Getting this show on the road...
First, a hearty "up yours" to El Jefe for reminding me I haven't made good on my promise to post daily. The man has a point, though. I have failed you thus far. Let's see if I can't mend my ways.
A simple phrase:
Makes sense, right? It's from a screenwriting course I took last year. Not sure why I remembered it this morning.
That's a lie. I know why. Because I've been calling myself a writer for some time now. And for a lot of that time it's been a damn lie.
I've gone whole weeks - sometimes months - without putting pen to paper. Not because I was too busy, or got held up by other obligations, or didn't have anything to write about. I have hundreds of things to write about, and even more reasons to do so. But sometimes I just... didn't. Which begs the question:
If you're a writer, and you don't write, what are you?
Aaron Sorkin, at whose screenwriting feet I worship, says there's nothing he fears more than a blank sheet of paper. He began writing A Few Good Men on a rickety grandpa-style typewriter, and I can see him rolling that empty sheet into the machine and just staring at the white of it all for hours - finally fracturing the silence with the first gunshots of frantic typing.
Me, I've been hanging out at Stage 1 - the paper's in there and I'm just staring at the bastard. Staring and waiting, waiting and sweating. Because I'm scared shitless.
As long as my ideas and my stories and my characters stay in my head, they're amazing. They're revolutionary. They're what TV and films should be, they're brilliant, they're golden.
Once they hit the paper, though, they're out there for everyone to see. To probe, to prod, to ridicule. And maybe, maybe, to be appreciated and enjoyed. But what are the chances of that?
Last fall I wrote my first "spec" script - in layman's terms, a screenwriting sample to shop around to possible gigs, a showcase of the wonders you're capable of should you be hired for your pen. And it was well received - my writing instructor said I blew her expectations for a first-time spec and that I showed promise. And I left class with my chest puffed out a little. Who wouldn't?
Then the fear sank in - what if she was lying? She was also trying to get me to sign up for the two-year writing program, which would've made a pretty big dent in my wallet, so what if she was buttering me up so I'd pay her salary? And the spec went in the drawer.
For four months.
I pulled it out last week and was surprised at how much I... liked it. I passed it on to El Jefe, Nate and some other writer friends - which made me realize that all my best friends are writers, which we'll come back to at a later post - and they liked it as well, and also threw in some valuable feedback to help me polish the beast up.
But they liked it - which means I'm doing something right. Just wish my self-esteem would get the goddamn memo.
'Cause the clock's ticking.
This weekend Helias and I jumped into our joint writing project, a spec pilot I've been kicking around for about five years now. No shit. Five years.
The thing's gone through permutation after permutation, characters have been added, killed and revived, pages have been written, burned and phoenixed. And it's waited. And waited. And it probably would've waited a while longer if Helias weren't the damn bulldog he is. Bless the bastard.
So the train's finally leaving the station. I'm kicking this fear bullshit.
It's on.
-TM
A simple phrase:
"You're a writer if you write."
Makes sense, right? It's from a screenwriting course I took last year. Not sure why I remembered it this morning.
That's a lie. I know why. Because I've been calling myself a writer for some time now. And for a lot of that time it's been a damn lie.
I've gone whole weeks - sometimes months - without putting pen to paper. Not because I was too busy, or got held up by other obligations, or didn't have anything to write about. I have hundreds of things to write about, and even more reasons to do so. But sometimes I just... didn't. Which begs the question:
If you're a writer, and you don't write, what are you?
Aaron Sorkin, at whose screenwriting feet I worship, says there's nothing he fears more than a blank sheet of paper. He began writing A Few Good Men on a rickety grandpa-style typewriter, and I can see him rolling that empty sheet into the machine and just staring at the white of it all for hours - finally fracturing the silence with the first gunshots of frantic typing.
Me, I've been hanging out at Stage 1 - the paper's in there and I'm just staring at the bastard. Staring and waiting, waiting and sweating. Because I'm scared shitless.
As long as my ideas and my stories and my characters stay in my head, they're amazing. They're revolutionary. They're what TV and films should be, they're brilliant, they're golden.
Once they hit the paper, though, they're out there for everyone to see. To probe, to prod, to ridicule. And maybe, maybe, to be appreciated and enjoyed. But what are the chances of that?
Last fall I wrote my first "spec" script - in layman's terms, a screenwriting sample to shop around to possible gigs, a showcase of the wonders you're capable of should you be hired for your pen. And it was well received - my writing instructor said I blew her expectations for a first-time spec and that I showed promise. And I left class with my chest puffed out a little. Who wouldn't?
Then the fear sank in - what if she was lying? She was also trying to get me to sign up for the two-year writing program, which would've made a pretty big dent in my wallet, so what if she was buttering me up so I'd pay her salary? And the spec went in the drawer.
For four months.
I pulled it out last week and was surprised at how much I... liked it. I passed it on to El Jefe, Nate and some other writer friends - which made me realize that all my best friends are writers, which we'll come back to at a later post - and they liked it as well, and also threw in some valuable feedback to help me polish the beast up.
But they liked it - which means I'm doing something right. Just wish my self-esteem would get the goddamn memo.
'Cause the clock's ticking.
This weekend Helias and I jumped into our joint writing project, a spec pilot I've been kicking around for about five years now. No shit. Five years.
The thing's gone through permutation after permutation, characters have been added, killed and revived, pages have been written, burned and phoenixed. And it's waited. And waited. And it probably would've waited a while longer if Helias weren't the damn bulldog he is. Bless the bastard.
So the train's finally leaving the station. I'm kicking this fear bullshit.
It's on.
-TM
posted by The Tin Man | 2/27/2006
9 Comments:
I'm currently blaming my current lack of writing on the bad ergonomics of my computer desk...
I. am. such. an. asshole.
Eh, you're not an asshole, PChen. You just gotta crank out that GAN... you know it's in there, probably drowning in scotch.
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