There were 3 separate mentions of Obama.  A search of my recent posts for his name ought to bring up each in different places.

In addition to the McCain comment, there was 1 Bill Clinton quote, at least 2 mentions of MLK, and 1 each of Robert Kennedy, Phil Ochs, Janis Joplin, Neil Young, Michael Jordan, Tiger Woods, Anne Sexton and Yvonne DeCarlo.  Several DS actors came up as well as his friend Rafer Johnson, and a lot of Errol Flynn. 

He writes (and acording to profstokes, said on Sunday) that people being people, will always doubt an idea like space travel, time travel, etc. until it actually happens. It doesn't defy the laws of physics. So time travel is not a non-issue, at least not according to Einstein and today's leading physicists

According to frankb, Stephen Hawking himself echoed one poster's skepticism ("Wouldn't you think that if time travel really was possible that someone from the future, when we should supposedly have the unlimited technology, would have already come back and visited us?"--KajunDC).  Hawking was quoted in the presentation as having posed the question, "Why haven't we been overrun by tourists from the future?"

LOL, I had no clue about the origin of the term "wormhole" until it was explained this weekend.

The Obama endorsement was disgusting. Using the Lincoln discussion as a jumping-off point for getting on his soapbox was uncalled for, and I would have thought David Selby would have more dignity than that.

Less dignified than, say, his entrance?  Just kidding. 

What you don't see on YouTube is that Selby next began the book discussion by painting a picture of the political climate of the era in which he first took on the role of Quentin-- the disillusionment and topsy turviness, the calls for change and unrest of a wartime that were not unlike current times.  His words hit home, I'm sure, for many in the audience.  He also stressed the importance of education then and now.  He performed "Lincoln's Better Angel," btw, as a play ("Lincoln and James") at the '97 Fest; it's a story about racism, the impact of war, mistrust and, eventually, of hope that is told in part through conversations between a proud black Viet Nam vet named Charles and the title President (who served in the Illinois House; Selby also pointed out that Chicago [Obama's home] was Lincoln's favorite city).  I purchased the book on Saturday (one of the last few copies; they apparently sold well) and I imagine that had he not brought up the Presidential campaign on stage, I probably would have made the comparisons between it and the characters' questions on my own, perhaps even wondering how Lincoln and Charles would be affected by current events.  But anyway,  I think it's difficult to capture the sentiment of Selby's talk without having been there to see it, but I will say that the brief references to Obama and segues between his story and modern political issues seemed seamless and quite dignified.

There is a time and a place for discussing one's political views, and that was not it.

In previous discussions about her books, Diana Millay has revealed that she practices Wicca.  Lara Parker has often talked about returning to school to study writing.  Roger Davis showed festival attendees a video for his real estate development project.  If there's a rule about actors not talking about their personal interests during Festivals, I doubt that many of them know about it.

If he had been asked who he was supporting at a Q&A session, that would be fine, but going from discussing the Lincoln project to "VOTE OBAMA!" was ridiculous.

What he said was, "I have the greatest respect for McCain" but "I will probably vote for Barack Obama."

TOO funny!

Thanks for your patience, Taeylor.  And to anyone who was receiving errors today when trying to attach Fest pics, MB has since created a new upload folder.

Sorry, 4everfridean, my point was that it was the move from his seated spot that got him into trouble.  Didn't mean to offend, and how funny is it that we had the same seats on opposite sides of the aisle?  It's like the PT mirror image slide in Frank Borzellieri's presentation. 

Are you sure Mark wasn't going to be with him, though?  If JF did fly it alone, I'm really proud of him, since I think it's been several years since he's flown anywhere.

Exactly, he hadn't flown since the 90s!  I'm sure; Mark left Sunday night (babies don't wait ) so it fell on Pierson to take JF to the airport.

Hi again, borgosi!!

I was there, and I did not feel that Jonathan was being disrespecful to Grayson.Someone in the audience asked him about her because he had talked about Thayer David.  Jonathan said, "she was a bit much" but he was referring to her acting style. I think he felt guilty saying that because he said, "I really shouldn't say this" He al;so said, We got along. and I respected her.

Thank you, Ronny G!  I think this account captures the moment perfectly.

Fantastic picture, Joe.

Once it was Roger and Marie, though, we actually saw some action to go with the words.

Ah, but that great kiss between Adam and Eve preceded her scene with Roger Davis.

Roger really got into the role and gave far and away the best stage performance.  He actually interacted with Marie rather than simply reading the lines as the others did.  Lara had very few lines overall but brought the audio passion one would expect from Angelique.

I'm glad you enjoyed Roger's performance, and it's with all due respect to you that I say that I feel the opposite about it.  First off, he is the only participant that didn't say his lines into the microphone but instead faced the other actor in his scenes.  And I'm sure more will be explained about the script in the coming days, but one scene called for Jeff to escalate in his physical intimidation of Eve, and Marie Wallace became so increasingly uncomfortable that she felt the need to announce, "Pretend he's choking me" in an apparent effort to thwart Roger.

I don't know what happened with Lara Parker's microphone but I would assume the audio crewmember had good reason to attempt to make an adjustment to it while she continued reading.   So her ad lib, "We can get to the moon..." seemed, to me at least, unprofessional and totally unnecessary.

So I take it Jim Storm was not there this year?

Right, he wasn't.