Hutch the Intern

It feels very weird to be an intern again. I know that 26 isn't technically that old, but having been out of college for almost five years (JESUS CHRIST!), it seems like I should have outgrown the internship phase of my life. I have a full-time job with "manager" in my title, a 401K, and a benefits package (starting January 1st, so fingers crossed nothing happens in the next month or so. Crap. Totally jinxed it. Please don't slap me with a critical illness or horribly expensive accident, Universe!). These are not things normally associated with an intern. But they came with the territory of settling for a job that would actually pay for my exorbitant college film degree that I have no chance of actually getting paid to use. It's not that I don't love my job. On some days, it's damn near inspirational. Especially now that I'm not being harangued by angry crazies every day or having to run an entire 347 unit property with virtually no support from my colleagues.

What I picture Parallel Universe Hutch to look like.

But there are days when I see my peers following their dreams and actually achieving moderate success, that I think about Parallel Universe Hutch. What would have happened if I had found that one job that lead down the path I originally saw myself taking after college? Would I be an assistant to a quirky but lovable television writer, a ruthless but brilliant acquisitions executive's right hand, a slovenly, scatterbrained creative development head's Girl Friday? (Yes, I'm some type of assistant in all of these scenarios. Even in fantasy, I tend to be very realistic). Who knows. I'd probably be very poor though and living in a three-bedroom crap shack in Koreatown with six other broke post-grads. You have to pay your dues somehow. But the thought of unemployment and never-ending ramen scared me into taking something a little more lucrative.

True story, a resident really did give me a bottle of vodka once.
It wasn't really a gift though. He got it from someone else and didn't like vodka.
His loss!

Almost everyone who works in property management wound up there by accident but stayed because it's stable and can be pretty awesome. A lot of residents are really nice and sometimes they bring you treats. And vodka. (Which of course you don't drink in the office…You take it home and mix it with some cranberry juice like a lady.) It's satisfying helping someone find their perfect new home and opening the door to the next chapter in their lives. But other than some inventive sales pitches and techniques, there isn't a whole lot of creativity involved. I had almost resigned myself to this road, first Assistant Manger, then Community Manager, then Regional Manager or other corporate gig where I actually get the Friday after Thanksgiving off in addition to Thursday. And I probably would/will be.

I looked a lot cooler when I did this in China town.
Probably because I had a college degree.

Yesterday, out of nowhere, I got an e-mail. A small production company, which I will not name because I don't like to identify where I work, and also because the name is just too much of a cheesy coincidence, came across a resume that I had sent in literally years ago. Probably some time in 2010, which I spent the bulk of job-hunting, census-taking, and sign-twirling. Since then I've had three different jobs with three different companies, and lived in three different apartments. It seems like a lifetime ago that I sent that resume off into what I assumed would be oblivion. They were looking for an unpaid reader/development intern. Someone to read 3-4 scripts a week from home and discuss them maybe once a month. Something I could easily do in my spare time. How freaking awesome is that? The perfect side job just landed in my lap.

Why, yes. I am the Gatekeeper.

Not only did it come to me, but the entire process of finding out about it, responding that I was interested, doing an informal phone interview with the producer, and receiving my first batch of scripts due the next week, all happened in about eighteen hours. Kind of the opposite of every job hunting experience anyone has ever had. Sure, it's not paid. And if a script is bad, it can be almost torture to read it and have to summarize and make comments. But it's a toe dip back in the pool of the film industry. And I can do it without having to sacrifice my cushy day job and discounted luxury apartment! SCORE!

Oh Rexy, you're so sexy!

This will be my third official reading internship, though I was a judge for two script competitions during which I basically did the same exact thing. It's been a while since I've written coverage, but it's all coming back to me. What makes a script great, what could be improved, and the ultimate power trip: getting to determine whether it's a Pass, a Consider, or a Recommend. I am the Gatekeeper, you must pass through me mwa ha ha! Of course it takes a lot more effort to create something original from scratch than to critique something already in existence. But I am a firm believer that reading scripts makes you a better screenwriter. So hopefully this will motivate me to actually finish something and perhaps Recommend my own screenplay to the producer (who has a very thick New York accent and wrote a movie once starring Maxwell Caulfield. He's done other more impressive things, but mostly I'm just hoping he can introduce me to Rex Manning!)

Ok, I'll give you one hint...

PS, while I obviously can't disclose details about the scripts I read, I just finished the first one and it was surprisingly kickass in an Evil Dead 2 sort of way.

How "The Help" Helped Me

Tonight I made a rare trip to the theater to see the film adaptation of "The Help." I read the book not too long ago. I didn't love it, but it was very nice. I mostly went because I adore Emma Stone and wish we could be best friends in real life. The film was pretty great, but what resonated most with me was just one of the end credits: "Based on the novel by Kathryn Stockett." This whole movie was made because one day a woman sat at her computer and began to type.

