Book Event

[May 4]

Bill Kimberlin is a Boonville resident and a retired visual effects film editor. He’s also an author, having just published a memoir called, “Inside the Star Wars Empire,” published by Rowman and Littlefield/Lyons Press in which Mr. K recounts his 20 years working for George Lucas at Industrial Light & Magic. It’s an amusing inside look at what it takes to produce those blockbuster Lucas films like Jurassic Park and Star Wars. Kimberlin studied film at San Francisco State University and the American Film Institute. After graduation he worked as a sound tech in post-production for a San Francisco film company, and later as a film editor. He produced his first documentary, Jeffries-Johnson 1910, on Jack Johnson, the first black heavyweight champion of the world, with the help of Francis Ford Coppola. (Jeffries was billed as “The Great White Hope.”)

Talking about his new book, Kimberlin said, “I’d been taking notes from the day I started working there and later I thought that somebody who actually worked there could write about it. Those movies became more than movies, they were part of the culture.” Kimberlin grew up in Kentfield in Marin County but spent a lot of his childhood in Anderson Valley. Kimberlin’s AV family history includes familiar names like the Prathers and the Falleris. His mother’s sister married Avon Ray whose family owned Ray’s Resort, now known variously as Wellspring or River’s Bend. Avon’s mother was a Prather. Avon’s sister, Pearl, married Frank Falleri who owned the old Philo Market (where Starr Automotive is now) and who also owned the AV Market in Boonville for a time. Kimberlin will appear at Gallery Books in Mendocino on Friday, May 4 from 6:30 to 7:30pm. Q&A will follow.