I began writing a new play this past week and my lack of focus and general lethargy has frustrated me to no end. This is a play I started writing notes for back in January. But then the Blue re-write took over in February and March and then the production took over from there….until now. The way I begin any script is by brainstorming as much as possible. I usually have a theme in mind and I write down random thoughts and develop characters through all the chicken scratch. Once I have a sense of the characters, plot and story slowly and oftentimes, agonizingly roll out. After all the notes I’ve taken, I have a basic sense of what I want (or need) to say in this new play.

The play is tentatively called “Circus” which not only represents a place, but a state of mind. Four characters are involved and I am about to start writing the first scene. I have read over my notes so many times that I have practically memorized them. And to be truthful, I am sick of them. I need to begin putting a voice to the characters and tunnel my way through the process. As is always the case at this stage of the game, I look for every excuse in the book not to actually start writing the script. All the notes are staring at me or are they laughing, saying such mocking things like: “You really gonna write this?”…or…”Give up already”… And then there are my characters who are just as fed up with me: “Rome, pick up the damn pen and write us already….we’re waiting. We need a path. Give us some direction”.

And yet, I delay….I delay, I wait and look and think and fret and continue to avoid the first blank page so that I don’t have to scribble the first words….Act 1, Setting (it’s a great setting by the way), AT RISE….and so it begins….. The whining ends today – it has to. My goal is to have some kind of rough draft in three weeks.

On another front, two of my film scripts, THE SCHOOL and SIGNS & WONDERS have just advanced to the quarter-final round of a Screenplay Competition in Los Angeles called Page International. Basically I made the top 25% of entries (there were nearly 4000 scripts entered). So not bad – my scripts live to see another day; that’s always nice. Semi’s are announced on August 1. Here’s hoping for the best.