Cowabunga
15/11/23 15:28 Filed in: Work
Illustrations I created for our Social Team for Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Mutant Mayhem. Due to timing I didn’t get to finish it exactly as I wanted, but I went back and added some of scuffs, marks and embellishments respective to each turtles pizza box to post them for my own enjoyment. Original post is on @tmnt and @tmntmovie
Clio Award Winner???!!!
12/11/23 14:50 Filed in: Work
Ha! I attended the Clios Entertainment Awards last Thursday night and had no idea a project I lent a hand on earlier this year won Bronze in its category. Our Paramount+ Social Team asked if I could do a sketch of an NFT style character (goat with a bong). I channeled "The Dude" for this one.
Appreciate the opportunity to let me be a small part of this and congrats to the rest of the crew for a cool series of posts for Rabbit/Hole. Final image along with the full set designed by the social team and my original submitted sketch.
Appreciate the opportunity to let me be a small part of this and congrats to the rest of the crew for a cool series of posts for Rabbit/Hole. Final image along with the full set designed by the social team and my original submitted sketch.
Practice, Practice, Practice...
11/11/22 12:28 Filed in: Personal
Practice, Practice, Practice...
11/11/22 10:52 Filed in: Personal
Happy Halloween 2022
31/10/22 14:04 Filed in: Personal
Happy Halloween Everyone! Enjoy a safe and fun evening of treats, fun and frights!
Inktober Redux 2022 - Day ?! - Toshiro Mifune, Star Wars
22/10/22 10:02 Filed in: Personal | inktober redux 2022
Inktober Redux 2022
Day ?! - ok , I fell behind, but we’re back with this series which I think I’m going to continue to push forward either way as I’ve been really enjoying it. Having said that…STAR WARS 1977…It’s well known that George Lucas was a fan of Akira Kurosawa’s work and fashioned the SW universe and characters off many of Kurosawa’s films, especially 1958’s The Hidden Fortress, which starred Toshiro Mifune as General Makabe Rokurōta. When casting Star Wars, Lucas approached Mifune and offered him the role of Jedi Master Obi Wan Kenobi. Mifune turned down the role as he felt the it would lessen his legacy and pride in his Samurai roles and films, since many of the sci fi films of the era looked cheap in production value. Kudos to Lucas for thinking outside the box in casting a major role with a person of color, and while understanding the reasons Mifune declined, imagine the impact and legacy of an actor of Mifune’s stature could have had for not just Japanese but Asian children in general in such an iconic role.
Day ?! - ok , I fell behind, but we’re back with this series which I think I’m going to continue to push forward either way as I’ve been really enjoying it. Having said that…STAR WARS 1977…It’s well known that George Lucas was a fan of Akira Kurosawa’s work and fashioned the SW universe and characters off many of Kurosawa’s films, especially 1958’s The Hidden Fortress, which starred Toshiro Mifune as General Makabe Rokurōta. When casting Star Wars, Lucas approached Mifune and offered him the role of Jedi Master Obi Wan Kenobi. Mifune turned down the role as he felt the it would lessen his legacy and pride in his Samurai roles and films, since many of the sci fi films of the era looked cheap in production value. Kudos to Lucas for thinking outside the box in casting a major role with a person of color, and while understanding the reasons Mifune declined, imagine the impact and legacy of an actor of Mifune’s stature could have had for not just Japanese but Asian children in general in such an iconic role.
Inktober Redux 2022 - Day 17 - Dorothy Dandridge, Cleopatra
17/10/22 18:45 Filed in: Personal | inktober redux 2022
Day 17 - “Cleopatra” - Elizabeth Taylor starred in the epic, grandiose and vastly expensive 1963 historical film. Cleopatra, was not Egyptian, but Macedonian, so not black, but definitely a person of color. Scholars identify Cleopatra as having been essentially of Greek ancestry with Persian and Sogdian Iranian ancestry, based on the fact that her Macedonian Greek family (the Ptolemaic dynasty) had intermarried with the Seleucid dynasty. The film originally was to be directed by Rouben Mamoulian. His initial choice to play Cleopatra was Dorothy Dandridge, whom he had worked with on Porgy and Bess. Dandridge replied, "You won't have the guts to go through with this... They are going to talk you out of it.” The role ended up going to Taylor and Mammoulian was replaced by Mankiewicz after filming started. The WHAT IF here would have been fascinating if Mammoulian did have the guts to cast Dandridge and what the impact would have been if this film had been released with Dandridge in the leading role playing opposite Richard Burton’s Marc Antony and Rex Harris Julius Caesar. It went not to become a box office smash though not able to recuperate its production costs and earned 4 of the 5 Oscars it was nominated for. The film, for all it decadent faults, still continues to warrant film discussion and influence fashion to this day.
