Dispatches From the Front Lines of the Culture War
Don’t forget: The new season of Project Greenlight premieres on Bravo tonight at 9:00 EST.
To get you in the mood, you might want to take a look at one of the more remarkable — if passed-over — audition pieces for that competition, Loose Ends.
William R. Coughlan is one of the founders of Tohubohu Productions (so even on pictures he doesn’t direct, he can squeeze in an Executive Producer credit) and in-house video producer for The Advisory Board Company. He dabbles in screenwriting, acting, 3-D animation, and writing autobiographical comments in the third person. He is also a published illustrator, has provided schematic graphics for several HBS case studies, designed the acclaimed Protégé clay poker chip line, wrote for the (now-dormant) online literary magazine Inkblots, and acts as editor for the MotherReader weblog (which is not-so-coincidentally written by his wife). He currently resides at a secret compound in Burke, Virginia, with his wife Pam and their two daughters.
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2 Comments:
Hey - with the loss of the Weinsteins over at Miramax, do you think there is a remotely a chance for PGL4?
Not bloody likely.
The whole reason PGL survived as long as it did was because Ben Affleck was able to call Harvey Weinstein directly whenever they hit a little bump.
The only reason it even made it to season three was because they agreed to limit it to genre films -- not that there's anything wrong with genre films, but the reasoning behind it was far from creative: It was all about the almighty dollar. The studio recognized that given the return on investment for, say, a horror film, they could afford to spend a million on it.
The big lie (and yes, I'm exaggerating -- sue me) about the PGL model is that they're not really talking about an indie film, but a low-budget studio film -- a union picture. And there ain't a whole hell of a lot you can do with a million under union (and studio) constraints.
Don't get me wrong -- I loved participating in PGL. Hell, I wouldn't have directed Loose Ends without it, and it sure gave me a chance to learn; I don't think it's an exaggeration to say it led directly to Schlimmer and Screening Process (not to mention the upcoming 48HFP). And from a screenwriting perspective, it gave me the excuse to learn just what diferentiates screenwriting from short-story writing, playwriting, speechwriting, what have you.
But I don't think it's quite lived up to its promise from either the participants' or the studio's point of view. We'll see how they do this year, but unless they hit a home run (always a possibility), I wouldn't count on a return engagement.
Of course, if they do come back, I'll be right there participating again...
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