What a 2010 Nicholl Quarterfinal script looks like**
I had the idea that if I pulled all the notes and drafts together that it would somehow make a substantial and impressive photo, but it turns out to be sorta measly-looking. **Not pictured: three years of brilliant feedback and suggestions from my workshop mates and friends. Thanks for listening to me rant about robbing the Federal Reserve! I should probably burn these satellite photos, power grid specs and floor plans now.
Metameta in a bret easton ellis interview
I’m a fan of Bret Easton Ellis. Some of his work a lot more than others, but on the whole certainly a fan. So Laist.com caught my eye with this b.e.e. interview about the new followup to Less Than Zero, Imperial Bedrooms. Not sure I’m going to get the chance to read Imperial Bedrooms any time soon, but throughout the interview I was distracted with the idea of how oddly meta it would be of RDjr to star in another film adaptation of a book that incorporates the first book and film as somewhat unauthorized adaptations (not to mention RDjr’s brilliant, tragic performance as Julian itself ) as fictional elements. A brain breaking miasma of art vs. life vs. art vs. art.
Also, he also drops some screenwriting talk and the obligatory Raymond Chandler reference. I wonder if b.e.e. has listened to any Bloc Party…
I hate this little peanut man.
Can’t believe that Thanksgiving is mere days away. I have too much to finish before the end of the year, and let’s not get started on Christmas presents. This time of year in Raleigh is kinda charming because it’s less crowded and I feel like I have the place to myself. The Christmas parade Saturday didn’t even wake me up, which is an issue on weekends living street-level downtown when you stay up until 4AM taking machetes to Chargers and Smokers.
Majority of casting for San Souci is done and now I get to wrangle scripts and rehearsal spaces and squib counts and other minutia until Janurary, which will then hopefully pass in a relatively pain-free blur. The locations have worked out pretty well thanks to Bogart’s and Hi5 but the Funeral Home where most of the action goes down is still somewhat tenuous, so I’m stressing more over that than anything else. Also, you can apparently rent caskets, which is news to me. But if anyone has a casket lying around that they’d be willing to lend us, shoot me an email.
Writing-wise I continue to grind. I’ve got two new scripts I’m eying for Austin/Nicholl next year, that I’m struggling to get into some sort of shape for workshop. I do myself absolutely no favors by being neurotic on each draft I know, so someone kick me in the head please.
Finally, since the Hurricanes are doing their best to emulate my other favorite franchise, the Cubs, Mom and I will be heading to VA to catch some AHL Hockey with the Albany River Rats. With the way things have been going, in all likelyhood many of the Rats may be in Raleigh at the time, so I guess we’ll be watching high schoolers or something.
Won’t waste time or effort on the CS Open again
Updates being few and far-between I don’t expect I get much screenwriting traffic on the blog anymore, but just in case, I thought I’d pass along an opinion on the CS Open screenwriting competition- avoid it and spend your time doing more productive things. Like clipping your toenails or something.
The CS Open sounded interesting $12 an entry for an elimination style tournament. You get a prompt and have increasingly shorter deadlines to return a new 5 pg scene with each round. Since I’m a spec writer and I’ve been out of college for a while, the idea of a deadline really appealed to me. (I’m sure working writers who genuinely sweat crazy deadlines are thinking I’m crazy, but… Well okay, I can’t really deny being crazy.)
Here’s how things have played out… First, there were technical problems with registration, then some folks had issues submitting their entries by the deadline so it was extended, and now it appears some entries have just disappeared into the ether. But as far as I knew until this morning, I wasn’t having any of these problems. Got my proper #digit entry ID, had my pages done and submitted, properly formatted and title paged, by the original deadline, got a confirmation page and everything. But no score. No nothing.
I’ve sent several emails after each “Check by” date they posted to the site and still have not received a direct response. Found out via Twitter that a few other people are having the same problems. Done Deal reveals others.
So to hell with that noise. And I’ll be honest, I didn’t have a lot invested in this. $12 ain’t gonna break me, which was half the reason I entered. Plus I had a lot going on the weekend of the first round, SparkCon was going down in Raleigh, bands were playing, I had even gotten a little sick. But I came up with my 5 pages anyway, trying to put a fun spin on the vague plot requirements- but that was it, these weren’t characters I’ve spent months learning about and I guess I like my process a lot more when I live and breathe my characters for more than 5 pages.
Caught a break
Made it to the next round of Page International with N&D, and subsequently dinked the next cut which isn’t much, but I’ll take validation where I can get it.
In other news, the Ghostbusters video game is just about the greatest thing ever. However my love is slightly mitigated because I’ve got the difficulty cranked all the way up, so invariably Ray and Peter are getting possessed and attacking me, and Egon won’t get out of the damn way when whatever giant monster is rampaging so I keep dying trying to save his ass. Janine runs up the long distance bill and Winston just wants some pizza.
The fact that it’s the 25th anniversary of Ghost Busters is kinda weirding me out. Both flicks are artifacts of my childhood, near and dear to my heart. I’m willing to bet the Real Ghostbusters cartoon modified my DNA at some point and it definitely put a few wrinkles in my brain. But it’s cool to see Ramis out and about doing a ton of PR for the Blu-ray release (and his new flick of course). Not entirely sure how I’m feeling about the talk of a sequel. There’s much potential for disaster, but George Lucas isn’t involved so I have some hope. What would really be great though is if some smart writers out there would diligently spend time and effort creating a new Ghostbusters-esque comedy, different premise, fresh characters…
Oh hey, some of those script meters are actually moving!