Posts Tagged ‘Jason’

So, I gave myself a little free reign and slept in a bit this morning. Jacob was off to his job – it’s his Friday – as he work. So, I gave myself a little free reign and slept in a bit this morning. Jacob was off to his job – it’s his Friday – as he works Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday and has the rest of the week off; and I had put in more time than expected on that copywriting gig (Thanks again, Jason!) which was a nice surprise and a good boost (plus there looks like they’ll be more work to do – which is perfect.)

I digress within the digression. I’ve been trying to get up at 8:30, but its been more like 9:00 or 9:30. What I’m trying to get away from is the 10:00 wake-up, which is what I let myself go until today. I’ve also resumed walking, now a bit in the afternoon, to get a break from the computer and get some sunshine/exercise in and to listen to my audiobook/This American Life because I’m not in the car much these days.

ANYWAYS (finally, woof! Sometimes the tangents within the tangents are a little taxing, aren’t they?) I awoke and grabbed my handy-dandy, don’t-know-how-we-existed-without-them iPhone, as I do now every morning, and checked my email before pulling myself up for some apple-cinnamon Cheerios and toast (Hey, I’m out of English Muffins, which reminds me….) with some iced coffee. So, I turn off my alarm – which is on my iPhone, too. (I mean everything’s on that thing!) and lo and behold if there isn’t an email there that goes a little something like this:

Hey Guys,

I got your emails from **** (Ed note: Jason & Doc’s Agent) It was so great meeting you a few weeks back.  I just wanted to reach out and tell you how much **** ( Ed note: Her Boss the Producer) and I enjoy your writing and that we’d love to find something to work on with you in the future so definitely expect me to be bothering you guys with projects.  Thanks again for coming in!

Talk to you soon.

This being from one of the Execs and her Boss whom we pitched to recently with our latest TV idea. And though they passed, we had heard they loved us and the door would be open, but that was it. Until the email today. Which was a nice boost. Which meant we had taken a nice little step forward. This was further emphasized when the above message sparked an email conversation between the Exec, Jason (as he was moving, nonetheless!) and myself (before I could have any breakfast or iced coffee, but not from bed) that seemed to go on for an hour and a half maybe? The Exec asked what we were interested in working on in the future. We asked what her company mandate (the types of scripts they’re interested in doing most of all/are actively hunting around for)  is on the feature side. We chatted on that a bit which evolved into her asking us to return to their office for a meeting to discuss features this coming Monday @ 4.

Which is exactly what we had hoped would occur, reasonably speaking, from our meetings. We hoped , and tasked ourselves, with making fans – which we apparently did with this Exec. Now we’ll go in and have more of a general meeting where we’ll pitch some feature ideas, but they’ll also talk about what they’ve got optioned or purchased (books, magazine articles, ideas they have themselves) and we’ll discuss possible fits for an assignment hopefully of some kind, or they’ll spark to one of our existing ideas and we’ll go across the studio lot and pitch it to the Studio Brass.

BOO-YA!  GO. TEAM!

Yes, a lovely way to start the day. We figure this should please everyone @ UTA as it shows (again as Jason reminded me) a) progress under their guidance, and b) demonstrates value in our pitching skills along with our material, which means that when they do send us out there are benefits – like making fans – who may open the door to unseen assignments, business/creative opportunities.

More and more I am mesmerized by the education in how Hollywood really operates, since I left school! Sure, UCLA really prepared me to take advantage of the PHD program Jason and I find ourselves in right now. It’s amazing. There is no way on GOD’S GREEN EARTH that you could do this – start a career – from anywhere but here. NO WAY. If you were able to accomplish that, I would wager my last dime that it was a result of sheer dumb luck, or the person had been here previously (This is the untold portion of the GRAN TORINO screenwriter’s legend. He actually worked and lived here for quite some time, before leaving for Minnesota where he wrote and then sold his script through his CONTACTS here.)

