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Indiewood
A Podcast for Indie Filmmakers
In the world of social media, and fast-paced journalism, knowledge is abound. But with all the noise, finding the right information is near impossible. Especially if you’re a creative working in independent film.
Produced by Cinematography For Actors, the Indiewood podcast aims to fix that. This is a podcast about indie filmmakers and the many hats we wear in order to solve problems before, during, and after production.
Every month, award-winning Writer/Director Yaroslav Altunin is joined by a different guest co-host to swap hats, learn about the different aspects of the film industry, and how to implement all you learn into your work.
"We learn from indie filmmakers so we can become better filmmakers. Because we all want to be Hollywood, but first we have to be Indiewood."
Indiewood
The Struggles of Screenwriting: Overcoming Blocks, Errors, and Obstacles
What happens when the words on the page become both prison and playground? Julia Stier, an actor, writer, and Forbes 30 Under 30 honoree in Hollywood and Entertainment, takes us deep into the creative tension between acting and writing, revealing how each craft fundamentally transforms the other.
For creators facing similar struggles, this discussion offers practical wisdom about writing for opportunities versus passion projects, setting external deadlines, and the liberating power of recycling creative material across different formats.
Listen now to discover why sometimes the best way forward is to put down your laptop, pick up a typewriter, and remember that creation should, above all, be playful.
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A Podcast for Indie Filmmakers
More on:
IG: @indiewoodpod
YT: Cinematography for Actors
In the world of social media, and fast-paced journalism, knowledge is abound. But with all the noise, finding the right information is near impossible. Especially if you’re a creative working in independent film.
Produced by Cinematography For Actors, the Indiewood podcast aims to fix that. This is a podcast about indie filmmakers and the many hats we wear in order to solve problems before, during, and after production.
Every month, award-winning Writer/Director Yaroslav Altunin is joined by a different guest co-host to swap hats, learn about the different aspects of the film industry, and how to implement all you learn into your work.
"We learn from indie filmmakers so we can become better filmmakers. Because we all want to be Hollywood, but first we have to be Indiewood."
Welcome to the IndieWood podcast, a podcast about independent film and the many hats filmmakers wear in order to get those films made. Each month, I'm joined by one such filmmaker, where we explore their approach to the craft and how they thrive within the visual medium of film. And this month, I'm chatting with a producer, an actor, a playwright and a screenwriter, and who is also on the Forbes 30 under 30 for 2025 in the Hollywood and entertainment category, julia Steyer. Hello, hello, thank you for having me. The Hollywood and entertainment category, julia Steyer.
Speaker 2:Hello, hello, thank you for having me back. You're welcome.
Speaker 1:Last week we talked about your career and I like your career in its entirety, even though it feels like it's been a short time, but you've done so much is the fact that you've done so much and, as we kind of explored in the last episode, how much of it is tied together, all the work that you've done and all the little things that, like, feel insignificant, are now very significant.
Speaker 1:And how one little moment, you know, working for a small, you know theater company as an intern, led to a career and like stability and connection and so much more. Uh, but I want to focus a little bit on writing and creating and crafting, because you've done a lot of creation and I think a lot of filmmakers do that, whether they're an actor or director or or a writer. They come to a point in their career where it's like, oh, I'm not getting to work, I'm not, what do I do? And then you just make it yourself, and I always say this when it comes to creatives trying to break through it's like nobody cares until they care yeah how do you make them care?
Speaker 1:right and that's always a challenge is, how do you make people care when you're hoping for that chance, you know, and sometimes people get help from a mentor or a colleague or a friend or just a lucky break, and sometimes they make their own luck and sometimes they make their own colleague or mentor. And so with you, you've started writing in the pandemic, not only like blogs and interviews and plays and shorts, but but you've now written a pilot. I want to talk a little bit about the volume of work, because I know sometimes creatives are doing stuff and it feels like they're spinning their tires a little bit.
Speaker 1:But what I've noticed and I've been around for a little longer is that all that work you do is accumulative and it helps build a foundation that makes you better, like everything that you do. And, um, how do you see your writing? Because you've done more acting before you started become, before you became a writer, how are you seeing acting, define how you're doing pages, how you're actually crafting um, a script or a story. How has that changed the way you write? But also, as you've become a writer, as you've written scripts, has that changed your performance in any way, or you as a performer?
