When did I start the third draft of Sam Bailey?

Sometime in the sort of blurry past, between my knee problems and the Holidays and all the other eruptions that confuse and complicate my writing life, I remember telling you guys that I'd finished half a rewrite, and that I was starting over.  Well, that was true.

Something like twenty percent of the original script is in the new draft.  Most of the rest of it is very rough - but I'm thinking I like where my characters are at.  Throughout this draft, I was hanging on by a very thin thread, I was wrestling with some very big issues in my life - heart, mind, and soul stuff - and finally I emerge out the other end with a script that's 25% shorter, way cleaner, and has some really soul-splattering stuff going on!

I broke down and cried!  I broke down and cried in a third draft!

While it needs a lot of cleaning up, I'm going to show what I've got to some of my creative partners, because this is one of those points where I might become totally convinced that parts of it are too good to lose.

Happy New Year, everybody.  Like Sam, I've been a day late to the party my whole life, because it's been more important to speculate and fear than experience.  Did I just learn something?

This film is so accessible from a filmmaking standpoint, and so giving from a performance standpoint, that I'm feeling very confident about shooting this film in 2009.  Right now, I'd like to celebrate a little.

Till next time,
T