cineman

I feel way overdue for a new journal entry, so here we go. I'll warn you now (having proofed it before posting) that this one is sorta New-Agey, occasionally blunt and at times bitchy, very heavy on the writing stuff and lean on celeb gossip and whatnot, so thanks for any indulgence you grant me...

But first, one thing. I'd like to offer a big "thank you" to you, my SG friends, who enlighten and entertain me daily with your perspectives on life, love, and the comedy that is all around us. I am really enjoying being a part of this site and getting to know such neat / cool / wonderful / sassy / sexy (as it applies) people as you all. I hope that in your eyes my presence makes a positive contribution to the overall vibe, both here and when you take pieces of this exchange with you into your "real" life.

Okay, on with it! This week has been relatively uneventful work-wise but very productive creatively. My writing partner Rook and I decided what we wanted to address in a polish of this one screenplay of ours, and Wednesday I completed my draft and shipped it for him to review. (He and his wife live near Park City so we mostly do revisions by email, though for the actual idea generation and first draft sessions one of us travels to the other and we lock ourselves into the same house until we have something.) Anyway, I feel really good about it and am eager to see what he feels he needs to change (if anything) before we can move forward on a few opportunities that exist for us with it...

Rook is deep in the home stretch on a new screenplay of his that he has to finish before he can deal with this joint one, but he thinks he should be finished by this weekend. I have to say that he is one of my fucking heroes when it comes to writing dedication (and sheer talent) and I am so lucky he's my partner I don't know where to begin. All I'll say here is that I don't know anyone else who has such an accurate self-assessment and objectivity towards their own work as he does; it's truly amazing. Not many writers would throw out hundreds of pages - yes, literally hundreds - to get to the one that mattered, but he does so routinely and without mercy. In my experience, it seems many would-be "writers" are so in love with the sound of their own inner voice made manifest on the page (and I have been guilty of this myself) that they don't apparently edit anything, and the crap that gets circulated and made is a large testament to that fact...

Sorry for the rant! Getting off my soapbox and back on track, the most incredible thing about the way he works (to me) is he doesn't rework old incomplete drafts (prior to the actual completed first draft) when he's fleshing out the bones; once he hits a wall, he takes the time to reflect on what's wrong and what needs to be done, then decides if what he has is reworkable but mostly on target. If so, he reworks the little bits that need it and moves on. But if more major surgery is needed, he doesn't keep anything: he selects the file and DELETES it - the whole thing! Starts from a blank effin' page. I do that occasionally if I feel there's no other way, but he does it all the time. Scary, that one. Even scarier is that after he's got all the false starts out of his system and he's in the zone, he writes about 15-20 keeper pages a day - every day. And by "keepable", I mean shootable, final-draft quality, major-league cinema writing, not bullshit.

Damn! This turned into a non-paid endorsement of my buddy's work ethic. Pretty sexy stuff, eh? I think I should stop because this is getting so long I fear I might crash the SG servers. But rest assured that the kinder, gentler Cineman will be back - with more light-hearted, pithy commentary on the stuff of life - shortly...just as soon as he finishes a keeper draft of HIS new screenplay!

Geez. See ya!