Why do I say this? Because, there’s so much misinformation swirling around this aspect of the journey and the more and more that we take each gradual step these days, the fact that there’s such a deep schism between hard reality and The fantasy that’s sold in the many books, screenwriter’s conferences, et. all which I used to look to for facts like countless others out there. This isn’t a Mike Tyson fight people. There’s no thirty second, first round knockout. This is Muhammad Ali, Rumble In The Jungle, gotta last the whole fight type of fight. Which means you gotta be there every step of the way. In the ring. Taking your shots as you deal some out, bit by bit, too.

As I look about, read the trades, and pay attention to what’s going on as best as I can, I witness this reality in all of its myriad guises. I love it. And am frustrated by it. As well as depressed some days and just bewildered other days. Or exhilarated. But there’s no sense in railing against how it is. You may not want it to be that way, but it just is – and has been long before you came along.

Best bet is to learn those rules, master them, before you start even having the slightest glimmer of the thought that they should not apply to you. Because guess what? Even then, they still do.

I think as long as their are emails like the one above every know and again, I can make my peace with that and work (though I’m not perfect!) towards setting aside any thoughts otherwise.

If you’re out there, on this crazy journey, too, do yourself a favor. One I wish I would’ve done years ago, and put aside the delusions, see it for what it is and approach it accordingly. The headaches and heartaches from pounding your head against it just isn’t worth it.

I’ll get the Saturday Review and Randoms up tomorrow – a little late this week. I’m done in Corona Del Mar (and none too soon!) with my old pal, Stagger Lee. I just have to say I love that dog more than words can say. He seems to be in fine shape and was quite excited to see me when I arrived. I know I was. Seriously, I hope to have such a steadfast canine companion one day.  I’ve got a special place in my heart for Stags, that’s for sure.

Thought I would interrupt our regularly scheduled program to share a bit of an update. Sure enough, after Jason and I became a bit concerned that we had entered some kind of weird stand still and didn’t know if we had done something or not to get us there; things suddenly perked up on Friday. In fact, they got down right crazy for a bit. Essentially we have four pitch sessions scheduled for next week. One on each day, starting Tuesday and going until Friday. All at wildly divergent times and all over L.A. – The Warners Lot, Beverly Hills, Culver City, and Santa Monica. All with legit television production companies – the company that did The Sopranos and does Curb Your Enthusiasm, for instance.

So this is it – we’re stepping up to the plate and going live. It’s no longer about trying to get into a position to sell something and getting paid to write. We are finally in that position and will head out to see what happens. It’s truly just a first step in what will be a long road, but it’s exciting to think the impetus for the meetings and work has shifted. It’s no longer the audition, now it’s time to put on the show!

Seriously.

I am amazed that yesterday’s entry was even coherent. I was so exhausted/falling asleep at the keys when I pounded it out last night. You should’ve seen me trying to write it out. Literally to just string those thoughts together. I think I had to take a nap on the couch at one point to rally and edit down the babble I had put down initially.

So, to recap on what I was trying to say and give anyone who’s curious a little insight into the cause of such exhaustion:

-Jacob and I decided not to go with the Culver City place we initially settled on. The one I blogged about earlier in the week. Instead we decided to raise our monthly limit a bit and broaden the area of our search and see what we came up with. That was yesterday. We took a look at several two bedrooms in the $1450 to $1600 a month range. We saw one that might work right down from Boardwalk 11 (Tiff!) Then today we conferred and decided to postpone our move out dates until August 1st, so that we can really look and find the right spot. We both have a bunch of writing type work to do and I need to look for employment of some kind, etc… So, it’s a relief to back off for a few weeks and come at it down the road.

