after my two hour power-lunch with a successful screenwriter, i’m uncertain what i can or should do with my life. but i was uncertain before. on one hand, he said, If i can do it you can do it. luck and grit. the ability to sit still. &c. on the other, he said he doesn’t understand this business, no one does. he could be out tomorrow (aaron mcgruder said that too. i suppose it’s a truism about most kinds of success). we had a pleasant chat; i really enjoyed it. tho he stated and restated his committment to the mainstream, the man’s hair, tweed, and glasses all point to intellectual with-a-capital-i. he looks like what he is, the son of an english professor and a librarian and a life-long resident of swarthmore, pennsylvania. he may have eaten lunch with nicole kidman but what shows is he’s a writer.
to finish with a flourish, he said, not to rain on your parade or anything —
and this came on top of: nothing new comes out of hollywood; every screenplay is digested by a 12-stomached cow before it makes it to the screen and the vast vast majority succumb to the bile; people like charlie kaufman, todd solondz, david lynch and neil labute (a) are flukes and (b) don’t exist
— but a screenplay on victoria woodhull, the subject of my screenplay qua honors thesis project, is in the works, a pet project of the man who did robocop. the kicker is, his’ll undoubtedly be far better than mine.