New Year, Goals, Worries. New Odyssey.

A New Year. Lots coming up. Shows. Short Film. An election that could lead to the end of America. All sorts of shit. I'm directing seven plays between now and June. Producing a large budget show that goes up end of June. Teaching playwriting at the Denver Center. 

Life, as always, chugs along. Sometimes, of late, I wake with this feeling of existential dread. Like, what is the meaning of any of this? Which I know is not productive. As far as I can tell, my little brain is not equipped to process, figure out, or solve the Riddle of Being Alive. Still, now and then, I get the blues, the why-am-I-here blues. And I think. And play Greig or Simon and Garfunkel or Phoebe Bridgers, and go through it. 

And what's really amazing, and to me miraculous, is that this simple act of allowing my self to wallow in self pity and dread for a bit sort of exorcises those demons. It douses the vampire with sunlight. 

It gets me going again.

I do not know how long life is, for me or anyone else. I don't know why we are here, or where we will go, if anywhere, once it's time to do the Mortal Coil Shuffle. I just know I love it here. I love clouds and music and dogs and cats and coffee and friends and my wife and my home. I love writing stories, and showing kids how to pretend to be a goblin in the Battle of the Five Armies. 

I love all of it.

I don't think this makes me heroic. I am fairly certain I was just born this way. 

And I must be a bit of an egotist, because I write about all this in my blog sporadically, and in my journal every single day. 

I wouldn't do it if it didn't make me feel good. But does doing something to feel good justify it? I suppose that has to be taken on a case by case basis. 

So.

2024. Goals. Resolutions. Hopes and dreams. All that jazz. 

I hope to read more books. I'm reading a new translation of Homer's The Odyssey by Emily Wilson that is just fantastic. I hope to use it to fuel one of my new projects, a pilot set in the world of another project, Lunatics and Assholes, that I really love. 

I hope to finish the color and sound of my new short, Burning the Old Man, which is a proof of concept for a feature that I made with my dear friend Tim McCracken. We shot it in the fall, mostly down in Gunnison, and it was fucking awesome. Is fucking awesome. Once it's done, we plan to enter it into several film festivals, and also send it to some producers we know, with the goal of getting funding to make the feature. All we need is someone to put up 500K to 10 million. Which seems absurd, yet there it is.

How did I get to a place where that kind of money is in the mix? No idea. But I won't question it. I'll just move ahead, hope for the best, and keep writing, directing, producing, teaching. Being me.

I hope to travel more. Going to Edinburgh last summer reawakened my wanderlust. The world is not one oyster, but a constantly refilling, huge bowl full of them. And they come in all sizes, and flavors. And I am famished.

I hope to go to more theatre, see more movies, hear more music, hike more paths, dream more dreams.

And I hope to write on this blog at least once a week.

Okay. That's now a thing. I will write in this blog once a week.

I now go off to make breakfast, get ready for tech rehearsal, then work on script for new show about Shakespeare, then hopefully catch a few more episodes of The Offer, on Paramount, which is an amazing show and I encourage you all to watch it.

Here's a song. It's Northern Attitude by Noah Kahan & Hozier. I dig it. 

STAR EXPLODING IN SLOW MOTION

It's a little before 8 am here in Austin. I am sitting in an empty Driskill Bar, the main meeting place for the Austin Film Festival, having my first coffee, collecting my thoughts and recollections from the past few days, going to this blog to keep some sort of connection to the Not-at-the-Festival me. And to let out some of the newly minted ghosts that sell memories. 

Was standing in line for an oat latte with my fellow bleary eyed geniuses and lunatics, and the woman who runs the Festival got in line behind me. I thanked her for the Festival, and we got to chatting like people do here, and in one of those odd things that happen in life, found out from here how a friend of mine had recently committed suicide. I knew he was dead, that he had his last film in this year's festival, but I didn't know the cause. 

Now I do. 

I must have some defect in my brain, because I have never understood someone taking their own life. I know the world can be relentlessly cruel, that there is anger and sorrow and stupidity in abundant supply. I have spent plenty of time in confusion. But always, no matter what, I sense this great underlying beauty in the universe. An ocean of peace waiting to be waded into. 

