a machete in the jungle

A few bullet point notes.

- When I say "it's finished"... I don't really mean that. No creative work is ever finished. If da Vinci came back from the dead tomorrow, he'd go to the Louvre and add some extra touches to the Mona Lisa. Do you know how many times people have reimagined Macbeth? Well I just reimagined it with a full cast of drag queens, so add one more to the list. (The LGBT market is still pretty much untapped. Look what happened to Hairspray. Instant $100 million box office.)

The point I'm trying to make is... "#667" isn't finished, and it never will be. But I did get the first draft out of the way. (Thank the Lord God, the Father and Jumping Jack Christ Almighty.)

- Lots of things change when you write a screenplay. The most important thing you can do is HAVE A PLAN. But you also have to be ready to alter that plan.

Sometimes you have an idea in mind to be the "core" of the story. You already know what you're going to write: it's like sketching leaves pressed under a canvas. All you have to do is take a pencil and shade over it, and the impression of the leaf forms itself. I used to do that in elementary school.

Then the main character changes names. Somebody tells you the twist needs an extra layer, so you create an entirely New Plot Device -- which means the end of Act Two needs to come backward eight pages, so you have to cut two great scenes and three minutes of dialogue -- so what do you cut? And once you decide where to swing the axe, you realize the New Plot Device doesn't play into your dramatic climax at all, and mixing it in throws off the whole balance, so you have to rework several of the final scenes.

Then you realize all the clever foreshadowing and set-up you've established in Act One is now irrelevant, because the ending's been changed. So you head back into the jungle with your machete and hack away -- cutting this line, adding three more, shifting that scene into Act Two, and removing a couple of extraneous characters -- and suddenly you discover that the leaf you THOUGHT you were sketching is actually a flower, or a stick, or a dead bird.

But when it's done, it has to look like you knew what you were sketching all along.

Whoever said writing a movie was easy?

- One of the main differences between a book and screenplay -- obviously -- is that eventually, people see a screenplay. But they only ever read a book. So it's important to describe things visually, and not get too wrapped up in the details, because some prop manager down the line will ultimately control those details.

A side result of this is that some people think of the "writing" in a movie as being equal to the dialogue. My movie could have the most stupid and implausible plot -- but if the dialogue is snappy/smart, Joe Moviegoer will say "well, the MOVIE sucked, but at least the WRITING was good". Because the only thing Joe Moviegoer notices about my screenplay is the words coming out of the main characters' mouths.

The truth is, movie execs will buy a script with crappy dialogue, knowing they can hire a more experienced writer to fix it... but if the plot itself is crappy, they won't touch it with a ten-foot pole. So it's crucial for a screenwriter to focus on Plot first, and Witty Banter second. Even though Joe Moviegoer will only notice the latter.

- Has anybody actually read this far?

- One more observation. It took me about two weeks to write the first forty pages, using Microsoft Word and formatting it all myself. Then I grabbed a copy of Final Draft 7. The last seventy-four pages took a total of five days to write. I can't stress enough how much better it was -- creatively -- to use a professional program. The ideas flowed quickly and easily, and it all looked very sexy, as well.

- OK, an opinion poll for whoever's read up to here, and feels like sharing. Have you watched Tough Love? There's a new episode on tonight.

I'm assuming you haven't. Duh. I know you readers personally for the most part, and I know none of you watched it. But I'll keep talking anyway. It's my god-damn blog.

My thoughts on the pilot episode: it's not a bad concept. The "matchmaking" idea carries some interest. Steve Ward is a natural host -- I thought this even when I met him in person. He's a big, tall, loud guy. The whole idea of putting all 8 girls in a house together is a little played-out, as it seems calculated to "create drama", and cause catfights (which it does). When Steve had the girls walk around the pool, in front of three asshole dudes, and then made them listen to the asshole dudes make snap judgments about each of them -- that was pretty fucking cold. Almost as cold as it was shallow. Then the second half of the episode wasn't shallow at all... Steve Ward actually had several good insights (after a mixer where the girls met a bunch of new guys) and gave the girls tips that would help them change their ways, rather than simply tearing them down. So Tough Love is a little schizophrenic -- it can't decide whether it wants to be a serious, Dr. Phil-esque relationship counseling show, or a trashy VH1 "reality" show.

At least it's better than "Bromance".