Posts by Billy Parrott

The revised Mad Men Reading List is now availble here.

If you follow The Battery Park City Library on Twitter then you've seen our tweets linking to books that have appeared in the hit television show Mad Men. These titles are a great way to gain insight into the episodes and the social and cultural times in which the series is set. Like the set and costume design, the literary choices of the show really add a stamp of authenticity. Dipping into these classics is also a great way to help with withdrawals while waiting for new episodes to air.

A few months ago I began thinking about the earliest books I remember reading and the first librarian I remember. The librarian was an older gentleman named Paige Ellisor. One book in particular stands out in my memory as a favorite. I recently began searching for a copy of that book, to read it again after over thirty years, and to try and see why I found it so memorable.

It happens quite often:  "Are you the actor Billy Parrott from Lars and the Real Girl ?"  "Dude!  Were you a Security Guard in The Incredible Hulk, Breakfast with Scot, and Resident Evil: Apocalypse?"  "I loved your work in Saw III. Can you sign this?"

I just smile and reply, "Sorry, I'm not an actor. I'm only a librarian."

Has the recent roundup of Russian spies left you wanting to read up on the wide world of espionage?  Then I have the book for you: Agent Zigzag, by Ben Macintyre.

As discussed in my last post, one kind of film within film is when a scene from one movie is shown in another, on a television set or movie screen. As a viewer there is an interesting connection here because we are watching characters in a film and those characters are doing the same thing: watching characters in a film.

This week marked the 50th anniversary of the release of one of the most memorable films of all-time: Alfred Hitchcock's Psycho debuted in New York City on June 16, 1960.  

What can I say about Psycho that hasn’t already been said? 

Anthony Hopkins' approximately 16 minutes of screen time in The Silence of the Lambs won him the 1991 Academy Award for Best Actor. As far as film villains go, you'd be hard pressed to top Hannibal Lecter, but the portrayal of the sadistic and twisted Frank Booth by Dennis Hopper in David Lynch's Blue Velvet easily gets my vote for cinema's most memorable villain.

A digital mayor visits the Battery Park City Library and makes a formal decree about the importance of libraries.

There are only a handful of art forms native to America. Among these are jazz, musical comedy, the mystery novel, and the comic book. As far as comics are concerned there are arguably no characters more beloved and instantly recognizable than Charles Schulz’s Peanuts. After all, the saga of Charlie Brown and his friends is arguably the “longest story told by a single artist” in the history of all mankind. But what do we really know about this cartoonist and his alter ego? In the biography Schulz and Peanuts, David Michaelis goes a long way in helping us to learn more about this complex man whose work we all know so well.

My tour of the downtown branches of The New York Public Library continues!  After being here for a few years and here for the past few months I am now here for a few days.  All of this traveling has been a wonderful experience as each branch is as varied and interesting as the neighborhoods they serve.

It is 8th Street, but from Third Avenue to Avenue A it is called St. Marks Place and is named for St. Mark’s Church in-the-Bowery, which is not even on 8th Street, or St. Marks Place, but at the intersection of 10th Street, Second Avenue, and Stuyvesant Street. The land there has been a site of Christian worship since 1660. The history of St. Marks Place doesn’t go back that far, but a surprising amount of history has happened on these four blocks.

January 23, 2010 marks the centennial of the birth of Django Reinhardt. Reinhardt grew up in gypsy camps outside Paris and began playing violin, banjo, and guitar at a young age.

After a number of years in an historic Greenwich Village library I’ve spent the past few weeks in an equally historic East Village library. The Ottendorfer Branch of The New York Public Library is surrounded by literary, political, and musical history. From Leon Trotsky and Abbie Hoffman to Allen Ginsberg and Joey Ramone,

Greenwich Village has many landmarks of music history. The jazz clubs in the area saw the likes of Miles Davis and John Coltrane. The bars and clubs that line Bleecker Street and the surrounding area helped popularize folk music in the 1960s. And of course there is that famous little recording studio just south of Jefferson Market on Eighth Street where some of the most important music of the past forty years was recorded. Out of all the Village music landmarks though there is one that absolutely dwarfs them all. In 1941 guitar manufacturer Epiphone was located at 144 West 14th Street and it was there that one Lester William Polsfuss assembled the first solid body electric guitar. 

“To doubt everything, or, to believe everything, are two equally convenient solutions; both dispense with the necessity of reflection.” -Henri Poincare, Science and Hypothesis (1901) 

We are now at that time of the year when so many students are getting ready to take that next giant step into the “real world”. I’d like to think that most are prepared to meet the challenges. High schools and universities have long used the commencement speech as a way of conveying final tidbits of wisdom before students are thrown into the pool of life and told “SWIM!”

Welcome to 24 Frames per Second, a New York Public Library blog tagline devoted to film. By following the 24fps@NYPL tag you’ll easily be able to read film reviews and suggestions from Library staff systemwide which will hopefully lead to many lively and insightful comments and discussions. You will also be able to find information here about film screenings at local branches. Hopefully the posts here will expose you to some films you may not have seen or encourage you to possibly revisit or reconsider some of those films you haven’t seen in a long time. And of course, all the films discussed here are available in the branches of The New York Public Library.

So, let us get 

Tomorrow marks the 40th anniversary of the premiere of the first work from one of the most notorious men in the history of Hollywood. He is prolific, having had a hand in the making of over one hundred film and television projects. That hand though has been the heavy hand of disassociation through loss of creative control. This man’s name is now synonymous with bad films and bad decisions. His name is Alan Smithee.

Eighty-two years ago today on April 19, 1927 Mae West was convicted at The Jefferson Market Courthouse on obscenity charges for her play Sex. The play, which she also wrote, produced, and directed, was her first starring role on Broadway. The production had been open for close to a year and playing to full houses before it was raided by the police. West received a $500 fine and was sentenced to ten days in jail. She spent one night in the Woman’s House of Detention before moving to Welfare Island (now known as Roosevelt Island). She was released after eight days for good behavior and the resulting publicity only increased her fame.

The Woman’s House of 

On Saturday April 25th at 2PM The Jefferson Market Branch will be one of the stops for The Black Maria Film and Video Festival. Yes, I know I know, the weather is finally nice, Spring is finally here, but we've got an incredible line up this year so you really must try and stop by.

"Since 1981, the annual Black Maria Film and Video Festival, an international juried competition and award tour, has been fulfilling its mission to advocate, exhibit and reward cutting edge works from independent film and videomakers. The festival is known for its national public exhibition program, which features a variety of bold contemporary works drawn from the annual collection of 50 award winning