Using PR to spread the message

I woke up this morning with one thing in mind: finish that damn press release that I was supposed to finish last week. I’ve joined the producer team on a pretty-damn-cool sci-fi indie called Apocalyptic Playground. One of the things I bring to the table is a little PR savvy. I’m a writer and a former tech guy, but I’ve worked for PR firms for nearly twenty years.  I listened to these flacks talk about impressions, outlets, markets, etc and quickly realized that PR is a valuable tool for message distribution.

News-release-writing-skills have proven to be a valuable skill for my own endeavors in independent filmmaking. Using the right keywords, news releases can help you target the right fans and the right news outlets as opposed to just tweeting your message out to the general public.

PRlog.com, a free news release distribution platform, has a nifty how to page about press releases here:

http://www.prlog.org/tips/1016-how-to-write-a-press-release.html

To learn more about Apocalyptic Playground‘s crowdfunding initiative, please click here:

http://igg.me/p/65653?a=9890

The First Five (5)

The first 5 years of your child’s life are crucial. Your baby learns more in these five years than he will in any span of time for the rest of his/her life. If your baby does not develop fully during those five years chances are it will never reach its greatest potential later in life.

The first five pages of your script are equally important to your script’s life and your success as a screenwriter. Kind readers will give your script 10 pages before they toss it in the PASS pile. Maybe, on a good day, they’ll give it 15 pages. But most readers have made up their mind by page five and have decided whether or not they’re going to finish reading.

I wrote and rewrote  my script Legend of Black Lotus.  Then I wrote and rewrote the first five pages and sent it off to a four trusted screenwriters. I asked three questions:

1) What did you see? – I needed to know if I used effective wording to convey my vision for the story.

2) How did you feel? – What was the visceral impact of the story so far.

3) Would you keep reading? – the premise here is, if a reader has 10 scripts to read over the weekend and they’ve just read my first five pages, would they continue to read it.

Five pages usually takes about five minutes to read and is a hell of a lot easier to read than 110 pages.  My friends got back to me quickly with amazingly helpful and insightful comments. So, I went back and tweaked the pages again.

Now I’m almost ready to print out the screenplay and perform a final proofread…but I’m also considering holding a table read for some crucial scenes. Either way, when I’m done, I’ll be damned satisfied with my first five pages

 

Get Out of Your Comfort Zone

Make Your Protagonist Thrive – Push Him Off A Plane

Not long ago I spoke with a friend about what was needed for a  rewrite on a script I was working on. In this particular script I have two female LEADS and I foolishly thought that these women were interchangeable as protagonists. That made my script muddy, unclear and as a reader you  were never sure who to root for.

It’s important that a hero (or antihero) be the subject of all the bad shit. These events and unfortunate incidents and consequences all become part of the hero’s journey. These things cannot happen to the partner, the buddy, the comic relief or even the bad guy.

Here’s what I hadn’t considered, I needed the bad things to happen to the hero so he/she can then make a decision that moves the story forward, preferably with some sort of Catch 22 consequence. If the bad shit didn’t happen to the hero she’s just following along, merely reacting, not acting.

So for the rewrite of my sci-fi cop thriller I started by listing the major plot elements of the story. When I plugged in the script’s equivalent  elements it was clear that I had split the events between the hero and the buddy. Now I can fix it. Moreover, now that I have a clear(er) vision who should be in these pivotal scenes the new and improved story is emerging almost on its own.

• OPENING
• INCITING INCIDENT
• ACT 1 TURNING POINT
• MIDPOINT
• ACT 2 TURNING POINT
• CRISIS
• CLIMAX
• RESOLUTION
• WHAT’S ON YOUR FINAL PAGE

I See Your True Colors

The Grammy’s is an award show. It isn’t the Source music awards where afterparty gunfire is a part of the celebration. It’s not an accident on the 405 or LIE to be gawked at. It’s. An award show. It’s a celebration of the artistry of musicians all over the world–whether YOU like their genre of music or not.

It pains me to see other artists bitch, gripe, moan and groan about an award show when they KNOW they would kill to be at the SAG Awards, WGA Awards, Oscars, Emmys or other award show.

And if you can’t write, act, sing, play an instrument, produce a song or movie, and you don’t have anything nice to say, why not just shut up.

And those are my thoughts on the lame comments I’ve seen tonight on Twitter and Facebook