STYX TAXI - a peek under the hood
Posted by StevenGoldman on Thursday, March 29 2007 at 1:38 pm
Happy Thursday, folks. I’ll be taking a week (possibly two) off as I get my next story for you together, a non-STYX tale I’m working on with Joe Bucco, an artist I worked with on EVERYMAN, a political thriller my brother Dan and I collaborated on back in 2004. If you’re making your way here for the first time, feel free to peruse any of the completed STYX TAXI stories on the right-hand sidebar under “Catch-Up Pages.”
In the meantime, I’d love to share a few works that have tickled my synapses over the years while I’ve worked on each of the STYX stories:
– AFTER LIFE (Wandâfuru raifu): Hirokazu Kore-eda’s slow, graceful film about a way station leading to the afterlife made me upset because its premise was so simple, so beautiful, that I wish I’d thought of it first. Each soul making their way to what lies beyond first submits to an interview process, wherein they deduce what was their best moment in life. Then a crew of filmmakers re-enact and film the moment for that person, allowing them to re-experience that moment one more time and leave this life as happy and content as possible.
– PRESERVATION HALL’S SONGS OF NEW ORLEANS: My fianceé and I were lucky to see these guys before Hurricane Katrina hit Nawlins. We sat on the floor in front of the front row and I almost was getting sweat on by the trumpet player, but it was worth it to see them solo up close. No rush, no egos, just great musicians bursting out in song, and then settling back to take in each other’s solos. I pulled the lyrics for “Please Don’t Talk About Me When I’m Gone” for the story “Encore for my Babies,” not just because they were wildly apropos, but because it’s such a catchy tune.
– NIGHT ON EARTH: STYX TAXI came out of my desire to write stories about a modern mythology, about how old ideas filter down into urban legends with their own truths. Charon moving from ferrying a boat on the river Styx to driving cab wasn’t a huge leap, but the melancholic feel of Jarmusch’s movie and the wild variety of stories he squeezes into a single film really set me on the path for the work I’d end up doing on this series. Roberto Begnini is typically priceless as a hapless Italian hack, and Winona Ryder was surprisingly good as the butch Corky.
– FLETCH: All right, so it’s not so much an influence as a shout-out. The movie version of Rosa’s beach novel was one of my favorites growing up, and I didn’t realize until rereading the novel while writing “Rosa” what a bastard the character really is. Twice divorced, has something like four mistresses during the course of the book, and manages to justify how much his editor hates him. Chevy Chase made him a lot more likeable, but I’m not sure I prefer him that way.
Category: Styx Taxi
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