Month: March 2011

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Spring Updates

Update #1

When Robert and Brenda met, they thought they had nothing in common... they were wrong.
When Robert and Brenda met, they thought they had nothing in common... they were wrong.

I sold a short film entitled “Middle Ground” to a production company in Florida a year or so ago but with the bad economy and their current heavy schedule blocking out time to film my script has proved difficult. Last week they called to inform me they’ve moved into calendar mode and they’re finally blocking out time to film the short.

It’s exciting for me not only from the standpoint that at least one thing I’ve sold in the past year or so will ACTUALLY get produced, but I will also be able to lend a hand as a “co-director”. I would say the position is more like Associate or Assistant Director but as we know the AD is a totally different type of position all together and I won’t be fulfilling that role. The director is giving me the ability shape the story with my input and I’ll be attending the production shoot if my schedule permits. It’s pretty rare to let writers on the set to do anything other than consume craft services.  Any time you are allowed on set (and you’re allowed to open your mouth) is a miracle so take what you can get.

More information as they approach casting mode. They have probably lost the previous actor they had attached because of the prolonged production schedule, but who knows, maybe they’ll find a spectacular replacement.

Update #2

A long awaited interview from a start up internet media company is still awaiting a time slot.

Update #3

Still waiting to hear back from an agency that has Dear Diary. They promised news at the end of the month, but I never hold my breath with these things.

As you can see, not much changes over the span of a few months. What do you do in the interim? Write. Simple as that. Keep working, which brings me to:

Update #4

I am currently working on a feature outline/treatment for a director to shop around. He’s been wanting to do a Western for quite some time and chose one of my four pitches to shop around to his A list contacts. Woot!  Even if he doesn’t reach funding or the story somehow turns out to be something he doesn’t want to do, I’m excited to write in this genre. I’ll shop it around myself if he gets nowhere with it.

Always have a back up plan, people.

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Homage to my Saturn.

The following post was a loving homage about my former car written for a contest on the Conan O’Brien show. On the show he asked people to send in stories about their cars. He would then pick one story and blow up the owner’s car on television.  I didn’t get picked, but I like my story none the less. That car kept me on the road for 14 years, took me across the United States several times, and was my best friend at times.

Not my Saturn, but this one has the same type of damage to the hood. It's a conspiracy!
Not my Saturn, but this one has the same type of damage to the hood. It's a conspiracy!

It was the summer of 1996.

I was 26, working odd jobs as a tape rewinder for Books on Tape in glorious Orange County, California. There wasn’t much work out there for a stage manager in those days; I took whatever job came my way as long as it was near a bus stop.

On my last day of work, as I walked away from the building, it started raining… a heavy coarse rain like never seen before. Dogs and cats were falling from the sky and I screamed to the heavens, why me? Why me, God?!

God answered my prayers in the form of a sparkling new deep emerald green machine…and so did my mother by co-signing the load contract to make it happen.

The days were good to us. I loved my car and it loved me.

Until 1998.

El Nino, jealous of my 4 door, automatic window, tilt back support, American made machinery, unceremoniously dropped a tree on the hood. Fortunately, my insurance covered the mischief of the storm and the hood was replaced, but replaced with what?

The sun ate away at the hood, ray by ray, peeling the delicate clear coat back like one painful hangnail after another…and that wasn’t all.

My car became a slave to the film industry. After dragging  jug after jug of artificial blood, sharp implements of destruction and mittens, the inside of my car looked like a teenager after his first shave.

I squelch my anger over these memories by gripping  the steering wheel, causing it to disintegrate faster.

So now, here it is 12 years, later. This once beautiful, yet sensible sedan is a limping visage of what it once was. There will be no Happy Happy Joy Joy songs over this GM POS any more. It doesn’t even deserve a home inside my garage because it pees oil constantly.

Please, Conan, if you have any sympathy, please give my baby what she deserves.  A powder keg of dynamite might be enough to send her to heaven where Saturns frolic on gleaming test tracks and long autobahns… oh who am I kidding.

This car is going to hell.