New Bradbury 100 podcast episode - B100 Live!

As promised, the Bradbury 100 podcast feed now carries the audio of my recent livestreamed edition of the pod. Pick it up in all the usual podcast places, or listen below!

Towards the end, I mention The New Ray Bradbury Review. You can find it here - and the actual content of the new issue will be online very soon. UPDATE: the content of the Review is now live!

Bradbury 100 · Bradbury 100 - Episode 47 - Bradbury 100 LIVE, 2023 Edition

 

 

 

Please subscribe to the Bradbury 100 podcast - it's totally free on all platforms. Where to find it:

 

 

Main platforms:

 
Apple Podcasts  - Google Podcasts - Soundcloud - Spotify

 

 

 

Other platforms: 

Amazon Music - Audible - Bullhorn - Castbox - Deezer - Listen Notes - Player FM - Pocket Casts - Podbean - Podcast Addict - Podcast Index - Podcast Republic - Podchaser - Podfriend - Podlink - TuneIn

Bradbury 100 LIVE - The Beast, and Ray's Miracle Year

As promised, here's the video recording of my live episode of Bradbury 100, celebrating Ray's 103rd birthday.

I will also port the audio from this into my usual Bradbury 100 podcast feed, so you can also pick it up as a normal audio podcast (although some of the visual references may not work quite as well in that format...)

Towards the end, I mention The New Ray Bradbury Review, the  journal of the Ray Bradbury Center. You can find it online here: https://journals.iupui.edu/index.php/nrbr - but you won't be able to view the new issue's content until I click the "publish" button.

Happy Birthday, Ray!

Today - 22 August 2023 - is the 103rd anniversary of the birth of Ray Bradbury. And so, in time-honoured tradition, I will be doing a LIVE episode of Bradbury 100, streamed via Facebook.

I'll be taking you back 70 years to 1953 - one of the biggest years of Ray's life!

 

Just use this link, and look for the live stream: https://www.facebook.com/bradburymedia

 

22 AUGUST 2023 / 8pm UK time / 3pm Eastern Time / Noon Pacific Time

 

 

...and if you don't do Facebook, don't worry. I'll make a recording available via Youtube and via this blog, after the event. (You'll just have to wait a couple of days!)

Martian Chronicles - new bluray release

 

Australian bluray publisher Imprint Films has announced a new release of Ray Bradbury's THE MARTIAN CHRONICLES, the 1980 miniseres. The CHRONICLES has been out on this format before, but with very little in the way of extras.

This new release has audio commentary by veteran science fiction film journalist Gary Gerani, and interviews with several industry professionals. They're also throwing in the documentary Ray Bradbury: American Icon, which was first released in the late 1980s or early 1990s.

 

Ray famously said that this miniseries was "boring", and he was heavily chastised by NBC for saying it. He wasn't entirely wrong. But the announced extras should make this a very collectable release.

 

It's a limited edition set, and I understand that it will be region free. I've placed an order, and found that they do ship to the UK (with added shipping of about 30 Australian dollars - which is about £15 in UK money). It's released at the end of September.

 

Ordering information is here: https://viavision.com.au/shop/ray-bradburys-the-martian-chronicles-1980-imprint-television-5

 

 

 

Staying up to date with the Bradbury 100 podcast

 

To make it easier for you to discover my Bradbury 100 podcast, you'll periodically see this page, which gathers all the episodes and shows together.

 

Bonus Video Episode - video of my public lecture on Fahrenheit 451 at seventy (extended, lavishly illustrated video version of podcast episode 42)

Bonus Video episode - video of my public lecture on The Illustrated Man at seventy (extended, lavishly illustrated video version of podcast episode 27)

Bonus Video Episode -  video of my public lecture on The Martian Chronicles at seventy (extended, lavishly illustrated video version of part of podcast episode 17)

Bonus LIVE Episode - writer Steven Paul Leiva returns as we celebrate Ray's 101st birthday

 

Episode 46 -  Chronological Bradbury: Ray's stories published in 1938

Episode 45 - Rescuing the movie Something Wicked This Way Comes after a disastrous preview

Episode 44 - How Ray wrote the book and movie Something Wicked This Way Comes

Episode 43 - Books that never were: proposed Bradbury books that didn't come into being

Episode 42 - Fahrenheit 451 at Seventy (live talk)

