The 50 Shades Cure for End-of-Summer Blues!

Have the end-of-summer blahs set in yet? It’s inevitable. After all, summers are usually Greyt, but this summer was even better because Fifty heated things up! Well, summer may be over but with so much Fifty everywhere, we don’t expect the discussion of all things #50Shades to cool off! So there’s no reason to feel blue…only Grey!

RECAPS & UPDATES

  • Limited Edition Hardback Set Available in UK – Order via AmazonUK (here). We’ve been told there are plans for the set to be released in the States soon, so we’ll keep you updated. You can also look forward to a chance to win an autographed set, as tweeted by the author. We’re also excited about her new website coming soon!
    E L James ‏@E_L_James
    @osieperez @50ShadesMontage I will do a competition when I launch my new website… not sure when that will be though – so keep an eye!

  • Fifty Shades of Grey: The Classical Album Released – For more information, go here.

  • E L James’s Husband Niall Leonard’s Promotes New Young Adult Book Crusher – He did interviews with Today show here and CNN here and wrote a “day in the life” style article for the Huffington Post here.

  • FSoG Inspired Fashion Week – A lot of black and leather was seen from designers Lubov and Max Azria! Check it out here.

  • Web Video BOOKD: 50 Shades of Grey Episode (@radical.media) – We were asked to be a part of this episode, but due to logistics and timing, it just didn’t work out. But Crissy from the fansite Laters, Baby! makes an appearance :) Watch it here.
  • FSoG Parody Song Developments! Chris Ward dropped in to let us know his FSoG parody song has been getting radio air time in Ireland! Congratulations, Chris! You can leave him a comment/review on his Amazon page by clicking here.
  • @50ShadesofGrey Parody Becomes Book – This very fun(ny) parody Twitter account has 80,000+ followers and is even retweeted by the author. For more information on the book, go here.
  • FSoG Illustrations – WOW! Beautiful illustrations from The Stir depicting “scenes” from the books here. We highly recommend taking a look at these, especially if you enjoy graphic novels. Let us know if you were ‘pulled’ right into the books by these like we were!

  • Emma Watson Asked About Ana Rumors – While promoting her new film, The Perks of Being a Wallflower, she admitted she still hasn’t read the books but thinks being considered for any role by fans is “flattering.” In a much more informal situation, she was on a plane with her Perks co-star Nina Dobrev (Elena on the Vampire Diaries and girlfriend of Ian Somerhalder), and the two did an on-air interview with Ryan Seacrest. He asked if Emma was going to play Anastasia Steele, as per the rumors of her being paired with Ryan Gosling as Christian Grey. Nina, helming the phone, relayed, “She [Emma] would be FAR more interested if he were playing Christian Grey.” Isn’t it nice to hear when stars are fans of another star? You can hear the full on-air interview here.

  • Ryan Gosling Asked About Christian Rumors – While promoting his new movie The Place Beyond the Pines at TIFF, @IamBenLyons for @extratv asked, “Any chance of Fifty Shades of Grey? Everybody wants to know.” Ryan’s response as he walked away was, “I haven’t… What is this book everyone’s talking about? Seems very popular.” You can watch the video here. That was not a direct answer from someone who is usually very quick-witted. Let’s respond appropriately, shall we?

From: 50 Shades Movie Fansite

Subject: Evasive Red Carpet Tactics

Date: September 16, 2012 5:17 PM EST

To: Ryan Gosling, Actor/Director and potential Mr. Grey

Sir,

Congratulations on your new film, The Place Beyond the Pines, which was picked up by Fifty Shades franchise distributors Focus Features during TIFF. We wish you much success with that project, as well as your upcoming directorial debut with How To Catch A Monster. However, we would be remiss if we didn’t point out that we felt your answer to Mr. Lyons’ question about Fifty Shades of Grey was a bit evasive, coy, and almost like you were hiding something (all ESSENTIAL QUALITIES of Christian Grey.)

Perhaps you’ve had to sign some paperwork on the topic, one of those NDAs? If so, well played, and we do understand about these things. Next time, just give us a wink or “oh-so-secret smile.”

50 Shades Move Fansite xoxo

  • Author to Appear on Katie! Yes, we’ve mentioned it before, but we are just so excited for this! Tune into Katie! on Monday, September 17th! The @katieshow airs M-F at 3pm ET on ABC.
  • Ms. James has begun her second US book tour! Dates and locations are listed at the top of our blog or you can find them here.

Summer might be over and the weather cooling, but #50Shades fans can count on topics related to the books and information about the movie to continue to be a sizzling-hot topic!

E L James interviewed on GOOD MORNING AMERICA and TODAY

Competition for Ms. James’ time is already pretty fierce as both GOOD MORNING AMERICA and the TODAY show aired interviews with the author this morning.

Just click on the links below if you missed one or both of the interviews.

_________________________________________________________________________

GOOD MORNING AMERICA

Link: Fifty Shades of Grey Author: Hit Books Were My ‘Midlife Crisis’ – ABC News

Fifty Shades of Grey Author's First Interview

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TODAY

Link: TODAY: Fifty Shades of Grey

TODAY Interview with E L James

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Did ABC 20/20 co-anchor Elizabeth Vargas or NBC news correspondent Michelle Kosinski ask the author any of your questions?

What’s in a Name?

There will be many upcoming interviews with Ms. James. In addition to GOOD MORNING AMERICA and ABC 20/20, the TODAY show is also advertising an upcoming interview. There is so much to ask the author regarding the books, both about the story and their success, as well as her hopes for the movie. We are looking forward to all of it!

About a year ago, I had the opportunity to ask Ms. James a question about her story, and I wanted to share her answers with you here.

As has already been said (to near exhaustion), the story began as a Twilight fanfiction, so when Ms. James decided to publish the story, she had to assign new names to her characters. The nickname of ‘Fifty’ was already well established, but I was curious about what inspired her choices of ‘Christian’ and ‘Ana.’

Ms. James graced me with this response:

“Christian is the name of the character from the first novel I wrote after I read the Twilight series. I just love the name. I did my dissertation at university on the fall of the Tsar in Russia – and since then have always loved the name Anastasia… “

~

Ms. James’ explanation of ‘Anastasia’ didn’t surprise me in the least. From the first time I heard the name, I had immediately thought of the famous story of the Russian family. Okay, and maybe Disney’s spin on it.

I love how strong the name Christian is for Fifty, and yet I admit that I easily likened Fifty to Dr. Christian Troy from the FX show “Nip/Tuck” because much like Fifty, he was quite confident in his sexual escapades! That show was as addictive as reading “Fifty Shades of Grey” wasn’t it? There was definitely a lot of anticipation of what antics would be tried next. Dr. Troy is probably kicking himself for not having a Red Room of Pain ;)

Do you like the names Christian and Ana?

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