My 2023 as a Working Screenwriter
/Or; How I Lucked Out and Made a Movie During The Year of the Strikes
This is my third annual What Even Happened This Year post, and it’s interesting to see seeds planted in 2021 and developed in 2022 begin to actually take shape. If you have the stamina, endurance, and privilege to keep at it… you may eventually reap what you sow.
A big portion of the year was the WGA (and SAG) strike(s) and business as usual was interrupted from February onward. I’ve not detailed the emotional ups and downs of being on strike for 148 days but it was a doozy. I’m extremely proud of the WGA Membership, Negotiating Committee, and my fellow Strike Captains for the solidarity and an incredible new deal. A really tough year financially, particularly for the working class of Hollywood who continue to be squeezed more and more by big business (true for all of the US, not just entertainment).
MINIONS FOR FAIR PAY
But we aren’t here to read about organized labor (which is good, more please). We’re here to read about the labor itself. What the heck did I do this year (other than look good in a safety vest)?
JANUARY
Start the year meeting other writers / directors. Meet with a director who wants to work on a historical fiction project. A couple conversations over the course of the month about what this might be and how to develop a pitch for it.
Prep for In the Blink of an Eye (the Passion Project Spec mentioned in 2021) is underway in Canada but until we start shooting I feel a little bit of a “well it might disappear” which might be pessimistic but might also be realistic. Zoom with the studio and the director to talk about script changes. I make some small revisions that we think will address the notes (mainly runtime and character moment things). Director and I meet with one of our potential leads over zoom as a final gut check before they sign on, and to see if there’s anything they’re concerned about in terms of working together. Seems like we’ll all get along and we’re all on the same page to make the movie! They officially sign on!
Finish rewrites on the Late Night Comedy I’ve been writing, which is for me to direct (see last year about this one). Share with a friend who’s an indie producer for feedback (I also think they might be a great producer for it). Send the draft to my agents / manager for their thoughts about how to puzzle together a directorial debut.
Can reveal now that the Quirky Class Doc my wife Emma was directing last year will be called The School of Canine Massage and it’s about… canine massage! This will be the first doc short with the Not Impossible Productions logo! Our editor is in NY, so we’re watching him work and chiming in remotely from LA. Emma is heading to NY for work later this year so she will lock the cut with him then. We also zoom with someone who can do the sound design and mixing. We get to a solid cut we like — now to show it to the subjects…
A friend producing the Genre Cram sketch show at the newly revamped UCB Franklin asks me to direct some sketches. Feels great to be putting on a live show again. If anyone has any directing gigs feel free to reach out! (I’m especially eager to direct some music videos)
My short Lead/Follow premieres online next month so I reach out to friends with podcasts to try to promote the release. Bank a few episodes which will release in February.
Call with the producers of the Short Story Adaptation about getting started (finally) on a second draft for them. (I turned in the first draft last April)
Staffing meeting about a streaming show. Goes well until I’m told the streamer may be changing their strategy as to when it starts, so it might be a while before I hear back. (One year later I still don’t know if the show ever started)
FEBRUARY
Lead/Follow premieres online (you can watch it here). After a year of festivals it’s nice to have it out in the world. Staggered release via Directors’ Notes, Beyond the Short, Film Shortage, and finally Omeleto.
Lunch with producer pal about the Late Night script. We’re both too busy to work on it now but feels like maybe we could try to make it together. My team have notes about the script and want me to build a lookbook for it since it would be my feature directorial debut. Like everything I’ve worked on it’s “a tricky one” because it’s “execution dependent.” This is just Hollywood Code for “not a straightforward genre picture.”
First production meeting with all the heads of departments for Blink. We go through the script page by page to talk logistics. Solid three hour zoom but to me as the writer it now really feels like a movie’s happening! Director and I and our cast have another break out meeting to talk minor scene notes and re-write thoughts.
Finally paid to start the re-write for the Short Story Adaptation (first paycheck of the year).
