The Micro-Budget Screenplay

1. The Micro-Budget Screenplay (Life Lessons For The D.I.Y. Screenwriter)

2. WHO THE HELL IS THIS PEDITTO GUY? • Wrote and directed Jane Doe, starring Calista Flockhart. $250,000 budget. Grossed over 2 million dollars. Featured on Entertainment Tonight and Access Hollywood—and was a horrible movie! • Six screenplays optioned through William Morris Endeavor, among them Crossroaders to Haft Entertainment (Emma, Dead Poet’s Society). • Teaches screenwriting at Columbia College-Chicago, Second City, and Chicago Filmmakers. Created the Micro-Budget screenwriting class at Columbia. Professionally consulting on thousands of screenplays since 2002. Recently published: THE DIY FILMMAKER, a micro-budget guidebook, available on Amazon. • Blog is: www.scriptgodsmustdie.com • Recently wrote/produced the micro-budget thriller Chat, $44,000 budget, distributed by Gravitas Ventures. We’ll be using Chat as an example and talking more about it later…

3. MICRO-BUDGET SCREENWRITING (A 3-PART COURSE) WRITING & REWRITING IT’S A MOVIE- NOW WHAT? PREPARATION DISCUSSION OF NECESSARY PREP WORK INCLUDING: OUTLINING MODELS MULTITASKING WITH OTHER ESSENTIAL PRE-PRODUCTION ACTIVITIES MENTAL PREPARATION 10-POINT SYSTEM FOR WRITING YOUR MICRO-BUDGET TRAPS TO AVOID GENRES YOU SHOULD CONSIDER, AND CONSIDER AVOIDING SOME WISDOM OF THE REWRITING PROCESS CHAT: A MICRO-BUDGET CASE STUDY DISTRIBUTION– A PERSONAL CHOICE KEEPING REAL EXPECTATIONS IN A CHANGING MARKETPLACE A FEW LAST ENCOURAGING WORDS WITH ATTITUDE!

4. Preparation(part 1) TIME TO WRITE THIS THING!

5. To Write, or Not Write, for Micro-Budget? • My good friend Colin Costello, a former Chicagoan who moved to Los Angeles, recently wrote an article about the how a writer needs to be in Los Angeles to be a professional. I asked Colin to define his terms—if, by professional, he means in the strictest sense someone getting paid to practice the art of screenwriting—then sure, L.A. is where you find the money and infrastructure. Sure, the established Writer’s Guild writer going the traditional route of agencies, pitching, and assignment work would have to live in Los Angeles. But if he thinks that’s the only way to get a screenplay made, then I’m happy to debate him. • You do not have to be in Los Angeles to make your movie.

6. In The Perfect L.A. Spec World • In a perfect L.A. spec world you would write the script you need to write. You’d write it with passion and purpose, resulting in a great script. This would garner a great placing on The Black List and attract an A-List producer who just happens to be combing online websites for the next big thing. Or maybe the script makes semifinals at Nicholl Fellowship and bags you a manager who then sends it on to Jeremy Renner’s production company where you sign a 6-figure deal, watch major talent attach to the project and get the movie made for 50 million. You would then be part of the Writer’s Guild, take meetings, pitch, and do assignment work, earning Academy Award consideration and... • In a perfect world…

7. The Mathematics of L.A. • Multiple writers have been signed off Black List, or have placed in X, Y and Z screenwriting contest and gone on to have their scripts made from humble spec origins. • But it’s the ex-casino craps dealer in me that can’t get over the mathematics of this scenario. The probability of this scenario. The likelihood of it. Or—can we be honest—the NON-likelihood of it happening. • I’ve seen quotes on screenplays registered with the Writer’s Guild at upwards of 50,000. And how many major Studio and Indie movie made last year? 500? 600? And of those, how many were specs? 60? 70? • For every spec screenplay writer you see on Deadline.com with a magical story of success, we could point to a thousand dreams that didn’t pan out. • Great Peditto, so you’re saying I should stop dreaming? I should stop writing… because the odds are against it?

