"Una Noche," a film by Lucy Mulloy Wins Top Honors at Tribeca!

“Una Noche,” a film by Lucy Mulloy about Cuban teens who dream of fleeing Havana for Miami, won the best actor prize, which was split between two of its leads, Dariel Arrechada and Javier Nuñez Florián; Ms. Mulloy was also named best new narrative director for the film, which additionally was cited for best cinematography in a narrative feature film. (As was reported earlier this week, Mr. Nuñez and another star of the film, Anailín de la Rúa de la Torre, disappeared as they were traveling from Cuba to the festival.)

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------
"The play's the thing wherein I'll catch the conscience of the king."

"The Combo"

(click to view)

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------
"The play's the thing wherein I'll catch the conscience of the king."

HOW A DIRECTING STUDENT BEGAN TO LEARN TO PUT THE HORSE BEFORE THE CART

AFTERTHOUGHT:  a few weeks ago a former NYU Directing Student of mine joined me/us at my School of Visual Arts - The Art of Connecting (with people) class. She was there to demonstrate an exercise with me for that class. But, here's what happened (summarized). 

NYU DIRECTING STUDENT

Oh, José I feel so stupid. 

.

Me

How come? 

.

NYU DIRECTING STUDENT

Because you taught us all this same stuff at NYU and I thought it only had to do with  ACTING or DIRECTING. 

.

Me

Well, yes, because if I had taught it this way at NYU they would have tried to get rid of me a lot sooner. 

.

NYU DIRECTING STUDENT

What do you mean? 

.

Me

I mean that all art has to do with human relations. The artist with themselves and their connection with their audience; the craft of acting has everything to do with a quality of connection between the performers and how that connection reflects the human condition of relationships, which in turn connects the performers with their audience.

Directing actors has everything to do with understanding this and being able to connect with actors about connecting with each other, in order to connect with the audience. 

.
This work of "Temenos 12 - The Art of Connecting with People" is about all that. We are putting the "horse before the cart,"  where it should be. 
.

NYU DIRECTING STUDENT

How do you mean? 

.

Me

That's a great question. People who learn about human connection for art purposes before they learn how vital the quality of face-to-face human connection is to our everyday lives are being shortchanged. 


In "art school" the only place that I've seen embrace this concept whole heartedly is at the School of Visual Arts, where I teach now. 

Also, the reason your sitting here now, and why so many of my NYU students loved our work together is because I was modeling this all the time. I was showing you all how to create an atmosphere that was conducive to excellent collaboration. While at the same time sharing with you all these vital principles. 
.

NYU DIRECTING STUDENT

That's right. 

.

Me

Since you were in "art school," of course, your focus was on making art. Here, I say, the focus is on mutual understanding between you and your fellow human beings. If one can do that, all good things will follow. 
.

NYU DIRECTING STUDENT

How is that?

Me

Because in order to understand anyone else, one has to understand the lens through which you view them. That is "you." 
.

NYU DIRECTING STUDENT

Oh, that's groovy. I want more. 

.

Visit: https://www.facebook.com/Temenos12

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------
"The play's the thing wherein I'll catch the conscience of the king."

THE BLUE ROAD SHOOT (2011)

BLUE ROAD is a film directed by Miguel Coyula, currently filming. This is a collection of TV clips that illustrates the events preceding the main story of this science fiction film. Writtten and Directed by Miguel Coyula. Second of a Trilogy that Begins with Red Cockroaches.

BLUE ROAD teaser trailer here:http://youtu.be/z7RNy1_MDZI


-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------
"The play's the thing wherein I'll catch the conscience of the king."

WE ARE ALL TRAYVON MARTIN

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------
We are all Trayvon Martin - José Angel Santana

GREAT INTERVIEW: ROBERT DOWNEY SR DIRECTOR WRITER

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------
"The play's the thing wherein I'll catch the conscience of the king."

THE SECRET: LISTENING DEEPLY TO YOUNG PEOPLE'S LIVES

CLICK IMAGE TO VIEW

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------
"The play's the thing wherein I'll catch the conscience of the king."

