I'm getting the urge to work another script of mine into a novel -- "Dair's Window". It's a drama about a gay man (Dair) finally coming to terms with the accidental death of his lover and the viciousness of the man's family. He's won the lawsuit against him and is about to enter into a commitment ceremony with a man he doesn't really love but feels comfortable with when the married best man comes into town with his very pregnant wife and upsets everything.
I set it in a small town in the mountains of Washington state because they offer civil unions and, despite the state's reputation for liberalism, has some serious pockets of right wing nuttery. And Dair became a stained glass artist from a well-to-do family while Adam, his late lover, is in the US illegally from Canada. There are hints the man was using Dair...but it's also suggested Adam is the reason Dair was becoming successful in his art. The new man in Dair's life is Wallace, who was also his lawyer and who is a political animal, while the best man is named Jacob, who used to be involved with Wallace when they both lived in Tokyo and does extreme IT work. His wife is Setsuko. Dair's got a mother I based on Lauren Bacall at her feistiest and an Episcopal reverend of a grandfather who marched with Martin Luther King in Selma.
I workshopped the script at Film Independent and am damned proud of it. It also got into the top ten of a couple of competitions. However, it looks like it will never see the light of day on a movie screen and I honestly do not understand why. But I can't get people in the gay productions houses to even read it...and I've tried a number of ways to make that happen. Nothing.
So it looks like the only way this story will become part of the world is if I work it into a book. It may not sell extremely well, but at least it will be seen by a few people instead of none.
It's funny...but I posted a first draft on TriggerStreet.com to speed up the feedback process. The nice thing about that site is you get honest responses, for the most part. Some people are out to slaughter for no good reason...and I've had them hit me on there, before...still, you can get a good idea of whether or not the story's working. And I got some very solid response. What I remember most, however, was just after gay marriage had been legalized in the state of California, not by law but by judicial decision. One bit of feedback said the script was a bit passe, now that gays could get married there. My immediate response was, "We'll see." I had no idea how vicious the fight over it would become and how easily Prop 8 would pass, but I knew gay men and women are still the minority everyone is allowed to despise...and by God, it got proven in spades, thanks to the Mormon Church.
So the story is still valid and current. For now. Isn't that disgusting?
I set it in a small town in the mountains of Washington state because they offer civil unions and, despite the state's reputation for liberalism, has some serious pockets of right wing nuttery. And Dair became a stained glass artist from a well-to-do family while Adam, his late lover, is in the US illegally from Canada. There are hints the man was using Dair...but it's also suggested Adam is the reason Dair was becoming successful in his art. The new man in Dair's life is Wallace, who was also his lawyer and who is a political animal, while the best man is named Jacob, who used to be involved with Wallace when they both lived in Tokyo and does extreme IT work. His wife is Setsuko. Dair's got a mother I based on Lauren Bacall at her feistiest and an Episcopal reverend of a grandfather who marched with Martin Luther King in Selma.
I workshopped the script at Film Independent and am damned proud of it. It also got into the top ten of a couple of competitions. However, it looks like it will never see the light of day on a movie screen and I honestly do not understand why. But I can't get people in the gay productions houses to even read it...and I've tried a number of ways to make that happen. Nothing.
So it looks like the only way this story will become part of the world is if I work it into a book. It may not sell extremely well, but at least it will be seen by a few people instead of none.
It's funny...but I posted a first draft on TriggerStreet.com to speed up the feedback process. The nice thing about that site is you get honest responses, for the most part. Some people are out to slaughter for no good reason...and I've had them hit me on there, before...still, you can get a good idea of whether or not the story's working. And I got some very solid response. What I remember most, however, was just after gay marriage had been legalized in the state of California, not by law but by judicial decision. One bit of feedback said the script was a bit passe, now that gays could get married there. My immediate response was, "We'll see." I had no idea how vicious the fight over it would become and how easily Prop 8 would pass, but I knew gay men and women are still the minority everyone is allowed to despise...and by God, it got proven in spades, thanks to the Mormon Church.
So the story is still valid and current. For now. Isn't that disgusting?
2 comments:
I think that the Mormons got their name when someone made a typo and added and extra "m" to the word they originally intended.
LOL...I have to remember that one.
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