#CROSSBOW UNDER THE TABLE

#Medium

#Writerslife

Writing for Medium has re-wired my brain in a massively positive way, in a way I give thanks for daily.

I have nothing but immense gratitude for what has happened.

Let me ‘splain.

For decades I wrote screenplays for the studios in LA, drafts upon drafts. Treatments, scripts, revisions. I would get notes on everything from everyone. First my inner circle, then the producers, then the execs, then the exec’s kids, then the exec’s kid’s followers, then the exec’s pets and their followers… you get it.

For decades, I thought this was writing.

It was selling my soul.

I’m probably too old to use a phrase like that, and have too much respect for the film industry to callously blanket it with a sentiment like this, but damn, something about what has happened to my #writerslife ever since writing here has given me a new lust for life.

When writing for Hollywood, I would take my laptop, notebooks, pens that would invariably leak ink on airplanes, wherever I wanted to go. This freedom to work from anywhere is one of the most attractive things about being a writer. I would take our family on vacations on the spur of the moment, I could be off the grid a lot.

As writers we can work from anywhere.

We all have our favorite places to write, from cozy nooks to five star resorts. Starbucks, diners, beaches, bumpy jeep rides in the mountains of Northern Lebanon, volcano rims in Nicaragua, chicken ranches outside of Cartagena.

Not one of mine

No matter how awe-inspiring a place was, as a scriptwriter I was living inside my head, trying to figure out story beats, sequences, turning points, conflicts. I was not living in the moment, I was not living in the present, I was not absorbing anything. I might as well have been in a windowless room.

Writing a script is like working out a brain teaser. Your mind turns it over and over like a Rubik’s Cube or MC Escher sketch, trying to find the best way to solve the story. Your job is to ask your brain the right questions and then monitor things as it comes to some kind of solution.

She kept a loaded gun in the crisper drawer. (That would have been a cool title!)

I may have been in an under water hotel on an island in the Arabian Gulf, but was I, really? No, I was inside the dark mind of a delusional woman booby-trapping her house in order to kill her husband for having another secret family and figuring out where she would have gotten a crossbow (in an organic way of course) that she could mount on the underside of her kitchen table with the arrow pointed at Matt’s (that was his name) crotch so if he didn’t answer a question right, or complained about the bacon and eggs, she could twitch her finger and… and all this had to happen by page 20–23, and we had to like her, she was the heroine, and the studio wanted 15 weapons in the house that Ruth (her name) could pull together from stuff she’d have on hand. Rigging a blow dryer so Matt would torch his head unless she warned him, wiring the toaster to electrocute him, having the razor edge from a box of aluminum foil swing into his face when he opens the closet…

I felt like I was writing Home Alone meets A Streetcar Named Desire.

Wherever I went, I was still in my head with these characters and their obstacles.

Sure I could have abandoned being nomadic and ensconced myself in a diner’s booth, but then why not just be a banker? A banker with an anchor. In the words of Dennis Hopper when he opines on Pabst Blue Ribbon: Fuck that shit.

Happiness for me is defined as being able to spend your time in your own way.

For me this freedom is benefit number one of being a writer. Sure, deadlines might encroach once in a while, but not if you planned it right, not if you stayed ahead of the game and were prepared to deliver early.

After 5–6 weeks, the characters begin talking to you, they begin to dance of their own accord, you feel like you’ve given birth to them and they exist.

They begin to take over your dreams.

It’s not only the exotic locations that stay blurry as you carry on the work of a screenplay, your dreams get hi-jacked as well.

Now, what has this present style of writing wrought?

When I travel without the internal baggage of a script and all its moving parts, I am able to revel in the world around me, no longer confined to the machinery in my mind.

I am able to look around, to enjoy the way time gets spent, the plans and the derailments. Everything becomes fodder for a writer who’s not expected to contour their narratives to some three-act structure that accords with some studio’s mandate (make sure he dies by page 87!)

Writing has become a pleasure again. It’s later in life for me, but for the first time I really feel like I’m finding (and expressing) my voice.

I’m not writing for the paycheck (ahem, Medium I’m talking to you), I’m not writing for a Star or a Director who wants to see Ryan Reynolds jump from a moving monorail into a casino as the act two turning point where he’ll save the day by pulling a slot machine handle in time to avoid the Las Vegas Strip getting blown up, one cathedral-to-greed after another! I actually got paid to write this, it’s called Payline, coming to a theater nowhere near you no time soon!

Today, I’m writing about whatever.

Whatever catches my attention, whatever takes hold of my brain, whatever jerks out of my fingers as I tap away on the keyboard.

Technology for blogging has been around for decades, but it’s not something I ever paid attention to. For me it seemed like a diary, or private journal, because I would never want to have anyone read my stuff. Now with this platform I feel like there’s a supportive ecosystem, dare I say “safe space” to… I guess… go for it. (I’m still talking to you #Medium)

My other passion, producing stand up comedy shows around the world, has me seeing all kinds of places on a pretty frequent basis these days, now that covid has allowed travel and audiences again.

I used to produce these shows, tours, events while working on scripts that had deadlines. I’d be in Bahrain or Oman or Dubai sitting by the pool (cool) working on my laptop with my head buried in figuring out the story dynamics. I was missing so much (not cool).

Now I am in incredible cities (Bali anyone? Cairo? Singapore, Bangkok, Vienna, Barcelona!) with my head up, my eyes open, my whole being just marinading in the cultures, ingesting everything that comes at me, even the unexpected obstacles.

With a script, I would want to get settled upon arrival. Now I embrace meandering. Delays (checking into hotels, traffic, etc.) become opportunities to soak in the people and the situations. Waiting rooms become stages for unexpected drama. Car Washes become arenas for memorable stories (with Fabio no less!). Food courts become playgrounds for characters who hoard sex toys!

It’s all material.

Maybe not today. Maybe not tomorrow, but soon and for the rest of my life.

Casablanca

Speaking of screenplays, that one was pretty good!

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