I have liked comic books since I could read. I was an advanced reader as a child and I read often and in great quantity. Despite the medium's reputation as trash, I loved it fiercely and still do and I had always felt a casual desire to attend the famous San Diego Comic Con but when I knew "Fellowship of the Ring," was on the horizon and that TORn was going to be there, the website I was checking daily for LOTR news, I convinced the wife to take a trip. So there we were.
Like any good Tolkien fan would, I made it a point to see TheOneRing.net's panel at Comic-Con. I have photo of head of Weta Workshops, Richard Taylor, on a stage with Cliff and Jon (Quickbeam and Tookish) and I believe this was during the TORn panel but I don't know for sure. Others may read and remember and I will edit as I can. This pair of staffers was active during TORn's early days, Quickbeam writing his "Out on a limb" pieces and Tookish doing a humor section. They were part of the early content providers that kept me coming back, along with the news team, including Xoanon, and spy Tehanu, putting up notices when somebody so much as broke wind on set.
I even signed up for, and after much lurking, posted on the message board. It is the only such place I have ever remained active despite great interest in a great number of things. I can't define the alchemy, but no other forum has prompted me to do more than lurk.
New Line Cinema had an official LOTR presentation as well. Wouldn't you know it, but when Shannon and I went to the thing, we ran into our friend Heather again. I recall that she was in San Diego alone and also motivated to be there by the LOTR events and probably because she is nicer than me, she called Shannon and I over to some seats she had saved in the auditorium that fit several hundred people. They were close to the front and we were fortunate to have the kindness of a virtual stranger.Then, Heather did something that mortified me. Cliff and Jon walked in the door and were in our general area looking for somebody or perhaps for seats. She stood up and yelled, "Cliff! Cliff! Jon!" She had more seats and they were intended for the guys from TheOneRing that she met. It is a fault of mine, but my natural instincts are to leave people alone, being a little self conscious. Heather had me help wave the pair down and I felt ridiculous but I did it and they came and sat with us. (I will ask Jon and Cliff if they recall this sometime.)
Cliff is pretty much the opposite of me in regard to how he deals with new acquaintances. Where I am reserved, he is friendly. Where I am stoic, he makes it clear he is happy to meet people. I keep a distance and he is immediately warm and gracious. I am not and was not then, completely without people skills, but he lights up individuals with attention and courtesy. I am perceptive enough to have watched and learned a little, especially when I have represented TheOneRing, but I think Quickbeam was born with this in his nature. I know of many, many LOTR fans that have been charmed by him.
So, Cliff was disarming and charming and Jon was friendly and cool and even gave me a shirt that never had a chance of fitting but was a treasure anyway. Heather facilitated this further meeting that led to me keeping in touch with Jon on occasion and being remembered. I wouldn't have flagged that pair down for money, but Heather made it happen. (Incidentally, I still see Heather at Comic-Con every year. Each of us has a social network there but we make it a point to say 'hi' and we both keep going back. She will always be my first convention friend.)
We ran into Cliff one more time where I got the impression that he had seen enough of the newlyweds from Utah.
After the convention at some point on TheOneRing, they posted a page called the "Line Party page" to facilitate organized meetings for fans to find other local fans and either watch the soon-to-be-released FOTR together or even to meet for other reasons such as the famous California-based Bilbo's Birthday party.
I checked the site to see if there was anything going on in Salt Lake City. There wasn't. I decided that was bad.
I signed up for a Salt Lake City line party and I had the idea that rather than wait in a line for tickets, I should buy a lot of tickets when they went on sale, a few weeks prior to the show, so a large group could enjoy the event together. I didn't know if just putting up the information at TheOneRing would be enough so I picked a theater, posted a flyer or two at a college, visited an anime club in person and before I knew it, things were happening. People were signing up in droves. Utah is a hotbed for not only Tolkien fans but fantasy fans in general. Why this is true would be a whole blog entry, but it is the case. Local columnist Lee Benson wrote about it.Not only were people Tolkienites, they were trusting! I set up a P.O. Box and had people mail me checks for their tickets. Why they did this in such numbers I will never understand but scads of checks and a few in-person cash transactions came in. I asked for a little more than face value on the tickets, thinking that for so much work we ought to be doing something charitable. During this time we also established a good relationship with a book store which became the future staging place of many events and even celebrity book signings. Salt Lake became a star on the map of Houghton-Mifflin who publishes all thing J.R.R. Tolkien.
Our planned one-theater buyout sold out completely at 512 seats with the front-row empty, so nobody had to break a neck to watch the film. Lots of people were still wanting seats so we directed them to the same theater's auditoriums where midnight shows were playing and they sold out, mostly to our people, as well.
The theater of choice wasn't willing to work a behind-the-scenes deal to buy out the theater so, the morning tickets went on sale I walked up to the counter and asked for 512 tickets to "Fellowship Of The Ring." The counter girl was a little flummoxed and I learned it takes quite a while to print out 512 tickets and they are an awkward bulk that you can't simply drop in your pocket.
I called the local media and while the television stations followed other stories, the newspapers showed up and we had some good coverage. The Deseret News had some great photos and this article.
TheOneRing was very active in California in those days. Owner and founder Calisuri-Chris was in Los Angeles, after leaving Penn State, pretty much following his future wife Amy. News poster-founder Xoanon-Mike was in Canada, webmaster-founder Corvar-Bill in Wisconsin and spy-founder Tehanu-Erica was famously in New Zealand. But, a lot of the in-person energy was going on in California. Chris became connected with Sideshow, making a partnership between the company and TORn that helped establish the Sideshow-Weta brand name as the premier LOTR producer of collectibles and helped TORn pay the bills to accommodate its massive traffic.Quickbeam was there, eventually partnering with Carlene to eventually make the documentary, "Ringers: Lord of the Fans" where I received my first film credit (so far!) as a unit director. It was natural with all this energy in California and lots of others staffers and friends like Garfeimao, Sarumann and Arwen, that the site would tackle the challenge of hosting an "Oscar Party," in February of 2002.
End of part 2
No comments:
Post a Comment