sin verguenza

don't look back

tomorrow is it - the movie begins! i'll be done on Sunday, the 8th so I hope to celebrate and reunite with the rest of the world then. i miss u.

talking knots

http://www.talkingknotsfilms.com

thanks kyle!

times a ticking

sorry for the lack of updates. that las one was pretty hyper.

yesterday we went and hung out with soccer players in McCarren Park. Soccer is awesome. I used to play in high school and i looked amazing. haha.

beyond that, we went and hung out to see if they would be down to be in my film and let my two actors join them in a scene. Lisandro, an argentian soccer player who seems to manage the team, was totally into it which is great. It looks awesome at night too.

next, i need a kitchen... a restaurant kitchen...let me know if you kno anyone. :)

casting

looking for Jesus Ochoa - he would be PERFECT for the part of my lead in my film. YES. Have a script. YES. Like the idea. YAY! Have a DP who's cool.

So things are progressing.

this is Jesus:


we're trying to get him but its a long shot.

i'm actually super nervous with casting. its like a weird version of dating but totally different.

also happy to annouce that my film and Samina's whom I am producing has been sponsored by the following:

Jana Water
Vitamin Water
Kariba Farms
EarthWare
Bagel Smith
Bare Fruit

yeah! still working on like 20 others, but this means we don't have to pay for a lot which is great because fundraising didn't yield enough for my film.

time the eternal revelator

I've been dealing repeatedly with 'the darkside'. this happens usually after extended periods of staring at a blank Final Draft document. Also, I've come to realize that I often meander down that dark, horribly narrow road after I talk about my film ideas. this is a pretty bad sign, right?

Last semester, I was so open to whatever comments I got. I didn't get upset once - as I remember - but now because of the heightened stakes and the mounting pressure, I feel completely and totally lost in oblivion. I've written about 15 drafts, thrown out an entire script idea, wrote various character biographies, listened to many songs that ere supposed to inspire me, visited a thousand different coffee shops thinking its what i need to write, and finally cried endlessly to a couple different people, including my entire writing class.

now, if you know me, i'm not often crying. i think i'm in an emotional hole where sometimes I feel like the only solution is to buy a plane ticket to Southern India, and ride a motorcycle around with some random strangers from Venezuela. This sounds ultimately perfect for my state of mind, but also like i might be completely missing the point.

I realize that in these moments, where you sit in a barren landscape of creative emptiness (dramatic writing, yes!), that these moments are actually really essential. I think that when things come so easy all the time that in fact the work suffers. And, more importantly the artist suffers because they never go deeper than the immediate and they never grow from the difficulty of working through an idea.

OK, so thats positive. I'm trying to consistently remind myself of positive affirmation because so many people i know are incredibly negative, all the time, and not only will this not allow you to learn from the mistakes you make but also ages you.

I'm working now. I'm going to positively finish a draft this weekend. I WILL.

officially obsessed

with j.f.

saugerties

loves it

LA 2

check out Esther's blog for photos because I forgot my digi cam. Dud. I just tried to post them but nothin doin - they turned out tiny. Mercedes and I are breaking into the Ritz today. I used to do it as a teenager, but now its become kind of a routine when I come visit.

I've decided that guys are crazy here. Some stupid dude threw a bottle a Caitlin and her friend when they didn't respond to their catcalls. wtf?

LA 1

so i shouldn't even be writing about such douchebags, but last night we were all hanging out at mountain bar in chinatown and i was talking with Caitlin in this corner table. a group of 6 dudes show up and crow around us even though there was a whole other table right next to us.i was like 'hey, there's actually someone sitting there' and this stupid, ugly fool goes 'well now i'm sitting here so what the fuck are you gonna do about it?" this proceeded until i couldn't stand their stupid faces any more and i said "i guess you feel like a bad man right now intimidating too girls out of their seats" then one dude goes "leave hipsters!" and i turned around and he had slicked back hair, braces and a fucking clash shirt. GOD.

guys in LA are dicks in general i've decided... well maybe dicks is a bit harsh, but they're super aggressive. i honestly don't think that would have happened in nyc. but maybe ... i hate that stupid comment "HIPSTERS!". that shit doesnt even make sense.

anyways.... i felt like venting. thats probably the dumbest post since ... maybe the whole time. caitlin says you should let those people just roll over your shoulder but all i wanted to do was throw my beer in his face.

summers almost done

its so sad...

i wish i started a better regimen... but, thats summer. days go by super fast and you're not sure what you've done.

When i was 12, i was obsessed with the x-files. I told everyone I wanted to be an FBI agent, to which, surprisingly everyone was ok with. Now, that seems fucking crazy. I bought a bunch of books on conspiracy theory and read up on places like Area 51.Its not that I don't believe there might be extraterrestrial life now, its more that I cant imagine why I ever believe they showed up in saucers. I don't know. Maybe they do and I've just become a "non-believer".

So, in this upcoming X-Files movie it looks like once again Mulder and Scully totally kiss. Rad. Plus, Mulder is back on the case in a serious way.

I guess I should go see that soon.

I'm working everyday on my next film. All of the work is fundraising focused, which is a lot of work. This is why people have executive producers. Whats also exciting is that I am trying to co-write with my very good friend Caitlin. We're in the process of trying to figure out how co-write... I seem to be coming at a bit intensely. I think maybe I should lay off all the charts and schedules. ha. I think I have the tendency to overcompensate with lists and schedules when I'm not producing anything creatively.
i wish i could rock a joan jett haircut, but it would just turn into a weird fro like puff.

piruw

i miss peru. i'm coming to california soon tho so that should suffice for now.

island fever

we got to take care of my friend Ed's little baby french bulldog last weekend. soooo cute and cool. suddenly people in the neighborhood were talking to us. he was the hit of the town.
i've really been into cooking lately too. cooking is super meditative for me - sometimes. Especially if I do it for other people. i stuffed a big chicken with currants, sour dough bread, carrots, peppers, onions, fennel root and garlic and roasted that with some pisco, butter and olive oil. then dave made those bomb stuffed onions wrapped in bacon and rosemary from our new herb garden. then i also stuffed some peppers and roasted those guys for way longer than you'd think and they turned out delish.
don brought over a Wii but my TV is super old so it didnt work. Instead we played pictionary but without paper - we used old paper bags and newspaper. pictionary is super hard..way harder than i remember.
next i need to focus and start writing more. i have all this anxiety about the next project we have to do in the fall. super intense. i'll post some ideas later and would love your feedback.

littles

these little girls became my bff's instantly at a rooster fight. They were super curious about why I was so tall and why I had two cameras. This one below I took for their mom. The older one told me about the earthquake that happened there last year. It was a horrendous earthquake that leveled most of the small adobe houses. A lot of their friends were hurt or killed. We drove through Pisco, the neighboring city, and it was completely leveled. I remember six years when I went last, it was poor but rich culturally. Pisco is one of the hubs of the Peruvian African community.Here's more from the trip.