Writers' Room Workshop with AJZ (Feb 2021) - GROUP 1 : Welcome to Team 1! by Harrison Glaser

Hi everyone!

I’m Jack from England :)

Hi All I'm based in Philadelphia, PA.

I recently wrapped up a pitch for a pilot, and I'm currently focusing on a film script. Recently got a small group of folks together to write scripts, so this workshop was perfectly timed.

Hey Cindie! :)

Hey there, my name's Kim and I'm from Rhode Island!

Hi team, I'm Eva and I just finished a paranormal romance novel. I also write short stories and have started some screenplays. Looking to have some fun and another creative outlet.

Hi everyone!! :)

Hi there! I'm Patricia from Berlin, Germany :) I'm currently working on a TV drama pilot. I'm also looking forward to the class and to work with you.

Tagging in Eva Finn Anthony Mariani Kimberly Mailloux -

We set up a doodle to check the schedule for the group here: http://bit.ly/3qnrFf8(I tried to tag you in the thread about that, but apparently, you can only tag thread members, not any lounge member - see, learning new things about stage32 all the time :) )

Hi Cindie, so you're thinking we meet every day? Not sure if I can do that. I'll sign up for a couple of meetings. Thanks. Also a noticed a 5-6 a.m. time slot - ouch! Thanks for setting this up :)

Hi Cindie, okay, I think I get it now. We are voting on which one of these days/times is best option for all, yes? Wonderful! Thanks.

yes! Thank you for jumping in and asking those questions!

So far Friday at 3pm ET has the most votes with 4 people - if that works for Tony & Kim that gives us a solid option, but is cutting down prep for Saturday...

If this is getting to be too much for folks, we can always pivot and work by text here -

I am happy to help support options but don't want to overrun the process with too much -

Hi, everyone! Greet to meet you. I'm Heidi but I go by HB. By day I'm a journalist, copywriter and scriptwriter for companies in the video game industry. By...well, always, I'm doing rewrites and polishing my body of work to seek management. I look forward to working with you all.

I'm pretty flexible on Friday, as well. I'm on MST. Just let me know! I can't guarantee makeup, lol but I'll be there.

Shall I set up a zoom for Friday? I’ve got a paid account so we don’t need to jump off after 40 mins?

That would be great Jack Silver

Hi, all. Many apologies! My name is Jane and I'm from San Francisco. I've written and sold a film script and am now starting a TV pilot, which is why I signed up for the class. However, I must apologize. I got very ill on Saturday and ended up in the hospital. I'm still here, unfortunately, and hope to be going home on Sunday. That means I will miss this pitch session and probably the next class. But I should be up and running next week and will try to catch up. I'm very sorry for not participating or letting you know sooner, and I hope this doesn't mess anything up for the group.

Hi Jane - sorry to hear you've been in the hospital. I hope you feel better soon! I can't speak for everyone, but we seem to be a good sized bunch and across the weeks I'm guessing there's probably a few of us that can't make all the get-togethers. Looking forward to connecting when you're home and catching up.

Hope you're feeling better now, Jane Gideon the hospital is never fun!

Harrison Glaser Is there a way to access this private lounge from the app? Not seeing it listed under my Lounge section even though I'm logged in.

Oh no! Feel better Jane! No worries at all!

Hi Jack, is there a Zoom link? Thanks. I think we should all exchange emails.

am in the

waiting room!!

jack@wearetramp.com

OK .. so here's what we've come up with...

Working title: Betty and Ethel

——

Two feuding former female detectives must team up to catch a serial killer in a retirement community when an unsolved case surfaces at a funeral so that they can make good on a promise they made years ago

Cagney and Lacey meet Golden Girls

Genre: Dark comedy / police-ish drama

Betty:

Career woman who wanted a home life but had a series of bad relationships

Ethel:

Homemaker who is a former staunch feminist

Both ex cops.

Fell out ears ago because one wanted career and one wanted traditional life.

I think tomorrow:

Heidi: Pitch title and "Cagney and Lacey vs Golden Girls" and credit Anthony as having the original idea.

Jack: Pitch longline / genre

Patricia: Pitch characters

Rest of group pitch in .. if anything else to add

I'd love to talk about the theme, if that's okay. Facing regrets in life and keeping promises to yourself and others. i.e. "here's our working title. This is the theme." Back to you.

Agree..

And yeah .. if you want to talk about those themes that would be GREAT! :)

This pitch is so much fun!!! How creative!

One thing I'd say .. is I think the title is open for discussion .. so if anyone has any brainwaves over the next 18 hours fire them into the group

Potentially Betty and Ethel both sound like "old people names" .. so do we want one that sounds a bit edgier?

Or do we want to go down a totally different route?!