I can't say much more without sounding like an insensitive asshole who doesn't understand depression, mental illness, or people who experience life the way I do. 

I just miss my friend and wish I could text him after seeing his film and tell him it was amazing.

So there's that.

I have other news of the festival to share, triumphs and surprises, new friends and fresh insights.

But for today, I will just say this. Life is... a tapestry that demands to be noticed, and touched, and reflected upon, and then noticed some more. It is that first cup of coffee in the morning. It is the little fights you get into with your significant other that seem so important at the time, then vanish with a smile at the most unexpected moment. It's a new piece of music you've downloaded but haven't listened to yet. It's a comedic short, a feature that didn't quite get it right, and also the discussion on the way out as you throw away your popcorn container. It is a symphony of birds and bats at dawn. 

And I love it so intensely. I love this world. I love it all. 

Here's a song. It's Star Exploding in Slow Motion by The Comet is Coming. I was told about it last night by a film maker named Kingsley I met here at the AFF. I am listening to it for the first time as I type this.

THE WORLD IS MYSTICAL AND MY COFFEE, AN ELIXIR

I get up every morning at 5:30. It's weird, but true. I used to be able to sleep all day, no problem. I was famously impossible to wake. I remember laying in bed before school upstairs at my home in San Jose, long after my old clock radio had been snoozed at least five times, and my mom yelling up that I had to get going. Now, this was early, so there was a little justification. I had a paper route, and I needed to get my ass out of bed, fold my seventy or so papers, load them into my basket attached to the front of my bike, and hit the road. But there I would be, trying to continue to sleep, my mind still at least partially connected to that deep, dark world of sleep that lies at the bottom of the ocean or the vast reaches of outer space or some other dimension that is very warm and thick. And Mom would yell up. And I would reach over the side of my bed and smack the floor with my shoes to make her think I was up and moving. 

Now I wake up before the alarm, on a daily basis. I still feel that connection to Dreamland. But I awake. And the first thing I do is put on a kettle to make a fresh pot of coffee with our French press. It may sound snooty, but as those who know me will attest, I really don't care what people have to say about my coffee habits. So I put the water on, fill of mug of cold coffee from the day before and put it in the microwave, and then sit down to write in my journal.

I find this gives me peace, joy, a sense of self. And reminds me that I am a writer. This is something I think I need to do, as often as possible. Because it is easy to not think that way. To think "I need to do A, B, and C", which are usually the mundane requirements of life like cleaning the house or paying the electricity bill, and still be able to then think "And I need to sit down at the computer for at least an hour and rework that scene, adding in what he writes in the letter to his dead dog".  Whatever A, B, and C  are, day to day, they are of course important. But not as important to me as being me, as expressing myself, writing down whatever I am thinking. I have to say "yes, I am a writer, and I need to let these things loose that are rampaging through my brain". So I write in my journal. Next, I take a long walk with my wife. Today, the sun rose against clouds, and the world was this insane color, first gold then pink then gold again. It was like being in a Maxfield Parrish Painting.

Next, I help Lisa get ready for work, then I write this blog. And that is my morning routine. I recommend it. There is something to be said for doing what makes you happy first thing. Coffee, writing, walking, nature, love, and more writing. That does not suck. I can take most of what the world has to sling at me when I am able to do those simple things.

So. Week two of Return of the Blog, and it feels right. You know how some things just feel right? How, from the moment you start, there is this sense of being where you are supposed to be, doing what you are supposed to be doing? I feel like that with this blog. I don't want to think about it too much beyond that, as over thinking can lead to some really bad writing, some phoney, convoluted poop. I think it was Aristotle who wrote "To over think is to create a lot of bullshit". 

He was wise.

What else? Well, had our first cast meeting for Wizard of Oz last night. Very exciting. I forget how awesome that story is, how bizarre and clean and scary and fantastical. My cast is excellent, and I feel like we are about to take an incredible journey together. Also, in two days, I head to the Austin Film Festival. Which feels to me like going to Disneyland. A whole week, focused on screenwriting and movies. Panels, pitches, parties. As Aristotle also wrote, "Fuck yeah". 

