Category: Filmmaking

2023 Last Looks — Happy 2024!

According to a study cited in this article, little kids perceive time as “bigger” when it is more eventful, whereas older kids and adults feel less-eventful periods as longer and eventful periods as faster. But maybe I understand how kids see time, because lately when people mention incidents that happened in early 2023, I find myself saying, “Wow, was that just this year?” It feels “big,” like there’s been an ocean of events between then and now. Here are a few highlights.

ADVENTURES AT HOME AND ABROAD
We hosted friends traveling through Los Angeles from far-flung places like Brazil, Australia and Wisconsin. Sometimes it takes visitors to help you appreciate where you live. I explored Kenneth Hahn park, visited the Queen Mary, and went to the Academy Museum all for the first time, while catching up on the lives of friends from years and decades ago! On the flip side, visiting friends from grad school greatly elevated my birthday travels to Ireland and Portugal! 

In May, I traveled to the desert near Joshua Tree to attend a ten-day meditation course. The most notable part of the course for most people is that it is “silent” — you don’t talk to your fellow students, and you also forgo books, notebooks, phones and laptops. The primary activity –approximately nine hours of each day– is practicing a kind of meditation called Vipassana. It was hard, but good, so I bullied Paul into taking the course as well. He went in later in the year and also found the experience intensely challenging, but ultimately rewarding. 

WORK
In the spring and fall, I produced seasonal toy sales shows at Mattel, and also worked for the first time with another company at the LA Convention Center. I enjoyed working on these jobs that combined video creation and organizing live events. Working alongside teams of hard-working individuals was a great pleasure and a balance to the solitary nature of my writing gigs. 

SHOWBIZ 
Thank you to the folks who checked in during the Writers Guild and actors strikes. Combined, the strikes lasted from May to November. It was hard for writers, actors, crew in every department, and many others from equipment rental houses to restaurants. Paul and I each had projects that looked promising in May, but had lost momentum by November, which was disappointing, but reinforced how I was lucky to have had other work during the year. 

A couple bright spots are that I completed eight episodes of a serialized comic for a phone app called Macroverse. The preliminary artwork looks cool and I hope to see the series launch in 2024. And, after a long road, Paul’s producorial effort, Americanish, is available for rent on streaming services and also as in-flight entertainment. Look for it on a plane near you!

PAUL
Though things were slow on the showbiz front, he worked on his own projects as well as script-consulting for writers and mentoring first-time directors (something I reaped the benefits of!). He continues to practice Brazilian Jiu Jitsu and play board games. If you’re a Star Trek fan, you might enjoy the Star Trek Discovery Podcast, where he is one of the three host/commentators. 

FAMILY
Paul and I were blessed with good health this year, yet the word “cancer” has a way of popping up in these year-end letters. In the fall, both Paul’s mom and my brother, Greg, received cancer diagnoses in the fall, followed by tests, recommendations, decision-making, and treatments. Though it was a stressful time, our families grew closer through the experience, and Christmas day, the major crises had passed and we are so grateful they are feeling well and that we have more time to spend together. We are also thankful that my mother, who has been gone for much of this year supporting her brother, is able to be with us for the holidays this year.

IN MEMORY:
RIP Raquel Welch. In 2017, a referral from a friend landed me a side hustle working a few days a week in the home office of this iconic actress, who was now in her 70s. We hit it off, and though her need for administrative help decreased over the years, I continued to occasionally visit and work through the pandemic and into late 2022. In February, I got a call from Raquel’s friend / live-in household assistant of over thirty years, Jean, that Raquel had died. It is now public record that Raquel suffered from Alzheimer’s. I’m grateful for the time we spent together both before her symptoms were noticeable, and after. Health is a gift, but illness, though cruel, can offer gifts as well: moments of levity and humor, stories told, and a degree of intimacy we might not experience otherwise. In particular I was honored to witness Jean’s generosity and grace as she took on greater caretaking for Racquel. Some people quietly model for us how to be better humans, and “Jeannie,” as Racquel called her, is one of those people. 

CREATIVE FUN IN PROGRESS
If I had to pick a “biggest” highlight for this year, I might have to say it was directing a short film that I wrote! I still reel at how unbelievably lucky I was to be gifted a location, equipment and volunteer labor and even a donation that covered our (unforseen!) data storage needs, and to have a cast and crew that worked with focus and good energy in the face of myriad challenges. I am beyond grateful and will be spending the first months of 2024 in the editorial process trying to make the film worthy of people’s generosity!

SIGNING OFF IN GRATITUDE
I planned to stick to two pages, which is very long for a “quick update”, and now I am running over, like an annoying not-famous-category-person at the Oscars. But even as the music plays me off, my gratitude keeps bubbling over – for kind, supportive friends who check in, send funny memes and read my scripts, for family who put up with me and feed me, for friendly strangers, for books and films and taking walks in our calm, pretty neighborhood. I fervently wish for all people to feel more safety and peace this year, and I wish for you…

🎉 All good things in 2024! 🎉

Barrington & Paul

PS: MORE WAYS TO STAY IN TOUCH
If you are a person who has read this all the way to the end, and would read more, I started a project this year where I send a letter a week to people’s email inboxes via a platform called Substack. You can see the letters I’ve sent so far, and/or subscribe to be on the email list.

