Pete's Blog

Edit...

2010-09-12T23:14:00.000-07:00

* Edit: I just got an email saying that Phone Sex? is no longer eligible for revenue sharing because advertisers only want their ads next to family friendly material. I guess it's not exactly for every age group, but what are you gonna do...

Here's some family friendly material instead:

Non-sense

2010-09-12T14:06:00.000-07:00

Youtube contacted me and one of my videos (from four years ago) has enough views to be eligible for revenue sharing with Ad-sense, meaning they're going to put ads after or before my video and I earn money based on viewers clicking the ads, or something like that. The video has over 66,000 views, but then again, it's been four years.

Just FYI the video is called Phone Sex? It's a comedy skit about a guy (played by me) who calls a phone sex hotline but his fetish is that he likes the ladies to be fully clothed and he enjoys when girls put clothes on. It's silly, there's some mild sexual innuendos, whatever, it's not for everyone, but the random people who have seen it on Youtube have responded to it. It's no Yelling Goat though.

I don't think I'm going to be able to quit the day job quite yet, I doubt if I'll make more than a few dollars from the ads. I also added ads to this blog because it's all through Google and I already have the account for Youtube, yada yada. But hopefully when I get these webisodes set up they can get some good views on Youtube.

I have another video on Youtube, again from four years ago, that I think is way funnier called Picture Frame. But again, that's not for everybody.

Yesterday I went to my manager's softball game and met Jamie Foxx. My manager plays on J. Foxx's production company's team. I hate to keep name dropping Jamie Foxx but he is a man that can get things made. I gave one of his guys a treatment for a movie and a comedy TV show spec, hopefully they read it/ enjoy it.

Also at the game I overheard a familiar voice talking, I looked up and who did I see but Money Mike from Johnson Family Christmas Dinner. That's the second actor from one of my screenplays that got produced that I've seen in real life just out and about. I talked to him for a while and we might play some basketball, it turns out he's in the same league I'm about to start playing in but a different division.

Slept-tember

2010-09-10T01:01:00.000-07:00

The movie that I wrote that I thought was going to be released on DVD in September has had it's release date pushed back to possibly February. Birthday present from me to me?

Nora's Hair Salon 3 has an IMDb page and an official release date, March 3rd, 2011.

Happenstances is still in the works, my producer is talking to a line producer and a budget will be made soon.

I have a first draft of the baseball movie I've been talking about, I gave it to Phil and I am waiting for his notes. The day I gave it to him though he read it and called me to tell me he loved it, which is rewarding. I hope to get his notes soon and have a draft we can give to my manager and Phil can start giving it to his contacts as well.

I recently started meeting with some LAFSC alums and friends of friends to do a comedy web series. I'll be directing the episodes, we already have scripts for a few episodes and hope to shoot some in the next couple of weeks.

I also did a variety show/ Chappelle's show type spec for a friend of my manager. Typical Pete, being cryptic, but it would be an awesome job if I got it.

The next thing I'm working on is a new draft of Addicted to You to enter in the 2011 Beverly Hills Film Festival, because that was so much fun last year. I met with one of my professors from Towson/ a Producer on Intervention to talk about the script and he gave me good ideas about the story. If you're a screenwriter, the Earlybird Deadline to submit a screenplay for the 2011 competition is October 1st. Go to Withoutabox to submit.

My new phone and phone number have been working out. If you play the Droid scrabble game WordFeud then look me up, my name is PeterLH.

And one of the most exciting things, to me, I'm going to start playing in an intramural basketball league in Beverly Hills next week!!! Ten games and playoffs. I can't wait.

Things are good at home, Ash started school again so we are deliberate with trying to spend time together during the week, but she loves her students. Summer is a good babe. I've been getting discouraged about the writing things but looking at all the projects in various stages is reassuring, and I've had some stuff made, and I'm young, etc, etc... So I'm not too down in the dumps about any of that.

Here's an interesting article about Intervention by the way.