Meet with a UK producer. We hit it off, I pitch him an idea I’ve had in my back pocket for a while now (see January 2021) that he seems keen on — a four quadrant Ghost Story. We agree to chat more, maybe there’s a world where we can take it out as a pitch.
Show Canine Massage to one of the subjects to get their blessing on the film which is stressful — will they like it? If they hate it what do we do? But all goes smoothly! Excited for Emma and our editor to now make some minor tweaks, lock the cut, and move on to the next stage of post production.
MARCH
Call with a potential composer for Canine Massage, seems like music will be a fun process to bring it to life. Emma as the director is overseeing the actual work and notes through post, I’m just providing a sounding board.
Finish re-writing the Short Story Adaptation just in time to head up to location for the shoot.
Location Tech Scouts for Blink begin in Vancouver. The whole team rides around in a bus for a week as we scout everywhere we’ll be filming. Now’s the chance for everyone to see everything we’re going to be dealing with at each location and start to prep accordingly for things like how to get power / water / food / cameras in and out of every place. Also time for everyone to see the light and look of everything in person. I fly up to Canada for this, then back to LA, then back to Canada — bopping back and forth on weekends because once we’re filming I’ll be too tired to head home. The following week we have camera tests to see how the wardrobe and hair and makeup will look throughout the film.
End of the month we begin principal photography on location. HERE WE GO! Incredibly surreal to see the sets and wardrobe and props and entire team of people bringing to life a thing I made up in my apartment years ago. Feeling lucky to have the team we do, and that the director and I had so much time prior to production to talk about basically every single scene, moment, and line in the film. Makes the production of a pretty complex movie feel fun and easygoing. Remarkably smooth sailing getting things done (and equally important, remarkably good weather).
Squeeze in another zoom with the producer about my Ghost Story idea. He’s into it, has some ideas about how best to tweak the pitch for a director he’d want to take it to.
We’ve slowly been taking the Genre Series I’d developed last year out to directors and hearing nobody wants to attach without a script, but it’s based on IP so I can’t really write the pilot without a studio financing it, so we finally put it in front of a studio and… they seem interested! Just one problem. They want it to be completely different. Can we change it all? Call with producers about whether we want to try to fit the studio’s mandate. We decide it’s best to pass, and try to find someone more aligned creatively. Feels risky short term to say no but empowering long term in that our partners will be aligned with us from the beginning.
APRIL
Production continues. One of my agents comes up to visit set.
Director and I get a call on the books with a producer he’d been talking to about the Historical Project — they’re interested but everyone is worried about the possibile impending strike. Could we pitch to them before? Should we? Seems likely we’ll see a strike soon. Director and I exchange a few drafts of what our pitch could be and have something we like, but we decide to wait.
Another call about the Ghost Story idea. Same thing as above — could we pitch before a strike? Probably not.
I finish a solid version of the lookbook for the Late Night movie. Send it in to my team who think… it’s too long? And they still have notes on the script. Gotta cut both down.
I get brought in at the last minute to zoom into a roundtable for a studio project in development. First time I’ve been hired to do one of these — a few different feature writers and I are all on with the writer/director to talk about their current draft and suggest improvements. Weird job but it’s also super fun to tell someone else how to fix a movie (and a lot easier than trying to do it yourself). Also stoked to meet these other writers who I admire a lot and am glad to get to know.
Over a three day weekend I fly back to LA to visit while my wife Emma does a test shoot for a feature documentary project she’s thinking about directing. It would be about her father (who has recently gotten very weirdly into ventriloquism) and their relationship. He’s visiting from out of town (with his dummies) and our friend who shot Canine Massage is going to shoot over the weekend and we’ll see if there is in fact a film to be made here. There is.
Lots of talk about the almost certain impending strike. Strike is good. Writers can/should get paid. So should everyone else. But also… What will happen? I am living in Canada now until Mid May so if/when writers do go on strike… what?
Rush to get any and all changes for the final days of the shoot finished BEFORE May 1st so that I can step away when/if the WGA strike.
Also rush to turn in the Short Story Adaptation re-write so that they can see something pre-strike (and so I can get paid).
