TiPsters -

Sing Sing… playing in Toronto.

Sing Sing is not about the famous prison 30 miles north of Manhattan ; it is about the inmates who form a theatrical group within its walls. The star of the film is the story. The characters are real and engaging. If you go and see the movie, you must sit through the credits to understand the nature of what the film is about. You can research Sing Sing on Google if you want to know more about the prison itself.

I urge all micro-budget producers to go and see the film. The big reveal is how much emotion a good director with a good story can generate. Engage with the faces of the characters in the story; come to understand the human dynamic expressed. You’ll be entertained when you get inside the DNA of the story as it unfolds. You will come to understand that no stars are required to instill some humanity in your soul. The story is one man’s fantasy and another man’s reality. Believing in the make-believe is to believe in the reality of your own imagined life for which you are accountable for. .
If you understand what this means and you feel you want to experience it personally, go and see Sing Sing.

As a micro-budget content evaluator, I can tell you this: if I had read the script, I would have approved it for production because it reveals what a motion picture is all about—reading character on the surface, knowing that below the surface, the evil that lurks is not the evil which makes you vulnerable and creative. Enough said; it is worthy of your time. If you want to talk or write about it, I’d be pleased to engage you.

Sing Sing… is a song with lots of lyrics surrounded by the music of the incarcerated mind—believable and questionably forgivable. There's genius in this film if you are sensitive enough to understand it.

For those who don't know about Popeye the Sailor Man, read this small piece and you'll come to understand that real-life experiences bring greater success to the screen than a copy-and-paste mentality. Throughout my career, I have learned that adapting books to the screen is fine, but there's more to motion picture storytelling. The visual inspiring force challenges the director to bring their vision to the screen by employing today's technology. It's all about the heart and soul being moved by the storyteller's audience. Move the emotions of your audience, and you will forever have their support.

For those who don't know about Popeye the Sailor Man, read this small piece and you'll come to understand that real-life experiences bring greater success to the screen than a copy-and-paste mentality. Throughout my career, I have learned that adapting books to the screen is fine, but there's more to motion picture storytelling. The visual inspiring force challenges the director to bring their vision to the screen by employing today's technology. It's all about the heart and soul being moved by the storyteller's audience. Move the emotions of your audience, and you will forever have their support.

His real name was Frank "Rocky" Fiegel.
He was born in 1868 in Poland and, as a child, immigrated to the United States with his , who settled down in a small town in Illinois.
As a young man, Rocky went to sea. After a 20-year career as a sailor in the Merchant Marines, Fiegel retired. He was later hired by Wiebusch's Tavern in the city of Chester, Illinois as a ‘Bouncer’ to maintain order in the rowdy bar.
Rocky quickly developed a reputation for always being involved in fighting ( and usually winning). As a result, he had a deformed eye ("Pop-eye").
He also ‘always’ smoked his pipe, so he always spoke out of one side of his mouth. In his spare time as a Bouncer, Rocky would entertain the customers by regaling them with exciting stories of adventures he claimed to have had over his career as a sailor crossing the ‘Seven Seas.’
The creator of Popeye, Elzie Crisler Segar, grew up in Chester and, as a young man, met Rocky at the tavern and would sit for hours listening to the old sailor’s amazing ‘sea’ stories.’
Years later, Segar became a cartoonist and developed a comic strip called ‘Thimble Theater.’ He honored Fiegel by asking if he could model his new comic strip character, ‘Popeye the Sailor Man,’ after him. Naturally, Fiegel was flattered and agreed.
Segar claimed that ‘Olive Oyl,’ along with other characters, was also loosely based on an actual person. She was Dora Paskel, owner of a small grocery store in Chester. She apparently actually looked much like the Olive Oyl character in his comics.
He claimed she even dressed much the same way..
Through the years, Segar kept in touch with Rocky and always helped him with money; giving him a small percentage of what he earned from his ‘Popeye’ illustrations.
WHO didn't love the cartoons??? We watched them religiously... so funny, so moral... each story had a good ending... Wonder if kids these days even KNOW who Popeye is???
Who knew he was a real man??”