When columbusmusic.com asked me to
do their "Making it in LA" feature, my first thought
was...well shit. It' would've been great if they
started following me on entry #1....that at least
would've been exciting. As we enter the fall of 2000,
and the entries are now into the 70's, the "journey"
is nothing more than a weekly newspaper column of my
opinions on life. How the hell can this be beneficial
to others? Well, the first thing I'll say to those who
are just tuning in to this...read the beginning. I
would've given anything to have had something like
that a year ago when I had no idea what to
expect. If you have read the other 73 entries...well
guess what: I actually have something worthwhile
to write about! An entry with a lot of developments,
and a pretty invaluable lesson on "Making it in
LA."
Where do I start...uhm. First of
all let me bring you up to speed on Hollywood
Screentest. I haven't done any video work for
them in months. As I've said before I did everything
already. I finished all the pilots for all the shows
and until something sells, there is nothing more I can
do. Well, something did sell - "Showbizz
Buzz"...unfortunately that's just written text for web
sites, nothing with video. But it is a start. As well,
the people at Hollywood Screentest are killing
themselves getting the big promotion together. Damnit,
I still can't tell you who it's with, but it's
really incredibly huge. They are redesigning the site
for it (thank GOD), and THAT is where I'm finally
gonna be able to make some money again. I'll be
working with their site programmer and designing the
site. The work was supposed to start 2 weeks ago, but
still nothing. It's a bit of a letdown to tell you the
truth. The false sense of security they gave me, even
mentioning that they were gonna bring me on full-time,
led me to update my computer, get an apartment that
was a little steeper than I could've gotten, and
then POW a grand total of $900 in about 9 weeks. As
I've said before $2000 a month only covers my car and
rent. Goddamn LA. And as far as the X-Men Movie
Minded, I will be finishing that up soon, but as
you can tell there's no hurry. I get no money
first of all, and we can't use it until something
sells anyway. But I assume by the end of the
month I'll have it done.
The rest of this entry will
hopefully provide some of you with an idea of how to
pull off your goals.
So since Jess and I have been back
from Columbus, our lives have consisted of Roseanne at
11 AM, a movie at 11:30, Cosby at 1 and 1:30, Roseanne
again at 2, Kids in the hall at 2:30, and Roseanne
again at 3 and 3:30...etc. Why? Well Jess is
completely off work now because of her tendonitus. She
has physical therapy 3 times a week, and workman's
Comp only pays 60% of her normal 40 hour paycheck and
they will not let her go back to work until she's
better. GREAT. So she works about 3 hours a week and
her paycheck is roughly $200 a week. Yeah, that gets
us really far. So she's here. I'm here. We're both
here. We've been married a month, and I've seen more
of her in 4 weeks than I have the entire time we've
been out here. Oddly enough, we don't want to kill
each other. The good news is, she is about to get an
offer for a management position at a ritzy Hollywood
restaurant on Wilshire Boulevard. We are waiting for
the phone call as I write. The point of all this, is
there's a lot of time on our hands.
Cut to 2 weeks ago when our
apartment flooded. There was a "manager on duty" and
he was who was dealing with everything. When he came
into the apartment he got all giddy about all the
"toys" we have. The DVDs, the videogames, the pac-man
machine, the computer. It got us to talking about
computers and such. The rest of the day I sat in the
office talking to him. Lots in common. He used to be
in radio in Oklahoma and gave it all up to come out to
LA a few years back. He's a director with quite a few
contacts. Get this...we were talking about residuals
for commercials and stuff and he mentions his old
girlfriend got one for .15 cents from SNL. He dated
Nora Dunn for 2 years. Can you believe it? I'm
shitting at this point. He's about 10 years older than
me, and Nora Dunn was part of the cast that I watched
religiously when I was 15. Jon Lovitz, Phil
Hartman, Dana Carvey, Dennis Miller, Kevin Nealon, Jan
Hooks...I loved that cast. Well we get to talking
and he's directing a one woman show his girlfriend is
in now and he was telling me how he's trying to figure
out how to do a slide show on his computer. Well,
since I'm not doing a DAMN thing, and he likes my
pac-man table, I offered to do the whole slide
show on my computer for him. I explained my situation,
and said I'd be happy to help. I said as well, if
he can ever find a damn thing for me to do - even
manual labor, I'd do it...because I'm hard-up at this
point. Giddy-up. It was probably 4-5 hours of computer
work for free, but could be something.
The next part of the conversation,
I can't really talk about for another month or
so. We realized that we both had the same idea for a
cable network. I had actullay made a project in
college about it. The more we talked, the more we
freaked out. He has contacts with some huge companies
and places to pitch the idea to. As well I have
the equipment to make video presentations, and on top
of that I was able to nail down a domain name and it's
up and running. In the coming months we will be
putting in action a series of events that could very
well lead to this idea becoming a reality. I will
give you guys an announcement of the site and be able
to tell you more about it soon.
The next day he was working as
well and we talked some more. He asked if I could do
the lighting and sound for the show he's directing.
Not a lot of money, but it would be something. I of
course said yes. I also helped mix the sound cue
CD and made the slide video for him over the next
several days. Last night the show opened and
everything went smoothly. The show is called
"Southern-Fried Chickie" - It's a one woman show
written and performed by Christie McBrayer. A
Stand-up/actress out here who is doing this one woman
show of her life in Mississippi. It's a great show
where she goes through all the characters in her life.
What first comes to mind is of course how much I'd
love to do an autobiographical show about my radio
adventures...but that's another day.
Anyway, here's a
short
clip of her
performance last night. And you can watch
me turn the lights off!! LOL. It's
actually a bit more complicated than that,
but after the way I was goin' crazy doing
my talk show at WTVN, this was nothing. At
WTVN getting carts set up for that show
was insane. My entire 6 hour show was one
bit after another...so last night was
nothing.
YouTube
link added
02.13.09
And as I write, I just got
the go ahead to start the web design!!!!
SO NOW I'M MAKING MONEY AGAIN!
Let's see how long that lasts......
....but the moral of the story is
that I'm not waiting. This is the lesson you can take
if you're sitting in Columbus wondering how to follow
your dream. Put your hand into every possible cookie
jar you can find. Give everything away. Worry only
about money to live, not money to party. I'm now a
video editor, a web designer, a sound tech, a light
tech...and I came out here to sing with 4tvs. Oh and
by the way I'm still doing that. Booked 3 more gigs at
lulu's. But as I was saying, put your hand in
everything. Keep yourself open to everything. The key
is - STAY HERE. By simply being in the element,
you allow yourself the opportunity to reach your
original goals. By offering to make the slide
video...I created another crossroad that just might
lead to the original goal. Which if I think hard
enough, I may remember what that was.
:-)
Well, now I have work to do! Thank
GOD. And hopefully we'll have an all-jessica entry
next time. She'll have a new job (and a new
website!!!) and we'll have some finanical stability.
Although as I said...I ain't holding my breath. That
would involve being stagnant. Stagnant is bad
mmmmk?