Twitter

Twitter is a very interesting social paradigm. It's more fluid and free flowing than Facebook, but not really a competitor to Facebook. Twitter and Facebook actually synergize well with each other.

Twitter is more about sharing and spreading information broadly, globally. Facebook is more about sharing private information with those you know. Twitter allows people to follow you, learn from you, without you needing to do anything in return. It ends the 'friend' connection, by letting people you don't know, or would not be 'friends' with on Facebook, get to know you.

Twitter can help you get news fast. It can help you find a job. Learn about your chosen career field. Share your thoughts, and influence the world.

The more you use it, the more you see how it can be used. It's like a game. But when you play it, it has real consequence -- good consequence if you are smart, don't tweet what you would not stand in front of a crowd and say.

When you play the Twitter game, ask yourself: What is my end game?

Then go play.

PHARAOH... the recent developments:

I have yet to approach any firms or prod-cos with the new draft, I'm actually still refining it with -- the help of my little circle. I don't actually think that any management firm or prod-co would sign any sort of confidentiality agreement from an unknown writer. I am well aware most would not find it worth the liability/risk. They would no doubt prefer to be free to share submissions they receive to whomever they choose. Often that’s how they find affirmation of it’s worthiness, or potential interested parties, as I understand it.

It's a tough place to be when you want to protect the details of your story/script and concepts, but also get it out there (to the right person)... It's a very difficult balance.

Because I am still just starting out -- still establishing myself as a screenwriter, trying to compete with the pros -- I don't really have the luxury (or ability) of keeping my script "under wraps" until it can be put into production. By the nature of the business when you are "unsold/unproven" you have to put your work "out there" before it can be bought/made. Only well established people who can set up projects based on past works, or via a studio, have the luxury of keeping projects secret until they hit the screen.

I sent out tons of queries for PHARAOH in 2009, and had interest from some major management firms, but the script just wasn't at the level, or developed enough yet. I wasn't seasoned enough yet. They all ultimately passed. But I could tell the concept and story was interesting to people; many people responded to it, some are still responding to it. So I wasn't going to give up on it, (I never will : ).

Then in 2010, I shared PHARAOH with people here on DDP and that really helped me take it to the next level. Special thanks to all of you who read it and gave me feedback, I truly appreciated it, and learned a great deal from it. Since then, I’ve met a bunch of established writers, creative execs, and film players and have been getting great advice and counsel, picking brains and really learning the craft; and the business.

Unfortunately, because I sent out early drafts, and people at firms/co’s read them, it’s definitely going to be an uphill battle to get it read again by some of them. However, I am increasingly confident in the story, and the global viability of the project. The more I talk with people in the biz about it, the more I come to see this as true. I am confident I will find the right home for it, in good time. I’m lucky that I work in the biz, and that I am able to meet new and connected people almost everyday.

A friend of mine told me the other day that John Milius was shopping around a project called "Pharaoh" -- a series -- and I sent me this article:

http://www.variety.com/article/VR1118017488?refCatId=19

I would be presumptuous to say he "stole" the idea from me. I’m not the first person to write a script about a Pharaoh, obviously. So, I know it doesn't really work that way. From what I understand he doesn’t have a script, so I do worry that they will try and use subject matter I plan on using however. But our projects are very different. His project is a series like ‘Rome’ set in ancient times, mine is a feature Sci-Fi /Thriller set in modern times. It is annoying however when people latch onto a title and idea that you put out there first – I sent out tons of queries talking about the marketability and promise of Ancient Egyptian lore -- and in my mind are trying to steal/borrow or use my thunder. I know it happens all the time and is just the nature of the biz, but it’s still a bit frustrating.

Ultimately, I see it as confirmation that I am on to something; that I am right. If people are going out with, and developing projects about pharaohs, sounds like people see it as viable... I take comfort in knowing I was out there with my PHARAOH project first (a year earlier), and I have the emails and meetings to prove it. I simply do not yet have the ability to go out with my PHARAOH in the way that a well established screenwriter like Milius does/has – just yet.

I’m currently doing one more pass at on PHARAOH, and then I think I am going to post it here again, in it’s entirety, because I think it’s going to be that good. Good enough that it can stand. Good enough that it should be read and shared. No one has read the new draft yet, but I think/hope it will live up to the hype.

My PHARAOH – set in modern times and the future, part 3 of the trilogy will go into the past – is a very convoluted story, with a very deep and complex (controversial?) underpinning, so making it work, flow smoothly and easily, is difficult. But I knew it would be going into it. Recent successes like ‘Inception’ and even ‘Limitless’ & ‘The Adjustment Bureau’ have shown that there is a real market for cerebral concepts.

Because I am still growing as a writer (hopefully I will always be) I am finding that my script/story is also constantly growing with me. I have had several epiphanies as to how to improve and solidify the story. I keep finding and reading books on certain topics for research and clarification, and continue to make the story ever more simple and concise without sacrificing story. I can’t expect that someone else will understand a story that I did not fully understand myself! This is changing fast. I have come a long way already, and now I can see the light at the end of the tunnel.

PHARAOH is a massive project and would easily cost $100 million to make, which makes the task of getting it sold and green-lit by an “unknown” writer even more difficult. But certainly not impossible. If people gave up on projects they believed in so easily, nothing in Hollywood would ever get made. Right?

I know PHARAOH is great/solid concept. People are interested in it. It would play well in emerging markets (like China and India), with youth, and with older audiences. I have been developing PHARAOH for over five years now, and am finally getting it to where it needs to be:

KNOWN