I’m guessing a strike will be long. The Guild’s asks are pretty fundamental changes to the core business of the streamers and I’d imagine that takes a decent amount of pain before any compromise. I’m planning on needing to save enough money to get through sometime between August-October. Somewhere in there hopefully. Hopefully. But even then it takes months to get a job to pay you, so… realistically need to save enough to last until January.
MAY
Strike! I’m stuck in Canada not writing (also celebrating my birthday?) while the film finishes last few days of production. Extremely weird. But thank god the script was solid and they’re able to wrap without the writer?
Go home. Sign up to be a strike captain at Disney — they were the last people to pay me as a writer so it only feels appropriate.
Plan to strike and rest and get things done at home that have been on my checklist for months (years) — install a garbage disposal, fix broken furniture… I don’t know. Just trying to stay busy between picketing. Also trying to actively take a writing break. Thankfully had a movie produced, and a few things to turn it right before the strike, so I’ve got a healthy cushion in savings and I’m just tired. I’ll get back to work, I have a lot of stuff I want to do, but for now I’m on strike.
Oh also I’m still producing the Canine Massage Doc which is in color correction.
JUNE
Maybe I’ll pivot to part time documentary producer. Start helping Emma produce the Ventriloquism Film. Documentary requires a lot of speculative shooting and editing, so for now we’re paying for those things out of pocket and trying to get as many favors as we can until we can find more funding. Our editor from Canine Massage helps us cut a sample from the test shoot. Next month Emma’s dad goes to a big Ventriloquism Convention and so we start prepping how we could go film him there. Reach out to the convention to coordinate if it will be possible and it is.
Sit down and do a quick revision of the Play Adaptation that I started working on last year, another thing I’d want to potentially direct. Heading to NY next month and would love to kind of know how I’d want to adapt the play before talking to the playwright.
Feels like Strike Summer is the perfect time to mess around with these directorial debut ideas because they’re weird passion projects and will take a lot of unpaid time and energy to figure out. Also cut down the Late Night script and lookbook.
JULY
Film with Emma’s dad, first at his home, then at the convention. It’s wild. More on that later.
I head to NY and see the playwright of the Play Adaptation I want to do. Pitch my ideas to him and he’s game. We agree to eventually figure out how to do it once the strike ends.
They’re busy working on the first cut of Blink which I’m not really in the loop on because… well… I’m on strike. But thankful that post can continue.
AUGUST
Lots of “will the strike end this month” chatter. Don’t think so, but we’ll see.
Since I’m stalled out on the potential Play Adaptation (can’t get the rights during a strike) I start messing around with an older feature idea I’d never figured out — a Sci-Fi Coming of Age that also feels like it could be small enough to be a directorial debut. Spend the month cracking a draft I’m excited about. Now that’s three weird potential directorial debut projects.
Emma and I have our first conversation with a potential producing partner for Ventriloquism Project. So far everyone who’s seen any of it seems to be very intrigued by the materials.
Follow Emma’s dad to Miami as he goes for work. It’s also where Emma grew up so it’s an odd documentary / homecoming trip. We’re trying to keep up with major events that feel time sensitive, even if we haven’t figured out how exactly to pay for this film. We’re just sort of betting we’ll figure it out (we will).
SEPTEMBER
Send the Sci-fi Coming of Age to a director pal for his thoughts. He has good feedback and most importantly agrees there is in fact a movie there.
Reminded of an older idea of mine I’d never cracked — a Paranoid Supernatural Thriller. Read the old draft, feels like I can polish quickly and maybe when the strike is over try to sell it? Feel like I’m just trying every which way to find angles into getting back to work (and getting paid again) asap once it’s over. I do a quick rewrite.
STRIKE IS OVER!
I’m sent almost immediately a portion of the edit for Blink where we could make line changes but wanted to talk to the writer first and that’s me, I’m the writer! Feels insane to go back to work immediately but here we are!
Also it feels insane to SEE THE MOVIE. Exciting, scary, overwhelming.
