Change of Address

Howdy dear readers. In a effort to stay up on new internet fads and technology this blog is being merged with Cinderella Bite's the Dust and is being moved to Tumblr at directorsnarrative.tumblr.com.

I'm trying to really streamline The Director's Narrative to be a full look at me and my life by pulling all my resources together and making it a central jumping off point to the rest of my internet presence, and Tumblr makes this a bit easier. Think of it as a portal to everything I do online.

All of my other blogs are remaining at their original blogger addresses.

Thanks and enjoy!

June 1, 2010

[ moving forward ]
Originally uploaded by DaizyB

I had one of those moments over the weekend, I hope it was from God, where it all hit me – it hit me that I am 28 years old, I want a place of my own, I want to live in LA, San Diego or New York, and more than anything I’m unhappy because I’m not being allowed to do what I have the talent and skill for. I hate that feeling, but I want to use it constructively. So the question is, how do I do that?

How do I respect and honor the people that are good enough to employ me now, yet try to get something more in line with where my talents lie? Do I take the ultimate leap of faith and just quit my job and step out into the unknown, confident God will provide?

I need a lot of prayer in this aspect. I’ve been in this place for awhile. So long it becomes complacent and it takes weekends like the last to remind me that I don’t have to be this unhappy with work.

God will do something, I am confident. I am just tired of asking “when”.

May 24, 2010

Originally uploaded by la.furia

One line in tonight's Big Bang Theory reminded me how geeky I actually am:
"He didn't date, it was Pon Farr.
I really am a bigger geek than I think I am.

Now Johnny Galecki, I want to cast you in a very specific role someday. It would surprise people, but I think you could pull it off...

May 20, 2010 part 2

Evil Experiment
Originally uploaded by Annie Southwell

Something you should never do when you’re having one of those days that you’re doubting your talent? Read the bios of other young directors. I shouldn’t have done that. Now I feel underqualified in more ways than before.

May 20, 2010

B-Tank & Blue Sky
Originally uploaded by mrbosslady

I’m having flashbacks to being a page at Paramount.

There was one audience show, that was in an old, giant stage on the RKO side of the lot. Needless to say in a stage that big, the AC was either off or on full blast – with all the lights and bodies in the stage there was really no in between.

As a page I would arrive just before seven in the morning to a beautifully quiet lot, and after taking all of that in march into the stage to be met with a freezing blast of air – one that I would be in for about six hours. The pages started wearing gloves, scarves, and thermals to survive as our job more than anything was to stand in one place and corral the audience, so we didn’t really have a chance to work up some body heat.

My office feels like that right now, only without the excuse of being ancient and huge. And I don’t have a long sleeve button down, tie and wool blazer to assist me.

Sometimes I miss being a page.

May 10, 2010

Like a good book...fairytale
Originally uploaded by Honey Pie!

I’ve been going through a kind of self-contained, internal crisis lately. All I’ve ever wanted to do it become a director and make movies that make people marvel.

Lately, it seems like everything I’ve tried has dialed and I’ve been getting more and more depressed about the state of my talent and the state of the independent film market. I’ve felt like I can’t get ahead and that I shouldn’t even try. I’ve been praying madly about what to do because I can’t figure out the next step.

I have not yet completely figured out what God is telling me, but I got a small glimmer of hope yesterday, a glimmer that’s told me that perhaps I am on the right path and I just need to keep pushing and striving towards the end goal.

I submitted END to a film festival in LA, and while I didn’t get in I received an e-mail from them yesterday with positive feedback on the film saying that they loved the philosophical and hopeful themes that run through it and loved the ending.

For the moment at least that’s given me the positive push I need to think about the future. I still need to figure out the next step for END and for me. Christopher and I have many more movies in us, and the thought of making them on my own is exhausting, but I will not rule out anything God has planned for me. I just need to be able to discern what He has planned and what the next step is.

May 3, 2010

May 2, 2010

2009 Los Angeles Film Festival
Originally uploaded by jmatheny

Didn't make it into another festival. The independent film market is changing. Drastically.

I need God's help to figure out what the next step is.

April 21 2010

"...the illusion of perfect casting. People look at it and go, `no one else could have done that.' Well, actually, they're very appropriate for the role. But part of the trick is bringing the character to the actor and manuevering the actor to the character."