8. OTHER PEOPLE’S MONEY • Not at all. I’m talking about re-calibration. A mental rearrangement of priorities. From Old School to New. I’m talking about knowing yourself…and your project. • When you write a screenplay and you ignore budgetary considerations, you pretty much guarantee needing other people’s money. • Needing other people’s money cedes power. It guarantees the need of L.A. and the necessity of the L.A. mechanism. It’s why you should consider writing with budget in mind. When you write for micro-budget, you increase your odds of seeing the movie happen. Because you control the mechanism. • The real question should be: How do I write a movie for the absolute lowest price possible without compromising the vision of my film?

9. MICRO-BUDGET DEFINITION • There is no one size fits all definition for micro-budget. My definition? Micro-budget is a movie made with money exclusively controlled by you. Meaning, literally, money you pull out of your pocket, or your mom’s pocket, or your 1000 Facebook friend’s pockets through a Kickstarter campaign. This could be $500 bucks or $50,000. It’s an amount you raise yourself, no strings attached by content-controlling outside money people. • You’ll need to write a script along the lines I will document using common sense measures to keep costs down. • So we’re doing this. Let’s get to work!

10. STRUCTURING(THE NECESSITY OF OUTLINING?) • TYPES OF OUTLINING: • BRAINSTORMING • LOGLINE • SYNOPSIS • TREATMENT • STEP OUTLINE • BEAT SHEET

11. BRAINSTORMING(WHAT MOVIE ARE YOU MAKING, AND WHY?)

12. LOGLINES(DON’T OVERCOMPLICATE THIS!) GOAL OBSTACLE WHO WHO IS THE PROTAGONIST? THE POV CHARACTER… WHAT IS THEIR GOAL? WHAT IS THE NEED? WHO OR WHAT IS STOPPING THEM FROM ATTAINING THE GOAL?

14. THE STEP OUTLINE • I start writing the outline, blocking out the major action, working down into single scenes. It takes me the better part of two months to “card out” the script and have the Step Outline down solid. • The thinking behind scheduling script meetings before a script exists is the immense pain and suffering it saves on the back end. Debate the story with your producers and director before you invest weeks and months writing it. Clarify what you intend to do ahead of time so there are no unfortunate misunderstandings on direction, or tone, or character development, or story arc.

15. MULTI-TASKING(YOU THOUGHT ALL YOU HAD TO WRITE WAS WRITE IT? • MICRO-BUDGET = WEARING MANY HATS • I NEVER USED TO TRUST PRODUCERS– UNTIL I BECAME ONE OF THEM • FINANCING • PRE-PRODUCTION CREWING UP • CASTING • BUDGETING • SCHEDULING

16. BUT How do I start? • Conceive a movie that can be made for a budget you can raise. Outline the idea, never forgetting the common sense rules we’ll go over in a minute. Write the thing, get some notes from your inner circle, and rewrite it. Make it tight as possible. • This whole time you should be doing something else—developing a network of people who can help make this script happen. That means networking within your local film-making community. Going to events and other people’s films. Meet DP’s, Production Designers, Editors, and other filmmakers who are just starting out. Sure, it helps to be in L.A. to network but it’s not exclusive to L.A. There are a dozen organizations here in Chicago likeChicago Filmmakers and Chicago Hollywood.com that help connect and support you in your efforts. Take classes there, network, and get educated. • Learn, too, about the mechanisms in place to help you raise money. Places likeKickstarter and IndyGoGo help thousands of grass-roots DIY efforts get off the ground. Cultivate investors if possible. And don’t forget to pass that list on to me!

17. Financing(you’ll need a kick-ass producer and a plan beyond kickstarter) • KICKSTARTER SCRIPT: (ANNIE starts the timer) • I’m going to set the timer once. 60 seconds… Want to talk? We’ll talk, or I will. You should never have come in here. Party chat with the sex monsters. Want to talk in private? Ah, we can do that. All the naughty stuff happens in private. 40 seconds…(Taking the camera in hand, she moves it POV-style, leaning back, incredible flexibility)I’ve got something for you. Some goodies, from me to you. Pictures, a personal video, a sneak peek into my world. But there’s something you can do for me first. 20 seconds. There’s a special, steamy, sexy guest I want you to meet. He’s going to tell you how we can meet. 10 seconds.I want to see you, in Private, inside. Let’s make it happen. Here we go. • The second part was the speech of director Boris Wexler, direct to camera. Sincere, passionate, competent…sell the damn toothpaste, Boris! • Hi, I’m Boris Wexler, the director of CHAT. I’ve been working on this project for a year now with my writing and producing partner Paul Peditto. It’s something we’re excited about. Something we think is kind of unique.

