you are viewing archives from 2004

i quit!

No, I don’t. But I wanted to.

Last week was one of those weeks where you feel as if the wind’s been taken out of you permanently.

We had been waiting to hear back from one of the kids’ networks about a show that we had pitched weeks ago. Each Wednesday came with the same news: you’ll know by the end of the week. Each Friday came and went with nary a word.

Until last Wednesday, when it was merely a footnote in an email message from our agent.

[..…] passed - but they absolutely love you and want to figure out some way to work together.

Thank you, drive through.

The frustrating thing wasn’t that they passed (okay, yes it was.) It wasn’t even that it took so long. It was that, after a year of being unemployed, after taking meeting after meeting, every place we’ve ever been to says things like I can’t believe that you’re not working! We would love to work with you! Occasionally they’ll talk about writers who are working who they think shouldn’t be. [….] is a hack! They couldn't write their way out of a paper bag!

We just nod and smile, trying to stay out of the badmouthing fray, only to discover that three weeks later, The Hack has gotten himself a job with the person who has christened him so.

Ack.

My problem is, as it always has been, is that I take it too personally. Not the actual rejection, but the project itself. The conundrum when you delve into a creative field is that your best work is on projects you feel passionately about. And therefore, when they’re rejected, so are you.

On Rejection Day, I had plans to meet A. in Burbank to see Harry Potter.

We don’t have to go, he told me.

I need to get out of the house, I responded.

I drove over the hill in somewhat of a trance, the tape loop playing over and over in my head.

You knew this was part of the game. This is just the way things work.

You’re never going to work again. What are you going to do then?

I don’t know, maybe I’ll just quit.

But if you quit, you’ll have to get a real job.

Fuck that. I’ll just feel sorry for myself for the next 24 hours. And then I’ll get back to work.

The one thing that I remind writers, actors, directors, anyone who wants to come out to Hollywood to work is that this is one of the few places in the Universe where you can work your ass off at your chosen job but never, ever get paid to do it. If you want to be a Doctor, and you work hard, chances are you’ll get an opportunity to practice. A lawyer, a teacher, a computer programmer…you may not have your ideal job, you may not get paid what you deserve, but at some point, you will probably get paid for what you were trained to do.

Writing isn’t like that.

But that’s just the way it is: you just go out there and tap dance every day until they tell you they’re looking for breakdancers, and then you bust out a the pop-n-lock until they tell you they’re looking for ballet. Until someone decides that they dig what you’re doing, you just have to keep dancing.

I was saying to A., after the movie, that it seems like the Dementors have been after me for the last six months, sucking every last good breath I have. It’s been about the most disheartening time in my life: career stagnation and failure, putting Peanut to sleep, my baba dying, my health going in the toilet, the Unspeakable Ickiness that I refuse to talk about.

I’m just done, I told him.

What can I do? he kept asking.

Nothing, I told him. There’s nothing to do.

So I felt sorry for myself for 24 hours.

Then the next morning, I woke up and I went over the two other projects we’re about to pitch, tying up loose ends, rewriting parts to make them tighter. I came up with a few ideas to explore when we’re done with this round.

Because I can bitch, I can complain, I can whine, I can moan.

But I won’t quit.