Writing in Hollywood

When I watched a lot of films, independent cinema generally felt better. It was more authentic to me. In Los Angeles there were many smaller theaters that showed limited releases, which definitely counted as one of the perks of living in an entertainment hub.

I’d frequent a theater not far from my apartment, and I remember well the red seats, the newly released song 23 by Blonde Redhead playing unusually often before trailers began, the scent of popcorn, the unique air-conditioned bouquet inside. Somehow it was possible to feel the outside city pressing on the walls. And outside felt unexplainable. Driving down Sunset Boulevard to go to the movies was at once both a normal Wednesday and surreal for a young man with small towns and Greenland behind him.

Once I had arrived in Los Angeles, the ongoing effort to put together my first film actually slowed. I’d already secured some actors before leaving Nevada, as well as a talented melodic composer named Miguel Samiez who had written some demo tracks after reading the script, but the originality of my screenplay was met with uneasy feelings by the people who held the money. This was not really a surprise. Mixing fantastical elements into an otherwise serious story, I was looking to make something like a modern fairy tale with grit. Ironically I’d probably have an easier time trying that sort of thing today, though it would no longer be nearly as unique as then.

It’s rarely the first who are first.

In any case, being “too original” was simply common Hollywood speak for a financial fear that not enough people in the mainstream audience would get it and go watch. Independent film did have more creative flexibility because the budget and risk was lower, and the audiences were more hungry for unusual stuff, but it was and is far from immune to the machinations of money in art.

Moonlight

As the first challenge continued, fortune would have my second screenplay was a drama. Shortly after moving to the city, I finished that script by typing nearly every night away, and it essentially became the piece that allowed me to get a small foothold in Hollywood. Late hours there brought out a much different life, and everything seemed to change every few blocks, from fancy to worn, to fancy again. The walk of fame would be taken over by homeless people, dealers, and other folks some might cross the street to avoid, but two blocks away a lone young woman would pass you in the 2am dark for her exercise through the warm southern California weather. I wonder what happened to her dreams.

For my part, the integration to Hollywood was spurred along by two producers who took a special interest in me, namely Yvonne Chotzen and Bill Jenner. They both had a passion for character driven stories, and my new screenplay impressed something on them. After sitting on the porch with Bill up in the hills, it naturally occurred where I’d go for progress, steering to a collaborative avenue that leveraged my sense of writing. The friendship we all built became a place where I could rest my soul now and then, one where my feet found a patch of steady ground in the city.

Time quickly got packed with different things. Yvonne nudged me off to represent them and never told me how to do this or that. Her confidence that I should simply be myself and continue to evolve remains a choice I’ve been glad for the whole time since. That trust meant a lot to me. After their company started sending me around town as a producer to find material we could make together, and as my script editing increased right along that, a transition completed.

Shifting focus to this new road ended up gradually cooling the effort to get that first film made, even if it remained in the back of my mind. That was a trade of sorts for new things.

No matter the busy, I still couldn’t stop typing out my own ideas too and kept trading sleep for more words. The work to write yet another feature screenplay on the side carried on a while, but I lost the draft when thieves broke into my apartment and stole the clunky laptop that contained the file. Eventually I moved to a more secure building but never tried to recreate the story, a science fiction thriller. Nevertheless, life felt as if I was suddenly immersed in a world that wasn’t available all that many places.

The distinct air of Los Angeles at the time is difficult to describe. I’m not talking about the smog which took a few days to get used to, but the spirit of the city. I lived in the moment without really making a conscious effort to do so, though fully aware that not everything happening to me was entirely normal. But it felt natural. I was helping people tell stories. I’d listen to other writers pitch their works, and I cared about it.

Good Souls

Arriving at one of my earliest pitch meetings, I met Michelle Matthau who assisted with events. She was a welcoming soul and we had similar sensibilities about the world around us, hoping others would succeed if we could help it. Having to reject people was nonetheless a natural part of the scene, and when I turned someone down, Michelle showed herself as a wonder at helping especially newer writers cushion their disappointment.

During pitch events like these, set in all manner of venues from drab cold conference floors to warm restaurants, other producers would sometimes mingle either before we began or during downtime. I’d continued to go see many films in Los Angeles and now found myself around a whole lot of the people who’d been making them happen. I was never the sort of guy to be star struck, but I appreciated someone with the creative drive to make a film. It’s difficult to do.

One example was a friendly line producer named Teresa Zales who was quick to strike up a connection, and it turned out I’d watched one of her recent films, He Was a Quiet Man, which she helped put together for very little money. Even small encounters like these could feel serendipitous. She later invited me to a party with other executives, though for reasons I don’t remember I didn’t end up going. It sometimes struck me how many people you could carry conversations with if you loved film, certainly, but also simply as human beings existing in this wild system coming together discussing life.

I’ve always gone through my own as if I was some kind of observer.

Other times I just sat and listened to folks talk and tell stories nearby, everything from the mundane to someone who had received an offer from Steven Spielberg (and said no). These types of moments reinforced that many do find the ten or twenty percent luck needed to put a project together, but the remaining piece of the pie really does come down to hard, relentless work.

Nearly all my best film-related connections in the city were built with the foundation of a friendship and human understanding. Perhaps that differed up in the higher stratosphere where the money grew unwieldy, but as far as the independent scene went, Los Angeles was full of good people who just happened to enjoy making films and gladly struggled years on end to make it work.

Long away from the city, I still sometimes itch to make a movie.