Greetings and welcome to another episode of Stamper Cinema, the film discussion podcast where you choose it, I watch it, and we discuss it. As always, I'm your host, my name is Andrew. Thank you very much for downloading this latest episode. If you are new to the podcast, well for a soft thank you, thank you very much for finding me. Please, to me a favor and subscribe to the show, tell your friends, leave a review, speaking to reviews, you can do them on
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So give me your money. Now, anyway, moving along in today's episode, we're going to shake things up a little bit. Now normally when we have a show on, we talk about one particular film that our guest brings to the table, but today's guest, Lolli Davidson, a writer, a teacher, she'll be out here shortly, I'll introduce her, but she had a genius idea that, you know what, we should talk
just some Mike Flanagan, Mike Flanagan being the filmmaker responsible for the haunting of Hill House and the haunting of Blimey Manor and several films, which will, I'll kind of like go in, kind of like do like a little, I don't know, like a little cliff note, it's a wiki kind of summary, but anyway, that's what we're going to be talking about. And it's really fitting because of the fact that at the time of publishing, it's Friday the 13th. So in October, so that's kind of like a double,
I love it. I mean, this is, this is really great. And we're also, again, talking about Mike Flanagan, who has a brand new show dropping. In fact, I think it just dropped on Netflix. Mike Flanagan has kind of like a partnership with Netflix, follow the House of Usher, which is based on the old, like Edgar Allen Poe work of the same title. Now I think that just dropped. So it's available now. I haven't seen it, but I'm hopeful. I mean, he's done really incredible stuff. So Mike Flanagan's
been in the industry for the better part of like 15 years. He, I think his full length debut film was in 2011, but he followed it up with Oculus, which was my introduction. I think that came out like 2013, 2012, 2013. They're about and movies here to shit out of me just absolutely terrified me. And it's great. I think it might be available on Netflix and such a good ghost story introduced me into a couple like Hotties in Karen Gillan and Kate Seagull. And Kate Seagull would then go on
to marry Mike Flanagan. And she's been in a bunch of stuff that he's done. Actually, Mike Flanagan has this tradition of basically using the same actors in a multitude of this film. So you have a lot of you know, continuity. When you, when you look at Kate Seagulls and a lot of his stuff, Carly Joginos or Gugino Jogino is a lot of the stuff that he's done. Henry Thomas, so like,
let me read her Elliott from ET. But I think Mike Flanagan might be most recognized for for directing Dr. Sleep, which I don't know how he did it, to be honest with you because of the fact that Dr. Sleep is the sequel to The Shining written by Stephen King. Of course, Dr. Sleep was written by Stephen King. Now again, Mike Flanagan did the film version of Dr. Sleep, which is a sequel to The Shining. But there's a little problem. The book The Shining and the movie The Shining
that came out like 1980 are very, very different. Very different. Tonally, the endings are different, just completely different kind of vibe. Now, they're both brilliant in their own respects, but be hard to make a sequel, a film sequel to a movie that kind of veers so significantly. But Mike Flanagan did a really impressive job in that he kind of bridged that gap so beautifully. So, for those that are like Stephen King, who in a word to say that he didn't enjoy
Stanley Kubrick's version of The Shining would be an understatement. But Stephen King loved Dr. Sleep because Mike Flanagan was able to, one, please the The Shining purists, but also please the Stanley Kubrick fans. And it's really quite remarkable in the way that he did it. So like mad shout out to him. But that wasn't like the first Stephen King like adaptation he did because he also did Gerald's game, like, which another, another thing that
should not have worked. I mean, the whole movie basically takes place in a bedroom with like Carly Jogino, like handcuffed to her bedposts. Meanwhile, like her, her husband's like dead body played by was it, like, a greenwood. You can't believe you're at it. Is it Sam Greenwood? Is that right? Shadow will come to me. But yeah, basically Carly Jogino is like handcuffed to her like her bedpost the entire film. And you know, has like some like visions. And it just does not seem like
it would be a movie that would work. But yet Mike Flanagan did it and crushed it. So yeah, yeah, and very, very impressive. But we're not going to be talking about Dr. Sleep. And we're not going to be talking about Gerald's game. We are going to be tough. We are going to be covering the Haunting of Hill House and the Haunting of Blimey Hunter. If there's time, you know,
we're going to try to, we're going to try to keep this streamline. And obviously, I want to have a really rich conversation about that Lollie Davidson and you know, her latest novel because she's got something brand new, but also kind of her process, what that looks like. So we've got a really, really heavily, heavily packed jam packed, if you will, episode today. So first up, we've got the Haunting of Hill House, which is loosely based on like the 1958 novel of the same name.
And what we've now got within like the Haunting of Hill House is essentially it's like a supernatural horror miniseries. Now, if you're wondering, wait, wasn't there a movie already called The Haunting of Hill House? Yes, yes, there was. It came out like the 60s and then the 90s, there's what we call the Haunting. It's the same thing quite frankly, but that one was pretty bad. If memory serves, I think it had like Owen Wilson, I think his head gets like a lopped off, but like a
grandfather clock, I think something like that wasn't particularly good. I think Liam Neeson might have been in it as well. Came out the same year that you had not only was like the Haunting of Hill House, but you had the house on Haunted Hill, a remake as well. That was like an old like, what is it? William Castle film, the neat, it's a six-season. And then they put that movie out of the 90s. So Hollywood has this thing where they like, all right, one studio is going to do that.