Speaker 2:yes, so actually to answer that one first okay um my my comedy pilot mentor, stan zimmerman, that I mentioned in the last episode.
Speaker 2:He actually also he doesn't do it anymore, I don't believe but for a while there he was hosting a acting like I don't even know what it was called, but basically it was. Essentially it was an acting for comedy class, but through the lens of a writer, and so his, because his whole thing was like especially it's a little different for drama, but with comedy every comma, period, word is so specific, and so what he really preached and taught was following the words exactly, and so that was actually a really cool way to to approach acting, because we would go up there and if you know, if we would do a scene, he'd be like well, julia, you're a writer, what do you? How do you think the writer, what do you think the writer was thinking when they wrote that? That's, and how do you think they want you to perform it? And it's.
Speaker 2:It's funny because comedy, when you look at it that way, is essentially shakespeare, right, because with shakespeare they're like the commas tell you where to breathe, the iambic pentameter tells you which words are more important, and it's like comedy. Writing is that specific. It's like as specific of a map as Shakespeare is, and I did not realize that until I started writing.
Speaker 1:That's so interesting because I have. I don't know when it started, when it ended, but in the last, maybe like 10, 20 years, there was this moment where people were doing comedy I think from like early 2000s to like 2015. Maybe you had a series of movies where it was all improv there was no script you know like that would freak me out.
Speaker 1:Yeah and and and. Sure, there was a script and people followed it, but it felt like there was a lot more room for play. But I, as a writer maybe I'm just being pretentious I feel like words are important. I'll put a comma there for a specific reason, not just because I'm like I feel like it, or I started doing this thing where I, instead of doing commas when I really want like a moment, I'll put a period, I'll do a parenthetical and I'll write then, and then continue that piece of dialogue, because I'm like that's a, that's a moment.
Speaker 2:Well, and do you write more film or tell or pilots film because you know what they say right. It's like theater is the actor's medium, film is the director's medium, but tv is the writer's medium, so they do pay more attention to words in television writing whereas in film they're like yeah throw a tag on there, because usually by then the screenwriter has been paid and kicked out.
Speaker 1:You know what I mean yeah, no, I'm in film, and maybe that's why I'm feeling so precious about my words, because everyone's like you should, like you kind of have to be your own advocate in film.
Speaker 2:Because yeah yeah they'll be like oh, just play with the words a little bit, no, no don't.
Speaker 1:Don't play with the words. You say the words as I've written them, please. It's funny.
Speaker 2:I actually I wrote an audio drama one time and I like was listening in on their recording and the director was like, oh, we could just cut that line, and I literally unmuted myself. I was like no, you cannot, um no, thank you please. I wrote that for a reason, oh that's interesting.
Speaker 1:Yeah, so the class that you took with Stan the acting for writers uh, so how did, like what were the things that you learned in that, in that class that helped define you as a performer?
Speaker 2:oh, I think, honestly, I I think as actors, we get so much, um like, in terms of auditions you get, you get so much that you have to learn in such a short amount of time that I think the first thing that goes is sometimes the memorization of the words and you know, you're sometimes you it's like a 24, 48 hour turnaround. And so I think there's a lot of times where, like, I've been doing an audition where I'm like, okay, well, it's close enough, which again you can kind of get away with in drama that class re-reminded me, don't do that with comedy like so much of the acting is going to come from getting those words correctly and if you trust the words and you trust the writer a lot of times.
Speaker 2:that will inform a lot of your decisions for you. So I think for me, it just like really um, as like I feel like that's kind of a lame answer, but I feel like it just like really reinforced that, like when it came to comedy and auditions, like like the words really were key, like because, especially a lot of times and you know I'm auditioning for a lot of like non-union or like things that you only have to be SAG eligible for- and so a lot of times the writer is actually seeing your audition, you know, and like it's not like TV, where the writer might not be seeing your audition.
Speaker 2:It's going to the director or the casting director or the producers, whereas like when I'm doing like comedy for like short films and stuff, like it's the writer and like, as a writer myself, like I can hear when someone is not saying the words that I wrote yeah, it drives me crazy a little bit too.