Calls with manager and agents to catch them up on what I’ve done over the strike. I feel ready to get going with my directorial debut projects: Late Night being #1. I don’t even bother telling them about the others because it feels like it’s easier to have their energy focused. I also have the Paranoid Supernatural Thriller (which I send to my manager). Reiterate to them that I’d really love a job because I’ve now spent months not earning money.
OCTOBER
Another doc shoot in Miami.
Call with producer of the Genre Series — how do we get re-started? Talk with agents and put together a list of potential producing partners, especially people with overall deals who could help sneak the project in somewhere.
Call with Short Story Adaptation folks — they’d like to get me commenced on the next (optional) rewrite of the script. Hopefully the last pass before we take it to directors / actors. Discuss what the re-write plan might be and I’m eager to get commenced but every step has taken ages so I’m not holding my breath.
I also need to get paid asap. I planned to save enough to get me through to Jan/Feb and now it’s looking like that’s the earliest anything new could possibly happen.
General meetings start up again this month. Everything feels weird. Remembering how to do these.
Calls with agents about packaging the Late Night movie — who are producers we might go to? Who are valuable lead actors we can go to (once SAG strike is over)? Another call with them about the Genre Series with the same question — who should be first on the list? Both of these lists take multiple calls which feels crazy to me considering… it’s a list of names. But everyone likes to chime in on the list.
Conversation with agents / manager about the Paranoid Thriller now that they’ve read and they don’t see a clear path for it. They’d rather find a director than expose it wide. I disagree. We sort of reach a stand still on what to do with it. So maybe it isn’t the thing that gets me paid before the year ends.
I crack open the Action Adventure Comedy I’d started on spec last year but hadn’t nailed. If I can fix it up maybe I can take it out as well, or instead? Begin re-write work on that.
Emma and I contact a trailer house about cutting a promo for the Ventriloquist Dad Project to convey the tone and feeling of the film. Once we have strong sample materials we’ll be in a stronger position to try to secure funding, especially from commercial producers / financiers.
I attend Austin Film Festival to talk on a couple panels and roundtables. While there I get asked to come in on a few zooms to weigh in on Blink edits. Also get word from agents that I have a meeting about staffing on a series as soon as I get back to LA, so while I’m trying to see movies and people I end up also bingeing a show to prep for that meeting.
Staffing meeting when I’m back goes really well. First TV meeting I’ve had where I immediately feel a rapport and feels like they’ve actually read my work and actually want to work with me and it’s a casual fun conversation and we all like each other! Cool! Who knows if it turns into something but feels nice that it feels nice.
Finally convince agents to send the Late Night script and lookbook out to a dream producer (along with a personal note to them). We’ll see what happens.
NOVEMBER
After feeling some resistance to taking out specs, and hearing from a few people who’ve had success trying this, I write a short story based on an idea I’ve had for a Cosmic Horror film. In a few pages and with a few days’ work I’m able to put something together that I like and that I think makes a case for what a movie based on the story might be. I’m just trying to find a way to get anyone to pay for anything I want to do. And this seems like it’s weirdly worked for people. Manager likes it and signs off on it, so we send it along to agents to get their thoughts on next steps.
General meeting with a studio. Four movie ideas they think I specifically might be interested in, all based on IP. One does in fact spark for me and I feel like I know what the movie is so I lean in and immediately follow up. We quickly try to put another call on the books to discuss.
Lunch with a manager pal. Run through his clients and whether anyone is doing anything I might be a good fit for. A couple people. I’m very eager for a paid gig so immediately follow up.
Zoom about the IP OWA. I’m not counting on it because OWA’s tend to be an uphill battle but… it’s sort of one I’ve claimed rather than one I’m competing for, so it seems like there may be a chance here.
Zoom with a production company I like. Their whole team is on the call and they seem keen to work with me and it feels weird to be wanted. A couple different projects that are adaptations they think I might be right for that I look at and just can’t quite crack so it doesn’t work out this time. But I’d love if they want to do one of my potential directorial debuts! File this away as a good place to hopefully reach out.
Still sporadically hearing from the Blink team as they continue to edit.
