Official Edgar Rice Burroughs Tribute and Weekly Webzine Site Since 1996 ~ Over 10,000 Web Pages in Archive Presents Volume 3949

Eclectica Archive

ECLECTICA v.2012.11

Eclectica Archive

EVENTS ~ FILM ~ ART ~ PUBLICATIONS ~ COLLECTIBLES ~ NEWS ~ ERBzine ARCHIVE ~ NOSTALGIA ~ ARTICLES ~ CARTOONS

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FROM ERB, INC.:  An All-New Full-Colour Weekly Tarzan Strip ARTIST Tom Grindberg ~ WRITER Roy Thomas Subscribe Now at the ERB, Inc. Corporate Site Read All About It HERE  www.erbzine.com/tarzan

Special Benefit Screening of  JOHN CARTER . . . of MARS

Reviews and Events:  JANE: The Woman Who Love Tarzan

More for ERB fans to celebrate: www.erbzine.com/mag40/4016.html

15 pop culture milestones marked in 2012
East Valley Tribune ~ October 27, 2012
The year 2012 marks significant anniversary milestones for several iconic pop culture characters and institutions. These fantastic figures and guilds of geekery have survived the test of time to become permanent fixtures in our society and their legacies continue to ripple across our collective cultural consciousness, certain to inspire generations to come – providing that the pending Mayan Apocalypse is an epic failure.

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15. Firefly — 10th Anniversary  | 14. Buffy the Vampire Slayer — 20th Anniversary | 13. Reservoir Dogs — 20th Anniversary | 12. Street Fighter — 25th Anniversary | 11. Poltergeist – 30th Anniversary | 10. E.T. the Extraterrestrial — 30th Anniversary | 9. Rambo — 30th Anniversary | 8. Judge Dredd — 35th Anniversary | 7. James Bond (Dr. No) — 50th Anniversary | 6. Spider-Man — 50th Anniversary 

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5. MAD Magazine — 60th Anniversary — First published in August 1952. The story of MAD magazine is one of the greatest anti-censorship tales in print history. When Bill Gaines, publisher of the infamous EC Comics horror books, was taken to task by the Congressional hearings on juvenile delinquency, he thumbed his nose at the establishment and created a magazine specifically designed to “to corrupt the minds of children.” MAD still remains one of the sharpest, smartest and wittiest print parody books in existence, routinely spoofing American politics, celebrities and popular culture.

4. The Hobbit — 75th Anniversary — First published in Sept. 21, 1937. This J. R. R. Tolkien classic has inspired untold legions of fantasy tales, including the author’s own Lord of the Rings trilogy. The beloved story of Bilbo Baggins’ epic adventures on the world of Middle-Earth is cherished by children and adults alike. It’s the only reading assignment I remember from high-school that I actually enjoyed and I can’t wait for the Peter Jackson film adaptation, The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey, the first of a three part film series, set to be released on December 14, 2012.

3. Conan the Barbarian — 80th Anniversary — First published in December 1932 in the Weird Tales pulp magazine story, The Phoenix on the Sword. “Hither came Conan, the Cimmerian, black-haired, sullen-eyed, sword in hand, a thief, a reaver, a slayer, with gigantic melancholies and gigantic mirth, to tread the jeweled thrones of the Earth under his sandaled feet.” Robert E. Howard’s barbarian was one of the first sword & sorcery heroes and Arnold Schwarzenegger’s portrayal of the surly Cimmerian launched his movie career (in 1982’s Conan the Barbarian – a film celebrating its 30th Anniversary this year.) I think it’s safe to say that if you connect the dots and trace the history back, without Conan, Schwarzenegger would never have become Governor of California. And then where would we be? Now that he’s retired from his political post, it looks like Arnold may be picking up the broadsword once again as King Conan. [Fingers-crossed!]

2. Tarzan — 100th Anniversary — First published in the The All-Story pulp magazine in October 1912. Tarzan of the Apes, the Mangani tribe to be exact, has been thrilling adventure fans in magazines, books, comics, movies and television shows for one-hundred years.

He’s the creation of pulp author Edgar Rice Burroughs, and the man raised by apes is one of the most legendary and enduring characters in all of popular culture.

