Criticizing the Critics, & futterwacking around the Alice Movie Paradox

[Warning! Spoiler alert! It was all a dream!]

When Lewis Carroll published a few thousand copies of Alice's Adventures in Wonderland in 1865, with no hype or buzz, it received some mixed reviews. That's one of the few things Tim Burton's Alice in Wonderland has in common with Carroll's original stories. The critics were out this week, and occasionally perceptive. As of this morning, the "top critics" that Rotten Tomatoes tracks average at about 59% (between rotten tomato and ripe tomato), with the general masses giving it about 53%. Manohla Dargis of the New York Times, one of my favorite critics to disagree with, had some interesting insight into the Alice Paradox in movies:

Dark and sometimes grim, this isn’t your great-grandmother’s Alice or that of Uncle Walt, who was disappointed with the 1951 Disney version of “Alice in Wonderland.” “Alice has no character,” said a writer who worked on that project. “She merely plays straight man to a cast of screwball comics.” Of course the character of Carroll’s original Alice is evident in each outrageous creation she dreams up in “Wonderland” and in the sequel, “Through the Looking-Glass,” which means that she’s a straight man to her own imagination. (She is Wonderland.) Here she mostly serves as a foil for the top biller Johnny Depp, who (yes, yes) plays the Mad Hatter, and Mr. Burton’s bright and leaden whimsies.

Her conclusion, however, is vague and baffling:

This isn’t an impossible story to translate to the screen, as the Czech filmmaker Jan Svankmajer showed with “Alice” (1988), where the divide between reality and fantasy blurs as it does in dreams. It’s just hard to know why Mr. Burton, who doesn’t seem much interested in Alice, bothered.

The great Roger Ebert, at the Chicago Sun-Times, admits he didn't care for the books growing up, which possibly explains some of his strange tangents:

This has never been a children's story. There's even a little sadism embedded in Carroll's fantasy. It reminds me of uncles who tickle their nieces until they scream. "Alice" plays better as an adult hallucination, which is how Burton rather brilliantly interprets it until a pointless third act flies off the rails. It was a wise idea by Burton and his screenwriter, Linda Woolverton, to devise a reason that Alice (Mia Wasikowska) is now a grown girl in her late teens, revisiting a Wonderland that remains much the same, as fantasy worlds must always do.

[...]

Burton shows us Wonderland as a perturbing place where the inhabitants exist for little apparent reason other than to be peculiar and obnoxious. Do they reproduce? Most species seem to have only one member, as if nature quit while she was ahead.

How could he not develop that shocking exposée? Who was the Duchess's baby daddy? Is there a Mrs. Mock Turtle!? I wish Carroll was around to explain the laws of dream procreation.
One more quote, I'll give Elizabeth Weizman of New York Daily News my highly coveted Saying Nothing Award:

"Frabjous" may be a word Carroll invented, but Burton knows just what it means, at least in his own mind. He's clearly excited to invite us inside, and as long as you're open to so much muchness, you'll be very glad he did.

This parsing of critics possibly to be continued... In the meantime, I have several questions:

-How come no one has discussed the influence of Miranda Richardson's Queen Elizabeth I from BBC's "Blackadder II" (1986) on Helena Bonham Carter's Red Queen?

-Why was the Dodgson-esque figure named Charles at the beginning Alice's dead father? What?

-Did the bizarre Chinese trade-route plot-line at the finale, which was guided on by the blue butterfly (née Caterpillar), have anything to do with opium (i.e., the possible contents of the Caterpillar's pipe)? I know it was 2am and I had a headache from two hours of drinking wine in an IMAX with 3D glasses, but I think I may be onto a possible explanation for the otherwise unexplainable China thing.

Just the day to see Alice in Wonderland... (1903)

At 12.01am this morning the curtain rose on Tim Burton's Alice in Wonderland. If the last five months of hype have left you cold, how about being truly perverse and making today the day you watched the first Alice movie ever made?

