Confessions

I’ve been a bad writer.

I got helpful notes on D Line and have done zero revisions.

I promised Ryan I’d give him notes on his rom com. Haven’t read it.

Another friend just gave me a script to give notes on. Haven’t even looked at it.

I have four very loose outlines for the next script and I keep waffling as to which one I should jump on first.

I used hung instead of hanged when writing about a death by hanging. (Sorry Emily and any other English teachers out there.)

Please forgive me.

What I need is focus.

You want focus?

Here's focus:



Did you watch this in 2003? One of my favorite moments in cycling. Flying down a mountain, Beloki falls when his tire ruptures, Armstrong avoids him by turning off the road -- and has the presence of mind to keep going through the field, on those wee tires, at that speed... then sees the ditch by the road in time to stop, hop off and carry his bike across... then gets back on -- without causing another crash -- and keeps going to finish the stage.

Now that's focus.

Time To Write

By now I’ve gotten a few sets of notes on D Line and, accordingly, I’ve decided to quit writing forever.

Kidding.

Not all the notes intersect or overlap, but there are a few key areas that everyone seems to agree on. This is good, since they are mainly the things I was having doubts about.

And so far, no one has told me to quit writing forever.

Addressing most of the notes shouldn’t be too difficult -– though finding the time to really focus on and address the notes continues to be a problem. You see all these movies about writers who are blocked and how hard that is -– they spend hours staring at their Underwoods of MacBooks, smoking cigarettes and watching the wind move the leaves in the trees outside the window, waiting, waiting, waiting for inspiration to kick in so they can create.

What a great problem to have: all the time in the world to write, but no ideas.

(Though I’ll pass on the cigarettes. Substitute coffee or something. Or sometimes, a good cigar.)

Anyway, you call that angst? Are you kidding me?

Try getting up at 5:45am, less than six hours after you went to bed, because the wee boy is screaming ‘cause his left eye is crusted shut and that’s just pissing him off to no end. Go to work, not realizing you still have chunks of pineapple on your shoulder, where the lad threw them while you were distracted assuring the wife she’s still beautiful, and even more so, at eight months pregnant. Spend a few hours in meetings discussing the four or five projects that need your attention immediately, then break speed limits to get to a lunch with the guys who want to make more movies, but dammit get back in an hour because those projects at work aren’t gonna develop themselves. As you drive home that night, listen to Miles Davis, because it helps, and try to spend the 20 minutes in the car brainstorming how you’re gonna fix those script problems. But then forget those brainstormed solutions because it’s dinnertime with the family -– chat with the wife, riff on Star Wars quotes with the teen, bathe the toddler. When 10pm rolls around and everyone else is in bed (wife and son) or out with friends (daughter), sit down to write.

And then get some good work done before you pass out.

I think most of the people who read this feel me -- we're all working other jobs while we try to hone our skills and bang out some good scripts. So yea for us!

I’m gonna push on through the D Line revisions, because I’m itching to start on a new script.

Oh, I have ideas all right. Just give me the time.

Lovely Kids

My second daughter, in utero and gorgeous already.





My son, nearly two and a perfect mix of cool and cute.





My first daughter, almost 19 and beautiful in every way.


Overall, I'm one lucky bastard.

(By the way, the last two pics were taken on my phone, so excuse the bad quality.)

Well Said Sir

"I have no interest in explaining, defending, reinterpreting or adding to what is there." --David Chase

And so it's over. Perhaps the most revolutionary show in decades, and second in storytelling only to Six Feet Under, in my opinion... The Sopranos has ended.

Talk about well-earned pay for writers, producers, actors, directors, editors. All of them top notch.

And the ending was exactly fitting. And as Chase says, he needn't tell us why.

Cheers all around.

Dome Dash

We spent five days in central Washington state over the Memorial Day weekend, at the two geodesic domes my in-laws live in. Beautiful, rural, windswept valley. Great weather. Plus geodesic domes.

Spent a lot of uninterrupted time with wife and son (daughter stayed in VA to work, saving for a new car), went for some good runs, drove an electric car… and got a lot of good (and overdue) work done on D Line.