Episode 41 - Ray's "ghost writer" friends

Episode 40 - The "Rocket Summer" you probably don't know

Episode 39 - Ray Bradbury and Christmas

Episode 38 - Ray and EC Comics

Episode 37 - Bradbury's dinosaur tales

Episode 36 - The tragic death of Ray's Uncle Lester

Episode 35 - Bradbury's October

Episode 34 - Bradbury's advice to writers

Episode 33 - Bradbury's story "The Exiles"

Episode 32 - Dandelion Wine live talk

Episode 31 -  August 2022 update

Episode 30 - Ray Bradbury's other Mars stories

Episode 29 - Ray Bradbury and the question of "style"

Episode 28 - the best Martian Chronicles films never made

Episode 27 - The Illustrated Man at Seventy (also available in extended, illustrated, video form - see Bonus Video episodes at the top of this list)

Episode 26 - tracking down "The Lonely One"

Episode 25 - with Bradbury scholar Phil Nichols!

Episode 24 - with writer and Bradbury scholar Steve Gronert Ellerhoff

Episode 23 - with writer and actor David J. Loftus

Episode 22 - with filmmaker and visual effects artist Christopher Cooksey

Episode 21 - with Russian author Pavel Gubarev, webmaster of the Russian Ray Bradbury website

Episode 20 - April 2021 update

Episode 19 - introducing my new podcast, Science Fiction 101!

Episode 18 - with science fiction writer and scholar Howard V. Hendrix, on Bradbury's influence and legacy

Episode 17 - with highlights from two centenary events: Bradbury 100 Live and The Martian Chronicles at Seventy (both of these events are also available in extended video form - see Bonus Video episodes at the top of this list)

Episode 16 - with writer and friend of Ray, Gregory Miller

Episode 15 - with Emmy-winning actor Bill Oberst Jr, who appears as Ray in a one-person show

Episode 14 - with writer and scholar Jeffrey Kahan on how Bradbury's fiction works

Episode 13 - with storyteller Megan Wells on performing Bradbury's stories and characters

Episode 12 - with writer/director/actor Jerry Robbins, who adapted many Bradbury works for Colonial Radio Theater

Episode 11 - with writer and editor Charles Ardai, who edited the new Bradbury crime story collection Killer, Come Back To Me

Episode 10 - with Ray Bradbury Theatre composer John Massari

Episode 9 - with scholar Miranda Corcoran, talking about Ray's "Elliott family"

Episode 8  - the second part of my interview with award-winning dramatist Brian Sibley, talking mostly about adapting Bradbury for radio

Episode 7 - with writer and broadcaster Brian Sibley, talking mostly about Disney

Episode 6 - continuing my interview with Jonathan R. Eller, Bradbury biographer and scholar

Episode 5 - with Jonathan R. Eller, Bradbury biographer, whose latest book Bradbury Beyond Apollo completes his biographical trilogy

Episode 4 - with photographer Elizabeth Nahum-Albright, who has a current exhibition on Ray Bradbury's house

Episode 3 - with Sandy Petroshius of the Ray Bradbury Experience Museum

Episode 2 - with Jason Aukerman of the Center for Ray Bradbury Studies

Episode 1 - with author Steven Paul Leiva, creator of Ray Bradbury Week in Los Angeles

 

The best way to never miss an episode is to subscribe for free with your podcast app/service of choice. See the list of links below!

And you can also follow Bradbury 100 on Facebook.

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Please subscribe to the Bradbury 100 podcast - it's totally free on all platforms. Where to find it:

 

Main platforms:

 
Apple Podcasts  - Google Podcasts - Soundcloud - Spotify

 

 

 

Other platforms: 

Audible - Bullhorn - Castbox - Deezer - Listen Notes - Player FM - Podbean - Podcast Addict - Podcast Index - Podchaser - Podfriend - Podlink - Podtail - TuneIn

Ray Bradbury: New Volume of Letters!

 

Coming soon from Simon & Schuster publishers...

 

Ray Bradbury biographer Jonathan R. Eller has edited Remembrance, a selection of Ray's correspondence. It's been several years in the making, in part because (as with all correspondence volumes) it can be a nightmare to get all the necessary permissions. But around November of this year, the book should be available. Amazon (UK) is already taking pre-orders here: https://www.amazon.co.uk/Remembrance-Selected-Correspondence-Ray-Bradbury/dp/1668016974

The title of the book alludes to once of Ray's best-loved poems, the one that ends with the haunting lines "I remember you. I remember you."

