I read a screenplay yesterday.
This is not an unfamiliar task, given I am a screenwriter myself. Okay, I consider myself a screenwriter. There's something about the title that suggests that which I write sees the light of day upon a screen. This has yet to come to pass, so I continue to burden friends, family, strangers, and colleagues with my properly hole-punched attempts at art. If it's not art, then it's a prediction of theoretical art.
Art is a curious thing.
I called a childhood friend the other day. It was very much out of the blue, and in keeping with my new found attitude. We'd known each other since the fourth grade and developed a passion for film around the same time. Coincidentally we lost touch when he went to film school after college and I dropped out and began paving my own path. A couple years ago our lives intersected again, and it wasn't long before one of us dropped the ball again.
He's working a nice, stable, non-creative, industry job in the City of Angels. He was talking about having a family and all of those other buzzwords of paint-by-numbers maturity that make me gag. He offered his opinion on the instability of artistic jobs. Since art is so subjective it's ridiculously difficult to determine whether someone is doing a good job.
So, after a bit of lobbying my self-worth to a local producer, I have secured another film job for the middle of January 2008. With each project that comes along I invest myself deeper and deeper into it, making every effort to buoy the filmmaker's vision.
Tuesday afternoon I sat down with this producer for the first time. I hung onto the laurels of the first impression I predicted I made via my e-mails and spoke with ease. There was a decent rapport between us. He told me about the professional level equipment we'd be using, quoted me an approximation of the budget, and told me he'd get me the script in a few days.
I read it. And I've thumbed through it a second time. I'm disappointed. There is a surprising investment of cash behind this project. All I can see are the under-written characters, the poorly presented plot, and the lack of a point. It's hardly the worse thing I've ever read, much less worked on, but the budget would assume something more.
Financing suggests art where I see none.
This is not an unfamiliar task, given I am a screenwriter myself. Okay, I consider myself a screenwriter. There's something about the title that suggests that which I write sees the light of day upon a screen. This has yet to come to pass, so I continue to burden friends, family, strangers, and colleagues with my properly hole-punched attempts at art. If it's not art, then it's a prediction of theoretical art.
Art is a curious thing.
I called a childhood friend the other day. It was very much out of the blue, and in keeping with my new found attitude. We'd known each other since the fourth grade and developed a passion for film around the same time. Coincidentally we lost touch when he went to film school after college and I dropped out and began paving my own path. A couple years ago our lives intersected again, and it wasn't long before one of us dropped the ball again.
He's working a nice, stable, non-creative, industry job in the City of Angels. He was talking about having a family and all of those other buzzwords of paint-by-numbers maturity that make me gag. He offered his opinion on the instability of artistic jobs. Since art is so subjective it's ridiculously difficult to determine whether someone is doing a good job.
So, after a bit of lobbying my self-worth to a local producer, I have secured another film job for the middle of January 2008. With each project that comes along I invest myself deeper and deeper into it, making every effort to buoy the filmmaker's vision.
Tuesday afternoon I sat down with this producer for the first time. I hung onto the laurels of the first impression I predicted I made via my e-mails and spoke with ease. There was a decent rapport between us. He told me about the professional level equipment we'd be using, quoted me an approximation of the budget, and told me he'd get me the script in a few days.
I read it. And I've thumbed through it a second time. I'm disappointed. There is a surprising investment of cash behind this project. All I can see are the under-written characters, the poorly presented plot, and the lack of a point. It's hardly the worse thing I've ever read, much less worked on, but the budget would assume something more.
Financing suggests art where I see none.
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