"Out in the Street" hits Hollywood and festival circuit
- Tom
- Mar 9, 2016
- 2 min read
Back into the madness that is Hollywood. It has been a few years since I had a script circulating around old tinseltown. I, as well as every writer who has ever drawn breath, have a love-hate relationship with Hollywood. You love being in “the game.” The exhilaration of having a script bounce around festivals, agents, managers, producers. The intense fervor that consumes you for weeks…sometimes months, as you wait for an answer…coverage…input…suggestions…acknowledgment! It really is like Christmas…no…the days and weeks leading up to Christmas. That childlike excitement…that zeal…that all consuming are you getting the Red Rider BB Gun mindset! Then, unlike most Christmas’s, the answer arrives!!! You get coal! A big, hard, cold reminder that this is reality and you ain’t invited. That’s the hate part of the equation.
Writing is something I do alone. By myself. Me. In a room, no noise, no distractions (except my cats…I never wanted cats!) It is singular. I have acted and I have produced and/or directed my fair share of plays, musicals, shorts, commercials, infomercials and films. It is a great creative process, a collaboration of talents and I enjoy every moment I am doing it. But it’s not writing! Writing is personal. A private war I engage in with myself. Me against me. Mano A Mano…you get the picture. And it can get bloody! Stories…good stories put up one hell of a fight and they demand the writer to keep up or…well…you get a lump of coal!
I have never blamed a story, script, pitch etc. for the failure at the Hollywood level. Hell, it wasn’t the stories fault that it wasn’t any good. It was mine. I didn’t tell it right. I failed it in some way. I fucked up!! I usually kill 95 out of every 100 stories that make their way into my brain even before I go to paper. They just ain’t good enough, have been told, stale, derivative or just plain bad. Out of the 5 that make it to paper 4 get killed the first 20-25 pages in. They just were not as good as I thought they were. That leaves one.
One of those “ones” is heading out into the fire this week. It’s kind of like sending your child out to go MMA with King Kong. You know they are going to get their limbs ripped off but you kind of hope they put up a good fight. I have never done television before so…this kid is blind and doesn’t hear to well. The odds are against him but the odds are always against them. It’s Hollywood. It’s not that Hollywood doesn’t want you. Hollywood doesn’t know you, doesn’t need you and is doing very well without you.
So why? Why kill yourself fighting with stories, characters, plot transitions, dialog, relationships and a myriad of other issues, problems and creative farts? Why lock yourself up in a room and go hand-to-hand with your other self. WHY????
Because, one day you just might get the Red Rider BB Gun!