THE HISPANIC ORGANIZATION OF LATIN ACTORS (HOLA)

The Hispanic Organization of Latin Actors (HOLA), advocates for Latino performers since 1975, is having a special deal on its membership.

HOLA is an arts service and advocacy organization dedicated to expanding the presence of Hispanic artists in entertainment and media through the cultivation, education and recognition of emerging artists. HOLA strives for an accurate, informed and non-stereotyped portrayal of the full spectrum of Latino culture and heritage in all entertainment and media industries.

An annual HOLA membership is $125. For those who join now, new memberships will include the months of March, April, May and June for free. New memberships would end on June 30, 2013. That's 16 months for the price of 12.

For more information on HOLA, go to http://elblogdehola.blogspot.com/2012/02/all-about-hola-becoming-hola-member-or_21.html.
For some FAQs about HOLA, go tohttp://elblogdehola.blogspot.com/2012/02/why-join-hola-frequently-asked_21.html.

To become a member, call (212) 253-1015 or go tohttp://nycharities.org/app/hola/.

If you are not interested in becoming a member, but want to support HOLA’s mission, go tohttp://www.hellohola.org/fohola/fohola1.html.

El Blog de HOLA: All About HOLA (Becoming an HOLA member or a Friend of HOLA)

elblogdehola.blogspot.com

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------
"The play's the thing wherein I'll catch the conscience of the king."

"VIVA LA VIDA" (2 CELLOS)

No estamos solos... :|: We are not alone...

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------
"The play's the thing wherein I'll catch the conscience of the king."

AN ACTOR'S DIRECTOR - JOHN CASSAVETES

An Actor's Director: “He set the climate for an actor to feel free to give whatever, and if it didn’t work, it didn’t work.” -- Ben Gazzara about Director John Cassavetes

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------
"The play's the thing wherein I'll catch the conscience of the king."

BEN GAZZARA, "THE KILLING OF A CHINESE BOOKIE" ONE OF THE GREAT PERFORMANCES IN FILM OF ALL TIME

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------
"The play's the thing wherein I'll catch the conscience of the king."

MIGUEL COYULA'S "BLUE ROAD" TRAILER

Bravo!

Miguel Coyula's "Blue Road" trailer captures the spirit of our time as fact, fiction, fantasy, reality, questions about what is true and false converge and asks each of us to take responsibility for finding truth and not simply accepting the institutional story. 

I'm very happy to have been a part of this and to have worked with such a gifted filmmaker. José Angel Santana

Trailer with Marta Reiman, Jeff Pucillo, Theodore Bouloukos, Leila J. Babson, Yukiko Niigata, Nana Masuda, Skid Maher, José Angel Santana, Kenji Hayasaki, and James Burns.

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------
"The play's the thing wherein I'll catch the conscience of the king."

José Angel Santana :|: The Art of Connecting

T.J.PARSELL - PRISONER NO MORE

If you are anywhere near Croton Falls, NY this Saturday night at 7PM, this is important stuff. A truly unique, individual and courageous story. The article below is reprinted from lohud.com

In 1978, T.J. Parsell was 17, living in Michigan as a member of a family deeply mired in bad decisions. His father, grandfather, several uncles and his older brother had all been incarcerated at one time or another. Yet, even now, 35 years later, he’s not sure what spurred him to pick up a toy gun and pretend to rob a pretty girl at a photo booth — mostly, he says, as a way to get her attention. It was the wrong kind of attention: She handed over $53, which, Parsell says, he took and ran.

He was convicted of armed robbery and sentenced to Jackson State Prison, where the scared, skinny, nonviolent teen was immediately singled out. “On my first day there — the same day that my classmates were getting ready for the prom — a group of older inmates spiked my drink, lured me down to a cell and raped me,” he recounted in a 2006 Op-Ed piece for The New York Times.

