@colehaddon
Novelist, screenwriter, art fanatic. Created "DRACULA" for NBC/Sky, wrote PSALMS FROM THE END OF THE WORLD, and more. Listen to the 5AM STORYTALK PODCAST: https://pod.link/1807437928 Read the 5AM STORYTALK NEWSLETTER: https://colehaddon.substack.com/
Just before 2024’s US election, I wrote an essay about my relationship to Anne Frank, the Secret Annex, and how her father played a huge part in my decision to leave the US for good after the 2016 election. It’s also about America’s long relationship with Nazism and fascist ideologies.
Otto would go on to publish Anne’s personal writings in the hope they would help save others in the future from such pointless hate. Unfortunately, I think many of its lessons in the book have been lost on the world over the decades. I’ve never forgotten them, though.
Only Otto Frank, Anne’s father, would survive the holocaust.
THE DIARY OF A YOUNG GIRL — or, THE DIARY OF ANNE FRANK — was a formative experience for me as a human being. It eventually led me to Amsterdam, where I visited the Secret Annex where Anne, her family, and four others hid for 761 days until they were betrayed to the Nazis.
Anne Frank was murdered by the Nazis 81 years ago this month. I say “this month”, because nobody knows for sure the exact day she died at the Bergen-Belsen concentration camp (same for her sister Margot).
Ian Curtis of Joy Division on a snow bridge in Manchester, UK, 1979.
📸 Kevin Cummins.
“What will you sacrifice? What other things will you let go, to clear the space for your book?” — Hilary Mantel
Stunning independent poster for THE FLY (1958).
Art by Christopher Shy.
SCHMIGADOON! creator @cincopaul.bsky.social shares the game-changing screenwriting lesson he learned while writing DESPICABLE ME.
If you've ever felt like you're "wandering in the desert" before reaching Fade Out, this is for you!
Listen to more of this 5AM StoryTalk ep: pod.link/1807437928/e...
I’ve known RIKI LINDHOME for 20 years and I’m still intimidated by her fearlessness as an artist.
In this 5AM StoryTalk ep, we discuss how hitting a Hollywood brick wall forced her to invent a multi-media career on her own terms. A masterclass for any artist.
🎧📺 pod.link/1807437928/e...
Diahann Carroll, NYC, 1960.
Photograph by Milton H. Greene.
“When I sit down to write a book, I do not say to myself, ‘I am going to produce a work of art.’ I write it because there is some lie that I want to expose, some fact to which I want to draw attention, and my initial concern is to get a hearing.” — George Orwell
'Drought refugees from Oklahoma camping by the roadside', 1936.
Location: Arizona-California border.
Photograph by Dorothea Lange (American).
Be sure to check out Riki's 5AM StoryTalk bonus ep, too. She returns to break down A CHORUS LINE, which explains her entire life's trajectory and still influences every piece of art she creates.
I’ve known RIKI LINDHOME for 20 years and I’m still intimidated by her fearlessness as an artist.
In this 5AM StoryTalk ep, we discuss how hitting a Hollywood brick wall forced her to invent a multi-media career on her own terms. A masterclass for any artist.
🎧📺 pod.link/1807437928/e...
Chuck Berry and Debbie Harry on the set of “SOLID GOLD”, 1981.
📸 Chris Stein.
"Explanations always minimize things. I think that the viewers are far better served by having to confront the questions and find their own answers." — Michael Haneke
From the making of TROY (2004): Wolfgang Peterson directing Brad Pitt as Achilles.
📸 Unknown.
Bill Murray and Gilda Radner dancing at Studio 54, 1978.
📸 Adam Scull.
"Books are a form of political action. Books are knowledge. Books are reflection. Books change your mind." — Toni Morrison
LOGAN was released nine years ago today (Mar. 3, 2017). It’s one of two films co-written and directed by James Mangold that serve as cinematic swan songs for aging characters, pitting fading icons against dramatizations of their greatest emotional obstacles. This essay breaks down how he does it.
Great independent poster for EX MACHINA (2014), which I’m of the mind is one of the greatest science-fiction films ever made. What do you think of both?
Art by Rory Kurtz.
Is AI the final nail in our climate’s coffin?
Digital rights activist LIZZIE O'SHEA discusses how communities are fighting back against Big Tech’s massive environmental footprint.
Listen to the rest of 5AM StoryTalk's chat with Lizzie here: pod.link/1807437928/e...
Ray Charles and his sons on his tour bus, 1966.
📸 by Bill Ray.
“We try to make something better out of what is real. If we want to be successful as an artist, we make it better, and give meaning to something meaningless.” — Bob Dylan
'The True America. New York City, USA', 1968–1971.
Photograph by Ernest Cole (South African).
Grace Kelly in Montego Bay, Jamaica, 1955).
📸 by Howell Conant.
“Society cannot share a common communication system so long as it is split into warring classes. Thus for art to be 'unpolitical' means only to ally itself with the 'ruling' group.” — Bertolt Brecht
