We have liftoff! I repeat: we have liftoff!

Save a little space in your weekend for "A Hazy Shade of Winter," the first installment in Jukebox's and my collaboration. Each of the three stories/chapters will have its own title, and though you can probably guess the name of the third one already, I'll keep the second title to myself for the moment. ;-) I will, however, tell you that we're calling the series as a whole The White Album - and that I've made a tag of the title so you can trace the progression of our collaboration more easily, if you're into that sort of thing. I am. ;-) Of course, I'll also have a "Peek Beneath the Duct Tape" for each chapter/story; and I'm sure Jukebox will have a "Behind the Music" or two...or three.

In the meantime, you can consider this post to be your final tease before the big event. I've blogged before about "casting" my stories with real people on occasion, and The White Album was no exception. In fact, Jukebox and I actually wrote one character with a certain person in mind right from the start. After awhile, I had so many players running around in my head that I decided to make a special post about it, all by itself. And here it is.

Three notes before you meet the players: 1) This is not everyone I've cast, just the ones who show up in "A Hazy Shade of Winter." 2) Not all the characters below are equally important, and you can't assume anything from the order in which the pictures are arranged. I just put them in what I thought was the most attractive layout. 3) You should not take these images as canon. I have no idea how Jukebox imagines any of our characters except for the one we agreed would be "played by" _____ _____. This is just how these people look in my imagination.

A few days ago, I was browsing through the Hedony Design website when I ran across the picture at right and said to myself, "Holy crap, that's Carly!" Not that I think Carly would be into latex, but I do think she'd wear a halter top like this if it was made of some other material. I've always pictured her as a Coyote Ugly kind of gal, though not as traditionally gorgeous as the actresses in the movie. And to be honest, this model (Elyther) is a bit too pretty, but she has the right body type, the right hair, and the right attitude.

On the right in this picture is Naomi Watts, whom I cast in A Tenpack of Trixies. Today, however, she's Sir Not-Appearing-in-this-Story. But Ann Miller somehow became my Flora very early on. That probably gives Jukebox fits, since he wrote the description of Flora as looking like she's just stepped out of a Tom Wolfe novel. As for me, I've never read Tom Wolfe, but somehow I get the impression his characters don't dress much like this. Unfortunately, I can't control my subconscious. It gave me Ann Miller in Mulholland Drive mode, and I'm stuck with her. ;-)

This is Parminder Nagra as Abby. I browsed through a lot of pictures of this actress before finding just the right one to convey Abby-ness, and this is definitely it. Plus, she's wearing a winter coat here, which fits the setting of the story...but that's just gravy. It's Parminder's overall look that I like in this shot.

Dalila was almost impossible to cast, but once I decided to write this blog post, I hunted through my collection until I came up with a shot of Mela von Winter (great coincidence with the name, eh?) by Silent View. I have a lot of pictures of Mela looking Dalila-ish, but I chose this one because of the whole scene.

Last but not least, here's Tilda Swinton as Renata. She's another character I cast very early on, so it was just a matter of finding the right picture for this post. The photographer is Craig McDean, and yes, this is the way he wanted the pic to be viewed: greenish and sideways. Works for me! ;-)