Yes, my posts have been few and far between as of late.
I’ve been working on final edits to a screenplay written with my partner, Devon Moore. And as the creative team behind Ninth and James Productions, I think I can speak for both of us and say the time away from the story has helped tremendously. The story now barrels down the road like a supercharged hot rod…
In other news, I’ve been working with UBIMS Inc. and founders Luke Ho-Hyung Lee and Jess Parmer. Luke and Jess have an innovative, if not revolutionary, if not actually evolutionary idea that could transform industries and economies around the world.
Our first article, describing the fundamental and essentially hidden problem confronting any economic recovery, is up on The Huffington Post.
There are a lot of projects on my short list, but it’s the usual excuses of too long a list, and not enough money or time.
But excuses just don’t cut it anymore, so my plan to get this documentary project going is to just do it — and structure the plan in such a way that all the shooting can be done on incredibly flexible schedules, and the budget can remain miniscule (for now, at least).
So here’s “One True Thing”. The idea is that our team sits down with someone at their preferred location, and once everything’s set up, all we do is ask for your first name, and to tell us one true thing.
It can be anything, from trivial to profound. So long as it’s true to you.
We also have some ground rules for ourselves/the project:
— First name only
— We won’t edit your response once you start on your true thing. That means once you being, we’ll run until you stop. So, no edits to make you look better, worse, or more concise.
— You can have more than one thing to say. We’ll just treat them separately.
— Don’t pressure yourself. We don’t expect Dalai Lama-league answers, so no worries. Something about your cat is acceptable…
What do WE get out of all this? Good question.
Expectations:
Sure, the first clip is three guys of various ages working in various levels of seriousness.
The real payoff should be when we reach a certain critical mass and broader themes emerge. Personally, I fully expect this to start focusing on religion, relationships and philosophy — but I could be completely wrong.
Maybe folks hone in on sports and cosmology, who knows?
If I were to point to an existing model for how I expect this to turn out, I’m going to reference one of my all-time favorite books and life guides: Directing the Film: Film Directors on Their Art, edited by Eric Sherman.
Yes, you’ll find a lot of practical advice on nearly every aspect of filmmaking by some of the greatest in the field — but that’s essentially a bonus.
What I find great is that within Sherman’s 352 pages of collected wisdom, you can read one absolutely sterling, profound and compelling piece of advice put forth by an absolute master of their craft — and on the next page, there’s another absolutely sterling, profound, and compelling piece of advice from yet ANOTHER master, completely and absolutely contradicting the first.
Example: Think about rehearsing your actors. There are a number of directors that weigh in on how their actors must be absolutely well rehearsed and prepared, so there’s no doubt about the lines, nuances or inflections before the cameras roll.
And there are a number of directors that talk about why anything beyond nominal rehearsal kills the energy and dampens the creative sparks from fresh discovery.
Who’s right? They all are. And that’s the point — the truths within this book are the truths that work for each person.
So that’s where I personally see “One True Thing”‘s potential. But we’ll see.
Technical Points:
As we add in clips, we’ll update the master video, and keep individual clips for easy reference.
We’re also COMPLETELY OPEN AND ENCOURAGING of outside submissions. So feel free to crank up your webcam or video recorder, work up a segment, and send it on.
Oh, and in the same announcement, George Lucas said he’d do the same. But few people ever doubted that Lucas’ heart was in the right place. With Ellison, it was less certain.
During the 1990’s tech boom, I worked for a nonprofit that doubled as both a (free, open) news and information service, and as a service provider to nonprofits — we went around the country teaching 501(c)3 groups of all stripes how to use tech to further their missions (and that covered a lot of ground).
It was a great job — even after 60-hour weeks living in hotels far across the country from my own bed, I always felt my work had helped people in specific, quantifiable ways.
It was also an exciting time to be reporting in that sector, because fortunes were being made overnight. (Looking back, we now know most of these fortunes were only on paper, but still, it was exciting.)