Follow me on Twitter @PeterLHarmon
My Tumblr. is here

Nora's Hair Salon 3

2010-08-12T00:52:00.000-07:00

The script that I "rewrote" recently for Nu-Lite/BCM was for Nora's Hair Salon 3. I didn't actually rewrite the script that the Producer sent me, I started on page one with a blank page and one hundred percent wrote the script they ended up shooting because I didn't want to put my name on the script I was supposed to rewrite. Nu-Lite was totally OK with that and really liked the script I ended up with.

Before I wrote the script I had some research to do.

Nora's Hair Salon

Nora's Hair Salon 2: A Cut Above

They just wrapped shooting the one I wrote, I visited the set and met the Director and have been following some of the people involved on Twitter.

The set was semi-professional, much more professional than Johnson Family Christmas Dinner and the cast of NHS 3 is more accomplished than the previous movies I've written. I've also been seeing the other two Nora's movies popping up on BET recently. I would love if my movie made it to BET.

In this picture is some of the cast, (clockwise) T. Ashanti Mozelle, Eurika Pratts, Annette Greenwood, Juwanna Mann himself Miguel A. Núñez Jr., Director Rico Johnson, and a mysterious hooded figure.

A page of the script. Which is incredible to me on the most basic level that more than just me and Ash read something I wrote, and is crazy that it is going to become a movie. I know that's so basic but I am not jaded quite yet. There were over thirty people on the set when I was there, all of them devoted to making something I created come to life.

More cast, from the left Ray Cunningham, Annette Greenwood and Eurika Pratts again, and Laila Odom.

A picture from the set.

So, at this point I know way more about Nora's Hair Salon 3 than I do about the movie I wrote that is coming out on DVD in September. I'm still not 100% sure what the title ended up being even.

I was glad to get to go to set, there was a lot of improvising going on in the scene I watched them shoot though, so we'll see how much of the page was preserved in the end.

As far as other projects, I did another draft of The Happenstances at the Yellow County Community Swim and Racquet Club the Summer Before Last script for my Producer friend. I'm really excited to give it to her so she can start the process of figuring out a budget then taking it to producers/ investors, etc. Right now it seems like it could actually get made but I'm not getting my hopes too high.

Also on my plate is the baseball movie I've been developing. I'm writing the script now, I hope to be done with the first draft by the end of August.

My job at Intervention is still great, look for my name in the credits Monday nights at 9pm on A&E.

Follow me on Twitter @PeterLHarmon
My Tumblr. is here

And I got a new cell phone and a California number. Message me on facebook, twitter, the comments of this blog, etc to get the new number, or call my old number, the voice mail message has my new number on it.

I think that having a California area code, as dumb as it sounds, makes it seem like I'm more serious about having a career out here. I can imagine an agent, producer, etc, etc seeing a strange area code on a query or a script and not taking it into consideration because they have so many submissions that are from LA.

On my new plan it's free for me to text and Gchat, hit me up.

This whole blog is about I'm writing this and that and blah, blah, blah, here is a picture Ash painted of Summer because she's creative and talented too (Ash, not Sums).

2010-07-24T17:10:00.000-07:00

This week's Intervention on A&E:
When Amber was molested as a young child, she bottled up her emotions.
She began binge eating, & became bulimic. Watch her episode Monday
at 9/8c on A&E Television Network.

This is the first episode where my name will appear in the credits. Look for "Loggers" then my name.

A lot of potentially exciting things in the pipeline but I won't be worrying about any of them until after my one year wedding anniversary with Ash on Catalina Island.

July, July, Julyyyyyy

2010-07-09T23:13:00.001-07:00

We had a great visit in Maryland. We saw my family, Ash's family, and a lot of friends. There's never enough time to catch up with everyone.

There are pictures on Ash's facebook.

We missed Summer a lot though, it was our first trip without her.

Real quickly, Toy Story 3 is incredible.

The short before it is spellbinding.

Writing wise, I finished a second draft of the outline for the Baseball movie. It's the longest outline I've ever written, it should help out a lot with writing the script. It will cut down the number of drafts of the actual script I will have to do initially because Phil and I will both know and agree on the story ahead of time. I should be meeting with Phil again this week. I sent him the outline today through the mail, he doesn't use computers.

