I admit it. I’ve always found it hard to believe that the Fifty Shades of Grey books had any fans, let alone the millions of people we know have been buying, and maybe actually reading, them.
I’ve also found it hard to believe that the Fifty Shades of Grey film and its upcoming sequels have fans as well.
And to top it all off, how could I possibly ever believe that the Shadesies are all concerned about who’s going to write the second film in the franchise? I mean, really?
by Larry BrodyThe Portland Film Festival, Portland’s leading film non-profit – but not the Northwest’s because not only do we need know how “leading” is being defined in this situation but, hey, we’ve got the Port Townsend Film Festival, in Port Townsend, WA, the director of which used to live right across the street from yours truly (She didn’t move. I did. So it goes.) – wants everyone to now that it wants you/me/us to submit our scripts to it so that…well, I’ve got no idea what the submission is going to be for because the “Submit your script” page doesn’t say.
And, yes, I find this annoying. Because TVWriter™ and I personally are all about helping new writers find new opportunities to develop their talent and show it off and make oodles of $$$ or at the very least change their lives by feeling proud of themselves and what they do–
And I have no idea if the Portland Film Festival’s Submit your script (why aren’t Your and Script in upper case, I wonder) page is going to help with TVWriter™’s and my above stated goals.
One of my earliest TV writing gigs was on a very short-lived, early ’70s series called THE SIXTH SENSE, which had nothing to do with the much later – and better – film of the same name.
THE SIXTH SENSE was unusual for its time because not only was it science fiction – psychic powers and all that – but it also had two story editors running the writing. And two very distinguished story editors at that: Harlan Ellison, a science fiction legend, and Dorothy Fontana, AKA D.C. Fontana, the fabled story editor of the original STAR TREK series.
Harlan and Dorothy both left THE SIXTH SENSE while I was in the early stages of writing my script, but we remained friends for many, many years. Both of them were huge boosters of my career and my self-confidence as well, and depending on our fortunes and relative professional positions at the time, we would hire each other to write on various shows.
This haiku was one of those times:
A pleasing presentation of a very unpleasant truth for newbies and gloriously famous old pros alike.
Tonight is the last meeting of the 148th session of TVWriter™’s Advanced TV & Film Online Workshop. (At least, I think that’s the official name. Official names have, I admit, never meant very much to me.)
148 sessions? Over a dozen years? I’d better try not to think about that because if I start seeing what I’ve been doing as any kind of rut my Normal Life Avoidance System might kick in and…well, then there’d never be a 149th session.
Right now, though, there is. And the 149th Advanced Workshop AKA the April Edition will start two weeks from tonight, on the last day of April, so maybe we should call it the May Workshop? But then people will start writing in demanding to know “What happened to the April Workshop?” so….