The Write Time

I'm back in Sydney now after a glorious week down in Victoria. Was in Melbourne first for producer meetings and a friend's 40th, then went down to the Mornington Peninsula and did a vineyard crawl over two days, staying in a lovely retreat with a roaring fire and a fluffy cat. Bliss!

In Melbourne I met up with Deborah Kol, my producer for DeCodeMe, to discuss the treatment. She's put it out for consultation amongst a few industry contacts and it'll be another couple of weeks before I get notes, but her initial reaction was favourable. We discussed a few points which could do with a finesse, but by-and-large she was happy with it. We'll just have to see how the notes come back.

I also met up with my DARK ANGELS collaborator, David Raynor, and we had a good night out. David's finishing off the short and we talked about the possible feature version.

I also met up with Julia Harari, which is always a pleasure, and had a gas about playwriting and other writing/acting/directing-related stuff.

But now I'm back in Sydney I need to pull my finger out and get back into the writing big time. I had my playwriting course on Wednesday where half the class read out their first drafts of their ten minute plays. I have to say they were excellent. So no pressure on me in wave two next week when I get to read out mine.

Of course, I haven't written it yet. I wrote a couple of pages whilst at the retreat in the Mornington, but I'm not real happy with it. With a couple of short story competitions coming up what I thought I might do is write it out as a story, which would give me the chance to explore the many different threads to the idea, then hone the short play down from that. But this weekend is also the second challenge of the NYC Midnight Flash Fiction Challenge (more anon), so I'm not sure I'll have the time to do that. But, although I feel a little bit of pressure to write something gobsmackingly wonderful for next week's class, I'm not too panicked. When I went to the gym today and as I was pounding the treadmill, I figured out where I'm going with the plot of the short play. In the changing room afterwards I was writing down my thoughts so I wouldn't forget and some guy asked me what was I doing, so I told him I was writing my last will and testament. Good idea, he said as he looked at my red face...

But, back to the NYC Midnight Flash Fiction Challenge. The results of the first round challenge one were posted today and I am pleased to say I ran in third in my group. My group's challenge was to write a 1,000 word story, in the fantasy genre, involving a public library and a remote control. So with the first round second challenge this weekend (I find out tomorrow afternoon what my theme will be) I have twenty points thanks to my story, 'Lonem the Librarian'. Theoretically this should put me in a good position to qualify for round two, but I was in this position last time I entered (in third place after the first challenge) but just failed to make the cut to the second round. So I need to make sure I rack up enough points with my second story.

So, lots to write this weekend. And I hope I can do justice to my short play idea.

I've also been trying to work out how to create my new website this week but am finding it tricky. So progress on that will be slow. I need to lose the 'Struggling Writer' tag if I'm to position myself in a more favourable light, hence my need for a new website.

Oh, and found out some pleasing news too about a friend of a friend I tried to help out before I left for Melbourne. A TV producer/director in London, he was in Sydney for a MTV shoot and I put him in contact with a few people who came up trumps, with Erin Black providing the burlesque performance and Donna King hosting. Shame I missed it.