I also am talking to a Producer's Assistant, a friend of mine from LAFSC, who wants to make my Happenstances script her one of her first producing ventures. She's taking it to different producers seeing what she can do since it can be filmed on a small budget.

Speaking of small budgets, the script I wrote before I went to Maryland is going into production tomorrow. I hope to visit the set at some point. I'm sure I'll have much to report.

I found out that the Black Christian Movies script about marriage that I wrote earlier this year will be released on DVD in September. Cool.

My job at "Intervention" is still going well. I'm working two 9 day in a row stretches from last Wednesday until the 26th to make up for my two July vacations. On July 26th Ashlea and I will have been married for one year.

I'm working hard, spending time with my little family of Ash and Sums, reading, writing, exercising, occasionally seeing a movie. Things are going well.

People all over the world, join hands, start a SmileTrain

2010-06-17T01:33:00.000-07:00

My night job has been going well, I just started getting a regular amount of sleep. If I sleep from 3am to 11am it's 8 hours and a lot of people do that anyway, but I have a job.

My days have been busy. My family was just in town but now that they're gone I have to finish an outline of a script for a meeting on Friday.

I'm meeting with an older guy named Phil Pote who has been a baseball scout for a long time, he has an idea for a baseball related movie and I'm writing it for him. The outline is going really well. Here's an article about Phil. He's been around the business before, he plays himself, as an older scout character, in the Al Brooks movie The Scout. (When I went to re-find this article, the ad on the page was for the SmileTrain, seems like a good sign to me.)

I also got contacted by Nu-Lite to rewrite a script for them, they're giving me a week and a half to make the existing script they bought from someone else better. If nothing else, working for Nu-Lite/ BCM has taught me so much about meeting with producers, pitching, outlining, writing on assignment, and now re-writing, this is going to sound very cliche, but it's literally been like a master's class in screenwriting.

This script is higher profile than the ones they've had me write before, I'll definitely be posting about it in the future (as long as I get it done in time.)

I also talked to them about the script I wrote for them earlier this year. It's in post-production. It has some actors that have been in a few things before and it was shot on a better camera than usual for BCM. I know all of this is super vague but once I have any real details I'll post.

Nothing is worse for me personally than having nothing going on, no irons in any fires. January was a tough month because of that, I didn't even have any coppers on any hot plates. Right now I have to finish up these two projects, work a couple weekend nights, and then I'll be ready to hang loose in Maryland in two weeks.

I'm busy and I'm thankful.

May: Part II

2010-05-28T18:19:00.000-07:00

Last update I described night logging, since then the production switched me to a day logger for most of May. I worked a regular office job 9:30am - 6:30pm. It was weird having to wear long pants and interact with other office employees, glad that's over!!

Just kidding, but last week I was offered a semi-permanent night logging job that I accepted. I'll be logging from 6:30pm - 2:30am five nights a week, usually Sunday - Thursday but I'm able to switch days around if necessary. I'll be on the payroll as opposed to being freelance so taxes will be taken out instead of having to file quarterly or paying a lump sum at the end of the year, I'll also be making more money per week even after taxes than I was in the average week of transcribing. It will leave my days free to (sleep in) write and take meetings.

The new season of Intervention starts June 28th. My name will be in the end credits as a Logger starting with the "Amber" episode, so look out for that.

Writing wise I was able to write another pilot for Orlando Brown while working a forty (plus) hour a week office job. It's probably better than the other one I wrote for him actually. I sent it to him and my manager and I'm awaiting their response.

Summer is turning one year old on June 14th!!! Oh yeah, and Ashlea is turning 24 on the 27th. And we'll be in Maryland June 29th.

I'll keep you posted.

* Edit: I also updated my E-Resume.

MAY!!!

