, everyone. “Moriarty” here with some Rumblings From The Lab. I think Harry and I have both had the lovely opportunity to sit down with Neil Gaiman in the past, and I know that I walked away thinking even more of him after the conversation than I did before. He’s one of those guys who is in it for all the right reasons, whose gift has somehow managed to stay pure even as he’s become a marketable name. I’m always interested in what he’s got to say, and our good buddy LUKE CAGE has the scoop for you.

Reasonable rates, satisfaction guaranteed, Luke Cage, Hero For Hire is ready to serve you.

What’s happening Harry et al, I hope everything’s fine. As for me, I am one happy superhero. I just came back from St. Mark’s Church in beautiful downtown NYC, where I was lucky enough to see one of my favorite authors in the flesh (which DOES NOT mean naked) for the second time.

Neil Gaiman, writer of The Sandman, Stardust, Neverwhere, co-author of Good Omens, winner of more fantasy writing awards than I have brain space to recall, is finishing up his last tour in support of the noble Comic Book Legal Defense Fund. He’ll be reading some works, including selections from his soon-to-be-published novel “American Gods”. As a card-carrying member (all superheroes should join the CBLDF), I get to work security.

First of all, let me tell you what a nice guy Neil Gaiman is. Guys like Harlan Ellison, Grant Morrison, they’re fantastic writers, I worship them and their work. But if you ever meet them at a convention, they’re a little stand-offish. Like they’re not really into the whole “meeting the public” thing. Maybe even a little arrogant. Oh well. Not Gaiman though. See, the lucky CBLDF members and folks who paid for premium tickets got to meet Neil before the reading at a local watering hole, a more intimate, party-like gathering during which I offered to buy him a drink from the over-priced bar. At this little soiree was a young girl, couldn’t have been over 8 years old. Apaarently her father has brought her to a couple of Gaiman readings, to the point where Neil can recognize her by sight. When Neil found out that today was her birthday, he scooped her up in a big hug and promised to read her any story she wanted at the reading. What a dude.

So I know what you’re all wanting to know… Did he drop any movie news? Sweet Christmas, did he ever!

1) GOOD OMENS – From directly out of Neil Gaiman’s mouth came these words: “Terry Gilliam”. That’s right, true believers (sorry Stan), barring any natural disaster, sudden death or destruction of the universe, our American Python will helm the Good Omens movie after finishing his current project.

1a) As an aside, Neil nixed the idea of a Good Omens sequel. He said that although he and Terry Pratchett had kicked around some ideas, if they really started the ball rolling on a sequel, in Neil’s words “the entire process would be interrupted by men in nice suits with thin watches and very large cheques.” The original was written over nine weeks, during which the two giants of literature had just been trying to amuse each other, completing each other’s ideas until the book was done. He loved that magic, he said, but it would probably be impossible to recapture, no matter how much moolah got thrown around.

2) DEATH – Another direct quote: “I’ve gotten a lot of very nice people at Warner Brothers very pissed off at me.” It seems Neil promised them he’d start on the Death script after finishing the first draft of American Gods. He estimated that start date to be in May, but was waaaay off. So according to Neil, he’s on page 37 and counting. No words on casting or crew. The script is an adaptation of the miniseries “The High Cost of Living”.

3) SANDMAN – Neil shares the general distaste for Bill Farmer’s draft, calling it “too much like an action film.” He likes elements of the Ross and Avery scripts, but not in their entirety. (NOTE: It was loud in the bar at this point when we spoke, and he was trying to save his voice for the reading later that night, so I may have heard those two names wrong.) He also said that he’s unexpectedly seen a very nice draft from David Schow. That’s right, the same David Schow credited with “The Crow.”

4) BOOKS OF MAGIC – He’s a surprise entry! Neil told the audience that he’s received an excellent screen treatment/script for the Tim Hunter saga by Matt Greenberg. Is this the same Matt Greenberg who’s a co-producer of the Sci-Fi Channel’s Invisible Man series and a co-writer of Halloween: H2O? My sources say yes.

Not much else to say here. The reading was great fun. Neil reports that American Gods is his most ambitious project since The Sandman: a number of full-length novellas tied together in one over-arching narrative, about the clash between the gods of the old world (lightning, the sea, the sun) versus the gods of our new age (the Internet, taxicabs, fast food). There was an advance reading of a children’s story called “Wolves in the Walls” to be published around (Sweet) Christmas 2001. He also read a poem called “The Blueberry Girl”, a touching piece written for Tori Amos’ newborn daughter. As I said before, what a dude.

So there you have it, Harry. A complete Gaiman report from your man-in-the-projects. My bill will arrive in the mail. Anyone else looking to put my superstrength and steelhard skin to the test can E-mail me. Oh yeah, and anyone looking to learn about and join the Comic Book Legal Defense Fund can find them at www.cbldf.org.

Peace, love, and disco.