Slightly Smaller Mistake

Big Mistake, the short which I script-edited and Dan Turner wrote and directed, is now even shorter. In order to qualify for the Virgin Media Shorts website, it's had a nifty new edit, clocking in at two minutes and 19 seconds. I like the new cut: moves like a rocket, hopefully without feeling too rushed. Why not take a look, and rate it, hmmm? Hmmmmmm? Yes?

Hot Festival Action

Big Mistake, a short film which I script-edited, has been selected for the eleventh annual Provincetown International Film Festival, which runs from June 17-21. Congrats to writer/director Dan Turner, cast and crew. For more on Big Mistake, see my report on the cast and crew screening here.

Give Stack A Stack Of Cash

There's a lot of filming in the air. Besides Splendid launching this week, master-blogger Danny Stack is on the verge of lensing his short film, Origin, "a supernatural drama about a woman who tries to keep her family together when her son falls ill after he's bitten by a mysterious creature." Sounds good? Hell yeah! And you can help ensure it gets completed.

Rather than just sitting back and holding out a tin-pot, Danny's offering various incentives to donate, including credits and some fun video diaries. Still, I say this to you (if you haven't already given generously): how many times have you absorbed the great man's advice for free, and become a better, more well-rounded writer as a result? The Stackster is the gift that keeps on giving, all year around, established 2005. So it'd be tremendous if you could hand over whatever you can afford, and get yourself an Associate Producer credit, or a Special Thanks, or whatever.

Danny also seems to still need a Sound Recordist & Boom Op for Origin. Click here for details.

Big Mistake: Cast & Crew Screening

Remember when I said that the previous post might be my last before Christmas? Well, it clearly was not. Last night, Dan Turner threw a cast 'n' crew bash for his new short, Big Mistake. He wrote and directed it, I script-edited it and lots of wonderfully talent people helped make it. In the above photo, neither actress Ty Glaser nor actor/writer/radio-fella Richard Glover were involved with Big Mistake, but aren't they gorgeous? Furthermore, Ty starred in Dan's previous short Go My Way. Richard starred in Look At Me, which I scripted, and has also formed the sketch show Splendid with Dan. Nice. Anyway, back to Big Mistake...


The screening was held at Soho's De Lane Lea rooms, and immediately lent glamour by the presence of a Tunis cake. Dan and I had long feared this spongy, chocolatey, marzipanny festive treat to be a thing of the past, but one was spotted in a Tesco's and promptly ferried to the screening, even featuring in Dan's pre-screening speech. Tremendous.


Here, we see BM focus puller Rich Swingle take a manful bite as Dan solemnly documents the occasion:


It was great to see Big Mistake on the big screen, and it looked great. I certainly felt proud to have been a part of it. Strange, of course, to walk into a comfy screening room, watch a film for five minutes and then walk out again, but Dan doesn't believe in doing things by halves. Crucially, the short's two present actors. Matthew Judd and Jordan Pitt, seemed very happy with it. Here they are, with Dan, being very happy with it:



If you weren't at the screening, then dry those eyes and head over here to watch Big Mistake in its online glory. Just follow the Big Mistake link on that homepage. Dan's also planning to examine Big Mistake's genesis from script to screen, on his blog, so keep an eye out for that, you beautiful petunia, you.

Fatal

Beckley's just posted his new short film, Fatal. Go see!

Progress, Sweet Progress

Had a grand evening with director Dan. After sensibly discussing treatment tweaks - largely centring on changing the function of one character and keeping our original idea intact - we got down to some booze in an old-school Elstree hotel bar, which was lent even more personality by a passionate posse of German card players.

So now, I need to update the treatment, ready to spend October writing the script. And before that, there's a short script to work on, which Dan's planning to film fairly soon. Oh yes, it's all happening...

Had the pleasure of bumping into Paul Campbell at the train station this morning - he and a colleague were arriving for another day at the BBC's Writing Academy, which is now in its second week. As he says in his latest post, it's "bloody hard work", but in an immensely positive way. Which kinda sums up writing as a whole, doesn't it?

Disclaimer: Any card players pictured on Jason Arnopp's blog may not necessarily be the ones he encountered in real life, during his wacky adventures.

Anatomy Of A Short Film

Just a quickie to recommend Living Spirit mainman Chris Jones' blog. It's always an interesting read, but right now it's especially so. Chris has spent ages preparing to lens a short named Gone Fishing, intended to act as powerful proof of his directorial ability. He has persuaded people to fund Gone Fishing, and undergone all kinds of trials along the way, including a child lead dropping out at the eleventh hour. This week, however, filming has commenced. Take a look. I like Chris' unstoppable drive and determination. Inspiring.

Riddle Me This...