We'll do this and it'll basically be the same movie. We'll confuse the audience. And I'm probably confusing the hell out of you right now. So let me backtrack and actually talk about what the Haunting of Hill House is. It's essentially like a supernatural horror mini series and we've got a show about the Crane family, the mom and dad and their five kids. Let me see if I got this right. So you get Steven, you got Shirley, you got Theo, you've got Luke and now. And basically,
what we've got is you've got like a two timeline story. You've got the Crane kids as children. And then you got the Crane kids as adults. And the timelines kind of go back and forth. Because so you see what happened while they were living at Hill House and how that affected them. And what the ramifications were. And then you see them as adults and what that experience did. Because without like giving any spoilers, tragedy falls them in the house. And then we're picking
up 26 years later where tragedy strikes them again as adults. And then they are kind of like forced to reconnect and experience those events kind of all over again. I mean, it's an absolutely brilliant show. It's terrifying in many respects. Audience is love it. Critics love it. I've referenced the Fangoria Chainsaw Awards. We did one best series back in like, like, 2019, maybe 2020, they're about. But fantastic show. And we'll we'll reference a couple episodes in particular without
it giving any spoilers away. I'm not going to spoil anything. But hunting of Hill House, it's stars, Michael Hussmann, Carlos, Carlos Gino. And again, if I'm butching your name, you guys are like, like dying inside. I'm sorry. Timothy Hutton, Oliver Jackson Cohen, Kate Sewell, obviously, Victoria Padredi, and a really, really great group of young, young actors. And then Anabeth Gish is in it as well. The music was by the Newton Brothers. Mike Flanagan and Tass' tradition of always
using the Newton Brothers and their music is beautiful. And both of these, these scores are absolutely fantastic. So what else can I say? Is that about it? I'll probably mention a little bit, but I was introduced, I was introduced to the show a couple of years ago. I used to do virtual watch parties. You know, I've referenced StreamLounge on here before. Unfortunately, StreamLounge is no longer with us, RIP. But I used to watch it with a group of like 10 to 15 people. And it was
so much fun, thoroughly, thoroughly enjoyed the show. We will cover Blind Manor, which different, different plot as well. I enjoyed that. Full disclosure. Didn't enjoy it as much as I did. Hill House, I think was just so much stronger. But the Blind Manor is still very, very enjoyable. I can say, it's a little bit more of like a Gothic ghost romance store than like an out and out horror, like series. Because there are some scary things that happen, obviously. But it's definitely more of
a show that has a like a slow burn kind of like Gothic feel to it. But it does in the end really, really pay off. The show does a really great job of being getting non-linear and kind of tackles the idea of like ghosts as time travelers in a way. Similar cast that you saw in Hill House is in Blind Manor. So you've got you've got a volume of say, or last name, but you've got Carla again. You got Kate C. Gole of Victoria Piedredi, Oliver Jackson Cohen. And again, tons of really,
really great tons. There are two really young actors in Blind Manor and they're fantastic. But Oliver Jackson Cohen is really good in this. And if I can like, I don't know, like offer kind of like a dark horse, James Bond replacement. I might suggest him. He's big dude. I think he can you could probably maybe, maybe I don't know. We'll have to see what you guys think. But I think
he might be able to be like a dark horse, James Bond replacement. But in Blind Manor, you basically have like this non-linear ghost story about like this O'Pair that's hired by like this rich dude to look after his niece and nephew. And so she stays at their country, their country house, or their country manor, blind manor, and ghosts happen. Mystery happens. Death happens obviously. And within the final episodes, everything kind of comes together. And like Hill House, it was
you know, based on previous material. Like this turn, no, I'm sorry, it was called the turn of the screw. Now I haven't read it, but the show is good. So take that at a face value. Think that's about it. So if you're still listening to me after that lengthy rant. Now listen, part of the reason why I did it is because of y'all, you guys have said that I need to paint a little bit more of a picture prior to these interviews. So hopefully, hopefully I succeeded. And you got a little
taste of how disjointed my brain works. So let's transition into the more interesting part as far as I'm concerned. And that is the guest. And I'm extremely excited because we've got Lolly Davidson. She's a writer. She's a teacher all around great human being. And she's got a few books already under her belt. A brand brand new book beyond sight available now. And I haven't read it yet. But the blurb, as I understand it, is in scenic Sarah Toga Springs ghosts of a dark capitalist past
awakened and challenge a young woman's power. It's pretty cool. I'm enticed. So we're going to bring Lolly on right now. And she's going to tell us a little bit about that a little bit about herself. And of course, why should we want to talk a little bit about Mike Flanagan on this Friday the 13th episode? Again, Lolly, hello. How are you? Thank you very much for hopping on the podcast.
I'm great. Thank you for having me. Now, obviously, I introduced you in my introduction, but for the listeners, if you wouldn't mind, sometimes it's better for the guests to say a little bit about themselves. As you know, yourself a whole lot better than I do as we are brand new to each other. So what can you tell the listeners about you? Well, I've been teaching writing for 30 years at Sunni Adirondack. I graduated from Oberlin College. I studied creative writing there, but it wasn't
my major. And then I went into graduate school at the University of Albany, met a wonderful group of students, and we did all kinds of performance work. And then I've been writing, you know, teaching like crazy and keeping the writing that embers alive, but not really having time to to publish until recently. So then I found Red Penguin Books, and they signed a three book contract with me, which I was able to do because, you know, they want them to come out one after another very fast.
And I was able to do that because I had stockpiled 20 years of work. So my first one, uh-oh, my background is conflicting. Hold on a second. Let me, if I can get rid of my background here. Is that, is this what, against the grain? My first one is called Blue Woman Burning. And then, uh, then that is a kind of a magic realist novel, a kind of a coming-in-age novel. It's about a young woman whose mother vanishes
in this surprising way, um, in the desert, in the Alteplanet between Chile and Bolivia. And it's sort of loosely, very loosely based on my life growing up. My mother did not vanish. She lived to the age of 99, but we did have some mysterious lights appear to us on that Alteplanet. And then, then we did, oh, so maybe you can see that. There it is. Yeah. There it is, Blue Woman Burning.