Alice in Wonderand (1903), carefully restored by the British Film Institute's National Archive, is now available online. In fact you can watch it right now, right here:



A fascinating article about the restoration project appears on the British Film Institute's website. Apparently, the film featured the first British actor ever to be named in the credits of a film: it was the collie dog glimpsed at 3:16 minutes in, later to star in Rescued by Rover (1905). Now you know.

From the March 5th - 15th, the BFI will be hosting a "brief rabbit-hole retro," with a selection of the most notable Alice films, from Paramount's 1933 star-studded oddity, through to Jan Svankmajer’s 1988 masterpiece of taxidermy. All films will be shown at the London Southbank Centre. For a full schedule and ticket information, see the BFI website.

Alice's Kitchen Sink Released on March 2nd, 2010

Paramount's Alice in Wonderland (1933), directed by Norman Z. McLeod, has been mentioned a lot in the past few weeks, as the first big Hollywood all-star blow-out adaptation of Lewis Carroll's books (with such stars as Cary Grant, Gary Cooper and W.C. Fields.) Slightly lost amongst the thousands of other Alices being released this month was the fact that this film, which was never released on VHS or DVD, is finally available (list price $19.99). Why is it being released as Universal Homes Entertainment? Our source from inside Paramount answers that question:

Back in 1957, Paramount sold most (but not all) of its pre-1948 film library to Universal for some quick cash (at the time, Paramount was ailing, financially). Thus, a number of Paramount films are now distributed by Universal, under their corporate and home video label [...] Paramount no longer owns the rights to these films.

There's a review from the New York Times here.

Also released on DVD on March 2nd is the SyFy miniseries Alice (list price $19.99), which originally aired last December. Jonathan Miller's 1966 adaptation was issued on DVD (featuring John Gielgud, Peter Cook, Peter Sellers; list price $14.98). I noticed that Amazon has a deal selling all three for $38.97, the price of which won't even get a family of three into the IMAX to see Tim Burton's Alice in Wonderland in 3D.

There's more: Hallmark's "overblown" 1999 television special of Alice in Wonderland (with Whoopi Goldberg, Martin Short and Christopher Lloyd) is being reissued on DVD (list price, $19.99) along with its companion Through the Looking Glass (with Geoffrey Palmer and Ian Holm; list price only $9.98!)

Now, several tie-ins to the Disney movie were also released March 2nd: several hot new video games for Nintendo Wii (list price $39.99), Nintendo DS (list price $29.99), and a Disney Interactive computer game for PC ($19.99). The movie soundtrack by Danny Elfman was released on March 2nd (list price $18.98). And merchandise, merchandise, merchandise, too much to mention here.

Did you know Alice stories can also be purchased in a book form? Many editions of this "book" were released in conjunction with the big movie premiere, but the only book rolled out on March 2nd (to keep true to the theme of this post), was one called "The Real Alice in Wonderland: A Role Model for the Ages" by C.M. Rubin and Gabriela Rubin (list price, $29.95), from AuthorHouse. A day after it was released, it appears to already be out of stock. From the product description:

In 2006, award-winning author C.M. Rubin and her daughter, Gabriella Rubin (who are related to the Liddell family), began an incredible journey to create the ultimate book about the original Alice in Wonderland's life. Their grand pictorial, biographic vision for the book involved collecting photographs spanning two centuries, reaching out to many celebrated Alice in Wonderland artists (including Vik Muniz, Annie Liebovitz, Mark Steele, Lizzy Rockwell, Helen Oxenbury, Frances Broomfield, Jeanne Argent, David Cooper, Bruce Fuller, Tatiana Ianovskaia, Jewel, and Tom Otterness), and connecting with museums, libraries and schools around the world. The Real Alice in Wonderland book is told using never before seen pictures along with prominent voices from Alice’s lifetime and from the present day. C.M. Rubin and her daughter Gabriella explore the theme of inspiration. Behind every great person there is the person who inspires and believes in him or her. The person who motivates them to realize their dreams. This magnificent cross-atlantic epic will fascinate you -- it will make you think again: what does it mean to inspire?
The Real Alice In Wonderland book is dedicated to all those who inspire the minds and souls of human beings.

