What, you might be asking, is Script Frenzy? Ever heard of National Novel Writing Month? This is the same thing except with a script. And as I’ve been lagging on my writing, this is the kick in the butt I’ve been needing.

Therefore, I will have a draft of my long promised CHUCK script by the first week of May. Hey, I started late so I get to finish late.

So, let’s talk about CHUCK. I’m halfway through the second season and, well, does it ever get back to what the first season was offering?

If you’ve ever met me in a bar or seen me in a decent restaurant and asked “what’s a good beer” then you’ve heard me give an impromptu lecture on brown ales or how a pilsener is different from a lager.  Yes, I’m a beer geek and it’s all because of a documentary called BEER WARS.

This week, that documentary is available on iTunes (and apparently my PS3 too but I can’t stop playing BORDERLANDS to check–help). Don’t believe me? Here’s the proof.

(that’s the documentary on the “iTunes->Movies” homepage sandwiched between NEW YORK, I LOVE YOU and some Hulk cartoon while I download the latest FRINGE).

Of course I’m biased (dear FTC, I worked on it for almost three years but I am not being compensated for this mention… but if the director wanted to buy me some tasty cupcakes I wouldn’t say “no”) but I think it’s a pretty damn good doc. Also, the “making of” was mighty interesting so I can’t wait for the behind-the-scenes book (hint, hint; nudge nudge).

At the start of the year I laid out my goals, some professional, some personal. I mentioned the importance of reevaluating them at least annually. Well, how about if I check my progress every month?

Gulp.

Okay, let’s go.

Finishing My Feature – This month I met with my editor and we put together a new schedule that has me looking at a cut soon. I’ll be checking-in with him to make sure we’re still on track to meet our deadline.

Write Another TV Spec – I’ve been consuming episodes of CHUCK (with 7 votes, the clear winner in my online poll which can be viewed on the right of the landing page) but I’ve also been catching up with FRINGE. I’d like to do both specs this year. Also, I’ve added MODERN FAMILY to my Hulu. Why? Cause I’m fucking Colombian and I detest some of the lame Colombian jokes they give Sofia Vergara. Baby, I’m coming to your rescue.

Get Hired to Direct – Yeah, that’s taken a backseat this month.

Get My Transmedia Project Up & Running – I’ve digitized 3 of the tapes we’ve shot and I’ve learned that using “Log & Capture” to convert HDV to ProRes takes 1h45m for every 50 minutes shot.

Develop a TV Pilot – I’ve thought about it.  Had a tiny breakthrough with the webseries idea.

Write a Feature Script – I’ve started outlining this bromance/romcom (can I shoot myself after using those terms?) that’s been brewing for a while. My goal is to start writing the script this month.

As for my other goals, I’m still looking for a sport, a class, a way to defy death, an acoustic guitar, a way to invest but I did pick up GLUE by Irvine Welsh and I’m hoping to finally finish it this month.

I wrote a spec for TERMINATOR: THE SARAH CONNOR CHRONICLES and I’m getting ready to submit it to a management company. That show, along with most hour-long scripted shows these days, is heavily serialized. Therefore, should I include a paragraph to catch up the reader, something akin to the “previously on…” most shows employ, like this example from FRINGE?

Also, if my spec occurs at a specific point in the show’s chronology, should I point that out? For example, “this takes place just after episode 3 of the second season”.

Thoughts?

But enough of the aphorisms, let’s get back on topic. What are my goals for the new year?

Write Another TV Spec – Last year I managed to successfully write a TERMINATOR: THE SARAH CONNOR CHRONICLES spec. It placed in the Austin Teleplay contest, was strongly considered for writing fellowships at both Warners and ABC/Disney and a management company is considering me for representation so only good has come of it (plus it was incredibly fun to write). That’s why I want to write another TV spec. I was planning a DOLLHOUSE but now that it has been canceled I’m down to a couple of options. I feel confident that I could write a strong FRINGE or CHUCK. I have to catch up on watching the 2nd season of both but let me get a show of hands from my readers. As you’ll see on the sidebar of my blog’s homepage, I’ve created a poll asking you which I should write. I’m looking forward to your vote. Also, a free beer to anyone that can draw a tie between those two shows (why is it that I feel I can write either of those particular shows?).

Finish My Feature – It’s embarrassing but my first feature has just been sitting there. Yes, it was a hard 2009 and a personal tragedy late in the year really rocked my world but if I don’t do this I’ll only beat myself up more and that yields no good. Besides, finishing this thing is one of the keys to taking the next big step in my career…

Get Hired to Direct – I don’t care if it’s another person’s project or my own, I gotta make this happen. I have to hustle this up for myself. This is mandatory.