If you are not so much a reader (then you probably aren’t still reading this) and are more of a video person, my project of posting “snippets of life” videos on Instagram and TikTok is not yet finished and will likely continue ’til mid-2024…

On set — Paul and our DP, Daniel, looking skeptical – photo credit, Kendall Severson
Paul and B at the Americanish screening at Century City AMC
Out with Raquel, 2021
B read a story at the Santa Monica Review launch and Janice introduced her
When Paul looks too comfortable trying to take a nap…
Paul and Jenny at the first Taylor Swift concert of the Eras Tour

I’m HAPPY to Direct a Short Film!

About a month ago, I mentioned directing a short film. Sometimes plans, as they roll downhill, unravel or disintegrate. Other times they pick up speed and size until you’re running to stay ahead of them and not get flattened.

In this case, I’m happy to report it’s the latter. Happy, of course, being one of medley of emotions that also includes recurrent heart-racing panic and existential dread. For those of us with a certain temperament, this is the price for getting things that we want. As the snowball of happening—and its accompanying panic—gets bigger and bigger, it helps to keep reminding myself “This is something I want.” And it is. For years, I’ve said I’m going to direct something.

Here’s a little background and an up-to-the-moment update on how it’s going.

ORIGIN STORY:
Back in 2020, Paul and I sent three pitches for a TV show called Creepshow, an anthology series with short episodes that are like Twilight Zone with a horror bent. One was chosen, leaving us with two fairly well outlined ideas. I decided to write out one of these and it became THREE DAYS. I was hoping to use it as a second sample for more opportunities in the horror anthology space — but when those opportunities never manifested and Paul didn’t seem interested in directing it, I started thinking more seriously about taking the plunge I’ve been talking about for so long.

I began to visualize the film taking place in a mostly furnished apartment I have access to. As the industry strikes crept into autumn, a friend with a small film equipment rental mentioned that she would donate equipment. And then in September, an out-of-town friend crashing at our place mentioned coming to LA at the end of October to produce a friend’s music video. Half-joking, I said, “want to produce my short film while you’re at it?” She said, “Sure, I’ll do it.” Her trip in LA became our de-facto shoot dates.

WHERE WE ARE NOW:
For almost any event, once you have dates and a location, it’s “just” a matter of filling in everything else… In five weeks, I’ve gotten more “Sure, I’ll do its” that I could have imagined… from cast members and also a DP we met at a film festival (who insisted on providing an even nicer camera and lighting package than I’d been going to get from my friend). It’s been amazing.

But as we gather more people, I feel more obligated to make my no-frills, “hey, kids, let’s put on a show!” learning experience into a good product for all the people who are being so generous. I want to ensure we make something they can be proud of, put on their sample reels and use to get other work. And I want make it a good experience… I’m terrified of being that friend who you agree to help move, only to show up and realize they aren’t done packing, there’s not enough people to share the work, and not enough boxes! I really want to have my boxes packed and in order.

We shoot in six days. As we get closer, every potential hole looks bigger. The actors are wearing their own clothes and makeup — should I have looked harder for professionals? I’m ordering bedspreads late at night like an addicted home-shopper, and each one that arrives is not quite right. Should I have sprung for a production designer? Production design is production value — what if our minimally furnished location looks shoddy? Our producer knows sound and will set the levels, but she won’t be dedicated to sound. Sound issues are the worst! There’s no assistant director, no script supervisor, no one is dedicated to continuity… am I courting disaster? Have I left myself so many producing worries that I don’t have time to cram all the “directing” prep and learning into my brain? What have I been doing for the last decade? Why have I not spent them watching videos about camera blocking and lenses and taking acting classes? Is this all a big, terrible, expensive mistake????

In my heart, however, I believe it is not. I remind myself that I have so many talented people on board helping me, and so many things that have fallen into place Catastrophizing is a waste of one’s imagination.

This is something I’m happy about. I am grateful. It’s going to be fine…

Here are some images from my amazing volunteer stand-ins who patiently let me work through my storyboards yesterday!

Why Do I Keep Doing Things That Terrify Me?

I’m directing a short film.
I’m starting a weekly Substack newsletter.
There’s a 90% chance that by the end of the day I will sign up for a class that will force me to pitch paid publications.

All of these things have been on my to-do list for awhile, but I have not done them.
But right now I’m feeling a desire to pull the trigger on these things. This desire has unknown origins, but it is not unfamiliar. It is a desire that pokes its head up very intermittently and causes present-me to set events and projects in motion that future-me will then have to navigate and carry out long after the desire to do so has beyond diminished and she is reduced to a frenzied ball of “Oh-God-just-let-me-get-through-this-and-I-will-never-put-us-in-this-position again.”

During the pandemic I wrote an article for Emry’s Journal that described this process in some detail. It all holds true.

More on this topic in coming days.

Pig Goes On A Journey

This is our latest foray into contest land. I don’t have to pressure you to vote–yeah! There’s no public voting–the band picks. Of course, if you’d like to follow the link, join, and leave us a nice comment or ranking–it might help our chances.

In any case, we are pretty proud of this effort. Mark, our production designer, was excellent as you can see, and Paul’s lighting and direction shows the production design off to best effect. I found some elusive polystyrene for my contribution–and along with Amber and Becky cut out trees and moved pigs and such.

Enjoy!