Speaker 2:So I think it really just helped like hammer that in of like, as the actor, like also remember to respect the writer and their art and their craft and like this is, you know, artist to artist just respect the work that's going on and the best way to respect it is to honor what's written so, as we've kind of talked about rules in filmmaking which don't matter or, like you, it's weird to have this mentality of like this is the rule of the script, say the words, don't mess with the words.
Speaker 1:like, follow this rule. But then also with filmmaking, it's like you can throw the rules out and break them. There's also this kind of idea of writing something, making something, and then just being like it's done, I'm not going to mess with it anymore, yeah, and so maybe that there are certain moments within a script or a short or a play or a feature where it's just done, yeah, and you don't have to be precious about it. So, as you've become a writer and as you've written a lot of things because you did the 10 minute plays and and shorts and now a pilot how has that initial idea of like let's be precious with the words kind of coexisted with the idea of not having something be perfect and just kind of like letting it be free?
Speaker 2:Oh, that's a good. So I think, with writing, I think I break it up into two ways that I write. Um, one is I, one is just like writing what you want to write, and the other one that personally helps me get through rougher times or lows, or and it really helps with the not being precious is I'm not afraid to write for an opportunity. And so I guess what I mean by that is I, some of my 10 minute plays and some of my pilots. They're things I wrote because I was like, oh my God, this experience happened to me and I want to write about it and I think I can dramatize it and I this is this is what I want to say.
Speaker 2:And then, on the other hand, there is I wrote this 10 minute play because a theater in Queens was looking for plays that featured a person with a disability and I was like I in Queens was looking for plays that featured a person with a disability and I was like I think I could write one, wrote it, sent it in. They didn't take it. And I was like, okay, whatever, like I now have a 10 minute play that maybe I can do something with at some point, but like I wasn't feeling particularly passionate about it because I had written it for the opportunity, so I was kind of able to put it away. A year later they came back and they were like actually, can we pay you to use that because we're doing the thing again now you can't? Yeah, like we're doing this like theater for all program and we we just need plays that feature characters with a disability.
Speaker 2:And because I think I'd written it for an opportunity rather than being like this is me bearing my soul, I was way less precious about it and I don't know if that's a good thing to admit, but it was just like I was still proud of the work I had done and, don't get me wrong, like I still did series of edits, but it wasn't like all my hopes and dreams were pinned on this piece.
Speaker 2:And I think what I learned that a lot, too, is because my actually, like, besides playwriting, my first foray into writing was I was a journalist, and into writing was I was a journalist and you can't be precious because you have a deadline, and so I think that for me, too, is like setting up deadlines and being like, okay, you can be precious about this, but you'll miss the deadline, or you know, and in terms of screenwriting, like, I find that I've definitely sent out pilots of mine that were maybe not in their most perfect form, because I had the option of waiting for perfect and missing this opportunity altogether or just submitting it, and then, you know, if I do a major overhaul in two years, I can resubmit, and so I think I'm a really big person on my mom calls and putting lottery tickets out into the world.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah, and I'm.
Speaker 2:I think I'm big on that and I think I I've just learned to like. If somebody likes what's there, they'll work with you to fix it. Like it's so much better to get stuff down on paper. I'm a big believer of you can't edit a blank page, yeah, so it. You know. To me it's a lot more important to get stuff down, to get it written and then to start taking it out into the world as like how can I make it better?
Speaker 1:to interrupt a little bit because I want to. I want to touch on two things this idea that we, we want to kind of explore with you know, no, work is a waste of time, like you did that and you're like, oh, they didn't take it. I wasted, you know, a month on the script. I wasted so much, so much time and effort writing these words and then, two years later, it's a paid gig. Uh, so you know, it's it's. It's this idea that, um, we are wasting time crafting, something I think is absurd and I think, whatever you uh craft is going to be, writing is a muscle, right?
Speaker 2:yeah? And the only way you flex that muscle is by writing more, even if it doesn't go anywhere. Like that's how I always thought about the. When I was writing for my local newspaper, I was like is this leading me to a screenplay? No, but what it is teaching me is how to take facts and make a narrative. So how do I write?
Speaker 1:words in a in a line. Yeah, how do you enter?
Speaker 2:when you're, when you're writing, like I remember I had to do. I was assigned because I was also because it was local news. I was getting a lot of assignments, which again it's me writing to the opportunity this is not stuff that I was like oh my god, I pine to write about this I had to write 800 pages on a linoleum factory, or sorry, not pages 800 words on a linoleum factory and it was honestly. After that I was like I made this interesting, I could write a screen story like yeah like I literally just took facts and crafted a narrative.
