We had yet another fantastic evening with actor Ian Ogilvy, on Saturday 25th September, for Misty Moon Online events.
We were honoured that Ian wanted to do another one after his previous online evening at the beginning of August, to tell us his stories of his career in tv and film. From The Return of the Saint, The Witchfinder General, The Socerers, No Sex Please, We’re British, working with Boris Karloff, Peter Cushing and much much more. The questions came firing fast from fans in the audience and a queue built up quickly, which Ian loved answering directly.
We Co-hosted again with his friend and huge The Return of the Saint fan Mike Smith, who first met Ian when he was seven years old and has kept in touch ever since and possesses one of the original Saint cars.
As well as clips of Ian’s work put together by tech man Martin Rudman, Mike had his own contribution of clips, including a hilarious video that he filmed himself of Ian re-enacting the scene from the Alan Partridge tv series, when he visits the character Lynn mothers grave and plays the theme tune of The Return of the Saint!
Ian was immensely touched that his friend, the actress Jenny Hanley, joined us for the event to chat about her experiences of working with him and thrilled the audience too.
An event is always fun with Ian and we all had a great time! Even the infamous Hurdy Gurdy that Ian handmade himself crept in to make another appearance 😀

On Saturday 5th September, Misty Moon started our autumn season off with a fun evening online reminiscing about the filming of short comedy film ‘Ready For My Closeup’ 🎥

Actress Lynn Lowry chatted to us and the audience about her experiences of working on the film, alongside director Jason Read of Robo Films, script writer Michael Haberfelner and producer, Misty Moons very own Stuart Morriss.

Lynn loved the role as Meg Topplethwaite, relishing in the different characters, badly acted by this actress who was once well known for her B movies and now locked in her world of memories and resentment that those days are now gone. Lynn drew inspiration for the character from Gloria Swanson, who played Norma Desmond in the brilliant film Sunset Boulevard.

Lynn originally came up with the idea and script writer Michael Haberfelner adapted it for screen and talked us through the writing process. Michael also had a role in the film as Craig the delivery man, where he had to hide in our wardrobe for a while, as you do! 😁

Director Jason Read, described the process of creating the film, from editing, colour grading, directing the actors and scoring the whole film! (My favourite is the guitar score in the scene with  actor George Sweeney! ) Yes! Jason is a man of many talents and one with great patience! Whilst it was a intense weekend for us, having lots of people and equipment in our home (where it was filmed) Jason had to manage filming  in a fairly small space with hoards of stuff in every nook and cranny!

Talking of our home and hoards of stuff, we both couldn’t believe how messy our house looked! Did we make it look like that especially for the film? As we were once asked! “No”, we replied, “it always looks like that!” Ha! A busy life and too much hoarding created it! Nevertheless, lots of lovely memories were made there and we look back with fondness on our crazy colourful London home, forever immortalised on film ❤️

A successful crowd funding project also brought regular  Misty Mooners together in supporting the film and enjoyed watching it again online, including Alan Hoare, who played a zombie killer and Martin Rudman, who both chatted to the audience about their fun experiences 🧟‍♂️

Well, now that Misty Moon has been involved with eight films with Jason Read of Robo Films, it’s been a blast! Here’s to the next one some day!

Next Misty Moon online event will be Ian Ogilvy! Returning to Misty Moon on Saturday 26th September 🌙✨

https://us02web.zoom.us/webinar/register/WN_TJv3GhZjTNaN_s1zaegr4Q

Check out Misty Moon on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram for updates and links for tickets to events 🌙⭐️

It has been 7 years since actress Diane Franklin came to visit Misty Moon, at our Art Gallery in London during the summer of 2013, where she spent a week meeting fans, talking about her films and exploring London and trips out for english cream teas with us in the Kent countryside! Happy days indeed and lovely to reminisce!

On Saturday our ‘visit’ this time from Diane, was online to chat to us and her fans about her tv and film career. Diane being full of exuberance and fun, chatted readily about her experiences in acting, from commercials, which resulted in her regularly being recognised in the street, to tv and film, including Last American Virgin, (what a great soundtrack!) Second Time Lucky, Better Off Dead and Bill and Ted’s Excellent Adventure! Our tech help,  Martin Rudman chose some brilliant clips, including a role Diane played in ‘Murder She Wrote’, where she plays an outrageously obnoxious wealthy lady in a strop!

A deeper and darker discussion occurred about Diane’s role in Amityville 2: The Possession and the effect this film had on some of its viewers, including Mr Moon, who watched it as a teenager and was scared witless! I have seen it several times too and have to say the prosthetics in the film really do make it more terrifying than modern day CGI nowadays! The real life murders and continued events at the property where it happened, over the years have fascinated so many and have been recreated again and based on truer events in the form of The Amityville Murders, which Diane stars in and is available on Sky Store right now! Mr Moon and I watched this the other night and really enjoyed it. Definitely worth a watch if you enjoy a good horror! And yes, it did creep us up! We woke up in the middle of the night hearing a scraping sound coming from somewhere in our bedroom! Even our two cats Molly Mog and  Suzie Sue leapt off the bed to investigate and started growling  (yes, Suzie growls like a little dog!) But don’t panic (she says) it was only the window knocking in the wind (sigh of relief from all four of us, drama over and  back to bed) I think I’ll lay off the horror for a few days and watch some of Diane’s comedies!

