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Television work for Hitchcock Presents and The Ray Bradbury Theatre garnered acclaim and earned the wizard an Emmy for The Halloween Tree. There was radio work before that. Then there's Ray Bradbury's Pandemonium Theatre Company, his love of loves, that puts the master's work live on its feet, consistently filling the small California Rococo Freemont Centre Theatre in South Pasadena where the company works . Poems, lectures, essays – the range, depth, and uncanny perceptions of the work and expression are breathtaking and conjured by one who is, himself, something else again. Today, while a citizen of the world, Ray Bradbury lives in a comfortably sized corner house in a traditional West LA neighborhood where the trees reflect the season's change. An intimate den off a patio, usually guarded by a luxuriously furred black cat, is the wizard's creative lair. Bradbury greets his visitors from a large recliner. The walls are lined with shelves jammed with books, varied leather bound editions of Moby Dick, and the stacks of books, papers and magazines that narrow the passage around the small room. There's a figurine of Lon Chaney's Phantom, a scale model of Captain Nemo's submarine Nautilus among scattered objects of intrigue, many gifts from admirers and apprentices. Everything is kept and given space. "I am surrounded by my metaphors," says the wizened conjurer. When his works are published or republished in new editions, he will travel to whatever venue and sign, with the date, to the last person. He smiles, chats, poses for snapshots, and shakes hands all the while looking into your eyes, drinking in your soul. It's what wizards do. While drifting through the galaxy, should you find yourself within docking distance of South Pasadena, take the time to drop by the aforementioned Freemont Center Theater and, like Dante, witness Pandemonium. Ray's theatre company that is. In addition to seeing Bradbury's characters walking and talking, under the auspices of one of the great free association conversationalists of all time, director Alan Neal Hubbs, there might be an historic literary nuance added to an already rare experience. Following intermission, the blood red curtains will pull back and there, in a single spotlight against a dark background, seated in a large, leather and mahogany chair is Bradbury himself. In the time he spends on stage he weaves the new and reweaves the old spells. The work, his life, views on the space program, the other planets, the nature of the universe and so much at the core of his passion. And it's Jules Verne you're looking at, and H.G. Wells. For that matter it's also Dostoevsky and Conrad. Poe or Henry James turning that last horrifying screw. In these moments of ultimate possibility and truth the images are all over Bradbury's skin and in the silvery beams of the spotlight. They begin to dance, breath, and live, and we are surrounded, borne away, and will always be so, in the mind and in the imagination of Ray Bradbury. Steven Robert Wollenberg is an actor and free-lance writer living in Los Angeles who has also worked for ESPN and CBS Radio Sports. He co-starred in the British-French co-produced film "The Pet" and appeared in Ray Bradbury's play "Autumn People" in Los Angeles.
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