2010-05-02T08:55:00.000-07:00

The Beverly Hills Film Festival ended, I didn't win, but it was fun and I gave out a lot of business cards, got some cool pictures, saw some good movies for free, and drank a lot of free iced tea vodka. Ash came to a bunch of parties with me and the gala was amazing and decadent.

When that was over I immediately transcribed some rush minutes and then started night logging at Intervention. Night logging means I go to the Intervention office in Sherman Oaks from 6:30pm to 2:30am and make Excel spreadsheets of the tapes that the producers have just shot, filling in time code, characters names and descriptions, and what action is taking place. That log is used not only for transcribing but also for the story department to find what they need faster. It's a crazy job that should be done by robots but it's not yet so I reaped the benefits.

My writing group met the other night for the first time in several months for everyone's status update. I was happy to tell them about my manager situation and that I have another Black Christian Movie in the works.

Another bit of news that I had was that I had recently met with actor Orlando Brown to talk about a sitcom he wants to pitch to some different networks. Since we share a manager he wanted to meet with me to see if I could write something like what he was envisioning. We met for lunch and hit it off, I really liked his concept and he had a lot of fleshed out characters and a good general storyline already. He liked my input as well and asked me to write a pilot for him. I wrote the pilot during the day then logged at night for a couple days and sent the script to him. He called me back and loved it, he's going to pitch it around. Best case scenario it gets picked up, but at the very least I made a connection to a working actor who likes my stuff and wants me to write for him.

So that was already a crazy busy week, writing the pilot and night logging, over last weekend Ash and I moved from Van Nuys to Encino (if you need our new address email me). It's a smaller place for slightly more rent but it is closer to Ash's school, has a pool and a barbecue area, is in a much safer neighborhood, is right across the street from a huge park with a basketball court, and we know someone who already lives in the complex.

We'll put pictures on facebook soon I'm sure. I'll keep you posted on everything else. Check out my Tumblr.

Night One

2010-04-15T11:56:00.000-07:00

Last night was the opening night of the 10th Annual Beverly Hills Film Festival.

I walked my first red carpet.

Along with some other, actually famous, people like Billy Zane, Andie MacDowell, this super handsome guy named Matt Dallas who played Kyle XY in Kyle XY, Larry Hankin aka Mr. Heckles from Friends, Shannon Lucio aka Lindsay from The OC, and more. I linked to the pictures from the event.

The night was sponsored by a Iced Tea flavored Vodka brand, that had its pros and cons. The after party was at The Roosevelt Hotel in Hollywood, at the Tropicana Bar.

Watch the first season, episode 5 of 90210 where they have the after school play party, that's where I was at. Luckily it was $8 beer night.

I talked to the Managing and Sponsorship Director and he said that there were 3,500 screenplay submissions for the contest. I am one of the 210 that made it into competition. That's a lot more submissions than I expected which makes it a bigger deal for me.

I guess I'll also say officially that I have management now from Titus Production and Management. They currently represent Orlando Brown, a rapper named Paypa, and some other talent and ME! They came with me last night to support me.

Having a manager is a huge step, I'm really excited.

So, back to the festival tonight. After party at Wonderland.

I have to find more things to wear that I own that don't make me look really poor. It was a struggle last night.

2010-04-12T09:28:00.000-07:00

Ash and I had an awesome Easter break in Maryland, as soon as I got back I immediately got work from "Intervention" then I got a call later that evening and the next day I picked up some rush minutes and worked all weekend, until this morning on those. In an hour I'm going in to turn those in and pick up more rush minutes. It's good money but I'll be ready for later this week when the 2010 Beverly Hills Film Festival starts.

Here is my tentative schedule:

Wednesday, April 14th
The Elephant in the Living Room at 10:15pm

Thursday, April 15th
Stoney

and

Once Fallen at 7:15pm

then

Killing Tarantino

and maybe

3 Saisons at 9:15pm

Then the after party at Wonderland.

Friday, April 16th
The Foreign Shorts Block at 9:05pm

The Finding
The Clearing
Takeo
Ice Scream
Bro

Then after party at Hwood.

