I should pay attention...

I just noticed "5 Dates" is also a finalist for "Suzanne's Prize" for best love story at Screenwriting Expo. I'm 1 of 16, much better odds than 1 of 114. I honestly want to win this one, not for the money or prizes but because the story deserves it. My lead characters -- Mitch and Charl -- deserve it. I feel very warm about this story; it came to me while working in Detroit, last January.

I was packing up a HUGE collection of books to ship to Bloomsbury Auctions in London and New York -- over 300 boxes, took two solid weeks -- and the very pleasant elderly couple who'd owned those books had been together for nearly 50 years and still were in love. I chatted a lot with them as I worked and the long days passed quickly. Didn't hurt that Detroit was having one of their serious snowstorms, one that just kept drifting snow and drifting snow till it was nearly 4 feet deep and totally fun to drive in -- not. And yet...it was. I've lived in Grand Forks, ND, where it can snow like madness (the opening of "Fargo" brought back such memories) but I'd never been through such a beautiful, magical experience before. I so enjoyed it, when I finally had a down day, I drove down to Ann Arbor to give myself an excuse to look around the countryside...and I saw the University Hospital and the University of Michigan and the old Queen Anne style homes and then happened upon a little pavilion on a tiny island in the middle of a frozen river...and "5 Dates" formed in the space of an afternoon.

To keep the thoughts going, I drove back through Detroit and up to Port Huron then across to Sarnia, on the Canadian side, and walked in a park overlooking the lake. After 12 straight days of packing books and shifting boxes and preparing artwork for transport, I didn't feel tired or weary or anything negative; it was like the world was born anew. And I associate that with this script.

I want it to win because it's like my child...and what parent doesn't want his child to do well?