It gets a laugh - obviously I don’t give this answer when in the company of actor/s - but just between you and me, I’m a little afraid of actors.

Being a working screenwriter might be all about getting paid and buying things on TradeMe but it don’t count for a slab of Whittakers’ finest if you don’t get produced. And to get produced, amidst the small army of collaborators who will trample your ego, mince your work, and sully your vision are… actors.

Unless you take up puppeteering, anime or cartooning, you’re going to have to accept the fact that someone - not a clone of you, not some doppelganger of you - is going to take your words and -

- and what? At worst, expose you to be the hack you’ve been all along.

At best - and this happens more often than you think - bring your characters to life in ways you never imagined.

Of course what you see in readings/rehearsal/shooting/editing it’s not what you had in mind. Those uppity actors are asking a million questions about motivation, moulding your characters this way and that, challenging the backstory you created. They’re taking over… and as they put a face and tic and walk to your characters, they’re irrevocably changing them.

Change is good.

Even though we were only talking about hypotheticals, the discussion camped out in a corner of my head. Surely there was more to my response than cynical pop references?

As always, the universe provides: last week, Stevo patiently guided The Boy and I through an afternoon and evening of a pool game of the FIFA U-17 Women’s Football World Cup*. At first, all I could think about was the physical discomfit of the cold plastic seats, exposure to the elements (a cold wind, passing showers), and the stench of fried food and stale beer. But somehow this was overcome by the immediacy of the game playing out right in front of me, the roar of the sizable crowd, the chanting and singing of blocs of fans supporting the teams. I got caught up in the spirit of the game. I started watching.

I’m not a sports fan to the dismay of my longtime male friends but I’ve been exposed to enough televised sport that I know when a player’s off-side, where the gully and slip are, what a zone defence entails, and the joke that is ‘non-contact’. For all that, I don’t care for it, really. When it’s on the box, I’ll just as readily watch Banzai! as world cup rugby. But take me to a live game -

- where I’m a short physical distance away from the action with little to no possibility of instant replays -

- and there’s a polite controlled mob hysteria that I’m happy to be swept up in -

- where else could I be as exhausted and aghast with each and every close call that happens on the field? Where else could I not care for the shrieking from the woman in the seats behind me?

I can’t speak for actors but the wannabe filmmaker within me believes that the let’s pretend approach can only take you so far. The environment and your senses inform what you’re doing. Whether you’re fighting frostbite at a rugby game or racing against the light on location, nothing beats being there.

*  When Bern asked, What were you guys doing at a women’s football game?, I flashed on my niece’s look of Yeah, riiight when I tried to explain to her that I watched Buffy the Vampire Slayer for its brilliant and daring storytelling.

Time to write.

This is worse than starting with a blank page - most times I bring up a blank screen, I’ve an idea of what I’m writing. No, this is when you have to pick up from where you last left off - a day, a week, a month, or years ago.

You’ve had some time-out, right? You’re refreshed! You’re raring to go! Bring it on!

Except… the last CUT TO: sneers at you from it’s right-alignment: And then what happens, sparky?

You open a NeoOffice window and your fingers, previously frozen, erupt onto the keyboard:

Names are important, though:

I’ve long since run out of first and middle names of friends, family and acquaintances. Unlike John August, no streetnames I can remember or think of lend themselves to being affixed to my puppets characters.

I have to work at it. But maybe I learnt from the best:

Thirty minutes including a couple of passes at dialogue and characterisation.

Such a glib response, however, is disrespectful to the craft. The actual writing typing may have taken only a half-hour but that doesn’t take into account that:

• I’d had the idea since May;
• I didn’t start making notes about it until July;
• and the mental image of actors lying on the stage before the audience only occurred in September, and kicked around my head for a week before I put finger to keyboard.

I continue to live in hope that my creative process would be something like being struck by a sustained series of creative lightning, long enough to thump out a feature-length script… but the reality is a much more mundane process:

Sometimes, due to sheer inspiration, utter bullheadedness or an insane deadline, it can all occur within a matter of weeks. Other times… it takes as long as it takes.

Pshaw! I hear you say. Mere details! I agree, like, totally.

So here I am, a few months on, and all I have is the first scene:

This got an airing a month or so ago, largely because a). a gathering of writers needed something to sink their teeth into, and b). I’d left my prep a little last minute.

