Talk to the Snail

Day #1 at KidScreen (”the ultimate kids industry experience of the year”) in dreary NYC. Luckily, Walden’s here to point me where I need to go.

– Eric

Tomorrow (Saturday) night’s the opening reception of “A Band of Bugs”, an eight-artist exhibition of “insect paintings, plush, sculptures, and installations.” Held at Nucleus in Alhambra, the event features work from Anna Chambers, Lou Romano, Don Shank, Megan Brain, Chris Rabilwongse, Michelle Valigura, Amanda Visell, and Alex Kirwan (that’s Alex’s stag beetle above). It’s free, the artists will be there, and the festivities begin at 7:00 p.m. If you can’t make it tomorrow night, you can still see the exhibition until March 3.

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You know, I’ve seen it coming for a while, and I’m the one who blogged it, but I still didn’t catch the fact. Anyway, we’ve just passed Frederator Blog Post No. 5,000. Of course, I’m too lazy to track down when we first went online with this, but it was probably sometime in 2005. Now, I’m no mathlete, but I figure 5,000 divided by 2005 equals about 2 ½ posts per hour. Not too shabby. Thanks to all our contributors and readers and commenters. Here’s to the next 5,000.

– Eric

Even the Mother of All Downpours couldn’t stop me from heading to L.A.’s Central Library this afternoon to check out the brand new Bunker Hill by Leo Politi exhibit (so new, in fact, it doesn’t officially open until Saturday, 2/2.)

Caldecott Medal-winning artist Leo Politi is best remembered as a children’s book illustrator and author who called downtown Los Angeles and nearby Angelino Heights home for most of his 87 years (he died in 1996). Many of his books are centered in L.A.

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So Bostonian Dave Schlafman stopped the Frederator compound in Burbank today. Oh, I had my camera, alright, I just forgot about it. So while I got to hang out with Dave and see some of the things on which he’s recently been working (very cool), you get to see neither his latest projects nor a snapshot of him at our offices. But you can go to his website for all sorts of art and animation. Thanks for stopping by, Dave, and see you at KidScreen next month.

– Eric

If you’ve got some free time tomorrow evening, please consider stopping by a benefit show/art auction at Monkeyhouse Toys in Los Angeles. Besides the normal you’ll-have-such-a-great-time thing, buying a piece of art would not only give you work by one of the terrific artists listed in the invite above (there are too many distinguished talents to name just a few), but you’d also be helping out a good friend of Frederator, Amy Rogers (Foster’s, Powerpuff Girls, Fairly OddParents, Teenage Robot), and her family. Please know that if you can’t make the opening reception tomorrow, you can still check out the artwork at the gallery until February 3.

– Eric

If you glued your hand to your bed to get out of going to school, what TV show would you watch?

Boy Glues Hand to Bed to Avoid School

MEXICO CITY (AP) — A 10-year-old Mexican boy dreaded returning to school after Christmas break so much that he glued his hand to his bed. Sandra Palacios spent nearly two hours Monday morning trying to free her son Diego’s hand with water, oil and nail polish remover before calling authorities, police chief Jorge Camacho told The Associated Press from outside the northern city of Monterrey.

“I didn’t want to go to school because vacation was so much fun,” Reforma newspaper quoted the boy as saying.

Palacios said Diego sneaked into the kitchen in the early morning to get the industrial glue, which he then slathered on his right hand. She didn’t hear him get up, but later awoke and found him watching TV with his hand [Read more…]

So Fred’s mentioned the new snazzy 10th Anniversary poster we’ll be sending out to FOFs over the next week. They’re silk-screened, weighty, and sitting outside my office waiting to be rolled and stuffed into tubes. In response to the many requests, the photo above is what 1/5 of a ton of posters looks like. They’ll be in the mail soon.

– Eric

Hey, look what New Yorker was in the House of Frederator yesterday. That’s right, Stephen Levinson! He stopped by to show off three new projects, including the already smash “Ace & Aqua”. Well, everything stank. Kidding! Steve made me laugh, he made me cry, then he made me take his car to get washed (teenagers!). The pitches were great, and, had you been here, you’d be surprised, too, that SL hasn’t been pitching cartoons for forty years. Like me, you’d also be surprised to learn that Steve’s still got two more years of high school to get out of the way before he goes off to animation school. I made him promise he’d hire me at his giant company – when he turns 19. Thanks for stopping by, Steve.

Alright, not animation-related but in the realm of kid entertainment for sure. When it comes to scary kids films, while I do remember going to see Santa Claus Conquers the Martians in the theatre as a kid, I either didn’t see this fairy tale or have since repressed it. A favorite blog of mine, Weekend Stubble, directs us to a Mark Jordan Legan and Slate V piece (watch it!) on this classic movie and its producer, K. Gordon Murray.

Then GO HERE for a list of some fantastic dialog quotes from the movie.

“Zombie Twins? I knew they were ugly, but I didn’t think they were zombies!”

– Eric