-I was sooooo exhausted b/c I had another crazy, marathon dental appointment. Though this one caught me COMPLETELY by surprise. I was under the impression I was going to get the finishing touches on the work I had done two weeks, or so, ago. Usually that’s a quick one or two hour appointment. Your in, your out. Everything is paid already. It’s not new work –  just swapping the temporary work for the actual veneers or crown (or combination which is what I have this time.) So, I swung in for what I thought was a quick visit and was there for a little over five hours in the chair, straight. I didn’t eat before, which was my mistake. Big mistake. But the whole visit was painful like the last time, which is unusual for me. Something about my front, upper area – super sensitive all around. So there were many shots to numb the area down, through the whole process. I also had a tightly scheduled day – looking at apartments, a notes meeting with my professor, and a writer’s support group meeting that night – boom, boom, boom – all back to back. So, as soon as I realized what was happening at the dentist, I had to start texting to cancel this and move that – very stressful when you’re managing pain and quite hungry!  Then I had to race out of there when I was finally free (in another cruel twist – they took the temporaries out, showed me the permanents weren’t done to their satisfaction – I could put them in, but my Dentist wasn’t completely happy with them, then had to totally redo the temporary!) and get on with what was left of my day. Which meant when I finally got home at 11 p.m. and ate something substantial, I got very sleepy very quickly. BUT, in true doc fashion, refused to admit to myself I should go to bed, because I wanted to watch the season finale of JUSTIFIED and eat this (what turned out be awesome) slice graduation cake JJ had brought for me at the writer’s support group. Thus the world’s shortest blog post last night!

- Saw the wonderful John Sweet for notes – my final UCLA obligation. He loved the script from the quarter. That’s good because we’re using it as a sample!

-Lastly, our former manager-producer officially declared he’s not going to pay us, or rather claims he can’t pay Jason and I the money we are owed on the two pilot scripts we separately wrote for him last winter. We got some money up front, but not the money due upon completion. There’s a signed contract, plenty of emails in our favor – all sorts of stuff. We just need to evaluate what it will take to get our money from him. He lives in $9000 a month condo with his fiance who owns four luxury day spas (invitation only) and guests on the Rachel Ray Show. He’s an actor on All My Children. I think he can afford $8,500 dollars (total amount owed.) We even offered a payment plan. He claims he doesn’t have the money. We’ll see. Sadly, this is a part of the film business and has to be endured. You do your best to avoid these situations or deals that will lead to these situations, but it happens.

More, when I know it!

It SEEEMS to slow down.

The pressure appears to lift.

The too much to do crunch-crunch-crunch of sleeplessness, constant doing, phone vibrating, emails flooding in quiets.

But, you know. You just know that it’s just the eye that we’ve slipped into. A lull, if you will, before the next wave. In the corner with the Cut Man and Trainer, shaking off the last round, getting ready for the bell.

At least that’s how I feel today, which was an unexpected lost day. Sure, I pushed my play around like a young tyke pushes his carrots and peas around his plate, hoping they’ll just eat themselves.

Part of this stemmed from the late news today that I won’t be getting read on Tuesday with the actual MFA Playwrights in the final class. That was the current in the final push – to not be embarrassed in front of the Playwrights and the Theater Faculty as my full-length is read out loud. The stakes would’ve noticeably higher, basically. I’m actually good with not getting read. I feel strong about the play and I know its in an early developmental phase, still incubating essentially, subjecting it to the rigors of a harried workshop read with non-performers reading and no prep. This definitely encourage notes and opinions which most certainly would’ve clouded the forward progress of future rewrites. Instead, I’ll polish for clarity and continuity tomorrow and hand it in on Tuesday, or possibly before. Hanay will be happy with the effort throughout and the quality of the work. I will launch into a true rewrite later in the week.

With SKEET in the bag after Jason’s quick, excellent work with tightening the new version and emphasizing some key emotional turns I only glanced at in my draft, we now are looking at a TV pilot we’ve had to wait on a bit (for me to clear some head space and time) which we can attack and Jason’s take on a script of mine SUNGATE, which I’m really excited about and am trying real hard to remain patient for! From there we have the Serial Killer/Procedural and a rewrite of the CHINATOWN/INDIAN CASINO script and then….whatever we dream up next.

To be certain, we have quite a back catalog of scripts and ideas that need to be addressed, so there’s no real shortage here. I don’t mean to sound arrogant, but we’re both writers who don’t really heal to the idea of writer’s block. We’re sit down, roll up the sleeves, and chisel away until it starts working writers. Which adds to the strength of the partnership. I don’t believe writer’s block exists. I just don’t. You have to give yourself permission to fail (ah, there’s that word again.) You have to encourage yourself to write poorly, as much as you encourage yourself to write well.

