An Anime Central anecdote
Some years ago, I think around 2002, I was director of Live Programming for Anime Central. By some chance, I found myself trading emails with Roger Ebert -- I had sent him an email thanking him for his coverage of Miyazaki films, helping raise their US profile as they were being released stateside.
I mentioned then how I was part of Anime Central, and that it would be really neat if he would be willing to come to the con and give a talk about his perceptions of anime and animated cinema in general. He agreed, especially since ACen was Chicago based, and we even talked a little bit about what such a panel might be like. I was already mentally drawing up the proposal to take to the head of Guest Relations when we came to one detail -- "which weekend is this happenning?"
Turns out that Anime Central almost *always* coincides with the Cannes Film Festival, which is understandably one event Ebert was not going to miss out on. ARGH. If not for that, I would've gotten to meet Ebert in person, and been able to chat with anime about him, before he lost his voice.
I was reminded of this as I read Ebert's twitter entries today, where he's reporting events from Cannes again, as I'm getting ready to leave for this year's ACen.
Ah well.
I mentioned then how I was part of Anime Central, and that it would be really neat if he would be willing to come to the con and give a talk about his perceptions of anime and animated cinema in general. He agreed, especially since ACen was Chicago based, and we even talked a little bit about what such a panel might be like. I was already mentally drawing up the proposal to take to the head of Guest Relations when we came to one detail -- "which weekend is this happenning?"
Turns out that Anime Central almost *always* coincides with the Cannes Film Festival, which is understandably one event Ebert was not going to miss out on. ARGH. If not for that, I would've gotten to meet Ebert in person, and been able to chat with anime about him, before he lost his voice.
I was reminded of this as I read Ebert's twitter entries today, where he's reporting events from Cannes again, as I'm getting ready to leave for this year's ACen.
Ah well.