Saturday, April 17th
I'm going to wander around all day trying to see all that I can and hopefully go to one of the Q&As

Sunday, April 18th

Closing Night Awards Gala at the Beverly Wilshire Hotel.

After party at The Mosaic Hotel.

I'll keep you posted.

2010-03-28T07:48:00.000-07:00

I started a Tumblr. to supplement this blog. You can check it out here or on the link on the side - >.
I'll post pictures, links, and other things to it.

I have another movie coming out for Black Christian Movies.com sometime in the next year, I don't have any information yet, but I found some pictures for my previous movies that I hadn't seen before so I thought I'd post them. Click on the pictures to enlarge.

I also added some other links to the side too ->

Bridezillionaire

2010-03-23T17:16:00.001-07:00

I recently started a second transcribing job for when "Intervention" is slow.

Now I do "Bridezillas" too, I've never seen an episode before.

I also updated my E-Resume and changed my blog's format a little bit.

Ash and I are heading to MD for Spring Break, we'll be home from April 1st through the 8th. That's what's up.

The Garden

2010-03-21T08:10:00.000-07:00

My friend from Towson, Jason Stefaniak, has a film in a contest right now. Go to this website and watch then vote for The Garden.

Also, here is some more info about the films playing at the 2010 Beverly Hills Film Festival. I'll decide which ones I'm going to see and post them before the festival begins.

Ashlea and I officially are definitely going to the Awards Night Gala, I received numerous generous donations. Thank you everybody so much. I'll keep you posted on how everything goes.

2010 Beverly Hills Film Festival

2010-03-14T09:49:00.000-07:00

The website has been updated for the 2010 BHFF. Here is the general site. Here is the schedule of movies, parties, panels, etc. Here is a list of my competition. There are about two hundred screenplays in competition.

Updates

2010-03-12T06:55:00.000-08:00

Yesterday I sold another script to Black Christian Movies.

I'll update you when I know the official title, release date, anything like that. I was only paid a couple hundred dollars once again but I'll have another DVD you can buy in stores or rent from Netflix or Blockbuster or something.

They want me to do another one soon and I pitched them one of my several ideas for them and they basically said yes.

As far as the 2010 Beverly Hills Film Festival, I've received enough donations to pay for one of the tickets to the Awards Night Gala and some money towards the other ticket. My bud Rick is going to let me borrow his tuxedo if it fits, that's an awesome donation because that could have been a large expense.

The proceeds from some t shirts I put up on eBay will go to attending the Awards Night as well and probably a haircut cause I need to look sharp.

If you still want to donate:
BY CHECK send me an email to PeterLHarmon@gmail.com and I'll give you my address
PAYPAL use the 'send money' feature and send the money to PeterLHarmon@gmail.com

If you're on Facebook, search for the event: Send Pete to the Beverly Hills Film Festival to follow the event and see what's going on with it specifically.

I thank everybody who has already donated, it will be an awesome experience and if you come to California you can stay with me for free anytime. Let me know before you show up though.

2010-03-03T16:16:00.000-08:00

My screenplay The Happenstances at the Yellow County Community Swim and Racquet Club the Summer Before Last is an official selection of the 2010 Beverly Hills Film Festival.

The BHFF is a competition, there are prizes, I will keep you updated on how far my script goes. At the very least I definitely get an all access pass which allows me into I assume all the screenings and parties the festival is hosting. When Andrew Payton's film The Misadventures in Drifting Laterally played at the Maryland Film Festival he got all sorts of free stuff, access to parties and screenings, etc so I'm excited.

Pete Thursday

2010-02-21T07:45:00.000-08:00

A couple of my buddies from LAFSC and I made a short movie, it's a skit that I wrote and star in with Taylor Calmus, directed by Rick Bickerstaff. You can see Taylor's other movies on youtube and go to Rick's website from the links on the sidebar. There's a link to it on the sidebar and here's a link here to The Stickler. It was just for fun. We actually did it the other way around too where we swapped the roles, I'll post that too when it's edited.

