Good morning, fellow artists! Welcome to another exciting edition of my weekly blog. As you all know, I am focusing on three goals this year. Those goals are: 1) Book supporting roles in feature films produced and distributed by independent or mid-sized studios. 2) Complete the second draft of “The Third Act” feature film script with Kelly Tighe. 3) Write and complete the first draft of my rugby feature film script. Each week, I will provide updates that are hopefully inspiring and engaging.
Yes, you read the title of this blog entry correctly! On February 12th, 2025, I started writing the script for my rugby feature film. Armed with the feature film treatment I created during my time at the Sundance Collab, in addition to supplementing it with Jeffrey Alan Schechter’s book, “My Story Can Beat Up Your Story,” I got to writing! On February 26th, 2025, I finished the first draft of act one. Now, you might be thinking to yourself, “Wait a minute. Days have passed between February 12th and February 26th. How did he write act one in 7 1/2 hours?” Keep reading below 🙂
One thing I wanted to experiment with for the first time as a writer was timing my writing sessions. Yes, technically, days have passed between February 12th and February 26th. However, according to my timer, I logged 7 1/2 hours (7 hours, 33 minutes to be more precise) of writing time across the days I wrote act one. That really put things into perspective for me (7 1/2 hours versus “several days” of writing). And it got me thinking: Which is the best way to measure writing time? By utilizing a clock? By counting each day of writing? How do I quantify my writing time as it relates to dealing with a network, movie studio, agent, or manager? Are they looking at the recorded time or the days/weeks/months it took me to complete something? Is it more impressive/accurate to measure progress using hours and minutes, or is measuring one’s progress by days/weeks/months the standard that will always prevail? Keep reading below 🙂
That being said, this is still a big win for me! I was able to accomplish this feat through the prior work and research I did. With each scene, I got out of my way. I didn’t focus on getting it absolutely right or being so precious with the dialogue. I focused on the event of the scene, how to fill it out emotionally in terms of what the characters were feeling, and making sure the scenes had a beginning, middle, and end. And of course, I will comb through act one later to make edits. Keep reading below 🙂
Act two is the meat of the script, and I am curious to see how long it takes me to write it using the timing system. I am confident that my prior work and research will come through for me again. I am also prepared for any roadblocks that will come up and force me to ask the next question or dig deeper or do a little more research to fill in certain moments. Keep reading below 🙂
Until next week!
Chasing The George 