18. CHAT- FUNDRAISING • FINDING AND PITCHING PRIVATE INVESTORS • CROWDFUNDING • GRANTS • DONATIONS • SOFT MONEY

19. CHAT- THE BUSINESS PLAN/PITCH PACKAGE • SYNOPSIS • DIRECTOR’S STATEMENT • BIOS • MARKET ANALYSIS • THE PROPOSAL

20. CHAT- CREWING UP • Producers • DP (Director of Photography) • AD (Assistant Director) • Script Supervisor • Production Designer • Sound Department • Hair and Makeup • Production Assistants

21. CHAT- BUDGETING(TOLD YA YOU’D NEED KICK-ASS PRODUCERS) • THE FOUR CATEGORIES: • ABOVE THE LINE • BELOW THE LINE • POST-PRODUCTION • LEGAL & INSURANCE

22. CHAT- SCHEDULING • SCHEDULING SOFTWARE • SCHEDULING FOR YOUR BUDGET • GROUP SCENES FOR MAXIMUM EFFECTIVENESS • LOCATION CONSTRAINTS

24. Mental approach(to write this, you’ll need to be ready!) • Energy. Meaning:Juice. What energy are you bringing to your writing? This has to do process—how many times a week do you write? What time of day? How many hours each session? There is no one right answer. Just as there are day people and night people, the time of day you pick isn’t the key—it’s the energy you bring to writing. It needs to be a priority. • Some write one hour a day, seven days a week. Some write four hours a pop two or three times a week. Some are weekend warriors, not even touching the script during the week. Some can close a door and steal valuable energy at work. When you write is as critical as what you write. You have to bring A-Energy to this. How you do that depends on your situation. Sometimes you’re feeling blocked might simply be a case of poor energy. Shut it down.  Live to fight another day.

25. Mental approach(why are you writing this movie?) • You want to say something. You’re about to write it. Why are you doing this? Have you ever asked yourself this? What motivates you? Money? Legacy? The need to tell a great story? • If you’re only in this for the $$$, you might be bound for double doses of Zoloft. Any idea how many people write screenplays vs. how many make it to Writer’s Guild status? The best motivation for writing is found at the core of emotion, something personal to you that will translate into a core, universal truth for an audience. • What is it exactly you’re trying to say with your movie, and why? • Consider this. • And while we’re on the subject of mental preparation…

26. KILLING THE PERFECTIONIST INSTINCT • Examine your process—how you write the script. Let’s say you’ve outlined your script. Remember the scene in Amadeus where Salieri gets his hands on Mozart’s music and discovers Mozart didn’t make copies? He wrote without corrections, in a single draft, touched by the hand of God. • God speaking to you lately? • There are going to be major rewrites, minor rewrites, polishes, trims, tucks… your script, in constant revision mode. The script is never done. Even with a micro-budget you’ll be debating well into the editing process everything from single lines up to full scenes that might not make the final cut. You’ll be changing the supposedly “locked” shooting script while on set. Not to mention the grief of deciding what makes it to the shooting script. You’ll be doing draft upon draft upon…

27. KILLING THE PERFECTIONIST INSTINCT • Depressed yet? • Kill the perfectionist instinct. It’s pointless to keep rewriting the same 30 pages. It’s counter-productive. Good writers lose confidence this way. They can’t let an unfinished scene go, and that’s a definite mistake. • Push forward. That’s the purpose of the first “discovery” draft, to say everything you want to say in rough form. If, at the end of Draft 1, you’re looking at 140 pages, so what? You’ll know what needs to be changed on the front end of the script by the time you reach the back end. Don’t censor yourself. Get to the end of the first draft and then refine. Say everything you want to say, no matter how many pages, and don’t try to be perfect. Push it out!

28. WRITING IT(PART 2) TRUST ME, YOU CAN DO THIS!

29. MICRO-BUDGET SCREENWRITING: TOP 10 #1: WRITE IT WITH A PRODUCER’S MIND

30. MICRO-BUDGET= SPEND ONLY WHAT YOU GOT! • Micro-budget is a movie made with money exclusively controlled by you. Meaning money you out of your pocket, or your mom’s pocket, or your 1000 Facebook friend’s pockets through a Kickstarter campaign. • The unlimited-budget, Kumbaya, write-your-dream first draft has no place here. If you raised $25,000–you sure as hell better write the movie with $25,000 in mind. • That means being aware of the COSTS of making a movie. What costs money shooting a movie- you need to know. It means looking at the movie as a producer would at story-stage; not forcing your producers into impossible production/post-production decision when the time comes.

