The Return of the Tall(ish), Red-Haired Man With One Bad Back Dept.: Web fixture Harry Knowles has been notably absent from the local scene for the past few months due to a recurrent injury stemming from, uh, an old war wound (yeah, that’s the ticket), but he’s re-entered the fray in a big way of late with the publication of his Warner Books tome Ain’t It Cool? Hollywood’s Redheaded Stepchild Speaks Out, which is currently awaiting purchase at BookPeople and other local geek-literature outlets.. Anyone who’s ever checked out Knowles’ (in)famous Web site — www.aint-it-cool-news.com — knows what to expect, although with Dreamworks honcho Mike DeLuca blurbing “Knowles is the Indiana Jones of film fandom” on the dust jacket, the stakes appear to be raised (“Quick, Harry, Nazis!”). The always insightful North Austin fixture also has a new radio show (!) on the XM Satellite Radio Network (that’s the one with David Bowie shilling for ’em), in which Harry and Company mangle the English language via a whole new medium. We kid, we kid — Knowles’ passion for film (and, more to the point, fantastic film) is second only to that of the great Forrest J Ackerman, and his occasional syntactical whoopsadaisy only adds to his rumpled charm. You can find links to both the book and the radio show at the above Web addy, or hit XM Radio direct at www.xmradio.com.
This article appears in March 1 • 2002.