Get My Transmedia Project Up & Running – This is another project that’s just hung in limbo. I now have the HDD I need so there’ll be few excuses for me to not get editing what we’ve shot… but we also need to set up our web presence and strategize our development, following a model similar to THE GUILD (BTW, using “we” just now was not a mistake).

Write a Feature Script – I’ve been working on an idea for a while, now it’s time to develop the outline and then crack open Final Draft.

Develop a TV Pilot – If I’ll be writing another TV spec, I need to have a strong idea for a new show. Here’s where things get a bit tricky. That feature film idea I just mentioned, I think it’d also work as a television show, maybe even be better as a TV show. Unfortunately, I don’t know anything about developing a TV show treatment/pitch and I feel like I owe it to myself to do the feature version first. And heck, if it doesn’t work then I can revamp it as a show ala GLEE. Maybe I should start with my web series idea and just practice serialized short-form storytelling. Maybe you’re wondering why I don’t develop this into a TV pitch? Because it’s raw, crude, funny and skirts the law. How bad to do you want to see my web series now?

And like the rest of the world, I have a laundry list of personal goals. Last year I was rather vague but how about I get specific? This year I’d like to…

1. Take up a sport.
2. Use my passport to leave this hemisphere.
3. Jump out of a plane.
4. Take a class that isn’t related to filmmaking or computers.
5. Buy a new acoustic guitar so I can start playing again.
6. Read four books that have just been sitting on my shelf.
7. Invest my savings more aggressivly.
8. Finally go out with Micki.

I’m sure I’ll come up with more but that should occupy my January.

And you? What are your goals?

1. The Sopranos
2. The West Wing
3. Curb Your Enthusiasm
4. The Shield
5. Damages
6. Mad Men
7. 30 Rock
8. 24
9. Lost
10. Modern Family

Of all these, I’ve only seen four of them more than once. Am I out of touch with television? Possibly. I own a television but I get no reception of any kind on it, not even the local channels. Therefore, let me give you my top show of the decade and a runner up.

The show of the decade is…

Battlestar Galactica

Why? Because it’s a reboot/remake (they dominated our decade), because it’s about the event that defined our decade and the resulting quagmires, because it went to those dark places (the middle of season 2 still haunts me), because it rocked. This is without a doubt the best show of the decade.

And my runner up?

Veronica Mars

Why? Because the first season was a near perfect season of television, because Kristen Bell owned it, because it’s a teen based high school noir powered by a revenge core that took teens seriously and nobody has done it better since, and lastly because it rocked!

And did I mention how cute the lead is?

Just sayin’.

Yes, I miss TERMINATOR: THE SARAH CONNOR CHRONICLES.

Granted, DOLLHOUSE had a rough start but the series did improve with each episode. Plus how could you cancel this?

So I guess this means I better get cracking on my CHUCK or FRINGE spec before they cancel one of those. Also, I should start watching FLASH FORWARD and V before they suffer a similar fate.

Time to write!

Now, if you read her site recently and managed to shove past all the industry rumors and executive swaps there was a tiny story reporting that the Advanced Television Systems Committee just approved a mobile DTV standard.

So why should you or I care? Well, were you excited by the iPod Nano with built-in FM tuner? No, me neither, but I was excited by the possibility (actually, I kinda was but I’m trying to dramatize my point).

Well, what if you could use your iPod to tune into your local Fox station to watch FINGE? We are now one step closer to that possibility.

F**king awesome!

I know it’s frowned upon to share defeat but it’s the reality of working as a creative in the movie industry. Recently, I suffered two hits.

First, the spec commercial I made for the Amazon “Make-Your-Own-Ad” contest wasn’t chosen for one of the top 5 spots. I have no idea how many entries there were but I would assume a lot of people would take a shot at $20k.

Second, I topped out at the second round of the Austin Teleplay competition. They did send a letter saying that making the second round means I was in the top 10%. Someone even took the time to send me a hand written note with the form letter congratulating my courage for writing on a new show (the recently canceled TERMINATOR: THE SARAH CONNOR CHRONICLES).

Obviously I’m bummed but if I dwell on the negative while trying to hack my way into this industry, I’d have committed suicide a long time ago. No, instead I take great pride in the work I’ve done, add it to the portfolio and move on to the next short (an actress from my Amazon spec pitched me an idea) and spec teleplay (I’m pretty sure it’ll be a FRINGE but I’m considering a DOLLHOUSE or possibly an EASTBOUND & DOWN).