And with that, I realize I’m getting off topic. Which means I’ll take this opportunity to reign it in a bit, and get to what I initially wanted to hit upon, which is we are entering a period where we’ll be writing for ourselves You always are to some degree, but the deadlines hovering over from the projects worked on will all be of our own making and policing. It’s a different sort of pressure, for sure. One that I’ve been five years removed from. Should be fun. Might actually get back to a more sane work load of only tackling one or two projects at a time.

Ahhh, who am I kidding?

So much to gab about, so little time tonight to gab about it. So, without further ado, let’s hit it:

-I’m hesitant to say anything about the Cardinals at the moment. (Did you see tonight’s box score, Dad? Not bad. Not bad at all.) Let’s just simply say: YAY! And leave it at that.

- Mouth? Still sore. But, starting to settle in. Body? Still discombobulated. Though I think that’s more from the 48 hour write-a-thon I found myself in, before the final 434 on Thursday. BTW, that script is looking quite sharp. It was a rewrite of one of Jason’s – a spare, dark psychological thriller. Near my sweet spot, so to speak. He did a pass, after I wrapped up on Thursday and the script sparkles in my opinion. Truly sparkles. I want to see this movie. See what a director could do with it.

- The delightful Ms. Antone is in town for the weekend from Prescott, AZ. Always a major league treat! We hustled out to see a play at the Pasadena Playhouse. It’s called boom by Furious Theater Company. It was not the best thing we’ve seen. A little annoying. Tough to say if it was the direction, though, or just the play itself. Overall, I’d say the production was quite well done – acting and set design. But the story turned on a rather trivial and tired joke at the end, with far too much wackiness before that to really hinge on something so – plain. One notable to the evening is that this production featured Julia Duffy, mostly known for her work as a series regular on the funny and endearing sitcom, Newhart .

-Tonight, my niece, Ellen, had her high school graduation party. I wish I could’ve been there, or, more importantly, there on Sunday when she graduates. She’ll be off to Saint Mary’s of Notre Dame, in South Bend, next fall. Congrats, Ellen!

- I’m just glad Ellen made it home, safe and sound from her senior trip – a mission trip to Guatemala that some students do as their senior project. All the students do some sort of aid work as their senior project. This particular trip took place this past week. Which meant that they were trapped in Guatemala after the volcanic eruption and then tropical storm. You can read about it here.

-Always makes me a little melancholy when someone I love, who’s heart is still full of wonder and isn’t hardened to the roughness and inexplicably tragic in the world quite only to get a random glimpse of it before they should. I made choices that I’m not so proud of when I was quite young, lead an extremely reckless and self-destructive life when I was in high school, college, and my 20s. This life brought me out into that rough and inexplicably tragic world far sooner than I should’ve been. When I look back on some of those things, string them together in their proper context, and look at them again in clear eyes, I wouldn’t wish that for anyone’s teenage years. Not what I saw. Not what I did. Not what I learned – about myself, about others, and about the world.

-I have three days to rewrite the play. Should actually be a mellow experience. A nice victory lap on my MFA career.

-I’ve made the decision to search for a 2bd/2ba apartment with my buddy Jacob Bursten-Stern, a fine playwright, former HS basketball star, and good guy. I’ve known Jacob for the full three years of school. We both worked together, as well, at the UCLA Film Archive during our first year. We go to lunch every few weeks, talk shop, etc.. He’s also a very good friend of Tiffany’s, a playwrights who plays poker, has good taste in TV shows and – with Tiffany – kept me in it to win it with playwriting this year. We’ve been discussing this, after Tiffany suggested it, for a couple of weeks. Kind of amiably considering it. Bottom line came down for both of us, at different times, this week and the fact of the matter is that we can find a place in Culver City that’s big and will go for $1300 to $1500. Split that in two, plus split the bills and all of a sudden, I cut my monthly by a third, which is nothing to sneeze at. So, for July 1st as the target date. I hate to give up living alone. But, I’ll have plenty of time for that later. Need to stay in the hunt and this will help that – tremendously.

-Been a frustrating week on the business side of things. That’s all I’ll say for now. It is what it is. Suffice to say, this business is not a very above board, say what you mean style of business. Deciphering the different layers of “I said this, but really meant this.” Or, “I agree to this, but what I really wanted was this.” Is a major pain, most all the time. But, it’s also par for the course, unfortunately, and you just have to grin and bear it. Best advice? Keep writing.