I started writing a novel almost exactly one year ago. It wasn't my first attempt. There are drafts written in pencil on college ruled notebook paper going back as far as second grade. And for my fifth grade yearbook ambition, I wrote that I wanted to be an author. In high school and college I cultivated my love for writing through creative writing classes, screenwriting classes, and other studies of what makes for a great story well-told. Once I got my first real job though, writing sort of took a back burner to bill paying and mindless TV watching.

While I was pretty much unemployed during the first part of 2010, I was finally able to exercise my long lost creativity. I started working on a script with a good friend of mine. We made it two-thirds of the way through a promising coming of age adventure story inspired in part by the Goonies before we hit a wall. Plot-wise we were stuck. And it was time for me to go back to work where I actually got paid. And so the story sat unfinished in the dark recesses of my aging laptop.

Since it was looking like that would never again see the light, I decided to once again try my hand at novel-writing. Screenwriting has so many rules. Relentless formatting, keeping descriptions succinct, letting directors and actors decide how a line should be delivered instead of instructing them, and what pitfalls to avoid lest your script appear juvenile. All that for little pay, less credit, and the joy of seeing your baby be torn apart by people who don't know a good script from their Aunt Mildred. With a novel, you can pretty much do whatever you want. Sure you have to keep to a basic story structure if you want it to be successful. But there is so much more you can do with tone, setting, and characters. You can really develop where you'd have to hold back in a script.

With this somewhat bitter attitude, I began my novel. It was semi-autobiographical even though the concept of a writer writing about themselves as if they are the most fascinating subject in the world irritates me. But you have to write what you know and just hope that others can relate. (That is, if you hate doing any kind of strenuous research, like me.)

I went back just now and read the first 11 pages. I only read 11 because that's as far as I got last September. But as I read those few pages, I was pretty damn proud of myself. Normally I go back and read something I wrote and cringe ever so slightly. But I made my future self laugh out loud! So now I'm inspired to go back and if not finish this book, at least keep heading in the right direction. Any progress is better than none.

Because some day I want to see "Based on the novel by C-------- H--------" on the big screen just like Kathryn Stockett. (Not that she's my new hero or anything. Tina Fey will always be number one. But I figure if she can do it, why can't I?)

Kickass Women in Film

Today I was fortunate enough to break away from mountains of paperwork to attend an incredible seminar entitled "The Chick Flick Grows Up," programmed by the organization Women in Film. I'd been looking forward to this conference ever since I found out that the panel would include the writer/directors of some of my favorite films: Karen McCullah (10 Things I Hate About You, Legally Blond, She's the Man), Lisa Cholodenko (The Kids Are Alright, which I plan to see ASAP, Laurel Canyon), and Gina Prince-Bythewood (Love and Basketball, The Secret Life of Bees). I was stoked just to be in the same room as these ladies. They could have talked about navel lint and Panamanian tadpoles and I would have been enthralled. But in an hour and a half, they covered some fairly major issues. Here comes the obligatory list:

Karen McCullah Lutz

1. What is a 'chick flick?' Does the term "ghettoize/marginalize" the creators and/or audience of female-driven content? (Yes they used the word 'ghettoize' than once. It made me giggle.)

2. Why are so many female-centric films still directed by men? Television has a much greater proportion of female directors; why has film yet to catch up? Kathryn Bigelow and the Hurt Locker. How a female director transcended her gender to win Best Picture.

3. Ageism in the media. There are so few actresses over forty who can get a project greenlit right away, if they can get cast at all.

4. Why is a female-written R-rated romantic comedy like the Ugly Truth (penned by McCullah) derided in reviews as "obscene" when Judd Apatow's films are praised for their vulgarity. (I'm not saying the Ugly Truth is as good as Knocked Up. But it does make you wonder why male writers/directors/actors can get away with with swearing like sailors and minds in the gutter, but it's inappropriate for women to be raunchy.)

5. The concept of "likeability." Impossible to define and even harder to create consistently. Prince-Bythewood told an anecdote about how studio executives didn't think Sanaa Latham was likeable enough because she wasn't smiling in the majority of the first week of dailies (most of the scenes were heavily dramatic). They were also perplexed by why she didn't seem to enjoy losing her virginity in a pivotal scene. The women in the audience had a good laugh at that one. She was chided for being too realistic.

Gina Prince-Bythewood

6. MPAA ratings and how they affect the final draft of the script. The House Bunny was supposed to be R rated. It was about a Playboy model, for god's sake. But in order to capitalize on McCullah's Legally Blonde audience, they had to tone down the naughty humor. Sacrificing tone for mainstream appeal.