31. #2: CONCEPT= GENRE + SIMPLICITY + VISION • The grand-daddy of Micro, for me, is Roger Corman. His low-budget B-movies made sure the stories reached the largest number of people by telling stories in a recognizable genre. Certain genres always work for Micro– horror, comedy, thriller, drama. • Corman added campy comedy to his horror, or thriller aspects to a drama. These were “mash-ups” of genre done with simplicity and for a price. The man infused genre pieces with an original vision specific enough to father the “Corman School”, predating the digital D.I.Y. era by 40+ years. • On genres, stay away from period-pieces or post-Apocalyptic action. Anyone who’s seen Primer knows Sci-Fi can be done cheaply. Robert Rodriguez made El Mariachi for the infamous $7,000 bucks so Action is also on the list. Look at Fede Alvarez, who wrote and directed the remake of Evil Dead. How did a young filmmaker from Uruguay get that gig? He made a short film (Panic Attack!) that looked like it was made for a million dollars… for $300! Based on that short film he got noticed and representation in Hollywood. That is how you play the game! Show the Hollywood gatekeepers you can make a high-quality commercial product dirt cheap.

32. #3: WRITE WHAT YOU HAVE= THE ROBERT RODRIGUEZ SCHOOL • Robert Rodriquez literally wrote the book (Rebel Without A Crew) on the subject. Predating the Digital era, his advice on how he made El Mariachiis more relevant today than ever. Locations, props, wardrobe– the goal is to pay for nothing. That means writing into the script nothing you can’t acquire cheaply or for free. While it’s unlikely you can get away with that goal for some costs(DP, Sound, Post House costs), you should fight to hold the line on other costs (actors, locations) Take an accounting of the resources you can bring to the project. Dad owns a bowling alley? Set the script in a bowling alley. Mom runs the local Salvation Army store? The movie’s wardrobe and props will be coming from the Salvation Army. Friend owes you a favor who has a stretch limo? Write it into the script.

33. #4:CENTRAL LOCATION= LIMIT COMPANY MOVES • For Chat the director Boris Wexler managed to nail down the Board of Trade offices he worked at to be our cybersex chat offices. This location was worth at least $10,000 dollars (if we would have had to rent a similar space) and added tremendous production value. We shot here 10 of the 18 production and a pick up day. • You as writer need to understand the basics of film production. Sure, you can read twenty books on the subject, but wouldn’t it be better to get down on a film set or two? To understand that every new location you write= a crew move= $$$. The producer has to pay the crew to pack equipment into company trucks and vans, drive to the new location, and unpack. Limit the necessity of company moves.

34. #5: LIMIT LOCATIONS • I wrote an article for Script Mag about August-Osage County and how the play was “opened up” for the movie screenplay. The conventional thinking is you have to do this. This was by no means a micro-budget flick, but the reasoning is the same. If you don’t want a claustrophobic s script, you’ve got to have some variety of locations. At the same time you want to limit those to, ideally, what you have access to for free. Apartments, restaurants, and bars are easy to find. Liposuction doctor’s offices–as we found on Chat–are harder to come across. This was a major discussion at script stage– did we absolutely need the liposuction office to tell the tale? • You can also be smart and make one apartment appear like multiple locations. Your DP volunteers his place? Nice! We can shoot Character A’s bathroom, Character B’s kitchen, Character C’s living room. This scheduling will be done by producers but it’s your script they’re locking in, so give them the best opportunity to make the movie happen by limiting locations in the script.

35. #6: EXTERIOR NIGHT SHOTS= JUST DON’T WRITE ‘EM!

