There is more to Crispin Hellion Glover than just his association with a movie classic like ‘Back to the Future.’
Sure, he played Michael J. Fox’s father, George McFly in one of the most loved and well respected movies of our generation, but that is just one layer of the man.
He is also a writer, musician, an all around gifted actor, and a filmmaker.
In town at Dallas's Texas Theatre in Oak Cliff, Mr. Glover participated last night in night one of a two night event called ‘Crispin Hellion Glover’s Big Slide Show.’
What this is is a presentation unlike anything I have seen before.
Mr. Glover has created, or more accurately, re worked a series of books. The best way I can describe this, is that taking books that were written in earlier time periods like the 1900’s, he has altered them to become original avant garde works of art.
An example is a text book on concrete inspection. He has altered the wording and the pictures of said book to make it an original story all its own. He’s also done it with a book on rat catching, as well as other tomes.
The result is something interesting and sometimes humorous.
He then, in turn reads/performs excerpts from these books while slides from them are projected behind him for the audience to see.
It’s a unique thing to experience. I found myself cocking my head at some of the content and raising a quizzical eyebrow, but overall enjoying what I saw/heard.
Mr. Glover delivers the content with such passion and zest that you cannot help but enjoy the experience.
(The books are also available to purchase from Mr. Glover as well. It is the only place you can acquire them unless you go to Ebay. I have seen a few there being offered by collectors and they were marked up considerably high. He does also sell them on his website www.crispinglover.com.)
When this presentation was finished, Mr. Glover presented one of the two films he has directed and financed through his company called ‘Volcanic Eruptions.’
The film shown last night was called ‘It is Fine. Everything is Fine!’
The film is actually part two of a trilogy of films Mr. Glover has been working on.
(The first is called ‘What is it?’ and will be shown tonight at the Texas Theatre for part two of his travelling tour. He will also perform the slide show again, but read from different books.)
‘It is Fine. Everything is Fine!’ is the story of a Paul. He’s a man crippled with Cerebral Palsy, who is locked away in a nursing home.
When we meet him in the film’s opening, he has fallen out of his wheelchair, and is lying on the floor of the home.
As he’s picked up by an orderly, his mind flashes to an inner fantasy where he is the object of desire to a cacophony of women admirers.
He unleashes his inner self as he picks up one after another, has his way with them, and systematically kills them.
The film’s screenplay was written by a man named Stephen C. Stewart, and according to Mr. Glover, is partially autobiographical.
Mr. Stewart, (who died shortly after the film was completed,) really was stricken with CP. He was locked away in a nursing home in his twenties, shortly after his mother died.
In the film, he speaks his dialogue, but his affliction is so bad, he is impossible to understand. The women he meets have no trouble with this, but as the audience, it is difficult to settle in with a main character that can’t be understood.
In the question and answer period after the film, Mr. Glover talked about this and that he purposely didn’t put subtitles in the film to aid in Mr. Stewart’s dialogue. He said that the film is Mr. Stewart’s fantasy, and to put subtitles under him would take away from his character’s experiencing of it.
The sets in the movie are very bright and surreal. To me, the bigness and the placement of them for some reason reminded me of the Patty Duke movie ‘Valley of the Dolls.’
They do aid in the ethereal feeling of the film and the experience of it.
There are some graphic moments in the movie that are hard to watch as Paul lives out his sex/kill fantasy, but all in all the film has a feeling of intelligence behind it that puts it in a category of its own.
Mr. Glover explained that the film was an attempt to show that handicapped people are people just like anyone else, and can also be people with dark thoughts as well. He said that Mr. Stewart wanted to show this, and also placed himself as the bad guy in the piece on purpose.
It is very interesting, and the end result does leave you thinking.
Mr. Glover said he’s been asked about putting this film and ‘What is it?’ out on DVD, but doesn’t do so because he feels that the live interaction between him and the audience when he tours in support of the movies is important.
It is nice to interact with the film maker and to ask him questions about movies that he feels so passionately about.
I talked with him about this interaction, and he said that he thinks that other filmmakers might follow in his footsteps with tours of their own, because it is sometimes hard to get smaller films out to an audience.
The Q and A session he had after the film was long, but an interesting thing to be a part of in its own right.
Glover was passionate about both films and entertained every question the audience had on the subject.
Alcohol is served at the theatre, and as the night progressed, one patron became drunk and rowdy. He interrupted the Q and A session, yelling at Mr. Glover and calling him names.
Mr. Glover never broke stride, verbally engaging the man and trying to engage his concerns.
After leaving the auditorium and returning one time to yell at Mr. Glover some more, the man was escorted from the theatre.
Mr. Glover took the incident good naturedly, and the show went on.
When the Q and A was over, Mr. Glover signed books for the audience, who got one on one time with him at a table.
I asked him what his initial spark was that set him down the road to making his own films. He told me that he’s actually always done so, first making movies as a boy on Super 8 film.
In person, Mr. Glover is quiet, somewhat reserved and incredibly gracious. As a genuine fan, it was great to meet him.
The overall experience of the show is a long one, but I came away from it feeling like I’d met an intelligent, bright and expressive man with a creative mind, and a lot of artistic energy, who genuinely cares about his projects and about his fans.
If you can make it tonight’s part two of the event, I would suggest doing so. It is something that shouldn’t be missed.
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