And then I wrote against the grain, which at first it was a screenplay, um, and it was based on the Redwood Summer of 1990, where in Northern California, where the activists were doing things like tree sitting and sabotaging machinery just to save the old growth Redwoods. And it's actually the subject of Richard Powers book, The Overstory. Um, and that has it. All of my books have a kind of a magical element. I tend to write in the
kind of magical realist realm, which is not quite fantasy. It's kind of like you're straddling both worlds. Yeah. What is that? Like what does that really mean? Well, it actually comes. It's a term that was coined by Gabriel Garcia Marquez, who wrote a hundred years of solitude. And I, and it, what it means is that you have this very ordinary realistic reality, but then these kind of surreal things happen. And it's if it's ordinary, but it's also like it may be a metaphor. So for example,
one young man is shot. And when he shot his blood, he drops to the ground and, you know, and goes down the street, turns right and goes up to the porch steps and returns to his mother. So these kind of symbolic things occur. Um, I like to think of it as like when you're reading a book and you're not sure, um, if it's real or not, if it's in the person's imagination or they're losing their mind, and that's a little bit magic realism. It's kind of comes from the clash of cultures,
so clash of realities. And I play a lot around, I think a lot about what is real, you know, and that's also become, you know, a very contested question in America today, unfortunately. So, but in this book, the trees have a voice. And I was very proud of that. How to make the trees sound like trees and not like humans, but still speak in English. Um, and then my third novel, Beyoncé, is, um, that is probably straight up fantasy in the sense that it's a world in which
ghosts exist. Um, although the protagonist doesn't believe in them at the beginning. Uh, and then I have a book of short stories with that that are kind of, uh, experimental, you know, my shorter work is more experimental and my longer work is written to both be thought provoking, but also really engage the reader. I like, you know, I like a plot that pulls you along. Yeah, absolutely. You mentioned like your, your new novel. I mean, it's, it's very, very new.
Like so new that it just came out, right? Yes. The onsite, I just had my sort of book launch at the bookstore locally here and just got my hands on the first copies, you know, a few days ago. So that was pretty exciting. So since this is brand new, what can you, what can you tell us about it? Well, it's, the main character is, uh, her name is Julie Sykes and she has been
suppressing. She has these supernatural powers. She sees the energy inside people in at the sort of the subatomic level and she doesn't, her mother has really given her the message that this is, that she does not want to hear about this, that this is bad, that she should stop, you know, talking about these things. And her father has died and her mother also won't talk about that either.
But she meets this young man, uh, Damien and they connect on a certain level and they decide to investigate a haunted house, which was built by a black, a farming family who was black in the 1890s. And now it's been abandoned and the owner was sort of, um, you know, they tried to seize the house by Aminant Domain and he died in the process. So Damien and Julie decided to go and investigate and Damien becomes possessed by a malignant spirit. And so she has to finally pull out her supernatural
powers to save him and, you know, to figure out what it is that is haunting him. So there's also a back story. We start, you know, the mystery of why her, how her father died. And then I took some real history from Saratoga Springs, um, which is, you know, it's a, it's a tourist town famous for its racetrack. It was really the, the destination place in the 1898, 1870s, 1880s, 1890s. Um, and there was this true real guy named Henry Hilton who came into his fortune by really nefarious means. He
was the, or for the fourth wealthiest man in the country. And he somehow ended up with all this man's money when he died. And then he came to Saratoga Springs and built these lavish mansions like six of them for himself and his sons and his daughters. And then when he, he squatted all his money and when he died, those houses were tied up in legal battles and were eventually abandoned and they all brought it to the ground. So, um, I, I had to use that story. Yeah. No, that's awesome. I'm, I'm,
I'm captivated. I, you know, I could just listen to you tell more about it. Um, so what I'm, I'm curious about. I'm always fascinated by the process of writer, how they, how they find their stories in the case of this one at being kind of like a ghost story. Do you yourself like believe and believe in ghosts? You know, I, I play it safe. I say I, I, I don't disbelieve in ghosts. Yeah. That's, I think probably the same kind of like a angle that I have on that as well. Yes.
Yeah. It's like it would be almost disrespectful to say that I know what happened after we die. But I am very skeptical. And I think a lot of things that people think are ghosts are really just sound being thrown around in, in ways that, that you can't imagine. I mean, I have definitely heard voices, you know, but, uh, you know, that I thought we're coming from a room that may have just been bouncing off of a wall. Um, so I think a lot of that, what we think of as ghosts or that, but there
are definitely some stories out there that you really have a hard time finding. And, and I've had a few events, you know, at least one event where I could not explain what it was. Mm-hmm. Do you want to share? I could. Yes. Yeah. So it was, it was Halloween. And I was teaching. And my husband had gone up to
Vermont to get, get our, this little boat out of the water and dry dock it. And I got this phone call in the middle of class saying, you know, your husband's had an accident and he's in the hospital, but he's okay, but he's broken his pelvis. And I'm like, wow, how do you have an accident, break your pelvis and be okay? Like, so I drive up to the hospital and I find out that, yeah, he had fallen out of the boat, which was right. And I, I guess in those days, I never believed in taking
days off. So I was a little bit of a panic. I had worked all day. I went to visit him in the hospital. It was Halloween night. I was planning to go back to work the next day. And so I felt like I was exhausted and I really needed to sleep. So after I said goodbye to him in the hospital, I got a room at the middlebury. This is middlebury for Mont where, you know, middlebury colleges.
And there is this old hotel that is brick. And they had a room, but it was this odd little room that was at the top of the third stair, third floor, just a little, you know, like all the rooms are off to the to the to the left. But this was one little room off to the right at the top of the stairs. It was kind of small, barely fit a bed. But that was fine. I washed a little ghost whispers. So I definitely had prime myself. And I went to sleep. And I could not sleep because I
kept hearing this weird sound. It was like boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom. And it would, it was like, it was happening all over the room. Like it was boom, boom, boom, boom, over to the left. And then it was boom, boom, boom, boom, over to the right. And it, and I was determined to sleep. So I was just like refusing to wake up. I was just kind of turning over and grumbling. And, and at one point, I remember I even, it seemed to be right at the foot of my bed. And I'm very tall.
So I stuck my feet out and it moved over. And I was just like, what is that sound? Is it like a heating duct or is it a, maybe it was a screen that's kind of bumping, whacking against the window? I could not figure it out. But I, but I was so desperate for sleep that I didn't really investigate. And finally, in my sort of haze of sleep, I heard the church bells ringing in the town. And they, and they stopped ringing after three strikes. And I thought, wow, I thought it
was midnight because that's, I just didn't seem like much time had passed. And I, I thought, wow, the church bells must be broken because it's midnight. And they stopped at three. And the sound stopped. So I slept soundly for the rest of the night. And I got up in the morning and I have a little travel mug. And I go down to the checkout desk. And I say, so is there something you'd like to tell me about room, you know, three, 28 or I can't remember what the number was. And they were like, what?