First call with the trailer house about Ventriloquism now that they’ve seen all the materials. They’re excited and eager to get started.
Pitch my take on the IP OWA. They’re into it but have notes before we take it up the chain. All reasonable stuff. Doesn’t feel like we’re too far away.
Zoom with a producer I’d met years earlier (maybe as far back as 2020? 2019?) who’s in the early stages of developing a Star Vehicle (the star is already attached) and thought of me for it. Cool idea and I immediately have a fun way in. We hit if off and the next step would be for me to come in and pitch the star. Need to do a few days’ work to figure out what that pitch is.
Catch up with an old exec pal who moved to a new company. I also add them to the list of possible producers for Late Night Project. Could be up their alley potentially?
We finally find out that Producer #1 for Late Night has passed and so we have to again all look at the list and decide who to send it out to next.
Still working on the Action Comedy Spec.
I am in fact being offered the staffing job. They want me to start in a few days! TV time is insane! A movie would’ve taken 3–6 months to figure itself out. Need to close the loop on all these potential feature gigs before I start (which isn’t actually possible). More news on this in the new year.
Also good news about The School of Canine Massage! Premiering at SXSW in March!
DECEMBER
Rush to get the Action Comedy Spec figured out and in solid shape before I start a full time job. Send the draft to my manager right before we start.
Room starts and I’m scared (TV is new for me!) but everyone’s great and I really dig it and don’t feel too in over my head.
Squeeze in early morning calls / meetings on the feature things still outstanding, knowing that if I can manage to land one of these at the very beginning of the year they probably wouldn’t start until after the TV room (considering how long deals take). Perfect timing. Just have to burn the candle at both ends until the holidays.
Meet manager pal’s director client about a Novella Adaptation he wants to do. Talk with the the producers about it. Sounds like we’re all on the same page so the director and I trade info to try to meet and discuss how we’d actually do it. Will need to meet the rest of the team early January before anyone agrees to anything but hoping I can land this one because it would be really cool and would love to write something for the director.
SPACEMAN for Netflix gets a release date and a poster and trailer! Premieres February 21st 2024 at Berlin Film Festival and on Netflix March 1st.
Emma’s found a great documentary producer who might be keen to come on and help out on Ventriloquist Dad, which sounds great since I’m NOT actually a documentary producer! Nearly done with the sizzle but everyone’s going on holiday break. Decide to take our time with the final round of notes so it’s not rushed (but that means we’ll be watching materials and trying to figure out the edit over the holidays).
Also over the holidays I want to polish up the Sci-Fi Coming of Age script, aka Directorial Debut Option #2. (I think this might be an easier project to get produced than the Play Adaptation, aka Directorial Debut Option #3). So for those keeping track at home it’s 1) Late Night, 2) Sci-Fi Coming of Age, 3) Play Adaptation.
Also also over the holidays I want to try to crack my final takes on the IP OWA and the Star Vehicle because I’ll end up pitching those during the first few weeks of January.
Also also also over the holidays I want to try to take some time off.
—
And that’s the year. 2023 was a weird one. More of it was being on strike than not (or recovering from being on strike, which was also difficult). The end of the year post strike felt like a No Man’s Land where nobody wanted to put too much capital into anything. My guess is that the top of 2024 also feels this way, not because of the strikes, but because of the larger economic forces at play everywhere — higher interest rates means it’s more expensive to finance projects, vertical integration has eaten all the ways projects used to make money (windowing!), and the business is going to continue to feel quite tight.
All that being said, I’m excited about 2024. Emma’s working on her directorial debut (here’s a page where you can donate to the project).
And there’s a lot of exciting stuff for me: movies coming out, a TV staff job, potential feature gigs, and a couple different options to try to put together a directorial debut. I just have to convince someone to pay for the damn thing. Which, granted, feels harder than ever right now.
Really I’m just lucky we somehow got a movie made in the few months of the year before everything shut down. Which has me feeling optimistic. Grateful and optimistic. And just continuing to work on the next thing and the next thing and the next thing.
