We just heard some good news about Mike Welch, who by all accounts was the life of the party (we mean that in only the best way) at the recent Creation Entertainment convention. This weekend we heard from several fans first hand about how entertaining an genuine Mike is in person.

Well, now you can catch more of MIke! Mike just completed filming CSI: Crime Scene Investigation Season 9, Episode 20. His character’s name is Steuben Lorenz and it has a tentative air date mid April.

Access Hollywood caught up with Kristen Stewart on Sunday. Kristen had lots of good things to say about her fellow cast members:

On Taylor Lautner:

“We’re so proud of [Taylor Lautner]…It’s been a year since we shot the last one and he’s been working on it the entire time. Not just physically — he’s gotten buff and everything but he’s [also] so [into] it.”

On Dakota Fanning:

“It’s cool to have small characters be really vivid and have them stick out,” she said. “I feel like she’ll do something really interesting with it. It’s a crazy character she plays.”

ADDITIONAL TICKET INFORMATION FOR MARCH 17TH EVENT

Please note, tickets are still available for Catherine Hardwicke’s special event tomorrow night, March 17th at Barnum Hall on the campus of Santa Monica High School.  Wristbands can be picked up at Barnes and Noble, , 3rd Street Promenade, 1201 3rd Street, Santa Monica, CA.  Those with tickets/wristbands from Barnes and Noble are able to enter the event first, starting at 6pm when doors open.  General admission starts at 6:30 p.m.Please remember, those wishing to participate in the costume contest (as James, Victoria or Laurent) must arrive by 6pm.

CATHERINE HARDWICKE
With Master of Ceremony Edi Gathegi
and special musical performance by Lal Meri

Tuesday, March 17, 2009
7:00 p.m.
Barnum Hall
On the campus of Santa Monica High School
601 Pico Blvd., Santa Monica, CA 90405

Twilight: Director’s Notebook will be available for sale during the event.  Ticket distribution while supplies last.  For information call 310-260-9110.  Please note, Catherine will only be able to sign one copy of Twilight: Director’s Notebook per person at the event.  No pictures will be allowed during the autographing.

Get the full article here.

This from Stephenie Meyer’s website.

Hey guys! This is just a heads up about an event I’m involved with here in Phoenix. The plan was for me to go entirely hermit this year (or decade), but there are always those things important enough to pull me out of my burrow.

One of my dear friends and mentors, Faith Hochhalter—a truly gifted book buyer who put together some of my most successful events—was recently diagnosed with breast cancer. I am not the only author who was helped along by her talent and enthusiasm, and all of us who have enjoyed her influence in our lives and careers are eager to help her through this rough time. To assist with her medical bills, several young adult writers are joining together for a fund-raising event: Project Save the Book Babe.

The event will be on April 4th in Tempe, AZ; it will include live music, a panel discussion with the attending authors, and an auction of some fun and/or rare items from each author. All the information about the event and the authors attending can be found at ProjectBookBabe.com.

Personally, I’ll be auctioning some ARCs (Advanced Reader Copies) of my books, an early marked up manuscript or two, my dress from the Eclipse prom, and the fluffy original epilogue to Forever Dawn, along with signed books, of course.

We’re still in the process of putting this together, so more info will be forthcoming over the next week. Tickets will go on sale tomorrow (Tuesday the 17th) so if you’re interested in attending and helping us save our Book Babe Faith, hurry over to the site and check it out.

Thank you!

Steph

Just a few of the other authors at the event are Brandom Mull, Janette Allison, and  Shannon Hale.

Edited: On a personal note, I met Faith during the Eclipse Prom two years ago. You could tell just by meeting her that she LOVES what she does for a living, and goes that extra mile to engage children and teen readers. She’s a person who really “gets teens” and doesn’t talk down to them.

I’m sure many of you who attended the event met Faith that weekend as she was one of the many people handing out tickets, giving information, and answering many questions, many of which were repetitive, with a smile.  I strongly urge you to support this effort in any way that you can.

Pel

Catherine Hardwicke has her LA area book signing this week on the 17th. SSVD (Stupid Shiny Volvo Driver) and her daughter from the Lexicon are going to be there.

If they get lucky enough to have Catherine pick on them during her Q&A, what do you think they should ask?

Remember to watch the Twilight Saga website on the same date because Catherine will be answering some questions presubmitted by the fans on that site too.

The Welcome to Twilight Italian site has let us know that director of the Italian magazine Ciak, Piera Detasi has confirmed on her blog that New Moon will not film in Volterra. Instead it will film in Montepulciano.

Now if you read Italian, you can find the the whole story here. It essentially says that despite meetings and enticements from the mayor and  officials from Volterra, Summit has decided to film in Montepulciano. She states that she received this info from a Summit executive with whom she was having lunch.

