"Catches on quick doesn't she!"

Or things I learned while ESCAPING real life.

Snake Plissken. I've dug Snake for 25 years now. Like MacReady, Plissken comes and goes into my life whenever he pleases. We're both older, crankier and know what we want and dislike.

Snake Plissken is the ultimate reincarnation of the spaghetti western gunfighter. He is the Man with No Name, he is Django, he is the Stranger and even Angel Eye(s). Plissken is all these storied bad asses and then something else entirely. The last and greatest individual in a society bereft of them. I didn't want Snake, I wanted to BE Snake.

Unlike just about any other movie I've enjoyed & loved, I can always return to EFNY and react the same way when I first viewed a cut for tv version back in 1983. The awe, excitement, wonder and laughs still come. Dialogue falls out of my mouth every single time. I may go back and forth between Mac and Snake being my favorite characters of all time, but nobody gets me cheering and sneering like Snake.

And that brings me to the remake issue. Just when I was about to make peace with the remake, a script review of the awful rewritten second draft by Jonathan Mostow pops up. I hope to whatever god is listening it DOESN'T happen. Some people just don't get Snake and that awesome but scary universe John, Nick, Kurt & Debra created. Jonathan Mostow is one of those people.

So after rewatching Escape from New York 3x in a 24 hour span recently and spurned on by the draft of the very crappy second remake script, I decided right then and there my in-process screenplay is a homage to Mr. Carpenter's incredible Escape films. Yep, films.

Escape From L.A. lingers too. I saw that in the theatre 15x. It was the chance to see my oldest character crush on the big screen, (I haven't seen EFN.Y. on the big screen yet.), and every single time I whooped and cheered right where I think John, Kurt and Debra wanted us to. I sometimes wonder how freaked Carpenter might be by predicting a future that's come to pass in a lot of ways. We're about two steps away from having a President like L.A.'s Cliff Robertson and if we were any more politically correct, I'd say please deport me to Los Angeles! So much in the Escape universe is true, and it's really scary. And funny. Thank goodness Plissken is around to set things right.

Regarding this site, I wanted a place where all my Escape interviews/essays and thoughts could be concentrated. I'm not trying to do anything that the one excellent Plissken page has done, but I can share some unique things I hope you'll all dig. Archive Interviews with Mr. Carpenter, the Adventures of Snake Plissken comic team & the late Mike McQuay. Sadly, the one time I spoke to Kurt we never got to discuss his legendary Carpenter men.

A new interview with Escape from New York still Photographer Kim Gottlieb-Walker is online. My thanks to Kim for her time, talent and patience. Looking forward to your book about working with John Carpenter and the casts/crews of Escape, The Fog and more.

Also drove up the dark passages of Broadway with EFNY/L.A. page webmaster Andreas to finally track down The Snake Plissken Chronicles creative team. We cornered 'em and made 'em talk. Those interviews will appear exclusively at Andreas' ode to all things Snake.

You might see other pages eventually, but no reviews. ESCAPE FROM NEW YORK remains my all time favorite movie (tied with THE THING) so I really don't think a review will say anything that the rest of the site doesn't.

Because of real life, IHYWD won't be as expansive, but I think that Plissken fellah would approve. Might as well have some fun and start lookin' around...

I'm goin' in-

THANKS TO: Kurt Russell, John Carpenter, Mike McQuay, Toy Mangler, Andreas @ EFNY/LA pages, William O'Neill, Tone Rodriguez, Rod Whigham, Len Kaminiski, Nan, Kim Gottlieb-Walker and anyone whose ever helped me get or understand my Kurt Russell fix.