The Dumb Are Mostly Intrigued By The Drum

UPDATE: Sorry for the confusion! The date was previously listed as Oct. 6th and it should have been Oct. 8th at 6pm. For this oversight, everyone reading this is allowed to punch Bryan Harley in the face repeatedly (even though it was my fault. We're a team like that). So adjust your schedules accordingly. And sorry if you already made plans with the babysitter.

You've you've might have listened to our podcast, The DUmb. Well, have you ever listened to the podcast and wondered "Man, I'd really like to see what these fat, ugly bastards look like. Nothing could be more visually stimulating than that! They should go a vidcast (or vodcast, depending on who you talk to)!" Well wonder no more. Next week, October 8th at 6pm, we will be streaming our podcast live over at Late Update. Our special guest for that podcast will be Fresno Film Commissioner Ray Arthur so join us as we talk about all things film & Fresno and I'm sure Ray will kick down some entertaining Hollywood stories. The plan is to be able to have live chats as well as possibly take phone calls from listeners for this one but we're still working out all the kinks on that. We'll keep you guys posted here on The Dumb Drum and you can always hit up Late Update as well. Bookmark this link as this is where you'll need to be next Wednesday at 6pm in order to see this epic Fresno event. Hope some of you can make it to our event which will, undoubtedly be riddled with technical problems as well as possibly less cuss words than usual since we're having a legitimate guest on our roll call.....but no guarantee!

Nothing makes me happier than to hear of local productions (well, there are some things but we won't go into that here) and earlier this week as I was surfing the internetz, I came across this little story of info over at Late Update. Seems like Center for Multicultural Cooperation (in collabo with Zero Divide) have helped students make their very own 30 minute documentary called Common Ground, which details the lives of three Valley families who migrated here and have created new lives for themselves while working in the ag industry. The families (whom come from Hispanic, Hmong and African-American backgrounds) were followed and interviewed by the students. And if you head down to the FREE screening of the film this Thursday, July 24th at 7pm, said students will be on hand to discuss the making of the film. All I know is that I wish these kinda of programs were around when I was a kid. All I had was Bookit and Troll book orders. Hope to see you guys out there!

Lateupdate.com reported a while back on the Carissa Project, a redevelopment program for Fresno's prostitution haven known as Motel Row (you can check out the full story here) spearheaded by Carissa Phelps. Well besides getting national media attention, a documentary named simply Carissa was filmed here in town which follows the life of Phelps as she tells her story of growing up as a prostitute after her mother abandoned her all the way to what lead her to change her life around and decide to make sure that others wouldn't have to follow her path. This weekend, the film, directed by David Sauvage, will be screened at the 2008 Fresno Filmworks Fresno Film Festival on Sunday at 2pm. Although the filmmakers aren't from around here, I would count this as a local film in my book and we need to support these kind of projects. There are a million stories here and they all need people to step up and tell them. Check out the official Web Site for the film here for more information and check out the trailer embedded above to catch a glimpse of the inspirational story. Below this is a story coming from PEHub.com and gives us even more footage of the film. Definitely don't want to miss this one.

Two podcasts in one week?! Crazy, yeah. But we're here to provide you with solid entertainment, right? This week we have special-special guests to help carry the topics:

• Bryan Harley - writer/director/creator of AMF Productions
• Adrian Rodriguez - publisher of lateupdate.com
• Robert Anaforian - writer, The Dumb/creator, onepicturesworth.com

This edition's topics include all things film, summer movies, the Academy Awards, the future of movie theaters, digital distribution and we offer free technical support for our friends over at Fresno Famous. BTW, swing by their site and don't forget to vote for us under the "Best Blog (or Blogger)" and "Best Podcast" categories. Voting ends this Sunday, Mar. 30th. Thanks for your vote!! Special shout out again to lateupdate.com for hosting our podcasts! They are currently starting a promo where you can win free Grizzlies tickets when you register at the site so check it out! Everyone likes free shit, right?

Download The DUmb here!

UPDATE: The podcast is now up on lateupdate.com and you can listen to it here or download the MP3 here!

Well, we still don't have on for this site but it is on my to do list but for the mean time, you can scope out lateupdate.com this weekend to hold you over until then. I was involved in recording a podcast this week for the local news site and it's done and ready to be released into the wild this weekend sometime. On it, you can catch:

• Adrian Rodriguez, founder/creator of "Late Update"

• John Rios, local artist & creator of "Dead Days"

• Aaron Wall, lead singer of local band "40 Watt Hype"

And of course, myself. We talk about various subjects......well, not really. Mainly just about Fresno and....yeah, that's pretty much it. Check it out and grab a little insight into the minds of some REAL Fresno creatives......and myself as the bumbling sidekick. So in the mean time, just stay home this weekend. Don't go out cause you'll probably just end up getting pepper sprayed by some trigger happy security guard anyways :) Keep checking out the site for the transmission!