In fact, I feel like it’s at the readable draft stage, so I’ve sent it to a few companeros for feedback.

Dear Companeros,

If you’re reading this, and if you’re reading D Line, please do not be kind. If it stinks, tell me it stinks. Cruel but fair is what I need.

And if it’s brilliant, tell me it’s "kinda okay." Don’t want me getting big in the head or nothin’.

Thanks.

At work, we’re gearing up to pitch a couple new series to Discovery Channel, either tomorrow or Tuesday, depending on when a few people up there are free.

And we’re a few pieces of paperwork away from having a four-part pilot/miniseries, in the hopes of it turning into a full series, on History Channel.

Overall, things are looking pretty good.

What A Candyass

I am.

Really.

There I am complaining about not having time to write. Poor me. Whining to beat any number of bands. Like a nancyboy.

So then Friday night rolls around. Son goes to sleep at 7:30. Wife goes to sleep at 8. Daughter's out with friends.

Perfect time to write. Right? Bang out a lot of those revisions to D Line I’ve been planning. Git ‘er dun.

But nooooo.

Instead, I recall that the Red Sox are playing the Orioles, and since MASN carries all Orioles games, I realize I have a rare opportunity to watch my beloved Sox.

So I do. Instead of writing.

And they lose.

How's that for fitting metaphor?

Busted Ankle, Finish Line In Sight

Okay, this is maddening.

I feel like I’m maybe 10-15 hours away from having a good, solid second draft of D Line.

But I just can’t find the time.

But I need to find the time.

Because I’m close. And I want to send it out into the world for feedback.

I wonder if I can talk my wife into letting me lock myself into a hotel room for a day and a night, have the management take out the TV and phone, leave my cell phone in the car, bring some good food, good coffee and good spirits… and just blast through it.

Prolly shouldn’t try. Wife’s pregnant, son’s been sick, daughter’s home from college. Now’s not the time to shirk the family responsibilities…


By the way, as for a Dismal update, we're negotiating with the foreign distributor/sales agent I mentioned. They've been good about revising to meet our needs. Looks like the deal is a fair one, so the question becomes, If this is a good, standard deal, is this the company we want to go with, or should we look for this deal with someone with bigger guns?

Decisions, Decisions

We have an international distributor who is making an offer on Dismal. At first glance, they appear to be a good company and the offer seems fair, and fairly standard, in the broad strokes we’ve discussed so far.

I like that they limit their titles per year so that they can really push them –- I’d hate to be one of 100 films being repped at a booth in Cannes. They’ve distributed some films that have made some money -– no huge hits, but their model seems to be selling smaller films that don’t take as long to become profitable.

Like ours.

Plus they appear to be decent people. Though we are, to be sure, checking references…

They want to bring Dismal to Cannes… which is great but would mean making a quick decision, since it’s only a couple weeks away. I’m not a big fan of that for obvious reasons.

But it’s not like they’re saying, “Sign now so we can bring it to Cannes or the deal’s off.” So we might just pass on this first film market, to give us more time to check out some other offers and carefully review the terms of the contract.

It’s an exciting position to be in –- someone already wants to buy our film –- but it’s also an awkward one. Everyone agrees a filmmaker shouldn’t jump on the first offer -– be patient, give it time. Fair enough. But what if, on the odd chance, the first offer happens to be the best one? Or as good as any other?

Tricky.

Anyway, they’re gonna draft a contract and we’ll review it with out attorneys and we’ll see what happens. We also have screeners making their way to Lionsgate, Sony, New Line and a few others through some contacts, and several other distributors (both domestic and foreign) have been calling to get more information, so maybe there will be more news soon…

To complicate things further.

But, of course, I’d rather have this kind of complication than the opposite -– not having any offers, ever, and having to face the investors. Now that’s an awkward position.

You Lose, Cho

Haven’t blogged in a while.

First, I was hit with the worst flu I think I’ve ever had. I mean, a week of literally not being able to do much beyond sit up in bed every now and again to make sure I didn’t get bedsores like an old woman with a broken hip.

That was the easy part.