Speaker 2:And I was like, and in screenwriting you just make up the facts and then you craft the narrative. And so, yeah, like you know, and I've had people tell me that some of the things I'm doing are maybe too small or like a waste of my time, and I'm like I just don't agree, I just don't agree. I think it's like I don't do as much freelance writing now and I actually miss it, because it was such a good way of flexing my muscle. It's a lot of work. It's a lot of work for like almost no pay. But again, like we were saying, like in the last episode, it was like I was building my credibility. Like now, when I go out for writing stuff, like I'm like, yeah, okay, like you know, I have these 10 minute plays at these theaters, but I've also been printed in this national magazine, in this local newspaper.
Speaker 2:Like I have this whole other portfolio to back up me as a writer and be like this is my credibility and again it's like that stuff doesn't happen overnight, like I had to write for the school newspaper to be able to write for the local uh website to be able to write for the local newspaper to be able to write for the local website to be able to write for the local newspaper to be able to write for the bigger local magazine to be able to write for the national magazine.
Speaker 1:Like no work is a waste of time. No work is a waste of time and it actually.
Speaker 2:it's something that really drives me crazy when people try to convince me that it is.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I want to also kind of mention this concept of timeline and I think a lot of newer creatives fall into that pitfall. You know, coming out of school or just you know, I want to be a filmmaker and let's do the thing, and where's my success? Yeah, it's timeline. You know, everything that you do has its own timeline and as long as you are consistently putting work on the table or like on the conveyor belt of life or whatever you want to, whatever analogy you want to use, the work is just gone and and it's in the. It's in the you know universe. That's on its own timeline. Yeah, like you can't control that, you can just continue making stuff and like being happy about it or finding the happiness within it. You shouldn't force yourself to be happy to make stuff if you're not being.
Speaker 1:If you're not happy making stuff wrong career, wrong career choice. Uh, please do something else, um, but it will come back, you know, in some form or fashion, because no work is a waste of time. Yeah, um, and also this other like aspect of it where it's like, hey, that doesn't have to be perfect, it's, it doesn't have to be bad. I mean like, don't make it bad, don't you feel like it's done whatever?
Speaker 2:never show someone your first, yeah. But like, if you've got to draft like seven, like just fine, it's maybe okay to start sending it out, just like.
Speaker 1:Show it to a friend yeah, I guess this idea that you know whatever rule we make for ourselves can be broken yeah uh, like nothing is set in stone.
Speaker 1:This weird industry just is always evolving and changing and all these rules that we have just don't make like they're not. It doesn't make sense to make them gospel, yeah, yeah. And like coming back to comedy writing and this rigidity that, um, I think was broken in the early aughts, where people are like let's not follow the words, let's just improv. I'm like let's, let's do a jazz set, uh, uh, onset. I'm like let's do a jazz set on set. And I'm thinking back to when I talked about, in episode one, watching Cheers, where everything feels very like ooh, this is really good craftsmanship. But also I would have loved to maybe break some of those rules, because after I think we're in season three now and it's 24 episodes a season, so it's two for 60, like 60, 70 plus 80, plus episodes. I see the structure.
Speaker 1:I'm like, okay, like those two minutes, two minutes, cold open, like run the two minute intro. Let's do like the first act, the second act and we're out. It gets a little boring after a while, especially when you're doing volume. So it gets a little boring after a while, especially when you're doing volume. So, yeah, how do you feel your writing career is evolving now? Like having all this work, such a strong foundation, looking forward.
Speaker 2:What's your biggest hope and your biggest challenge? Ooh, I mean, I would say one of the big ways my writing career has changed is I've always been confident sending out my plays.
Speaker 3:Mm-hmm.
Speaker 2:I, this year I've gotten confident sending out my screenplays and my or my screenplays I mean my pilots and I think the biggest thing that I've like stepped into is like kind of like what you were saying of like throwing the idea of like legitimate out the window and being like no, no, no, I have something to say. I have something I've really worked on like I am proud of this. I'm not ashamed of people reading it, and if they don't like it, they don't like it, but it's not. It might not just be their taste, yeah, um, and so I think for me, that's been a big, like milestone. Um, I do have a producer attached to one of my pilots, so, like, my big hope for the year is that we get it into the right hands at the studio.