I don't know why I felt compelled to give my daily routine to you all today. Honestly, when I write this blog, I don't prep at all. I just sit down and write whatever pops into my head. Today it was my routine. Tomorrow it might be a treatise on the joys of ascribing foul language to the greats. Who knows? Only The Shadow. 

I think that's it. For the moment. Need more coffee. More music. To go over my pitches for The Belvedere Jungle, American Spirits, Burning the Old Man, and Out of the Past. I have to run errands. You know, A, B, and C.  And then I have rehearsal for Holiday Inn up at StageDoor Theatre in Conifer. That show is going well, and that place is special. Full of energy and magic. In fact, both the Scarecrow and Dorothy in my upcoming Oz are former students from StageDoor. On top of that, a Jitterbug and an Ozonian are former students from the Denver JCC. How cool is that? One of the greatest things about teaching is when your students grow up and start to excel, to work in the field you teach. It's quite amazing. As amazing as the sunlight was this morning, turning the world into a mystical experience.

On that happy note, I shall go forth. 

Here's a song. It's The Jitterbug, a song deleted from the original movie but put back in for the stage performances of The Wizard of Oz. Dance, you maniacs, dance.

I AM GONNA MAKE IT

Dreamt of going to school. Elementary School. I went to Strawberry Park Elementary in San Jose, California, long ago and about twenty minutes from the sea. In the dream, it was that school, but looked more Ivy League, less weird 1970s style. When I got to the school, there was confusion as to which classroom I was to go to. One was overcrowded, even though the room was very big. I went to that class first. The teacher was nice but struggling to keep control. He told me he thought I was supposed to go to the classroom next door. So I went there. That room was a little bigger than a broom closet, and was empty.

For some reason, that woke me up. Lisa was asleep. Padfoot was asleep. Just me and the room and that dim light from the windows and electronics that fills a room in the middle of the night.

So. I am still wrapping my head around the fact that there is a virus that has spread across the entire planet, infecting over half a million people and killing so many. Even now, it doesn't seem real. It all feels like a dream. Sometimes, when I am having a particularly bad dream, I will realize that it is indeed a dream, and I will wake myself up. No such luck with this one so far. And the peak has happened yet. I mean, how are we supposed to wrap our heads around estimates like 100,000 to 2000,000 dead just here in America? Large numbers are hard enough to contemplate in happy times.

I think our brains are all processing and changing, adapting to this new reality. How it will change is anybody's guess. Cuomo the other day said some will become better people, some worse. That's probably true. I'm fairly certain our appreciation of the little things by and large will increase dramatically. Also, I think the way we treat each other and the planet will change. The need for universal health care is pretty apparent, and gets more so each day. So does the wonder of nature, which is moving along with no care, shaking off a bit of our mess and showing her glory more and more. Every day, the sky is cleaner, and it seems like there are more birds in our neighborhood. Maybe we just hear them more because the traffic is so much lighter. I don't know. But I like a cleaner planet.

Yesterday, for the first time since this all kicked in, I did a good bit a yard work, mowing both our lawn and the neighbors. Took a few hours, but felt great. Working on the new script, it was nice to have something like that to do, so that my subconscious could kick around ideas without me telling it what to do. And, of course, ideas came. For me, writing is best when I let my subconscious come up with the fun stuff. It's like that idea bubble they make you do in writing classes, or at least the classes I took. You get a blank piece of paper, write down and idea, and then make a bubble around it, and then just let your mind go where it wants, and write down other ideas that somehow relate to the first idea. Free association. Improv. Being in the moment. It is something artists always strive to do, find a way to follow structure and at the same time be in the moment.

I think that's what we are all trying to do now. I come across friends doing their best to deny the moment. To fill their day yelling at the tv, or posting every couple of minutes about how it's a Deep State conspiracy. Or how good their ratings are. There are even some who are still trying to tell toilet paper hoarding jokes. Not too many, though. That, I think, has finally jumped the shark. And while all those things are of course valid things to do, sometimes I get the vibe that some of those folks are not being true to themselves.