I am officially in the middle of writing my third feature for Black Christian Movies. Again I am being paid only a couple hundred dollars. My producer says she wants me to keep writing for them and that the fee will raise. I'll post about the title once I finish it and know that it's going into production.

However, I am in the middle of a possibly extremely exciting series of meetings that I will post about later in the week after I know 100%.

My birthday was on Thursday (Ash Wednesday then Pete Thursday), I turned 24. I still feel like a little boy, I still can't believe not only that I'm married but that I even get to live in California in my (our) own apartment. Earlier in the month my parents and Uncle came into town and we all celebrated down in San Diego, it was really fun, I got a new iPod, nice.

The next weekend Ash and I went to her Aunt and Uncle's twins' beautiful memorial service. It was really sad but hopefully provided closure for many.

Intervention has picked back up. I got a ten percent raise.

I finished a screenplay at the end of January called Addicted to You. Here's the synopsis:

Jake, a producer for the Intervention style documentary show "Confrontation," is devastated when is longtime girlfriend tells him she's cheated on him the night he set to propose. He goes into depression until his next "Confrontation" shoot. When he gets to the documentary subject's hometown he meets a girl named Amber and falls for her instantly. He continues to the subject's house and finds that Amber is the addict he's supposed to be documenting.

This script is registered by the WGA.

Another post coming soon.

Gutters and Strikes

2010-01-28T16:36:00.001-08:00

January has been pretty disconcerting. I expected to come back from the holidays and go right back to just transcribing as my means of income. I've been doing it for a year and a couple months very steadily with only a week or so of drought every now and then and even when that happened I conveniently was able to PA on American Idol. So far the transcribing hasn't picked up to full capacity yet if it ever will. That said I have been getting some minutes, including some rush minutes that will make a very nice paycheck for the amount of time it took me.

In the off days I've been being an extra on TV shows again. So far I've been on Melrose Place, Cold Case, CSI: NY, Cougar Town, and 90210. I also put stuff up on eBay once and it turned out really well actually. I've been doing what I can to supplement because of the lack of minutes from what I thought of as my regular job.

Because of my weird work schedule I've gotten a lot of writing done, it feels great.

The other day I was on the set of 90210, they were shooting on the pier in Santa Monica, and the extras were being held right on the beach basically. I was already having a relatively good day even though I was making minimum wage but when you consider it's for doing literally nothing and eating free catered food all day you can't get too mad at it. Also part of it was getting paid to ride the roller coaster at night with all the lights on over the ocean, usually you have to pay eight bucks to ride it, I was getting eight bucks to ride it basically.

Anyway, that day I got a call from one of the producers at Black Christian Movies. It looks like I'm going to be writing another movie for them and then probably more in the future. I picked up a DVD from a producer on Tuesday, I'm writing another sequel to one of their pre-existing movies. I'm not saying anything about anything yet, just that I'm probably going to have another movie out there in the following months.

I'll keep you posted.

A few posts ago I mentioned having a meeting with the director of Pastor Jones: Preachin' to the Choir. I went on that meeting, it went well but last I heard from him he doesn't know what he wants to do yet (even though I pitched him several things). I'm still optimistic about that contact though because he likes my writing, we got along pretty well, and he did the best Pastor Jones yet by far.

I also stumbled across (and by stumbled across I mean google alerted me to) an interview with the director about Preachin'.

Ash has a recent blog, one of her resolutions is to blog more often so check it out every once in a while.

Here's Summer discovering snow:

2010-01-04T06:34:00.001-08:00

I saw these 2009 releases in 2009. The rest of the list (other year's releases and tv shows) is here.