7. Why everyone loves scripts by Prince-Bythewood and Cholodenko, but no one will pay for them. High quality movies that they want to see get made, but aren't willing to risk millions of dollars on primarily black casts (that haven't played well internationally), or cause controversy by addressing the subject of homosexuality in a family context.

8. How casting is often decided by a formula that determines a star's 'international worth,' rather than who is best for the role.

9. What it means to compromise during the marketing campaign and let the experts get butts in the seats. It may not always be what you want, but if it gets people to see your movie, you have to pick your battles.

10. Paying respect to male characters in female-centric movies (as opposed to the arc-less, shrew girlfriends in most male-driven fare)

Any one of those topics could make for fantastic feminist/film research papers, but I'm not willing to delve deeper for a silly little blog. If any of them strike your interest, feel free to discuss in the comments. And now for some sound bites (they may not be exact quotes, but I think I got the spirit of them):

"Men are often surprised at how funny 'Legally Blonde' is." -McCullah on the subtle sexism of lowered expectations.

"No one ever thought of it as a black book. It was just a book." -Prince-Bythewood on 'The Secret Life of Bees.'

"Don't limit yourself when writing. Let them worry about the budget." -McCullah

"It's all about the way you feel when you leave the theater." -Prince-Bythewood on why no one thought Slumdog Millionaire would ever find an audience with no stars.

"Your film's gotta have great laughs or great sex. Something that really gets the heart beating." -Cholodenko on advice she was given by male studio execs.

"Dear ____, I"m so sorry about your tiny penis." -McCullah in response to a critic who didn't appreciate the line about Joey Donner's tiny dick in 10 Things.

"Once you label yourself as something, others will label you as well." -Prince-Bythewood, on being an African-American woman who refuses to pigeonhole the stories she wants to tell.

Lisa Cholodenko

Overall it was an inspiration just to share oxygen with women who have overcome discrimination of all kinds to achieve both critical acclaim and commercial success. They were insightful and hilarious (especially Karen McCullah. I now regret dissing the Ugly Truth. It was a cute movie that took place in my under-appreciated hometown of Sacramento). The experience reignited my easily vanquished desire to write. It gave me hope that I might one day sit on that very panel and inspire some other lazy girl with a blog and a dream. It was also fun to see three women who may share an occupation and a role in reversing the marginalization of women in the film industry, but have nothing else in common and clearly can't stand each other.

Sticky Business is Legit!

My writing team from UC Irvine has finally registered our dark comic masterpiece, "Sticky Business" with the Writers Guild of America. We kept talking about and putting it off, but Rachel, ever the leader of the group, finally got us to commit and our intellectual property is fully legal now! Unfortunately, now that it's copyrighted, we aren't really allowed to revise it. Sure this is like the fourth or fifth draft and is probably as good as it's ever going to get by semi-amateur screenwriters, but none of us has really looked at the thing in almost a year. What if it's awful? We did go a bit on the broad side with the comic Tarantino-like violence, but that's what made it so unique and fun. Hopefully someone (with money) will discover it and decide that it's worth making into a multi-million dollar feature with a stellar cast. And hopefully that cast will include some of the amazing actors who were kind enough to bring "Sticky Business" to life on stage at the UCI Screenwriting Festival where it won Best Feature Length Script. (Pats ourselves on the back). The copyright is good for five years, so we really have to get cracking on finding an agent or a producer or something to get the ball rolling here. But at least we have our momentum back! Maybe we'll have another writing session at Lee's Sandwiches followed by a trip to Yogurtland just for old time's sake.

Clash of the Commitments

I am a commitment-phobe after burning myself out in middle and high school with far too many extra-curricular activities that involved several 16-19 hour days a week. Not to mention belonging to a church that takes up half of your free time with lessons, gatherings, and other various obligations. So for the past few years all I've wanted to do is go to work/school and come home. But I love singing and I miss being in a choir. So I finally joined one after searching for a low-cost, low-commitment, non-professional group for several months now. It's a small all-girls (: ( ) a cappella group, and it's been so challenging but much fun!

I discovered recently however that this group meets on Thursdays. Being unemployed I have very few time slots that are filled, but once a month on a Thursday, I have my ScreenplayLab Mixer networking event (see previous post Shmoozing Part 2). This is probably the one organization that could really help my career and I have to miss it because I committed to this group. We only meet for an hour and a half once a week and I don't want to be the girl who ducks out early to drive all the way to Beverly Hills just to stand around awkwardly.

It's not a big deal, it's just I wish I could do both. Hopefully I'll get a job without the help of this ridiculous tradition of networking and I won't have to feel guilty about missing my singing group. I do still have the other networking thing I go to, but that's mostly just sit around and pretend you can hear what people are saying. Ok, gotta get back to reading scripts! I've been able to take in a lot, and it's really been improving my own screenwriting skills.