There is a German animated version of this timeless story in the works and author Robin Maxwell has just recently published the book Jane,  a look at the jungle man’s tale as told from his romantic partner’s viewpoint.
 

1. John Carter — 100th Anniversary — Edgar Rice Burroughs published his first John Carter story in the pulp magazine The All-Story in February 1912 as the story, Under the Moons of Mars. John Carter of Mars is the grand-daddy of almost every science-fiction adventure saga of the past century. Everything from Superman to Star Trek to Avatar has been influenced by the Carter stories of Mars. Untold numbers of real-life authors and artists have been inspired by John Carter and prominent Americans from the scientist Carl Sagan to President Ronald Reagan are fans of the John Carter stories.

The 2012 movie has been widely panned for its failure at the box-office, but not necessarily for the content of the film (which in my opinion is incredible.)

Some have even criticized the film as a rip-off of Star Wars. No, no, no my friends – George Lucas has admitted to being heavily influenced by the John Carter stories of a hundred years ago. So if you haven’t given the John Carter books or the movie a try yet, you’re missing out on one of the greatest tales ever told.

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David Yates Commits To Tarzan Remake,
Eyes Henry Cavill And More For Lead
Cinema Blend ~ Bleeding Cool ~ IMDB News ~  November 7, 2012
There's been talk for a while now of the return of Tarzan, the Edgar Rice Burroughs character who has been depicted around 89 times on screen already. Twilight's Kellan Lutz is at work on his own 3D motion-capture version, and Warner Bros. has been developing their take for a while now, at one point attaching Hustle & Flow and Footloose director Craig Brewer, who spoke frequently in interviews about his passion for the project.

But word broke not long ago that Warner Bros. wanted to hand the project off to one of their most loyal blockbuster-makers instead, and now the news seems to be official. Vulture reports that David Yates, who made the final four Harry Potter films for the studio, has committed to Tarzan as his next project, and is already meeting with several actors who might play the title character. Actors you might eventually see swinging through the trees include future Superman Henry Cavill, Pacific Rim star Charlie Hunnam, True Blood's Alexander Skarsgard, or even Bane himself, Tom Hardy-- though Vulture notes that it's unclear how interested he'd be in the part.

Given that the last major on-screen take on Tarzan was Disney's 1999 animated version, it's hard to even know how they're going to update Tarzan for modern audiences. Even if they set the movie far in the past, in some exotic African jungle or whatever, the idea of a man raised by apes and living in the jungle is a little hard to swallow these days. Casting a strong actor like Hardy could definitely go a long way to selling it, and Warner Bros. seems right to trust Yates, who jumped in and gave the end of the Harry Potter series a clear identity without mucking around too much with J.K. Rowling's original stories. But given the recent flop of John Carter, we've seen how Burroughs's iconic character don't necessarily translate into modern blockbusters. Can Tarzan gather up the goods to overcome that?

Johnny Weissmuller:  Popular film Tarzan from the '30s


Undated picture of US swimmer Johnny Weissmuller diving in the swimming pool of the French ocean liner Normandie.
Johnny Weissmuller was one of the world's best swimmers in the 1920s,
winning five Olympic gold medals and one bronze medal.
He won fifty-two US National Championships and set sixty-seven world records.
After his swimming career, he became the sixth actor to portray Tarzan in films,
a role he played in twelve motion pictures.

 

Edgar Rice Burroughs: Film Producer
Burroughs Tarzan Pictures, Inc.
More Posters and Lobby Cards

TUNDRA | SANTA FE POSTERS/CARDS click New Adventures of Tarzan | Tarzan and the Green Goddess  Drag-Net | Phantom of Santa Fe | Tundra | Young Eagles Three Wise Monks www.erbzine.com/mag2/0287.html Lobby Display ERB Movie Guide Glass theatre promo slide for The Land That Time Forgot

Christopher Lambert Greystoke: The Legend of Tarzan, Lord of the Apes www.ERBzine.com/movies

Mike Hoffman's Ghost of the Princess of Mars More Mike Hoffman Barsoom Art: HERE and see eBay

John Carter, Flash Gordon and Tarzan  by Neal Adams ~ ERBzine Art Encyclopedia

Suzan Crowley Facebook

Amazon Purchase

Robin and Suzan: Performance at Tarzana

www.erbzine.com/mag/ez121005.html	www.erbzine.com/mag/ez121012.html
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www.erbzine.com/mag/ez121019.html	www.erbzine.com/mag/ez121026.html