- YAY REDBIRDS!

-Coach John Wooden, The Wizard Of Westwood, passed today. He was considered not only one of, if not the, greatest basketball coach/es. More than that, though, he was a teacher, a mentor, a molder of men. As Vin Scully said: “He is a genius in his ability to inspire There are a few giants who walk among us. He was truly one of them.” Coach Wooden’s spirit pervades all of Westwood. Not just in a basketball sense, but in an inspirational success. One of my favorite Wooden quotes:

“Success is never final, failure is never fatal. It’s courage that counts.”

Below is an brief video from UCLA’s tribute page for Coach Wooden. In it he talks further about failure:

“In life there will be peaks and valleys. The strength of a person’s character depends on their ability to accept both success and failure. Gonna have both.”

That is a lesson former Sony Pictures Head and famed Producer, Peter Guber, who will speak at graduation on Friday, taught quite eloquently in his opening lecture for his class ‘Navigating A Narrative World.” I believe he mentioned that he had learned it from Coach Wooden, but I’m not sure. It is, I feel, the core lesson that UCLA teaches and a resounding truth to life that is all too often overlooked. In all things and in all lives there will be peaks and valleys, you must reconcile that in your heart, have faith and learn to grow from both.

At the end of the tribute, Coach Wooden intones a beautiful poem on letting go of the fear of dying.

God Bless and Good Night.

Normal posting will return tomorrow.

How’s your week going?

Mine’s rumbling along, thanks for asking. Been a little busy, though. Well, a little busier than usual. The deadlines, self-imposed or teacher-imposed (there is no deadline discrimination at Guided By Wire!), are coming due.

Best way to picture it is a fighter squadron, in this case four fancy jets, way out in the ocean. They’re coming in for a landing and  running out of gas at various tight intervals. And I’m air traffic control and a co-pilot all at once.  So, they’re lining up in a certain order and coming in hot – they’ll be no sending them back out for another pass. Those wheels have to touch down. And it’s at night (I kid!I kid!)

Jason and I just wrapped up the initial draft on the Chinatown in the desert script. I was slugging it out the past day and a half. Having turned away from it last week, to do some necessary work on the second act of the play, I was holding us up. Jason wrapped up his pass through the weekend, so it was time for me to roll up the sleeves and get messy.

I have to say it felt really good. Quite a relief, actually. This being an outside project. The most outside of the parameters of school or a workshop assignment I’ve ever partaken in. I just realized that right about now. Huh. That’s why it felt so satisfying midway through my big, last crunch, despite being pretty sleep deprived and exhausted with a healthy chunk of work still to do.  I did an immersion stint in the chair. That wasn’t the plan, but when the work needs to be done, it needs to be done. You suit up and you make it happen. That’s the name of the game. We’re both pretty darn good at that. That’s one of the things that I think makes us a strong team in tackling projects – we work separately and we practice a divide and conqueror approach that’s really served us well so far. I did twenty hours in about twenty-five hours in two chunks of time. That included about an hour and a half scattered, in various increments, over that time frame. Exactly four hours went to sleep.

Now, that’s not how I prefer to do it, but the situation called for it and I’m thankful we took that route. It being an outside project and not all the way official yet, we could’ve pushed it, gotten lazy, taken forever to do the work., etc… Not the most effective way to tackle your first out of school assignment, even if it is for a buddy and no one would really, probably get upset.

It’s been five years since I’ve worked outside the confines (good and bad) of the UCLA ten week quarter system when pitching, developing, and writing new material. That’s two years Professional Program and three years in the MFA program. Five years is a long time to generate new material every ten weeks, just about. Quite a training cycle, in retrospect. But, and this was always a fear in the back of my head – whether realistic or not – that once the veil on that omnipresent institutional deadline – tenth week = script, without fail or you will fail – I would slack off, get lazy, turn into a couch potato, lose my hunger or edge, show signs of burnout. Who knows? None of them = working screenwriter!

So, we put that script to bed. And I’d have to say, a) I’m pretty darn proud of us for the quality of the script, and 2) yes, I feel pretty professional and that’s always nice.

