After an embarrassingly long gestation period, a first draft of Psycho Ex (with a name change) has finally gone out to its first round of readers. I should get feedback Tuesday after the long weekend.
This always feels weird. I am happy and satisfied and exhausted and not convinced it’s really happening – like the first week after college finals.
But there is a whole different additional dynamic at play with this one than usual, because – due somewhat to the original “Challenge” - it is much more an exercise than a passion project. Don’t get me wrong, the story was my idea, and I take its execution very seriously, but now that a draft is complete I feel “outside” the thing more than I ever have.
The thing I love/hate about writing is that when I work on something this big and all-encompassing, I get overwhelmed and lost inside it. I fall in love with it, and I don’t know if this is a blessing or a curse. It’s wonderful because I think/hope it adds heart and soul to the piece, but it’s terrible because I lose all objectivity and get lost. For long periods. With almost every script, I can vividly remember THE EXACT MOMENT when everything shifts and I come up for air, when I get back “on top of it,” when I get back outside and un-consumed by it and I start cutting and shaping and whacking at it with no emotional attachment whatsoever. This is when the work really gets done. But this is also when I feel guilty, like I’ve stopped loving someone simply because it is no longer the pragmatic thing to do.
I don’t think I was ever in love with this one. I spent a lot of time in the depths with it, don’t get me wrong, but it was never a passion project like Aftershocks was or Dead Guy is. I was more objective with this one all along, so there are parts of it (Act Two hopefully, Act Three definitely) that I think are better executed than my usual output. I would say I’m very happy with the execution on those (this Act Three is probably the best I’ve ever written). But it never took on a life of its own really.
Does this mean it will be less “alive” than it should be? Than it could be? Does this mean there won’t be enough “there” for the reader?
Will the reader know that it has less of a “soul” than it could have had? Or will it just be me?
Or have I finally shaken off the indulgent crap of falling in love with your material? Have I finally got on with the real business of writing?
Update: Just got my first feedback (thanks Tammy!). The weekend is off to a good start…
It was 2006 or 2007. I was leaving work, pulling my car onto Flower Street, when you zipped by right in front of me on your bike. I had to brake to miss you. I could have sworn it was you. But what would you be doing – at our age – zipping a bike through downtown L.A.? 3,000 miles and 20 years away from home? We made eye contact and you disappeared behind parked cars. I know it was you – you gave me that look. It was 1987 you, the last time I saw you. But it was you.
Are you even still alive? Google won’t tell me.
Last night I had this dream. My two sons (age 9 and age 4) and I had broken into your house. And you were pulling into your driveway and we were desperately trying to get out before you could get inside. But we couldn’t find our way out. You were putting your key in the door and we had to hide from you and get out before you could discover us. You try doing this with the 4-year old whose idea of playing hide and seek is yelling out where he is as soon as you stop counting so you can find him. Terrified of never being found again.
Somehow we made it out and walked past on the sidewalk just as you went inside. But you knew. You knew. You glanced backward and gave me that look again. That look like you knew something I didn’t.
My dad was in the military when I grew up so we moved around. Not nearly as much as some do, but I changed schools a few times. Different states. It’s rough when you’re a kid, but one huge thing I learned was how to come into a new situation and figure it out immediately. Intuitively. The politics, the dynamics of the relationships, all that. Every time we moved my parents told me not to be sad about the friends I left behind, but instead to just go to school and make new ones. I got practice at this – I got good at it. Figuring out who to be friends with and who not to. But there was one thing I never learned.
When my dad would come home from work and tell us we were moving again, we would be devastated. We would cry, we’ll never see our friends again, all that. But you learn to put that aside because it hurts too much. You learn to figure out the place you’re moving to, not to dwell on the one you just left. You learn to forget your old friends. But I never learned how to say goodbye – it hurt too much. Terrified of never being found again. So I never have.
So I never did.
Are you still alive? I saw you. Are you a ghost? I see ghosts. Different states. I see dead people. I saw you. Sometimes it feels like I can’t see alive people anymore.
They say the definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over while expecting a different result. But they also say “if at first you don’t succeed, try try again.” So what do they know?
Look, you’re not going to get lucky. Nobody does. Whatever it is you’re trying to do, you need two things to succeed: a great idea and the skillful execution of that idea. One without the other isn’t enough. Where do you get these ingredients? The short answer is this: trial and error.
You try and try, over and over, discarding the weak ideas and refining your execution, going through your process. Always hoping for a different result this time.