Edgar Rice Burroughs November Calendar www.erbzine.com/mag5/0571.html Important dates in the life of ERB

Our Annual Hallowe'en Scare WAR OF THE WORLDS Script | Novel | Radio

ERB artist, J. Allen St. John ERBzine Art Galleries

Hallowe'en Feature Scary film posters through the years

Denny Miller: Actor | Writer | Fitness Guru ERBzine Features: Film ~ Tribute

ERB's Remarkable Summer of 1893 Columbian Expo: Events ~ Stereoviews ~ Photos

Lee Chase: Burroughs Family Photos in ERBzine Lee I | Lee II | Caryl Lee | Florence

Edgar Rice Burroughs: A Life in Pictures Bio Time in ERBzine

U. of Louisville Special Collections Dept.  Honors Tarzan's Centennial Sunday,  October 28, 2012 ~ Eckstrom Library WHAS-TV Interviews: George McWhorter | Denny Miller | Scott Tracy Griffin

GEORGE T. McWHORTER University of Louisville A ROSTER OF REMINISCENCES ERB Memorial Collection Virtual Tour www.ERBzine.com/mcwhorter

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'John Carter' Was Proof That Disney Needed 'Star Wars'
The Telegraph ~ Nov. 1, 2012
A NEW STAR WARS IS COMING IN 2015
George Lucas Explains What's In Store For The Next Star Wars Movie. First Pixar, then Marvel and now Lucasfilm - entertainment giant Disney has a hunger for franchises in search for the next box-office hit. George Lucas was not being completely serious when he said on Tuesday night that Walt Disney would be his retirement fund. It is true that the creator of the Star Wars films is now one of Disney’s largest shareholders after agreeing this week to sell his company, Lucasfilm, to Disney for $4.05bn (£2.5bn) . But besides 40m Disney shares, the legendary director also gets a chunk of cash.

When talks between Lucas and Robert Iger, the chairman and chief executive of Disney, first began 18 months ago, however, the Hollywood producer was under little pressure to sell. Star Wars, which first hit cinemas in 1975, remains a cash cow even though the last film in the series was released seven years ago. Sean McGowan, an analyst at Needham, estimates that about $140m of Star Wars toys will be sold this year alone.

By contrast, this year has seen Disney’s film business come under increasing pressure. In March, the company warned that it would take a $200m hit after the box-office failure of John Carter, in what was the biggest loss on a single film in recent history. Rich Ross, who ran Disney’s film studio, left within weeks. That failure, say analysts, was an embarrassing reminder to Disney of the costly and difficult challenge of creating films that have the potential to generate profits for years. “They have a very chequered record in developing new franchises in-house,” says Matthew Harrigan, an analyst at Wunderlich Securities. “No matter how much money you spend on a film, the outcome is uncertain.”

It is not a surprise that the likes of R2-D2, Darth Vader, Luke Skywalker and other Star Wars characters attracted Disney’s chequebook. The films have raked in $4.54bn at the box office, leaving them second only to Warner Brothers’ Harry Potter series in the history books. No set of films, though, has made more money from toys. “For 35 years, it has been the most valuable toy franchise,” says McGowan.

Lucas is not the first time Iger has bet big on a maverick billionaire. At his first board meeting as chief executive in 2005, he said that the company needed to buy Pixar, the film-animation studio founded by Lucas and then sold in 1986 to a trio including Apple co-founder Steve Jobs. By the time Disney paid $7bn for it in 2006, Pixar had already produced Toy Story, the first in the most profitable ever series of animated films.

The swoop on Pixar was followed three years later by the $4.2bn purchase of Marvel Entertainment, the company behind action heroes such as Spiderman, The Incredible Hulk and The Avengers. Some shareholders balked at the prices, but both deals have paid off for Disney. The Avengers, which was released this summer, has already become the third-most successful film on record and helped drive a 24pc increase in Disney’s second-quarter profits.

For Iger, the importance of owning characters and film franchises with a global reach is magnified by the explosion of digital platforms that the internet has brought with it. “Technology has proved more friend than foe to great story-telling,” he said this week. “It allows us to distribute in ways we never thought would have been imaginable.”

