Development, part Trois

About a month ago, I hit a titanium wall in the development process with all the grit and grace of a bug on a windshield. I found myself not only writing, but outlining, thinking, speaking, and dreaming an entirely different story than I'd started out to write. It was the first genuine Charlie Kaufman moment I've ever had. I literally HATED the story I was supposed to write. Not to mention that I had to dodge the occasional call from the producers & Creative Exec who wanted to hear what the status was and "If I was having any problems, they're always there to help me."

Yeah, lot of help you guys had been, I bitterly mumbled to myself as they drove down Topanga Canyon in their Masarati being rich and powerful.

What started out as a cool and unique concept that no one has done, had evolved into a hodge-podge of ideas tossed together like some story-Gumbo of half-cliches and incoherent motivations. And here I am, left to turn it into some sort of brilliant horror film that not only scared people, but didn't fall apart like a house of cards when a characters motivation was changed.

After mucho stress, half an ulcer, several nights of binge drinking, and the occasional emotional melt down in public (there's nothing like seeing a grown man sob on Third Street Promenade), I realized something.

This is why the job is so fucking hard. And this is why, when it's done well, it pays well.

I've known this, I mean, years and years of saying: "no thanks, can't go out and skinny dip with five single bi-sexual redheads, must finish screenplay" was hard work.

But this, this tortured limbo between writers block and mediocrity, this was gut wrenching. I felt like I was letting everyone down. My agents, who got me in the door. My manager, my personal John Keaton, screaming: "Carpe Diem!". The C.E. who fought for me, an unknown, a hack who bumbled his pitch like Rain Man without Wapner.

Somewhere, a village was missing its idiot.

And I was that village.

Then, out of the blue, something else hit me. A sort of horrible epiphany, like the twist ending of Angelheart.

I was the master of my own demise.

FLASHBACK TO: the dozen or so creative meetings I'd had with the producers and creative exec on the project. They'd throw an idea out, I'd write it down and try to figure a way to make it work. Always eager to please, to be a writer they'd say: "Hey, lets work with that guy again, he was uber-nice."

But not all the ideas they had worked. And some of them blatantly sabotaged the story. It's not like my ideas were gems, in fact, I'm utterly embarrassed by a six page section that seems ripped out of Hellraiser 2. Still, they called me out when they didn't work. They played ball, I didn't.

I should have raised issue with those ideas then and there in the room. Should I have battled them out? Called them "Idiots!" while throwing a stapler? Keyed their cars and blamed it on an intern? No, not at all.

But by not contributing to the ebb and flow of the spitball process, by not explaining why something didn't work, or may have to be tweaked, I was, in a bizarre sense, validating that it would work. That mental priest that says: "Speak now, or forever hold your peace" was off with an Altar Boy, and I was left there, wed to a tangle of plot threads that amounted to the worlds biggest ball of yarn. My mental image of the story and their mental image had, at some point, filed for divorce and were now eating the children. It was the difference between 2001 and Plane 9 From Outer Space, and I was writing Plan 9.

So here I am, a few weeks to deadline, and I call them up, get everyone on the phone at the same time, and explain my problem. They ordered Sushi, I brought them Calamari. They were both from the sea, but not quite the same thing.

I'm expecting: rage.
I'm expecting: fury.
I'm expecting: You're Fired!

Instead, after careful explanation, aided by 2 pages of notes, there's a long silence on the other end. Finally: "Okay, let's roll up our sleeves and dig in, say...next monday?"

BEAT

"Monday works."

CUT TO: Next Monday. The best story meeting I'd ever had. Ideas were tossed out and shot down. Feelings were hurt. Names were called. Cigarettes were smoked and assistants scurried for shelter like vampires at dawn. I talked, they talked, we all talked and two hours later, we'd dug up the faulty pipes, poured a new foundation, and I was off to build a new house. This was how it was supposed to work. This is how it should have worked. In all my eagerness to please, to play the bookish, sycophant writer, I'd ignored one of the basic tenants of this business. It may be a collaborative medium, but I wasn't the one collaborating. I was the story expert in the room, and I wasn't doing my job by explaining why something wouldn't work, and then trying to figure a way to make it work.

These producers and C.E. rock.

I walked off into the Santa Monica sunset with a smile on my face and a tune on my lips. I haven't had been blocked since.

I turned in my draft this week.

And fuckin' A.

I like it a lot.