The Rough Draft

It’s been an interesting last few weeks. Some things have been reinforced others are just as hazy and vaporous as they have ever been. Trying to get a commitment to anything in this industry, that’s the trick.

Which leads us to this moment. You’re probably wondering about the surfing reference and I will get to the real heart of that story in a bit but first I’d like to share a bit more of the personal first. During my mid twenties I sustained a terrible personal tragedy. My youngest son was killed in a house fire. To add insult to injury my other son who is Autistic was also badly burned as well and as a result spent months in intensive care and the Burn Unit of Vancouver General Hospital (of which I cannot express my gratitude enough). This was a couple of years before I became a screenwriter (which is another story in itself) at this point I was writing the first novel.

The thing about tragedy is that it skews your perception of reality a fair bit. I’m sure now that it’s all part of the grieving process but at the time the only way to describe it is that you’re essentially insane, well on your way to becoming a danger to yourself and to others around you. And though I felt that I was keeping it together, I was moments away metaphorically speaking from hitting the wall at full speed.

The crash came after a very insensitive phone call from an acquaintance who at first belittled the severity of my son’s death and then proceeded to try and sell me Amway. Something inside me, I’m guessing the last tether of control broke and I moved into the next stage of the grieving process anger. Unfortunately for me it decided to manifest itself as towering all destructive rage. The only way I know how to describe it is; It’s like having the accelerator stick in your car and even though you’re still at the wheel, the situation is rapidly moving out of control. We all know how that scenario ends, it ends in a crash .

Lucky for me, I realized that my actions were outside of acceptable societal behavior and sought help. I found a good therapist and over the course of the next three years, she helped me reassemble myself. The way I look at it we’re all sort of a picture painted on glass. When something really terrible happens, that glass is broken into a thousand little pieces. It’s possible to put the picture back together but there’s going to be cracks and little bits missing here and there from now on. You just have to grow to like the new picture and ignore the missing bits. A friend of mine talked about how after having major reconstructive surgery how hard it was to adjust to looking at somebody else in the mirror every morning. It’s kind of like that.

What does this have to do with surfing you want to know? I’m getting there and don’t worry it’ll tie into the writing thing as well.

So here I am reassembled. I figure the fire, my son’s death and everything else that goes with that set me back about three years creatively. It was a major blow to come back from. Not just for me but for my own family and even my community. I’m left with the after effects of PTSD (Post Traumatic Stress Disorder) still affecting my life to this day. I’m less tolerant of certain situations and more tolerant of others. The surfing thing? Well when I don’t get enough sleep the world around me really starts to rock and roll and I feel like I’m always falling forward. In fact it feels just like surfing. When I feel like that, I just make extra sure to listen to people and not to misinterpret their words because the distance between happy and angry in that state is very close indeed.

So that’s a ton of backstory. Probably more about me than you ever wanted to know but it’s mare about showing what the sum of a writer’s life is. Yes, very bad things have happened to me but you know what? I hurt, I retreated, I healed and I came back at it again, and again, and again. You keep coming back at it until something gives. You’re the drop of water, eventually that mountain has to give.

The other surfing story takes place at the Closing Gala of the Vancouver International Film Festival. I had just optioned a film out here in Toronto and an actor friend had invited me along to the Gala because he had an extra ticket and he knew I’d appreciate the gesture (I swear Dean, this year I’ll get you that part). At the Gala I went through the usual swirl of the beautiful and the damned. The first lot are almost always actors, the second lot include everybody and actors. The wine was free and bloody good I might add and even though I usually don’t drink in public (especially wine) this night I cut loose.

Her name was Anna and she was an actress or actor if your one of those PC idiots. I still lament to this day the loss of the word aviatrix from our lexicon as any asshole can be an aviator. But I digress. Anna was very pretty and like most actors (hell most people) much shorter than my 6′2″. I was well into my cups and my father’s genetic influence to wax rhapsodic when liquored was well upon me. So Anna asked me about my current option.

“How does it feel to sell something?” She asked in such a way that it was obvious she actually wanted to know. She wasn’t just making small talk.

I paused before answering. Not so much for dramatic effect as to sort the words out in my wine addled mind. “Have you ever body surfed?” I asked.

“As a matter of fact I have.”

“So you know what it’s like to swim out and wait for the right wave.”

“And you never know when it’s going to come.”

“Exactly, and when it does you have to paddle and kick like hell to get into it.”

