Narnia Fans » 2006 » August

In a world where most people get their news and information online and at their own schedule, Come Alive International, Inc., home to the Creation Festivals, Morocco’s Friendship Fest, Creation Concerts and Come Alive Cruises, announces the launch of a new endeavor that will offer the next generation of entertainment and information to the Christian community. MonsterPod.org aims to provide access to a variety of positive, cutting edge, encouraging, thought provoking, entertaining and faith-focused topics from Music, News, Entertainment, Sports, Health, Technology, and more, through the widely growing technology of podcasting.

“Although MonsterPod is a different medium of reaching people than hosting a concert or event, we feel it ties in nicely with the mission and vision of Come Alive International,” says Harry Thomas, MonsterPod co-founder. “Our goal for the site is to provide a community where everyone can find the information or entertainment they are looking for, in a clean, family-friendly environment.”

With a vision to offer a wide array of content for both the experienced and novice podcaster, MonsterPod has teamed with companies such as EMI Christian Music Group, Tooth And Nail Records and HearItFirst.com to be the exclusive provider of Christian music podcasts, including music videos, “behind the scenes” and “life on the road” documentaries, live performances and much more.

Other partners, contributing semi-exclusive content include Walden Media, BEC Recordings, Provident Label Group, Gotee Records, Word Label Group, Integrity Music, Floodgate Records, American Policy Roundtable Compassion International, Crown Financial Ministries, Faith & Action, Our Daily Bread, Moody Bible Institute and many others.

MonsterPod also presents daily and/or weekly content from the White House Press Office, CNN, C-Span, Reuters, AP, Forbes Magazine, Wall Street Journal, National Oceanic and Atmospheric Association (NOAA), PBS, NOVA, Sports Spectrum, FOX Sports, Major League Baseball and Harvard University to name a few.

In addition, MonsterPod will be providing exclusive online coverage of many of the major summer music festivals, and other events throughout the year.

“We are very excited about the partnerships we have made through Monsterpod,” explains Bill Darpino, co-founder and vice president of the site. “These companies have caught our vision and are jumping on board. Throughout the summer and fall, we will be adding and producing exclusive MP content, featured concert tour footage, creative independent podcasts, wild and creative exclusives found only on MP, and simply the best quality podcasts all in one site.”

About Come Alive International, Inc.:
Come Alive International, Inc. exists to reach contemporary society, especially youth, with the life-changing gospel of Jesus Christ. By the creative direction of the Holy Spirit, Come Alive utilizes the spoken word, music, mass- media, concerts, festivals and innovations in technology to carry out Christ’s command to “… go and make disciples of all nations”.

Come Alive International produces the annual Creation Northeast (Mount Union, PA) and Creation Northwest (George, WA) Festivals every summer, the largest Christian music and teaching festivals in the United States. Each spring and fall Come Alive promotes a series of concerts throughout the United States, called Creation Concerts, presenting some of the biggest tours in Christian Music. Additionally, Come Alive also coordinates Friendship Fest Morocco, in Marrakech, Morocco and Come Alive Cruises.

For more information about MonsterPod, or to express interest in providing content for the site, please visit monsterpod.org

Episode 4 of our podcast from NarniaFans.com for August 7, 2006. When you want to lose yourself in a great story, you can’t beat C.S. Lewis’ classic “Chronicles of Narnia.” When you want to find yourself in a great online community of Chronicles fans, you can’t beat narniafans.com and its forum The Dancing Lawn.
NarniaFansCast is the voice of this great community.

~If you are interested in transcribing or editing our shows, send an email to NFC@narniafans.com with your name, age and why you would like to be on staff. If you are applying to be an editor, please also include a sample of your work.

~John announces our new contest!

~A wrap-up of the news.

~Andy and Paul are joined by London for the News Discussion.

~Our thoughts on the KNB EFX Group, Disney’s budget, and Europe.

~A new six-part weekly serial called Heart of Ice is introduced.

