Hello Madrid!

ON'D has left the Jersey Shore. We had a packed outdoor screening where John Waters was in attendance. Curious neighbors watched from their windows as the Captain's farts made the debut en español. The Rizoma Festival is small, truly independent and insanely fun. Here I am with director Dylan Mendoza O'Neil, talking about the festival, the food and the wine.


Here (below) you see (left to right) director Ari Gold who screened his film "Adventures of Power" at the festival, with Gabriela Marti, the founder of Rizoma Festival, Sir John Waters, Dylan, and Tosso Hettinger, composer for ON'D.


We had many amazing meals. On the day of our screening, I got an email inviting us to lunch with John Waters, Pedro Almodovar, and Spanish TV and music stars Alaska and Mario.




Oh, Big Blast, show me a sign... all over Madrid, there were mannequins hanging out.

Must be some sort of mistake???

RE: 9550-UNF- Otis N' Dwayne

Dear Anne,

On behalf of our Programming staff, I would like to thank you for submitting your film to the 2010 Sundance Film Festival. Unfortunately, we are not able to include it in our program this year. We received a record 9,800 submissions this year, and many tough decisions had to be made in order to narrow the field down to under 200 films. Please know that your work was carefully considered by our team, and we viewed far more worthy films than we had room for in the program. I sincerely hope that this decision does not discourage you in any way. We wish you the best of luck with your film, and we look forward to having the opportunity to view your work in the future.

Sincerely,

John Cooper

Director, Sundance Film Festival

more chocolate love

Applying to film festivals is a bit like standing naked in front of a bunch of blind people - you feel really nervous, excited and vulnerable about putting yourself out there, yet you hope and pray that someone will notice you. Needless to say, we are standing naked right now. This has me feeling anxious and requiring constant comforting in the form of delicious treats. Here are two of the most insanely awesome chocolate concoctions you can buy, both of which I discovered only recently so I hope to have many weeks left before I overdo it and get sick of them and never want to see them again.

This blend of rich, almost dark, milk chocolate, bacon and smoked salt is heaven in a bar. Mo's Bacon Bar is not a cheap chocolate bar but in the grand scheme of things, it does not cost a lot of money and provides much pleasure. I don't know what the chef was smoking when she came up with this one, but me likey!



Ciao Bella makes some of the best gelato this side of the Atlantic - just leave it out to soften a bit before you indulge... This chocolate jalapeno combo has my name written all over it. At first it is all innocent. But veiled in delicious chocolate is a spicy after kick in the ass. Hells yea!