No doubt, I am not true to myself all the time either.

No movie to promote today. We watched an Amazon original called The Pale Horse, one of their new Agatha Christie adaptations, and it was great, but I fell asleep early on. Maybe the lawn mowing tired me out. Maybe the whole global pandemic did. Hard to say. I did do a zoom meeting with a bunch of local writers, and that was amazing. We all vented about things, or talked about what we are working on, or what we want to do, and decided that the meeting itself was a great idea and plan to do one each week. For me, writing isn't a problem, even now. What I want to write about has changed, but the act of writing itself helps me. Hence, this blog.

Ok. Time to wrap this one up, then it's off to go shopping for a few essentials. And later today, I do my first bit of teaching/rehearsals. Should be interesting. Will I have a class full and wild, or an empty broom closet?

Here's a song.

70 SCENES KNOCKING

Woke up in the middle of the night. Maybe 3 or 4. Not sure. Someone was ringing the doorbell, over and over, and it woke me up.  I could see that our motion detector light had gone on for the front porch. The ringing had stopped when I awoke. Whomever was doing the ringing had done so every couple of seconds. I stood there, wondering who it was... a drunk kid? The police? Death? Took me a while, then I remembered we don't have a doorbell.

Dreams last night were a jumble. A room full of spiders. Theatre students asking for help with a scene or monologue. Theatre teachers looking for work, and all of us moving into a tiny apartment for the foreseeable future. There were other dreams, but they vanished like the morning fog, burnt off by the sun.

Last night we watched the movie Ladybird. So good. I'm trying to watch as many coming of age movies because I am working on a coming of age type story. I figure I should watch/read as many of those types of story as I can, see what other folks have done, how they approached it. In Ladybird, scenes are very compact. We are given the essence of each incident, and move on. It was a revelation to me. I have a list of little scenes I want in my movie. I keep note of them in this Bigfoot pocket journal I was given. I get a lot of things related to Sasquatch, have most of my life. I like cryptozoology, my first feature script was about Bigfoot and mythical beasts, and my theatre company is Sasquatch Productions. They all feed the myth of me and Bigfoot. There is even, on that list, a scene where as a boy I watch a documentary about Bigfoot. But I digress. The point is, I have a list of scenes, moments from my life from 1975-1977. I want the list to have at least 70 moments. This is because I read a thing by David Lynch once saying when you are preparing to write a movie, get a bunch of note cards, and write on each one an idea for a scene for your movie. When you have 70, you are good to go. So I'm giving it a try. It seemed, watching Ladybird, that maybe this is what Greta Gerwig did. I read that at one point her screenplay was over 350 pages. Amazing. She must have cut so many bits, so many moments.

Later, we were doing our now daily meditation, and I had a thought hit me like a bolt of lightning right when good old Deepak was giving us the days mantra. A simple thought, true, but it seemed super important at the time. All stories are about love, or the lack thereof. Love of the world, or each other, or that certain someone, or one's art. Or no love, angry and sad people doing angry sad things, all the result of no love. I think might look at each scene in my script and see how that principle applies. Maybe it will make it amazing. Or terrible. We shall see. As soon as the meditation was over, I reached for my notebook and began writing as fast as I could.

Today's agenda: Writing; Walking; Cleaning; Reading; Going Over Stimulus Plan; Games with Ryan and Lauren via Zoom; Movie. Who knows what else. So go find the love in your world.

Here's a song.

ALWAYS BE WRITING

ALWAYS BE WRITING.
A- Always
B- Be
W- Writing



It's as simple as that. I think the only advice I've been given over the years- and I've been given it in almost the exact wording from many people, including Taft Miller and Tom Wolfe- is "keep writing".
Amen, namaste, yippee-ay-yo, and all that. I don't know why, exactly, but writing is necessary for my soul. Feeds it. Fuels it. Makes it feel good.

Maybe it's just my ego, and my need to say "look at me and what I think!"

Maybe it's destiny.

I don't really care.