(500) Days of Summer
17 Again
Adventureland
Avatar
Away We Go
Brüno
Brothers
Coraline
Dana Gould: Let Me Put My Thoughts in You.
Drag Me to Hell
Extract
Friday the 13th (2009)
Funny People
Futurama: Into the Wild Green Yonder
G.I. Joe: The Rise of Cobra
He's Just Not That Into You
I Love You, Beth Cooper
I Love You, Man
Inglourious Basterds
Jennifer's Body
Land of the Lost
Mega Shark vs. Giant Octopus
Monsters vs Aliens
Moon
My Bloody Valentine 3-D
My Sister's Keeper
Next Day Air
Notorious
Observe and Report
Paper Heart
Pastor Jones: Preachin' to the Choir
Saw VI
Spread
Spring Breakdown
Star Trek
Terminator Salvation
The Butterfly Effect 3: Revelations
The Cove
The Final Destination
The Girlfriend Experience
The Goods: Live Hard, Sell Hard
The Hangover
The Last House on the Left (2009)
The Lovely Bones
The Soloist
The Ugly Truth
Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen
Up
Watchmen
Whatever Works
Where the Wild Things Are

My favorite movie was obviously Pastor Jones Preachin' to the Choir, the script was so good, I don't know why.

You can follow along with my list this year here.

2009-12-11T06:47:00.001-08:00

Intervention has been great. There are some awesome episodes this season. "Greg" just came on and I didn't see it but I was so interested when I was doing the footage. I might buy it on iTunes for my plane ride home.

Ash and I will be in Nashville from the 20th until Christmas Eve then we'll be in Maryland until after New Year's. Yeah!

I also transcribed some footage for the pilot of another show from the creator of "Intervention." I hope it and the other pilot I transcribed get picked up so I can talk about them.

Ash and I joined a Pug Club and went to a party the other day. There are pictures on facebook. Summer loved it.

Yesterday I sent out about forty query letters (I already got one "no"). I think I've explained what query letters are before. Basically mine say that I'm a produced screenwriter, here's my info, here's what I wrote that got produced, here are the synopses of the specs I have written. They are supposed to get me an agent or maybe get a production company interested in one of my scripts. Last time I did a round of these a production company (assistant) read Love Bites and said that their company wasn't interested but that it was probably marketable, and a guy also tried to scam me for $600. Who knows what'll happen this time!!!!!!!

Today I have a meeting with the director of the movie I wrote, Pastor Jones: Preachin' to the Choir. He wants me to write something for him. I would be getting paid slightly more than I did for my work for Black Christian Movies. He either wants to buy one of my current scripts, or more likely, give me some plot points and have me write on assignment. I guess I'm reasonably optimistic about getting this job, I talked to him on the phone twice and he still wants to meet with me, I just never want to be excited about anything until I have something signed or a check, etc.

If you have Netflix watch instantly or some other way to watch the short lived sitcom "Worst Week," in the episode titled The Party go to 12 minutes in, where the Sam character is talking to the David character (played by RonReaco Lee from "Sister, Sister") about eating a big eclair or whatever and who is that in the background in HD??? Pete!! I'm shown four times for a total of probably about 30 seconds, it's my best background acting role to date.

I'm up to 223 so far, how are you doing?

2009-10-28T18:34:00.000-07:00

So "Intervention" has picked back up and I've been working very steadily on my minutes.

I also worked as, what they call in 'the industry' around 'town,' a day player on "Criminal Minds." I filled in for an Art Department Production Assistant for a day at the "Criminal Minds" office/ set. I basically got people food and looked for jobs on the internet all day but I made a surprisingly alright amount of money for one day.

This may sound like I'm an idiot, I mean I knew this existed but I wasn't sure in what capacity, but the Art Department is awesome. If I knew how to use any illustrator type programs I would try to get into it. The Art Department does a lot of stuff, but what I thought was the most awesome, and this is the part that might make me sound dumb, is that whenever there's anything in the script like a brand or a company or product, etc, the Art Department gets to name it and design a logo for it. I do some of that in my screenplays already, for free!!

This is actually real though:

It makes T-Pain saying that he wants to buy you a drank and take you home with him a lot creepier.

