“I’m Not Insane! My Mother Had Me Tested!”

A few months ago I posted a review of Parks and Recreation and I have come to the conclusion that I don’t feel the same way about the show as I did before. I still think it’s had some good episodes but I’ve been slightly disappointed week after week. After watching back to back episodes of P&R and then Community (on hulu), I have to say that I preferred Community to P&R four out of five times. Community’s holiday episodes were better/funnier every time with more imaginative plotlines, sharper dialogue, etc. I’m still a P&R fan but I hope they start surprising me.

Also, my new favorite sitcom is The Big Bang Theory. I saw it a couple of times on airplane rides to and from LA/NJ. A few months after that I finally decided to watch the show all the way through. The show centers on three extremely gifted physicists and one talented engineer whose social awkwardness stifles their lives outside of their lab rooms and halo nights. In the pilot an attractive blonde waitress moves in across from two of the friends, Sheldon Cooper (Jim Parsons) and Leonard Hofstadter (Johnny Galecki). Leonard befriends her, which shakes up the daily routine that the guys have grown so accustom to. My favorite aspects of this show include its sharp and smart dialogue and its character development. A mix of neurotic behavior, OCD, genius intelligence, and a lack of social understanding, makes Sheldon Cooper one of the best sitcom characters I’ve ever seen. He says a lot of things that the average modern gal, guy or cynic may want to say out loud everyday but doesn’t. This show has also provided a platform for Nobel Prize winners, comic book heroes, and classic sci-fi TV characters to make very amusing cameos. Best of all, the show is a refreshing take on love and friendship and the fact that it’s been renewed for TWO more seasons, at least, makes me very happy. My goal for next season is to secure tickets to a live taping of the show! It shoots in Burbank and tickets are free from tvtickets.com

Fun facts: The Big Bang Theory shares executive producers from Roseanne and many of the characters from that sitcom make appearances on this one, including Johnny Galecki, Sara Gilbert and Laurie Metcalf.

The theme song is performed by Bare Naked Ladies.

The show’s had several Emmy nominations and last year it won a People’s Choice award for Favorite TV Comedy.

Ratings are high here in the states, but I also read that The Big Bang Theory is the number 1 sitcom in Latin America, go figure.

Let me leave you with some amusing quotes from the show:

I'm polymerized tree sap and you're an inorganic adhesive, so whatever verbal projectile you launch in my direction is reflected off of me, returns to its original trajectory and adheres to you.

Oh, well, this would be one of those circumstances that people unfamiliar with the law of large numbers would call a coincidence.

Oh Gravity, thou art a heartless bitch.

And of course…

I'm not insane! My mother had me tested!

“My Favorite Genre of Movie Are Ones That Get Made”—

--says John August as he moderates part 3 of the FIND Directors Series, a series of discussions between filmmakers, sound editors, actors, producers and more, hosted by Film Independent. I attended two of these events over the last few weeks. Each session had a focus; the first one’s topic was “working with actors” and the second focused on “sound in filmmaking.”

Panel One had crew members from The Blind Side, including Director John Lee Hancock and actress Kim Dickens, along with 2004’s the Alamo actor Jason Patric. What I remember most about that panel is Hancock’s admission that any good director isn’t afraid to say he doesn’t know the answer to a problem. He, Dickens and Hancock discussed problem days when certain scenes just wouldn’t work and how they problem-solved their issues. He suggested time, if you have it, to stop and go back to a particular scene. He also suggested opening a dialogue with the actor instead of trying to diagnose an issue and pick out problems when you don’t really know why something isn’t working. Basically, he believes that honesty can be the best policy when trying to get the right performances from actors.

The second panel I went to had Jeffrey Friedman, one of the two directors of HOWL, a Sundance 2010 film festival opener, and Lora Hirschberg from Skywalker Sound who was the sound editor for the film. Focusing on sound was refreshing since it seems to be one of the lesser discussed topics in filmmaking. One point that I wholeheartedly agreed with was stated by Hirschberg. She said that you should always try to get the cleanest takes while you’re on set. If sound tells you they need one more, you should get one more. The extra five minutes will pay off in the end when you aren’t stuck in a black box with your actors trying to record ADR and recapture that amazing moment that you saw materialize on set, five months later.

But my favorite quote was spoken by moderator John August, whose screenwriting credits include Go and Big Fish. It is also the title of this blog. He reminded me that making a film is a huge feat, but also, that having multiple project ideas in different genres is a good thing. Keep your options open and don’t be afraid to try a genre that you normally wouldn’t. The point is simple: get your work out there and get something made.

You can watch the videos by clicking here or by visiting Film Independent’s website.

First Time to Utah, First Time to Sundance, 10 Things I Wasn’t Expecting

(Sorry I've taken a little while to update but hopefully that will be changing!)





1.) To be 100 percent surrounded by mountains. Yes, I’ve been to Colorado and rode up to the top of Pike’s Peak, but I’ve never stood in a town and been able to turn 180 degrees and see nothing but a jagged barrier landscape, makes you feel like you’ve been dropped in a teacup where the sides of the cup are gigantic mountains.

2.) Such rustic lodging. There were deer antlers on my wall, ‘nuff said.

3.) To regret forgetting a hat. I know how that sounds but I had gloves, multiple scarves, two winter coats and snow boots; yet, because it snowed nearly every day a hat became paramount. Also, the lines were quite long as we waited to get into a screening. Good thing we had hundreds of awesome SAGIndie hats and I eventually got my hands on one.

4.) To see Robert Duvall in person! Probably the actor I was most moved to see. He came up on stage along with his co-stars Bill Murray, Sissy Spacek and Lucas Black after the screening of their film Get Low. He didn’t have too much to say but he did speak fondly of the mule they used in the film.

5.) To meet Amber Benson and Adam Busch. They attended SAGIndie’s Filmmaker’s Lunch and they were representing their Slamdance competition films Cummings Farm and Drones. Yes, I know each of them as an ex-Buffy season 6 cast member and that season’s wannabe supervillian, respectively.

6.) To learn so much about Right to Work states. Utah is one of them, which made for an interesting discussion during our SAGIndie Panel, which included our National Director Darrien Gipson, SAG’s Diversity National Director Rebecca Yee, as well as the New Media National Director Mark Friedlander and National Director of Digital Marketing Steve Graham.

7.) To see John Carroll Lynch at our SAGIndie Actor’s Brunch and have him not talk in a Minnesotan accent.

8.) To have a film that I knew little about end up being my Sundance favorite: Hesher. Obscene and unapologetic, it had some authentic, heartfelt moments. (Joseph-Gordon Levitt to the right in Hesher)

9.) To be one of the audience members who asked a question during a post-screening Q & A. After I saw Splice, I had to ask director Vincenzo Natali a question: did he mean for his sci-fi horror flick to be so darn funny? Splice had the most audience participation of any film I saw, it scared us, made us grimace, gawf, squirm and most importantly, laugh. His answer: horror and comedy make good bedfellows so yes, absolutely, I was expecting laughs. I was happy to hear this because if you can laugh at the characters and the story a little then this movie has got to be my second favorite.


10.) To have a week in Utah go by so fast.