An Otherworldly Experience Vinyl
The films: 2001 – A Space Odyssey; A Clockwork Orange, and Star Wars are unforgettable to every science fiction buff but given their historical impact are known to so many more. Why these three films? Besides all three being trendsetting and iconic science fiction films of the 20th century – all have a common connection to the turntable industry. Does the name John A. Michell ring a bell? No. Well, let me tell you about this engineer that came out of the mid-60’s. Along with establishing his own engineering firm, John built scale models, which
fortuitously led to his crossing paths with the American film director / producer, Stanley Kubrick. The outcome was John eventually building an essential scale model for Kubrick’s transformative film, 2001 – A Space Odyssey. The model, none other than the seminal spacecraft Discovery. By 1969, Michell was involved in building turntable parts for Transcriptors, a British turntable manufacturer.
Transcriptors relocated to Ireland in 1973, at which time J.A. Michell took on the full manufacturing of their turntables, under the name J.A. Michell Engineering Limited (MICHELL). It was about this time that Stanley Kubrick featured a Transcriptors Hydraulic Reference Turntable in his film A Clockwork Orange – second connection. I’d guess that John’s connection to Transcriptors and to Kubrick let to the turntable becoming part of film history.
Now, the third spoke in this wheel around John, involves the film Star Wars. On Star Wars, John Michell contributed his talent to the building of set models us in George Lucas’ ground-breaking film.
One man, three iconic movies…but wait…we’re just getting started. It was in 1977 that the first true MICHELL turntable was born – the Michell Reference Electronic.
To read more, click on the link … Michell Gyro SE
https://www.tedpublications.com/fr/en/magazine-list/#flipbook-df_43109/60/