Competition

I can be a pretty competitive person, especially when it comes to middle school dodgeball, trivia-based board games, and chugging contests of any kind. But right now, I'm feeling the strain of competing against thousands upon thousands of others in the Los Angeles job market right now. Someone must be getting these jobs that I keep applying to. Someone who is more intelligent, more creative, more outgoing, and more experienced than me. Even jobs classified as 'entry-level' are being filled by people with ten years or more in that specific field. It's incredibly frustrating.

I found a television writing fellowship for ABC that sounds absolutely ideal for my situation. The opportunity to learn from real writers and potentially be hired by one of the biggest networks in America is absolutely incredible. The salary is outrageously good too. It doesn't start until next year and I wouldn't even find out until November if I got in. The deadline is July 1st, and already I'm starting to panic. I have plenty of time, and I know I could probably knock out a decent spec script of a sitcom by then. But knowing that there are only eight spots and who knows how many hundreds of applicants is making my head explode.

My confidence isn't too high after being turned down by a different ABC internship last Spring, and not even receiving a big fat "NO" from an NBC writing program in the Fall. I'm really hoping that in both cases it was because I screwed up on some logistical detail, forgetting to sign something, misreading directions, that sort of thing. But of course there's that voice in the back of my mind that says "You're just not good enough." It also tells me to set fire to things, but that's a whole separate batch of neuroses.

Hopefully I've gotten better over the past year. I've been collaborating on a feature script with a friend, in addition to writing random things on my own. Nothing really worth mentioning, but the practice has been beneficial. I hope. Anyway, I feel exactly like I did when I attempted to apply to the USC screenwriting program and had a nervous breakdown before I could even finish the application. The competition is fierce and brutal and painful and all manner of unpleasant synonyms for bad. Especially when what you're being judged on is creativity, which is completely subjective to begin with. It's like giving birth to a baby you think is beautiful, then sending it off to be ripped apart by pageant judges who blame you for producing such a piece of crap child. (Too much?)

I think I'm a decent writer. But I don't think I'm good enough to beat out hundreds of others who have dedicated their lives to writing and have a greater natural skill to boot. I'm not looking for sympathy or ego-boosters. I'm just saying that it's overwhelming to have a way to attain your dream dangling right in front of your face, and to know there's only the most infinitesimal chance it could be yours. All I can do is write the best script I can and hope to god everyone else applying comes down with mono. Or leprosy. Leprosy would be better. They can't type if their fingers fall off...

What you may expect here in the land of plastic multi-purpose utensils:

As you probably know, my name is Hutch and this is my first attempt at a real blog. I flirted with the blogging function on my rapidly decaying myspace page, but that was more the ramblings of a sad, pathetic college girl desperately avoiding homework at any and all costs. In this new and improved blog, you may expect the ramblings of a sad, pathetic, post-grad girl desperately avoiding...everything at any and all costs. I may even invent things for myself to avoid since it gives me such a thrill. I'm open to suggestions.

So I tried to come up with a cohesive, over-arching theme for this blog. But I seem to lack a cohesive, over-arching theme in my life, so I decided to embrace the chaos erupting in my mind and just go with a standard stream of consciousness.

The primary inspiration for Sporadic Sporkitudes is the Entertainment Weekly columns of one of my all-time heroes, Diablo Cody (cheeky stripper turned oscar-winning screenwriter of "Juno" and "United States of Tara.") She seems to write about whatever strikes her fancy, be it bad reality television, Jewish deli soup, or silver twinkie Airstream trailers. And good times are had by all. In an effort to follow in her footsteps (along with Tina Fey, Mindy Kaling, Judd Apatow, and John Hughes among other heroes), I am attempting to work on my writing skills as they are sadly deteriorating. Trying to boil down witticisms, observations, quotes by more intelligent and pithy writers into 140 characters or less has really affected my ability to complete whole paragraphs of thought.

Regarding what you may expect here in Spork-land, probably a whole lot of nothing. Posts may be few and far between or several completely unconnected posts in a single day. They will most likely postulate on one or more of the following subjects: movies, tv, books, music, food, attractive menfolk, pop culture, random bouts of nostalgia, observations of my wacky South Central surroundings, and rants about arbitrary pet peeves or how lame my life happens to be at the moment. I may occasionally veer into the world of politics (though I try to keep an open mind and see both sides of a topic), religion (Jesus Freaks be warned), education and other more heavy topics. But I will probably end up writing mostly about the simultaneous joy and despair of Raumen noodle soup.

So that wraps up my inaugural blog of Sporadic Sporkitudes! We'll see if this experiment works.