The clock tower and plaza in Montepulciano (seen to the left)is a deadringer for the clock tower and plaza in Volterra. Interestingly enough, neither square has a fountain in the middle of it.

If you’re wondering why they didn’t pick Volterra, we suspect it’s much the same reason that they didn’t pick Forks or La Push:

• accessibility
• ability to house film crew and for days in a secure fashion
• money

You get a really good idea of how remote the actual Volterra is vs. Montepulciano on this map.
View Larger Map

It’s no secret that Stephenie had a loose inspiration for each of her books from classic literature.

Twilight: Pride and Prejudice

New Moon: Romeo and Juliet

Eclipse: Wuthering Heights

Breaking Dawn: The Merchant of Venice and A Midsummers Night Dream

Well now it seems that sales for Wuthering Heights are up to record highs in France, and booksellers are attributing the success to Stephenie Meyer.

“We have sold as many copies of Wuthering Heights in the first two months of 2009 as we usually sell in a whole year,” said a spokeswoman for Le Livre de Poche, the publisher of the French translation…We are on course to sell several tens of thousands of copies this year, which is exceptional. The enthusiasm has prompted a lot of bookshops to put Brontë on display next to Stephenie Meyer, and that has obviously encouraged people to buy both of them.”

See the full article here.

Have any of you picked up a classic novel because of Stephenie Meyer?

As we noted earlier this month, the Lexicon opened three years ago.  In honor of the Lexicon’s third birthday month(because it took us a full month to get it all together), we are going to hold three contests over the next three weeks where one Lexiconer a week will win autographed Twilight related merchandise.

All you have to do is answer the questions by replying to the post here on the blog.  We will pick a winner by random from the people who answered correctly.  You must be a registered user on the blog with a valid e-mail address so that we can contact you about your prize. We will ship it to you anywhere in the world.

All questions will be related to the Lexicon history in some way.  This isn’t “Twilight” trivia!  We really tried to think of difficult questions so that the winners will have to have paid attention to the site over the years!

And be careful!  Just because someone posts a good answer doesn’t mean it is the right answer.  Only someone with the right answer can will the prize.  We tested out the questions on our moderators and managed to stump quite a few of them, so be warned!  Even the most seasoned Lexiconer isn’t certain to answer correctly.

So make sure you have a registered account here on the blog before you post.  Then answer the question the best you can.  You have until Wednesday  at 12:01am Eastern Time to enter this week’s contest. Only one answer per person, please (so think before you post)!  We’ll announce our winner on Wednesday night.

This week’s prize is a Shopping With Alice tote bag from the Lexicon shop autographed by Alice Cullen herself.

This week’s question is:

Alphie and Pel met through the message boards of another fandom.  What fandom was it?  At what event related to that fandom did they first meet face to face?

Good luck!

Just when you thought the SAG infighting was the worst mudslinging in town, there’s a good, old-fashioned, media slug fest going on featuring Nikki Finke, the LA Times, and Eric Feig.

So last week Nikki Finke, Variety and several others report that Juan Antonio Bayona was offered the job to direct Eclipse. As Nikki and Variety tend to get their stuff right, everyone else publishes this.  Granted, some outlets misquoted and said the ink was dry on the contract and it was studio official, but the fact they all agreed on was that the offer was out there.

Then, Patrick Goldstein of the LA times publishes a blog that quotes Summit executive Eric Feig (if that’s not getting a quote from the horse’s mouth, we don’t know what is) as stating:

“The ‘Eclipse’ directing job hasn’t been offered to Juan Antonio or anyone else,” he told me. “We’ve met with three or four talented filmmakers and we’ll be meeting with three or four more other candidates before we make any decision. No one has been offered the job.” Feig added that no one even bothered to call to check out the rumors before printing them, something that has become an all-too-often occurrence in the Wild West free-for-all that constitutes today’s Web-based entertainment coverage. “Nikki never called Summit or any of the producers, and Variety ran it off her blog without calling us either, which I find doubly irresponsible.”

Nikki Finke after having been bad-mouthed big time in public has now fired back at both the LA and Feig:

Summit Entertainment’s president of worldwide production and acquisitions Erik Feig is accusing Los Angeles Times blogger Patrick Goldstein of misquoting him today about the accuracy of my reporting…I’m still waiting for Goldstein to publish my response today that I stand by my story, which I worded very specifically to say: “I can confirm that Summit Entertainment is telling Hollywood privately that Juan Antonio Bayona will direct Eclipse.”…I look forward to Feig demonstrating that being a Hollywood exec, and doing the right thing, are not mutually exclusive.

OKKKKAAAYYYYY….so, how about that Forks weather?  *cricket* *cricket* *cricket*

At this point, your guess is as good as ours.