Staffing Season

It’s hard to explain staffing season, but I will give it an all-American effort. A long time ago I was hired by a ‘major’ producer to write a movie based on a true story. It was one of my most notable accomplishments as a young writer back in the day. I was really in the big time. It was big time money with a big time producer.

I was flown first class to a small town in Maine. I was to follow around this person I was to ink a movie about and soak up as much from him as I could. The story was about his unique experience in the military. He had been on national television, ‘Sixty Minutes’ and even ‘Oprah.’ After several weeks of research, I commenced to writing this famous person’s story and finally produced a first draft. The big time producer and his cronies read my first draft. A story notes meeting was called. I was excited. I knew it was going to be a tedious, page by page notes session, but I was so excited because I believed I had crafted a masterpiece.

I waited in the conference room and the big time producer and his cronies arrived. The big time producer got his assistant on the intercom and told her to hold all his calls for the next few hours. I got out my script, note pad, pen, and braced myself.

For the next 4 hours I was berated and just put through the wood shredder. This big time producer raked me over the hot coals. He told me the script was a piece of crap and he said I was the worst writer he’d ever experienced at my level. He said I should give all the money I made back.

I sat there and the misery and pain was unbearable. I could not wait to get out of there, get home and throw the noose over the rafters. It was by far the worst experience for me as a young writer, early in my career. My reputation took a tremendous hit. When a noted producer starts telling other noted producers, agents, directors, school teachers, and taxi drivers, how bad this writer he hired was, the town caves in on you.

This experience was not nearly a fraction as painful as waiting through staffing season and not getting pick up for a show.

I loathe staffing season with every molecule of my body. You have to sit for 3 months and hear every day, that a new show is up and running and two of your friends are on it. And when the entire season goes by and no one wanted you and you receive not one offer, you feel a thousand times worse than getting cut from a ball team, or not getting a date for the prom, or not asked to the big party that everyone was invited to but you.

Not getting a show during staffing season cuts through a writer’s self-esteem like a hot knife through butter. Even when you are writing a movie and you are getting checks in the mail, the buzz around town about who got picked up and what shows are being slotted in for May pickups, wears you down to a stub.

I really believe, truly, that if you asked one hundred writers, which was more painful, your mother’s unexpected death or not getting a staff position for a show during staffing season? I promise you, any writer who has been on a television show would say, ‘not getting staffed.’

My mother died unexpectedly and I’m still not completely healed. May my mother rest in piece. I loved her more than life, however, I’m closer to being healed from the loss of my mother, than the year I didn’t get a staff position as a writer after three straight seasons of being on a show. Staffing season is a bitch.

And if you are lucky enough to get hired on a new or existing show, there is no higher high than the first day you set foot in the writer’s room. You take your seat, you look out the window, and you feel so sorry for those poor, miserable, bastards that are out in the bitter cold of not being on a show.

The Chicago Screenwriter's Network

My maiden voyage to Chicago got off to a less than stellar beginning. My luck completely changed when I met several members of the Chicago Screenwriter’s Network.

I looked forward to conducting a workshop. Columbia College had not jumped for joy when I arrived, but the Institution was gracious enough to let me use their facility to host a workshop.

Ninety-nine point nine percent of the enrollment of my workshop was members of the Chicago Screenwriter’s Network. I must go on record to say, of my near half dozen years of teaching at a major (Southern California) film school, and several workshops and appearances, the best audience I have ever had was the Chicago Screenwriter’s Network.

These folks are warm, polite, knowledgeable, enthusiastic, and just down right good people. Most of them have written several screenplays and taken several workshops and classes. It’s as if they cannot get enough experience and exposure to writing feature films and television pilots.

They took copious notes and asked questions that showed me they were right on point, and willing to accept any knowledge I could impart. They were as colorful as a Benetton ad. They came in all shapes and sizes. The common denominators were their courteous manner and their thirst for screenwriting techniques and stories.

When any teacher stands in front of students who are sponges for information, it is rewarding beyond explanation. The more they wanted, the more I was willing to give. At one point, I felt I needed to take a breath and not try to cram so much information Hollywood screenwriting experience into a few short hours. Fortunately, I would turn to this audience and they held pens at the ready over notepads.

