1. Open up the project file (this is the one we resist the most).
2. Go straight to the issue that is causing you the most stress. The nagging sound issue, the second act plot hole, the bad acting from that girl you should never have cast ----- go to it! WORK ON IT! Just do it!
3. Turn your phone off. Close down your web-browser. Dedicate an hour to it. The problem is never the WORK, it's the resistance we feel BEFORE doing the work.
4. Accept that less than perfect is okay (Perfection in art is rare, and even if it did exist, it should probably be avoided).
5. Show your work to a friend and ask for three POSITIVE pieces of feedback. Often we struggle because of how fragile we are when it's going wrong. Getting that rare burst of positivity can help us rediscover what's good about the project.
6. Ignore the brain wave that rushes into your head and says "Actually, I have a great idea for that OTHER project!!". That's just avoidance, ignore it. The other project can wait.
7. Read this poem.
8. Fall in love. You'll complete your project in three days just to impress her/him.
9. Get dumped. You'll get ANGRY. You'll want to take over the WORLD! That burst of energy will ignite you to great heights!
10. Focus. Once you're 12 minutes in and focused, you're fine -- the time will fly by. But you have to do the work to get past the initial few minutes where all the distractions come racing in.
Sunday 20 May 2012
Saturday 19 May 2012
Big Sea Of Nothing: A Rant About the Internet and Shiny Black Devices
What the hell are we all doing here on this internet thing? Smashing out blogs at an alarming rate, updating our statuses, poking and tweeting and retweeting and messaging and telling people where we are and how we feel.
And whatever we wrote last week is consigned to history. I mean, the data grabbing marketing people have it, but we have no use for it. I've seen the stats on my blog, my latest articles get read a lot but the old ones get about 4 hits a week.
Yet we keep churning it out. Is this the best use of our time? Do I blog for you or is it just my own ego trying to look like I know what I'm talking about? I've written nearly 1000 blog posts in three years! Should I have written a novel instead, or spent that time getting deeper into my screenplays?
Did you know I've been single this whole time? I'm good at writing statuses and making people laugh and inspiring people to maybe sort of start writing a script; but where's the intimacy? What am I doing in my life?
Is your productivity better this year than three years ago or worse? There are so many people online with advice, tips, help. How much of it is useful and how much of it is a pile of shit? Did Shakespeare need to read Seth Godin's blog every day, or did he just get on with it?
Social networking is useful in that I've met great people, shared my projects and even garnered some interesting work. But most of the time, it's wasteful! Every moment I log into Facebook is a moment I could have spent writing, or getting to know someone better face to face.
I'm not techno-phobic, I've always embraced it all. But I don't think this is it, I don't think that on our death beds we'll be wishing we spent more time on our MacBooks. All my friends sit around the dinner table with their phones out. Everyone in the cinema is texting. Are we capable of two hours without BBM'ing and tweeting, or is it too much for our wired up brains?
When iPads were first released, thousands of people lined up to buy them. Nobody even knew what they did, they just wanted them. And everyone wants the next iPhone. We're locked into this model of consumerism where we always want the next thing and then the next thing.
You can say it's healthy and I'm sure for many of you: it is. But far too many people are just spending all their money on devices which detach them further and further from their lives. And the next shiny black metal device isn't good enough, cause you'll get a newer one in six months.
But don't worry about me, I've finally decided to be in a committed relationship. With a Kindle.
Friday 18 May 2012
(Real Life) Character Development
They say insanity is doing the same thing again and again and expecting a different result.
It's okay to fail, just don't keep failing in exactly the same way.
On the other side of your self-perceived limitations is where the river is flowing. You have to adapt, change, learn, grow.
I can't sleep so I've been sitting here figuring out all the dumb ways I self-sabotage.
Not sleeping is one of them. Calling my self sabotage dumb is another, I am actually extremely sophisticated at self-sabotage! I can make a script problem seem like it was caused by the paper jams and I can convince myself a relationship problem was caused by international terrorism.
But it's when you see your same patterns repeating that you know you have to change.
It's like that moment in a movie when the main character has to decide whether to grow and save the world/get the girl, or to just curl up at home.
In life, even after you change and grow, you can still lose.
But if you don't at least make the leap, you might as well just throw in the towel.
Thursday 17 May 2012
ANDIE MACDOWELL, CHAZZ PALMINTERI & RAINEY QUALLEY on ACTING
ANDIE: So you've paid your dues?
CHAZZ: Oh big time, big time I've paid my dues.
Chazz talks about the nine years before 'A Bronx Tale' and Andie talks about the seven years before 'Sex, Lies & Videotape'. These days we see Andie MacDowell as someone who sells hair products, but she's just like everyone else-- a human being who's worked damned hard.
This interview is so unusual, they're actually talking. You realise how much hard work they put into their careers, and the decisions they had to make. Did you know that Andie's agents didn't want her to do 'Sex, Lies & Videotape'? She made the decision, she took the risk - and it's things like that which turn a career around and spin it in a different direction.
They discuss the breaking in stories. And they talk about doing jobs for money when the script stinks, and doing things for art when the money stinks. It's fascinating! How often do we get this kind of access to names like this? Not often.
It's a great YouTube channel, worth checking out. But not every interview is golden. They talk to Sorkin, and he's fascinating, but it's while he was promoting 'The Social Network' and he's full of the same soundbites that he said in every other interview at the time.
And the woman on the right is Rainey Qualley, Andie MacDowell's daughter. And they talk about that; being an actor whose parent is famous for the same thing. After fifteen minutes, they're talking about parenting -- what does this have to do with promoting the movie? Nothing. But now I care a lot more about these people and the flick they're in. It's refreshing.
This video only has 252 views at the time of writing this; so I guess it won't appeal to everyone. When people see actors, they just want the soundbite, they wanna hear them say 'Oh it was great to work with Andie MacDowell' and then move on to the next thing. I understand that, because too often actors can be full of their own self-importance, as if their performances are going to save the world from extinction or something.
But occasionally you get people like Chazz and Andie who are down to earth, who just tell it how it is. It's refreshing. You feel like you actually learn something.
You don't have to watch the whole thing. Towards the end they start doing the promo schtick. But the first twenty minutes or so are an insight.
As for the movie, it's called 'Mighty Fine', and I have no idea if it'll be any good.
AMANDA PEET on ACTING
"There were so many low points, I can't even count them. You just have to perservere. I think work begets work. So even commercials, and small movies and NYU films, all that stuff--- I did all of it. That's how I became more comfortable. I never would have had some really quick overnight success 'cause I was too nervous, and not good enough."
-Amanda Peet
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