User:Scipio66/Amit Itelman

Amit Itelman Amit Itelman is a director, writer and producer. A multi instrumentalist, he works as a Nashville session musician. He is the Founding Artistic Director of the Steve Allen Theater in Hollywood. (1) A theater impresario of uncategorizable performance acts, Itelman’s curration style is akin to "a human science fair"(2).

He has developed and directed shows like Max Maven(e) Thinking in Person, a magic act woven into slivers of metaphysics(5), Mary Lynn Spreads her Legs, starring Mary Lynn Rajskub(f) which was described as “Hilarious. Mind Blowing Oddness” by the LA Times (6)and Aye Jaye Carny Trash. He was a producer and Haunted House director of Hollywood Hellhouse, the first time a Hellhouse performed for a secular audience(7)

He produced the Kids in the Hall (g)reunion in 2006 and continued to work with them on various projects including his Grand Guignol short film, the Final Kiss, which he directed and produced. (9)It stars Dave Foley (h) and Scott Thompson (i) whom also adapted the text with Itelman from Maurice Level’s original. Combinging his secular curiousity with an interest in mondo religion lead to directing shows such as the first ever public ritual by the Church of Satan(4)(k), a Knights of Pythias(l) Magic Lantern initiation ritual performed in the Rodolf Valentino’ moseleum of the Hollywood Forever Cemetery(10), and experimenting with the theatric relavance of actual Mesopatamiam (m)curses in rock clubs(11).

As Artistic Director, some of the productions he developed and premiered include the Beastly Bombing (4) directed by Julian Nitzeberg (n) which won LA Weekly best musical award; Nevermore ( 12) and Re-Animator(o) the Musical(13), both of which were directed by Stuart Gordon(p), and many more. Itelman premiered Tobe Hooper’s(q) Eggshells(r)(14) and American Hippy in Israel(15), both over thirty years after they were made. With Mobmov technology, he converted a parking lot into a Drive In movie theater, programming screenings and appearances by Tobe Hooper, Joe Dante(s), Larry Cohen(t), Jessica Harper(u), Mick Garris(v), (17)and Rudy Ray Moore(w), who made his last public appearance at the screening of Petey Wheatstraw.(18)

As a session musician, Itelman has performed with Monster Magnet(x), Jacob Jones, Magic Hammer, and three releases Nashville garage band The Ettes (y)(19)(20)(21). He has played with South Central blues legend Mickey Champion and folk darling Kate Micucci(z), who also premiered her show at the Steve Allen Theater. Band projects include the Tulsa Skull Swingers, (22)(11) playing bass in a stomp swamp spookabilly band featuring Steve Allen Theater performers Craig Anton(aa), Ron Lynch (bb)and Blaine Capatch(cc). An experimental duo with Hans Fellestad (dd) finds Itelman playing his harmonica through a Moog and bowing a Vietnamese mouth violin. Othe rprjects include the Hermetic Order of the Golden Dawn featuring Dave Lovering(ee) from the Pixies, and he is currently collaborating with Samhain drummer London May(ff) in Oogly Boogly, ”Somewhere between weird-in-a-good way, conceptual noise rock and a Harry Potter-like existence in a mescaline trip, Oogly Boogly did nothing less than capture the crowd’s imagination” (24)

Itelman was the Special Effects Supervisor for the levitation sequence in Nina Menkes’ Phantom Love, in which Variety describes his work as “an amazing shot of a sleeping woman rising off her bed sends the viewer back to the medium's earliest days. “(25)(26) Brief on caemra appearancs include Sienfeld’s (gg)Festivas episode and in Doug Benson's Super High Me(hh), where he participated in testing the effects of marijuana in a paranormal phychic challenge.(26)

Itelman has merged the world of theater and comic illustrations with ellobarate limited printings of season programs that have become collectors items. Robert Crumb(ii) (27) drew an original poster for Amit’s Vaudeville production, Janet Klein and her Borcht Belt Babies. Crumb also drew Itelman's Portriat.(30)

He recently conceived and presented a dramatic interpertation of David Mamet’s(jj) Glengary Glen Ross starring 2 geese(28). Amit was awarded a grant by the James Hervey Johnson Foundation for his next directorial effort.

The LA Weekly cover story “what’s so Funny” describes him as having “a heart beating with love and lunatic curiosity for where we come from. It’s alternative because it’s so rare, and you’d have to be dead not to feel its pulse.”(29)