John Oak Dalton

"Not 'Hollywood Independent' - writer John Oak Dalton is the real Real Thing." --Cinema Minima."Very weird and unpopular b-movies and comics."--Blogalicious. "After watching the film I am left to wonder if he had some childhood trauma he is not telling us about."--IMDB user review. "Screenwriter John Oak Dalton wanted to be in Hollywood. Instead, he's in the rustic kitchen above the Germania General Store, stirring a pot of boiling hot dogs." --The Harrisburg Patriot-News.

Monday, September 22, 2003

Con Weekend

I went to the Twisted Nightmare Con Saturday, in beautiful downtown Akron, Ohio.

It was uncanny meeting so many people I knew from the Internet there: Jason Santo, Sheri Carter, Wayne Harold, Bill Shotten, Eric Thornett, Jasi Lanier, Eric Spudic, Jeff Graham, and others, plus seeing a few I had met before, including JR Bookwalter and Mark Burchett. Some were exactly like I thought, a few were nothing like I expected: taller, shorter, older, younger, thinner, fatter, weirder, saner.

I have been to many Cons, including comic book Cons and role-playing Cons, and there is always some weird proportion of nerds to hot girls that does not exist anywhere else in nature. "American Nerd" Toby Radloff wasn't the nerdiest person at the Con, nor the nerdiest person I know, by some distance.

MEMORABLE MOMENTS:

Filmmaker Jason Santo telling me about how he spent Friday night getting business tips from Erin (BUCK ROGERS) Gray.

TOWNIES director Wayne Harold telling actor Jeff Dylan Graham that he had the "perfect" part for him in his next movie, involving an attempted rape at a party, then Jeff spanking off into a bed full of coats, and Jeff Graham asking "Why do people always want me to play rapists?"

Getting to chat with DAWN OF THE DEAD's Ken Foree, and talking about our mutual pal Ivan Rogers.

Getting to chat with Jeff Dylan Graham, and talking about how we both slept on the same couch at Mark Polonia's house.

BIGGEST HIGH:

Getting to meet nice new people, including most of the aforementioned as well as Jason Paul Collum and Ken Foree.

BIGGEST LOWS:

From Jason Santo, meeting me for the first time, "You're shorter than I thought!"

Two pierced, tattooed guys in the bathroom: "So are they having any good screenings?" "Microcinema stuff." "Oh, so nothing good."

Telling people, "I'm from Indiana," or "I just wrote the next Polonia Brothers movie," and having certain people look back at me like I just said "I have an inoperable brain tumor."

MY SWAG:

BAD MOVIE POLICE 1 and 2 from JR Bookwalter at Tempe; Jason Collum's JULIA WEPT; Jason Santo's MINDSCAPE PICTURES PRESENTS #1; and a kooky-looking robot movie called PROJECT: VALKYRIE (I was the only person they had sold one to at that point).

Overall it was a fun day, and worth the long drive to meet a lot of people I would like to work with some day.

Back to AMONG US tomorrow.

Give me a yell at johnoakdalton@hotmail.com