Interview with Kristoffer Tabori

 

Kristoffer Tabori is known for his movie roles, his directing of Hallmark movies like “Murder, She Baked” and TV series all over the world, but especially in LA. He has narrated many audiobooks, including my own “Fame Island,” for Blackstone Audio, and has won an Audie award for MIDDLESEX, plus Earphones awards for at least four others. See Audible.com. His dad directed the original Invasion of the Body Snatchers, and he narrated an audiobook about that. I spoke to him via Zoom, and we talked for over an hour. To summarize, he is in a good place in his life now, looking back at where he’s been, teaches a Shakespeare class, and is ready to start narrating more audiobooks. He has a channel on YouTube with acting reels and movies like Family Flight, where he flies a small plane in distress onto an aircraft carrier. You can watch his role on The Twilight Zone, and two episodes of The Rockford Files, plus an interview with gaming aficionados about his playing HK-47 (and other video game voices.) In the video below a tiny bit of that is included, plus talk about Rod Taylor, an actor he loved, and James Garner. It was a pleasure to speak to him, and he will no doubt be busy again in this newer audiobook chapter of his life. I met him once at the Audie awards with the late Yuri Rasovsky, a Grammy winning audio producer and columnist for Audiofile, who was married to narrator Lorna Raver, who also starred in a horror movie I recommend highly, “Drag Me To Hell.” That was a 2009 production directed by Sam Raimi with a 92% rating by Rotten Tomatoes. There was just today a story on it by journalist Jamie Duncan! Kristoffer narrated an audiobook with her and Yuri, who gave my first novel “Postmarked for Death” an Earphones award as narrated by the late Frank Muller as “Postal,” (2000), now an ebook again. Yuri directed Kristoffer in Fame Island, out of print from 2004 but coming back in 2023.

Fame Island novel produced by Grammy winner Yuri Rasovsky for Blackstone Audio 2004, narrated by Emmy winner Kristoffer Tabori (Star Wars games, TV from The Rockford Files to Law & Order, Hallmark movie director.) Currently rewritten for Blackstone distribution as Lottery Island, with two Powerball wins, narrated by Tom Lennon. Based on the true story of John Caldwell, developer of Palm Island in the Grenadines. (His book “Desperate Voyage” was once optioned for film before he died in 1999. Trump tried to buy property, and Caldwell showed Barbra Streisand around. All this in letters on his stationery in my possession. Have slides and photo release. Caldwell purchased Palm at $1 a year for 99 years from the government of St. Vincent, plus 12% of future profits. It was called “Prune” at the time, and was overrun by swamps and mosquitos. He planted 8000 coconut palms by hand, got the name “Coconut Johnny,” and employed native islanders from Union. He also fought off renegades with .22 rifles, aided the Marines during the Grenada invasion, which prompted my turning articles into a novel.  A travel writer and his photographer side-kick are hired by a “disappeared” lottery winner to finance a coup against a corrupt Caribbean island governor so that he can emerge a hero, famous for more than just 15 minutes. With twists. And sharks. (George Clooney and Jimmy Buffett have cameos. Mentions Dolph Lundgren lookalike. Dolph currently appears in ads attacking on heavy equipment for Volvo, just as he does in the book.)