Because then, April 16th rolled around. And my daughter goes to Virginia Tech.

She’s safe, thank anything and everything that can be thanked, but it’s obviously been rough. She’s handling it pretty well, though she’s certainly reeling still. But she’s a person who really has her shit together, so I know she’ll be alright in the end.

As the stories came out, it got more and more difficult for me. As I was telling my family recently, I read about these kids who were killed and I saw that they are all exactly like my daughter. They are her. She is them. The things written about them -- great kids, hard workers, good friends, big futures, smiles that stay with you -- that's my little girl. And she was doing exactly what they were doing, at exactly the same time, just a few buildings away. I try to suppress them, but these thoughts of what-if keep coming and it's horrifying. She was so close.

And then the media (who drove my daughter and her friends to additional tears, by the way, invading their grief in a mad scramble to break some new element of the story) started playing the message of the gunman.

I quickly stopped watching.

Because I will not give that piece of shit what he wants. I will not receive his message. I will not ingest his manifesto. I’m not interested in his story or what drove him. I do not care what his intent was. And I definitely will not accept his reasoning.

So fuck you, Cho. And I mean that sincerely. You are nothing. You don’t win. You don’t matter.

What you did matters, to the people killed and those they left behind and to your own family, for whom I feel great pity. But you, you don’t even get contempt. You’re already out of the picture. No legacy. Nothing.

And, by the way, since this is a writing blog, allow me to note that you were a shitty writer.

Healthy Young Infant For Sale

I spent the whole of Sunday locked in a dark room with five other guys.

Not that there’s anything wrong with that….

See, we spent the day with the sound editors doing the final mix review. I know I’ve posted about this before, but I love sound design and sound editing -– because of its furtive nature. It improves the film experience in a remarkable way -– yet done properly the viewer shouldn’t think about it at all. Love that.

Maybe a few people might bring it up when thinking back on the movie at the bar over a couple beers with other filmsters, but not while they’re watching.

Anyway, it was an excellent day. The editors and composer did a great job and we were mainly unanimous in the notes we had for additional tweaks, which the boys are working on now. Since this is one of the last steps in the process it made it extra-excellent. Excellenter, even.

Composer Len is sending me his score on CD, and maybe I can figure out how to post some of his cues on here for you to listen to -– ‘cause they’re pretty fucking cool.

From here on, we have some spot checking on a few sound tweaks and visual effects, then finishing and dubbing -– and we take Dismal out into the world, looking for distribution.

Our baby, up for sale.

Two Steps Back... But In A Good Way

It’s David, late to the party one more time.

I read all kinds of posts and articles and books and such about the almighty Index Card. I suppose it’s always made sense to me, something that obviously would be helpful in revision. I mean, no duh.

But I’d never really done it before.

Well, I popped my cherry.

Last week, I asked my dear Movie Magic Screenwriter to please print out my latest draft of D Line as index cards. And my dear faithful Movie Magic Screenwriter complied, snappily. How nice.

Friday night I cut out the cards, laid them out on my dining room table, poured a neat glass of Bushmills Black Bush, slipped the iPod earbuds into my ears and took two steps back.

And POW –- perspective.

No wonder all these people were recommending it. It really helps.

Really.

No kidding. It’s not just an OCD, Type-A, control freak thing.

So much easier to isolate the story arcs of individual characters, one at a time, to really trace where they’re going, at what pace, why. So much better to see the overall structure and to spot the holes in logic and plot. So much easier to see how reorganizing scenes would work or not work.

I worked for two nights like this, making notes on the cards of revisions that needed to be made. Then we had a dinner party on Sunday.

So now the cards are back in a pile, secured by a couple of rubber bands, snugly tucked away in my bag.

And now I know why all those people recommend attaching the almighty Index Cards to the inimitable Cork Board.

Dining room table: bad idea.

Yet again, David’s late to the party…

Hey, Is That Where Google Got Its Name?

Been working on developing a pilot for a new history/anthropology show for a few days straight now and my brain’s starting to get googly.