Speaker 2:And what was the other one? My biggest fear yeah, ooh, my biggest fear is this is like I feel like this is like such, like a silly one, but like I sometimes fear that I'm running out of ideas and I think it's because I'm not writing as consistently as I used to, I think, when I was constantly, and it's because I'm trying to like clear away and like zero in, but now I'm finding myself kind of like what you were saying. Like I'm only going off the last five pages. I wrote Like I almost feel like I need to like pause, like go out and like not think about writing so that I can come back and bring my experiences and infuse them, because I think right now I'm trying a little too hard to be like a good screenwriting student, of like I'm going to take this idea I have and I'm gonna fit it into all of these molds so that I write.
Speaker 2:The good thing and I think, like what I am craving a little bit is like a little bit more cracking open of that of just like, and I and I don't know what the answer is. I don't know if the answer is to get up and, like, write for 10 minutes every day and just see what comes out.
Speaker 2:I don't know if it's like you know, bust out the artist's way again, or if it's just like like I just got back from a like a very long trip and I feel that was like the first time in a while that I have felt refreshed and like excited to like sit down and make stuff.
Speaker 1:So I think my big fear is that I sometimes get caught up in the rat race a little bit and like yeah you need to take those breaks I um, I'm gonna make an observation, because this is something I've been through recently as well, where I'm like, looking at the, the stuff that I'm writing, I'm like, wow, this feels derivative, you know, and I'm realizing that I started to become precious with it oh because I was like this is my job this is my career.
Speaker 1:I'm not having any fun anymore yeah so my brain was like cool, then I'm not gonna like I'm not gonna be here for you creatively because you're not having fun. I'm gonna go do this other thing. My brain's like let's play over here, yeah. And so I'm currently doing the artist's way, still, oh yeah, trying to. I'm like inching my way through, crawling my way through it.
Speaker 2:But uh, I've noticed that if I'm not having fun, if I'm not exploring the opportunity for play within this story, my brain is just not going to like activate in that creative way yeah, oh, and like, honestly, when I was, when I was on my trip, I was like not, I'd like didn't touch my laptop and said and like just had like a little journal with me, yeah, and suddenly the eyes just came pouring out.
Speaker 2:Yes not necessarily screenplays, but it was like travel article ideas. The solo show idea came out like it was just like. My brain was finally like oh, you're having fun, you're not forcing us like you're not being precious just breathe and think, and I think that's another thing too. So we spend so much time on technology that, like I don't want to sit down at my final draft because it's just another thing in front of a screen. So I'm actually right now, I'm actively trying to do more pen and paper I'm trying to do more, um, paper-based like, honestly, just like crafting.
Speaker 2:I was like I feel like I need to exercise a different part of my creative brain that doesn't have to do with a screen. So I'm doing a lot of like scrapbooking, just to like get more tactile with it and like give my eyes and my brain a rest, and then coming back to my journal and being like, oh, that's a scene idea, um, and so I'm kind of like exploring that a little bit because I think, truly like while I was away, I just realized I'm burnt out yeah, yeah, no, no, that that's a big part of it.
Speaker 1:We put so much pressure on the work that we're doing and we can't think about anything else, and then we get burned out.
Speaker 2:Well, and then you and I. I'm a big uh culprit of yelling at myself being like don't do that why don't, why aren't you? You should be writing more like no, you should waking up and at 4 am and writing for three hours like I'm like mean to myself and I'm trying not to be because it's it's not helpful, it's so counterproductive. And then I think too, I think the um, I think I lock up out of like fear of disappointing you're literally like.
Speaker 1:You're literally just saying things that I've experienced in the last year. I'm like, oh, I've, I've opened up. I used a highland instead of final draft. Um, I opened up highland and I'm like, yeah, and I choke because I'm like I, I feel this, this pressure, I'm being too precious with it, it's, it's there's.
Speaker 2:I'm putting so much, uh strain on this idea of me being successful in this page like this word needs to be perfect and I'm like my workaround for that has been because final draft or highland it feels so final I've started just doing it in google docs because that feels. That feels like I'm just playing yeah, I'm just playing. None of this is real words. And then the things I like. I move into final draft. I'm like this is this story, this is the serious like this is serious now.