And it was particularly exciting because many of these tech entrepreneurs were giving away big chunks of their new fortunes in very public ways. The attitude at the time was that the people drawn to the tech/start-up culture were more in touch with their core values through their work, more in tune with how social networks can bring real benefits to society, and that the type of people working in that field were driven primarily by the thrill of innovation and discovery; not simply greed and profit.
I believe a lot of these (positive) stereotypes were true, although it would have been interesting to see how these newly rich folks would have held on to their values if the tech crash hadn’t removed most of their fortunes.
But I digress.
I was reminded of that time by Ellison’s announcement. He apparently was motivated by the VERY public appeal by Bill & Melinda Gates, and Warren Buffett, as part of their “The Giving Pledge” effort.
And during the time of the tech boom, the three biggest tech bazillionaires that HADN’T publicly pledged much of their personal fortunes (as opposed to corporate gifts and donations) were Bill Gates, Larry Ellison and Steve Jobs.
Melinda Gates and Bill Gates Sr. went first, announcing plans were underway to create a massive foundation that would funnel the trio’s fortunes into specific areas of global health initiatives, global development (economic aid to the poor), and tech/access and education initiatives in the U.S.
Ellison, not so much. At the time, he was fairly closed-mouth.
It turns out he has been giving away millions, but in a quieter, far less public way. Okay, there was that little dust-up with Harvard University, where he rescinded a $115 million gift because of their ousting of Lawrence Summers. (But Ellison also stated he’d increase his other giving to medical research.)
The reason he’s coming forward and signing this pledge now is that his example may lead other wealthy folks to give and/or make other commitments to the social good.
“Warren Buffett personally asked me to write this letter because he said I would be ‘setting an example’ and ‘influencing others’ to give. I hope he’s right,” he stated in his pledge.
Maybe one measure will be when (rather than if) Steve Jobs announces plans for HIS vast fortune, and how exactly he plans to give it away. That should be fascinating.
I’m pondering exactly how political to get in this blog, because there’s a lot to be said about both parties, Congress in general, and the team in the White House.
But I believe Bill Veeck summed it up completely, even though he was talking baseball: “All I ever said is that you can draw more people with a losing team, plus bread and circuses, than with a losing team and a long, still silence.”
I’ve been on the road this week (in fact, drove 850 miles in 11 hours on Monday — it wasn’t a great idea, but I will brag about it), so this post isn’t exactly timely. But I want to vent before tomorrow’s post-turkey overdose.
I’m generally not a sports assclown, but I am a huge fan of football, and would like to note that the Chicago Bears lost AGAIN Sunday, 24-20, at home to the Philadelphia Eagles.
But the Bears could just as easily lost to the Eagles, the band, in their current touring lineup:
Timothy B. Schmit – bass guitar, acoustic guitar, vocals
And Frey has no wind at all because he doobed his way through the 70s, 80s, and 90s.
Why do the Bears suck so bad? It has to come from the top: ownership, management, coaching, star players. That’s obvious, but not too interesting.
What’s stunning to me as a current Chicago resident is that the sports base in the greater Chicagoland area actually puts up with this crap. Come on, this is a storied franchise! Why the suckball for so many seasons? And who in ownership is so in love with Rex Grossman that they’ve essentially cloned him as Jay Cutler?
But I don’t put this on Cutler. It takes a village of underperformers to keep things this mediocre, and few QBs could stand in the pocket as their O-line collapses like Iceland’s economy. Not to mention not having a true 1-WR, stand-out backs and ends, et al.
I didn’t grow up a Bears fan, so I feel more objective in my criticism. Being from North Carolina, the choices then were the Atlanta Falcons or Washington Redskins, which is why I pulled for the Miami Dolphins and the Pittsburgh Steelers. Oh, speaking of, here’s hoping the Panthers suck just enough to get their head coach, John Fox, booted so Bill Cowher can step in with little fuss. It may not happen, but it would be sweet.
So the Bears will likely not collapse completely — they play the Ravens and the Rams, although they have to play the Vikings twice in 30 days — but it can’t look good for next season.
Posts like this may explain why Lovie hasn’t yet accepted my friend request on Facebook, though.
James Hyatt 