My biggest musical obsession for Weird Girls seems to be Fever Ray and Lykke Li. No, the show is not set in Sweden. I’m just in love with what they’re doing musically. The first one I’ll point out has a title that I just love for the show. It’s a Lykke Li song called “Youth Knows No Pain.”

I don’t think there’s an official video of the song but if you find one let me know. I just love the shot in that video.

The next one is a great song and I found of it on a YouTube video a few months ago. It’s not an “official” video, but HelloGiggles posted it on their stream and I can’t tell you how many times I watched. It’s another great song by Lykke Li called “I’m Good I’m Gone.” I think it’s better than the “official” video personally.

The best thing about that video is just how happy she it. That’s how I want the kids in “Weird Girls” to feel.

I want to jump stateside before I get to Fever Ray and point out a song that just screams at me whenever I hear it. There’s an episode cliffhanger in particular that I would LOVE to be able to use this song on. It’s “Judas” by Lady Gaga.

That song would be amazing over the closing credits for that episode. Now if I can just get Lady Gaga to give me the rights to use it in the show. We’re all little monsters here you know. Gaga, you listening? Call me.

So now we can go back to Scandinavia with a song I can’t stop listening to by Fever Ray. It’s called “I’m Not Done.” When I was writing the season finale, this song is that one that played in my head over and over again. There’s no official video so I’ll just post this one, but if you do a search you’ll see plenty of interpretations of the song.

This is the best part of the song…

“One thing I know for certain
I’m pretty sure
It ain’t over
I’m not done”

That will make more sense once you see the season 1 finale. That is once we get it made.

What about you? Do you ever listen to music when you write?

Aimee is a great Austin-based actor and I love working with her. One of my favorite things from her is a bumper she did for SXSW directed by Joe Nicolosi. He does a TON of great work like “Kittywood Studios” or the “Mario Bros. Indie Movie Trailer.” Oh and let’s not forget “Star Wars: Retold.”

Take a look at Aimee’s bumper.

[vimeo]http://vimeo.com/9543387[/vimeo]

When I was putting together the table read for Weird Girls, Aimee was at the top of my list of people to ask. Once I find great people I tend to want to work with them a lot. She had actually seen some early early drafts of the scripts so I was anxious to see what she thought in a full reading with other actors.

So please take a minute to visit her blog and read her thoughts. My personal favorite is…

“These weird girls are loyal, resourceful, funny and smart–they are the kind of girl I would have loved to be at 13, and they’re the kind of girls I want the girls in my life watching and emulating right now.”

And that’s exactly what I was going for. Those are all qualities that I would want the girls in my life emulating as well.

I really can’t wait to make this show.

I’ve also been obsessed with Mass Effect and the impending release of the next game in the franchise in March.

I’ve always really enjoyed the storytelling in Mass Effect and earlier today I realized that the Death of Superman explains one of the reasons I enjoy the game and the story behind Mass Effect.

(Careful…. spoilers to “The Hunger Games” and “Serenity” are nestled below)

Nestled in the back of the “The Death and Return of Superman” sits a little nugget of wisdom. (Watch the whole thing if you have time. It’s worth it, if for nothing else Elijah Wood as Cyborg Superman. If not, I’ve jumped you to the end here.)

“The sacred suspension of disbelief, as far as death, had ended.”

Good stories should engender some kind of emotion. You should feel happy, angry, scared… run the list of emotions and a good story should make you feel that. That includes feeling sad and feeling a sense of loss. Those are real human emotions and the power of great storytelling is to take the viewer to those places we don’t like to go.

The death of a beloved character in a story can hit those notes with engaged viewers, maybe better than any other. Tell me you didn’t feel a shock when Wash was killed at the end of Serenity. And don’t tell me you didn’t get choked up in the middle of “The Hunger Games” when Rue died as Katniss sang her a lullaby. (Here’s an awesome fan video of that moment, but full o’ spoilers. Don’t say I didn’t warn you.)

When you take away the finality of death you lose the ability to have death mean something to the characters and, more importantly, to the viewers.

Which leads me to one of the reasons I’ve enjoyed playing Mass Effect so much.

The decisions you make throughout the game have a profound effect on how things play out. After several hours of playing I found myself caring about the other characters. It’s like watching 40 hours of your favorite TV show with characters you’ve grown to like, dare I say love.

And if you make the wrong decision, they die.

No more conversations. No more joining you on missions. No more romance options. No more banter with other team members. Done. Over.

In Mass Effect 1 you’re forced to make a decision about the fate of one of your team. There’s no turning back from that. That decision means that character is gone for good.

That precedent makes those decisions more real in Mass Effect 2. As a viewer I know that death is “sacred,” to use Max Landis’ phrase. These characters aren’t coming back, resurrected by some tagged on plot device. As a viewer I won’t get to see their story play out. There were times that I spent forever just trying to decide what I wanted to say and the decisions I wanted to make. I didn’t want to lose those characters.