Speaker 1:So I my kind of approach with with the tangible, the tactile tactile.
Speaker 2:Thank you. Tactile works too, though.
Speaker 1:Okay, yeah, I like tactile. Better is, I'll do traditional note cards because sometimes, like, I actually have a program called drawio for anybody who wants to use the digital version of this. It's like a graphing program that, like, makes flow charts.
Speaker 2:Oh.
Speaker 1:But I've made note cards out of it.
Speaker 3:I like that.
Speaker 1:So Drawio, it's browser-based. Go check it out. It's free too, I think, and I've used that a lot for note cards. But then I'm like I'm staring at a screen, so I've gone back to traditional note cards. I'm just on a cork board with pins.
Speaker 2:It's so satisfying, isn't it?
Speaker 1:But then before I write a scene, I'm trying something new, whereas I have a separate journal from my artist's way journal when I, whatever scene I'm writing, for that moment I'll just start talking to myself on the page about it, and then that's when I activate that fun center, creative center of my brain, where my brain's like oh, we're playing. Let's go have fun. Here's some ideas and then I'll be like ha ha, steal and I'll go write those on a digital platform like Pylonder. Final Draft.
Speaker 2:Not Final Draft.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:I love that. You know what that's so funny there actually is. Oh my gosh, I think it's in the book Steal. Like an Artist, he talks about the importance of touch and he was like, he's like. So he's like. Even if I'm writing something on kind of exactly what you're saying, he's getting off the screen working with your hands. That, just like, activates different parts of your brain. And honestly, for me it's like it got to a point last year where I was on the screen so much I developed an eye twitch Really.
Speaker 3:I was just like and.
Speaker 2:I was like what's going on? And someone was like yeah, you're looking at a screen all day. And I'm like uh. Yeah, I feel that.
Speaker 1:I also get an eye twitch when I get really, really stressed, having a while, because I'm meditating a lot and it's helping. But to kind of go back to that tactile note card thing I once did and I really want to go back to this because it was so much fun, I have an old typewriter and I will do note cards on the typewriter and it slows me down so much and I think we move too fast nowadays.
Speaker 1:so like that idea of slowing down living with that, I like that creative nugget that I that I have helps so much. And I'm not seeing a screen, I'm not like I'm not connected to any technology, it's just me, like hammering a button, that's hammering an arm into paper.
Speaker 2:I'm so excited you say that, because I do the same thing I have. I bought a typewriter off of eBay for like a hundred bucks. It's not good, so I have to like rewind the ribbons all the time, but that's how I write monologues.
Speaker 1:Really.
Speaker 1:And I, just because again there of the clack, clack, clack yeah yeah, and it's just, it's like a free write, and then I went through and I highlighted the things I liked and then I went and typed them up I uh read some pages that I wrote this wasn't like script pages, but just stuff that I wrote on a typewriter and I was like, wow, this is good. And I was. I was like this is, this is really fun, this is really creative, and it's because I was having fun, yeah and uh. So I think, as we're kind of talking about all this stuff right, all this volume, I think we return back to that concept of no work is wasted time, like, even if you're just writing stupid stuff, you're creative, you got to do creative things, you got to keep like and you can't work from a blank page.
Speaker 2:Like you, really can't no. So it so it's like, yeah, but like, just write down your ideas. One of the biggest examples I have of that of just, like you know, ideating and and maybe even writing like half-baked ideas, is I was in an acting class and there was a guy who was in it um, frank tran, uh, amazing director and he was in the class with me and he was he was in it because he's a director.
Speaker 2:He wanted to learn more about acting and I'd been talking about a lot about my writing and stuff. And he actually came up to me after class one day and he was like, well, what if we made something together? He's like you want to act and write, I want to write and direct. Like what if we like co-wrote something and shot it? And I just opened up my ideas folder, picked something out that I had started in college but it hadn't gone anywhere. I just had like a one pager on it and it made the whole experience actually happen, because I could have seen it where I just got so caught up in trying to find an idea that the fact that I was able to be like oh hey, I had this idea, like what do you think about that? And we weren't starting from a blank page, like we actually sat, wrote, yeah, shot it, submitted it like it happened and I know work is wasted work.