~ Bryan Singer
Film Comment, volume 45\issue 1

April 12, 2010

Young woman running at park
Originally uploaded by alexey05

I’ve been happy lately. This is a lovely thing because for so long I felt like I was trapped in a dour, depressing outlook on life. Nothing major that I’ve been hoping for has really happened yet, but still I am having a very different outlook on things. There’s only two things this can be blamed on: a) God & b) endorphins.

I’m training for the Rock N Roll half marathon. Notice I don’t say I’m running it. I’m not an athlete and the half marathon is walker friendly, which is nice as since I’ve never run I’m not going to be able to run 13.1 miles by June. I’ll be lucky to run 2 miles by June and walk the rest, but I will be happy with that even. However, in order to train I’ve been walking/running 4 days a week – long distances too. Exercise produces endorphins which make you happy. I am very happy and even better because I am getting healthy (one of my goals for 2010).

A happy and healthy artist is a productive artist. Now let’s see what can happen from here…

April 9, 2006

HDR Wedding
Originally uploaded by Amundn

Four years ago today a wedding was planned, invitations were sent, RSVP’s & gifts had come in. But at the beginning of March, after ignoring all of the prompting from God along the way an event happened that derailed the wedding – the bride and groom were separated by bad paperwork.

The bride was in the country on a work visa and met the groom when they worked together. After two years they’d gotten engaged despite everyone’s advice, and one weekend in March 2006, a month before the wedding the bride ignored the grooms pleading and crossed the border into Mexico. When ready to come back to the U.S. and her fiancé God stopped her. At the border questions were raised about the paper work of the bride and her friends and everyone lost their access to come back to the U.S.

The groom and bride were devastated. What were they to do with all of the plans in place, only a few short weeks from being man & wife?

The grooms family had it just as hard as the groom. He’d lied to them about what was happening with the bride. He wouldn’t let them help and despite their dislike of the pairing, they would have been there. Watching the groom fall apart was hard. Together the groom and his family canceled the wedding, returned gifts, and hung the wedding clothes far back in the closet. It was apparent that the bride would not be back into the country for a long time.

Once they were apart the waiting game began, new visas were applied for and more about the bride became revealed. With months and miles between them the groom started to come out of his haze and began to see the bride and the world again. The bride lied about her name & her age. The groom became upset that she never listened to him. The bride tried to control the groom from a country away and slowly felt her influence lessening.

Finally in July, when the groom and the bride should have been a Mr. & a Mrs. for three months, the groom told the bride goodbye.

That brings us to today, a Friday like any other. Four years have passed, all but one gift were returned (a lesson in leaving a return address) and the teal bridesmaid dresses have long since been recycled. Today a man and his family sigh a deep sigh, and wait to see if he will ever be a groom again.

March 26, 2010

Single?
Originally uploaded by mrbosslady

At the risk of sounding like a meloncholy broken record, I am tired of work.

I often think that it's harder to be a person with a dream or ambitions than a person that is happy where they are planted. If you have a lofty goal and you're swimming upstream like I am, you start to feel like you are never getting anywhere and none of your effort is paying off.

It's times like these that I need to remember that God is in control and not me, but more often than not that is a hard thing to remember.

The human centric spirit inside of me want answers and wants them now. I don't want to deal with God-time, I want to deal on my time. If I am miserable and unhappy with my situation in life I want the fix. But God doesn't work that way.

The truth is that I don't know what lies ahead for me. For all I know two weeks from now I will get a phone call and someone will be interested in my movie and I will begin a new season of my life. But on the flip side I could be stuck in this season of my life filled with angst and meloncholy for years to come. I hope not, but it's all on God-time not mine.

My job is just to keep the faith, listen when He pushes me, and try to discern the path ahead of me. Every day I just have to keep putting one foot in front of the other, no matter how exhausted I might be.

March 19, 2010

Paramount
Originally uploaded by Shavar Ross

I miss this place.

March 19, 2010

IMG_0736.jpg
Originally uploaded by gafl

It's no secret that I want to get into a film festival badly. When you're being trained as an artist you get negative criticisms much more often than you get positive and I am ready for some positive. Being accepted into a festival would definitely be a positive.

I have to figure out what to do next. I have a few options available to pursue next for END but I would love to be able to pursue them with the extra bonus of being able to tell people where the film screened. If nothing else that's like being able to approach people with actual credientials for your film instead of just saying "well I really think it's good, but you know, I made it..."

Positive reenforcement, that's all I'm saying. A confidence boost would be lovely.