And that’s brilliant. That’s great storytelling.

The reality and finality of death in Mass Effect takes the viewer deeper into the world and makes them more engaged in the story.

But Superman can never die. So why should I care.

Today I just finished my first draft of my first comic book script.

It felt like I was writing in a completely different language with a totally different alphabet.

Part of the “Weird Girls” project is creating a comic book that goes into another part of the world that’s being built around it. So I need to push myself to write those scripts. Actually let me rephrase that. I need to learn how to write those scripts. There are a lot of differences between writing for comics and writing for film.  Fortunately there are a lot of resources to help people learn how to write comic book scripts. Here are a couple of pages I found and liked…

Script Frenzy

BBC Comic Book Format

So what exactly are the differences? It’s still just a script, right?

Let’s start off with the format. Screenplays are really standard in their format. That strict format helps me gauge how long each episode is. Correctly formatted, one page is generally estimated at one minute of screen time. That’s why a one-hour TV show is usually 44 pages long. (Lot of commercials, huh?)

Comic book scripts don’t have specific formats. That’s not to say there aren’t rules or expectations. How you define each page and panels are fairly standard. But there are a couple of ways to format the dialogue. Even Movie Magic Screenwriter (my writing software of choice) has a couple of different templates with different formats for comic book scripts. Here’s the same section of a script  in two different templates…

Generic Comic Format

Gossett-Kayle Format

It’s a subtle difference, but try to get away with that writing for film. Actually don’t. Because you probably won’t get away with it.

Another subtle difference turned out to be one of the toughest things for me to adjust to. It really is a difference in mindset.

It’s always pounded in to screenwriters to not “overwrite.” Keep character actions minimal. Keep descriptions of actions minimal. The more white space on a page, the better.

In comic book scripts, you have to describe every thing you expect to see in the panel. As a writer, if you want to see a certain expression, reaction, scenery, prop, weather, puppy, reflection, spaceship, you name it, then you have to describe it in the panel description. That’s how you express to your illustrator what needs to be in the panel.

To adapt, I found myself writing the dialogue first and then going back to fill in the panel descriptions. Maybe that’s how everyone does it. Maybe that’s just how I do it. But it got me through the first draft of my first issue.  Now it’s just a matter of revising the script so I can send it off and get an illustrator officially attached.

There are a lot of other things I learned as I wrote this script. Comic books really are another language. It’s unique from screenplays and novels. It’s somewhere in between. The greatest thing for me is that it forced me to think about story in a way I haven’t in a while. Now I’m excited to start working on the second issue.

If I learn anything else I’ll be sure to let you know. What do you guys think? What are some other differences between writing for comic and writing screenplays?

I think we did a pretty good job mixing up our shots so it felt fresh throughout the series.

We also used a little trick to help express things to the viewers that they hopefully never realized.

When I break down the majority if Season 1 of CELL, I look at it as if there are really only 2 types of scenes, excluding the finale. One consists of our two heroes alone with each other. The other includes the Man in the cells with our heroes.

When we see Brian and Sarah together by themselves, it’s usually pretty calm. Sure they get into some arguments, but overall they’re safe. They’re in control of their space. For any shot with just the two of them together the camera stayed on sticks (tripod) to give the frame a nice steady feel. Any movements were done on a dolly or jib to give it a smooth, controlled feeling.

On the flip side, anytime the Man was in the frame, it was a handheld shot. The subtle movement of the camera added just enough imbalance to disorient the viewer a tiny bit. I didn’t want the effect to be a huge contrast. I just wanted it subtle enough to give the viewer the sense that something changed whenever the Man came into the scene. All of the camera movements were done by hand as well which gave a nice frantic feel when the camera moved.

There are a few instances where we actually broke that rule, and each one was for a specific reason.

One was in episode 10. When Sarah confronts the Man, the shot follows her as she walks across the cell to the bars. We kept that shot on sticks and used a dolly to track her movement. I wanted that shot to be controlled, because for the first time in the show, Sarah is in control when the Man is with them.

Another time we broke the rule was in episode 12. At its deepest level, Sarah is in control now so we kept the camera locked down for that entire episode. (That episode also has no music. It’s the only episode where the only music is Sarah singing at the end.)

I hope that those subtle changes worked for the viewers. Can you find the other times that we changed out camera moves? Did it work for you?

The Katie that almost was...

Not too many people realize that we shot the finale to Season 1 of CELL twice. When we had the opportunity to work with the amazing Emmy-nominated Beth Chamberlin, we jumped at the chance. It had been months since we shot the finale and there was a question if we could even make it happen.

