MALLRATSIAN

So I just re-read (and changed a few lines) of my first script. I am prepping it to send it out to the 2005 Nicholl Fellowships in Screenwriting. I put the link there because I know I can trust you and you won’t send your screenplay there thus making the competition for a 30 grand writing fellowship any harder for me to secure. This will be the second Fellowship to which I submitted HEARSAY. The first was Disney. They passed. I also sent it to the Slamdance Screenwriting Competition. I did not win, show or place. They were kind enough to offer me coverage. And by ‘offer’ I mean I paid them to criticize me. Unfortunately they gave me less constructive criticism than I hoped. They wrote that the concept and execution were great, the dialog sucked. I should say, that is the opinion of the one guy that read my screenplay. I am one draft removed from those contests and criticisms. The final draft was inspired by a good friend’s thoughtful and savage outline of everything right and wrong in my script.

Now I need to print this monster out and send it off.

John?

Yes, imaginary audience?

Why haven’t you sent out any query letters yet to production companies that are looking to produce an inexpensive and original romantic comedy?

Wow, uh, good question. Uh, MALLRATS.

MALLRATS? What the hell kind of answer is that?

I’ll explain. I recently watched MALLRATS. Although I find it a funny movie, I feel the dialog is stilted and self-conscious and designed for the joke. In the months since I finished HEARSAY, it began to creep into my mind that my script might be something like that. The characters are smart and sassy and talk fast and funny. I thought of that as a strength. As I watched MALLRATS and as every character says every silly thing that came to Kevin Smith’s mind, I worried that all my imaginary friends who I thought spoke like me and my friends, were actually just spouting exposition and pseudo clever things that made us all laugh when we said them in real life.

Long Sentence (No suggestions)

As I said I just re-read it. I think I was being hard on myself. It’s funny. It has less exposition than I feared. I’ll send it out to Nicholl and I swear I will get on the query stick ASAP. That damn query blog is making me quite nervous.

Will try to write in new script today or tomorrow.