However, don't miss Simply Read Books edition of Alice's Adventures in Wonderland by Lewis Carroll, no longer out of print, with Iassen Ghiuselev's unique and beautiful illustrations, reissued in hardcover on March 1st (list price, $24.95).

Rated PG for Hookah-Smoking Caterpillar

I just noticed that Tim Burton's Alice In Wonderland is rated PG "for fantasy action/violence involving scary images and situations, and for a smoking caterpillar." Wonderful! Disney's 1951 version, which also contains a smoking caterpillar, is rated simply G. Therefore, since All Scotchmen are Non-Dragons, and a fish with three rows of teeth is not to be despised, it would follow that it was not that hookah-smoking caterpillar which increased the rating from G to PG.

Smoking in movies is of course a contentious issue, with many organizations and websites tracking Hollywood for how it portrays tobacco use. (There's something called the "Hackadamy Awards", presented by the Breathe California of Sacramento-Emigrant Trails, for smoke-free movies. Nine, for instance, got the year's biggest Thumbs Down for providing "a depressingly perfect example by lavishly promoting cigarette and cigar smoking as emblems of sexiness, wealth, power, coolness and relaxation.) Shisha is not something they come across very often, so I'm curious to see how this goes down.

Alan Rickman (the great actor famous for his Professor Severus Snape) is playing the voice of the Caterpillar in the new film!

"Alice's Theme": Music & Lyrics by Danny Elfman

Danny Elfman's soundtrack to Tim Burton's Alice In Wonderland will be released on CD (an ancient kind of optical disc used to store digital audio) next Tuesday, March 2nd, and there's some short clips at the Amazon store if you desire a teaser. I couldn't help noticing the opening song - with children's voices singing "Oh, Alice, dear where have you been?" - and I found the complete lyrics at a blog called cinemusic.net. I'll include them with that website's charming introduction:

Tim Burton’s Alice in Wonderland, starring Johnny Depp as Elijah Wood The Mad Hatter begins pissing off prickly Lewis Carroll purists on March 5, 2010 in theaters everywhere in eye-popping 3D. Lending musical support is Burton’s constant composer Danny Elfman, AKA film music’s most awesome red head.

Threaded throughout the score is an original song penned by Elfman, called “Alice’s Theme”, and it opens up the Disney Records score album due in stores on March 2 (obligatory Amazon link). Here’s a sneak peek at the song’s lyrics (thanks to the supremely talented LD for these)…

“Alice’s Theme”

Music and Lyrics by Danny Elfman

Oh, Alice, dear where have you been?

So near, so far or in between?

What have you heard what have you seen?

Alice, Alice, please, Alice!

Oh, tell us are you big or small

To try this one or try them all

It’s such a long, long way to fall

Alice, Alice, oh, Alice

How can you know this way not that?

You choose the door you choose the path

Perhaps you should be coming back

Another day, another day

And nothing is quite what is seems

You’re dreaming are you dreaming, oh, Alice?

(Oh, how will you find your way? Oh, how will you find your way?)

(There’s not time for tears today. There’s no time for tears today.)

So many doors – how did you choose

So much to gain so much to lose

So many things got in your way

No time today, no time today

Be careful not to lose your head

Just think of what the doormouse [sic] said…Alice!

Did someone pull you by the hand?

How many miles to Wonderland?

Please tell us so we’ll understand

Alice…Alice…Oh, Alice

(Oh how will you find you way? … Oh, how will you find you way?)

Sing along!

I've never met a prickly Lewis Carroll purist, let alone a pissed-off one, but I would presume they're easily decapitated with a vorpal sword. Or defenestrated with a defibrillator.