On a completely unrelated side note, it looks like I will be participating in the Rock N Roll half marathon in San Diego in June...ha ha ha...um, that's different for me.

March 16, 2010

all work, no play.....
Originally uploaded by lomokev

How is it that this work space looks better to me than going in and sitting at my desk tomorrow morning?

I think I have a disease.

Wah.

March 15, 2010

Donner pic @ DGA
Originally uploaded by mrbosslady

My younger brother Jonathon is a religious studies major at CSUF and this semester I was able to convince him to take religion in film. Saturday night we ended up at the City of Angels Film Festival as a field trip for his class as he was required to see at least one film at the festival. What I didn’t know until I bought the tickets was that the festival was at the DGA, so I ended up with my first trip to the Director’s Guild of America.

This made my heart hurt in a good and bad way. I want so badly to be a working director, to make movies that matter, for an audience that needs to be stimulated. So being in the DGA building was awesome because it’s like making a piece of the fairy tale tangible; I was in the building that great American directors have been in, that helps regulate their work and unify them, I saw Taylor Hackford’s parking space!

I only saw the parking garage, lobby and theatre, but I was hooked. The lobby is encircled with images of it’s members on set doing what they do – Zumeckis directing Back to the Future, Spielberg directing Jurassic Park, Jackson directing Lord of the Rings, and even Donner directing Superman. The theatre itself was one of several on the premises and while I was totally spoiled by the theatre at Paramount when I worked there, the DGA theatre is pretty dang amazing too. I am a fan of comfortable seats and leg room!

The downside to all of this was the fact that as I explored the DGA building and passed the Editors Guild and Cinematographers Guild, and went through LA it made my heart sad. Not only do I want to be taken out of my desk job and into directing, but for some reason I have always had a heart for the industry and Hollywood and I am not there. I visit, but I live behind the “Orange Curtain” and work in a glorified customer service job…the only way I get stimulated to use my passion is by blogging, watching films and trying to push my own, but when no festival wants a film as small as mine it becomes insanely difficult to keep the faith and continue full steam ahead.

I completely trust God to control my life and I know the best way to live is to let Him direct my path instead of trying to swim upstream. I’ve been praying a lot lately that God would adjust my heart to what He wants but what I think now is that I not only need that but I need the discernment to know what it is He wants versus what it is I want. I don’t know if this heaviness on my heart and this drive are from me or Him; I lean towards it being from God but I have no idea what to do about this or how to proceed so it becomes difficult.

I want to go back to the DGA again and this time without wondering if I will ever be in one of the photos that graces the lobby walls.

March 6, 2010

The Oscars are tomorrow and I'm excited, but I also just got a facebook page put together for END. Please follow my film on facebook and twitter!


END Facebook
END Twitter

Thank you all!

I miss painting. I need to do it more. Painting birthday gifts today was a nice way to be inspired and relax.

February 18, 2010

This has been a week of decisions for me, all spurred by an exercise in spiritual disciplines by my life group. I started concentrating on prayer last week, and that lead to me remembering to talk to God through my day and working on the position of my heart. By the time I made it to church on Sunday the sermon resonated with me. God is good.

One thing that really began to resonate with me is that I’m focusing on the wrong things. To use the lingo of my church, I have been holding onto my film with a closed fist; it’s made me sad, bitter and upset at everything that’s transpired – work going bad, getting rejected by festivals, and the state of my life in general. So this weekend I began to pray.

I’ve been praying that I would leave the path that I have placed myself on and get back on God’s path. That created a huge peace in me. I still don’t like my job, I’m still upset END is sitting in a DVD case instead of being on screen, but I know things can change.

I’ve started to remember that part of why I made END even beyond my love of film, is that I don’t want to be in customer service for the rest of my life. I love movies. I want to make them. Desk life is not for me.

So now I’m thinking. If I was able to pull off an entire feature film, start to finish in one year then I have to be able, with God, to figure out the next step. The next step probably consists of a lot of things – getting an agent, thinking about self-distribution, trying to sell end to distributors…and a hundred other things that I don’t even know to research yet.

God is good.

February 9, 2010

Someone recently asked me what my dream job is. As of today I have an answer.

Working under Christopher Nolan to direct the next Superman film. God that would be a dream come true.

The person that gets this job had better appreciate it and produce one heck of a film about the boy in blue.

