I, ad man

Back in the 1990's when I was in college, I decided after bouncing around a few majors that I wanted nothing more than to be a Madison Avenue advertising guy. Why? Well because a lot of my friends were doing it and it looked like an incredibly fun, sexy and cool way to be  (somewhat) creative and make a good living.

So I enrolled in the creative track at the University Of Texas advertising program, which is as renowned as similar programs at RISD and the Portfolio Center in Atlanta. I did pretty well and managed to survive three rigorous semesters of intense work developing my "book." (That's inside baseball-speak for a portfolio of spec ads).

Upon graduation I landed a headhunter who had an office in Chelsea that I was probably the least cool person to ever step foot in and within about two months I had a good solid job at a real ad firm on Fifth avenue and 18th street.

I worked there for eight years. I probably didn't know how good I had it, given the freedom and autonomy my boss and mentor gave me. As long as the work got done he didn't care what we did in our free time. Sure, I didn't work on a bunch of fancy Clio winning accounts, but I think I did something just as challenging - I regularly pitched commercials that pushed my conservative clients out of their comfort zone.

It was great! It was the tail end of the era of extravagant budgets, expense accounts and boondoggle commercial shoots in far flung locales like Mexico City, Amsterdam and of course by beloved Vancouver. I went to amazing parties at post-production houses and photographers' lofts and directors' houses. I left the business at age 30 to pursue screenwriting full-time but along the way I even got to make some fun commercials. This is one that always makes me laugh.

I'm trying to track down more of my spots online to add here and eventually put up my own site. Unfortunately all I have to show for my years in the biz is a horrible VHS copy of my reel.  

A cool Hollywood story

So I figured after writing so many blog posts about things going wrong I'd write about a time things went very right. Like "holy shit, did that just happen?" right.

In May of 2004 I sold a screenplay to Universal for the proverbial low against mid six figures. It was reported in all the trades and it was a big deal because I was still a "hot" writer at the time and after the sale went down I had several producers call me angry that they hadn't had a chance to take it out themselves. More on that later.

I described the script as "BROADCAST NEWS set in a high school." Now, I know you're saying "Simpsons did it. Bob's Burgers did it. Every show on Disney Channel did it for Christ's sake!" but the concept hadn't been done to death 11 years ago and I had written it very much in the dark tone of ELECTION and HEATHERS, two of the best high school flicks by any measure. The center of the story was a rivalry between two very different girls who would do just about anything to screw the other one over.  In other words, my wheelhouse.

The week I sold the script was the first week of May. I know this because the sale was not just helped by but pretty much dictated by the unexpected success of MEAN GIRLS which opened at the end of April. My script sold, unequivocably, off the heat of that film's success. The goal was to get Amanda Bynes to play opposite Hilary Duff because they had a real life "rivalry" at the time. I took people's word for it. I can't claim to know if that was true or not.

But here's the thing. I was completely unaware of MEAN GIRLS during the months I wrote the script. I wasn't trying to capitalize on the success of something, because it had yet to be a success. I wrote the script because I love a good, weird high school movie (THREE O'CLOCK HIGH anyone?) and I liked the subject matter. The fact that my script was "finished" at the exact same time that I had heat AND a similar movie killed at the box office was nothing I could have planned if I had wanted to. I can barely plan a pack lunch. It just broke in my favor.

To make the story even more serendipitous I hadn't even finished the script! I had handed the first draft to my manager for his input. He had printed it out and was reading it poolside over the weekend (Hollyhollywood, y'all!). A producer friend who was hanging out with him saw my name on the title page and asked to read it. His company made an offer a few days later, which is why no other producers got a whack at it. I hadn't even run a spell check on it.

So, there you have it. The "easist" fuck-ton of money I've ever made which I fell bass-ackwards into due to the sort of impeccable timing that can't be planned or even prayed for. If this post reads like bragging or something I'd like to think I've earned it after the numerous tales of woe I've subjected my reading audience to over the months of this blog. Even 11 years later I still remind myself that this did indeed happen and I like to think that it could somehow happen again. This was the sort of Holy Grail/Holy Shit! moment that we writers dream of. These things do happen. If it happened to me, it can happen to any writer who does the work.

Now if they'd only made the fucking movie.




Next time I'll get back to the shitty stuff. That always gets a lot more clicks!