Wow, two years already!
In July 2008, I celebrated the first half of my L.A. First Anniversary Week at Comic Con in San Diego (see an earlier post). Later that week, I attended a script reader course then I polished my Grey's Anatomy spec. TV script that I submitted to the Disney/ABC Writing Fellowship before heading to the east coast for some medical follow-ups.
Side note: This year is a bit sadder as my dear eldest brother died last week Wednesday.
L.A. Second Anniversary Week: July 24-30th 2009
I spent most of July polishing my House TV script. I had considered submitting it to this year's Disney Fellowship in early July as they've dropped the feature film writing portion. I think to myself... "They dropped features just when I have a great features script". My House script seems good too but alas the deadline has passed for Disney. I remind myself to work on the scripts for the script reader program for my writers group.
On Friday afternoon (7/24) after church, I was in the stand-by line outside of the Samuel Goldwyn Theater waiting to see if I would get into the Mel Brooks Tribute. The tribute would have shorts of all Brook's films and guests like Carl Reiner, Cloris Leachman and .... as well as the guest of honor. The usher walks through the crowd of fans, news crews and photographers and hands me a stand-by card with my place in line... it said 150. Mine was the highest number they handed out so things were not looking too promising.
With my chances to get in slim or none, I start doing excerpts from Mel Brooks movies that I saw as a kid, to entertain the crowd and to try to get someone to have pity on me so that they give me their ticket. I did dialogue from The 2,000 year Old Man, Young Frankenstein and Blazing Saddles just to name a few. The other people who were waiting in stand-by were mostly older people and they were amazed at my recall and knowledge of Mr. Brook's work. One man said that I looked so young and that I could not possibly be old enough to have seen or remembered most of Mel's earlier work (I think I'll keep him). We waited about an hour and no one in stand-by got in. In fact, they even turned away people who had tickets because the theater was so packed.
Saturday (7/25/09): I missed a nice panel with comedy writer, Devon Shepard (Weeds, Everybody Loves Chris, MADtv) because of transportation problems. It was nearly 100 degrees and I was p.o.'d so I head to the mall for some window shopping and a rare snack at McDonald's.
Sunday (7/26/09): At church, we read scriptures and heard a sermon on how to approach God's throne to praise Him and to correct injustices. God is justice!!!!!!
Monday-Wednesday 7/27-29/09: I pack my red suit cases (the same one's that brought me to L.A.) as I try to book a flight home for my brother's funeral but the flights are nearly $1,000 round-trip. I find a flight one way for under $300 but the price changes when I try to book it. I also find out that the significant rent decrease that I was counting on in August doesn't start until September. I resign myself to the fact that I'm not going to make it to my brother's funeral. Still, I am comforted (see upcoming post). God is great!!!!!
I do more re-writes to House and my features script which helps keeps my mind off of things. I submit scripts to my writers group for coverage. I'm still praying that they reverse the cancellation of the show Samantha Who? as I have not one but two specs for that show. I sent a few more people the petition to save the show (......). I hope I can still use these specs as a writing sample though the show may be off the air for good.
Thursday 7/30/09: I pray at 6:00 a.m., the exact time I boarded the airport shuttle at my friend's home in Maryland in 2007. At 1:30 p.m., I put on my favorite praise and worship Cd's and I don the exact outfit I wore on my first day in L.A. I mentally retrace my steps from the airport, to the shuttle van, through L.A. to my hotel and my first night of prayers and tears (see first post). That same friend calls from Maryland just to see how I was doing and we pray and encourage each other. Later, I unpacked my suitcase and even drank microwaved hot cocoa and ate packaged raisins and snacks the way I did the first day. I praise God loudly and I clap my hands for Jesus for a few hours then I write this blog.
My blog:
In two years, I have done everything imaginable (writers panels, pitch fests, conventions, picket lines, movie premieres, Oscar's and Emmy's... As you can see, I have barely chronicled even half of my adventures here so I have a lot of typing to do. I ask that you pray for my chronic pain to end and I ask that you stay tuned because there is much more to come.
Coming soon... "Blog me a river"
Thursday, July 30, 2009
Hollywood, Health and Society
I attended a Hollywood, Health and Society event last week at the Writers Guild of America building on Fairfax and 3rd. Hollywood, Health and Society is a free program at USC's Norman Lear/ Annaberg Center that provides science and medical information resources and consultations to writers and producers for TV or film. The program is funded by the CDC and the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation. There was a presentation by Dr. Tachi Yamada of the Bill and Melinada Gates Foundation then a panel discussion with Dr. Nael Baer (a writer who returned to med. school and became a pediatrician then returned to writing/producing ER, Law & Order: SVU), Peter Blake(House) and J. David(Numb3rs) and two other medical doctors. The writers showed video clips of their shows that had health or medical story-lines from HIV, infectious diseases and organ donation.
The panellist and presentations were great and it was especially nice to meet other pediatricians interested in health and the entertainment industry. I am not at all surprised that pediatricians were in a majority, as we've been on to the importance of media and health for decades. I recall the "Media Matters" campaign by the AAP and something similar through the APHA but I think the best way for us to affect media is to have doctors involved in the creative process (consulting, writing, producing and advocating) ala Neal Baer.
I was thinking of attending Pediatric Grand Rounds to keep my feet in clinical medicine but after the panel I see it as a good way of finding story ideas. The panel also had great story ideas! In fact, I raced home after the panel to flesh out a malaria script I was already working on but now with an added twist. I have also finished a spec. script for House that I am submitting to various contests which involves Down Syndrome and blood disorders. I submitted my Grey's Anatomy script last year to the Disney/ABC fellowship but didn't get it. Then I submitted it for coverage and got fair to good coverage on it, the main complaint being my formatting. I am also turning a feature script I wrote into a spec. pilot as Ellen Sandler (Everybody loves Raymond) suggests (get her book, The TV Writer's Workbook ). As Neal said on the panel, 'getting the medical right is most important" but doing it in 65 character driven pages is definitely a challenge.
The panellist and presentations were great and it was especially nice to meet other pediatricians interested in health and the entertainment industry. I am not at all surprised that pediatricians were in a majority, as we've been on to the importance of media and health for decades. I recall the "Media Matters" campaign by the AAP and something similar through the APHA but I think the best way for us to affect media is to have doctors involved in the creative process (consulting, writing, producing and advocating) ala Neal Baer.
I was thinking of attending Pediatric Grand Rounds to keep my feet in clinical medicine but after the panel I see it as a good way of finding story ideas. The panel also had great story ideas! In fact, I raced home after the panel to flesh out a malaria script I was already working on but now with an added twist. I have also finished a spec. script for House that I am submitting to various contests which involves Down Syndrome and blood disorders. I submitted my Grey's Anatomy script last year to the Disney/ABC fellowship but didn't get it. Then I submitted it for coverage and got fair to good coverage on it, the main complaint being my formatting. I am also turning a feature script I wrote into a spec. pilot as Ellen Sandler (Everybody loves Raymond) suggests (get her book, The TV Writer's Workbook ). As Neal said on the panel, 'getting the medical right is most important" but doing it in 65 character driven pages is definitely a challenge.
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