Inktober Redux 2022 - Day 14 - Sibongile Mlambo, Chataya
14/10/22 23:46 Filed in: Personal | inktober redux 2022
Day 14 - “Game of Thrones” Often times, backlash against casting POC in fictional roles comes with the ridiculous argument of “that’s not true to the :::insert original media here::: However, where’s the same wringing of hands from those same folks when the opposite is true? That’s when that argument starts to show it’s girdle and you realize that this is not about notions of keeping “purity” (again an odd world choice) with the original source material, especially concerning fiction. Case in point, the books from A Song of Ice and Fire featured a character names Chataya. Chataya is the owner of an upscale whorehouse in King's Landing. Chataya described int he books is a tall, black woman with sandalwood eyes, from the Summer Isles. She ends up being a confident and spy to both Tyrion and Varys becoming integral to the plot involving Robert Baratheon’s numerous bastards. In the show her role was remixed to have Peter Baelish run the brothels in KIng’s Landing and her role was cut and then replaced with a new character name Ros (played by Esme Bianco). WHAT IF show runners had decided to cast the role? Sibongile Mlambo a Zimbabwean actress would have been perfect for the role as the commanding beauty with deep knowledge of the court and its secrets. She’s best known for starring in Netflix’s Lost in Space, and the Starz historical adventure series Black Sails.
Inktober Redux 2022 - Day 12 - James Shigeta, A Majority of One
12/10/22 22:25 Filed in: Personal | inktober redux 2022
Day 12 - “A Majority of One” - 1961 is a romantic comedy about a Japanese businessman and widower (Alec Guinness), and a Brooklyn widow played by Rosalind Russell, who share a bond over lives, their families, and their faiths, which develops into a romance. Alec played the role in yellow-face with latex prosthetics to appear Japanese. George Takei, recalls that while playing a minor role in A Majority of One, he was "shocked" at the "grotesquely offensive" latex make-up applied to Guinness's eyes. The film is still considered a warm film filled with humor and a message of tolerance and compassion that remains relevant today. WHAT IF the role were handled by James Shigeta? Shigeta was an American actor noted for his roles in The Crimson Kimono (1959), Flower Drum Song (1961), Bridge to the Sun (1961), Die Hard (1988), and Mulan (1998). He even won the Golden Globe Award in 1960 for Most Promising Newcomer. Shigeta often played romantic male lead roles, which were almost nonexistent for an actor of Asian descent during his time. It seems like a shoe in that he could have easily been cast in a role in a film that dealt with inter racial marriage and this film would probably be held in higher light in cinematic history.
Inktober Redux 2022 - Day 10 - Idris Elba, 007
11/10/22 15:31 Filed in: Personal | inktober redux 2022
Day 10 - whoops, a day late! - “007” - Idris Elba has gone on the record to say that he’d wouldn’t take on the role of Bond now due to several factors, one of them being his age and the commitment needed to tackle the role which could take 10 - 12 years of his life. Having said that, if there was a role that would benefit conversations about diversifying casting, the idea of him being the first Black Bond would be a strong argument for more. While producers figure out who will carry the mantle of 007 after Craig (perhaps a woman?), here’s to the WHAT IF scenario if 15-20 years ago filmmakers reached out to one absolute badass of an actor and cool icons of modern cinema to take on the Walther PPK and tuxedo.
Inktober Redux 2022 - Day 09 - Irrfan Khan, Captain Nemo
09/10/22 23:40 Filed in: Personal | inktober redux 2022
Day 9 - “20,000 Leagues Under the Sea”, Jules Verne's 1870 classic has had about dozens of film and tv adaptations over the years. The character of Captain Nemo, identified as an Indian name Prince Dakkar, was also featured in Verne’s other classic, The Mysterious Island (1875). Nemo enters his nautical exile after his homeland is conquered and family slaughtered by a powerful imperialist nation (England). Most of the adaptations where the character was in a prominent role were usually portrayed by a non Indian actor; most famously by James Mason in Disney’s classic version. Disney+ is currently in the works of a television show focusing on the origin story of Nemo, to be played by Shazad Latif. My WHAT IF today would have been a big budget spectacle/character study possibly directed by Denis Villeneuve with the late but great Irrfan Khan, from films The Warrior, Life of Pi and Slumdog Millionaire, as the undersea scientist/explorer.