It was a pattern of abuse that continued for nearly five years of incarceration. Along the way, Parsell was “sold” to an inmate who eventually ended up protecting his “fish,” came to terms with the fact that he was gay, fell in love with a fellow inmate and managed to complete high school behind bars.

Against all the odds, Parsell, who struggled with drugs and alcohol, graduated from college and had a successful 20-year career in the software industry. Now a third-year film student at the Kanbar Institute of Film & Television at NYU’s Tisch School of the Arts, Parsell will be at The Schoolhouse Theater in Croton Falls on Saturday to present three short films; two are based on his bestselling book, “Fish: A Memoir of a Boy in a Man’s Prison,” (Da Capo Press, 2007).

Although not quite ready for the Sundance Film Festival, Parsell was nonetheless thrilled to be in the company of Martin Scorcese and Helen Mirren last week at the National Board of Review’s annual film awards gala. “Not as a filmmaker, no,” he laughs. “As NYU. film students, we get to go to the screenings, and also to volunteer. I was a volunteer at the event.”

Still, his fledgling film career is a positive goal. “I am having a second childhood and run around with these young people,” he says. “But I have my moments; you know, you have these raging arguments with yourself, ‘should I be doing this?’ I am 51 and I figure if I don’t do it now...”

Parsell’s film is still a work in progress, but it’s as unflinching and candid as his book. He says the retelling is part of recovery, so much so that he speaks out all over the country; he served as as president of Stop Prisoner Rape (now known as Just Detention International) and has served as a consultant to the National Prison Rape Elimination Commission.

“I have a really amazing adult life; I feel very fortunate, exceptionally fortunate that I was able to get out,” he says. “On one level, I am a testament to the inherent ability of the troubled teen to be able to transcend his circumstances and become productive. I deserved to be punished, there was no question about that,” he continues. “And there are people who say, ‘you get what you deserve’; that if you don’t want to be raped, stay out of prison. But, you see a young kid going in there, and yes, he is troubled, but he doesn’t deserve that. I think that’s what I am trying to capture.”

“T.J. is an amazing person; what’s he’s done is to turn incredible hardship and injustice into advocacy to help keep others safe,” says Lovisa Stannow, executive direction for Just Detention International. “He’s been an exhaustless champion against prison rape and trying to ensure teenage offenders are placed in appropriate settings.”

Parsell actually filmed part of his film in Jackson State Prison, and scenes were shot in the the very cell where he was once incarcerated. “Shooting our film at Jackson Prison was actually empowering; for eight days, I owned the prison I was in,” he says. “I was low key about who I was, so when a guy from the prison said, ‘I am going to Google you tonight,’ I was a little nervous. The next day, he came back and said, “I Googled you, and I realized you are responsible for a lot of the rules we have in here. That was an incredible experience.”

The Prison Rape Elimination Act, signed in 2003, is part of the reason for those rule changes. Says Parsell, “in the last eight years, there’s not a correction department in this country that hasn’t been involved in the conversation; everyone has been engaged.”

Laying bare the story of what happened to him in prison was also emotional for his family, but Parsell says he prepared them all, and in a strange twist, it was their support that helped him move on with his project. “My parents, as any parents would be that lost sons, were filled with all kinds of questions, ‘what could they have done differently?’ and fueled by that, they got behind me. Simple awareness is curative,” Parsell says.

Parsell says that the constant retelling of his story and reliving the past is never easy, but necessary. “Activism is a way to take that stuff and change it into a vehicle for change.”

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------
"The play's the thing wherein I'll catch the conscience of the king."

CINDY CHEUNG IN "SPEAK UP CONNIE"

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------

"The play's the thing wherein I'll catch the conscience of the king."

WAITING ON OTHERS - EPISODE 1 - BRING YOUR A-GAME

http://www.waitingonothers.com/

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------
"The play's the thing wherein I'll catch the conscience of the king."

CHARLIE KAUFMAN BAFTA SCREENWRITER'S LECTURE

My friend Risa Bramon Garcia sent me this from here blog post "In the Company of Naked Wounds." I think it's important. Thank you Risa. 

