2024 Zero Draft Thirty September Challenge: Day 19

One month. FADE IN to FADE OUT. Creativity meets Productivity.

Zero Draft Thirty: Day 19.

Write an entire draft of a script in September — FADE IN. FADE OUT. Or any sort of creative goal you have in front of you.

Feature length movie screenplay. Original TV pilot. Rewrite a current project. Break a story in prep. Generate a month’s worth of story concepts.

Whatever you feel will ratchet your creative ambitions into overdrive…

DO THAT!

Download your very own Zero Draft Thirty calendar — designed and created by Steven Dudley — and track your daily progress!

On Twitter, use this hashtag: #ZD30SCRIPT.

Join the Zero Draft Thirty Facebook Group, 5,100+ members strong.

Today’s Writing Quote

“You can dress it up, but it comes down to the fact that a movie is only as good as its script.”

— Curtis Hanson

Today’s Inspirational Poem

A Spiral Notebook

By Ted Kooser

The bright wire rolls like a porpoise
in and out of the calm blue sea
of the cover, or perhaps like a sleeper
twisting in and out of his dreams,
for it could hold a record of dreams
if you wanted to buy it for that
though it seems to be meant for
more serious work, with its
college-ruled lines and its cover
that states in emphatic white letters,
5 SUBJECT NOTEBOOK. It seems
a part of growing old is no longer
to have five subjects, each
demanding an equal share of attention,
set apart by brown cardboard dividers,
but instead to stand in a drugstore
and hang on to one subject
a little too long, like this notebook
you weigh in your hands, passing
your fingers over its surfaces
as if it were some kind of wonder.

I love this poem. It’s a poem for writers. The tactile experience of writing, reflective of the magic and wonder of something emerging from nothing.

You can check out Ted Kooser reading a number of his poems here:

Today’s Anita Loos Award winner: Jonathan Melikidse.

The other day over at the Zero Draft Thirty Facebook group page, Jonathan posted this.

Okay, this is something of a long and winding road anecdote. About a decade ago, I was in Santa Monica leading a writing workshop. There were eight writers from all over including someone from Australia, each traveling to work with me and this cohort of writers on their original feature film screenplay projects.

To put this in perspective, I have led well over 100 workshops. In fact, I’ll be heading out to California in October and November to mentor two sets of writers as part of my 24th and 25th Black List screenwriting workshops.

I love it. It’s exciting to get to know each writer, drill down into their scripts or unformed stories and facilitate their creative process.

It’s also exhausting. The combination of hard creative work while interfacing with a group of disparate individuals, nurturing the workshop experience so each writer benefits from group feedback … it requires a constant awareness of the “room” while focusing on the story at hand.

So it was in Santa Monica years ago, I had just wrapped up a nine-hour day with that group of writers. I was utterly spent and wanted nothing more than to head back to my hotel room and crash.

That’s where Jonathan Melikidse enters this story.

Looking back through the haze of time, we must have intersected via my blog, and as I recall, we had an email exchange. Jonathan, who lives in Hawaii, contacted me when he learned I’d be in Southern California for that long workshop weekend. As it turns out, so would he. Could we get together for a drink?

Sure, I wrote back. We set a time and place in Santa Monica. Then amidst the blur of travel and the workshop itself, I forgot about our appointment.

As I dragged my weary body to my rental car, I checked my calendar … and a good thing I did because there it was: Meet Jonathan at a nearby bar.

Again, I was really tired, but I summoned up my energy and headed over to meet Jonathan.

I am glad I did!

Jonathan and I met up. Had a drink or two. We talked for over an hour. I can’t recall any of the conversation, but I do remember this: I immediately liked him. His positive creative energy was palpable. This was someone who had stories to tell … and a passion to tell them.

We stayed in touch and when the Zero Draft Thirty Facebook group launched in 2015, Jonathan was one of the first members to join.

As the group grew, he became a moderator. For several years, Jonathan hosted our weekly Twenty-Four Hour Scamper-A-Thons.

Remember that devastating fire on Maui that destroyed much of Lahaina? That impacted Jonathan and his family. Somehow while rebuilding their home, Jonathan wrote and produced a successful TV series called Moku Moku.

In other words, Jonathan is one of the screenwriting universe’s “good guys.” So when he posted that invitation for folks in the Zero Draft Thirty community to join him on a writing scamper … and I saw those words … my mind went all the way back to our chance meeting we had long ago in Santa Monica.

I feel grateful our paths intersected.

Therefore, I am happy to present today’s Anita Loos Award to Jonathan!

Congratulations, Jonathan! Feel to print this award and post it at your writing desk for inspiration.

To learn more about Anita Loos and her illustrious career as a screenwriter, playwright, director, and journalist, go here.

For your chance to win the Anita Loos Award, one given away each day during the Challenge, post something inspiring, here on the blog, via Twitter, or the Facebook group.

For background on how the Zero Draft Challenge came to be and what it is, go here, here, and here.

Zero Draft Thirty: Day 1
Zero Draft Thirty: Day 2
Zero Draft Thirty: Day 3
Zero Draft Thirty: Day 4
Zero Draft Thirty: Day 5
Zero Draft Thirty: Day 6
Zero Draft Thirty: Day 7
Zero Draft Thirty: Day 8
Zero Draft Thirty: Day 9
Zero Draft Thirty: Day 10
Zero Draft Thirty: Day 11
Zero Draft Thirty: Day 12
Zero Draft Thirty: Day 13
Zero Draft Thirty: Day 14
Zero Draft Thirty: Day 15
Zero Draft Thirty: Day 16
Zero Draft Thirty: Day 17
Zero Draft Thirty: Day 18

Now Zeronauts…

SCAMPER ON!

Onward!