 

Here's what the publisher says about the book:

 

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Remembrance offers the first sustained look at his life in letters from his late teens to his ninth decade. Bradbury's correspondence was far-reaching - he interacted with a rich cross section of 20th-century cultural figures, writers, film directors, editors, and others who simply wanted insights or encouragement from a writer who had enriched their lives through his stories and novels.

 

Bradbury scholar and biographer, Jonathan R. Eller, organized this volume into categories of correspondents, showing Bradbury's progression through life as he knew it, and not necessarily as the public perceived him. Letters to and from mentors and other writers are followed by correspondence with such film directors as John Huston, François Truffaut, and Federico Fellini. Letters with publishers and agents are followed by letters that capture moments of national and international recognition, the shadows of war and intolerance that motivated some of his best writing, and the friends and family members who shared the memories of his life. Among the writers whose letters illuminate Remembrance are Theodore Sturgeon, Sir Arthur C. Clarke, Twilight Zone writers Charles Beaumont and Richard Matheson, Dan Chaon, Bernard Berenson, Nobel Laureate Bertrand Russell, Graham Greene, Anaîs Nin, Gore Vidal, Carl Sandburg, and Jessamyn West.

 

Remembrance illuminates the most elusive aspect of Ray Bradbury's wide-ranging writing passions - the correspondence he sent and received throughout his long life, each letter originally intended for an audience of one.

 

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Follow Me On Facebook

 If you're on Facebook, please make sure you like or follow my Bradbury 100 Podcast page. Not only do I use it for announcements about the podcast, but I have also started doing daily posts about Bradbury. Some of these are news items, but many of them are historical posts.

One thing I'm particularly trying to do over there is note every anniversary of every short story and book. For example, in the last couple of days I've posted about "Luana the Living", "Touched with Fire" and "Tale of the Mangledomvritch"!

New Bradbury 100 podcast episode: Chronological Bradbury!

With this new episode of my Bradbury 100 podcast, I start a new occasional series: "Chronological Bradbury".

The idea is to work through Ray Bradbury's fiction output in the order of publication, discussing each item as we go.

In this first "Chronological Bradbury", I start right at the beginning, with a discussion of Ray's earliest published works, which appeared in amateur magazines in 1938.

I hope you enjoy the discussion - and do please let me know what you think. You can post a comment down below, or on the Bradbury 100 Podcast Facebook page.

In this episode I mention several useful sources:

• Ray Bradbury: The Life of Fiction (Eller & Touponce)
• FANAC's historical fanzine collection
  
• The Earliest Bradbury (Ritter)
   

 

 

Bradbury 100 · Bradbury 100 - Episode 46 - Chronological Bradbury: 1938

 

 

 

 

 

Please subscribe to the Bradbury 100 podcast - it's totally free on all platforms. Where to find it:

 

 

Main platforms:

 
Apple Podcasts  - Google Podcasts - Soundcloud - Spotify

 

 

 

Other platforms: 

Amazon Music - Audible - Bullhorn - Castbox - Deezer - Listen Notes - Player FM - Pocket Casts - Podbean - Podcast Addict - Podcast Index - Podcast Republic - Podchaser - Podfriend - Podlink - Podtail - Stitcher - TuneIn

Ray Bradbury Experience Museum in Waukegan: Closure Announced

Sad news: the Ray Bradbury Experience Museum in Ray's home town of Waukegan, Illinois, has announced that it is permanently closing. This sad news follows a tough few years - including the pandemic, of course, in which the RBEM has struggled to establish and maintain its presence. This was especially true after the Museum lost its downtown exhibition space.

Waukegan's historic Carnegie Library is currently being renovated, so as to serve as the new home to the Historical Society. I understand that a section of the building's interior will feature a display of books bequeathed by Ray to the city - so there will be something for Bradbury tourists to seek out in the downtown area.

 

(And please note that the Ray Bradbury Center in Indiana is unaffected by the closure of RBEM. The two organisations (RBEM and RBC) are not connected, except in spirit.)

 

Below is the full text of the announcement from the Museum committee chair, Sandy Petroshius.