~The trio is reunited as Roger joins Andy and Paul for the Movie and Book Discussion.

~How do the Pevensies need to change in the next film?

~What needs to be established in this movie in order to make the next 2 movies successful?

~In Horse and His Boy, A knight saves Shasta from dying when he was a baby. Why does Shasta not ask for the knight’s name, or story?

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The first wave of 2006-07 single tickets are now available for purchase! Concerts released in the first wave include Rachmaninoff Piano Concerto No. 2, the world premiere of music from The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe, Preservation Hall Jazz Band, Magnificent Mendelssohn, Van Cliburn, Peter Cetera, Aaron Copland’s Greatest Hits, The Kingston Trio, Mickey Hart and Friends, A Colorado Christmas Presents Home for the Holidays, Glen Campbell, the Colorado premiere of Edgar Meyer’s Double Bass Concerto No. 2 and more! Click here to purchase tickets online, or call the Colorado Symphony Box Office at (303) MAESTRO (Monday-Saturday, 9 a.m.-6 p.m.).

We’ve just posted the second edition of the NarniaFans Mailbag. (Just a day later than planned.) We’ve answered seven letters this week, including such topics as the music in the teaser, interviews, when Dawn Treader may be filmed, and more!

Click here for the second NarniaFans Mailbag!

While the first Chronicles of Narnia, The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe, was shot in snowy New Zealand, the second installment, Prince Caspian, will likely shoot in the forests of Europe this coming January, says producer Mark Johnson.

Set for release in summer 2008, the four stars of the movie will be 2 1/2 years older, but luckily, after Prince Caspian the two older siblings, Peter and Susan, disappear. (Just as well, I prefer Edmund and Lucy anyway.) Andrew Adamson is returning as writer-director for the second Narnia installment.

A year after that he and Johnson will reteam to produce Voyage of the Dawn Treader, my favorite Narnia book, which includes a boy who turns into a dragon.

In August BG Touring are to perform ‘The Voyage of the Dawn Treader’ at the 2006 Edinburgh Festival.

BG Touring is a theatre company established by drama students from Bishop Grosseteste College in Lincoln. The students have taken on various roles needed to produce a successful show ranging from acting and set production, to lighting and costume. At last years Edinburgh Festival BG Touring received a four star review for their performance of the show ‘The Flood’.

‘The Voyage of the Dawn Treader’ is a great family show with humour and adventure. The show is the fifth story in the ‘Chronicles of Narnia’ and is a great sequel to the movie ‘The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe’ which was released in UK cinemas in December 2005.

The play surrounds the magical voyage of Lucy and Edmund as they journey back to Narnia, where accompanied and protected by Aslan, the children battle mystical powers across the high seas in search of the seven missing Lords. With lavish costumes and a realistic lion the show is enthralling for young and old.

BG Touring has worked hard to produce this first class show, alongside studying for their degrees. They have put many hours and a lot of effort into preparing and rehearsing.

The company would not be able to attend the festival without the support and funding from BGC and The Higher Education Innovations Fund. The company have also raised awareness and funds by undertaking a car wash and a college Big Brother event.

The company also has groups of street theatre performers and a samba band who will be performing in Edinburgh so look out for the singing nuns, mischievous gnomes and lively scouts.

The show is running from 22nd – 25th August at Augustine’s Theatre, Edinburgh

To book tickets visit www.edfringe.com or call the box office on 0131 226 5138

‘The trip to Edinburgh, in my opinion is an invaluable experience to all students involved. It was a fantastic event, worth all the hard work.’ Quote from BG Touring Student who attended last year’s festival.

Walt Disney Co.’s third-quarter earnings made another double-digit jump, this time fully a 40% improvement, thanks to continued strength in television advertising, home-video sales and hefty theme-park growth, the entertainment giant reported Wednesday.

Burbank, Calif.-based Disney said net income was $1.13 billion, or 53 cents a share, on sales of $8.62 billion, for the three months ended July 1, compared with $811 million, or 39 cents, earned on sales of $7.72 billion reported in the third quarter of fiscal 2005.

