Catching up and something new

I got email from the French director on my screenplay called Chase, or in French  "La Pursuite" which is the word for chase. The project looks like it can go later this fall, but I never count on anything until it's finished production.

The screenplay was originally an idea I had about a man who thinks he's seen a man in a van who has taken a girl off the street. However, my guy has different memories of the incident and he's not sure so he decides to follow the van which becomes suspicious. 

 
My story takes both my guy and the van into the Mojave desert. I wanted to see if I could get any attention on a script about essentially "a guy in a car for 90 minutes". My then agent suggested I never show it too anyone... it's too "artsy".

It wasn't long after that I got email from two men from France, actually one was Canadian. They liked the script. I had a meeting with them and it all sounded good.

However, this was two years ago and they were working on other projects. But this spring they finally put the deal together and are hoping to shoot this fall.  They translated the screenplay into French  and I managed to make out most of it as I took French in school in Canada. 

They also changed some of the scenery as they don't have deserts in France. Just streets.

 So for now, I await their efforts to find the financing. The script has changed some, but basically the same story. And I hope to be able to go there for at least a week or so.

Then there's S.O.B.

I began to write a pilot for a TV series on spec, entitled S.O.B. but it's not quite what you think. But first, here's how the idea came to be.

Three years ago I reconnected with my ex-wife, as she had lost her current husband and her niece "found" me on FB. We were married in 1971 and divorced in 1976, with no real hard feelings.  Needless to say, we are now close although we live in different places of the continent.

That's when I got an idea for the pilot.

What about two women who married the same man, at different times, who now learn the husband is dead and has left a down and out private-eye business to the two women who had never met.

One in her 50's and one in her 20's.

Here's where my ex-wife comes in,  she's the "older woman" of the pair. And I picked one of the waitresses at Crave, a local joint for coffee and food. Then I imagined what would happen between them, how they got along, if they got along. 

Then there's the catch: If they stay together at the business, they will each get $1 million from a life insurance policy.  If they don't get along, they don't get the money.

So I finished the first draft and today will re-read it over again, as I already have a dozen or so changes. 

And then what?

Then I have an agent and a manager, both of whom could take the project to a network or whatever works now, as in Netflix, etc. Amazon might be a good idea as their new projects don't seem to work that well.

And, keeping with memory, I have a storyline in this first 1-hour pilot episode about someone who has anterograde amnesia.

There's no real reason that I picked two ideas that are similar, the pieces seemed to fit, Chase was written about 7 years ago and S.O.B. was stewing for 2 years and didn't really take off until this spring and my ex, who by the way is thrilled to be my inspiration.

Life is strange and in this case, fun.