Writing: Boonsville

(For those who came in late...)

Four hundred weeks ago a washed up man in a remote Richmond sharehouse, sole survivor of a call centre, was rescued by friendly pygmies. (ok, they weren't that short).

He swore on the skull of George Romero "to devote my life to the creation of piracy, comedy and horror.... My sons shall follow me." His sons, and their sons, will follow -- and will be thought to be the same man . . . immortal. "The Ghost Who Walks," the "Man Who Cannot Die." Now the 1st Phantom, nemesis of mediocrity everywhere . . . he writes alone.

(And apologies to those who aren't as familiar with The Phantom as I am :))
(If you're not, here's an interesting article about Phantom history - particularly from an Indian viewpoint.)

Anyway, just when I was trying to make an effort to make these posts more reader friendly and put the gist of the story in the first paragraph. (Actually, strictly speaking I did, in my own way).

(But while I'm side-tracking, I might just give a little cheer on reaching 50 posts in this blog - huzzah)

Ok, back now.

Anyway, 8 or 9 (maybe 10) years ago I started to try some serious writing on a film script that had been buzzing around my head for a little while. It's a zombie film (at which point let it be recorded that the readership decided that they really needed to get on with work stuff) which tries to follow in the Romero tradition of infusing a healthy dollop of humour and pointed social commentary.

So without giving too much away, we have a story with evil corporations, feisty leftwing community radio dj's (the radio stuff in the story came long before I ever got into community radio), meathead bogans, technohippies, psycho religious fundamentalists and the war on terror.

Anyway, after a productive burst of writing, the first draft was labouriously born from the (every analogy I can think of here is very wrong) of the worlds slowest printer.

And there it sat. I've shown it around, scribbled on it, jotted down ideas, changes, lines of dialogue that have occurred to me in the intervening years but as yet there is no draft two.

Hopefully though, this is about to change. After a productive screenwriting short course run by AFTRS last year, I got back on the horse and have been fleshing out my characters. I found a really interesting character questionnaire online which forces you to think about every nuance of your character and their life and history. This has also been good in terms of working out what happens to them in the story.

I took a small writers retreat to the coast last year, just me in a house with notepads galore (I like to write in pencil - as a left hander it's less messy and the sound of the pencil on the paper is more appealing) and I started to nut out the main characters.

And to bring you up to date - pretty pointless trying to do too much over Christmas, got stuck into typing these up last night. The typing process is interesting as there isn't as much creative pressure but it still allows for tweaks and tightenings and changes if needed.

So Sharyn, the surprising heroine of the story, is much more formed now than ever before. She's more corporate and snobby - name is pronounced Shah Ryn, or Shah for short - where it used to be Cheryl. She has a phobia about being stabbed by junkies with HIV needles and she loves Rove live. Not necessarily details that will come out but helpful nonetheless.

Stay tuned.