Anyway, if you are not familiar with Mr. Elfman, he is the film composer and long-time collaborator with Mr. Burton, the man wrote the iconic music for Batman, The Simpsons theme, and those wonderful songs for The Nightmare Before Christmas. He has done less-than-stellar work for some of Mr. Burton's more recent mediocrities. Elfman is often mocked in the classical world for basically having a team of composers do his work for him, although I sometimes feel this criticism is harsh. (After all, Renaissance painters employed whole crews of apprentices, Dale Chihuly has a studio to manifest his glass-art masterpieces, and George Gershwin didn't do the orchestrations for Rhapsody in Blue (free round of drinks if you can name the composer who did!) Art is not always the product of an agonized solo genius, sometimes she can be more of an architectural designer, et cetera, especially in the film music world. Thus ends this parenthetical rant.)

As dear to my adolescent heart as Elfman's music for The Nightmare Before Christmas is, there's many cringeworthy lyrics (e.g., "I wish my cohorts weren't so dumb / I'm not the dumb one / You're no fun / Shut up! / Make me!") I would pay a large sum of money to hire William Shatner to read the lyrics to "Alice's Theme" as a beat poem accompanied by bongos and upright bass (as he did for Sarah Palin's verbiage). In conclusion, Mr. Elfman should hire a real librettist.

Movie Anti-Hype: The Onion's A.V. dreading another Alice movie

In regards to what we wrote below, that many writers have taken on the theme of "all those awful Alice movies" in anticipation of the imminent Tim Burton 3D one (in seven days!), The Onion's A.V. Club lists Lewis Carroll's Alice books in a series on movies that have been adapted to death. Allow me to quote liberally from "Put the book back on the shelf: Literary works that should never be adapted to film or TV again" (February 17th, 2010):

[...] The world doesn’t need a fifth Indiana Jones movie, or any more big-screen retreads of ’80s cartoons that weren’t that great to begin with. And it especially doesn’t need yet another weak reconceptualization of Romeo And Juliet, or yet another stuffy screen version of Pride And Prejudice to join the wave of them that started back in 1938. In fact, here’s a list of just a few of the literary works that have officially been done to death—and some recommendations for where to find newer, fresher stories just waiting on the page.

Book: Lewis Carroll’s Alice’s Adventures In Wonderland and Through The Looking-Glass

Adaptations to date: More than three dozen, notably including the 1951 animated Disney musical version and big-event 1985 and 1999 TV miniseries. Other countries have released their own versions as well; there’s a 24-episode Japanese animated adaptation, an Argentinean mime version, and nationalist versions like 1966’s Alice Of Wonderland In Paris and 1979’sAlice In Spanish Wonderland. Plus, of course, the upcoming Tim Burton sequel to Carroll’s original stories.

Definitive version: The Disney version is probably best known. While it has its own charms, though, it liberally diverges from Carroll’s text, like most Disney adaptations.

Why steer clear? The Alice books are simultaneously two of the most-adapted novels in history, and among the most habitually worst-adapted. Film and TV versions necessarily tend to elide over the original books’ densely packed puns and references, and instead concentrate on spectacle or on drearily plodding through a series of events that should be sprightly and disorienting, yet somehow not manic. It’s a difficult balance, and one that directors rarely seem to get right. What’s left behind is a bunch of creative, fun ideas that have had the creativity and fun leached out through repetition. How many times can we watch Alice grow, shrink, and boggle at it all?

What to adapt instead? Other Carroll works, including his novel Sylvie And Bruno and his poem “The Hunting Of The Snark,” bring in as much clever nonsense, wordplay, and episodic adventure, but are less line-by-line familiar.

Sylvie & Bruno!! How about that? The list continues with A Christmas Carol, The Bible, and other books that will by no means stop inspiring filmmakers in our lifetimes.

More Tim Burton movie hype at the LA Times blog Hero Complex

It's now only two weeks from opening night of the Tim Burton Disney 3D Spectacular. There's posters all over bus stops in the East Bay Area, California. The LCSNA is preparing for the plunge (in lieu of the macropsiacal interest in Carroll) by revamping its website, which will integrate this blog (that's right, we're moving! so watch for a White Rabbit), all of this pretty soon.