As I say to my colleagues, I must heed as well: Chin up, gather your strength and keep moving forward.

Personally, while imbued with a healthy does of skepticism and prone to ranting, I’m looking for a glimmer of hope on the horizon. It is with those glasses and crash helmet that I begin this series I’m calling “Filmmakers are Dead” (we’ve talked about Dark Tony, right?). My goal is very selfish: I hope to better understand what’s going on and hopefully get your two-cents in the process. In order to give this series some structure, I’m gonna release one installment per basic reporter questions (i.e., who, what, when, where, why and how).

Welcome to the first installment:

Who?

As I’ve already mentioned, this is very much the old guard (mainstream media such as the studios, broadcasters and all those that profit from working with them under the current structure) versus forward thinking up-and-coming artists.

Allow me a tangent here (the first of many). Let’s breakdown these artists of the internet age into the major disciplines addressed by Scott in the interview above. We can safely say that the majority of internet artists are either musicians, animators or filmmakers. I’d like to permanently break filmmakers out from under this umbrella. Why?

1. Unlike musicians or animators, filmmakers can’t make movies by themselves in their bedrooms. Filmmakers need crews, locations and actors/subjects.
2. Films, on the whole, will always cost more than the output of musicians or animators. While Jill Sobule can hold a web-a-thon to raise $75,000 to comfortably record a very polished album, a filmmaker would need to raise anywhere from three to ten times that amount to create an equally commercially viable and polished film.
3. Independent feature films don’t lend themselves to the internet by simple virtue of their length. According to Scott, five minutes is the longest any internet video should run (after that, viewers bounce). And again, unlike the musician who can put their full length album up as individual MP3s, the feature filmmaker can’t really present their film as a chopped up series of shorts.

Let me tackle another tangent. The popular term for filmmakers of the internet age is content creator and personally, I hate that term. I know it’s meant to expand the understood scope of what filmmakers create (features, shorts, websites, web series,  games, ARGs, etc.) but it makes me sound like I’m some corporate shill pumping out widgets for customers. It strips the art out of what we do. Yes, I understand that one of the keys to survival under this is new model is identifying your audience and targeting them with laser like precision but that also means you need to brand and market yourself as a specific kind of content creator. You are the dude that makes motorcycle films, period. Me, I’m still exploring my artistic voice but I beleive all my works are steeped with the themes that drive me, Look at Scorsese. It doesn’t matter if he makes a period romance, a gangster flick, a horror thriller or even a music video, you can recognize his works by their themes and style. Me, I’m a filmmaker.

Now, let’s get back to the “them” that I simply described as the old guard. Yes, it’s easy to boo the major studios and broadcasters, their corporate parents and all their related media spawn but don’t we all want to play in their yard? I know we’re all in an economic crisis and I don’t know where they get the stones to say “instead of giving you a commercial with a six-figure budget we’re gonna demand a high quality product with a two week turn around but we’re only gonna give ya pizza money and we’re gonna call it a viral video, which we’re gonna post all over YouTube, Hulu, you name it, but we’re not sharing any of the profits. The exposure is your profit. BTW, since we’re the copyright holders we’re not gonna let you post it on your own website. Cool? My lawyers tell me it’s cool” but don’t we still do the job for the exposure and the pizza money? Hey, cold pizza will feed ya for most of the week. Plus, aren’t they scouting us, hazing us, testing us to see if we might be the right person to direct the webisodes based on their new Christian Slater series? I know it’s terribly unfair but…

Another tangent: I love how clients ask for viral videos. Um, you can’t make a viral video. You make a video, send it out into the world and it either becomes viral or it doesn’t. That’s for the internet to decide.

So now we have some idea of the players, their motivations and how they clash and commingle but let me leave you with this question: Unions and their members are always confronting major corporations (as they should) but how do they interface with new media? I’m not talking about television shows repurposed for the internet but rather original content. How do they (or any of us) make a living from new media, much less collect dues to pay for benefits? Before you answer so quickly, have you seen the budgets on new media programs? They’re all over the map: Joss Whedon‘s DOCTOR HORRIBLE cost in the low six figures, John August‘s THE REMNANTS cost over $25k and I know some folks that make internet shorts for less than $100 a pop. Want one union’s answer to new media? Check out SAG’s New Media Rate Sheet?

Next week: What?