And....ACTION!

Me working on Sonora's webseries

Back in December a really cool thing happened. We had a staged reading of my sitcom PREGNANT OR NOT HERE WE COME. It was amazing. It was a night I'll never forget (even though a lot of it is a heart-pounding too loud to hear much blur). And then Christmas happened and New Years and I have a DVD that's not the sound quality to show people and then that's it. Nothing else happened.

Hollywood's a tough town. I have a sign on my wall next to my computer that says, "Hollywood has high walls but there are gates." Below it is written, "What are my gates." The answer? I don't know.

I've been scaling the walls for years. YEARS. I've been working and strengthening myself and working and preparing for the moment I go over. If you can ever prepare for such a thing. I've been hunting and planning and tracking the gates but they seem to move. Write a spec script of a show that's currently on the air. Write a pilot. Write a screenplay. Write a play. Write a sketch. Make a webseries. Get a job. Do work for free.

It's a lot to navigate. There's no one path that leads to being a screenwriting, a television, or even just any type of writer. Every single person in Hollywood has a different story on how she or he broke in. Every. Single. Person.

And so last December my friends and I decided to try our own way. Build a new road. We did the staged reading. And yet? The path was blocked. The road ended.

But...we didn't want it to end. We wanted it to keep going. We all had such a great time that night, and the weeks leading up to that night. Working like crazy to pull it off. Preparing and rehearsing and writing. I loved every crazy minute of it. I loved working with all these great people, meeting new people, seeing actors perform my story on a stage. Amazing.

And then, I went back to my regularly scheduled life. In January I sat back down at my desk and started writing. Other things. I rewrote my one-hour pilots. Now I'm working on a couple of screenplays. I wrote a treatment to be pitched to a production company. And while it's all forward movement, it's not enough for me. Not now. Not since I've had a taste of what the other side is like. The fun, working with people to bring my stories to life side.

And so, Monday morning when I sat on Sonora's (my amazing producer of the staged reading) porch and ate an orange and lamented about how I didn't want PREGNANT to die, I had this crazy idea that I was scared to tell her. And yet? I did anyway. I told her I wanted to make something. For the first time since I moved out here I have a desire to move away from the keyboard and onto a stage or behind a camera or anything other than just sit behind the keyboard.

So together, in one of those excited, heart pounding moments where you literally feel like jumping up and down, we decided to produce and film the pilot of PREGNANT OR NOT HERE WE COME.

Yes, it's true. All the gurus in Hollywood say don't make a pilot. In fact, just THE DAY BEFORE I had been listening to my beloved John August and Craig Mazin on their Scriptnotes podcast telling "the new billionaire in Hollywood" to spend his or her imaginary money making movies, making music or making a broadway show. They implicitly said, don't make a pilot. They did say make a series though. And so, I'll ask forgiveness not permission on this one.

I know it's a crazy idea. I've never made anything before like this. But Sonora has. She's made an award-winning webseries. She's been in a ton of movies and on a ton of television shows. She knows how to get shit done. And so, together, with Dasha and Angela, we're going to do this.

But here's the cool thing: We're not going to do it alone. It can't just be the two of us, or even the four of us. It has to be an all-in, everyone is our biggest cheerleader-type of thing. We need you. All of you. I need you. I need my family and my friends and my peers and everyone to help me do this really cool thing. And I'm not just talking money (though trust me, there's one of those dreaded Kickstarter emails coming your way soon, I know, I know, we all feel the same way in this town, but it's how shit gets done). I'm talking love and energy and coming to the screenings once it's done and tweeting about it and Facebooking about it and reminding me when I'm in the thick of it how awesome it is and how awesome it will be. Because life is too hard alone. Way too hard.

Monday morning after this very quick and life-changing (well, maybe, we'll see) decision was made I was shaking I was so excited. And terrified. So so terrified. I called my parents on the drive home and can I just say, I have the coolest parents around. Without even a second's hesitation they were like, that makes sense, what do we do, do we need to paint, will people like the food I make, we'll sleep at Jenny and Andy's so Sonora can have our bedroom. I'm serious. That's what happened FIRST. Coolest. Parents. Ever.

So yeah, that's a detail - we're going to shoot the pilot in Michigan. In Howell and Detroit because well, it's set in Detroit. And because I have people there. We'll shoot in my parents' house, in a local parking lot and hopefully a local bar. It's a 22-minute pilot with four lead actors and all but one scene is set inside. We can do this. It will be amazing. It will be. I promise.

We already have the amazing Ashlie Atkinson (coming soon to a TV near you on FOX's US AND THEM) committed to be the lead. Knowing she wanted this story to continue to live was a huge part of what pushed me to want to do this. She was amazing in the role and even though I didn't write the part of Leah for her, the minute she said Leah's lines, she became Leah, which was so awesome. We're working on getting some other people on board. We're working on figuring out how to film in Michigan. How to put together a budget. How to get people interested in our project. How to raise money. How to do it all so that in JULY (yep, July!) we can spend a week making a TV show. A TV show I assure you all you'll be able to hold in your hands on DVD and watch on your TVs and computers. How cool is that?

So I'm excited. And terrified. Did I mentioned terrified, yes, it's true. I am. But I am so much more excited. I can't wait for what's next. I can't wait for tomorrow. Sunday I spent the day listening to podcasts and talking about TV with a friend. By Monday I was making TV. Life is crazy some times.

So yes, I'm making a pilot in July. Yes, I'm still going to Europe and going to Michigan as planned. And yes, I can't wait to go on this journey with all of you!

And....ACTION!