No. And I tell them the whole story. And they're like, no, no, we've never, I said, so nobody's ever had any sightings or anything in this, they say. So I check out and I leave. And I'm walk, and I'm standing on the sidewalk looking up at the window where I had stayed just again to see was it a branch, you know, but I don't see anything that it could have been. And somebody comes running out and they're like, excuse me, ma'am, you forgot your mug. And I'm like, oh, thank you. And they said,
and also I wanted to tell you that there have been two ghosts cited at this hotel frequently. One is a woman in a ball gown because she used to be a ball room on the third floor. And the other is a little boy with a rubber ball. So I was like, that was that was what it was sound that was the ball bouncing. Wow. So, you know, no, who knows who knows who knows who knows those are fun. I love just kind of like, you know, just unexplained occurrences. And sometimes it it works. So I love when
people share their their ghost stories. Yeah, it's kind of scary, but it's also comforting the idea that, you know, you could stay in touch with somebody after they die. So, you know, I like the comforting aspect of it. But, you know, I think I would be terrified if I actually saw one. Yeah, no, definitely. Most definitely. I think I would not be okay. Just now that we're sharing like ghost stories, I have never really experienced anything except for my wife and I before we were
married, we were living in kind of like an old Atlanta apartment. Old Atlanta is kind of like misleading because everything was kind of like burned during the Civil War. But in the late 1800s, early 1900s, you know, there were more mansions that were built up. And sometime in the out of the 50, 60s, 70s, those mansions then got converted into like four, five, or six, like smaller apartments. And my wife and I were living in one of these old, you know, former like mansions, but now kind of
like a little like a little apartment. And this is back back in our struggling days. You know, I was fresh out of grad school and you know, my wife had like her first big girl job out of college. And it wasn't really paying well. Neither one of us were really like I was working on like I had received like a grant for a screenplay that I had written. So I was doing re-writes not really bringing in any like new money. And my wife and I just one day were having this conversation.
She was at work. I was in the house. And just like tidying up in our bedroom, but it was kind of like, you know, it was only maybe like 850 square like foot apartment, not big by any means, right? And we were talking about money. And then all of a sudden there was just like this loud thud on like the other side. And we had like a like a hardwood like hard like real proper hardwood, not kind of like a laminate, like real proper hardwood floor. And my wife, you know, she was on
speaker. She was what, you know, wondering what that was. I had no idea. And I go like searching through the apartment. And it was a random thing ever. My wife, when she was when she had graduated college, a family friend and a girl that she used to babysit, she made her like the kind of like a not porcelain, but she made her like a piggy bank like an actual like piggy bank and put a $100 like a hundred like gold silver, you know, gold dollars in in that piggy bank. So like gave her
like a hundred bucks. And during this conversation about money, her piggy bank literally like lop like jumped off of a bookshelf like inexplicably. It wasn't like, you know, I was banging. I was on a different side of the room. And it wouldn't wouldn't make any sense to be like the bookshelf that I've got behind me. And there was a piggy bank in the middle of the bookshelf like leaping off there onto hard wood floor mind you. Yeah, we should have shattered. Yeah, and didn't. And it was
like, well, that's weird. Your piggy banks on the floor. And we're like, yeah, that's, you know, like what happened in somebody knock on the door? Was there an earth like a small like earthquake? And we couldn't figure it out. But then my wife's like, wait a second. Like my piggy bank shoot and I'm like, yeah, so like there's like a hundred bucks in there. I'm like, what do you mean? There's
a hundred dollars. And she explained the story. But it was just kind of like this weird kind of coincidental thing that we had like this, this helpful spirit like, by the way, if you really need money, there's a hundred bucks right here, which we didn't use that we still have the, you know, she still has all that money. But it was just the most random thing that could have been a spirit of some sort,
more likely than not, you know, just don't know. But that's a hard one to explain. Yeah, just weird inanimate object like leaping off a bookshelf onto hardwood floor and not breaking. It was odd. It was odd. So that just said my ghost story, if you will. Yeah. So I do think it's important to stay open to possibilities. Yes. The possibilities. Yeah. Absolutely.
So I think that might actually be one of like the most perfect segues into what we're going to be, you know, spending a little bit more time on today, which is we're going to talk some Mike Flanagan stuff now at the intro. And I did a little bit of his his background, but I don't know how familiar you are with his work apart from, you know, the, the hunting of Hill House and Blimean are which we will definitely discuss. But as a reminder, he's also done Oculus, which is
also kind of like a ghost movie that was kind of like his his first full length film. And then he did like the prequel to the Weijia film. So it was like we just like origin of evil, which was another kind of like ghost film. And then recently he did Dr. Sleep, which was the the sequel to the shining. So definitely related material like source as far as like ghost stuff. But predominantly what we're going to be talking about today will be a couple of his Netflix films in
or series anthology, haunting series of, hunting of Hill House and, and, and Blimean. So why did you other than maybe kind of relating to what you're talking about? Why did why were you interested in discussing his work or specifically like the hunting of Hill House, for example? Well, I think that in a way the hunting of Hill House, well, first of all, I love the book
Shirley Jackson in high school. I was I was dating and a little bit of college the the grandson of Shirley Jackson who I didn't I mean, I I knew Shirley Jackson was, but I didn't quite I didn't quite get it. So, so I had always loved, you know, the lottery and the hunting of Hill House. And I mean, that that book set starts with such a beautiful paragraph. That was one of the things that I was looking up before. It starts with no live organism can continue for long to exist
sanely under conditions of absolute reality. Even Larkson Katie did's are supposed by some to dream. That is such a beautiful beginning, the absolute reality. So that question of what is reality, you know, that is a theme in my own work. And, and that's what drew me to that book, of course. And, you know, the hunting of Hill House, that question of is, is the main character sane or is this house really haunted? Is she insane or is the house haunted? But then when Flanagan did his interpretation,
he really took huge liberties and really reinterpreted it and really cast it. And I actually really love what he did with it. I mean, I think of them as two separate pieces. And what I loved about that was not only was the it was very atmospheric and wonderful. And I think, but, but this quote, when he says, you know, a ghost can be a lot of things, a memory, a daydream, a secret, grief, anger, guilt. But in my experience, most times, they're just what we want to see.