Speaker 2:You know, could we have edited that film forever? Sure, yeah, but we also. This is where deadlines become your best friend. He had a, he had a family thing back in florida, and so he. We had a deadline of, like, this needs to be done at the end of january. And so suddenly we, just we stopped being precious. We wrote it.
Speaker 3:We were like yeah, we like that, that's fun let's go shoot it, let's edit it and it.
Speaker 2:I do think deadlines are your best friend in creative works, because they just force you to put the pen down, or they force you to pick the pen up, because a lot of times people forget.
Speaker 1:We can become afraid of our own work yeah, I have a short that's uh still in the editing bay that I have to edit there's no deadline I shot it two years ago. I'm like I'm not, it's not going anywhere, like I don't have a deadline for it, but maybe I need to. So I'm gonna go home, I'm gonna make a deadline for that short film and hopefully by but I you know what I would do.
Speaker 2:I would, I would make it external. You, I would pick a festival you want to apply to.
Speaker 3:That's a good idea.
Speaker 2:That's how I would pick it, because if you make your own deadline, you won't meet it. If you make a deadline of something external that you literally are like I can either get it done or I can completely miss this opportunity, you're more likely to do it.
Speaker 1:I think I'm going to do Austin Film Fest. Maybe not this year because, because I don't think I'll be able to make it. I think it's already done, I think it might be. I think it's a late deadline. So next year, austin Film Fest, that's going to be my deadline. For those at home, go write, go do stuff. Even if you're an actor, if you're a writer, if you're a director, if you're a producer, if you're an editor, just go make something small, go do something. I'm on Reddit. I see a lot of actors just put monologues together and share it and I'm like some of these are not great. Some of these are really great. But you're doing stuff. What am I doing? I'm sitting here criticizing you. That's productive.
Speaker 2:So go do stuff, go thrive and I'm a big believer, too, in recycling material like.
Speaker 3:I and.
Speaker 2:I think it makes it less scary when you're trying something new as well, and so like the example I have for makes it less scary when you're trying something new as well, and so like the example I have, for that is I. For a couple years, one of the big theater communities I was a part of was called it's Personal and it was this company that did collections of solo performances based around a theme and I, the first one I did.
Speaker 2:I was so nervous. I had never done anything like solo performance. I was like, oh my gosh, oh my gosh, my gosh. I had a my senior year of college. I'd written an essay about my fear of stage kissing and I was like, oh my God, this is a solo piece and I wasn't starting from a blank.
Speaker 2:I mean, it ended up being so different from the essay but, I, wasn't starting from a blank page and I was like, ah, this is working smarter, not harder. No one was going to see this essay from college, but it made a great solo performance piece and to me that really solidified that just generating content is key because recycle it Like if it. If it's not, if you never use it, or like, or even some of those other essays because it was a, if you never use it, or like, or even some of those other essays because it was a. It was like a college class on writing about arts and entertainment. The other two essays became posts on my blog. I was just like just reuse, reuse, renew, like recycle In that like act of reusing your rewriting.
Speaker 3:Yeah.
Speaker 1:Yeah, you're, you're perfecting that moment and I think you're flexing the muscle of rewriting, which I think is very important.
Speaker 1:So, to end on one really kind of interesting little Easter egg tidbit, something I don't know, you're reading a script of mine, so that first scene, I've written that in three different scripts a version of that scene in three different scripts and it's been refined into what it is now, and I don't think that's some of the best work that I've written, because it's I've written, because I've written it so many different times in so many different scripts with so many different characters, but that moment has existed in multiple timelines. All right, so we have to end because we're running a little short on time. We have so much to talk about I know we have two more episodes.
Speaker 1:We'll keep talking. We'll keep chatting next week and the week after that. But for everyone listening, go write. Go make stuff. Uh, don't be precious and make your deadlines. Yeah, make your deadline, external deadlines, external deadlines. All right, we'll see you next week. Everyone, take care bye. Thank you for listening to the podcast. You can find us anywhere you find your podcasts or on youtube on the cinematography for actors youtube channel. See you next week from the cfa network.
Speaker 3:Cinematography for actors is bridging the gap through education and community building. Find out about us and listen to our other podcast at cinematographyforactorscom. Cinematography for Actors Institute is a 501c3 non-profit. For more information on fiscal sponsorship donations because we're tax exempt now, so it's a tax write-off and upcoming education, you can email us at contact at cinematography for actorscom. Thanks.