Thursday, November 12, 2009

L.A. Times


What a week folks. After catching Neko Case Thursday night in St. Louis I hopped a plane for the coast way early Friday morning and hopped off in Los Angeles where I was in attendance at the AFM (American Film Market) where buyers, sellers, talent and the beautiful and shameless hawk their wares, (and by "in attendance" I mean haunting the bar in the lobby). I was there to hustle a little film I wrote called Mosquito Kingdom and help the producers push some of their other projects. It was an operation executed in the same manner as the film's production - improvise, bullshit and steal. I was happy to help. Got the chance to rub elbows with the likes of Robert Rodriguez and Black Caesar himself, Fred Williamson and had a nice chat with Richard Ledes the director of The Caller, (Elliot Gould and Frank Langella - nice) on the pleasures of working with Laura Harring. Also got tossed out on my ass, like I deserved to be, from the offices of a certain company who have acquired Michael Winterbottom's The Killer Inside Me from Jim Thompson's masterpiece of the same name. I have seen clips and let me tell you, Casey Affleck is once again fighting through my reservations to his casting and turning in what looks to be a scorching performance. I'd never been to L.A. before. Enjoyed the weather and the beach and The Mystery Bookstore in Westwood Village. I had breakfast with ex-St. Louisan current staff writer on The Mentalist and all around badass Jordan Harper. We talked favorite subjects like James Ellroy, Shawn Ryan, Todd Robinson and the tendency of publishers to pull their punches when handling "dark material". I asked him the progress on his yet unpublished novel Dirtnap Avenue and he said he'd been getting the same story a lot- "Love the book. Too dark for us. You'll never sell it." Seriously? That is a sad sad thing to hear. DA is as pleasant an ass kicking as you're likely to read anytime soon. Anybody reading this, (of course I mean publishers/editors) and wanting to take a look at this great little book should head on over to his website and request one. Also had a good meeting with a script agent and discussed the possibility of developing one of the original scripts I wrote with Scott Phillips into a television show... Interesting. Veddy interesting. I'm back to St. Louis now and have a couple film projects to consider, (one writing, one acting - c'mon, really?). Dunno what I'll have time or energy for, but it's nice to be asked. On a sad note, it doesn't look like Daniel Woodrell will be in attendance this Sunday for the St. Louis International Film Festival's presentation of the Director's Cut of Ang Lee's Ride With the Devil, (from Woodrell's fantastic Civil War era novel Woe to Live On). Bummer. Incidentally, while I was away St. Louis hosted Leonard Cohen and Jonathan Lethem. Though not together.

5 comments:

Kent said...

Sounds like a good trip. And Fred Williamson!!! That's very cool.

I agree with you on Casey Affleck. My initial thought was: Give me a break. Affleck as Lou Ford? No way.

Then I saw the long promo trailer last week, and, yeah, it sure looks like he nailed it. Maybe not how I always pictured Lou, but that's all right.

Unknown said...

Congrats Man!! Keep us posted.

Neil said...

That's a great fucking trip, sounds like to me. Cheers. We're rooting for you.

Unknown said...

Dude, you should totally do the acting gig just for the experience if nothing else. And a TV show would be awesome. Best of luck, Jed.

Greg said...

I seriously see you being a tripple threat -- fiction, screenwriting, acting. ... Rock it, Jed. ...