wilderworks

Is This What's Been Missing? This evening, I followed my own instruction and I scribbled down everything I knew about Sick Day. I did so in the sloppiest, most freeform manner I could muster. I put Fletch Lives on Netflix streaming, which chased away my intellect completely, and I doodled down the movie. Until that moment, I'd honestly forgotten about all the scribbling and doodling I've done on my past screenplays. But tonight, in pieces, I remembered sitting in the LA courthouse hallway, waiting through at jury duty, drawing circles around ideas for Zaniness Ensues . I remembered sitting in backseat of my car, in the rain, on break from my all-night hospital job, scribbling as quickly as I could in cursive, until I sorted out Blaring Static . I remembered laying on my stomach on the carpet, drawing lines all over dozens of notebook pages, until I cracked the third act of Storybook Park , which became Gravedigger's Son . I remembered the rush I felt each...

Inexplicable Resistance I can't make myself think about this screenplay. (I'm giving it the codename Sick Day  for the blog). I feel like I'm trying to give my dog a pill. I feel like I'm trying to clip the cat's claws. I want to hold my brain down and make it think about this thing, but it snarls and snaps and kicks away, and then it hides under the couch and growls softly for hours. Not even a treat will lure it out. Not even opening and closing the front door. It wants absolutely nothing to do with this script. Look at it! Look at this brain! It chooses to discuss its inability to to discuss the screenplay rather than actually discuss the screenplay! These are advanced, professional avoidance tactics, here. It's possible I'm still adjusting to nicotine deprivation. It's possible my brain is atrophied by a tedious routine, by a dirty apartment and a cluttered room, by these lengthening commute-times and overburdened work-days, by all this...

1095 Days Later... Three years ago, a producer gave us $5000. I'll call him Sheldon. (It's not his real name). In exchange, he entered into a "joint-venture" production of a short film based on my script, and won a three-year option on my feature-length screenplay. We'll pretend the name of that script was Zaniness Ensues.  It wasn't a great deal, but a starving man doesn't turn his nose up at a stinky Twinkie. When I signed, I made sure the dates all said January 2007, so the contract would extend 1095 days from cashing the check. Over the last months of 2009, Sheldon discussed that impending expiration date on at least two occasions. January came and went. No word from Sheldon. I was free. I started making plans. I had control of my screenplay and my short film again. I would finish the edit and send it to competitions. I would cash-in my few connections and get a packet out to agents, a packet including Zaniness Ensues . I  would leverage...

Chase has posted one of the below advertisements on Pico Blvd, where I am pleased to view it daily, first-thing in the morning, on my approach to the Fox gate: It says - CHASE: Almost as many ATMs as unsold screenplays! (exclamation point mine) Teehee. Well, that tickled me so much that a whole bunch of other, similar slogans came to me. I wonder if some of them are already part of the campaign. Anyway, here are a few of the slogan ideas I came up with, following the same general theme!   CHASE: Almost as many ATMs as still-born babies!  CHASE: Almost as many ATMs as elderly widowers, quietly contemplating suicide!  CHASE: Almost as many ATMs as abandoned family pets, wandering the streets alone tonight, wondering what happened, what happened, what did I do wrong?  CHASE: Almost as many ATMS as things you never took the time to tell him.  CHASE: Almost as many ATMs as middle-aged women who, sighing softly, have finally accepted the hard tr...

Act One (Phil is an Ass Hat) 00 min - Phil gives report 01 min - We meet Rita and Larry 02 min - Opening credits 05 min - Phil is a dick, Rita cheerful (Rita-Phil interaction) 08 min - First time: Groundhog Day 13 min - With the groundhog (Phil's report) 16 min - Trapped by blizzard (officer turns them back)   This is Act One. It appears in two 10-minute chunks. In the first 10-minute chunk, they establish who the characters are, why they're going to Puxatony, and what they think about the fact that they're going to Puxatony. This actually takes less time than implied: there are credits in there, and it's actually over by the 8-minute mark. Efficiency. In the second 10-minute chunk, they take us through the first Day. Several side-characters are introduced and geography is established. We see Phil's report at Gobbler's Nob. And finally, they are turned around, trapped in Puxatony by a blizzard. Notice, the scenes are averaging two or three minutes, to...

00 minutes - Phil gives report 01 minutes - We meet Rita and Larry 02 minutes - Opening credits 05 minutes - Phil is a dick, Rita cheerful (Rita-Phil interaction) 08 minutes - First time: Groundhog Day 13 minutes - With the groundhog (Phil's report) 16 minutes - Trapped by blizzard (officer turns them back) 19 minutes - Second time: Groundhog Day (first repeat) 26 minutes - Third time: Groundhog Day (broken pencil confirms) 28 minutes - Phil sees doctors (is it in Phil's head?) 30 minutes - New locations (bowling alley), admitting it's real 32 minutes - Getting reckless / crime 35 minutes - 4th time through, happy, no consequences 39 minutes - 5th time through, taking advantage, making plans (other women) 41 minutes - Finally: skipping ahead indeterminate amount of time (robbery) 42 minutes - Another skip - gags now - movie night 43 minutes - Getting to know Rita (Rita-Phil interaction) 46 minutes - Fast repeats to woo Rita begin 50 minu...

Feature Screenplays 2002: wrote Intelligence and Ladies & Gentlemen 2003: wrote Blaring Static and Bad Blood (aka Occult Blood ) 2004: wrote A Darkling Plane (aka Burying Amelia Waverly ) 2005: wrote Storybook Park (moved to LA, January 15th) 2006: fail 2007: wrote Zaniness Ensues 2008: wrote Voodoo 2009: wrote Gravedigger's Son  and Unpredictable Short Subject + Episodic Scripts 2002: fail 2003: Anniversary Dinner, Billy Bump 2004: Momentary Engineering, Antebellum, 20 Feet Less Dead, Tumble Dry 2005: Hit & Run, Brains!!, Signal Decay, Alien Ignorance 2006: Just Us League, Space Fax, Zaniness Ensues, Perversity & Wine, Zoe 2007: Security Deposit, Creative Comments, Business as Usual 2008: Batteries, Packages, Obama and the Red Phone, Hell Froze Over (8 episodes) 2009: Last Tank, Negative Space, Monstrous Mistress Filmmaking 2002: Kingdom by the Sea, Darwin’s Kids Graduation Special, The Div III ...

Here's a shocker: quitting smoking is hard. Not so much because you must stop smoking. More because it sets off a chain reaction of other changes. Many of these unexpected changes - you may not care for. I've broken the habit. But I'm not well-adjusted to the new ones. Smoking suppresses appetite. Which means, my appetite is now completely unsuppressed. My body doesn't remember how to make full feelings. Thus, I am hungry all the time. All the time. All. The. Time. While I'm eating, I wish I were eating. How many cheese-steaks could you eat? Eight? Nine? I bet I could eat a dozen. I'd like to try. I'd like to eat a whole head of lettuce with my hands. Right now. This insatiable hunger means that I can't eat the stuff I used to eat, because I'd become enormously unhealthy - and enormous. Thus, I am snacking on carrots and celery and crackers. I chain-snack for five hours a day. This daily fruit and vegetable binge adds more unfamiliar material ...