Yesterday I got off track and didn't do my daily write first thing in the morning. Big mistake. I forced myself to write a few lines of crap at close to midnight. But I did it, because I always tell my students to do it NO MATTER WHAT. Just do it, even if it's crap. Stick to the commitment you've made to yourself.
Of course, I doubt that my writing partners are excited or thrilled to receive my crap writes, but they can always ignore or delete them. I just need to send my writing out to a few someones, because sending to The Void is no longer something I can do. It's too lonely, too absurdly lonely.
Late yesterday afternoon, long before I got it together to write my crap write, I watched the pilot epiode of a now-over TV series called Battlestar Galactica. I know. Huh? Come again? But I stumbled upon it when I browsing around looking for something decent on Netflix, and after reading some reviews I decided to check it out, in great part because I like the two actors who star in it: Mary McDonnell and Edward James Olmos.
Excerpt from an interview with Edward O. and Mary M.:
McDonnell: I always read an offer. And I read it that night, and I went, "Oh, dear. I have to do this." I found it so compelling. And I eventually found out Ed was agreeing to do it, so that made a huge difference to me.
Olmos: I was the same, basically. There was a story that drew me in, especially with the mindset that one has after 9/11. You had a whole different perspective on the end of the world, that whole philosophy. What [Galactica executive producer Ronald D. Moore] did before you read the piece, he put three pages at the beginning. It was like a mission statement, kind of. It told you a little bit about how it was going to be shot. The script was very powerful. It was completely different. It was very much in the realm of Blade Runner . . . we talked about Blade Runner, and I said, "There was a door that was opened there that nobody ever walked in. Everybody walked through the door of Star Wars, but nobody walked through the door of Blade Runner." I said, "If you really want to do that, then I'm game to join up, but I'm going to be very honest: The first four-eyed creature I see, I'll faint. I will faint on camera, and I will be off the show." I just didn't want to go that route. I didn't want to act against those kind of situations; I didn't have the time to do that.
So we went into this with a 9/11 perspective and mindset with a very strong understanding of Blade Runner. This third season has been truly the best television I've ever been involved with in my life, to date. I can't even compare it to anything I've ever done. . . This is closer to, say, West Wing or ER or NYPD Blue, where the human drama is so intense that you're just sucked into the story. This one, it's even more poignant than that because the stakes are so much higher. I've never seen a show like this in my life, ever."
So heck, I watched the pilot. It wasn't as good of writing...or as immediately captivating... as Breaking Bad, but I am going to watch the next episode and see how it evolves. Turns out (I've read) that Mary McDonnell's character, unbeknownst to me when I rented the pilot, has breast cancer and will be fighting it all through the series, as she also fights to help save all of humanity. That was a bit of a surprise for me.This is the second series I've chosen to watch, without knowing ahead of time that the main character would be battling cancer.
Weird, don't you think? At least a little bit weirdly coincidental?
I DO think that's weird. And I really like the interview.
Posted by: linda | Monday, July 18, 2011 at 05:22 PM