Book of Mormon, Looking, Need for Speed, Techies vs. Mission

Theater - Conrad Susa, versatile composer, dies at 78 Mr. Susa was the first composer to be commissioned by the late Lotfi Mansouri to write a new work for the San Francisco Opera.
The Chronicle's best bets for holiday theater
'Book of Mormon' creators have a long history of bad taste
You Can Still Get 'Book Of Mormon' Tickets Via Lottery
SF Theater Lore - ...The goat cart that carries disabled Porgy in the original version of "Porgy and Bess" is nowhere to be seen or used in "The Gershwins' Porgy and Bess" showing at the Golden Gate Theatre. Porgy is still disabled, but uses a cane and has a very severe limp. 
Perhaps one reason for this change is the history of Porgy's goat in San Francisco. Garrett Graham recalls the 1954 run of "Porgy and Bess," at the Curran. Graham was then a student at Lowell High School, and prone - with a close pal - to practical joking. When the show opened here, "we cased the Curran, and every night, the goat was kept in the west side alley. The night we struck, we gave the goat a huge chunk of Ex-Lax. And right on cue, when the goat goes onstage, wonderful results occurred. They had to stop for five minutes to clean up the stage." - Leah Garchik, SF Chronicle

Movies/TV - The State of Film Production in San Francisco for 2014 - "...Things are definitely on the upswing. We are issuing more and more permits and have more and more shooting days every month," said Ms.(Susannah Greason) Robbins. Indeed, the number of shooting days in San Francisco has risen by 25% in the third quarter of this year alone, according recent San Francisco Film Commission statistics. Nine large budget productions have shot here over the past year and a half — like MTV's "The Real World," Woody Allen's "Blue Jasmine," and most recently, HBO's "Looking," and have brought a total of $2 million to the city in direct spending…." - fwd labs.com


VIDEO: Behind-the-Scenes of HBO's LOOKING, Starring Jonathan Groff - www.broadwayworld.com

  VIDEO: Watch Second Trailer for HBO's LOOKING, Starring Jonathan Groff (TV Content)

Heroines of Cinema: Reed Morano, The Next Big Thing in American Cinematography
- Cinematographer of HBO's "Looking"






Need For Speed – Trailer

  KiD CuDi To Star In Need For Speed Movie [VIDEO]


Tech - Google tries pop-up stores

Affordable Care Act/Covered California - Covered California hotline established to help consumers 

Find Help Near You You can get help in-person from certified enrollment counselors, certified agents and county service agencies.

The Artist's Health Insurance Resource Center. - Get Insured. Get Health Care. Get Creative. - Introducing The Actors Fund e-Learning Center

Only in San Francisco - Backlash by the Bay: Tech Riches Alter a City

New housing units in S.F. are filling up fast

Lisa Devlin

Good and Welfare - Lisa Devlin breathed her last Saturday the 16th, our friends and fellow workers were with her. Paula Jean made a blog to celebrate her life,  http://lisadevlin.blogspot.com

A memorial is planned on her birthday, Sunday January 12, 2014. More details later, but plan for the afternoon.

Watch the blog for details.

She worked at the Opera, Ballet, FM Productions, and on many films. Here's her IMDB page.

Mrs. Doubtfire (Full Screen)
James and the Giant Peach
Made In America
Class Action
Getting Even With Dad
Nash Bridges - The First Season
Hemingway & Gellhorn


 That's the Rotunda Building in Oakland on Frank H. Ogawa Plaza, it was an empty shell, Lisa and the crew painted and dressed the lowest level to be a police station.

SF Chronicle Obituary

Looking, Blue Jasmine, Need for Speed, Google Globes

Movies/TV - 'Looking,' new HBO show shot in S.F. - Peter Hartlaub

Q&A: HBO’s “Looking” creators Michael Lannan and Andrew Haigh

Cate Blanchett, Alec Baldwin in San Francisco: Making of Woody Allen's 'Blue Jasmine'

Hollywood Studios Facing Upheaval at Highest Levels
The New Need for Speed Trailer is Here
Film Society's foray into the new club scene

I found pictures of the 16th St. Oakland Train Station posted in 2013 which show some of our work on Hemingway and Gellhorn is still there. They are at this blog: http://virtuallynonexistent.blogspot.com Here's a letter from Hemingway, rediscovered in 2010, describing his rooms in the hotel: “In the fall of 1937 when I took up playwrighting, there weren’t any top floors to the hotel anymore. Nobody that was not crazy would go up there in a bombardment. But the two rooms where we lived were in what is called by artillerymen a dead angle. Any place else in the hotel could be hit and was. But unless the position of the batteries on Garabitas hill were changed; or unless they substituted howitzers for guns; rooms 112 and 113 could not be hit because of the position of three different houses across the street and across the square…"
Some more H&G links:
DTC Lighting and Grip Blog
Style in Film
Architectural Digest
Movie Insider
Tease
Trailer

Theater - A Conversation with Lucas Meachem -- San Francisco Opera's Barber of Seville
“Porgy and Bess” Adapts to Life Outside the Opera House
THE BOOK OF MORMON National Tour Announces Lottery Policy for San Francisco Run
The BEAUTIFUL Set: 3 Weeks in 2 Minutes

Art - Michael Goldman has his work "San Francisco Pictograms -sign prototypes" in the juried exhibition THIS WILL NEVER WORK at Southern Exposure 3030 20th St, San Francisco.

Tech - Giant Snow Globes by 32Ten

Check out the #winterwonderlab by @Android at Bryant Park #NYC @asallal @ojsallal @Smafa_1 pic.twitter.com/AbAGHI26x3
— MJ Al-Sallal ★ (@MjSallal) November 19, 2013

Google opens snow globe outlets in the Christmas season - Link to the video
Google Is Opening Interactive Holiday Pop-Up Shops That Have Huge Snow Globes You Can Play In
Google opens Winter Wonderlab pop-up shops showcasing latest gadgets

Jesse James's Snow Globe Video
Gaby's Video

PICTURES: Look Inside The New Google Showrooms That Will Challenge Apple's Stores
AMAZON'S BETAS WILL BE YOUR NEW FAVORITE SHOW TO HATEWATCH
'Betas' review: Clever tech sitcom tries too hard

More BatKid - Special Effects Contributed By 32TEN Studios Help Make-A-Wish Come True for 5-Year-Old 'BatKid'

Affordable Care Act - Americans Like Obamacare Where They Can Get It John Cassidy - NewYorker
California Encouraged by Health Plan Enrollment -NYTimes
Single-Payer Advocates: It Hurts To Say I Told You So
The U.S. Health Care System Is Terrible, In 1 Enraging Chart

Only in San Francisco - "Not since the late 19th century, when San Francisco and its environs dominated the state, has influence been so lopsidedly concentrated in just one region."
THE 'GREAT STATE' OF SAN FRANCISCO by Joel Kotkin