Swimming Upstream

written by a black woman, she teaches yoga, talks a lot about coffee, her site's multi-colored in earthy tones with a smallish font, and at the top of each page she lists whatever music she happens to be listening to.

Well, I don't....do you?

As promised, I am being a Working Girl this week. No, no, not that sort of Working Girl (sheesh--like anybody'd have an old married broad anyhow); the other kind. After working on my rewrite script and my sitcom outline, I sat down yesterday and rewrote Act III of my thesis script.

Today I opened my working copy of the script and started hacking away: x'ing out anything that I didn't like or that no longer fit what I have, marking everything that needs to be rewritten, making a note of new stuff I need to put in there. There was more than I thought, but less than I feared. However, tomorrow is going to be full up.

(Good thing I marked Friday on the calendar as a "free day," eh?)

Last night Linda, Christian, and I went to Largo's in the Fairfax district to hear some "alternative stand-up comedy." The comics are supposed to go up there and riff, not do full routines. Most of them did full routines anyhow--Linda said usually anyone who does something that polished or practiced gets booed off the stage.

The last guy who went up, who's a writer for Mr. Show on HBO (and whose name I can't remember right now), made the evening for us though--he did a spontaneous riff on Billy Crystal that was priceless. This guy is funny. I'll keep an eye out for him in the future...just as soon as I find out what his name is.

The highlight of today was reading a copy of another student's thesis script. Boy, if I ever need the impetus to a)work on my stuff and b)love my stuff, I only have to read someone else's. I couldn't read past page 36 in this student's script, and that was only because I pushed myself to read that much. The writer considers the script damn near perfect as is. The main comment that this student keeps getting (and keeps rejecting, obviously) is to throw out the first 20 pages, because nothing happens in them and the story doesn't start until page 20 or 21.

Linda told me that evidently the other thesis classes are falling apart--no one shows up anymore, and no one critiques anybody else's stuff. Well, if this script I read today is any indication...no one, evidently, including the professor, has bothered to tell this Emperor that the clothes are a mite translucent.

Thank God I got into Len's class, where he every so often gives a damn. Where he has made me work harder than I have ever worked in my life.

A couple of truisms I've come to firmly believe while in the screenwriting program:

1. Writing is rewriting. I don't care who you are--it can always be better. More than likely you didn't get it right the first time. And from what I've seen, my fellows haven't even come close.

2. Most people think "rewriting" means "tweaking"--everything stays the same, except they edit this one scene here. They are wrong. "Rewriting" means "toss everything out and try again--you might be able to keep the same structure (might), but nothing else is golden."

3. Most people don't want to hear criticism, they only want to hear that what they've written is great, that it's the best thing since sliced bread. They will not accept any criticism from any quarter; they don't think their shit stinks. They are wrong.

4. Good screenwriting is way tougher than anyone thinks it is. Including people in this program.

5. I am a better writer than I give myself credit for.

I know this feeling of not wanting to hear any criticism--I feared getting critical feedback from the editors and senior writers at Apple. I couldn't look at what they said because I only wanted to hear how wonderful it was. I've been there, done that: I've avoided facing the facts that I've fucked up and something I've done sucked. I've tried to tweak when wholesale rewriting was required. (Heck, I almost got fired over that tendency when I was an employee, and I did get fired over that when I was a contractor.)

This script I've been doing has been liberating, because I created an excellent opening scene (which pretty much only required tweaking) and everything--everything after page 12 I was willing to rewrite from scratch. And a lightbulb went off: Oh. Duh.

I don't want to get a big ego. Okay, a bigger ego. Okay, like I could stop myself at this point. I know the Industry will take care of any lofty illusions I might hold. But I do know that I'm willing to rip my own work to shreds if there's a hope of making something better out of it, and I honestly think that puts me one step ahead of the game.

Lies, Damn Lies, and Statistics

I lost 2.6 pounds last week (grand total: 24.4). This may be because I spiked my caloric intake, which told my body I wasn't starving anymore...at which point I stopped eating again. Ha! Fooled it! We'll see how next week goes.

My exercise has to go better in the next week, however. Back to the gym tomorrow!