barrington99@gmail.com Lately I’ve been writing quite a lot, along with my co-writer. In the last three weeks we finished a full draft of a screenplay, which is faster than I’ve ever written a first draft–but it wasn’t pretty, and honestly neither is the draft. Which is not to disparage it–you don’t disparage a big lump of … Read more
In my last post I mentioned my friend who is having issues with his health and posted on Facebook the status, “nothing seems fair anymore.” His post got an overwhelming response, because he has so many friends who love him, and also, i think because they are words that hit a cord with all of … Read more
These words were yesterday’s Facebook status update of a friend from both college and LA. He is funny, talented, goodhearted. He has cancer. Several months ago, he went into hospice, but has continued, on social media, to be the source of upbeat quotes, photos, and memes. Most of our mutual friends have moved away, and … Read more
SATURDAY: My mother-in-law, in town for the weekend, holds my arm as we stand at the L-shaped buffet at her friend’s new Thai noodle shop. She wears jeans, a floppy tee-shirt and tinted glasses with white rims studded with Swarovski crystals. Her friend, on the other side of the sneeze-guarded trays of food, has on … Read more
When Steve Kay, Dean of the USC Dornsife College of Letters, Arts and Sciences, took leadership of the school in October of 2012, he said, “As a biologist, I have often focused on “nature versus nurture” to help me understand how we form ourselves and become who we are,” but, he said, he had come … Read more
But maybe not in that order. Sometimes I like to read Scott Meyer’s Go Into the Story blog, that is all about screenwriting, and also contains a million (yes, hyperbole) links to other blogs and resources about screenwriting. He adds content more frequently than I can keep up with, so I miss a lot, but … Read more
A couple of weeks ago, I finished a short course in book reviewing. We discussed things like the changing culture of reviewing with the advent of social media and decline in traditional publishing, and the recent debate regarding the pros and cons of printing a negative reviews. We also made a couple of stabs at … Read more
I just watched a really lovely documentary called Lost in Living. The director, Mary Trunk, followed the lives of four women, who were both mothers and artists, for seven years. This film is by turns, intimate, philosophical and poignant. Although I don’t have children, the idea of motherhood is something that I lived with pretty … Read more
I’m getting behind on my movie-tracking already. I had an interesting job nibble a couple of weeks ago, tangentially related to a singing group from a past era. No idea if it will manifest, but just in case, I watched a couple of movies that I figured might inform either the structure or the subject … Read more
I forgot, when writing my first “movies of 2014” post, that I had also watched Lovely and Amazing, which is the second movie by writer-director Nicole Holocener, made in 2001 (her latest effort, is buzzing during this current awards season). The story (of Lovely and Amazing) revolves around a mother and her three daughters, two … Read more