Friday, August 22, 2003
I'll show you my Premise, if you show me yours
So last Tuesday, I met my screenwriting Tutor "E" at a coffeehouse in Cincinnati. He's won a couple of scriptwriting awards and his stories have been optioned (but lapsed). He's a young, I'm guessing hispanic, guy with intense eyes -- but that may be from the glasses. We're supposed to start with a "premise" and meet with a group once a month at Borders Northgate Mall to take our story to its end. I showed him my "premise", which is a short story I wrote for my Pikes Peak community college class in creative writing a couple of years ago about a woman who abandons her kid at a Wendy's.
"Your story is very visual. 'her eyes look instinctively toward her house' -- that's very visual." Said E. He read my story by keeping his middle finger down on the line, with his pinky and thumb spread, like a ruler or placeholder. A couple of times his finger-ruler stopped and he would sit back, as if thinking. At the first mention of Wendy's, he sat back and said: "Unless you're looking for a product endorsement, *never* use a product name. And with this kind of story, I don't think you'll get a product endorsement from Wendy's." (Uh, what do you mean? I thought Dave Thomas was *adopted*.)
He gave me some screenwriting tools to remember, like definitions for things like POV and OC and VO, and also the website for a hollywood scripts clearance center. Yesterday, I clicked around
I read all of the American Beauty script last night, and I gotta say, it was (*sob*) beautiful. I only saw the movie once, but it left an impression. And this script brought it all back and wow, if I could write like that!
After I paid a quick visit to an ATM to transfer cash, I stopped by the Pipeline to see what's what; they had a full parking lot and youngies falling in. Most were going upstairs to dance but there was a $3 cover, so I stayed downstairs. I pretty quickly picked up a fairly young guy in town on business. He was 6'-6", an electrical engineer, and I thought pretty cute. He had a great body, and boy was he excited to be with me! He didn't like to kiss, but he liked to touch and, after everything was over, I noticed his wedding ring. (Well, that's his deal; not mine.) It was nice to be with someone who enjoyed himself and vocalized it.
"Your story is very visual. 'her eyes look instinctively toward her house' -- that's very visual." Said E. He read my story by keeping his middle finger down on the line, with his pinky and thumb spread, like a ruler or placeholder. A couple of times his finger-ruler stopped and he would sit back, as if thinking. At the first mention of Wendy's, he sat back and said: "Unless you're looking for a product endorsement, *never* use a product name. And with this kind of story, I don't think you'll get a product endorsement from Wendy's." (Uh, what do you mean? I thought Dave Thomas was *adopted*.)
He gave me some screenwriting tools to remember, like definitions for things like POV and OC and VO, and also the website for a hollywood scripts clearance center. Yesterday, I clicked around
www.script-o-rama.com and printed out the scripts for two of my favorites: American Beauty and Fight Club.
I read all of the American Beauty script last night, and I gotta say, it was (*sob*) beautiful. I only saw the movie once, but it left an impression. And this script brought it all back and wow, if I could write like that!
After I paid a quick visit to an ATM to transfer cash, I stopped by the Pipeline to see what's what; they had a full parking lot and youngies falling in. Most were going upstairs to dance but there was a $3 cover, so I stayed downstairs. I pretty quickly picked up a fairly young guy in town on business. He was 6'-6", an electrical engineer, and I thought pretty cute. He had a great body, and boy was he excited to be with me! He didn't like to kiss, but he liked to touch and, after everything was over, I noticed his wedding ring. (Well, that's his deal; not mine.) It was nice to be with someone who enjoyed himself and vocalized it.