…I did nothing, at least in terms of writing.  Well, not ACTUAL writing.  But I did do a little reading.

On a whim, and partially because he died about a month ago, I bought Blake Snyder’s SAVE THE CAT!  I kept hearing how great it was, so I bit the bullet and got it.

I’m about 50-some pages into it.  He’s talked about loglines, titles, audience and cost and types of stories.  My take?  Meh.  Nothing I haven’t heard before.  I’ll keep going until the end, but I’m glad I didn’t pay full price.  As I’ve said before, and as I will say many times again, I know I don’t know everything, but I do okay.

-There’s a script-review sight I’ve been enjoying.  I think it’s called ScriptShadow.  From what I can gather, he gets spec scripts that are if not optioned, at least represented (a strike against me).  He discusses what works, what doesn’t, the characters, etc. Then he rates them on a sort of 1-5 scale, 1 being awful and 5 being genius.  Most of them seem to fall in the 2-3 range.  But he recently ran a review of one he gave the first 5 to.  A dark fantasy that seems to combine film noir with Victorian whimsy and Lord of the Rings.  It’s from ’05.  The writer has since gone on to at least a few high-profile projects.  The reviewer could not stop raving about how incredible he thought it was.

It would be nice to think I could have somebody react to one of my scripts that way.

Someday.

I’ve been really bad about posting.  I realize that.  Part of the problem, as pointed out to me by my lovely K, is I usually post at night, and sometimes that’s not easy or possible.  I work in the morning, try to work on the story in the afternoon and go through the process of dinner and getting V ready for bed before having a handful of minutes to possibly watch whatever Netflix we have in the house or get ready for tomorrow, followed by going to bed.

Can you see where the problem lies?

So, starting this week, which will include 4 out of 5 days of doing the midday shift, I’ll try to post BEFORE the evening process.

Unfortunately, not much in terms of updates to report.  I’m still planning to go to LA in mid-September.  Potential meetings have yet to be developed, but there’s Manager Guy and maybe two entertainment attorneys.  Wish Almost-Agent Lady was still around.  That would be nice.  But it would seem she has skipped town without a forwarding address.

‘Round these parts, the outline is just about done, but I’m still very concerned/worried about whether or not I can make it funny.  At the rate I’m going, I hope to have at least 1-2 actual drafts done by year’s end.

But I’ve also been seriously considering joining up with a new writing group, or at least investigating it.  While I like the two people I’ve been meeting with for the past two years, I feel like I can’t really get any more benefit out of it.  In all the years I’ve known them, she hasn’t finished a script and he is ALWAYS going back to rewrite his, which seems to never end.

So this other group is by a guy who writes for Salon and he holds a writing group at his house out by the ocean on Tuesday evenings and Saturday afternoons.  I almost joined up last year, but he charges for people to take part, and that just didn’t jibe with our financial situation.  But I still get emails from him on various subjects.

The next round starts in September, so we’ll see how that works out.

What’s also been interesting is posting my progress as part of my Facebook status.  Lots of my friends seem to be very interested in it.  Curious to know who will want to read it when it’s done/ready.

This is Saturday night.  I’ll do my best to have something up Monday afternoon.

Promise.

That’s me. I’ve been really bad about posting.  Guilty as charged.  I’ll try to do better.

On the script front, I reached the halfway point in the latest, detail-heavy outline.  That’s nice.  The second half is always intimidating, but I bet if I take a step back and take it slow, I’ll maneuver my way through it.

One of my biggest concerns is amping up the funny.  You always hear about how hard it is to write comedy.  It’s true.  I bought BLAZING SADDLES last week.  A lot of the jokes still stand up, and they’re really funny.  Of course, that had 5 writers, including Richard Pryor.

I won’t even get into the BACK TO THE FUTURE movies, which have been playing on Encore.  That is just some incredible storytelling, with some good jokes thrown in here and there.

What I’ve also noticed is that they don’t try too hard to be more realistic.  They embrace the story.  That’s something I haven’t quite grasped yet.  I focus more on being realistic, rather than embracing the story.  And sometimes I forget to have fun with it.  That’s important.

I suppose once I get the story worked out I’ll work on the fun part.

Plans slowly developing to actually go to LA mid-September to see Manager Guy.  I’m trying to figure out how to get at least 1-2 other meetings, but I’m not sure with who.  I thought about the guy who wanted to stay updated about my progress, but I wonder if it’s a good idea to contact him.  Still deciding.

I’ll try to be a bit more…timely about updates.

Don’t know what, but definitely something.  that’s what I’m hoping for.

I think it’s been about 3 weeks since I heard from Manager Guy.  Sometime in the near future I’ll contact him to say I’m coming to LA and would like to have a face-to-face meeting.  I hope it yields positive results.

My schedule at work is slowly getting back to normal, so I actually got to get some work done today.  I fleshed out the first quarter of Act Two. I like how it’s developing, but still have that nagging feeling in the back of my head about whether it’s “Hollywood” enough.  Have to work on not letting that gnaw at the creative process.

But anyway…

It was very…fulfilling to be working on each scene and, for a lot of them, be able to put it together in such a way I hadn’t considered before.  I wish that happpened more often and earlier in the process. Then again, every writer probably wishes that too.  I’m hoping to get to the halfway point by this weekend.  we’ll see.

when a guy at work found out I wrote screenplays, he said he too had written one. part of one. about 3o pages or so.  Over the past couple of years.  I knew where this was going.  I asked for his 30-second elevator pitch.  It went on for 2 minutes and I still didn’t know what it was about.  Something about a guy killing his family or something.

I told him about the various milestones (page 10 inciting incident, page 17 twist, etc.) and I could tell the words weren’t making much of an impact.  he asked to see my script, which I’ll probably send to him. it will be interesting to see how he reacts.

I got an email notice from the fine folks at ScriptShark for a one-day seminar-thingy in September.  It looked interesting and the price seems right ($139), but that’s also the day we’re planning a big shindig.  I like the idea of going to these things, but more for the networking and pitching aspects, rather than the classes.

I’ll be the first to admit I’m no expert at writing, but I like to think I know what I’m doing.  It just takes a while to reach my objective.

And I’ll keep trying until I do…

I’ve been working the morning AND midday shift all this week, and with K working once again, the responsibility of making dinner has fallen once again upon my weary shoulders.  But it’s cool.

Only downside is there hasn’t been much time for working on the seemingly eternal outline.  But the silver lining in that regard has been that I’ve been working on the outline during the midday shift.  Because the roads have been so busy, progress has been slow.  But significant; I completed the first act today.

I think it’s been 2 weeks since the infamous non-response from Manager Guy. I really don’t know what to do about it.  Due to his lack of communication, I don’t know what the status of the script is.  It could be gathering dust on somebody’s shelf, which may be the most likely scenario.  K suggests I tell him I’m coming down to LA and do a face-to-face meeting.  While I wasn’t keen on the idea at first, it may be worthwhile.

I’ll have to go over the contract again to see if there’s an out, just in case.  What’s really annoying is that he seemed so eager in the beginning, and it seems to have died off.  I’m very worried this is a replay of what happened with Mr Miko a few years ago.  He’s not getting the response he expected, so I get pushed aside for something with more potential/promise.  Very, very annoying.

I go into the coming week with the objective of making some kind of definitive progress…