Also, today I had a job interview at an office. That's all I'm gonna say about it for now, you know how I don't like to say anything about anything before I actually have any news. The interview went well, I'm really good at those sort of things like the interview to be a director of one the LAFSC films. If they offered me the job I would have to consider A LOT of things about my current lifestyle. What to do with Summer during the day? (Dog walker?) Do I mind traffic every day for an hour or two? (Not if I have mah podcasts) Can I wear dumb t shirts to work? (Maybe) And other things like that. If I got/ took this job I would have to schedule time to write still because ultimately I want to be a screenwriter, not a professional this-job-that-I-interviewed-for-today-er. The office was really cool and the gentlemen that interviewed me were great though, so we'll see.

My writer's group is starting back up tonight as well after a couple month hiatus. Looking forward to that, I'll probably get some Pinkberry tonight even though it's chilly out (for Southern California at least).

And in reference to my last post, all those feelers I put out for the different jobs, I haven't really heard anything back from any of them except for that interview I was waiting to hear about, which I did get the interview, and now we wait...

2009-10-14T08:34:00.000-07:00

"Intervention" has been slow for the past 3 work days so I've been trying to network/ promote myself in all kinds of ways. I applied to a job at Netflix that sounds like the perfect job, watching movies and writing analysis about them, I'm assuming so that Netflix knows whether to carry them or not. I applied for a script coverage job. I sent my scripts to some people. And I entered The Happenstances at the Yellow County Community Swim and Racquet Club the Summer Before Last into the 2010 Beverly Hills Film Festival Screenwriting Competition. I also did some writing on my latest script. So I've tried to keep busy and maybe something will come of the feelers I put out there. I'm still waiting to hear from the management company that was interested in one of my scripts and I'm still waiting to hear if I got an interview with this company that does DVD distribution.

However, I usually send out all kinds of feelers and don't really get any responses so I'm not super optimistic about any of the above. Today I am picking up minutes from "Intervention" and I hope that they'll continue to have work for me since that's a great job.

Summer is 4 months old today!!

She went from this little baby:

To this slightly bigger baby:

She's even outgrown her raincoat!

2009-10-10T17:03:00.000-07:00

I added a link to the sidebar here ->
for Cheverladotblogspotdotcom.blogspot.com, my new blog where I comment about my blog.

If that doesn't sound interesting, please don't go. If it sounds interesting at all, go and make sure you read them in chronological order starting from the earliest date to the most recent and read the "What?" sidebar thing first.

2009-09-28T22:09:00.000-07:00

I don't think I'm going to use any names, yet, but let me say a couple things.

Last week I sent out what are called Query Letters to about 10 to 15 literary managers/ agencies. The purpose of a query letter is to get an agent or manager to represent you and try and sell your script or set you up as a writer on a project that is in development or something like that. My query letter said I have two direct to DVD features sold, some info about me, and three pitches for screenplays I have written and registered with the WGA. I didn't expect any sort of response but I was just gonna put myself out there and see what was up.

So here's what happened:

On the good side of things, a smallish but seemingly semi-reputable management company/ talent agency was intrigued by one of my scripts and asked me to send a copy to them to read. They should have received the script on Friday or early this week. I'll keep you posted on that. Best case scenario they would want to represent me and help me get screenwriting jobs and that would be awesome.

On the other end of the spectrum, I got a phone call from a private number from a fast talking gentleman who was interested in another one of my scripts. I'm not going to go into too much detail, yet, but he wants to represent me, all I would have to do is send him a $600 advance... As soon as he said that I knew he was shady. When I got his email I looked him up on IMDbpro and his resume was not impressive. Then I googled his name cross indexed with "scam" and dozens of links popped up, not a good sign. Needless to say I am not going to send him any money. I sent him a nice email saying that I would not be sending the "advance" but that he could still read my script if he wanted to and if he liked it he could represent me (which I'm guessing none of those things are going to happen), I was very polite even though he had just tried to rip me off.

If he tries to push the issue or is a jerk to me I'll let you know, that would be semi interesting.

Other than that: Summer and Ash are very well, Intervention is cranking along, and my brother is visiting this coming weekend which is gonna be fun.

I also saw Jesse Eisenberg from The Squid and the Whale and Adventureland at Trader Joe's.

Goodnight.