Sometimes – too many times – you get one without the other. On the one extreme you have the killer idea that goes nowhere. On the other there’s the immaculately-polished turd.
How do you get past these? You work through them, all the way, as deeply and as completely as you can, then throw them away and keep going. Keep driving. Keep moving. Send your stuff out if you’re happy with it, but move on. The clock is ticking and you still need more practice.
There’s a saying in the writers room: “You’ve got to kill your babies.” Harsh? Definitely. And that’s the point.
You’ve got to be willing to throw away everything, even the ideas you’re most in love with. Especially the ideas you’re most in love with. You’ve got to keep cranking. You’ve got to keep yourself honest. You can’t hang on to anything that can slow you down, that can keep you from moving forward, from driving the process along. Hanging on to one idea is just going to keep you pinned down and preoccupied when the next idea – a better idea – comes along.
When I think about creative people who have been successful, their success has almost always come from a steady progression of projects through which they’ve practiced and improved and reached a critical command of their skills. Then at some point that key idea comes along, and BAM! the idea gets executed with these skills and the rest is history. It is rare to hear of a creative person coming across his killer idea at age 19 or 23 or something and then spending years sheltering and nurturing and protecting that same idea until a miracle happens and the skills of execution arise out of nowhere.
But you see people – talented people – clinging forever to that one thing. That one pet idea. For years, wasting time. And it breaks your heart. Forget about doing the same thing over and over and expecting a different result – these people do NOTHING and expect a perfect result. Now that’s a definition of insanity.
These skills are learned. You have to earn them, from stretching. From work. Not from babying that same idea you’ve held onto forever. In love with your idea? Terrific. Now go write that idea. Then write another one. Just do it. Kill your babies.
This from the guy who’s been working on Dead Guy and Psycho Ex for about 2 years now.
No, I haven’t forgotten about The Challenge. Since my son’s school year ended, there has been no semblance of any routine (swimming lessons for 2 weeks here, a different summer school for 4 weeks there…) – and it’s hard to write when you’re the shuttle driver. But there’s good news: we’ve slipped into a semi-routine and I’ve carved out some time for most weekdays, even getting a few pages written this past Tuesday afternoon. Psycho Ex is up to 71 pages now with Dead Guy at 66.
The bad news is that this semi-routine will only last for another few days, until we fly to Texas for a week vacation. If things go as I hope during the second half of August, I may be able to get a LOT more done those last two weeks – this is when I hope to really get up to a sprint. This will be my best shot at a continuous writing window for the rest of 2008.
And I’ll need it – after initially being concerned that these two ideas were too slim to expand into feature screenplays, I’ve been having the opposite problem. At 71 and 66 pages in, I am nowhere near the midpoints of each story. I think this has a lot to do with the piecemeal process of the writing of these scripts (which has been VERY different from the process I’ve used on every other script), but we’ll see. As I have suspected for a while, it is looking like these will be the longest and loosest and roughest first drafts I’ve ever written. This is very different from my usual style, as my first drafts are usually pretty close to my final versions, mostly needing only trimming and focusing within existing scenes. This time there will likely be radical revisions of structure and combining/deleting of several scenes. August, here we come.
- Supervillain: Things are still moving forward with the investors, but the rate of speed has not picked up. Yesterday I was told everything is cool, but my producers are looking for other opportunities just in case. With that in mind, this weekend’s opening of Hancock may do great things for my script. When Supervillain made the rounds of the studios, readers liked it but conventional wisdom said that superhero comedies always flop. We’ll see what Hancock has to say about that. So the producers are readying Supervillain for a renewed studio push.
