Things seem very slow in town work-wise. Makes getting on a pilot look like a cake-walk. The TV shows seem to be staffed with everyone but PA's. I'm waiting to hear on a few features, but in the meantime the bills keep coming, so pragmatically speaking it looks like temping is in my imminent future.
Of course, there are the strike rumblings, but I don't think that it will actually happen. In 2001 we had the defacto strike simply because the threat was enough to panic the studios into stockpiling scripts. This trickled down and really hurt us wage slaves. I know I was out of work for a time as a result.
It may yet happen again, unless it has begun already. Or is it just part of the bell curve of the changing face of media? In 2001 the promise of TV on the internet had failed, now 6 years later we have YouTube and the Director's Guild is signing deals for internet broadcast webisodes.
Look at the Fall line-ups, so little scripted material in network TV. More reality and very few half hour comedies. More spin offs of hour long franchises. In my opinion, cable continues to stand out as the superior product generator. Maybe that's what's happening? It's been two camps, cable versus network -- each trying to eat the other. Only now there's the internet and it's gnawing at them both.
Will the internet eat the networks? Will cable eat the internet? Will the internet eat everyone and the phone companies too? And where does that leave us? The content creators and workers - those of us who actually do the things that get the stuff out there? If everyone can create content, where does that take us?
Tuesday, June 5, 2007
Monday, May 21, 2007
Making it happen
A recent conversation with a producing partner got me thinking about how I "brand" myself in this business. One thing they don't really teach you in art school (or film school for that matter) is how to set yourself up as a business and market yourself as a creative person.
The ironic thing is that I do know how to do this, I just have never applied it to myself.
Thus, after some pondering, I've set up this blog. Admittedly I am a bit late to the blogosphere - but rather than look at myself as a day a day late and a dollar short - I see it as having taken the time to think it through.
The things that I would like to accomplish this year with this blog as a catalyst, and in no particular order:
The ironic thing is that I do know how to do this, I just have never applied it to myself.
Thus, after some pondering, I've set up this blog. Admittedly I am a bit late to the blogosphere - but rather than look at myself as a day a day late and a dollar short - I see it as having taken the time to think it through.
The things that I would like to accomplish this year with this blog as a catalyst, and in no particular order:
- Get another feature made (the second one is the hardest I hear)
- Meet VC people!
- Be a resource to others for making ones' way in this mercurial business
- Be more diligent about writing and generating my own content
- Do more travelling
- Join the PGA
- Form an LLC
- Continue to explore how internet social networking can build on the already collaborative nature of film and television production. In other words, expand my collaborators base and meet those people that I didn't know I didn't know.
So as I put this blog out into the world, I invite your feedback and I leave you with these questions.
- What happened to the smart and funny half hour sitcom? Am I missing something here or was the last good one Seinfeld?
- Is it really true that being accepted to a high profile film festival "makes" your career?
- How do we define success for ourselves? Is it money? Awards? A sense of achievement? What milestone moments have you had?
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