As I’ve posted about before, this is where the creation of a TV show gets difficult: when you need to create a verbal pitch and written documents that quickly and clearly illustrate that it’s not just a cool idea, but a compelling, fresh television show that’s easy to visualize from start to finish -– and will last multiple seasons, constantly building ratings and staying relevant and on-brand, in an increasingly fickle world. Oh, and be producible for essentially no money. And we can start yesterday, if you just sign here.

Which is very wiggly work. It, like any good storytelling, is taking something as ephemeral and formless as an idea and turning it into something that exists without you. And I mean without you. Tricky. Lots of mind-wrangling and idea-surfing. Grinding your skateboard of creativity on the handrail of the staircase connecting thought to reality. (As if that staircase exists, says Buddha, chuckling…)

I don’t know what any of that means. But you can see, after you work on it for a while, your brain gets googly.

Great googly moogly even.

So I’m taking a break. Focus on something else for a moment. Allow a fresh perspective to creep in. Free your mind and all that.

So I’ll spend a couple minutes telling you about a little forum we had last night.

In conjunction with the ONFilm festival sponsored by Old Dominion University, the Hampton Roads Film Office set up a panel of independent filmmakers in the area to talk after a showing of Oscar-nominated shorts at the coolest arthouse theater in the area, the Naro (www.narocinema.com).

There were five of us who spoke and took questions about all aspects of making indy movies. It was great to get together with like-minded folks who are navigating some of the same waters, share ideas, horror stories, failures and successes.

In fact, afterwards I proposed doing so on a regular basis. My wife is in a book club and a women investors club. I have friends who are in writer’s groups. AA seems to help an awful lot of people.

There’s no doubting the importance of community, and this is true in the independent film world, too. While reading the blogs of writers and producers is helpful, think how much better it would be if everyone were in the same room.

Which would be easy to do in LA or New York.

But I think we can pull it off in VA, too.

I’ll let you know if it happens, and if it works.

Back to work, googly or no…

Pa(ren)thetic(al)

Len and I finished spotting Dismal last night, and he’s plugging away at the rest of the score. Thankfully, he had done a lot of great work on the rough cut (most of which we were able to keep or just tweak a little) so it’s not a total do-over.

Also plugging away are our fine sound editors, Larry and Cret. We’re planning to do a review of the mix (with music) on April 1st (and that’s no joke). Then little fixes and problem-solving as needed, and we’re off by the second week of April.

And the update on D Line: tonight I start a (restructure) rewrite. It’s a complex story, with multiple characters, and it jumps around a lot. Which was intentional, because I wanted it to have a jazzy feel, as it’s a piece in which jazz plays a central role… but I have to take into account that jazz structures (musically or story-wise) are hard to swallow by non-jazz fans, so I think I need to take it (a tad) more toward the traditional.

Not entirely so, but making it a little cleaner, in a classic story sense. It still has to maintain some of its jazzy qualities, though, or it just won’t (work).

So here I go.

(Which means, Greg, if you haven’t started reading that draft I sent you –- and with your wife in town and your remarkably busy work schedule I imagine you haven’t –- then don’t. Wait for the new one.)

(Oh, and also, Ryan, I got your script and promise to get back to you soon…)

Spot On

Spent three hours on the phone last night with Len, the composer of Dismal, spotting the movie.

This is some of the producing work that I absolutely love. The creative interaction with the creative people who make the movie really shine.

For those of you who don't know what spotting is, it's not when you get a little, um, flow unexpectedly. I mean it is that, but in the film world, it's when you go through the movie scene-by-scene, talking about tone, intention, feeling, etc., deciding where music begins, where it ends, what it sounds like -- and probably most importantly, where there should be no music at all.

(A little advice for the beginner: if your composer creates a wall-to-wall score, find a new composer.)

Ideally, of course, this spotting session should happen with you and the composer in the same room. If possible, every creative decision should be made with people looking at each other. Communication’s always best that way -– as is bitch-slapping. But with Dismal, we have no real money to fly around meeting people all the time, I have a full-time job (hence starting at 8pm) and the composer's in Pennsylvania while I'm in Virginia. So we did it over the phone, each with timecoded DVDs running.