You know, so of course, the main character is a skeptic. And, you know, the the trope for that is, you know, the skeptic gets in trouble. That's another reason why I don't say I don't find this. Good mantra. So, yeah. So, and he really plays that theme out. So you see all the characters are haunted by something different. By guilt, you know, one, the one sister has had an affair. You know, the one has an addiction. So they all and and then I guess in a way, the main character,
his what's haunting him is his anger at his father. They felt like his father let his mother down. So I love how he played that out. And then I don't want to put any spoiler alerts. But he also does some interesting things with conceiving of ghosts as time travel. And that's that shows up, I think, in blind manner as well, that idea that maybe we're not seeing a spirit, maybe we're just seeing a
person at a different time. Like the times have collided, like the wrinkle in time. Yeah, it goes into something just kind of even like a subjectivity of like reality anyway, you know, in in many respects, you know, like, and then just the the time traveling element that also what's great about about
what I mean, there's so many things that are great about the the hunting of Hill House. But what I love is just kind of each episode kind of like focusing on like an individual like family member, you know, and it's a 10 series, but you you get a Nell episode and you get I can't believe I just forgot Kate Seagulls, I forget which I can't remember all their basically they each each each of
the the crane kids have their own like focused episode. And even though you could you can make the argument that Michael Husman, I think is like the kind of like the main protagonist of it. Yeah, yeah. But you can also say that they're all kind of central because they the each episode, so there's a narrative that focuses on that particular character, which gives it a lot of like
strength to it. So like, for example, like the for me, they're they're too real standout episodes and they kind of like tie together because you see these people kind of like in their own individual lives. And then this tragedy brings them all together. So like these two episodes that I really think of is like the the bent neck lady that that episode, which I think is just really, really strong. And then also what is it? The two storms episode where you've got the storm when they're
in Hill House and then the storm when they're kind of all brought back together. Why I really drawn to the two storms episode is there's the scene at like the funeral home and the way they construct like the to see at the funeral home and as well as in the mansion is just the insanity that it took for them to even make those episodes with like these really long scenes. And I'll I mean, I'll get into that in one second, but I want to talk about like the the funeral parlor itself
because I live like a mile away from it. And really? Yeah, yeah, yeah. About two years ago I was watching this show and I was kind of like doing like a virtual watch along with some friends. And I'm like, you know, just watching it, you know, like, oh, yeah, that funeral parlor did it it it interesting. But like I was dropping my daughter off from from daycare so she would I guess she would have been
like four at the time. And I'm at a traffic light. She's at a traffic light and I look, you know, just looked to my right. Like that building looks really familiar. And you know, as I'm waiting this for this light to turn green, it dawns and I'm like, oh my god, that's that's the funeral parlor. That's in the show that I'm watching right now. Wow. Yeah. No, go ahead. Go ahead. No, well, no, I was just saying the the bent neck lady, you know, but well, again, I don't want to
give it away. So the question of what is she doing? Why is she haunting this child? You know, is it the level end or is it an attempt to warn her? It's, um, it's like I like listeners, I want to like spoil this, but I don't want to like, this is something you have to see for yourself.
Yeah, it's just so beautifully crafted. Um, and each episode I think is strong, but I wanted to single out the bent neck, bent neck lady episode and those two storms, um, because like, for example, and I got this like, kind of like quote from like Mike Flanagan, but essentially they were doing 18 page scenes without any cuts and to make that work is every shot had like a hundred people
standing on each other's shoulders and having to execute dozens or hundreds of tasks. So basically it's kind of like designed to be like a single, you've got like these long single takes, but not only did the actors have to deliver their lines, but like crew members were also on hand to like, move around props and equipment and to basically support like the choreographed scenes, right? So like you essentially have like a 17 minute continuously like operating, so you're watching
one single take, but as we're following around, they're crew members moving things around. So just uh, goes very, very like seamlessly. And so, um, according to Mike Flanagan, we shut down the company for over a month to choreograph and it rehearsed each of those five long takes. So they're like five of those takes. The longest was 17 minutes. Uh, there was no room for air at all. And if we made a mistake, we had to start all over. We rehearsed for over a month with our second team
stand-ins before even folding the cast into the process. So, um, insane, insane. Like this is for a Netflix show, you know, and um, which I guess I should bring up is the fact that I think this was the first film under this contract where Mike Flanagan had kind of like a, a dedicated contract with Netflix. So he did this, um, obviously honing a blind manor, uh, midnight mass, and then most
recently, I can't believe I forgot just the, the, the name of something he just did with them. And now the, the final, the final thing that'll be doing with Netflix is coming out on for, uh, I think Thursday, the, the 12th of October, uh, and that is fall of the house of Usher. So as you can see, I'm, um, you open the door or open the Pandora's box for me to kind of like, you know, like Mike
Flanagan stuff. I really do, uh, love, uh, love his style. And it just, I don't know, he's a refreshing new filmmaker that is, it is not just making horror films, but he's doing really great stuff and, very artistic and like the themes of like grief and the themes of, of fear, you know, he's
tackling them in I think really interesting ways, you know, like not just like fear of, like a child being afraid of a ghost, which is kind of like a fear, but also like the, the fear of losing a family member and, and the fear of not being able to save somebody or protect somebody, um, it's more than just like jump scares, even though the show does a really good job of those two, yeah, he, he, he's using something very like visceral and real. And I think just executed very
beautifully, I think. Yeah, I think also there's a, I mean, I also, like I, you know, I mentioned high spirits because I, there's a genre of sort of funny ghost stories, which I enjoy, I don't know why, maybe it's because of the contrast over the humor with the, you know, the death that I enjoy, but, um, also the ghost stories that I'd like tend to be ghost stories that are a bit sad,
like the mystery at the heart of it is really just terribly, terribly sad. Um, I'm thinking of, um, you know, uh, Guillermo, the Torre Maze, um, Pan's labyrinth is just very sad and, um, I think it's the Awakening's, yeah, there's another Guillermo del Torre Maze, Torre one that's that is about the, um, the orphanage. In fact, that's what it was. Oh, devil's backbone, I believe? No, the orphanage is called, and it's okay. So at the heart of it
is just this sad story about this child that's gone missing. So I guess I have a, you know, I must lean towards the melancholy, um, but I, but I love ghost stories where the ghosts aren't just pure evil that the issue is the misunderstanding between the living and the dead and that there's, that if you can bridge that, that misunderstanding, things can be resolved. So, um, you know, Flanagan has that in, in almost all his pieces. And, you know, and when I finished watching the
Hunting of Blind Man, I thought, well, that's it. You know, nobody can do another movie on ghost because he's covered all the basis, you know, he has, he has covered all the metaphors for what a ghost is in, in, you know, real life, whatever that is. Yeah. Yeah. Um, well, hopefully it doesn't stop
because I'm enjoying what he's been doing. And, you know, uh, and even though obviously, um, Hill House and Blind Man are share, uh, well, obviously they share some cast members and, uh, kind of like a same kind of music and, and obviously kind of like overall idea, you couldn't really be much more, like further from, I mean, uh, Blind Man, or I think is a complete 180 shift from really what he was kind of looking at and exploring, um, in, in Hill House. Now, I think it's a
little bit more of a slow burn. I don't think it, um, I don't think it's nearly as scary, but where he kind of tapped into the idea of, uh, like ghosts and kind of like a, like a time traveling, I mean, that's really one of kind of like the central themes that he's kind of really looking at in Blind Manor. Uh, it's very non-linear. I mean, extremely non-linear is, is Blind Manor. And, uh, obviously that one's based on what was at the, uh, the turn of the screw, which I had not read.