2004: My short script Life 2.0 is a runner-up in the British Short Screenplay Competition.

2007: My short script You're All Going To Die doesn't even make the Second Round.

Have I regressed? Was Life 2.0 really a better script than You're All Going To Die? Personally, I think YAGTD is way stronger, but the Kaos Films folk disagreed. Way it goes. Move on, nothing to see here. If I wasn't such a self-assured type, it might slightly chip at the old confidence, coming as it does mere hours after I sent off my Red Planet Prize entry...

I'm pretty damn sure that Lucy's in Round Two, though, so congrats, Luce! Oh, and the same goes for Elinor and Christine! Hooray. Who else is ploughing forward, flying our Scribosphere flag beside them, hmmmm? Feel free to tell me. I promise not to (a) hate you or (b) turn up on your doorstep, with a garden gnome tucked under my arm.

In Other News, I interviewed Elisabeth Sladen for 90 minutes this morning, in Selfridges. As she's a childhood heroine of mine, having appeared in the classic Doctor Who series and now in her own upcoming show The Sarah Jane Adventures, it was a wonderfully surreal experience. And a damn fine chinwag.

Social Flurry

Yesterday was quite the day for fraternizing. In fact, this entire week has been gloriously insane and I'm now quite ready to sink into the weekend... for some hardcore scriptwriting.

I spent the day working at heat magazine, which is a pleasure in itself. Even though I'm generally allergic to office toil, this place makes temping a dream, with a relaxed atmosphere and absolutely lovely folk. And yes, I'd say the same if we were sitting in a pub. As I hope we will, sometime soon.

I went out for lunch with Doctor Who/Torchwood/Severance scribbler James Moran. Wasn't entirely sure about the way he continually touched me, under the cafe table. Still, I figured this is the way it works, if writers like myself are to get on in the business and "keep in with the big boys" as Moran put it, with a salacious gleam in his eye. Ho ho, just a bit of hilarious fun there - it was a splendid hour of banter, free of sexual politics, which flashed by like it was 10 minutes.

After work, I went over to the Fitzroy Tavern, which has an informal Doctor Who-related gathering on the first Thursday of every month. While it's a great event, I was mainly there to collar The Empty Child/Girl In The Fireplace/Blink writer Steven Moffat, walk with the great man to a nearby quieter pub and interview him. It's for a Doctor Who Magazine feature which I came up with, partly for selfish reasons, as it will give readers an insight into how he operates as a writer. Very exciting stuff, even if it won't be published until something like May 2008, what with featuring Top Secret Stuff.

After that, I went to the Curzon Soho Cinema. A group of film-making folk gather in its pleasant bar on the first Thursday of every month, under the collective banner of The Development Pool, for wine, networking and script-development chat. Met a couple of new people and a few familiar faces, including the Nice Producer I mentioned a few posts ago. Despite him having been a few sheets to the wind when I first met him, it seems he really is keen to discuss me writing a 90-second short which he will then make. So we're meeting again next week. Fingers crossed.

Yes, that was a good day for hob-nobbing. I shall leave you with an unrelated quote from Wall To Wall's chief exec Alex Graham. I found it in my notebook from Stella Network's Pitch Up event...

"It's almost impossible to get one-off dramas made on television. The companies toss them out like doggie treats to their favourite writers."

Looks like we'd better set about becoming companies' favourite writers then, folks...

By Demons Be Driven

Feeling pretty good today. Yesterday, I wrote and submitted my entry for the Royal Tapes competition (deadline midday today: hurry hurry hurry!). And this very morn, I've completed the rough first-draft of a three-minute horror short which has been rattling around my head for most of this week.

Here's one of the more exciting things which has happened of late: a director-friend of mine wants to film a short, this Summer. He has a self-produced feature behind him, plus a few shorts, and is set to film a new movie this year, adapted from a novel. He initially wanted to shoot this short for the hell of it, but recently realised that it would be nice if it somehow complemented his upcoming full-lengther (and I just know that Lucy will be going, 'Ooh! Titter ye not!' at the expression 'full-lengther'). Now fortunately - and entirely coincidentally - the short film which I've banged out (calm down, calm down) this morning does indeed have a similar theme. So I've sent him this first draft, to give him the idea. Let's see if it appeals. If not, perhaps he and I can hammer an entirely new notion out between us. Either way, it'll be great to get that first screen credit.

I'm slowly, oh-so-slowly, getting myself around to heading down to the BECTU Freelances Fair. If you're reading this and also going, then do sidle up and say hello, hi, word-up or whichever greeting suits. Good day to you.

You're All Going To Die, Done And Dusted. Possibly.

