ISSUE NO. 76 August 1992 ________ ISSN 0791-3966 RAMSEY CAMPBELL INTERVIEWED RAMSEY CAMPBELL INTERVIEW ^by Brendan Ryder page 13 THE TWILIGHT ZONE How to find your way around by Michael Cullen page 5 OUR SEMI-ANNUAL "MEGA" QUIZ It’s not just a quiz, it's the contents of page 11 MORPHING So how did Arnie turn into Michael Jackson? See on page 12 REGULAR FEATURES News 3 ISFA News 4 Letters 7 Meeting report 8 Movies 9 Videos 10 Book Reviews 15 Comics 18 Drabbles 19 PUBLISHED BY Wc welcome unsolicited manuscripts on the basis that the THE IRISH SCIENCE FICTION ISFA is poor, and if wc don’t actually pay contributors it ASSOCIATION doesn’t mean wc don’t appreciate them. So send us your news. Send us your opinions. Send us your doodles. Send 30, BEVERLY DOWNS us your shorts. But wash ’em first. KNOCKLYON ROAD Take that old dusty Royal out of the wardrobe and type it, TEMPLEOGUE, DUBLIN 16 if you can. If you can’t, well, it’s not the end of the world. FURTHER INFORMATION NOTE: OPINIONS EXPRESSED ARE NOT THOSE OF FROM THIS ADDRESS OR THE ISFA, EXCEPT WHERE STATED AS SUCH PHONE 934712 2 ISFA Newsletter August 1992 NEWS Crypt Creator Dies Wiliam M Gaines, publisher of Mad maga­ zine and the EC comics line which included Rings, No Strings Weird Science, Tales from the Crypt, and As part of the Galway Arts Festival which ran The Vault of Horror, died in Manhattan in from 15-26 July, the Canadian Theatre Sans June, at the age of 70. Fils (No Strings Theatre Company) per­ formed Lord of the Rings. The show featured more than 60 characters played by 12 pup­ In brief.. peteers, and played to an audience of more It is rumoured that Douglas Adams finished than 1,000. Mimes, glove puppets, and suit Mostly Harmless, the fifth Hitchhiker book, puppets, some as tall as 10 feet, were used on the plane to the Annual Booksellers As­ to recreate Tolkien's epic. This is the first of sociation convention in May. only two of these productions which the company will mount this year. Movie News Foundation Movie Due Spielberg Walks the Dinosaur The Foundation Trilogy by Isaac Asimov has This month sees the start of shooting on been sold to Tristar Pictures, who will make Steven Spielberg's Jurassic Park, based on one movie based on parts of the three Michael Crichton's novel about a theme books, with options for TV, video game, and park which features genetically-resurrected merchandising rights. dinosaurs who run amok a l& Westworld. Jeff Goldblum has replaced Richard Dreyfuss Leiber Finally Ties Knot has leading contender for the hero role. Fritz Leiber has finally married his compan­ ion of 20 years, Margo Skinner. The wedding In brief took place at San Francisco City Hall. Leiber The script of Predator vs Alien has been is 81, ten years older than his new bride. completed, and now needs a green light from director Walter Hill to go into develop­ BarkerVerse ment. Clive Barker is to create the BarkerVerse for Marvel Comics. He has recently produced a Anthony Hopkins will star in Francis Cop­ children's book for Harper Collins called The pola's Dracula, which is now set to arrive Thief of All Ways. here in early 1993. Inverted Comments "I am writing the script for Terminator 3, which I am calling The Final Battle, but I am running out of ideas. Please tell me how I can get in touch with James Cameron or other people who were involved in the Terminator films." - letter to Film Review magazine "i'm not by nature a fighter, I’m a lover. But my films have not so far reflected this. I want them to." -Jean-Claude Van Damme, who will next star with Rosanna Arquette in Pals, an action/romance/thriller sort of thing. August 1992 ISFA Newsletter 3 IS FA News ting £6, Junior (under 16) £6. Guest of Hon­ our Orson Scott Card. Other confirmed guests: Gill Aiderman, Graham Andrews, The Artists and Writers workshop on Tues­ Catherine Brophy, Diane Duane, Martin day, August 18, will feature a discussion Duffy, Nicholas Emmett, Katherine Kurtz, regarding future projects. ISFA members Scott McMillan, Anne McCaffrey, Peter Mor- who wish to work on an "Alien Lenscapes" wood, Geoff Ryman, Michael Scott, James slide story are also welcome to attend. We White. "Green" theme and a Tolkien celebra­ are offering free slide film for the first project. tion. Progress report 1 now available to members only. Membership etc available An ISFA/Dublin Filmmakers’ Club joint ven­ from ture: a celebration of Halloween on Satur­ 03, 30 Beverly Downs, Knocklyon Road, day, October 31, in the "Wonderful