I don't know. Yeah. Much about that. Yeah. So for me, yeah, I've read that to the skirt, turn of the skirts. It's wonderful. It's a wonderful story. And in that, you don't know, again, that's one of those books where you're like, is the cover is losing her mind? And she's, there's this hint in the, in the Henry James story that she has been possibly molested. And that, that's why she's imagining these ghosts. But you never know by the end whether she's
imagined them or they've really happened. And, you know, and, and there are terrible consequences one way or the other. Um, what was there? Let's see, I mean, we've kind of talked about both of them and kind of like a, like a general sense. Was there anything specific that you wanted to kind of look at, explore out of those or just kind of, just, just kind of like chat about them? Yeah. I don't have any, anything specific. I think another stylistic thing that I find interesting
about Flanagan is how he takes risks, uh, with these long monologues. Like there's a point in the middle of them where a character goes on for like five minutes. And it's this quite beautiful speech. I can't think of what the monologue is in, in, um, the hunting of Hill House, but in midnight mass,
it's when the two main characters are talking about what happens after you die. And, uh, the male character whose name I can't remember, uh, gives this beautiful speech about, you know, sort of what I believe, sort of like, you know, all your energy stop and then, you know, your, kind of the electricity stops and then your cells start to kind of dissipate and then you, you know, become part of the universe. And, um, you know, I think he's kind of a secular humanist. Um, and, and I
just really appreciate that. Yeah. Reminds a little bit of, um, if you've ever read the series, the Golden Compass series, his dark materials by Philip Pullman. I know. Well, but I have not read it. Yeah. The Golden Compass is very good. But when you read all three of them together, again, he's kind of a secular humanist and he's promote, he's really presenting a cosmos that, um,
backs that up. And, um, the, in, in that one, there's a, I think it's in the third novel. He presents an, a possibility of an underworld where spirits go and they get kind of trapped, uh, in this, in the labyrinth of the underworld and, and, uh, there are harpies that can lead them out. And the way that you can get a harpie to leave you out is by telling them the story of your life.
So if you're a good storyteller and you thought about your life and you can tell the story of your life, you can make it out of this underworld and dissipate into the universe, um, which is good. And if you can't, if you have not lived a real effective life and don't know how to tell a story, your trap forever in this labyrinth. And I, I just thought that was a wonderful
concept. I'm curious. Like as a, as a writer yourself and, I mean, we've just spent, you know, better part of the half hour talking about, I mean, Mike Flanagan at his core, he himself is a writer. Obviously, he's a director, but most of the stuff he, he's, you know, he's writing the stories, obviously, it's somebody that's very, very busy. What, and you've been, you've been doing this for, you know, quite some time, uh, yourself. But let's talk about when you're not at your peak
performance and maybe the idea well is kind of drying up. Like how do you, I don't know, like, uh, to use the like writers block, you know, like what are, what are some ways that, that, that you can kind of like overcome, overcome that? Well, I've got a lot of experience with writers block. So, uh, I think the first thing is to understand the writing process and to understand that there are times when, you know, the fields lie follow and there nothing is growing there and use nothing
you can do about it. You just have to let them lie there or, um, and you have to feed them, you know, plant some clover, um, to get some nitrogen in the soil and the, the analogous experience would be as a writer, you know, you need to do different things. You need to go out and sort of feed your creativity by, um, you know, watching other people's art and, you know, traveling and, uh, having deep conversations with people. Um, so, you know, I think not pushing it, understanding that, okay,
I might be in a fellow period or I might be in a gestating period. So when I, when I, when I, I think you had asked me, you know, how did I write beyond site? How did that happen? You know, um, I started writing kind of like, uh, like, uh, I don't, like a dictionary of like, what is a ghost? What might cause a ghost? And why do they manifest in different ways? Like, how would I explain why some ghosts or these orbs and some can talk and some can't talk and some you can feel
and some can't, you know, why is it that we have these different manifestations? So I started to kind of answer that question for myself of like, well, it all has to do with how they died, where they died, what was going on in their lives, et cetera. Um, so, you know, I, so I, as I was writing this, I was thinking, what am I going to do with this? I mean, I have no story. I'm just writing notes on possibilities for, you know, ghost theory. Um, but then when I was done with that, and I started,
oh, and I was walking through the north woods. This is a part, a scene. It's a, it's a, it's a beautiful trail on the Skidmore College campus, where these old mansions used to be. And as I was walking on the trail, there are still a couple of, um, like little ruins, like just, there was like a big sister and a big brick sister that is kind of broken down. And, um, and I
thought, well, what, what, what, what, what that is? And so then when I did some research and found out about Henry Hilton and those mansions that used to be there, that kind of a story started to form. So I guess what worked there was I was writing notes. I didn't know why or what I was going to do with them, but I wrote them anyway. I had faith in the process. And then, uh, as I was taking walks
and thinking about my writing, taking walks, I let the environment inspire me. So, you know, um, and when I started to write the story, then I wasn't interested in writing the ghost theory anymore. And I thought, isn't that interesting? You know, I'm glad I wrote that then, because now I don't feel like it at all. So I think it's a matter of listening to yourself, understanding the process of creativity, um, and, you know, not fighting too hard, you know, following the energy, basically.
