Hello, Stage 32!
My name is Tennyson E. Stead, I'm a writer and director, begrudgingly a producer, a script doctor, and a pretty well-established resident blogger here on Stage 32. Over the years, I've written more than 30 screenplays. Ten of these have been optioned, sold, or were written as works-for-hire. Very littleof my time on Earth has been spent doing anything other than showbusiness, and my background includes classical theater training, dramaturgy, design, and a ten year career as a film development and finance executive. My directorial debut feature (although I've directed shorts and stage plays) is in development with Lady of the Light and producer Lucinda Bruce, and I'm currently working on two other scripts for her as well. For a list of my articles on the site, please visit my profile.
My other big project, which is a project I've had on the back burner for years and which I've really made strides on since we all went into quarantine, has been a transmedia project called Jump Rangers. With a concept that revolves around kid space commandoes fighting to give humanity a home among the stars after alien dinosaurs kicked us off of Earth, this is a fun, evocative world that I plan to take into comics, gaming, animation, and eventually feature films. Right now, I'm working on a young adult novel and a tabletop role-playing game. Having never written a novel before (although the readers of my blog may beg to differ, I've gotten seven chapters in and I'm very happy with how things are developing.
Over the next few years, Hollywood's future will be shaped almost entirely by how we rise to the challenge of our economic troubles and our political crisis. So much of our middle management is getting wiped out, that the problem won't be the gatekeepers anymore. Our problem will be that there's nothing behind the gates. Building new infrastructure, and making that infrastructure more sustainable than the Hollywood we inherited, falls on us.
Showbusiness has done nothing but grow, since Athens was the center of world culture. If we build strong communities and excellent productions, a showperson today has more ways to succeed than ever before. Anyone who's looking for a career just doing the work they like to do with as little interruption or interference as possible is going to have a very hard time, because so much of the middle management is either struggling to survive or has been just plain wiped out... but people who are willing to do whatever it takes to put on an amazing show, and who make their business to take care of the people around them, are going to have an amazing century.
Showpeople, let's go to work.
Yours truly,
Tennyson
The Great Reset
Nelleke Nieuwboer - And none too soon. DVD, and the insane revenue from that market, made this town unbelievably fat... and ever since, we've just kept paying for all the crazy stuff we bought on that spending binge. From 2000-2004, the aftermarket grew from $3 billion - which was the money for VHS - to $30 billion. Ever since then, we've been acting like the audience owes us that money.
We don't need this much middle management. Whether we need any at all is a fair conversation to have, as far as I'm concerned.