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scop (noun): Old English – bard, minstrel, storyteller

  • This Way to Egress: “Heft and Presence”

    This Way to Egress: “Heft and Presence”

    [This is the third in a series of posts on the shooting of Nightmare Cinema’s “This Way to Egress.” You can find the previous installments here and here. The film is available to stream on Freevee and Tubi or to rent/own on Amazon, Apple, and Vudu.]  In his essay “The Effect of Effects” (2008), critic Roger Ebert praises the cinematic illusions created for…

  • This Way to Egress: Grit

    This Way to Egress: Grit

    [This is the second in a series of posts on the shooting of the “This Way to Egress” segment of  Nightmare Cinema. You can find the first installment here. The film is available for free on Freevee and Tubi or to rent or own on Amazon, Apple, and  Vudu.]  Filming “This Way to Egress” began…

  • This Way to Egress: Looking Back

    This Way to Egress: Looking Back

    Mick Garris’s anthology film Nightmare Cinema was released to theatres four years ago this month, with premiere events held at The Dynasty Typewriter and Arena Cinelounce in LA, the Frida Cinema in Santa Ana, the Parkway Theatre in Pittsburgh, and others. I covered those events in previous blog posts, along with accounts of earlier festival…

  • HWA Pittsburgh:Gearing Up for StokerCon® 2023

    HWA Pittsburgh:
    Gearing Up for StokerCon® 2023

    Last week I got the chance to hang with some of my favorite writers and aficionados of horror and dark fantasy when the Pittsburgh Chapter of the Horror Writers Association gathered at the Sheridan Inn at Station Square to tour the site of this year’s StokerCon®. Above: Members of the Pittsburgh Chapter of the Horror…

  • This Week on PSMT:
    The Mystery of the Hidden Key

    Last fall, in the final act of Prime Stage Mystery Theatre’s “In the Ghost Light’s Glow,” we discovered a key inside the secret compartment of an old pencil box. Then, last week, in Act IV of “The Elf in the Wardrobe,” that key made a return appearance as our characters attempted to open a locked…

  • Overcoming Writer’s Block:
    Bono, R.E.M. & The Doorway Effect

    Some of the best advice for overcoming writer’s block comes from U2’s Bono by way of R.E.M.’s Michael Stipe. At least, I think that’s the case … though try as I might, I can’t locate any record of the interview. Nor do I recall anything else said in the interview or even if I came…