You know, so I mean, there's a lot of writing that is a struggle and you do just have to bash your way through it. But sometimes it's better to go, if this feels bad, I don't need to analyze why it's feeling bad. I'm just not going to do that. I'm going to do something that feels good. You had mentioned a moment ago that also like appreciating other people's art, you know, this is one of the things that you do. So what do you, what do you read? What do you, what do you watch?
Well, I watch way too much too many series. I really love these, you know, telenovelas, as they're called, you know, because I realized this new kind of Netflix series, um, it's, they aren't like novels. And I've grown to prefer that format to the movie format. So I have to say probably my first love is really movies. And, you know, the visual, um, I love having the sound and the visual together. Novels, you know, some of my favorite writers are, you know, the magical realist, you know,
of Gabriel Garcia Marquez, Louise Erdrich, Tony Morrison. They're all people that are dealing with culture clashes. And I just, I connect with that. I relate to that. I don't travel. I use to travel like my family traveled all over the world. So maybe that kind of satiated my traveling appetite. I do most of my traveling in the United States now. Um, but, you know, I think, um, I don't know, you know, going to museums, uh, listening to music.
Um, sometimes when I'm really, when, uh, when I'm, sometimes there are periods where I don't write and I just do crafts, you know, like I'm, um, and then, you know, I might make a quilt. And then I'm sick of making quilts. I don't want any quilts anymore done, you know, and then I go back to writing or I play viola. So I might get into playing music and then I'm done with music, you know, so I just allow myself to move around in the different forms of expression. I love dancing.
Um, so, but I always come back to writing. Mm-hmm. And even, uh, correct me if I'm wrong, but you've been teaching for, if I'm not, this correct, like you said, like over 30 years now? 30, 30 years. Yeah. Yeah. At a community college, which is, um, as soon as you're at a rendezvous, which is hard work because we have to teach five courses a semester, five writing courses. So, you know, it's, the, the, you know, it's not like
scantron where you can just run the papers through a mill and get the right answers. Um, you know, every paper you read, you're like inside somebody's head and trying to figure out where they got made the mistake and how you can explain to them how to make it better without crushing their ego. Mm-hmm. So it's like a very delicate dance that creates, it requires a lot of creativity, which is wonderful. I mean, every day is different. I don't think I could survive a job
where every day was the same. Right. But it's also, you know, very tiring. Yeah. I mean, obviously to do something for 30 years, you obviously, I assume one would love, if you're going to be in anything for, for that long, but I mean, obviously, yeah, we do things for money, but we also do things for like four experiences, what you get out of it. So what are, you know, what are, I don't know, to use, forgive me for using kind of like a general question, but what, you know, what is
like maybe one of like the most valuable lessons you've learned yourself as a teacher? I think, I think, I don't know if it was like Robert Browning, but there was like this quote, like every adult needs a child to teach. It's the way adults learn. So I love the idea of like teachers as learners. You know, what are, what are, what are something that you as a, as a teacher have learned about
yourself or writing or, or anything, just in general? It's tough. I mean, I, I think, first of all, what I love about teaching is that like, I don't think I would like teaching math because it's all about math. I mean, I guess if you really love math and, you know, but what I love about teaching writing is that I get to hear all these stories of people's lives in this very intimate way. And I guess I,
I love people. So I'm kind of endlessly fascinated and moved by their stories and, uh, get teaching it soon at Arondack, you know, the people who end up going to community college, think there's a variety of reasons. They're sort of self-selecting like they either didn't do so well in high school or they didn't want to leave home or, you know, they loved their family and wanted to stay home or they wanted to save money. Um, so, uh, I often the stories that the students
tell me are sometimes just unbelievable. Like you can't believe how much tragedy strikes one family, you know, you just like, you know, where there's multiple cases of cancer and deaths and suicides and poverty and, and then they keep on. These are students who get knocked down over and over and over and they keep standing back up and trying again. Now, you know, a lot of them get knocked down and
walk away and don't come back, but an awful lot of them, you see them the next year. Like they failed out this semester. They're having a nervous breakdown and they come back and I just really admire that, that grit. So I guess one of the things I learned is, you know, don't make assumptions about why people aren't doing their work, you know, um, I don't believe in laziness. I think that people procrastinate because most often because they're afraid, you know, they're nervous about the writing.
Writing is a very self-exposing thing to do, you know. So, um, I mean, you, you see your own contradictions, you're sharing all this, these secrets and you're opening yourself up to judgment. I mean, that's terrifying. So I think a lot of students procrastinate because of that and then, you know, it's embarrassing, they're embarrassed because they can't, you know, they don't have no of their grammar. Um, but of course, I learned a lot of my grammar by teaching it. My, the way I learned
grammar was by being read to. So I just absorbed it. I just knew the sound of the, the correct sound of a sentence, but I couldn't tell you why. Right. Um, and I learned the rules by teaching them, you know, that's, um, well, thank you. Um, and our final couple moments, obviously, we've got a brand new novel out. Uh, how can, how can the, the listeners find it? How, and how, how can they find you? Well, the best thing would be to go to my website, lollydavitsin.com. It looks, and lolly spelled
L-a-l-e. It looks like a layout. So lale. David's in.com. Um, and then that has all the links to my various books and, uh, and you can also find me more easily on Barnes and Noble. It is harder to find me on Amazon. I don't know why they, they removed a bunch of my books and then only replace the Kindle. And when you search, you can't find me. It's just, are so, uh, so, oh well, go to Barnes and Noble. If you search my name on Google, that those are the first links that will show up anyway.