Results in the latest quarter included a $30 million net benefit, or about 2 cents a share, from the completion of Disney’s acquisition of Pixar Animation Studios.
Analysts polled by Thomson First Call had expected the company to earn, on average, 44 cents a share on sales of $8.6 billion.

Studio entertainment revenue improved 17% to $1.7 billion, carried by the strong DVD performance of “The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe,” as well as lower distribution costs caused by fewer returns of unsold DVDs by retailers and reduced marketing costs.

[Read the rest at Market Watch]

Our friend Howard Berger has informed us that he and his team are back on Prince Caspian. They’ve begun early preparation work for the film. Here’s part of the e-mail:

Very exciting things that will be better than the first, but still have the amazing heart and wonder we all created the first time. We have been designing some of the creatures for the film for the past 4 weeks and things are looking good. We have some new takes on some of our old friends that should make Narnia an even more amazing place to visit.

KNB EFX is also working on a large film that we’re very excited for: Transformers!

[Read our Exclusive Interview from March of this year]

Movie studio 20th Century Fox and Walden Media, the company behind “The Chronicles of Narnia” films, have formed a joint venture to produce and market family friendly films, the companies said Tuesday.

The move gives Walden, which has been producing films with a number of studios, a permanent home for future projects while giving Fox the means to expand its reach into the lucrative family entertainment sector.

Walden, which is owned by Denver billionaire Philip Anschutz, will remain an independent entity under the deal with its own production staff. Current projects under development with rival studios, including The Walt Disney Co., Paramount Pictures and New Line, also will remain in place.

The new, as yet unnamed joint venture, will market and promote films generally rated “G” and “PG,” including movies that will be contributed to the venture by both Walden and Fox.

As part of the deal, Fox will have first look rights at future projects from Bristol Bay Productions, Walden Media’s sister company under Anschutz Film Group. Bristol Bay’s past projects include 2004’s “Ray” and 2005’s “Sahara.”

Fox has been focusing on the family audience once owned almost exclusively by Disney. Fox has been releasing more animated films, such as Ice Age.

The studio also distributed the home video of Mel Gibson’s The Passion of the Christ and last year launched a website to target Christian and family films directly to a religious audience.

“‘G’ and ‘PG’-rated pictures make up 10% of films released, but they dominate the marketplace with almost 30% of the gross,” Fox Filmed Entertainment co-chairmen and chief executives Jim Gianopulos and Tom Rothman said in a statement.

“It’s a great business to be in and this venture is a great fit between our two companies.”

Last year, after the success of The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe, which was released by Disney, Walden started a book publishing unit and began to explore a potential partnership with a studio.

The new label already has a number of films under development, including Mr. Magorium’s Wonder Emporium, starring Dustin Hoffman and Natalie Portman, and City of Ember, based on Jeanne DuPrau’s novel and produced by Tom Hanks and Gary Goetzman for Playtone Productions.

Walden already has started work on a sequel called The Chronicles of Narnia: Prince Caspian which is based on the third book in the C.S. Lewis series. It’s scheduled to be in theaters by the summer of 2008.

Episode 3 of our podcast from NarniaFans.com for August 7, 2006. When you want to lose yourself in a great story, you can’t beat C.S. Lewis’ classic “Chronicles of Narnia.” When you want to find yourself in a great online community of Chronicles fans, you can’t beat narniafans.com and its forum The Dancing Lawn.
NarniaFansCast is the voice of this great community.

This episode of NarniaFansCast brings back our usual panelists Paul Martin (Specter), Roger Thomas (PrinceOfTheWest) and last but not least our host Andy Flipowich (Holyboy666) to answer the questions of the Narnia fandom, give you the top news stories, and a short piece by John Burkitt called “Unicorns in Love.”

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[Here's a direct link to the file, just in case you don't have iTunes]