Diane answered questions directly to her fans and there was a lot of love and warmth for her career. It was great for some of the regular Misty Mooners, such as Ian Crosdale, who met her the first time round, to be able to chat to her again. See the great photograph below of Ian, taken back in 2013, trying on the coat and hat Diane wore, as the character Monique Junet in the film Better Off Dead!

Diane’s autobiography is available signed via her website http://www.dianefranklin.com
I revisited this during the week and find it a really inspiring  positive read, no matter what your chosen career path is, especially during these times of uncertainty.

Overall in the words of Bill and Ted, Saturday was an excellent and most triumphant Misty Moon online event! Can’t wait for the next time! 🎬🎭

Next Misty Moon online event Saturday 5th September (British time) Screening of short film ‘Ready For My Close Up’ and interviews with horror actress Lynn Lowry, director Jason Read and producer Stuart Morriss 🎬🎭

https://us02web.zoom.us/webinar/register/WN_N4xwNPz0TMqo65n8KGezbw

Check out our Misty Moon Facebook, Twitter and Instagram pages for the link

During another balmy August Saturday afternoon, Misty Moon had yet another fun filled Bill Reunion, with actors from the show, Graham Cole OBE, who played PC Tony Stamp, Ashley Gunstock, (PC Robin Frank) and Victor Gallucci,  (DC  Tom Baker) The Bill’s longest running regular background artist, appearing in over a thousand episodes! Everyone got comfy for a few hours with their favourite tea, hot chocolate, jelly tots (the curators favourites) and a gin or two for me (well they don’t call me Gin Jen for nothing!😃🍸) with some of their favourite actors brought virtually into their own living room! 🍷☕️🍸

Despite a few gremlins in the system when we first started (well there’s a first time for everything 🧐🤔) it was quickly sorted by our tech extraordinaire Martin, and was a smooth ride from there on.

MC and Misty Moon curator, Stuart Morriss, started the proceedings with  Ashley Gunstock in the hot seat, which led to a revealing story regarding his on screen moustache!

Great stories followed of the excitement of onscreen car chases (Graham being a stunt  driver before his days on The Bill and being the main driver in the show) and the attention to detail and advice given directly by the police themselves, which added to the realism portrayed, plus lots of location secrets.

We heard from the actors of their fascinating careers before and after the Bill, including time in many theatre productions, Ashley’s directing and Victor’s producing career and time working onset with the likes of Dustin Hoffman and Al Pacino, who I think the whole audience agreed, Vic  very much looked like  (see photo!😃)

Of course we had lots of lovely Bill fans, including the lady who runs The Billaton fan account on Twitter! Lovely to be finally able to put a face to the person who runs this fabulous account and thanks to her, for all her support for our Bill reunions 😃

It’s great to be able to catch up with some of our regular Misty Mooners too, especially during these strange times, when some feel quite lonely and isolated and to find out how everyone is coping in their different ways and discovered some are even back in lockdown.  As Misty Moon is online at the moment, we also get the pleasure of connecting to audience members in more far flung areas, who would normally struggle with travelling the distance to the venues we normally use, especially from abroad!

Our next Misty Moon online event will be this Saturday 29th August with Diane Franklin to chat to us about her career on films such as, Amityville 2, Bill and Ted’s Excellent Adventures, Last American Virgin and her autobiography ‘The Excellent Adventures of The Last American, French-Exchange Babe of the 80s’.

Hippy Happy Birthday to The Misty Moon Film Society…….we are 8 years old today. What a long way we have come from our humble beginning as a small art and craft fair in our local church hall. Thank you to everyone involved with Misty Moon and to everyone who has ever been to one of our gigs, exhibitions or events. Here’s to many, many more Misty Moons and Happy Halloween…….

The Misty Moon Film Society’s Autumn Season gets well and truly underway when everyone’s favourite comedy duo Trevor and Simon come and swing their pants @ The Phoenix Artist Club on Wednesday the 7th September.  Chaired by Misty Moon’s MC Chris Collins this is going to be a night of hilarity and one definitely not to miss. Doors 7pm Gig: 7.30pm

Tickets available on the door or in advance at https://www.ticketsource.co.uk/event/EGDLHD

The Curator Will Show You Around Now……..Happy Friday the 13th from The Misty Moon Film Society.  Photograph taken by John Chase Photography

A Bloody Brilliant Night @ FlatPlanet For The Misty Moon Film Society’s An Evening With John Altman. John was fabulous and Our Outrageous Chris Collins Rocked The House. Here Is A Very Special Message From John