Here are "31 Strange Medical Conditions," courtesy of John Green (who is awesome) and the Mental Floss team (also awesome). Charlie doesn't get a mention, nor do his films, but observe this:
#19 - Walking Corpse Syndrome, a.k.a. Cotard's Delusion. Synecdoche, New York's lead character, I probably don't need to point out again, is named Caden Cotard.
#20 - Capgras Delusion. At one point in Synecdoche, when Caden visits Adele’s flat, "Capgras" is one of the names on the building's address list.
#21 - Fregoli Delusion. You know Anomalisa? Charlie's upcoming animated film, based on his own play? When he wrote the play, he originally hid under the pseudonym "Francis Fregoli". (The Coen Bros' half of Theater of the New Year couldn't be performed in L.A., due to scheduling conflicts, so Charlie wrote a second play -- "Anomalisa" -- to double bill with his "Hope Leaves the Theater.")
John Green has a weekly show on the Mental Floss channel. It is cool. I recommend it. I'll embed another episode after the cut. Just for fun. Cos I'm cool, too.
"When I was in hospital I kept on telling them that the tablets weren't going to do me any good 'cause my brain was dead. I lost my sense of smell and taste. I didn't need to eat, or speak, or do anything. I ended up spending time in the graveyard because that was the closest I could get to death." (Source)
Stuff like this freaks me out a little bit. Also those reality medical shows. One day you're perfectly fine; next thing you know, you're foaming at the mouth and paralysed from the eyebrows down because you picked up a pen with a germ on it. Those make me want to sit still in an empty room and stay quiet for a very long time. But even that could cause medical problems. YOU JUST CAN'T WIN, MAN.
Anomalisa's latest project update is on Kickstarter, and you can take a looky at some photos of what the crew have been up to in the last few weeks. Observe puppet moulds:
More photos at the link. The other thing worth mentioning is the official Anomalisa Tumblr account, which is a little bare at the moment but will become."a weekly production notes blog."
The cast from the stage/radio version of Anomalisa is officially on deck for the animated version. Charlie will be co-directing with Duke Johnson, and HanWay are taking the film to Cannes. Says Screen Daily:
Charlie Kaufman is to co-direct anticipated animation Anomalisa, which HanWay will take to Cannes.
Adapted by Kaufman from his own stage play, Anomalisa will be the director’s first animated film. Production is already underway.
Jennifer Jason Leigh, Tom Noonan, and David Thewlis are set to lend their voices to the film, reprising their roles from the original stage production. Composer Carter Burwell who will write the score.
[..]
The film follows Michael, a man who is struggling with his inability to connect with people. Everyone in the world seems the same to Michael until he meets Lisa. (Source)
I really like this cover of "Little Person," Jon Brion and Charlie's song from Synecdoche, New York. It's by Foxtails Brigade, a chamber pop band from Oakland, California, and Laura Weinbach's vocals really suit this song. Observe the video:
Over at Mental Floss, you can read about 10 reported incidents of Cotard's Syndrome. Synecdoche, New York's Caden Cotard was named after the bizarre condition. Matt Soniak describes it like this:
Cotard’s Delusion is a mental disorder where people suffer the nihilistic delusion that they are dead or no longer exist. First reported in the 1700s, the disorder is still a largely a mystery today. The underlying cause isn’t understood; it’s been linked to bipolar disorder, depression and/or schizophrenia depending on the patient’s age.
Here's #3 on the list:
3. In 2008, New York psychiatrists reported on a 53-year-old patient, Ms. Lee, who complained that she was dead and smelled like rotting flesh. She asked her family to take her to a morgue so that she could be with other dead people. They dialed 911 instead. Ms. Lee was admitted to the psychiatric unit, where she accused paramedics of trying to burn her house down. After a month or so of a drug regimen, she was released with great improvement in her symptoms. (Source)
NEWS! ACTUAL NEWS! SWEET JESUS IT'S AN EASTER MIRACLE.
Via Deadline:
FX Networks has greenlighted How And Why, a half-hour comedy pilot from Oscar winner Charlie Kaufman. It tells the story of a man who can explain how and why a nuclear reactor works, but is clueless about life. Kaufman will write and direct the pilot and serve as executive producer. FX Prods will produce. (Source)
indieWIRE points out that this doesn't sound like the series Charlie was developing for HBO, which would star Catherine Keener. So that one's probably dead. Or maybe there are two T.V. series' in the works.
Big thanks to Sarah and Tim! And John! And Metkidd!
You might've noticed, BCK went kaput for a little bit in February. My computer died, see, and I was out of action for about a month. I tend to have an annual computer meltdown. I live on the coast -- salt air and corrosion are problems. While I was out of action, my web host shifted my websites to a new server, and I think there was a minor hiccup, and BCK temporarily vanished. Not much I could do about it while computerless. But then BCK came back online, with no help from me, and it's still online, and I have a new computer, and I'm here, and everything's good again.
"Star Wars: Sequel Debacle" is a completely silly but clever (but mostly silly) Flash game that, as WIRED puts it, "lets you choose the parameters that you think could/would/should underlie the announced Star Wars: Episode VII and see how the public and critics would receive the film thus produced." You can choose a writer (INCLUDING CHARLIE!), director (INCLUDING CHARLIE!), star and title for the film, then hit "Launch" and see what kind of review the film receives. WIRED again: "Obviously, it’s all in fun, and in fact the parameters clearly only somewhat affect the outcome, as hitting the “Launch” button repeatedly with the same entries often produces wildly different results."
Recommended if you enjoy silly pointless things and/or procrastination.
Thomas and Joey point me to a blog entry, in which Joey has a two-degrees-of-Kaufman experience in a gallery -- randomly bumpin' into a woman and her mother, who worked as an RN on the set of Synecdoche, New York. It's a trippy read with a unique style. It starts like so:
BENNINGTON -- Lisa and Julia were putzing around on their phones during lunch in the brew pub across the street when they stumbled upon a link for Fiddlehead at Four Corners. The cuties hit the link and loved one of the pictures -- Brian Hewitt's "Carriage Barn Gala" oil painting -- and then saw a link for the Google Street View virtual tour inside the art gallery. They took and loved the tour and decided to walk across the street to check out Fiddlehead at Four Corners in person.
At first AGD was pretty stoked to hear the cuties tell this little ditty of a tale because Fiddlehead's Street View tour went live on Google just an hour or two earlier, so he immediately thought how sweet it was that this new technology was working as intended. But the longer AGD engaged the cuties in conversation the more he wondered if they weren't in on the jig, whatever that jig might be. (Source)
