lucky number seven? or: we have passed the halfway point or: the 7th one...the 7th script

February has been a strange  month...and, if I am completely honest, I've been a tetch lazy for a bit. Busy, but mostly lazy.  plus I have stuff lined up for march and april and just couldn't get my mojo woikin' for this.  plus I think all the events of Nov and Dec kinda all caught up with me at once and i'm a wee knee deep in exhaustion.

plus my film F**k New York got accepted into the Queens World Film Fest (still tix left...BUY Quite!!) and I've been trying to get all the marketing stuff for that. What do you think?

so anywhoo...I was floundering and then my wife pointed out that February is, in fact, a short month so I had better get off my keester, meester so here we are.

I thought it might be a fun little experiment (read: I couldn't think of a fucking thing to write) to revisit an ancient script back from the day when I was just a fledgling writer wannabe with no clue what i was doing and maybe rewrite it now that I'm a fledgling wannabe writer with a slight clue as to what i am doing.

the script is St. Genesius: The Actor's Church.  It was originally written as a sketch for a comedy troupe I was in called House of the Dead. and I think it was 1999-ish...possibly 2000-ish but it's at least a decade old and quite shitty.

here is the original script:  The Actor's Church It's in playscript format.

My friend, Melanie, actually took this and "optioned" it (meaning she made me a cake) and actually filmed this. I'm begging her to get me a copy so I can post...so stay tuned for that.

So when revisiting this script, I was struck immediately by a) how terrible it is and b) how many stupid pop culture references are in it (for crying in the sink I talk about Jessica Tandy...) and c) I guess Charlie Sheen was messin' up back then as well.  It was mostly just me trying to be funny and failing at being clever.

but I still think that idea is solid: An Actors Church that  treats actors like everyone else treats actors (like shit).

so i took to the rewrite.  I think there was a solid concept here and what I needed to do was cement the character of Lucy in the real world...give her a real need to get into that church. An actor's need. Once I hit upon the sincerity of her through-line...I was free to make Jimmy and Bill even more detestable. because I could just give them their own real world needs...to fill their church with the proper personnel.

here is the end result:  St. Genesius