Auteur : Martine

Vos enfants sont indisciplin�s cet �t�? Offrez-leur une de ces poup�es et placez la dans un coin sombre de leur chambre.

Tout devrait rentrer dans l’ordre.

Just sent in a new version of the screenplay to the producer (yeah I know, I’m working at night…) who is working very hard to make the most out of the tight budget we have to make this movie. No matter how much you think a screenplay is « final », once the budget and scheduling people start working on the script, new issues come up that force you to rethink some of the scenes. Take a character out of the scene because the actor playing him can’t be there on that day. Cut down the lines of another character to transform her part from a « second role » to a « third role », which will reduce her salary. Sometimes it’s an easy fix. Other times it takes a bit more thinking and shuffling to make it work.

It’s still hard for me to believe that the damn thing will actually start being shot in a little more than a month. I stopped by the producer’s office today for a meeting and there were already a few people starting the early stages of pre-production. Part of me, the pessimist annoying part, still thinks that something will happen and force the shoot to be canceled. Seeing the new people in the office today helped me silence that pessimist grump. Still, I’ll feel better when the film is officially announced because then it will be harder to go back and cancel it. Though you know, it could still happen. (Shut up, grump.)

Soon. Very soon.

I don’t believe in writing at night. Doesn’t work for me and even though a lot of people pretend it works for them, I suspect they are fooling themselves. Which is why I was happy to find this post on Dead Things on Sticks (Denis is a screenwriter based in Toronto):

« Writing at night is bullshit.
[…]
We live in difficult times. People seem to have trouble telling the truth — they even seem to have trouble recognizing the truth, it seems. The night, for me, has never been about truth. The night is about regret and secrecy and passion, and longing and recrimination and rumination. But not truth. Truth is best observed and channeled in the morning’s light. And truth is essential to what we do.
[…]
What I think about at night, what I don’t think about at night, what I don’t realize I’m thinking about until it works its way into my dreams, that’s filling the tank. Night is for maintenance and detailing. And mornings are for writing. »

Actually, in my case it’s more like « afternoons (1 to 7pm) are for writing ». Mornings tend to be about returning phone calls, correspondance, financial matters, filling, etc. I’ll work through the night if I have to but I know it’s not when my writing is at its best.