How a guy called Joe lost his self, his confidence and his friggin' HAIR in the course of trying to make it in screenwriting.  Christ, life can be cruel.  And when it's not being cruel, it's just dull.

Prologue

I started writing screenplays back when personal computers were vying for attention with Bill Gate's wet dreams.  Or so it seems.  I remember getting a book on how to write screenplays called, "Writing for Movies & Television," by someone whom I forget and is probably old, insane or dead, so who cares?

That was the ONLY flippin' book on the shelf at that time!!  Ye Gods, when I think of the megamonies made by maniacs writing and selling HOW TO WRITE A SCREENPLAY books... I shrug my thin shoulders and say, "Just another opportunity that passed you by."

Ahead of the Curve...

Anyway, the cupboard was bare back then as far as pithy, germane and intelligent advice on writing screenplays.  This was the late 70's, I think.  Or thereabouts.  Late 80's?  Gawd, I should have invested in better drugs.  The point is that I started writing screenplays ahead of the curve.

 ...And Still Completely Lost

What did I write?  Horror, of course.  Horror was big then, everybody was doing horror.  I HATED horror, and should have realized that the first rule of writing something is to at least LIKE IT a little bit, but that's what learning is for, right?  

So I wrote horror screenplays.  Vampire stories, demon stories, cursed rings, cursed people, even wrote about a cursed pot one time.  That one really got me far, I can tell ya.  I didn't have a computer then (NOBODY did), and I found it incredibly, mind bogglingly difficult to actually TYPE something that was coherent.

Typing?  What's That?

Couldn't type at all.  Not that I ever invested in equipment.  My mom was big on buying crap from garage sales and stuff, so all my old typewriters were missing letters or left long smudgy lines across the page.  My crap looked like crap.  

I don't remember if I ever sent anything anywhere back then.  I know I used to spend small fortunes mailing shit to myself all the time.  Like THAT was ever going to stop professional thieves (ie: development swine) from stealing someone's work.  I can hear them now... 

"Hey, this is good, let's steal it."  

"No, wait... he might have( gasp) MAILED IT TO HIMSELF!"  

"You don't think?! Arrrrrgh, the good ones know ALL the tricks!"

Three Bad Horrors and a Side of Kid, Please

After sort of writing about three very bad horror scripts, I found myself getting a woman pregnant and filled with a sense of urgency to marry her and start a family. This sense of urgency was fueled by a misplaced idea of morality I must have picked up watching t.v..  To this day I have no idea where those thoughts came from, nor do I exactly remember what they were.  Anyway, those damn morals led me to put away the horrible typewriter and get a job.

See That Ship?  The One Sailing Away?

This was right before the great 80's screenplay spec script buying frenzy began and kids from grade school with half-completed scripts made deals with figures that sounded suspiciously like a million dollars a script.  Oh, the pain... the pain...

So I sit out the 80's, hating life, working at various and sundry jobs to support my family.  This, I have concluded, was (cue Voice of God, please) THE WAY THINGS WERE MEANT TO BE!!  

I must believe that.  I must.  Have no choice, you see.  HAVE to, lest I snap.  Like Renfield eating the flies... Haaa, haaa, heee, heeeee...

Once Again Into the Breach!

In the 90's (right AFTER the great buying frenzy officially ended), I decided in my wisdom to again strike out and write screenplays.  This is my brilliant notion for the 90's.  Except that now, being oh, so much older, established, having considerably more credit cards than ten years earlier... I get myself a really cool, Smith-Corona Personal Word Processor.  Ooooooo. Ahhhhhhhhh.    

It's great.  I can actually make mistakes and fix them without liquid paper.  Oh, the joy.  The resounding, thumping joy of it all!  So what do I write with my new found freedom from smudges, holes and ugliness?  What fine, original, inspired  work will pour from my brain unto the page?  A movie?  A novel?  Wait!  How about a script for...

STAR TREK: THE NEXT GENERATION?!

Ooooooooh. Ahhhhhhhhhh.  Now THAT's using the ol' noodle.  So I write this thing.  A STAR TREK: TNG script that I learn has to be exactly 581/2 pages long, have a 2/3 minute teaser, contain no more than 32 scenes, weigh 6.75 grams, come on paper stock #27764567238 and generally fit a format created by people who really DON'T want to read a mountain of awful, unsolicited CRAP from wannabee writers.

Yeh, baby... I'm making progress now.  Did my script, sent it off to what's his face, the guy you're supposed to send them to.  Eric something, I think.  Who cares.  He never responded, the rat.

The Pain, the Pain  

My script became landfill along with the other 15,000 awful, unsolicited crap scripts filled with, "Make it so, Number One!" and "Captain, there's a core breach!" sent in that year.  

I think over the course of the seven year run, STAR TREK: TNG was responsible for collecting more than a quintillion awful, unsolicited crappy scripts from writers around the world.  That pile of paper is now holding up the sinking Mandalay Bay resort in Las Vegas.  Sure, they SAY it's not sinking, but we know the truth...

And the Point Is--?

I entered the world of screenwriting with hair on my head.  After twenty some years of countless frustrations, late nights, too much coffee, and not enough sex, I now had a hairline that was retreating faster than Bill Clinton on an ethics issue.

Worst Moment of All 

One of the worst moments in my screenwriting Group history was when the local paper did a major write-up on us and I was described as "A bald man."  Hey, I WASN'T bald!!  Receding, yes. Follicily challenged, okay. I woke up every damn day and spent a half hour getting my hair so that is looked less bald.  I was NOT BALD, dammit!!

But there it was in the paper.  A "bald man."  Me. Joe. Who was utterly convinced that I was not.  Me, with my wispy sprites of hair valiantly hanging on.  Afraid of wind, terrified of swimming, staying up nights watching those ads for Medical Hair Replacement dreaming, "Oh yeah, when I sell my script, I'm getting some friggin' hair!" 

Ageism In Hollywood?  Don't Be Absurd!

I'd show up at meetings and meet incredibly young development people (execs in t.v. start their careers at twelve, ya know) and feel their eyes crawl up to the top of my shiny dome, faces registering that ineffable sense of sadness that here was a poor guy who just never made it... and wondering how they were going to get the hell out of this meeting as soon as possible.

What To Do, What To Do?

In a fit of screenwriting and life induced desperation akin to what Van Gogh must have felt had he been a talentless boob with a family rather than a tortured genius chasing hookers, I took to my head a sharp object and chopped until my hair was completely gone. 

I stood in the bathroom looking at what I feared more than anything in the world... Bald Joe.

I noticed that people looked at me differently in check-out lines, especially 7-11 late at night.  This I didn't mind too much, in fact I thought it pretty cool.

Now I'll Show 'Em...

My next trip to Hollywood for a pitch meeting, I felt years younger, more powerful, more focused, better than before.  It was harder to tell exactly how old I was, or rather, how very UN-YOUNG I was.  I thought, "I've got a chance here... I look like I'm 30 again instead of looking like somebody's moon-faced Uncle Bill.  This is great!"

So I did my pitch, told my stories, flirted with the help and generally convinced myself that I was hot.  At one point they asked if I was Canadian because the production was getting money from the Canadian "Supporting Bad Writers From the Great White North" Campaign in which bad writers from Canada have a leg up on bad writers from the U.S. 

Humbly, I had to admit that, "No, I'm not Canadian."  Oh, the disappointed looks, the sincere, heartfelt human pain seeping from these nice development people.  No, I was not Canadian, and therefore... my stuff didn't sell. 

Damn it!

All that perfectly good hair. Gone.  

For nothing. 

NEW!  Joe's "Revelation" about why he failed...
It's a page that could change your life.