Last Night I Fell in Love with Laura Linney

Eh, what can I say?  Maybe it wasn’t her, at all, but a mish-mash of the characters she’s played, but it was strong last night and hit me full on.  Maybe it’s just a deep admiration, but after watching an episode of “The Big C” and then the movie The Savages, I felt a great swell of emotion toward her.  Her smile is sweet, her tears contagious, her face in repose is breathtaking and she can summon a fiery intensity that can stop a bullet.

This is nothing new.  It’s called “The Witching Hour”, and in Texas it occurred around four a.m.  Each night when I found myself awake at that time (which was just about every night from age 19 to 24) I would inexplicably fall in love with whomever I laid eyes upon or conjured an image of in my brain.  Here on West Coast time, that makes it about two a.m., which is right around the time I saw Laura Linney staring out at me from the television with that steely intensity of hers, her brunette hair cascading in subtle waves around her face.

I’m a hopeless romantic. We know this.

Despite that, The Savages wasn’t really all that good.  I was unimpressed.  It did however help me come to the realization that I need to write my screenplay, and soon.  So I took Syd Field’s Screenplay off the bookshelf and placed it on the queue (my coffee table) to be read next, after I finish Marcus Luttrell’s Lone Survivor. 

I’ve had this idea stuck in my brain for almost a full year, now, and I’m itching to get it out.  The fact remains, I’ve never written a screenplay before and don’t entirely know how; hence the book.  I want to do it right, once, the first time.  I want to sit down, summon my will and energy, and write a kickass screenplay right out the box on the first try that sells for a cool one million (I’m not greedy) and then rest on my laurels for a while and drink coffee and whiskey and hang out with my wife.  Is that too much to ask?

The premise: A nihilistic worker drone without ambition or purpose finds himself hurtling towards his mid-30s.  Desperate and mad from directionless relationships and dead-end jobs, he plans a trip back to his hometown to see his old high school chums.  He discovers once there that they have not changed but the world around them has aged drastically.  In a last-ditch effort to feel young again and/or put a cap on their carefree days, the protagonist convinces his buddies to aid him breaking into their alma mater and stealing the mascot, a full-sized stuffed tiger.  Hijinks ensue, people learn about themselves, fart jokes abound.

In other news, I just turned 32.  It happened with little fanfare, but I did get my FaceBook blown up by messages all day long.  My gifts were practical, my weekend little more than a dinner and a movie.  Interestingly, I’m not upset about this.  I’m a career-man, focused and driven to the point of exhaustion.  The quieter my private life, the better. 

I have to assemble addresses so I can send out the save-the-dates for my wedding.  Then I can get to work on the screenplay, maybe publish my “Making of Action Squad Episode 3″ to the internet, collate the works of Macy over a few CDs for my friend in Oregon to catalogue, then perhaps get some sleep.  These are my plans over the next week or so.  It truly is an honor being me.

So…. yeah.  That’s it.  I guess I don’t really have much to say, do I?