February 4, 2010

2009 Academy Awards: Best Actress winner Kate Winslet
Originally uploaded by USA TODAY

I’ve always described The Oscars as my Super Bowl. It’s exciting for me, I have to watch the pre-show, I have to know about the films and I settle in and normally do dinner and the show. For a few years I’ve even been to Oscar parties that heavily resemble football parties. When Martin Scorcese won his best directing Oscar my friends and I screamed so loud you would have thought the quarterback just threw the game ending pass – the neighbors even complained about how loud we screamed.

I constantly wait through awards season leading up to The Oscars watching who gets nominated for other awards, who wins, what new films are on the horizon, etc. I watch it all with a fanaticism and anticipation for what’s coming next, guessing the whole time what films and people will make it into the Oscar race. In the past I’ve felt a little strange about this because most people around me have no idea who was even nominated for the SAG, PGA or DGA Awards, or why certain people would be favored at the Globes, or what the heck the ISA’s are – so they look at me a bit strangely and I took it to heart for awhile, wondering why I get so excited about these silly awards shows. As a girl so many people would simply accuse me of wanting to see the red carpet spectacle, but that’s not really it.

Finally, a friend said something that made it all click for me. If The Oscars are like be Super Bowl, awards season is like my play-off’s. Only for me it’s even more exciting because there are far more teams and variables than in any sport I can think of. There’s politics, bodies of work, box office, critical response, the possibility that one nomination could cancel another out, etc. It’s fun.

I still believe that at the end of the day judging one film against another is a futile attempt to quantify art in a way it can’t be measured, but I don’t think there is any harm in it. Good work should be rewarded, and watching the process is really fun.

February 1, 2010

Day 30: January 30, 2010
Originally uploaded by mrbosslady

Tomorrow is my birthday and I will oficially be one year older. I am quite excited about that. I've got to hope that every birthday moves me a little closer to my goals, God willing.

I don't make New Year's resolutions, but I did make a decision that could be construed as one this year. I think of a panel at Comic-Con by Joss Whedon and he told the audience that he felt like he just hadn't entertained us enough lately and wanted to do more; he then went on to make Dr. Horrible, Dollhouse, etc. starting the following year. Well I have that feeling, like I just haven't entertained people enough lately, I haven't been using my craft.

I don't have the money or equipment to start putting out viral videos every week, or continously shoot movies, but what I can do is show what of my world I can and be a little creative every day. So I started a 365 project again. I'm taking one picture every day for the whole year. I kicked off the project on the first of January and won't end it until New Year's rings in next January. I have done a 365 or two in the past so I am looking to be a bit more creative with this one and hopefully not only entertain any one who checks it out on flickr, but refine my ability to use images to convey a message or a story.

Now let's be honest, taking a picture a day will mean not every picture is going to get knocked out of the park, but it does mean I have a lot of chances to try things and I intend to.

If you are interested in viewing my project please view my photostream at Flickr.com/mrbosslady.

Here's to a new year, a birthday, and getting closer to directing!

January 28, 2010

[This post has several links embedded in the text. Please click the links if you would like to see the referenced items.]

Whether 2009 or 2010 is the start of the new decade, I am glad that the numbers on the calendar rolled over and a new year began. I was mentally ready for it. As I’ve already posted several times on this blog, 2009 was a heck of a year.

Yesterday, January 27 was my one year anniversary of being laid off. A lot of people discount my experience when I was laid off because I was hired back after only about five weeks, most people refer to it as my “extended vacation”. This aggravates me to no end. I was not “on vacation”, I was laid off and experienced all the mental trauma and damage that comes with that – trauma that doesn’t go away simply because I was hired back.

It’s true that I was quickly able to be emotionally over my job, but that wasn’t because being laid off didn’t hurt, it was because the job I am currently doing is not my passion and my heart has never been in it. This did not make the flowing weeks easy.

I worried constantly. I worried that I wouldn’t be able to make my car payment and I’d lose my car. I fought with the unemployment system as they continually lost my application. I sent out dozens of resumes, applied to a countless number of jobs and heard nothing. Everyone around you tries to be sympathetic and I am incredibly greatful for the people that helped me but that in itself gets tiring, to know you are always the example of pity when you are with certain people. No matter what you do there is always also the feeling that you can’t shake that there had to be some way this could have all been avoided and your subconscious likes to tell you that other people deserved this more than you did. Even if you try not to listen it pops into your mind.