Perfect. Now in the, the final question, this is always like a weird, weird thing, but I, I hear people ask the question all the time. So I'm, I'm a victim of it as well. Like you have a brand new, uh, novel out. So asking you what is, what's next for you? It seems kind of like a pointless, but, um, what are some of the things, you know, what are some of the things that you're going to do in, in support of, of your, of your new novel, uh, beyond site?
Well, I'm going to keep on, uh, you know, I'm actually doing some performances because I'm also a storyteller. So I'm doing some local performances in Bennington and, um, and also I'll continue to do readings at like libraries and, you know, book groups, book, uh, book clubs and things like that. Um, you know, posting on Facebook. So, and doing these podcasts. So that's how I plan to do kind of a
slow, steady, um, promotion. And, uh, I don't, I, I am a little worried about the writing part because I've been, I've been revising and editing for three years now because I, I pumped out one book after another, but they were all revisions of things I already read. So I love revising. Um, it's so much easier than generating. And there's a part of me going, uh, what if I forgot how to generate a new story?
Like, what if I just know, and I tried to force it the other day and it was just awful. It's just like everything that came out was bland and flat and lifeless. And I thought, see, you know, I wasn't trusting myself. So I do have an idea for a book of short stories, um, that I really want to tackle sort of the Americans' like guys. I mean, this is such a pivotal moment in history for us that I really want
to write about, you know, kind of what's going on. And so much of it is so absurd and surreal. It's a weird time we're living it. It's a very weird, same time that we're in. Yeah. And so I really want to write about that. I don't know if I'm going to focus mostly on, you know, the environment or focus mostly on our, the history, our repressed history. I mean, talk about, you know, America's sort of haunted by its ass, like sort of all the evil things we've done that we don't want to talk
about. I just don't know where I'm going to go with it, but I'm envisioning a little bizarre and a book of bizarre intense stories about America. That's kind of underground. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I just kind of like just trying to make sense. I love that though. So there's definitely something there. So keep keep plugging away at that. But I wish you nothing but the best on your latest one.
I'm going to get my hands on it. I'm I'm a sucker for for for ghost stories as well. So I just want to say, well, I think you know, it's been an absolute pleasure hanging out with you this past hour. And yeah, and great all the best to you and your new novel. And please stay in touch anytime you want to talk about anything, you know, maybe you want to come on and talk about Pan's Labyrinth or something like that. You know, any any time you want to come chat about any movie, open invitation.
Thank you. I want to learn about your work as well. So I assume that your listeners already know where to find you. Yeah. Yeah. So I mean, when it comes to right now what I'm part of the reason why I have a podcast is I I got into I don't it's wasn't even necessarily writers block is I've got I've got multitude of things that I just haven't done like and the truth is my only excuse is and I'm doing some that's very, very time consuming now and podcasting. This was a way to do something
because I didn't think I had any time for writing, but this is every bit as time consuming. But it really just came down to my wife and I we had a baby and I just wasn't really able to dedicate the time that I really wanted to to focus on writing, but I I went to school for well once upon a time
I was a journalist in the Navy and then got out of the military then went to went to college and got my masters at Carnegie Mellon and dramatic writing specifically writing for the stage and screen and so I've written a couple screenplays couple plays and I've got three three more that I
that are well one is fully outlined I've got one kind of outline and then I've got kind of a strong one act idea that maybe that can become something so I've got my projects it's a just a matter of saying you know what I'm going to actually write down these these stories that
I've got so yeah I wish I could say it was like writers block I can't think of what it's just actually you mentioned you know like it's not laziness my case I think it is a little bit of laziness I'm not afraid like I want to do this it's just the can I dedicate the amount of time that I want
to to really like tackle them but that's that's hopefully I keep saying that next year's the year but next year's the year that I'm going to because I'm one of the fun things that I get to do is I'm also I also like copy edit for the Austin film festival so you know because I I was a quarter
finalist for one of the screenplays I had written for them and so I've this past year I've been like copy editing the notes they give screenwriters so basically somebody writes a screenplay they have the reader they create notes based on hey your first act fell apart here or this was good this
is what the story is about well Austin film festival send those to me and then I just copy edit so it doesn't sound like this the reader is absolutely murdering this poor writer and so I'm still kind of in it but I'm not I'm not necessarily as a merc as I would like to be again
yeah you know two things it might be helpful to think about one was something that William Kennedy told me about he when he wrote Ironweed which that was a book that took him 11 years to write and he said that he had re he re wrote it in many different forms including in plays he would take entire
characters out put new characters in and then what he said now what what he did later was he would he would take notes on his novel for two years before he would start writing it so I thought that was really instructed because I used to be really hard on myself when I was just writing about my
writing like I was just writing notes to myself I didn't count that as writing but now it's like of course everything counts and what I say to my students if you can't write it write about it because you know like write about it you know without fear not like oh but you know I'm worried
that this is going to come out badly but write about like I want this to come out this way here's what I'm trying to achieve and if you write about it in that kind of constructive way what happens is you kind of just slide into writing it it's sort of opening a door so if you can't write it
right about it but also you know allow those those ideas to gestate and and then of course you have to be willing I think the other fear of writing is that in your mind you have this gorgeous scintillating thing that's floating around you go to write it it's it's just straw and and
dirt and you're just like what happened to this beautiful thing in my head I guess it was just illusion you know you know that that's where the rewriting comes in yeah absolutely I could talk to you about about writing for days I can talk to you about you know I've just really enjoyed
this hour so thank you thank you and again all the all the best to you same to you all right lolly davidson again thank you so much to lolly davidson for a wonderful interview and thank you for being a wonderful wonderful audience hopefully you enjoyed yourself every bit as much as I did
and you'll come back if you've gotten this far and you haven't subscribed to the channel please do so leave a voicemail feel free to share a ghost story I know I referenced one earlier but I've got a couple more ghost stories maybe I'll save those for a later time if if anybody else wants to talk some more ghost stuff but that's all I've got for this week please check out the show notes
I'll have information on lolly I'll have information on st.a.m.a I'll have some information on what we covered today in hillhouse and blime manner and especially happy friday the 13th in October this doesn't happen very often so I know I'm pumped you're probably not even listening to this on friday the 13th but it happened y'all it's a real thing so that's all I've got and we'll see you next time on another episode step for set up