After the group reading, an uppity actor asked, Of all the different ways you could’ve introduced these two friends, why this way?

I confessed that although I’d written a whole lot around my idea for the play I hadn’t given much thought to the logistics of theatre. Then I had a what-if? moment: what if it started with the actors lying on the stage before the audience? I suppose I worked backwards from that, making up dialogue and movement would answer the burning question of how come they’re lying on the stage, as well as establish their friendship and dynamic.

It’s rough. And clunky. Even though it read okay out loud. And it’s a start.

I’ve tried to post about the very pleasant experience but, despite five false starts, have been unable to satisfactorily tie it in to the business of this blog. I knew what I wanted to say but was unable to execute it in such a way as to be a). appropriate, b). informative, c). entertaining, and d). easy on the reading eye.

Yes, meeting fellow scribes is b). informative and c). entertaining, and the lunchtable conversation was a). blog-appropriate - but you, Gentle Reader, don’t want a transcript of the conversation that accompanied our repast.

You want something to take away from this post, some nugget of wisdom observation, some kind of distinct perspective on an everyday occurrence (having lunch, not meeting fellow scribes).

… Nope. Still don’t have it.

But I got a lot farther with this post than the others.

- No, wait, I have it: if after [PICK A NUMBER] attempts, you lose heart and focus, remember: Every time God closes one door, He opens another.

Here endeth the lesson.

I bring this on myself, really.

Yes, it hurts, a voice whispers in my head. It builds character.

My TradeMe connections brought me right up to Season 6. The final season (Season 7) is half-way through its run in the States as I type this. And thanks to my leetle frien’, I’m just a few days behind them.

It’s all building towards a James Ellroy ending. And just like in Ellroy’s L.A. Quartet, the following thoughts are uppermost in my mind with this final season:

• no good turn goes unpunished;
• the rule of unintended consequences applies supreme;
• things, no matter the best of intentions, will not - can not - end well.

So often in film and television these days, I recognise the portents and the foreshadowing, and can comfort myself that, even if/when things go bad, I was braced for it. But now, despite six seasons of faithful viewing, and with only seven eps to go, my sleeps in between are fitful with drowning dreams…. I can’t contemplate the show ending. It has to, I know that. I accept it. It’s the how that scares the bejesus out of me.

… Mr Ryan - I’m in. All the way.

• I wish I could break down my projects like this:
  … The Mentalist is no different from any of its mediocre-to-lousy brethren.  You’ve got Simon Baker as the TROUBLED HERO WITH A TRAGIC PAST, who is BRILLIANT IN A DISTINCTIVE AND UNUSUAL WAY.  He has a flirty, clashing rapport with Robin Tunney, the NO-NONSENCE LAW ENFORCEMENT GAL WHO SECRETLY WANTS TO BONE HIM SENSELESS, YOU CAN TOTALLY TELL.  She works with her TEAM OF MISMATCHED SUBORDINATES, including the BIG LUG (Owain Yeoman), the UNEXPECTEDLY FUNNY GUY (Tim Kang), and the HOT, WIDE-EYED ROOKIE GIRL (Amanda Righetti).  A baffling crime is committed, to and by rich people living someplace sunny and appealingly photographed, and involving a beautiful-yet-mutilated lady-corpse and a TAUNTING SERIAL KILLER ARCHENEMY.  One hour later, after the hero has a few opportunities to DO QUIRKY THINGS, BROOD ABOUT HIS SECRET PAIN, and DEMONSTRATE HIS UNIQUE GIFTS, guns are drawn, people are shouting authoritatively, the hero is smiling, and the case is neatly wrapped up.

  For the rest of the article, click on over to Teevee.org.

• Over at The Rouge Wave, Julie Gray wrote up a list of writerly traits, amongst them:
  • Many writers, regardless of age, have not seen the classics
  • No new writer is realistic about breaking into the business
  • Action scripts are almost always written by men of any age

  Guilty as charged. Let’s see how you fare. (Fedora-tip: Jill Golick.)

• Speak of the devil - Ms Golick recently wondered aloud about a world where you only got nice notes.
• In these uncertain post-West Wing times, New York Times columnist Maureen Dowd writes how got Aaron Sorkin to script some face-time between Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama and former president Jed Bartlet might go. (Fedora-tip: Dan Slevin.)
• And over at What I Write, Sean Molloy provides some pretty detailed insights into one of his script projects (in five parts, with addenda).