The Winter 2009 edition of the Knight Letter (no. 83) featured an article by Daniel Singer called "Off With Their Heads! Those Awful Alice Movies." (The Knight Letter is the LCSNA's magazine, sent to subscribers for the membership fee of $35.) Of course, this theme is being taken up now all over, retrospectives of the century-plus of mediocre Alice in Wonderland movies. Susan King at the Los Angeles Times blog Hero Complex took a stab at the topic, beginning her article: "The first known 'Alice in Wonderland' film ... was made in 1903, just 68 years after Lewis Carroll first published his fantasy 'Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland.'" Perhaps she's onto advanced rabbithole mathematics, and that works in base 17 or something. We recommend the Daniel Singer article if you can dig up a Knight Letter.

Elsewhere at Hero Complex, they quote Tim Burton discussing his Red Queen (played by his partner Helena Bonham Carter):

"In lots of illustrations and incarnations of Carroll's work through the years, it always seems like she had a big head. It was an interesting challenge for us to find the right size and weight and proportions. One of the things we wanted to do was to use the actors and their performances -- to use the real them -- and then make them different. It's still their performance but it's just made weird. We wanted to achieve this blend. That was an important dynamic."

"In a lot of children's literature and other literature it's kind of the same thing over and over -- there's good queens and bad queens, and here you have that but the elements are a bit blurred," Burton said. "Everybody's weird and has weird qualities to them. She's kind of a mixture. When I look at her now, she reminds me of pictures I've seen of Leona Helmsley. There's a tiny bit of elements of my mother in there too, for some strange reason. And Helena brings her own things to it too."

Screening of McLeod's Alice in Wonderland (1933) in Vancouver this Weekend

Do we have any readers in Vancouver? Near Vancouver? I don't know, but if we do they should go to Vancity Theatre - the Vancouver International Film Center - on Sunday to see a rare screening of Norman Z. McLeod's Alice in Wonderland from 1933. See Cary Grant as you have never seen him before - totally concealed inside a giant mock turtle suit!

From the Vancity Theatre website:

"Extravagant all-star assaults on the work of Lewis Carroll – like the forthcoming Tim Burton-Johnny Depp movie – are nothing new, as this rare item from the vaults of Paramount Pictures goes to show. With a screenplay by Joseph L Mankiewicz (All About Eve) and designed by William Cameron Menzies (Gone with the Wind), this has considerable pedigree even before you check out the cast list.

"But what a cast it is! WC Fields steals the show as Humpty Dumpty, but underneath splendid (if uncomfortable-looking) costumes you may also recognize the voices of Cary Grant as the mock turtle, Edward Everett Horton as the Mad Hatter, Gary Cooper is the White Knight, and Edna May Oliver as the Red Queen. Curiouser and curiouser, it has never been released on DVD or VHS."

Alice in Wonderland, Sunday, January 10th, 2.30pm. All ages.
Vancity Theatre, 1181 Seymour St, Vancouver, BC, Canada, V6B 3M7

Rumors of an Indian Alice in Wonderland Movie

There's Bollywood buzz of a big budget Indian Alice in Wonderland. The gossip from One India:

Quick Gun Murugun director Shashanka Ghosh is planning an Indian version of Alice in Wonderland. The film’s lead character will be named Alisha and it will be a modern version of the story.

The film’s script will be written by Samit Basu (writer of Simogin Prophecies). Shashanka wants the movie’s special effects to match up to international fantasy hits like The Lord of the Rings and Harry Potter.

Actresses Katrina Kaif, Soha Ali Khan and Sonam Kapoor are being considered for the lead role. A character, based on that of the Alice in Wonderland writer Lewis Caroll will be added in the film.

