Eric & Tilda

I'm sorry to say you won't find things here quite the way they are in the movies.
There's much less glamor and a lot more drudgery.
-"The Divided Path"
by Nial Kent

What do the actors Eric Bana and Tilda Swinton have in common? Well, both of them participated in the Tribeca Film Festival 2009 in New York City. They both agreed to be part of a filmmaker event series at the local Soho Apple Computer store in April 2009. I was able to attend both events and learned a bit more about each of them (before and after the events). I am a big fan of both Eric and Tilda. They are excellent actors.

Eric Bana is the actor known for his roles in Black Hawk Down, The Hulk, Troy, The Other Boleyn Girl, Munich and Star Trek. He made his directorial debut at the Tribeca Film Festival with ‘Love the Beast’, a documentary that tells the story of Eric Bana’s love affair with ‘The Beast’, his FORD GT Falcon Coupe automobile. I saw Eric on Monday, April 27, 2009 and took these portraits of him.

Eric was born on August 9, 1968 as ‘Eric Banadinovic’ in Melbourne, Australia. As a teen, he watched the Mel Gibson film ‘Mad Max’ (1979), and decided he wanted to become an actor. However, he did not seriously consider acting until 1991 when he was persuaded to try stand-up comedy while working as a barman at Melbourne's Castle Hotel. His Croatian father, Ivan, was a manager for Caterpillar, Inc., and his German-born mother, Eleanor, was a hairdresser. In 1995, Bana began dating Rebecca Gleeson, a publicist. They married in 1997, after Bana proposed to her on a trip to the United States that he won from Cleo Magazine after being named "Bachelor of the Year" in 1996. Bana and Gleeson have two children, a son Klaus (born July 1998), and a daughter Sophia (born April 2001). I detected the soon-to-be 41 year old as one still in touch with his 'child within'. I liked that because he would get so animated when talking about his fascination for this car he has had since he was a teen.

PHOTO: Rebecca Gleeson, Eric's wife
Eric will appear in ‘The Time Traveler’s Wife’ based on the book later this year. I read that book so I cannot miss it. I did not bother to see his Tribeca film, ‘Love the Beast’. The preview just did not appeal to me. It is clear that he certainly loves his car (it must stem way back to that Mad Max movie, a favorite film of mine as well).

Tilda Swinton is the Academy-Award winning actress (Michael Clayton) known for other roles like Caravaggio, Orlando, Possible Words, The Deep End, Adaptation, Young Adam, The Chronicles of Narnia and the Curious Case of Benjamin Button. Tilda made an appearance on April 29, 2009 at the Soho Apple Store to discuss her new film ‘Julia’, an independent thriller where she plays a middle-aged alcoholic lurching from one crisis to another until she really ‘blows it’ by kidnapping a millionaire’s grandson.

Tilda was born on November 5, 1960 as “Katherine Mathilda Swinton” in London, England. Her mother, Judith Balfour, was Australian, and her father, Major-General Sir John Swinton, is Scottish. The Swinton family is an ancient Anglo-Scots family that can trace its lineage to the 9th Century. Tilda attended West Heath Girls’ School (the same class as Diana, Princess of Wales). In 1983 she graduated from New Hall (Murray Edwards College) at Cambridge University with a degree in Social and Political Sciences.

Tilda lives in Nairn, in the Highland area of Scotland, with Scottish painter John Byrne. With Byrne she has her twin son and daughter, Xavier and Honor. She travels with her partner/lover Sandro Kopp, a German/New Zealand painter who was born on February 14, 1978 in Heidelberg, Germany. You can ‘do the math’. He is a lot younger than her; whereby, she can also be known as a “cougar”. She has been with Kopp since 2004 and the relationship has Byrne's blessing. John Byrne, a playwright and painter was born on January 6, 1940. In a 2008 interview, Swinton commented on her domestic situation: "It’s the way we have been for nearly four years. I’m very fortunate. It takes some extraordinary men to make a situation like that work.”
PHOTO: Sandro (Alessandro) Kopp, painting
Tilda's current love interest

I had recently screened the 1986 film Caravaggio that Derek Jarman spent seven years making. Tilda has a small part in the film and it's a bit of a snore (unless you read M, The Man Who Became Caravaggio (like I did). When someone asked a question about her living with Derek for many years she made it clear that she was very emotionally involved with him. Derek Jarman (January 31, 1942 – February 19, 1994) was an English film director, artist and writer who died at the age of 52 of an AIDS –related illness. CLICK on this link to learn more about Derek.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Derek_Jarman
Last summer Tilda Swinton and film critic Mark Cousins held a film festival in the town of Nairn, on Moray Firth, Scotland. The venue was a former ballroom with beanbags for seats; entry was free if you brought cakes. From August 1-9, 2009, the pair is planning a festival just as unique as the prior years. We will not be seeing the last of Tilda Swinton as she is one of the most fantastic British actresses to reckon with.

Twenty-five years ago today:

July 3, 1984
Tuesday

Well, Cedric Green, a polite black gentleman I know from the RTOC (Residence Telephone Order Center) invited me to the County Fair in Pleasanton for tomorrow. I am hesitant to accept because he said ‘a group of people’ would probably be attending. I did not feel comfortable being with a new crowd that I didn’t really know (other than Cedric). And do I really know Cedric very well? It seems “iffy”.

PHOTO: Cedric Green has an almost
identical resemblance to British Actor,
Chiwetel Ejiofor


After work I went for a bicycle ride and followed that with a bite to eat at mom and dad’s house. I then returned to my pad, feeling restless and unable to get into any further exercise.

I wanted to really talk to Chris Cordellos again. I knew he did not have a phone yet. That girl (Katie) never called me either. Danny was away on his roller-skating escape or vacation or whatever one would call it.

I broke down and decided to go to the skating rink in San Leandro. I thought that maybe Frank Vasconcellos will be there. He could give me my twenty bucks that I loaned him for this traffic school fee. I entered the skating rink on this designated ‘gay night’ and I ran into Leah Cossy (the lesbian from Danville).
“Hello,” Leah said with a smile.
“Hello,” said Brian.
Do I really know that many people here? I don’t even really know Leah or Brian very well. I saw Jim skating around but I didn’t talk to him. I stayed there until about 9:30 to 10:15PM. I don’t even skate! Here I was watching the folks going round and round. I couldn’t hack hangin’ out at the somewhat sleazy joint any longer.

I was in bed by 10:40PM (or thereabouts). I telephoned mom to say ‘good night’. I slept soundly.