Some of my students have gone on to be more successful than me. I wanted the same for each and every member of the Chicago Screenwriter’s Network.

I wanted to mentor them into instant Hollywood fame. I still do. I want to be the bridge for each and every one of them to walk over into stardom.

My own Hollywood story is not completed. I have several irons in the fires with noted studios, networks, and production companies. Part of me wants to stop time, so I can devote myself to the Chicago Screenwriter’s Network.

They say, to truly give back, one needs to send the elevator back down for someone else to come up. I hope there is room for all the members of the Chicago Screenwriter’s network.

Maiden Voyage to Chi-Town

The first leg of my trip to the mid-west was a bit of a roller coaster ride. The ups and downs started with a chance meeting with an earth angel as my plane touched down on the cold, windy, city of Chicago. The parting was a very understated, “give me a call if you need any help navigating your way around the city.”

I gave a smile along with a “thank you, I’m sure I’ll be fine” to the earth angel.

I was eager to get things going, and more eager to find Columbia College because of it’s incredible reputation of pumping out an assembly line of ‘Academy Award’ winning graduates.

I was hoping my reception was going to be as enthusiastic. Unfortunately, my arrival was less than a ripple. No one actually knew I was coming. Columbia College students have made more than a splash in tinsel town. The faculty must be littered with brilliant and inspired professors. Where were they?

When I inquired as to why no one seemed to care that a Hollywood screenwriter (with a modicum of successful experience selling screenplays, pitches, and working on television shows) was visiting, I was told that only one faculty member was willing to let an award-winning screenwriter from Hollywood teach her class. Did the other faculty members feel my IMDB credentials were not enough to warrant more than one class? Oh, well. I had to accept that none of the professors felt I needed a red carpet with scores of trumpet players.

Anyway, notwithstanding, I had a terrific experience with the one class I was able to teach. The students were eager as well as intelligent. I only wished that I could have met a few more of them. I did manage to convince a few of them that film is indeed the ‘director’s medium’ and television is the ‘writer’s medium.’ I mounted my charges with explicit diagrams and personal testimonials that I scrolled across the white boards. That was a kick.

So, I decided to hold onto my tiny little victory and I looked forward to conducting a workshop on the upcoming the weekend. I was going to make a splash, even if only one student showed up.

I checked my calendar and saw that I had a few days to kill in the meantime.

My only problem was that I didn’t have the wheels, I didn’t know the public transportation system, and I didn’t know which direction I was facing or heading. Luckily, the earth angel called to see how my first visit to her city was going. I told her I was a little boxed in at the moment. The snow was plenty and my knowledge of Chicago was less than plenty.

Wouldn’t you know it, the earth angel did what typical earth angels do. She volunteered herself as my private chauffer. She picked me up and drove me North and South, East and West around Chi-town.

I understood some of the magnificence of this cultural town. My marvel was only a tiny bit thwarted by being covered in snow. I let my imagination fill in the blanks. What I did manage to see was captivating.

Chicago is a beautiful city. Even to the undeserving screenwriter from Hollywood.

Zaki Gordon Institute for Independent Filmmaking

Is anyone ready for an alternative for the 30 and 40 thousand dollar tuition fees at some of the film schools in America? If you could send your child or yourself for that matter, to a film school with incredible facilities and faculty for less than 5 thousand dollars, would you?

Here comes my first endorsement of a film school in America. The Zaki Gordon Institute for Independent Filmmaking is the bomb!!!

These folks really have it going on. I have toured the facility, spoken to the students, and had lunch with some of the faculty. This place in Sedona, Arizona should receive ten out of ten stars.

The practical, hands-on training, at Zaki Gordon has managed to bridge the gap between the theory of managing a film career and actually having a film career. If you want to learn how to ride a horse, don’t just read about it -- go and jump on one at your local dude ranch.

If you want to learn the ends and outs of film making -- go to Zaki Gordon. Google the name, go visit the place. Enrollment is only 40 students. The program is only one year. I’m telling all my students right now, this place is the real deal.

Like I’ve said in past letters, emails, and blogs – I have very few regrets in my career. Well, add just one to the list. I regret not knowing about the Zaki Gordon film school. If I was starting my career over, and I wanted to take a year to learn how to write and make films, I’d point a human cannon toward Zaki Gordon, jump in and light the damn thing.