Looks like you guys are well on your way with pitches/ideas. Most of the groups are planning on doing one main pitch for the group, but are coming planned with other pitches in their pocket if they get called on. You're in the right direction using known characters that everyone will know (Betty & Ethal). Some groups are using cartoon characters, some are using well known characters from well known shows. Hope this helps you guys zone in on your idea for your main pitch and backup pitches if called on.

Anthony Mariani I love the "golden" aspect of the title.. but I guess my issue is that there's nothing that suggest "deaths" "murders" "detectives" or "cases"

Thinking back to a show like Pushing Daisies it had the cute thing .. but you also get the "death" thing from the title...

Fell like we haven't quite nailed it yet?

On other pitches .. shall we come up with 2-3 secondary pitches if the main one doesn't land?

I think that's a great idea. I'm always down to pitch "George Jetson becomes a spy to save his family." lol Although you all seemed to like the Cheshire Cat idea better. It's never the one I think is going to land... hmmm (for those of you who missed the meeting, the pitch was, "Cheshire Cat gets picked up by animal services and uses his magic powers to find his way home, helping abused and abandoned pets along the way.")

Other title ideas for our pitch:

(If we're going the old lady route)

Silver Coppers

Badges and Old Lace

Grans of Grimm

Death and Doilies

Bridge Club Murder Blues

(If we're going the drama route)

Murder Never Retires

The Promise

Also liked "Pushing Daisies," that's a good one Jack Silver

We should definitely have 1-2 backup pitches.

For the main pitch title I still like

Badges and Old Lace

Pushing Daisies (also a real good one!)

I wasn't suggesting Pushing Daisies .. that's already a show!! ;)

--

I've set up a poll for the other ideas we discussed. Can everyone try to vote for up to 3 by the time we start pls?

https://doodle.com/poll/fb9m3x79yq36xhgb?utm_source=poll&utm_medium=link

BTW - Pushing Daisies is an AMAZING show .. you should defs check it out!!

https://filmschoolrejects.com/petition-worthy-pushing-daisies/

What about:

OAPD?

It's NYPD meets the Golden Girls.

(Not sure whether OAP for Old Age Pensioner is a thing in America .. so if not let me know!!)

Hi All, I'm dialing in for class today, and may need to drop early. I'll catch up on the recording. Had some recent changes, and it's looking like I might be off-schedule for a few weeks.

Thanks folks for summarizing the stuff from yesterday - nice!

Great job everyone!! :) .. and great pitch Heidi!

Hey guys sorry that I haven't really been responsive. I work long hours in a call center with a horrible schedule that has me getting off at 8 PM EST if I'm lucky for most of the week except for Thursdays and Saturdays.

Again, I'm Kim and I'm from Rhode Island. I probably have the least amount of experience out of everyone here, but I'm super passionate about creating stories. I tend to really like messing with fantasy and supernatural/horror genres with bits of dry humor mixed in, and right now there's two stories that I'm actually seriously working on.

The first one is the Lovecraft one that I mentioned in yesterday's class. It's called Chaos Lark and it's basically a Lovecraftian superhero show with bits of Hellboy, Umbrella Academy, Stranger Things, Twin Peaks, Welcome to Night Vale, and Gravity Falls mixed in. It's about a teen who, after being in the wrong place at the wrong time ends up becoming the new vessel to ancient slumbering eldritch being of chaos itself, and now has to defend his new home from the various malicious cults and other eldritch beings that want to destroy it and the rest of humanity, while also learning to make connections and actually get friends for once.

The other is more of a graphic novel/web comic concept called "Lost Resonant" which centers around 4 down on their luck individuals in a fantasy world who start their own adventuring guild in order to survive fantasy capitalism™, while at the same time inadvertently changing the course of history for their continent itself. It's basically like your fantasy kitchen sink with elements of steampunk, dieselpunk, final fantasy, and Tolkien-inspired fantasy, plus waaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaay too much effort into worldbuilding that I have and still am doing.

So, for anyone who missed the end of the class, we voted on which idea to work on as a class and after a run-off vote The Muppets meets The Sopranos was the winner.

PS.. Hi Kimberly! :)

I really suck at checking this site lol. I had to pop off early for work and may need to next week as well. Thanks for the updates guys! I'm gonna watch the end of the class recording later this week to see how the pitches went. The Muppets meets Sopranos sounds amazing haha Did she mention any homework?

She’s going to drop us an email about it I think

Also on a side note: Won an award today .. we reacted really calmly

https://twitter.com/wearetramp/status/1363590829957410816?s=20

That's awesome, congrats!!

Ditto, congrats, Jack!

Are we meeting again tomorrow?

I've set up a Zoom for 3PM ET..

https://us02web.zoom.us/j/81638065643?pwd=cEFRVmpQWTUrOGU0aGxSR3FVYTlQdz09

I'm down but can only meet for a little. I have another meeting at 1PST. I'm watching Muppets Most Wanted for ideas lol

Hi Guys! Jack, Anthony and I met briefly today to discuss ideas to pitch at tomorrow’s class. We were asked to come prepared with “things you learned” “pilot ideas” and “emotional journeys” so I tried to separate the ideas as such. PLEASE FEEL FREE TO ADD YOUR OWN IDEAS IN THIS CHAT!