Lou Bunin's 1949 animated Alice in Wonderland showing in L.A. on Saturday

Cinefamily, a "movie lover" organization in L.A., will be showing Lou Bunin's Alice in Wonderland at the Silent Movie Theatre, 611 N. Fairfax Avenue, Los Angeles, CA 90036. Two shows on Saturday, November 28th, at 5:00 & 7:30pm, for $12. Here's the description & musical clip from their listing:

Alice In Wonderland (1949)
This ambitious, highly faithful late-'40s Alice adaptation took years to complete, and features an abundance of impressive, meticulous and labor-intensive stop-motion work from pioneer puppeteer Lou Bunin. After a live-action prologue showing the historical inspirations for the major characters, Alice (a decidedly adult Carol Marsh) is quickly launched into surreal realms of design and color. Remarkably, the film stays true to the original novel's anarchic construction, and the inspiration of Victorian illustrator John Tenniel's Alice imaginings. Bunin's handiwork is at its peak during the musical numbers, which dunk you head-first into the film's opium-riddled dreamworld--and in addition, live-action director Dallas Bower comes up with clever, simple solutions to the FX limitations of the day. Originally suppressed by Disney for fear of its potential upstaging of their own animated Alice, Bunin's work comes to you here at the Cinefamily in a rare screening of a beautiful MOMA-restored 35mm print!
Dirs. Dallas Bower & Lou Bunin, 1949, 35mm, 76 min.

The Hunting of the Snark - New Short Film Premiers Saturday in Queens

Strange creepy creatures come out of your dens, and go to the world premier of The Hunting of the Snark at the Queens International Film Festival on Saturday, November 14th, 2009. The 30-minute student film is the directorial debut of Peter Pavlakis, a Brooklynite. The synopsis sounds like the plot sticks close to the Carroll poem, and the film trailer has an actor reading verbatim one of the rhymed speeches - so, we can expect a bit of fidelity, not a psycho-sexual re-imagining of the Bellman returning to sea a decade later to confront his nightmarish inner demons (ending in a car chase).

This will be at noon tomorrow at the Frank Sinatra School of the Arts Charter Room, 35-12 35th Avenue, Queens, NY 11106.

Also coming out this week with the same title, the transatlantic "cosmopolitan post-bop" group NYNDK released "The Hunting of the Snark" on the label Jazzheads. The album includes hip versions of Charles Ives, Edward Grieg, and Carl Nielsen. The titular track (which can be heard online here) begins with some snarky outgribations on trombone, but I couldn't find any explanation for the use of the Carroll poem's title beyond catchy inspiration.

(Just a little) more ranting

Another opportunity for marketing to me missed... Apparently attendees of the Comic-Con presentation were told to follow the ImportantDate tweetstream, which eventually told followers how to get tickets into an offsite exhibit of props and costumes. Supposedly this will be a touring exhibition, but no where and when information is yet forthcoming.

Disney/Burton/Depp

After much accidental online leakage (I would very much like to know the story behind that - coerced intern? anarchist webgeek? media outlet that doesn't respect embargoes?) one day prior to Tim Burton's official showing at Comic-Con (with surprise visit from Johnny Depp) and an early release to Mad Hatter's fans on Facebook yesterday, the trailer for Alice in Wonderland is now up on the Disney website.

Probably not coincidentally, Disney also announced yesterday that an Alice game for the Wii, DS, and PC would be released the same week of the movie.

As a former marketing person, it is very interesting to see all of the various games and gimmicks that they are dreaming up for this movie. On the other hand, they are not quite on top of their game... I signed up for Disney's mailing list despite my misgivings of giving the Mouse Corporation any of my private information. By signing up, I basically told them that they already have my $10 to see the movie on March 5, that I am their target audience, and that I will probably be talking about it to all of my friends for the next eight months. Soooooo.... why haven't I received any emails yet?!

Mickey in Wonderland

If you need a bigger Disney Alice in Wonderland fix than a one-page website can provide and can't wait until March 5, 2010, check out the upcoming Mickey Mouse Clubhouse: Mickey's Adventures in Wonderland DVD. "Meet Tweedle Chip, Tweedle Dale and Goofy Hatter, play croquet with Queen Clarabelle and more!" Currently available for pre-order, the DVD releases on September 8.

Donald in Mathmagic Land

Disney's Academy Award-nominated Donald in Mathmagic Land (1959) is now out on DVD. While members of the Disney Movie Club (or wise online shoppers) have been able to get the regular version for a year or so, a "Classroom Edition" has just been released to the public. One amusing sequence has Donald--on a chessboard--dressed (and bewigged) as Alice.