Ultimately we did pull it together. And sitting on a shelf a few feet away from me is the footage from that first shoot that has never seen the light of day. 

When I first talked with Beth about coming down to shoot with us I realized that it would take some work to make it happen. First off I had to rewrite the script.

I really needed to beef up Beth’s character. That role had so much potential and I wanted her to have as much to chew on as possible. I made her more active and more in control and rebuilt the mythology of the show around her retooled character. She went from someone who controlled the scene to a woman that COMMANDED the scene. It was a great change that fit in more with the wider universe of CELL and also made the last scene that much more dynamic.

The bigger challenge came in the cast. It had been so long since we shot that some of our actors had moved or weren’t available. That meant recasting.

The biggest part I had to recast was that of Katie. She plays a pivotal role in Season 2 so I had to make sure she was spot on. I had an amazing actress named Natalie Self who played Katie when we first shot. She was amazingly talented and a joy to work with. I knew she was the one I was looking for as soon as she finished her first reading at auditions. Unfortunately she had moved to New York City. I see her pop up in videos on YouTube and she’s an amazing dancer. Granted I do harbor a secret love for dance that goes back to “Smooth Criminal.” *Insert ‘Dazed and Confused’ comments here* Half the reason I watch “Glee” is for Heather Morris.  Take a look at Natalie in action (she’s the one in purple)…

I contacted Natalie and unfortunately she couldn’t make it back down for the shoot and the prep we needed. So I recast the part with Hilary Wagner.  Just like Natalie did, as soon as I saw Hilary read I knew she was the one for the part. Hilary brought a different look and feel to the character that I loved. I even rewrote some parts for the character and changed the direction because of it.

Scott Friedman and Scott Mullins... I didn't do it on purpose

The role of Drew was one I had to recast as well. Scot Friedman is an amazing theatre actor in Austin and he was unavailable for our reshoots because of a theatre production. I ended up recasting his character with Scott Mullins. Once again the new casting brought a different energy to the character. I ended up rewriting some of the mythology of the series around those changes as well.

Another big challenge was that Beth doesn’t live in Austin so she wasn’t able to come down for any rehearsal time. There’s a lot going on in the last scene and we had a very limited time to get it on film.  The big thing I had to get to her was how we were going to handle the fight at the end. I worked with an amazing Krav Maga instructor in town, Kersten Lillejord Levine, to choreograph the short fight at the end of the finale. I shot Kersten and Hilary rehearsing and sent it off to Beth with instructions from Kersten on how to make it look great. Beth, being the consummate pro and an amazing athlete to boot,  nailed it.

Did I forget to mention we had to find a new location?  We were very lucky that Jourdan Gibson’s cousin had a beautiful house they said we could use. When I first saw it I knew it would be perfect because of the bar motif in the house. Bars are on the windows and that same iron bar theme is carried inside the house with the stairs. The cell on the inside was matched by the bars on the outside.  Niiiiiice.

After all of that, we ended up with two different versions of our Season 1 finale. At this point we can all only imagine what the finale would have been like with the original cast. It changed so much they really are two different worlds. How would Katie have changed? Would Drew be holding his daughter in the Season 2 teaser? Would Beth’s character really be confronting a Cadre?

People ask if I’m ever going to release the original shoot. I haven’t decided yet.

Maybe that’s a DVD extra.

But it does make me want to do a musical version of CELL even that much more.

Thanks so much Lauren! You really are more than nice and I’m really excited you liked the script.

I also came up with some great ideas on ways to make “Weird Girls” even better so I’ve got to work on those on top of the changes to the script. Oh and did I mention I have to write scripts for a comic tie in?

I hope you can all watch the live stream Thursday evening at 8:00 CST at http://www.youtube.com/iawtvorg

CELL is up for 6 awards at the show. We’re up for Best Drama, Best Writing in a Drama, Best Female Performance in a Drama, Best Male Performance in a Drama, Best Cinematography, and Best Score. The other nominees are brilliant so it will be tough but keep your fingers crossed that maybe we can bring home a couple of trophies.

Regardless of the outcome, it’s a great honor to be nominated by your peers for these awards. It’s also a great moment for the industry and we’re all going to be a part of it. So check out the live stream and follow @IAWTV and @IAWTVAwards for all the details and the play-by-play all week.

Oh, and I’ll also be moderating a panel on music in web series and I’m a panelist for the Best Drama nominees. They’ll be taping those and putting them up on the YouTube channel as well. So watch it all! There will be some great panels going on.

After 5 hours, a bunch of sandwiches, bottled water, and a few boxes of the best cupcakes in Austin (I’m looking at you Sugar Mama’s)… I finally have my answer.

I’m admittedly very hard on myself and my work. I’m probably worse than an albino numerary of Opus Dei when it comes to flogging myself. I can also sincerely say that yesterday’s reading exceeded every expectation I had about the story and the characters.

