Garison Piatt's Lounge Discussions

I want to say thank you to Stage 32, this is a wonderful way to start off my weekend. I want to say CONGRATULATIONS to all the other finalist, I know a lot of them are in this Writers' Room and i hope that CHRIS MESS continues to stay in the pack and, yes, I 'm gonna say it, I hope we win!! Merry Chris Mess!

Darryl looks behind him. Terrified, he crawls frantically toward the door.

Mr. Henderson slams the door and locks it.

###

OK, regarding Darryl's off-screen screams, do I write:

Darryl's blood-curdling screams are heard from behind the door?

or

Darryl's blood-curdling screams are heard off-screen?

or?

Greetings and salutations. I've been writing since I was nine years old. I started out with prose, moved to poetry, worked on the school newspaper, wrote a few short stories, started and failed to finish several books, and finally ended up writing screenplays (though I'm still hoping to one day finish that Great American Novel). I started out writing screenplays because of my interest in Hawaii, where I lived for twelve years. "The Byrds of Paradise", arguably the best Hawaii-based TV show ever, was canceled; at the same time, "One West Waikiki", demonstrably the worst Hawaii-based show ever, was sold into syndication. This was unimaginable to me. I ranted. I raved. I stopped believing in God. I could not accept that this had happened. My wife (at that time) suggested I do something. In retrospect, I'm sure she meant "Write a letter to complain." Instead, I studied screenwriting and created a Hawaii-based TV show. Everyone I showed the pilot script to loved it; however, no one loved it enough to finance creating the show. Still, I became hooked on screenwriting. I've completed several scripts, and have many in various stages of completion (all the way from "almost done" to "not even started"). I keep a notebook of all of my story ideas: at this point, I have over thirty film ideas, about a dozen TV shows (including three set in Hawaii and two in Japanese), and five stage plays. A script which I consider to be one of my worst got me three writing gigs, one of which actually became a movie (the first ten minutes of which is not my fault). Sadly, I don't write that much these days. My father taught me to be pragmatic, and pragmatism says to do work that earns a paycheck before work that doesn't. So, everything is on the back burner. My (current) wife and I are traveling the country in our ancient RV, with the intention of seeing all 48 contiguous states, which would be a lot easier to do if I could sell one of my screenplays and live off the royalties for several years. Here's hoping.