“There are dreams and there are career plans. They are not the same. Some dreams are compensatory: visions that we retreat to in times of stress, like blankies for infants, things that comfort us and tell us what we need to be told. The dream of being a famous writer can be like that: a dream of infantile power and attention that disguises the more immediate need — for safety, self-love, serenity, peace in our hearts.”
Just a quick post to point out a nice long post John Scalzi made re: the dedication/stamina/stubbornness necessarily to write and get published as a novelist. Here’s a choice pull-quote I can relate to:
[Some writers] start writing something that they thought might be a book-length idea, only to find not only did it not qualify as a short story, it was better for everyone involved if the stunted, weird thing was taken behind the tool shed, whacked with a shovel and buried without anyone else knowing it ever existed.
This episode was a bit harder to write, but I’m really proud of how it turned out, especially considering how rushed I was when I wrote it. My only regret is that I wasn’t able to find more places for comedy and/or jokes.
Eddy, Nick and Daniel all say they’re happy with the tone of the episode and love how it turned out, but I knew there would be fans that might complain about it being “too serious”. Oh well. Can’t please ‘em all.
Feel free to check it out, although I do recommend catching up on previous episodes first. The Leet World has become almost entirely serial at this point, so if you aren’t caught up on the previous episodes, you’ll be lost in the wilderness watching this one.
Yes, it’s true. Jeff James, continually procrastinating writer, has actually produced new work! Specifically, Episode #9 of The Leet World.
To be completely honest, I actually finished the script about a month ago, but I haven’t talked about it for a few reasons. First off, I wanted to wait until the episode was actually released. However, that happened on February 1st, and here it’s two weeks later and I’m just now writing about it. Can’t really explain that part, except that I did kind of want to wait a little while to see what people thought of the results. Most people seem to think I did a good job, so I guess it’s about time I talk about it.
In any case, I’d like to share the episode and talk a little bit about the writing process. If you’re completely new to the show, however, I’d recommend watching one or two of the previous episodes since the first part of my episode resolves a cliffhanger from the first half of the season.
Once you’ve familiarized yourself with the show, go ahead and check out the episode:
The final version you see there is about 85%-90% stuff that I wrote. The Player/hat love story (which is *great*, by the way) is the biggest addition they made, and is a joke I couldn’t even have come up with in the first place since I had no idea there was a freakin’ snow man on the map. There are also a few line tweaks and improvs here and there.
If you’d like to know more about the episode and my writing process, continue reading… Read the rest of this entry »
So it occurred to me recently that Google Video will let you post videos of pretty much any length. A guy on the Leet World forum posted a 40 minute video, so I thought I’d get in on the act and digitize the footage I have of Knifepoint, which I haven’t watched in years.
I ended up having to re-digitize the video into iMovie, and it took forever to convert the 43 minute video into a format that Google can use, but here it is:
This performance is from 2003, and is the final dress rehearsal, so there’s no audience other than the techs, who occasionally walk in front of the camera. The show was directed by Andrew Richey, and stars Barrett Michael, Lauren McCauley, and Liam Boyer. I haven’t talked to most of those people in years…
I think most people I know managed to come see the show when it was performed, but there may be a few of you out there who didn’t get the chance, so it’s nice to have this available in an online format. I think I may do the same thing with some of the other videos I’ve got lying around…