Don’t get me wrong. There is plenty to fix. One episode in particular needs some work and we all discussed things that went wrong with that one and ways that it can be fixed. There are a few other places that need some tweaking and a little more character development for some of the supporting roles.  A couple of jokes fell flat and are about to get taken out completely and some jokes added in. I need to work the pacing in some sections to make sure we don’t lose the characters in the action and vice-versa. I’ve got notes from everyone there about what they liked and didn’t like and why. I’ve also got ratings on every episode on a scale of 1 to 5. (Every episode, except that one outlier, averaged above a 4.5.) I’ll be taking all of those notes and putting them to use in another pass of the scripts.

I also learned what did work…

• Everyone loved the strong female characters and young role models, which made me very happy. That’s what I was going for from day one.
• Most of the jokes hit. We had to slow down a few times so the actors could recover from laughing so hard. I was nervous about that since if you watched my other show, CELL, you know that I don’t really go for the funny in that one.
• The scary parts creeped people out and usually kept people on edge. It was nice when we would finish an episode cliffhanger and people had that reaction of “What’s next??!!” or just have a general shiver.
• And yes there’s some gross. And yes, it was awesome.

Maybe the most fun for me was the raucous discussion about which catch phrases people want on t-shirts. So far the leaders are…

• “Chest Area”
• Burn Sage
• Salted, bitch
• I don’t like cuddles.
• It’s the boob connection.
• I gotta go to France.

So all in all it was a great reading. The actors that came in were amazing. They took 150 pages of material and easily brought it to life. Make sure you check them out in this earlier post.

Next step is to REVISE REVISE REVISE. It was a great reading but there’s plenty to work on to make “Weird Girls” even better. It has to be spectacular in order to succeed with the amazing content that keeps coming out. Independent creators keep raising the bar and we have to step up and clear it.

I’ll also be finishing up budgeting and once that’s done, we start the long process of raising money to shoot.

So tell your friends. After the success of this table read I can definitely say that I’m more motivated than ever to make “Weird Girls” happen and to knock it out of the park.

Red v Blue Table Read at HaloFest

I’m always amazed when I hear people say that “writing is easy.” I’ll take a (probably uncontroversial… because I hate conflict) stand and say that they couldn’t be more wrong.  Well, they could… but they would have to think Greedo shot first.

Writing a solid script takes a lot of time and energy. Make sure the characters are unique. Make sure the mythology is consistent. Make sure the dialog sounds real. Make sure the story makes sense. Make sure characters have an arc. Make sure the story has an arc. And that’s just the creative side of it.

The best tool I’ve ever used for finding out if scripts work is the simple table read. There’s a great feeling when you have talented actors read the script as those characters for the first time. There’s also that horrible feeling in the pit of your stomach when you realize something doesn’t quite work. There are few things more satisfying, more stressful, or more helpful than for a writer to hear his script read for the first time.

This Saturday I’m hosting my very first table read for “Weird Girls” with a brand new group of actors.

Exciting. Stressful. Fun. All wrapped in one shiny little package. And that’s just where it starts.

Of course calling it a “simple” table read is a little bit too simplistic.

Two days out and I’m still making last minute edits to the scripts to tighten them up as much as I can. There are 10 episodes with about 150 pages total. That’s a lot of dialog to go over. And over. And over. Because I’m a little obsessive like that.

In the real world that I so fervently avoid, there’s not much more I can do with the scripts until I get some feedback to find out what works.  Tomorrow I’ll call it in the evening and start printing out a TON of paper. Then I get the fun job of marking up the scripts to help out the actors reading. Saturday will be the first time any of them will have seen these scripts so I need to do anything I can to help them out.

Speaking of actors, table reads need talented actors. That means casting. This isn’t final casting but it’s just as important. Having talented actors read can’t be underestimated. A good actor really brings a character to life and shows you exactly what works and what doesn’t.

Everyone who submitted to read had to include references and yes, I did check those references. Since I didn’t do a physical casting where I could meet the actors beforehand, those references were vital. After obsessively (do you see a trend here?) pouring over the submissions, I settled on a great group to come in a read.

I’m really excited about the group I’ve got coming in and most are actors I’ve never worked with before. I’m sending out the last information on the read to them as well.

So take a minute and meet the actors…

Lauren Galley	Alexandra Intrator
McKenna Marmolejo	Annie Eileen
Trey Curtis	Ian Blake
Jen Brown	Aimee Thomas
Martinique Duchene-Phillips	Robert Lambert

I’ve been told that I’m an actor’s director. I love the whole process of working with actors to bring characters to life.  This weekend will be a great chance to make that happen again and finally hear what these characters sound like.

I’ll deal with the anxiety and stress later.