Making it all the more interesting is that Len’s a great composer, very creative but also practical, and we really understand each other. I can’t say enough about the value of hiring the right team.

Anyway, this, as I said, is one of the fun parts of producing. And it's one of the parts that most people don't know about. Which is maybe why I like it so much. Do it right, and it enhances the film dramatically but the viewer doesn’t really notice it. It’s stealth creativity. Ninja style.

Same thing with sound design and editing -- I love sitting with the sound guys and working through all the ways to amplify the quality of the film -- little sounds here or there, silence when it should be silence, snapping twigs, sound effects, foley, ADR, all that great background stuff that can really make or break a film.

In fact, if I had to change positions in the film and TV world, I think I’d switch to sound design. Love that shit.

By the way, in the three hours spent last night, we got through roughly half of the movie, so we finish tonight. Looking forward to it. Because over the phone, Len can’t bitch-slap me.

Uncle Walt Says Lay Off

I’m quoting from memory here, so don’t hold me to it, but in one of his many fantastic poems Walt Whitman wrote something like, “Better than to tell the best is to leave the best untold.”

This is kinda what’s occupying my writing thoughts lately.

I tried, as I was writing D Line (formerly known as “the Harlem rewrite”), to keep a strong filter up to snag any dialogue or action lines that were too heavy-handed. You don’t want to hand the reader everything -– and by reader, I really mean the director or actors who might ultimately get behind the script and want to work on it. But in day-to-day America, it seems people want everything handed to them, so you end up being inadvertently trained to give them everything.

I know the first couple scripts I wrote were way too heavy-handed –- telling everything.

But the moves I like best are the ones during which I have to do a little work. No easy answers. Lots of unsolved problems. Not too much unchecked, uninspired, way-too-easy redemption. I like the ones where you have questions running through your mind during the credits, and not just about why they needed that many stuntmen.

I was thinking about this last night, while watching The Illusionist –- which was okay, but it handed me everything. I like to do a little concluding of my own, a little critical thinking. And so naturally, I’m trying to write such a script.

But where to draw the line can be tricky. To be sure, subtlety and careful open-endedness can be easily misconstrued as idiocy and lack of clarity.

As I go back and reread D Line, making notes for the next draft, I wonder if I hit the balance. This is not just an artistic question –- though I hope for my soul's sake it's mainly so -– but a practical one, too.

If I’m going to use this script to try to break into Hollywood, get an agent, maybe a manger, try to sell it and work my ass off to help shepherd it into theaters, do I have to dumb things down a little? Spell things out? Hit a more conservative structure? Do people who have to read hundreds of scripts want to do a little work for a story?

I suppose the answer’s obvious, if I’m just trying to get into theaters. Then, the answer would be, yes, dumb it down, write the Robert McKee tripe in which the cookie cutter is clearly visible and the marketability shines through like a great glowing Golden Arches, and hope you hit the blockbuster fever-of-the-day at the right time.

But I also want to write movies that I’m proud of. Oh, I know. I’m naïve. Okay, in some ways, yes I am. But it’s true: I want to at least start by trying to write honest scripts about honest people with honestly messy lives.

If, after multiple failures, I end up jaded and writing thin plastic schlock to get a paycheck, okay. Fine. Ain’t too proud to beg.

But first I want to try not to tell the best, but to leave the best untold -– so that someone sitting in the theater will be able to find it on their own terms.

Dismal Trailer

Official DiSmAl trailer 1

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It loses a lot of quality being compressed to fit on MySpace, and then transferred here, so it doesn't look as beautiful as the full HD version does... but you get the idea anyway.

Dismal Poster

Here's our poster. Whatcha think?

Pants On Fire

'Member when I said we had picture lock on Dismal? 'Member that?

Um.

I lied.

When our DP reviewed the whole thing this week he found a bunch of stuff that our second camera shot that isn't going to work once we up-res to HD and project on the large screen.

So we have to cut the shots.

All of them.

Which means finding time with the editor to recut.

And having the sound editors skip those parts.

And telling the composer his pacing's all off now.