Although Disney’s movie business steals the headlines, it is not the biggest driver of the company’s sales. ESPN, the television sports network, contributed $18.7bn of the $40.9bn of revenues Disney made last year. Disney’s theme parks were next, generating $11.8bn. The film studios, which are based in Burbank, California, were third with $6.3bn.

Iger, who stands down as chief executive in 2015, now faces the twin challenges of integrating Lucas’s company into Disney and ensuring that the next film is a box-office success. “The vast bulk of the deal has to be justified on the basis of the new movie releases,” says Harrigan.

The history of Pixar and Marvel suggests that goal is within Disney’s reach.
 
 

This Week In Connecticut History
Author of Tarzan — Which Debuted 100 Years Ago
Had Deep Connecticut Roots
Manchester Patch ~ November 1, 2012 ~ By Philip R. Devlin

The year 1912 saw many famous historical events unfold, such as the sinking of the Titanic, the unforgettable performance of Jim Thorpe at the Stockholm Olympics, the opening of Fenway Park, and the election of former Wesleyan University football coach and professor, Woodrow Wilson, to the presidency of the United States. That year also marked the publication of the first Tarzan story by Edgar Rice Burroughs, Tarzan Of The Apes, in October 1912. The story first appeared in a pulp magazine and later was expanded into a novel in 1914. It was the first of 25 novels in the immensely popular Tarzan series. That series — as well as the films and merchandise that resulted from it — would earn millions of dollars for Burroughs.

Though Edgar Rice Burroughs was born in Chicago on Sept. 1, 1875, his family has deep roots in Connecticut.  In fact, Edgar's third great-grandfather, John Burroughs, was one of the earliest settlers of Enfield. John and his wife, Hannah, gave birth to four children, including a son named John. Young John remained in Enfield until 1718, when he moved to Windsor. John and his two wives had eight children, one of whom, David, served in the Revolutionary War. Later generations of the Burroughs family moved out of Connecticut to Portland, Maine, and eventually to Chicago. It was in Chicago that Edgar was born in 1875. He grew up in the Chicago suburb of Oak Park, birthplace of another famous writer, Ernest Hemingway, in 1899. Edgar's father, Major George Tyler Burroughs (1833- 1913), served with distinction in the Civil War. His mother, Mary Evaline Burroughs, was a writer who published a collectible Civil War book entitled Memoirs of A War Bride.

Edgar attempted to continue his family's tradition of military service by applying to West Point. He was not admitted; nevertheless, he joined the regular army and served with the 7th Cavalry at Fort Grant in the Arizona Territory until a diagnosis of a heart problem ended his service in 1897. (Ultimately, a heart ailment would end his life in 1950.)

Burroughs held a series of low-paying jobs, including that of a pencil sharpener wholesaler, until he came to believe that he could write fiction as well as anything he had read in the pulp magazines of his time. The results of his efforts were unimaginably successful. Besides Tarzan, his stories about the heroic Mars explorer John Carter were also immensely popular. Another famous writer and the creator of the hit TV series ER, Michael Crichton — also from Chicago — was a huge Burroughs fan. He named the popular ER character Dr. John Carter, played by Noah Wylie, after the famous Burroughs character.

Tarzan of The Apes depicts the story of John Clayton, an Englishman marooned in Africa. After his parents were killed, John was adopted by a female ape named Kala. He is named "Tarzan," which translates to "white skin." After hunters kill Kala, Tarzan avenges her death. Soon, another group of white people gets marooned in Afrca, and Tarzan comes to their aid. He becomes enamored with one of them — Jane Porter of Baltimore, MD. Eventually, Tarzan and Jane become man and wife. Subsequent novels recount the various adventures of the couple. Tarzan remains popular today; in fact, a first edition copy of the novel Tarzan Of The Apes is currently for sale online for over $55,000! The serialized form in the pulp magazine edition is extremely rare and would presumably command even more money. One of the 20th century's most popular and prolific authors, Edgar Rice Burroughs eventually settled north of Los Angeles in a town named Tarzana after his most popular fictional character.

The Liana Vine at 17H27 has been delayed by 23 minutes.....
 

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