TWO LINKS

http://guru.bafta.org/charlie-kaufman-screenwriters-lecture-video

http://bcove.me/e0ft4h8z

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------
"The play's the thing wherein I'll catch the conscience of the king."

KRISTINA NIKOLOVA - "FAITH, LOVE AND WHISKEY"

FACEBOOK

SCREENINGS DATE AND TIME

Faith, Love and Whiskey from Mollye Asher.

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------
"The play's the thing wherein I'll catch the conscience of the king."

DRAMA MANDALA

the Abe Polsky "Drama Mandala"

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------
"The play's the thing wherein I'll catch the conscience of the king."

THE RING OF TRUTH

Yesterday, January 5, 2012 I shared this with some friends and former students:

a beginning

Over the years my students have regularly encouraged me to write my teachings down and to share them with others. Recently, one student in particular more than any of the others. If ever there was a good time to begin, now is that time.

Since this work has always been collaborative for me, I really don't know how to do it alone. I'm going to share it with you now a "very very first draft" of the beginning of the story. Because, yes, I also don't know how to say anything outside of the story form.

Preface (rough draft):

As a student of Sanford Meisner at The Neighborhood Playhouse I received a most precious gift, a guiding belief in the great value of "a sense of truth." It was the standard to which Mr. Meisner and all his subordinate teachers and students were devoted. Each day we strove toward grasping this illusive term, I had never heard before, "a sense of truth." Over the course of two years of ceaseless practice and observation of countless exercises designed to hone one's "sense of truth," it was the standard to which the quality of all our work was always measured.

The question always, "How does the work at hand square with one's sense of truth?"

In time I came to realize it had a ring to it, a "ring of truth." One could best detect it in the sound of a person's inner emotional life. Visually, the best way to detect it was to determine, "is the person really doing something or are they pretending to do it?"

Nothing less than "the ring of truth" was ever acceptable to Mr. Meisner. Fortunately for his students, he had perfect pitch for the "ring of truth." One could always count on what seemed like his x-ray vision into each student's soul, usually by means of his extraordinary ear for emotional life and for his uncanny ability to detect the most miniscule diversion from "the reality of doing."

He was our tuning fork, by which, over time we each learned to tune our own instruments. 

Since then, this ethos has been the foundation for all my creative work.  Though I've often fallen short, due to my own limitations, I do not recall ever consciously compromising my sense of truth, in the work, for anything or any body.

William "Bill" Reilly and I shared these same artistic values.

(to be continued)

Syntax and punctuation are not my strong suit. Please forgive. This is my first rough draft.

Moving forward today (January 6), I came across a piece I've given my students for years:

The Ring of Truth 
by Vernon Howard adapted by José Angel Santana 

A Swiss shepherd girl was kidnapped by passing gypsies. As she was hustled away inside the wagon, she heard the ringing of the village bell. The sound became fainter and fainter as the wagon carried her away. But that bell's special tone made a permanent impression upon her mind.

Years later, as she grew up, the memory of that bell stirred a restless urge within. It made her weary of the gypsy life. she longed to return to her rightful home. So she broke away from the gypsy camp and began her search. She wandered from country to country, village to village, listening intensely for the special ring of that single bell. She heard many peals as she journeyed along, but she always detected a false ring, and so refused to be lured away.

Finally, while pausing by the roadside to rest, she heard a faintly familiar peal. She turned in its direction. The farther she walked the more swiftly she stepped. Something within her knew that she was hearing her village bell at last. And she followed it all the way home.

Likewise, the ring of truth is inside every person. And this is not something merely mystical or philosophical. It is a practical fact. If one learns to listen, if we refuse to be lured away by false sounds, we will find our way home. The ring of truth will always be recognized by the person who listens. And everyone has the capacity to listen and to follow.

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------
"The play's the thing wherein I'll catch the conscience of the king."

PERNELL WALKER INTERVIEW - "PARIAH"

http://focusfeatures.com/pariah

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------
"The play's the thing wherein I'll catch the conscience of the king."