Have Mandolin Will Travel

A deep dive into the fantastic Iranian vampire fairy tale Western film "A Girl Walks Home Alone at Night," written and directed by Iranian-American filmmaker Ana Lily Amirpour. You should watch this movie.

A look at the 2011 film adaptation of Shakepeare's "Coriolanus," directed by and starring Ralph Fiennes. It's staged with a late 90s Balkan War aesthetic and is pretty awesome, both as a film and as an adaptation. "Coriolanus" is relatively obscure for a Shakespearean tragedy and is rarely performed. (A quick straw poll of my friends revealed most of them had never hear...

A deep dive into the obscure 1983 horror film "The Keep," directed by Michael Mann and the slightly less obscure 1981 F. Paul Wilson novel it's based on. The premise is great: German soldiers occupying a keep in Romania during World War 2 get slaughtered by a supernatural force. While the book is enjoyable and interesting (though it doesn't stick the landing). the film is a wreck...

A deep dive into the classic 1971 blaxploitation film "Shaft" and the 1970 novel it is based on. The film is good and very important to both film and pop-culture. The book is *really* good and it's interesting to see how different it is than the movie despite the events being largely the same.

Inspired by Opera Orlando's production of the tragic opera "Lucia di Lammermoor." I read the book it was adapted from: Sir Walter Scott's novel "The Bride of Lammermoor." The book is pretty good and, weirdly, often quite funny which is *very* different than the opera. It was an interesting read, especially after having seen the opera.

A look at Opera Orlando's 2024 production of "Lucia di Lammermoor," an 1835 opera by Gaetano Donizetti. The opera is based on Sir Walter's Scott's 1819 novel "The Bride of Lammermoor." This production was put in a Game of Thrones setting and was really good. I also read the book, which I will look at in the next episode.

Part 2 of my series on "The White Buffalo." This one both takes an even deeper dive into the novel which, spoilers, is actually pretty good, and revisits the film adaptation with some enlightenment after having read the source. (I recant some of my theories from the previous episode on why the film is the way it is.) It makes me sad that this book is out of print. Again: it's pretty...

A deep dive into the 1974 Western "The White Buffalo," a film adaptation of Richard Sale's 1975 pulp novel of the same name starring Charles Bronson. This film is kind of a train wreck, but a really interesting one to do an autopsy on. This ended up being the first entry in a two part series about "The White Buffalo". I was so fascinated by this film that my friend James bo...

The last in a three part series about Herman Melville's novel "Moby Dick" and its adaptations. This episode talks about Christophe Chaboute's 2017 black and white graphic novel. Spoiler: It's a really good read and is a good adaptation..

The second in a three part series about Herman Melville's novel "Moby Dick" and its adaptations. This episode looks at the surprisingly great 1956 film starring Gregory Peck.

The first in a three part series about Herman Melville's novel "Moby Dick" and its adaptations. This episode is a deep dive into the novel itself, looking at its structure, its writing, and its themes. I *really* like this book.

A deep dive into Orlando Ballet's May 2026 production of "The Great Gatsby" where I talk about the performance and the ballet as an adaptation of F. Scott Fitzgerald classic novel. Spoiler: Ballet is quite good.

A deep dive into the Spaghetti Western "A Fistful of Dollars (1964)" and the film it is a direct remake of, Akira Kurosawa's samurai film "Yojimbo (1961)." (Like "got sued" direct remake.) Spoilers: Both are good, but I think "Yojimbo" is better.

An exploration of Opera Orlando's 2025 production of "Werther" and the book it's adapted from: Goethe's 1774 novel "The Sorrows of Young Werther." Spoilers: Both versions are quite good, but I want to punch Werther in the face. "Horrible incel sh*t, Mason"

A dive into two fantastic comic books set in the Alien universe (i.e. the same franchise as the Sigourney Weaver film Alien ), Dead Orbit (2017) and Sacrifice (1993) . The two stories are standalone tales that very different from each other and mine a lot of the things I love about Alien.

The last in a series looking at Dracula and its adaptations. This episode is about Francis Ford Coppola's 1992 film Bram Stoker's Dracula and the classic 1931 Dracula starring Bela Lugosi. Both really interesting adaptations, but #wheresMina

The second of three in a series looking at Dracula and its adaptations. This episode is about the 2023 horror film The Last Voyage of the Demeter, an under-seen gem. This movie flopped pretty hard in theaters but really is quite good.

The first of three in a series looking at Dracula and its adaptations. This episode is about Bram Stoker's 1897 novel with a bonus addendum about Michael Pink's 1996 ballet adaptation.

A deep dive into Gustav Flaubert's masterful 1856 novel Madame Bovary . Spoilers: It's... masterful.

A look at Franco Zeffirelli's Romeo and Juliet from 1968 starring Olivia Hussey and Leonard Whiting. Spoiler: This is the gold standard of Romeo and Juliet film adaptations. This is the third of 3 episodes about Romeo and Juliet adaptations. 

A look at Orlando Ballet's 2024 production of Romeo and Juliet , music by Sergei Prokofiev and choreographed by James Sofranko. Spoilers: It was really good and a really good adaptation of the play. This is the second of 3 episodes about Romeo and Juliet adaptations. 

A deep dive into Baz Luhrmann's 1996 Romeo + Juliet starring Leonardo DiCaprio and Claire Danes. I take a look at the source play and then the adaptation itself. Spoiler: I don't think it's very good, but it is an interesting movie that's worth seeing. This is the first of 3 episodes about Romeo and Juliet adaptations.

A deep dive / historical record of Opera Orlando's January 2024 performance of "Frida," Robert Xavier Rodriguez's 1991 opera about Mexican artist Frida Kahlo. There's not much about this opera online and I enjoyed it a lot, so this is my contribution to posterity.

A deep dive into Akira Kurosawa's 1957 film Throne of Blood , an adaptation of Shakepeare's Macbeth set in feudal Japan. Spoiler: this movie rules. This is the fourth and final part of my Macbeth-a-thon. (For now. Dun dun dun)

A look at Orlando Shakes's 2024 production of Macbeth . Spoiler: It was good and interesting and I really enjoyed it. (As much as one can "enjoy" the subject matter of Macbeth )