She was digging the analogy I could see it in her eyes.

“And then when you hit the edge of the wave, it starts to roll over and you push down with everything to grab onto the power of it. That surge of energy in your chest as the wave picks you up and you start to ride it out.”
Anna nodded emphatically, “Yes.”
“Well it feels sort of like that.” I looked at her to gauge the impact of what I had said. I was hoping for mild appreciation of some decent metaphor. That’s not what I got.

She started to cry. Not those silent tears trickling down the cheeks that really touched my soul type of cheers. No, not for me the discreet, silent sob. I get the hugely lungful, deep air sucking, braying cries of a tormented soul. And she just kept getting louder. At this point, I’m looking for the exit. People in the crowd are giving me dirty looks like I’ve just told her that the child she carries couldn’t possibly be mine, even if she’s my high school sweetheart. I’m trying to explain to anybody who would listen that we only just met (at this point the wine and panic are working against me). When I’m saved by one of her friends who shoots me yet another dirty look and whisks her away.

My buddy Dean walks up and says, “What did you say to Anna?”

“I just told her how it feels to sell something.”

He slaps me on the back and goes, “Good job, dude.”

If you think for a second that scene isn’t going to make it’s way into a movie…

Okay, so bear with me a little longer, we’re getting to the end here and the real point of the article that really should be more about you than me. First off, we make connections with people having no idea of how that will affect our careers in later months or even years and two who you ally yourself with and how professional they are will directly impact your ability as a creative individual. Trust your gut, it’s smarter than your brain will ever be. Saddle yourself with the wrong individual and it can tar you with a very black brush or at the worst create an anchor that will hold you back from achieving your ultimate goals. Remember anchors are for ships at sea on land their just dead weight. In regards to the first point, meet everybody you can. Talk little and listen lots. What they say will reveal where they are and where they are going. Make friends with the ones who know of what they speak and bail on the want to be’s as fast as your little legs can carry you. The road is long make sure the weight you carry is your own and nobody else’s.

Things are happening behind the curtain right now. I’d love to tell you all about it but I’m waiting on the negotiation process to work its way through. The front end of this year was a tough one but the back end looks very promising. I’ll keep you informed as always as it happens.

In the meantime…

Good Luck and Good Writing.

Steve Abbott

Well our little horror film has wrapped. It’s in the can baby! Now it’s all up to those guys in post to work their magic and turn it into a finished product. Word has it that we’ll be on the shelves of your local video store sometime in March of next year. So look inside this article to find out what my one day on set was like.

It’s not often that the writer goes to set. For the most part, Director’s aren’t too happy to see you there because they usually feel that you disapprove of their work. Now the boys at Twisted Cow are certainly much more secure in themselves than that so there was no problem with me being on set in fact it all worked out rather well for everybody in the end.

A low budget set is usually comprised of people who can at the drop of a hat fulfill many different functions. On my last film project, I was not only the writer but also the guy who built the camera rig for the car shots and the high hat for the camera hood mount. I also cooked up the blood and fashioned a rather cool (but totally fake) naval cutlass. Then at various times during the shoot I was the weapons master, a grip and road control. You do what it takes to get the job done.

So for this shoot because I’d been gone for the majority of it, I was looking forward to being on set and just hanging out and eating craft service.

If only it were that easy.

I know a bit about generators, enough to be dangerous anyway. I was approached early on by one of the best boy grips. He had no power coming out of the generator unit. This is usually not too good of a thing. I sent him off to get a voltmeter and started to check his connections. Five minutes later it turned out that he’d just plugged one of the distribution boxes in incorrectly. An easy fix and we were up and running minutes later at least power wise. Ten minutes later Brian the Producer approached me.

“One of our Actors has bailed. How would you feel about playing the Coach?”

“I’m a Writer, not an Actor. I don’t know the first thing about acting.”

“Well you look like a Coach to me. Wardrobe!”

The next thing I know I’m being given a whistle and a stop watch, the universal gear of all coaches. Though I always thought it was a thrown chair.

Then came the makeup, an interesting experience and sort of fun. I may take it up as a hobby.

Next thing I know we’re shooting the scene and I’m doing my lines off camera. Now I may have written this thing but do you think I could remember my lines to save my life? Not a chance. Lucky for me the script was handy and it was only two lines. Pete, the guy playing Jay did a great job. I fed him my lines when he needed it and before you knew it, it was my turn. The camera was on me.