My short horror-comedy script You're All Going To Die has taken longer to complete than I anticipated. Many drafts, many changes. God only knows how I made the finals of 2004's British Short Screenplay Competition with a script which had barely seen a few revisions. Must've been a really slow year for them...

This was my first experience with the Power Of Three system, and it really works. Every single one of my nine readers delivered very helpful notes, which helped reshape the screenplay. I discovered that if one person makes a criticism, you consider it; but if several people concur, then it really needs to be changed. For instance, today I made a drastic final edit to the script, chopping it down from 15 minutes to 10, as a fair few readers said it either took too long to get going, or was just plain over-long. It's much, much better with a third (aptly) slashed out of it. Hopefully it's now finished. I'll naturally wait until early next week before sending it off to the competition, though.

So let's hear it for my Power Of Three folk, as follows...

ROUND ONE: Potdoll, Good Dog, Pillock.
ROUND TWO: Oliver Jeffery, David Bishop, Anne-Marie (who doesn't have a blog, but really should).
ROUND THREE: Laura Anne Anderson, Stuart Perry, Piers Beckley.

So I finally got around to...

... posting my teen sci-fi script on the Inktip site. For anyone who doesn't know, it allows you to upload your logline, synopsis and script, for a closed group of "industry professionals" to peruse. They can search through the Inktip site, using various criteria, then chance upon your concept, read your script, seize it with both hands, phone you up while gibbering hysterically and offer you a seven-figure sum for the rights, while barking at their assistant to go get a magnum of champagne.

...in Bizarro World!

Then again, who knows, eh? Who knows. Anyway, I found the whole upload process pretty easy. Interestingly, there are loads of tickable boxes with different story elements, to aid the execs' searches. So if they're looking for a buddy movie and you ticked that box, then hopefully you'll end up on their screen in a list of search results.

My short script - formerly titled Doomsayer, but now You're All Going To Die - is coming along well, and almost at the Third Round Of Power Of Three stage. This pleases me. All I need to do now is start the 30/45 minute script, and I'll have three scripts to hold under TV agents' noses (the third script being my Panik full-lengther).

Anyone For Power-Of-Three?

Now then, I've got this here Doomsayer short-script. It's 16 pages long, which means it needs a little trimming if I'm going to enter it into the British Short Screenplay Competition.

I'd love three people-with-writer's-blogs to have a read and give me some feedback. Apart from the usual 'Did you enjoy it?' stuff, I'd especially like to know if it hangs together, tonally. Horror-comedy can be tricky to pull off, so I'd obviously like to get it right. Please don't pull your punches, either - I like the direct approach. Remind me of that, when I'm crying in a pool of Jack Daniels...

First three writers-blog-types to comment (obviously provided they're offering to read the script and not just hurling abuse), will get the pdf, the lucky lucky bastards! And naturally, if they want, I will return the favour on a piece of their work.

God, this could be embarrassing, if no-one sticks their paw up. Then again, it is Friday evening...

Illness = Focus... Short Script Second Draft... Hustle...

Am I the only one who can see the positive side of getting a cold? I rather like the way it forces you to slow down a little. Apart from that, of course, it's utterly annoying.

At the end of last week, I got a chance to look over a print-out of the first draft of my Doomsayer short story script, while on a train from London to Brighton (gotta grab those free moments when you can - even if it means refusing to accept one of those free London newspapers which are thrust in your direction every five minutes in the capital these days). I still like it, thankfully, but after daubing those pages with red corrective pen, I started having plenty of ideas for how to make it better and give it more depth. I'll be making the corrections and improvements later today, all being well, while high on a potentially lethal cocktail of Lemsip and Benylin.

Just reviewed Hustle episode five for heat magazine. I'm a very late convert to this show, but it's a wonderful thing from the scripts to the performances to the glitzy way in which it's shot. It also has a consistently bright-and-breezy, nothing-too-dangerous-is-going-to-happen tone, which is challenged by the goings-on in episode five. I won't be spoilering it for anyone, but let's just say that the viewer's expectations of formula (the crew con someone and get away with it at the last minute) are subverted. It's an especially great script this week. Written by Nick Fisher, its opening minutes demonstrate a really imaginative way to set up a story and make use of having five main characters. Check it out when it's broadcast on BBC1 on May 31.

Good Christ...

It's 1.20pm, and I've completed the first draft of a 15-minute horror-comedy script called Doomsayer.

Maybe because the idea had been percolating in my mind for a while now, it just seemed to pour out onto the screen. By 12.20, I was on the tenth page.

Of course, just because I've written 15 pages in two-and-a-half hours, doesn't mean they're necessarily any good. And speed of writing clearly means nothing, in itself. But Doomsayer now exists in first-draft form, nonetheless.

Bloody hell. I'm shocked. Won't look back over it for a while now.

Time for lunch...