When I finally got the call by HR and the VP and offered my position back I can tell you I did not want to go back. Not only was I over this job, the management had already essentially told me I was unnecessary to the company and that is a very difficult feeling to put aside. Every emotion and instinct I had did not want to say yes, but in the end I said yes because life prevails. I do still have a car payment, a student loan payment, a phone bill and in general the things life throws at you that all require a job.

I did everything I could to remember that God was in control of the situation not me. One thing that helped me greatly was that I took a photo and posted it on flickr; it was the day after I was laid off and as art always does it helped me to center myself and my emotions and remember that a plan would unfold.

Since being back at my job and annoyed with those telling me I was on “vacation” I’ve slowly come to realize that while in the past twelve months I’ve outwardly lost the effects of being laid off I still have emotional and mental scars. I don’t know if all of them can be healed while I am still employed by the company that got rid of me, but I know God can do great things to heal.

One of the things that started the healing process, as strange as it may seem, was going and seeing Up In The Air. I know art and film usually reach me in a different way than they do the masses since that is my passion, but the chords of this film resonated with me in a cathartic way I am not fully capable of explaining. When I walked out of the theatre I realized I felt better about my situation than I had felt in months.

As the anniversary of being laid off approached I could feel my angst and anxiety rise all over again, so I decided to take action. Not only have I been applying for new jobs again, but I decided I needed to take another picture. I don’t know if this one will have as great an impact on viewers as my original, but I am hoping that at least for me it will provide some small amount of healing.

January 27, 2010

I'm plugging myself in shameless self promotion right now. I have an Etsy Shop where I sell my dabblings in jewelry and photography & aparently the only way to get my stuff seen is with shameless self-promotion. So I encourage you to take a look. I like what I create and I hope you will too.

You can visit my shop by clicking on this link or using the widget in the sidebar.

I promise a real blog post soon. This week is an interesting one.

January 21, 2010

20/365 Sundance in Park City
Originally uploaded by diamond-mind

I’m going to admit it – the next ten days might suck a little bit. Sundance is going on.

I have made peace with the fact that independent film is an incredibly hard business right now; everyone is saying it – the economy has hit little films like mine the hardest –no one wants to touch them because the chance of getting a return on them is so incredibly slight. I have made my peace with not getting into Sundance this year, God obviously has other plans for me. However, it’s still incredibly hard to know it’s going on in Utah, and that I would do just about anything to be there, in that culture, experiencing it.

Sundance has been a dream of mine for so long. It’s implanted in a film students head, usually years before they even hit film school that if your film makes it to Sundance that is a stepping stone to success. Even though Sundance has evolved over the years and bigger films have gotten into it, the festival is still looked at as one of the top festivals in existence and it’s incredibly prestigious to go.

Beyond even that though, I just want to be there. I want to see what it’s like to be so incredibly immersed in a film culture that is happening everywhere you look. Everyone that’s there is excited about the new treasures they are going to uncover and the films and art that lurk around every corner. It has to be amazing.

I still want to get a film accepted into Sundance, there is no question about that; eventually though, I may just have to buy a pass, book a hotel and experience the magic for myself.

January 8, 2010

Game Over
Originally uploaded by Nika Fadul

I am really getting tired of this frustrating feeling I have somewhere between free falling and being stuck in place. I think this is the feeling the term "quarter life crisis" was invented for.

I'm 5 years out of college as of May. I am ready to move forward a bit, get some positive goals set forward, but it just isn't happening. Woo hoo.

I think part of what's helping this melancholy stick around is that I am still sick. We are 8 days into 2010 and I've spent everyone in varying states of this fracking cold. It doesn't give me much confidence in 2010.

I've decided to alleviate most of the cold annoyance and stagnation by burning through Battlestar Galactica for the first time. That is a show that can really inspire the creative mind. It had to be insane to work on that show.

Maybe when I get better things will start looking up...and soon I'll be done with the entire BSG series...

Januray 7, 2010

New Year 2010 Signpost
Originally uploaded by Master.Miu

And so I began my new year in a spectcualar fashion - I'm sick. I've been sick every day since the first. Eww. I have a doctor's appointment Monday so that should start making things better. But so far I've been too out of it to look at festivals to apply to. That needs to be corrected this weekend.

However, I am happy that I decided to start a 365 photography project again this year. I haven't done one since 2008 when I was crazy enough to do two at once. This year I will be taking one picture a day, no theme to it except my life. If you want to see the photos they are being psoted on flickr at flickr.com/mrbosslady. I'm excited to document my year.