Now the two shot was no problem. You walk in do your line and then walk out. Then they switch it up to the close up and that’s a whole different kettle of fish. Am I on my mark, what’s my eye-line, forget that what’s my fucking line. Shit, I’ve got more than one. Dammit, the camera is rolling. Do these pants make my ass look fat? How many times do I have to do this? And then you’re done.

I walked of set and collected myself elsewhere in the building. I felt like I’d run a marathon. I’ve always respected the Actors but now I respect them just a little bit more.

Now if we could just get people to respect the writing…

This is Steve Abbott and I’m Waiting to Sell Out

Writing is about living life not shutting yourself off from it in some room. The only way to illustrate this point is to talk about my second favorite subject… Me. But don’t worry, there’s plenty about the craft in here too.

First however, I’d like to fill you in on a bit more about me than just what my bio on the main page talks about. I’m not one of those writers who writes out of his ass. If I’m putting it down, there’s a pretty fair chance that I’ve done something very close to the experience. In fact I’ve got a pretty solid rep as a writer who does research on a far deeper level than most. Research however will only take you so far. Sense experience is what you really need to convey your point effectively.

So yeah, I’ve had a lot of different jobs in my life. Most are of a technical bent but others, like the time I spent as a Bailiff in BC were not. For the most part, of that job I went around serving various papers on people. Sometimes it was a divorce, other times people were just exercising their right to sue other folks. I think my most memorable paper served was the small claims service I did to the BC Ombudsman of the day. The guy doing the suing had filled out the form (and I kid you not) in purple crayon. I think he lost his case. The Bailiff gig also involved seizing of property, which I always got a kick out of. Though the time I had a shotgun pointed at my head was an experience I probably could have done without. During the construction phase of my life, I built houses and condos as well as the odd turn rock scaling on the notorious BC, “Sea to Sky,” highway. Believe me when I say, when they say look out for falling rock, LOOK OUT FOR FALLING ROCK! We would have to freeze on those cliffs every ten minutes to let traffic by and there was not a second of the day where there wasn’t loose Scree rock slithering and rolling by me. That job was almost a capper when one of our choker cables snagged tight round a forty ton rock and tried to pull our High Ho Excavator off of the ridge we were working on.

What did all these jobs teach me? How people talk and what they talk about. I saw guys who could drink all night, get two hours of sleep and then climb hand over hand up a steel cored rope to their work station the next day. As a bailiff I got to see the lengths people will go to keep from paying monies owed, and just how nasty a nasty divorce can get.

What does this have to do with film you ask? Nothing but it’s got a whole lot to do with writing.

Hemmingway wasn’t the best writer in the world, regardless of what people say. For all intents and purposes he was a pretty surly bastard but you could never fault his authenticity. He fought in a war, he drank like a fish and he screwed lots of women. He lived and he wrote a bunch of it down. As a screenwriter, we need to know who our characters are and who they are going to become and a big part of that process is knowing their history. To create a believable history, you need to actually know a bit about what has gone before and then you need to filter that through your own experience. Or if you’re really good leave out the filter and jump deep into it.

A good example of this happened with my friend Steve O’Hearn. You’ve seen his articles here from time to time. He’s a fairly erudite guy and he spins a good tale. For many years until I moved to the Big Smoke he and I were part of one of the best writing groups I’ve ever been involved with. One day he brought a scene to one of our meetings that was a gunfight in a darkened underground parking garage. Now me being me and being known for not letting anything hang back, I told him the scene didn’t work technically. Steve of course wanted to know why. I told him that for one thing, the very location worked against our hero. He would be blinded by the muzzle flash of the handgun he was using and deafened by its report as well. As he was up against multiple combatants his chances of survival, at least believable survival were slim to none. But don’t take my word for it I said, come out with me next week to play some indoor paintball. It’s not even close to the reality but it’ll give you the faintest glimmer of what the situation would be like for your character. So Steve came out and after the first two games realized how much he would have to change the scene to make it work (but he did have fun doing it).

So my feelings on this whole thing is basically, know that whatever job you’re doing right now while you work towards your big break is not in vain. Listen to the people around you. Write down the situations that pissed you off or made you laugh today. Quit and do something else if it’s not working out for you but don’t dismiss it as wasted time because it isn’t. It’s just research and deep research at that.

Good Luck and Keep Writing.

Steve Abbott