===========================

RBEM Announces Closing

 

Ray Bradbury to “Live Forever” in Green Town 

 

In 2017 a group of dedicated volunteers came together to honor Ray Bradbury in his hometown Waukegan, Illinois, with an interactive museum. As the Ray Bradbury Experience Museum Committee, we operated the museum out of a space in downtown Waukegan, donated by the Greater Waukegan Development Coalition. 

 

Now, after much consideration, the RBEM Committee has decided to officially close in May 2023. This decision followed challenging realities. COVID was a daunting obstacle. Many donors shifted their attention to other, more pressing social needs. In addition, it was immensely difficult to secure a much-needed permanent location in downtown Waukegan.

 

Over the years, we worked with museum designers to develop plans for the future museum. At the same time, the RBEM Committee and volunteers welcomed visitors to events, readings, performances, and exhibits in Waukegan and at national and regional conventions. We presented Ray Bradbury programs, online and in-person, for local and regional schools and libraries. A highlight event was the August 22, 2020, celebration of the Centennial of Ray Bradbury’s birth in Waukegan. 

 

April 2023 marked our final program. Partnering with the Waukegan Public Library and the Waukegan Historical Society and funded by an Illinois Humanities grant, we presented Explore Ray Bradbury, a weekend of multi-media and hands-on engagement with Bradbury’s classic books and themes. Excited visitors of all ages heard Bradbury stories, created Bradbury-themed crafts, invented banned book slogans and pins, and experienced a virtual reality journey to the International Space Station. 

 

While our vision of an interactive Ray Bradbury museum will not come to fruition, Ray Bradbury’s legacy is flourishing in Waukegan. “Fantastical Traveler,” the brilliant Ray Bradbury sculpture, greets everyone outside the Waukegan Public Library at 128 County Street, with Bradbury’s own typewriter on view inside. The historic Carnegie Library, currently under renovation, will open as the Waukegan History Museum. It will house Ray Bradbury’s personal collection of books. 

 

Thank you to the RBEM Committee for your boundless dedication, creativity, expertise, and generosity.

 

Thank you to our “Visionary Contributors” listed below. Your support energized all our efforts. 

 

Thank you to so many others not listed, who supported RBEM’s vision and work over the years by contributing thousands of hours volunteering, professional expertise, in-kind donations of goods and services, and communications. You made everything possible.

 

Thank you to Ray Bradbury for your lifelong passion for writing and your hundreds of stories. Your imagination inspired us from the very beginning. 

 

Ray, “live forever” in your beloved Green Town!

 

With heartfelt gratitude,

Sandy

 

Sandra Sarsha Petroshius, RBEM Committee Chair

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New Bradbury 100 podcast episode: Rescuing SOMETHING WICKED THIS WAY COMES

Last time on the Bradbury 100 podcast, we looked at the origin of Ray Bradbury's Something Wicked This Way Comes, and its peculiar history as a film script that became a book, and then became a film script again.

In this new episode of the show, I continue the story, examining how the film - disastrously previewed in 1982 - was rescued through some re-writing, re-shooting and re-editing. Ray claimed that he "directed" or "edited" the film doing this re-make period, rescuing it from the clutches of director Jack Clayton. But is this really true?

Join me as I dig into the archives, and look for evidence of what really went on.

This picture up above, by the way, is a publicity still showing Ray Bradbury and actor Royal Dano (who took the pivotal role of the Lightning Rod salesman in the film).

Before listening to the pod, you might want to re-watch this short video clip from 2017, where I talk about finding Ray Bradbury's personal copy of the preview version of Something Wicked: 

 

...and here's the podcast, also available via your podcast app:

Bradbury 100 · Bradbury 100 - Episode 45 - Rescuing SOMETHING WICKED THIS WAY COMES

 

 

Please subscribe to the Bradbury 100 podcast - it's totally free on all platforms. Where to find it:

 

 

Main platforms:

 
Apple Podcasts  - Google Podcasts - Soundcloud - Spotify

 

 

 

Other platforms: 

Amazon Music - Audible - Bullhorn - Castbox - Deezer - Listen Notes - Player FM - Pocket Casts - Podbean - Podcast Addict - Podcast Index - Podcast Republic - Podchaser - Podfriend - Podlink - Podtail - Stitcher - TuneIn