Ah, but it's not really lying to you. We did have picture lock. Honest. This is just the way things go. No matter how finished you think you are, no matter how well you think you've planned, something's going to screw up. And all you can do is try to fix it.

Which we will. We'll still have our final-final by the first week in April. It'll just be a little hairier go now. But dammit we're all dedicated to making this the best thing it can be. And it will be.

Just a week later than we thought.

Skewed Perspective

Man I should be better at posting to this regularly. Just so busy. But I just finished my peanut butter and jelly sandwich in record time so I have a few minutes for a quick update.

We have picture lock on Dismal. Whew. It's a very good, solid movie, entertaining throughout -- and now it's gonna get better as the sound editors and composer get to work. All that, plus onlining and color timing should be finished by the end of March.

Which means by April we can do a cast and crew (and friend) screening and start hitting the sell hard: getting back in touch to the distributors who've called us, contacting other distributors, maybe renting theaters in LA and New York to screen for distributors. And we're continuing with the film festival circuit.

Speaking of that, someone on the team was expressing some worry, saying that so far, it's been nothing but rejections, so he's worried we'll end up with a very expensive coaster.

Huh?

We didn't make it into two film festivals. Two.

Is that something to worry about? Does that mean we're doomed? Hell no. I heard that, in its first round of pitching, American Idol got turned down at every network and all the major cable channels. There are tons of stories of now-classic movies, books and people who at first were rejected a hundred times. A thousand.

Please people. This is the film industry. While it's true that only 13 days passed between the start of writing on Basic Instinct and its being sold for $3 million, usually, it's a long, slow, cruel business.

So let's stick to it, shall we?

Grrrrrrr

Okay. I’m pissed. And it takes a lot to get me pissed.

The company I work for is experiencing a difficult lean time. It happens sometimes in the TV business, when a gap appears between show contracts. Production companies accordion up and down with staff levels all the time. We’ve been fortunate that in almost 15 years we’ve had very little down time, and few hiatuses. Hiati?

Anyway, we could be looking at a hiatus soon. Just went through a round of painful layoffs -– some very good, skilled people had to go, people whom I hope we can rehire soon once we get some more series up an running. All of us are worried.

But word’s starting to creep around the small-minded gossip grapevine that this is largely my fault. Since I’m in charge of development, it must be that I’m just not doing my job.

They’re not, of course, considering the 25 projects I have on the development grid, or the seven projects that various networks have expressed great interest in and could go forward at any second. They’re not looking at the corporate trouble way beyond me that our company’s going through that’s contributing to the lean times. They’re not realizing our main client is going through a massive upper-level restructuring and have instituted a freeze on new programming. They’re not considering that selling shows isn’t just saying, “Hey, I got this great idea” and then boom, you’ve got a contract for 13 hours. This is hard work, and it takes time.

One of the theories I’ve heard about is that last year I wasn’t doing much for the company because I was working on Dismal all day. Another good one: the professional conference I went to last week? Oh, all I did there was try to sell Dismal.

This is where I get pissed.

First of all, I wrote the script before I took my current position, while I was freelance writing from home. Secondly, when Dismal moved beyond a let’s-shoot-on-weekends-with-friends project and into a full feature, I had many talks with my employers, outlining how I would manage both projects and keep them separate. We came to a clear agreement and I kept to it.

Since then I have worked my balls off to do as much as or more for this company in terms of development than anyone has, ever -– and to make sure I do the work on Dismal I’m responsible for on my lunch breaks or after I go home nights or on weekends.

And as for that conference? It was a FACTUAL ENTERTAINMENT conference for TELEVISION. Factual. As in, not drama. And television. As in, not movies. There was literally no one there to talk Dismal with even if I wanted to.

Simple bastards. I mean, I understand people are frustrated, but shit, know the facts before you go slinging someone’s professional reputation in the mud.

I know I shouldn’t care. People do this gossip shit all the time. Just let it slide off, lad. But it’s hard to let it slide off -– because A) I actually have feelings, and this hurts, and B) once people start saying things often enough, they cease to sound like gossip and start to sound like fact. And like I said, this is my professional reputation.

GRRRRRRRR.