More after I get some ZZZZZ’s

We are closing in on finishing the script we’ve been working so hard on. Well, let me amend that, we’re basically done with the first draft. Finishing is not a fair word in screenwriting. Their really is no finishing that happens. I tend to see it as completing a phase. This next phase involves polishing. I need to do a polish – Jason’s already done a polishing pass. Then we’ll both read it and if it feels good enough to send along, we will send it. Then the first draft phase would be complete (We hope!) So far I’d say chances are quite high we’re sending it by Wednesday. From there, it all depends, but hopefully in a month or two at the most, we’ll get an answer.

The first big hurdle is to insure Alan and Seth are on board with the draft. I’d say (and I’m sure Jason would say) “this draft is fantastic. I can’t see why they wouldn’t be.” But, in this business, never take anything for granted. I think we’ll be just fine, but I’ll feel best when we know we’re fine. (One thing I’ve seen is that everyone’s fine and then when you take it up a level and that guy isn’t fine, all of a sudden your people aren’t fine either. It can be a trial!)  Then it goes up the ladder to the head of the company. Who gives it a read and makes the big decision – yea or nay. If “nay” we are free to take it out to the rest of the biz. At least that’s what we were promised. If “yea” supposedly he may write a check for it, right on the spot. Though I think that’s a bit of hype. Just a little. I would never expect that kind of treatment.

That’s one of the good things about the smaller size of the company. We can see all the way to the top of the ladder. The amount of people between us and a decision is at an extremely rare and unusually low number of people. Two of which (out of the three) are already involved in the project! So, I think we’re in good shape going in.

Welcome to the back half of the week.

A shout out, first of all, to my dear friend Monique, wife of my other dear friend Mike. Both hail back to the Marquette days and are two of my most favorite people on the planet. That have a beautiful family on the east coast. Monique was also in graduate school as well. We were mirrors of each other. That is until monday, when Monique graduated! So congrats, Mo!! And to all the Howley’s! I know we don’t quite celebrate like we used to at the Love Apt’s or Roseneath, but I’m sure you guys acknowledged the momentous occasion in fine style.

I’m do back, pounding away on the script Jason and I are working hard to finish as soon as possible. Initially, I thought I wouldn’t post, but then figured the warm-up would do me well before I dove back in for the final lap of the evening. It’s been a long forty-eight hours, with the brunt of the work coming today. Much as I mentioned last night, I faired the same today – no so hot. It was a game of inches when I was looking for a blow out. What can you do? Keep going, that’s what. It eventually turns around. Late tonight I started to feel it rumbling towards take-off, thus this last lap. Usually if I’m struggling and I put in the hours I did today, I’d drop it for the night, come back in the morning, attack it again. What I feel like the writer is always trying to conjure, induce, cultivate, amplify, stoke, cook, construct is a certain magnetism to the project at hand. A kind of low humming, constant gravitational pull. The bits, voices and scenes are flashing through your head, story knots are being unwound by the diligent, tireless fingers in your subconscious, and your mumbling under your breath – chasing the rhythm and cadence of your characters’ voices, trying them on, tailoring them as you go and then loading them into your hands and your mind’s eye.

That’s why it’s tough – this magnetism – to switch gears quickly from one project to another. That’s what I’ve been feeling a bit lately. Many writers will not switch gears between projects like that. It’s one at a time. Jason and I separately, and now together, have had a habit of juggling many projects at UCLA. But that’s more out of drive, wonder, and need, mostly. In time we became accustomed to it. I don’t know if I, or Jason for that matter, would prefer that the workload ease off a bit or calm down to a one project at a time kind of thing. I don’t think we could go back to that. I once said that without thinking to my Therapist – retiring to Italy and not writing. Her reaction? She laughed out loud. Like surprised laughter she found it so absurd. Not the Italy part. The not writing part.

Well I’ve gone off on a tangent and completely gotten away from my simple post. Oh, well. Suffice to say, the magnetism is hard to get going, but when it does, there’s nothing like it. If it’s not happening, all you can do it keep tending to the just planted crops, waiting for them to shoot up out of the ground. All work will be repaid, eventually!