Barn", Templeogue, Dublin 16. Telephone 934712 Leixlip (used in the Vampire 2092 section of anytime. (Note: anyone wishing to help out "Alien Lenscapes"). Witches, Warlocks and on the organisation of the con ring the num­ Wizards costumes. Not a Halloween party, ber above anytime - it’s a big job!) although food and drink will be available, but a celebration of the true traditions of Halloween. If you’re going to Glasgow in the near future, don't forget to check out Alien War. For £3 for 15 minutes, you can September Meeting: experience the horror of being stalked the ISFA Pub Quiz. Questions will be set by by the Alien, or at least a fair replica of the winners of the previous quiz, who are one. The game started in April, and is set Robert Elliott and some other people. in a vault below the city's railway station. It was the subject of a feature in this Conventions month’s Time magazine, who reported that "fright intensifies with each step 03 - Octocon '92, 16-18 October, the Royal until, hearts racing, they stampede out Marine Hotel, Dun Laoghaire, Dublin. Regis­ of the darkness." tration (until Sept 1) Attending £13, Suppor­ Safety in Numbness: Some Increasingly familiar SF film cliches A spinning, flying thing is seen hurtling The thing/villain is impossible to defeat, towards its victim as if the camera was until the hero kicks him in the nuts (Cast perched on top of it (Dark Angel, War a Deadly Spell, etc) of the Roses, Evil Dead 2, Batman Returns, Crimewave) The hero turns on the television and sees nothing but death and destruction The camera zooms out on someone but [what, no game shows?] (Hardware, moves towards them, as seen first on Lawnmower Man) Roy Scheider in Jaws (at least once in just about every horror movie since then) The thing/villain, after a whole movie of great chases and evil doings and threats to Western civilisation, is killed by a gun In the first scene of the movie someone (Exorcist III, The First Power, etc etc) is being chased by a horrible creature, but it turns out to be (a) a dream, (b) a film the characters are watching (Day of The hero's girlfrlend\accomplice turns the Dead, Jack’s Back, Thriller etc etc) out to be one of them. v . ■ ' '■ : :' 4 ISFA Newsletter August 1992 about cancer and disability, one allows zom­ bies and chainsaw murders. Imagine, if you will, Alan Bleasdale, In 1959 the Vietnam War was still a well-kept the acclaimed playwright who gave secret. In America there was a general un­ us GBH and Boys from the Black­ ease about the threat from the Russians. stuff, giving an interview in The Many were demoralised by the launch of Face saying that he had just signed Sputnik in 1957. This was intensified by the a deal with Channel Four to do a shooting down of Gary Powers in the U2 spy 26-part series of half-hour dramas. plane, when for the first time Americans And that the basis of the series heard the president admit he had lied to them. would be science fiction. American television was controlled, in effect, Unlikely. Even more unlikely if Mi­ by the sponsors. They were large, conserva­ chael Grade said he planned to put tive-minded companies like General Elec­ the new series tric, Kraft, U S Steel, up against Eldo­ and Kimberly-Clark. If the sponsors rado on Wed­ didn't like the politi­ nesday cal content of a pro- evenings. gramme, or if it And it was just as un­ some how reflected likely back in 1959, badly on the pro­ when Rod Serling duct, they could pull did the equivalent. the plug. The Twilight Zone, The challenge for a from the beginning, conscientious writer was an idea larger in this climate was to than its execution. It still get across a is variously de­ message, to talk scribed now as about the way the corny, sentimental, country was going, predictable, wordy, about stupid and quaint. It is all people, crazy ideas, those things. But lost ideals, but the there is one facet make the sponsors which it had when think it was just an­ audiences saw it for other show. the first time, and So Rod Serling man­ which it retains aged to criticise today in re-runs. It is American involve­ what Serling in­ ment in Vietnam be­ tended, what audi­ fore most people ences responded to, and what has inspired knew there was any. Richard Matheson told several generations of writers since. America that sometimes America can be the The Twilight Zone is real. bad guy. In the guise of fantasy, Serling and the other writers put across more reality than they ever could have with "straight" drama.