All I know is that when I write, I feel better about myself and the world. Not that both I and the world don't need work, help, and fixing. We do. But somehow, I feel much more hopeful about fixing what needs to get fixed, connecting to what needs to be connected to, when I write.

Like right now. As I sit here, writing this, I feel like I am doing what I am meant to be doing.

Yes, that could just be me assigning meaning where there is none, magic thinking, and blah blah blah. If that is the case, so be it. I still feel a sense of well being from the act, and that in and of itself is reason enough to continue.

My father loved to write, but he always had to self-deprecate and call it "scribbling". I think maybe he felt guilty about the pleasure writing gave him. I don't know, and can't ask him now since he has gone to the great Elsewhere, but that's my sense.

Anyway.

I am working on several writing projects at the moment. And submitting like mad. A big part of a writer's life is submitting your work to strangers and then waiting for either a form letter of rejection, or a phone call saying "wow". Most of the time you get the former.

What am I working on, you ask? Well, there's April's Fool- which has been submitted to many places, most recently FringeNYC. And there's also Ghostlight, a screenplay that I wrote a while back and had my film students read out loud- and based on their very positive reaction I've decided to jump back into the waters, and tweak it a bit, and also film the first scene and then see what happens. And I am very very very very very close to finally finishing my short film Strong Tea, which has been in post-production for almost as long as the US has been in Afghanistan.

I hope to have more writing to share with you soon. I you can't wait for my new stuff, go buy one of my plays- either at IndieTheatreNow, or Playscripts.  Until then, here is a tiny segement from Ghostlight. Enjoy.

INT. BLACKFORD HIGH SCHOOL THEATRE - NIGHT

The theatre is empty, the only light a lamp in the middle of the stage. FOOTSTEPS AND WHISPERED VOICES approach. A KEY TURNS IN A LOCK. A DOOR CREAKS open. Behind it, a group of high school kids, ready to party. MILTON, a brainiac freshman, nervously points a FLAHSLIGHT into the theatre. RAY, the school rebel, pushes past Milton into the theatre, twelve pack of BEER in his hand. 

RAY

Lock and load!

He tosses a beer to NOEL, the class clown.

NOEL

My ninja!

TRINA, a pretty red head, laughs. The group walks in.  Ray tosses a beer to MAGGIE, Milton’s smart and sexy older sister.

MILTON

(shocked) Maggie!

MAGGIE

What?  

Noel grabs Milton’s flashlight, shines it on himself, and starts making faces. GROANS, LAUGHTER, “Loser!” ETC.

NOEL

I am the ghost of Bloody Bones!

He HOWLS. Two girls, MARNA and CECILY, giggle.  

  

MILTON

It’s not funny!

NOEL

I am the ghost of Bloody Bones, and I am walking into the theatre!

Noel FREEZES IN TERROR,  points over Rays shoulder.

NOEL (CONT’D)

Ray- look out!

Marna and Cecily SCREAM. Trina LAUGHS. Ray doesn't flinch.

RAY

Hilarious.

Unseen in the audience, LENNY- the school janitor who has been sleeping behind some chairs- sits up. 

LENNY

Morons.

Lenny takes the last swig from a bottle of whiskey, lays back down, and immediately passes out.

MILTON

Actually, Bloody Bones is an old Scottish legend. He was skinned alive, and roams the highlands seeking new skin.

Everyone stares at Milton. MAGGIE hangs her head, embarrassed. DANA, sophomore drama geek, looks scared.   

DANA

N-N- New skin?

MILTON

You could tell his victims from the lack thereof.

DANA

Lack there of?

MILTON

He'd peel them like grapes, and leave the carcass for the birds.

DANA

(shudders) That’s disgusting.

MILTON

Indeed.

NOEL

Sweet!

Milton notices everyone is listening, smiles sheepishly.

RAY

Nobody’s interested in a lecture on Captain Bloody Butt-

MILTON

Bones.

RAY

What?

MILTON

His name- it’s Bloody Bones.  

RAY

Whatever- we’re here to party- not to talk about Bloody Butt.

Milton turns to Maggie, confused.