Alice In Wondertown

New on DVD: "Inspired by Lewis Carroll's classic tale, Daniel Díaz Torres's Alice in Wondertown (First Run Features, 1990) is a absurdist comedy and an allegory with a dark political undercurrent. Alice is a drama teacher who goes on a cultural mission to a small town where the most bizarre occurrences are commonplace. Mirrors become doors, circus animals walk the streets, and it seems anything could happen - but everyone except Alicia seems resigned to the situation. She discovers before long that the town's population is made up of officials and workers who have been fired for violating rules minor or illusionary, and now cannot find their way out of this strange town."

Lewis Carroll reads

One of the great things about modern poetry is that we can listen or watch recordings of the poets themselves reading their works. Perhaps using a modified Wayback Machine, Jim Clark/poetryanimations has made it possible now to watch poets of the past "read" their works, including Lewis Carroll!

(Before you ask, the real reader is Justin Brett.)

Seattle International Film Festival

The Seattle International Film Festival's Bumbershoot short-film program this weekend includes two Alice-related offerings:
Jab, "A mixture of live action and 3D photo animation illustrate the weird and beautiful world of Lewis Carroll’s Jabberwocky."
Alice in Not So Wonderland, "From legendary stop-motion animators the Brothers Quay comes a dark and surreal variation on Alice in Wonderland, in which our puppet heroine suddenly finds herself on the other side of the looking glass, witnessing nightmarish scenes."

Pittsburgh and Colorado Springs, but not Sunderland

As mentioned in the last issue of the Knight Letter, the Pittsburgh Ballet Theatre will be performing the ballet of Alice in Wonderland April 17 to 20. Originally created for the English National Ballet, the performance is danced to pieces by Tchaikovsky and includes illusions such as roses that change color and the Duchess's "flying house" (!?). www.pbt.org/performances/alice.php
www.prnewswire.com/cgi-bin/stories.pl?ACCT=104&STORY=/www/story/03-27-2008/0004781489&EDATE=

Alice in a hookah lounge... with the Caterpillar performed by a male belly dancer... in Colorado Springs? Okay, sure, why not? The Moody Touring Mystery Theatre (http://moodytouringmysteries.com) performs at 40 Thieves Hookah Lounge (http://40thievesonline.com/)on Friday, March 28, and Saturday, March 29: www.csindy.com/gyrobase/Content?oid=oid%3A24182.

The yet-to-be-filmed Mischa Barton movie, Malice in Sunderland, is now Malice in Wonderland, due to lack of funds: http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/7316174.stm.

Fun stuff

According to The Muppet Newsflash blog, "The Sesame Street characters are set to appear in a retelling of a classic story in the all-new film "Abby in Wonderland". Giving Lewis Carroll's "Alice in Wonderland" a Muppety twist, the new DVD will star everyone's favorite Fairy-in-training, Abby Cadabby in her very own film. The musical film is currently in post-production and aimed to reach audiences in just a few months. While Abby takes on the role of Alice, the rest of the Sesame gang joins in (such as Elmo in the role of the Rabbit, Grover as the Mad Hatter, Cookie Monster as the Cheshire Cat, and Bert and Ernie as Tweedle Dee and Tweedle Dum). While the exact release date of this title has not been confirmed yet, I've been told that fans should expect to see Abby's first direct-to-DVD feature hitting stores in September 2008." www.muppetnewsflash.com/2008/03/sesame-street-dvds-coming-your-way.html

Among other new shows, the SciFi Channel announced on Tuesday that it has "commissioned a six-hour miniseries dubbed Alice, a modern day-retelling of Alice In Wonderland..." from the team that created last December's The Wizard of Oz tale Tin Man. www.multichannel.com/article/CA6542335.html

And on the "what were his parents' thinking" front: Lewis Carroll, age 16, made his field hockey debut in Dinnington, U.K., last week: www.dinningtontoday.co.uk/sport/Relegated-side-ready-for-break.3895510.jp