good? I'm not sure.
Before Free Katie, where I struggled to define myself as an artist, there was Project Greenlight where I struggled to define myself as a writer.
It was over 10 years ago, long before Facebook was jacked into the DNA of our culture and people who spent time on the internet were considered the lonely and marginal by those who had yet to feel the shifting beneath their feet. Celebrities didn't tweet. There was no twitter. Mainstream media knew there was something to it, but there was a skittishness about breaking the barrier between the unwashed masses and the unwashed elite. Best to just do an AOL Chat, lest the people learn secrets or travel through the fiber optics to stalk and murder. No one wants fans to see the sausage being made. It is ugly work .
I don't think it is overstating it to say that Chris Moore, Matt Damon and Ben Affleck took the leap into the deep end of the internet before the water had been tested. Mostly I am proud to be a Co-Producer on this project but it also represents some of the darkest times in my life. Being laid off by Live Planet was one of the biggest heartbreaks of my life. I believed in what we were doing, even when the powers that be doubted the potential and looked askance at my enthusiasm about the highly engaged community that sprouted up around this project. Potential doesn't pay the bills. I understand that and I have no bitterness towards the people that canned me. But it will always represent the moment I knew I was far too tender hearted to work in Hollywood. I couldn't love something and move on the way that others seemed to. I cursed my luck to be so sensitive and was ashamed of how I cried. Now older and wiser, I consider myself lucky that my feelings were not beaten out of me by the machine that spit me out.
But guess who is still around?
The masses.
The people: The PGL Diaspora (find them on Facebook if you'd like)
We were a group of writers, some great, some not so great but bonded by the love of words and a passion to better our craft. Many were united by feeling misunderstood about that passion in their hometowns. I wonder if they understood I was feeling just as misunderstood on the other side of the firewall.
We played with words, we jousted and cheered. We set norms for sections and mingled with trolls and dualies in a virtual verbal fight club. It was magical and passionate and it had very little to do with the TV show or movie. It also wasn't making much money but it fulfilled the promise of the internet; community, access, engagement, creativity.
Now over 10 years later, we are all finding each other again. Loves, deaths, marriages, scandal, confessions: all the elements of great drama live in the stories of these people I am proud to call friends. Many I never lost touch with but I am now seeing names of people I forgot I barely knew. I am charmed all over again.
There is serious talk about a reunion in Sundance next year. I think that is cool as shit and maybe the only thing that still tugs my tender heartstrings back to Southern California.
But what the fuck am I talking about?!
I am here. We are here and I don't need to face Chris Moore in a staff meeting tomorrow (no offense dude, but they were not fun).
So this is for all you PGL Bitches. A writing challenge.
LURV YOU GUYS!
You must use all these words in a story, scene, poem, whatever:
cracked heel
Watermelon Jolly Rancher
school directory
vegan
lighter
ringing phone
bacon
tent
chipped paint
first grade science experiment
I've got message boards too. Feel free to post your work there.
Guess what else...SOLD!