MILTON

Maggie you said we were all here to practice our monologues for the upcoming auditions.

Maggie glares at Ray.

MAGGIE

Milton, why don't you get some candles?

MILTON

Sure.

Milton sullenly runs towards the prop room.

NOEL

Lack thereof.

Marna giggles. Noel smiles at her. Ray notices this.

RAY

What we need is some atmosphere.

Ray steps to lamp, reaches for the switch.

MILTON

Don’t turn off the ghostlight!

Ray stops, turns to Milton.

RAY

The what?

MILTON

A theatre in the dark is a dangerous place. 

Trina howls with laughter. Ray winks at Maggie.

RAY

Danger's my middle name, baby.

MILTON

Be that as it may, you don't turn the ghostlight off-

NOEL

Why’s it called the ghostlight?

MILTON

All theatres are haunted- full of shadows and ghosts and things that go bump in the night-

RAY

I got something that goes bump in the night.

Noel and several others shush Ray.

MILTON

There are rules in the theatre. And you don’t break them. 

RAY

Rules?

MILTON

Never turn off the ghostlight. Never whistle backstage. 

MILTON (CONT’D)

(growing excited) This is sacred ground...can’t you feel it?

RAY

No.

MILTON

You’re clearly not a thespian.

RAY

Clearly.

MILTON

Every theatre has a ghostlight, to keep the spirits out.

Trina takes a step towards Milton, fascinated.

TRINA  

What do they want?

EMMY, a cute freshmen who likes Milton and is jealous that Trina is paying attention to him, steps forward.

EMMY

Yeah, what do they want, Milton?

MILTON

Oh, uh...some think it's the ghosts of actors, not ready for their final exit- a theatre to a ghost is like fire to a moth- it draws them in.

Trina looks Milton in the eyes and smiles. Milton blushes, not sure what to do. 

RAY

Oh no!

Ray turns off the ghost light, plunging the theatre into DARKNESS.  Milton SCREAMS. Everyone LAUGHS.  

MEANWHILE

So I'm waiting on things. Contests, projects, the proverbial ship to come in and all that. And while I do, the wheels of the world keep turning at great speed, as if all motion is perpetual, all moments continual, all threads connected somehow, in a way that I always understand in my dreams but can't quite remember when I wake up.

Guess Lennon was right- Life is what happens while you're making plans.

I got a reading of Riddle Lost coming up out in Salinas, California at the Western Stage- one of the many incubators of my artistic soul. I spent many summers there as an actor, working on some pretty amazing projects, including a nine hour, three part adaptation of East of Eden which was one of the seminal experiences of my life. It's run by Jon Selover, who I went to college and who taught me a lot about theatre.

Salinas is also where my first play, Last Call takes places.

The reading is part of 2x4 Bash, a project run by another old friend and fellow lunatic Mark Englehorn that also includes a reading of the play 8 by Dustin Lance Black- the guy who won the Oscar for writing Milk, and who was in a production of Peter Pan with me at Western Stage. So that's pretty friggin' sweet.

Riddle Lost is about a real life guy from the Old West named Jeff Riddle who's mother was a Modoc Indian and father was a settler and who lived through a really nasty war. It takes place in the after-life, and has a cast of characters that includes Norse death god Hel, a cigar store Indian named Ziggy, and Raven- the trickster god of the Pacific-Northwest. It's weird and funny and sad and I like to think kicks it in the ass. If you're near on Salinas on August 24, go check it out.

I'm also doing a lot of children's theatre this summer. A lot. Tomorrow I audition 52 kids for a musical I'm directing up in Boulder in July, and on Monday I start a production of Lightning Thief here in Denver. And while it may be tiring as all hell, it's also really invigorating to do theatre with young folks. They still understand the power of the imagination, and there isn't much they can't do.

On top of that, I am super close to finishing my first flick, Strong Tea. Like probably a week. Then I leap into the land of submitting to film festivals- where I will live for the next year.

And on top of all that, I have two other screenplays I'm figuring out.

I think I need to take the wife and drive up to the mountains and watch a river splash along for a few hours, sing to the trees, and search for Bigfoot.