Facts Learned:

- Final Muppets Movie: The Muppets Most Wanted - 2014

- All Jim Henson’s children (5) are puppeteers except for Lisa who is a hollywood producer. But all have been involved in the Henson business.

- Jim died at 53

Pilot Ideas:

- There was a large falling out between all of the Muppets after the last movie and the pilot is about “getting the gang back together. ” We visit all the Muppets in their retirement and learn they have been estranged since 2014.

- Perhaps one of the Henson kids discover their father’s debt to the mafia and decides to call upon the estranged, retired Muppets.

- We learn Jim Henson’s early death was actually due to his mob involvement

- Kermit has been keeping Jim’s mafia secret for years. Maybe he even has worked for the mafia himself. Question his loyalties?

Emotional Journey:

- Gonzo as the Lead - He misses how things used to be. He’s been feeling lack of purpose since the Muppets have been out of business and the discovery of the Mafia debt excites him to get the group back together. He struggles with his identity outside of the muppets - Who am I as an individual?

- Kermit struggles with all of Jim’s secrets he has kept over the years, which is also the reason why Miss Piggy left him and his downward spiral. Maybe Kermit is the new target of the mafia because of how much he knows and he’s been playing both sides to save his life and struggles with his loyalties. He’s witnessed and maybe helped Jim do some questionable things to keep the Muppets in business and is now living with the consequences all alone. Lots of moral dilemmas.

Additional Concept Ideas:

- “The Henson Empire” title?

-Pulling back the curtain on the Muppets and learning they are nothing like we thought they were. (I.e. Kermit’s actually a jerk. Animal actually hates music. Miss Piggy is always type-cast but is actually shy and timid in real life.)

-Sesame Street characters run the mob

-What if Kermit is the villain?

-Retired Life Ideas:

Bert has permanently moved to a private island

Kermit is living on his couch, depressed, divorced from Miss Piggy, and lacking purpose

Miss Piggy still performs around the world trying to have a solo career although her audience is scarce and getting pretty old. She self-funds the performances to keep herself feeling relevant.

Rowlf ran into some drug problems.

Fozzy opened a chain of failed restaurants - now lives in the "retired actors community" in the valley

Gonzo lost all of his money in the stock market

Hey I just finally started watching the original Muppets on Disney + for the first time ever. I watched the first episode and one of the recurring skits was Skeeter basically forcing Kermit to allow some diva dog to get top billing, get his own dressing room, etc. because Skeeter's uncle owns the theater. What if we do something with Skeeter's uncle? Like what if he was the mob boss Henson was in debit to? Or at the very least an obstacle to getting the show back on? Like where he refuses to lease the theater back to them because he's currently about to rent it to a more successful current act, so Kermit and the gang have to give him some..."incentive" to chose them instead.

Love the idea of bringing Skeeter's uncle's theatre into it!!

BTW, shall we get together again on Friday to chat about the pilot?

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Stage 32 - Group 1 Zoom Call

3pm ET

8pm GMT

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If anyone’s interested we have a great free event happening this morning (7pm GMT)

Its the director from our award-winning show giving a behind the scenes look at her directing process.

https://www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/rehearsing-ridley-in-a-pandemic-with-qa-t...

HI! I popped into the Zoom but no one was there. I'll check out the pilot outline on my own. Hope you're all having a great day, TGIF!

FYI, I added some notes to the Group 1 Miro board. Since it didn't look like anyone else had worked on it yet, I noted my additions w/ my name and highlighted them. I also took a crack at writing the cards for Act 1. Hope that's ok. Sorry that we didn't get to collaborate in real-time. See you all in the morning!

Congratulations, Anthony Mariani!

Honestly you've done a great job HB! I wish that I could have added to the board. I get off of work after 8 PM and I was too exhausted to add anything but I'll try to add something right now! Also congrats Anthony!

HB Duran to the rescue! lol

Aww, thanks, everyone, it was so fun to work with you! Please connect with me on here and keep in touch.

My apologies all - life got crazy for me last week. I teach two classes and do freelance and also accepted a full-time position last week. I hope it went well! It was wonderful to meet you all and I hope we can keep in touch. Take care and thanks :)

Hey everyone! Glad I wasn't the only person who had a busy week .. sorry I din't make class .. I really wanted to but my day job's taken over the last week .. which was rubbish .. but he ho! Can't wait to catch the recording .. and thanks so much Heidi!

BTW I'm @jacksilver on Twitter, @realjacksilver on Insta .. and you can find me on Facebook too if anyone wants to keep in touch :)