And then there’s the title – “Who Wants To Be A Supervillain?!”. Now, we all love the title and all the game-show desperation it brings. But it does seem a little, well, Y2k. Yeah, dated. At least for getting shown around the studios. If the movie ever gets made, we’ll see (by then it will be WAY dated…). But for showing it around, it needs a little refreshing. Any suggestions? I have the perfect title, but I stole it from a friend who has been trying to get a project with the same name going for years, so I really shouldn’t use it…
- Aftershocks: I’m currently finishing up a mini-rewrite (somewhere between a polish and a rewrite) for the script’s new manager/agent to spiff it up before it gets sent out. This rewrite is somewhat… experimental for me. Not “experimental” in that the script is getting any weirder, but “experimental” in that I may end up chucking it completely and reverting to the original version. I have received quite a few sets of notes on it lately (from Abbot and elsewhere) and after talking with the script’s new representation I decided to address some of the more consistent observations. I have previously discussed the contradictory feedbackthe script has received (and all scripts receive), but I do have to admit that some points pop up somewhat consistently among those who don’t like the script. Those who do like the script tell me to disregard these points, and there’s the rub: sometimes the very thing a non-fan sees as a weakness a fan will call a strength. So it’s tricky. As I’ve discussed before, Aftershocks is an atmospheric drama, and some people love this. Others say it needs more drive and focus. So the question is: is it possible to crank up the drive a little without destroying the atmospherics that many readers love? We’ll see. The worst-case would be to screw up what is already there while trying to make tweaks to attract an audience that just isn’t going to like it anyway. I’m trying to find a middle ground. But if the feedback on this new version tells me that this middle ground is the worst of both worlds, then the rewrite gets chucked and the original draft gets sent out instead. So it’s still on the hard drive and waiting, just in case.
One more new scene needs to be finished (the scene is 85% done) and then another read-through to smooth things out and it’ll be ready for my agent. Then it’ll come back with his inevitable notes… The hope is to finish it tonight, or at least this weekend.
I don’t like to outline. I used to, I may again, but not right now.
In school I outlined – we all did. I wrote 3 features this way, with each outline getting better and more detailed than the last. I would refine the outline first and then write. If an idea came to mind while I was writing, I would stop writing, add the scene to the outline, and then tweak the outline again and again before resuming writing. By the third feature, my process was disciplined and precise.
And completely lifeless.
It was actually a chore to complete that third feature. Part of this was because I was writing the script on spec for a producer (based on his idea) who bailed halfway through, but the other part was because the writing was so lifeless – all the “fun stuff” had been explored and laid out before, at the outline stage, so the writing itself felt like dictation. The script turned out okay I guess, but the process was an exercise in drudgery, without life or spark or energy. Without discovery.
So with my fourth feature I decided to try an experiment: I would take the 4 structural chunks of the script and only look at 1 at a time. I could outline, use index cards, anything I wanted, but I could only work on 30 pages at a time – thinking about anything beyond that 30-page unit was off limits until it was done and polished. To challenge myself, I consciously tried to write myself into a corner every 30 pages. And each section would end with an ambitious climax or cliffhanger, one which I had no idea how to top or get out of. It was great.
The good news is that this fourth feature ended up being Aftershocks, still the script I am most proud of. The bad news is it took 7 years to write. I honestly had no idea how to end the thing as I would set it down and then pick it back up months or even years later, letting it breathe as I worked on other scripts and other ideas in between. False starts and dead ends on the second and third acts took years. But once I figured them out… well, as I said, I’m pretty proud of it.
Stay with me here – a few related ideas swirling around.
Last week (May 3 or 5, I can’t remember) I hit a milestone of sorts at the day job: including the time I was temping there (I temped for a few months as a temp-to-hire ), I have now been there for four years. Four years. Is that a long time? It is and it isn’t.
It is also an additional milestone for me: it is now the longest-held job I’ve ever had. In my entire life. Four years. Is that pitiful? For a guy my age? It is and it isn’t. I worked in TV for 6 years, but that was 12+ jobs (that I can think of right now) for 7 different companies, each of which lasted anywhere from 9 months to 4 days. Even of the pre-TV day jobs, the current one is the marathon winner.
All this means at least a couple of things: (a) it has been 10 years since I started working in TV and (2) it is now impossible to deny that I am officially out of the TV business. So my current day job is no longer a fluke, it is the all-time duration king. It is now the rule, not the exception.
A friend of mine (an entrepreneur, which is pretty near-identical to being a screenwriter/producer) is now getting ready to start her first “day job” in several years, maybe ever. She has emailed me asking for any pearls of wisdom I can throw her way, because she doesn’t want the day-to-day crap of the day job to overtake its real purpose: merely funding her passion. To her (and myself), I say good luck. The day job is supposed to enable you to follow your real passion, but it can so easily overtake it and become Read the rest of this entry »
Jens Lekman: Oh You're So Silent Jens (2005)
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INXS: Kick (1987)
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William Shatner: "Captain Kirk is Climbing the Mountain" (2009)
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Bob Dylan: Together Through Life (2009)
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Trashcan Sinatras: In The Music (2009)
Posted by Robb 
Posted by Robb 
Posted by Robb 
