Information for "Unititled" ("Almost Famous"). Please Read Before You Answer Agasha's Questions.

Before Agasha gets her blog up, I wanted you to have some resources to refer back to you when you're answering her questions and for when we discuss the film tomorrow. 

First is the "Tiny Dancer" scene.  Some critics (and viewers) hated it.  I can see why: it's "cheesy" to use a contemporary term.  But I tend to think you have to buy this moment to buy the whole movie, which romanticizes rock music while questioning and critiquing the "circus," as Russell calls it, that exists around it.  

Second is the "The Wind" scene, totally unnecessary to the narrative but clearly important to the movie as it occurs after Dennis Hope and his mercenary view of rock-music-as-business is adopted by Stillwater.  It also highlights Penny Lane's character as a potential "manic pixie dreamgirl" figure, one that Cameron Crowe has used in many of his films.  I think she's more than the trope.

Here is "Stillwater"performing.  Mark Kozelek who plays bassist Larry Fellows and John Fedevich who plays drummer Ed Vallencourt are professional musicians. Billy Crudup and Jason Lee, the Mick and Keith, Page and Plant, of the band, are not: they took lessons from Crowe's wife Nancy Wilson of Heart and Peter Frampton (who for many years had the biggest selling album in pop music, 1976's "Frampton Comes Alive"; he plays a roadie for Humble Pie in the movie—after having really played guitar and singing for Humble Pie in the time the movie takes place).  They look like a real band.

Finally,  here's an earlier version of the screenplay and some trivia and information about the film from Cameron Crowe's website.