So, here’s a few simple quotes I found on the internet. They’re for screenwriting, but I think they apply to any craftsman. Hope they’re at least enjoyable to mull over. They’re great reminders for me of some of the fundamentals.

“Writing really is a process of discovery. The biggest enemy is being satisfied. When I think, ‘Oh, this is so great. They can’t change a word. They’ve got to film it exactly like this,’ that’s when I know I’m not pushing hard enough. That’s when you have to be most suspicious.”

-William Broyles, Jr. (Apollo 13, Cast Away, The Polar Express)

“Guilt drives me. I know I have to write every day. During the story period, it’s so much harder, it’s much more fluid… When I start to write, I give myself a goal of five pages a day. I don’t stop until I get that done, whether it’s taken me two hours or twelve. Sometimes if I get rolling I can write more, I can write ten pages… It makes you push. Because otherwise, you’d come to the tough part two pages in and you’d go, I’m gonna give up. You have to push through. Because with every scene you come to, you know that the last scene was easy to write, but this scene is impossible. And you get through that, and you see the next scene, and you say, that last one was easy to write, but this one’s impossible. Every single scene is usually like that. Always, impossible. And then the characters start talking to you.”

Paul Haggis (Crash, Million Dollar Baby)

“One thing that has proven to be true for us [Kurtzman & Orci] over and over again is not to be married to our words, necessarily, but to be married to the spirit of the words. Because there’s a thousand ways you can express an idea.”

– Alex Kurtzman (Mission Impossible 3, Star Trek)

“The writing is the easiest part of it. The trying period is the period of conceptualization, followed by research. This prewriting time can take anywhere from six months to ten years. But once I know everything there is to know about my characters, the actual writing of the script switches to automatic pilot. It makes no difference whether the script is for TV or feature–the writing period is the same: five pages a day, seven days a week. That’s it. Nothing magical. You just sit there and keep typing.”

– Stirling Silliphant (In the Heat of the Night, Charly, The Poseidon Adventure)

“You must write everyday. Free yourself. Free association. An hour alone a day. Blind writing. Write in the dark. Don’t think about what it is you’re writing. Just put a piece of paper in the typewriter, take your clothes off and go! No destination… pay it no attention… it’s pure unconscious exercise. Pages of it. Keep it up until embarrassment disappears. Eliminate resistance. Look at it in the morning. Amazing sometimes. Most of it won’t make any sense. But there’ll always be a small kernel of truth that relates to what you’re working on at the time. You won’t even know you created it. It will appear, and it is yours. Pure gold, a product of that pure part of you that does not know how to resist.”

– Alvin Sargent (Paper Moon, Julia, Ordinary People)

“Forget every rule any screenwriting guru ever taught you. Except one: Never be boring.”

– David Mamet (The Verdict, The Untouchables, Hoffa)

Good Night. Good Day. God Speed. I hope you’re smiling wherever you are. I’ll be at the keyboard.

Sort of….

Drifted away there for the past couple of days. Guess I needed a little bit of break. I’m not too sure. Been feeling a bit too overwhelmed the past few days in all honesty. Then today, I have to say, I hit a bit of a wall and have really not been feeling myself at all. Not to worry anyone. These things happen. Sometimes, with how hectic I can let things be, sometimes I think these moments are my mind (more than my body) saying, “Hey, slow it down a little! Even if it’s for a day!” So, though I lost the last two days, in particular, and I didn’t really have those days to lose; I did relax at night and not dwell on it. I let them go. Today was a little tough. I get antsy when this happens. Aware I should be driving forward, but also aware that driving forward will probably not happen when I’m this atypical state. Part of the deal, too, is that this past week I really locked into the new schedule and was adjusting to it well. Then I got out of it and there has been some dislocation because of it. So, starting tomorrow, I’ll lock back into the work and the schedule. Jason and I have many things we need to move forward; and I have to wrap up my school work. It is May First, so in thirty days, I will complete Grad School. That’s probably part of it, too.

Lots going on….

