This week, for some reason, despite the fact that I am in the same position as I was last week financially and so on, I feel super hopeful.
ONE: I've been looking at job and internship possibilities here and there and beyond (LA, San Fran, New York, EUROPE), and while I know I'll have to fight for the chance for anything and probably won't get anything for a long time, the chances are out there. Even for losers like me who feel like burnouts.
TWO: Lena Dunham. I work in the Industry Relations Office for SFTV on campus, and one of the women I work for went to the Austin Film Festival and came back with recommendations, mainly "Tiny Furniture." It's a movie made by a 23-year-old post grad girl about a 22-year-old post grad girl, it was made quickly and very cheaply and it's doing very well. This is interesting, as just last week I started writing a script about myself and my family.. I decided to just go for the ultimate in self-reveal creativity, even going so far as to make the main character a writer just to add dimension to what might be a Rain Man story. I then just decided to make it as close to real-time speculation as I could, but I was still very apprehensive about doing something that seemed like maybe it had been done a little before, or maybe was just for my own sense of catharsis, or would just never ever be made. But then I started reading about Lena Dunham, pretty much my age, who just DOES stuff. She just goes for it, and that's what we should all be doing. Not only am I going to finish that script, I'm going to attack making movies. Even if I suck at first, I'm going to do that, even while I'm writing and working menial jobs, I'm going to make shorts and work towards making features. MY GOD, WHY NOT????!!! There is no need to be discouraged. Summer short, here we come. Summer 2011, summer feature. Whammo.
THREE: I knew this would happen. I started to like school. Well, I always like school, but I started to realize that I like all of my classes this semester. What. And they like me. And they are HELPING me. And my fellow screenwritery classmates are getting along. And the majority of them GET IT. Suddenly I'm so sad that school doesn't work in reverse-- what a bummer that these great and bonding classes are coming at the end of this, and that all these people with all of these interesting ideas will vanish from my Monday mornings and Wednesday afternoons. If I had more time we could be friends, but as it is we have to charge on out thar, and there's nothing we can do to slow it down. So for now I enjoy Adaptation-- discussing literature and comic books and history and how we will interpret them, discussing not only Fitzgerald's work but also the work of a classmate's as she attempts to adapt it. The encouragement is priceless and inspiring and wonderful. And Thesis-- where we all feel like Serious Writers and spend hours reading through and carefully critiquing each student's script. Again I am blown away by the astonishing difference between a person and their writing; some people whom I find ridiculous write with such professionalism and grace and PERSPECTIVE(!) that I am always floored. I love those classes especially, even if it really is so much work. I'm glad I went to this school. I'm sad that I didn't get to bond with these people last year.
FOUR: Breaking Bad is back on TV. All hail the best written show on television... television in general is gradually becoming a much safer and more prosperous place for a writer to thrive, and that is pretty exciting. I'd be psyched to write for a good number of shows on TV-- it seems like in the last few years broadcasting has shifted from "not much on" to "too much on, too many choices." Admittedly, the sitcoms still need work, but there are even some gems in that department [Community replacing The Office as best NBC comedy, USOT gettin' all weird an creative, How I Met Your Mother]. Right now I'm fanning the AMC flame. For a previously confused and crappy network all of a sudden they're producing two of the most intense, character-driven, writers-paradise shows [BB and Mad Men, siiiigh] and hopefully the rest of them will follow in that direction.
Yes I realize I just based a point of my happiness on a TV show and proceeded to give the rundown on television, but I am not going to bother justifying it.
FIVE: Reading. Reading. Reading. Even a little each day-- which I kinda HAFTA do for my classes at this point-- feeds the idea monster, and she spits out the magic afterward. I was in Irish Horror class today, discussing the ghost stories we had just read, including a chapter from Joyce's Ulysses, which I am beginning to form a love/hate relationship with, and just the act of interpretation got the cogs of my mind to start functioning. I came out of class tired of thinking and yet reinvigorated to write write write and read everything I haven't reached yet.
SIX: I am going to see Owl City next month, and James Taylor in May!! HURRAH!!
SEVEN: Monty Python. Just because.
No comments:
Post a Comment