August newsletter and it's my birthday!

The year rumbles on but we are no nearer to getting any serious work done due to the lack of funding which is an issue that we need to get a handle on. Hopefully we can get the coffers filled up a bit and get something sorted out for 2019. This is my birthday month, so before the 27th, we are going to have to work together to make a difference.

At the moment I am at a loss as to how people get any decent results from crowd-funding but I am sure that this blip can be sorted. 

Let us see how much we can raise before the 27th of this month, and here are some ways in which money can be raised. Don't forget that every penny goes into creating comedy sketches, films, documentaries, podcasts and more. In return for your generosity and help I will release everything online totally free of charge.

A Christmas Carol

Once again I am taking bookings for Christmas, and here is a list of Dickens related ways I can be of service. In addition to this, I am selling a printed version of my half hour reading text of A Christmas Carol which is ideal for performance in schools and festive events as well as for broadcast. I have also included slight stage directions and optional props. For details about this please email me at the address below.

The Unqualified Lectures

Another one of those ideas that came to me while taking my dog Jack for a walk. It is basically a way for me to challenge myself as a writer and public speaker. Anyone who donates using my ko-fi account chooses a subject, any random subject. I then go away and do some research on this subject and write an hour long lecture that I will perform to an audience who have paid enough to get in to cover my venue hire costs. Once I have done a few of these I will try and develop this into a one-man show to take to Edinburgh. 

Ko-fi

You can still make donations using the PayPal button at the top of this page, but I have created a ko-fi page too so you can make small payments in return for the things that I make and upload for free. I will add things to this page to hopefully encourage more regular donations. My ko-fi page is here.

Twitter

I would really like to change my Twitter bio and especially remove the word 'underfollowed'. Someone in my position should be in the tens of thousands at least and there are a lot of people missing out on the fact that I am a fine example of a Twitter user, mixing jokes, observations and a smattering of plugs for my work interspersed with the occasional photo of my pets. As another birthday present from you to me, if you follow me on Twitter then get recommending me and hopefully I will finally get to make edits to my bio.

Thank you in advance for reading and sharing this newsletter.

S

PS - The Random Sessions series is still going, so is The Sunday Alternative podcast. I am also making a documentary, working on a screenplay with Nottingham musician Ian Brough, and working on the next instalment of The Curse of The Jester. Surely worth the price of a drink?

Halfway Through the Year

I am writing this newsletter on the Monday after a weekend in which the aim was to try and raise £500 in donations in order to allow me to start filming. What I had forgotten though, is that nobody seems to grasp the idea of crowd-funding anymore. 

You pay (in the UK) £150.50 a year for your TV Licence. Your input of £150.50 funds television, radio and online content. It isn't just your £150.50 that finances an episode of Eastenders, your payment is pooled to finance content that anybody is able to watch. You put in a little, you take out a lot. 

I am not asking for multi-million dollar blockbuster money here, my work is on the low budget spectrum and I will share the finished product on YouTube for everybody to enjoy. Here's another example, it costs £8.80 to go and see a film at Broadway Cinema in Nottingham (or 'the house of stolen ideas' as I call it). One of the films currently being shown at Broadway is Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom, and that, according to Wikipedia, cost $170million to make. You put in a little, you take out a lot.

Here's something else, here is my Twitter statistics for the weekend - it isn't massive but I am strangely underfollowed, no, I don't understand it either.

My point is that if the above figure was translated into pounds, I would have more than enough to get to work and start making entertainment for people to enjoy. Unlike the cinema or theatre, or even your TV Licence, you can choose how much you donate. 

To keep the costs down, although it won't make them disappear altogether, I have made the decision to make several documentaries as audio rather than video, I will still need to do a fair bit of travelling though. However the comedy projects need to be visual (especially as one is a silent film) and they aren't cheap. I reckon I can do the first project for £300 at a push, it'll be tight but I am sure I can do it without losing quality. 

Filming wise, I have been through my notebooks and a box with 'Notes and ideas' written on and need to get moving. There are seven short films, mostly comedic that I want to get off the ground and am scared that I will die before I get everything finished off my ideal to-do list. Once I have finished I am not bothered because I would rather leave a legacy of entertainment behind than a box of notebooks.

The PayPal button is at the top of this page, please donate as much or as little as you can. It will be worth it. If you are in a position to bung a larger amount there then I would be forever grateful. You could also download one of my audio books from my Bandcamp page. There are more audio books to come in December and rather than a kazoo Christmas album this year I am making an album of Glenn Miller compositions. 

In other news, I am not doing my Die Hard one-man show this year due to not having finished it properly. I will instead be doing more readings of A Christmas Carol and Finding Scrooge (which is being published this year and I have written the foreword to. Hopefully I will be able to tour Die Hard towards the end of 2019.

Here are some other ways you can help swell the coffers and be a part of something brilliant:

Kazoo: 

For £5 I will record the song of your choice on kazoo and send it to you, it is the ideal present for someone you love.

Typewriting

Letters, essays, whatever you like. I will type it up for you old school for 50p a page.

Just email me steveEoliver@gmail.com, which is also my PayPal email

Thanks in advance!