Things are still progressing on the pilot front. Maybe not as fast as we’d like, but this business is really not built for speed, from Spielberg on down to the Interns at any given production company or studio. So, we’ve been learning about “letting the process be the process” as the manager told us, and how to be the client and direct our team a little better. Both good lessons and part of the ultimate balancing act that I know we’ll get better with as we move through the minefield. I think this week’s been great, although it hasn’t yielded results yet, for Jason and I to grow as partners and to learn some lessons on both sides of that balancing act. We are definitely getting stronger as we get more and more experience in the real industry. That makes me quite excited to get established and really start the heavy lifting of building a career. Right now, I look at it as excavating the ground and then laying the foundation – tedious, dirty, back breaking work really that must be done meticulously and absolutely right, so we can build anything on top of it. I think we’re doing a pretty good job of it so far, but I know I can’t wait until we’re putting on the roof and painting the exterior!

There’s more, including Tiff’s visit – which meant lots of plays were seen over the past few days, always a blast. We saw one in particular on Thursday night that was incredible. Absolutely incredible. Perfectly cast. Great piece, well staged. Lots of inspiration for mine. More on that later.

As a last note, anyone that’s reading that’s of the mind and heart, please light a candle at Mass or say a prayer for a fellow Bruin Scribe, all around great guy and friend, David Radcliff, who was struck by a car last night. He is on the mend in the hospital after a scary twenty-four hours, but could use all the prayers and good thoughts to continue his recovery. Thanks.

It’s running late and I’m overdue to hit the sack; so let’s dive right in:

- I highly suggest you check out Jason’s blog entry for tonight. In it, in the highlighted section, part way down he lays out our process, which is fairly unique for writing partners, and details a wonderfully clear sense of the actual back and forth. The entry’s a must read, if you’re curious how we do what we do. Which arguably allows us to write more, better, faster in a much less stressful fashion. That might be the catch – the less stress. Either way, it’s an ace up the sleeve for us, in a big, big way.

-Trying to get to sleep earlier and wake up earlier. I am tasked by my sleep psychologist to get into bed at 11 p.m. I’m sure everyone is having a real good laugh at the thought of that. Let’s just say it’s 1:30 a.m. now, so it’s not exactly happening yet. But, then, I’m to be lights out, no later than 1  a.m. and up at 8 a.m. Then (this is the key part) I’m to go outside first thing, take a twenty-thirty minute walk, in the sun so that I can reset my biological clock which should lead to a more regular sleep pattern.

- Cardinals are on the west coast, but didn’t stop in L.A. It’s like they’re taunting me. That’s completely unfair.

-We tentatively resolved the situation around our TV pilot which is with the production company where we’re doing the screenplay. Our manager got in there today, and while we have not heard from him yet, officially, we did hear from our friend who works at the company and was privy to the mood post conversation between the director of development and our guy. It’s not a big staff, as most of these companies aren’t, so it’s pretty ground zero.

-This is good news, right? Yeah. (He begrudgingly says.) It’s tough to get too excited. This is just another climb up on the rollercoaster – there will be, sooner rather than later, a screaming descent. It’s just the nature of things, especially in this business. Before we get too ahead of ourselves, we want to hear from our Manager and get his thoughts, first person, on the whole thing.

-Need to get back to the gym, soon; or take more walks!

-Jason wrote the first sixteen pages today on the desert screenplay. So, I am really jazzed by that. They were fantastic as expected and really launched us into the story in a perfect manner. So now we’re off and running on that project along with the others. We may have to do work next week on the TV Pilot at the production company. Somehow, though, this desert movie is really number one with a bullet on our slate of projects. Just something about the story. Can’t wait to see where we take it.

-Going to get to see an old, dear friend this weekend. She’s out with her boyfirend, visiting a bunch of folks she knows. They’re in from Chicago. I haven’t had a chance to see her since I left Chicago. So it will be lovely to see her.

-What’s your favorite color?

Hahaha. That last one, I just thought I’d slip in. My answer is orange. I’m not sure why, but always has been. Though, I would never wear an orange suit; I have painted an entire kitchen Orange in the first apartment I shared with my ex, and still good friend, Nikki. It was a bold color choice, for sure.  We liked it at first, but then realized it was a little….intense?  Tough to say. It was a garden apartment, so not much light.

Good night and Good day!