36. #6: EXTERIOR NIGHT SHOTS- DON’T WRITE ‘EM! • The beeping gate of the parking garage that rang out like a warning siren on Star Trek Deep Space 9.The drunken Erie Street bar hoppers whose fascinating drunk speak babble was oh so more important than respecting some dinky micro-budget trying to make its day.The passing EMT van, cop cars, cop wagon, limo, pizza delivery guys, and a dozen other rubberneckers who slowed vehicles to a crawl to gape out on what might have been the filming of the final first-season episode of Chicago Fire, but alas, was only us.PA’s and the writer himself were dispatched as living lawn chairs in the great Chicago tradition of saving cleared parking spaces. The sirens in downtown skyscraper chasms howling…The skateboarders’ click-clacking…The Harley-engines revving…The small dogs of high-rent paying owners, late-night walked whilst yip-yapping…The constant Muddy Waters from yet another ubiquitous Friday night sports bar… • You can’t control these, so PLEASE, limit those exterior night shots!

37. #7: LIMIT PRINCIPAL AND SECONDARY CHARACTERS • Even if the story you’re writing is character-driven, it doesn’t mean you need 10 principal and secondary characters to tell it. I would suggest limiting key characters to 5 and under. SAG Minimum is $100 bucks a day, but your producing team is not spending that on 10+ actors, not and maintain a budget. And you most definitely don’t want to get into the habit of paying some of your actors and not others– word will spread about that leading to resentment and D R A M A. • Make sure every character has a purpose. Limit the number of extras, and crowd scenes. Don’t write in Wrigley Field, don’t write in Union Station. Whether or not these can be “stolen” is a debate for another day. I’m not forcing producers to find a hundred extras unless there’s no movie without them.

38. #8: KIDS, WEATHER, ANIMALS, BLOOD AND VFX- JUST DON’T WRITE ‘EM!

39. #8: KIDS, WEATHER, ANIMALS, BLOOD AND VFX- DON’T WRITE ‘EM! • The Fede Alvarez VFX exception…if you’re writing and you know someone who can pull off SFX like this, go ahead and write them in! If not… • You’re the writer. You think it’s not your job to know that the simple gunplay you innocently wrote in will require a gun wrangler to oversee and train the actors. Or that it requires a Chicago Police Department officer on set for the full day. Or that Chicago cops gets double-time if your shoot happens to stretch into 15 hours. Or that you need someone to convincingly mix blood and apply it to the actors.  You didn’t really think about all that when you wrote those two simple lines into the script because…well, you just didn’t.  These things you write have to be made to happen, and that costs $$$. • The question you have to ask is– did they need to happen to tell the story and not compromise the movie’s vision? • Kids are only allowed to work half a day on a film set, and the producer must pay for a child Welfare Officer or/and Teacher to be present at all times. Whenever you write a kid in your script, you are paying for an adult who will NOT appear on screen.

40. #8: KIDS, WEATHER, ANIMALS, BLOOD AND VFX- DON’T WRITE ‘EM! • With all due respect to the good people of PETA, I still have nightmares dealing with them because we were pinning cockroaches down on doughnuts. I just had to have the main character about to bite down on  a doughnut and seeing a cockroach on it. Those cockroaches weren’t street bugs either–they had to be imported–at a cost–and pinned down with PETA’s consent–to get the shot. By the time we were finally ready to shoot I wondered why the f*&^ I wrote it in at all.

41. #9: PAGE COUNT= SOUTH OF 100 • What? You’re saying I can’t write a 105 page micro-budget? Nope. I’m saying it would ideal if the page count were south of 100. Every page costs $$$ to shoot. Your mission Mr. Phelps, should you choose to accept it–is to knock down the page count to the best of your ability. This takes us back to the cut instinct– the reductive mind you need to attack the script. • First draft, no limits, push out, give us your vision exactly as you see it. Page count doesn’t matter. • Follow up drafts, rewriting begins, cutting down page count, additions only where necessary. • White Production draft (the shooting script): Every scene boiled down to necessity (meaning, if you remove it, the story falls apart), trimming every scene, every action line, every line of dialogue for necessity.

42. #10: “STORY IS FREE” • Always loved this simple expression from John August. While there might be some downside to not being able to write in Transformers-style stunts, the upside is the writer of micro-budgets is utterly essential in the process. You’re compensating for the “money hose” with story. People love great storytelling. They are starved for powerful and original work. Writing micro-budget means concentrating on the character-driven, on dialogue, on the juxtaposition of story elements the world has never seen before.  • Eraserhead over Lara Croft, Tomb Raider. Primer over Battleship.

43. CHAT- SCRIPT CASE STUDY

44. CHAT- BEGINNINGS (NOVEMBER, 2012) • I was in the lobby of the Portage Theater. A movie was screening I had done additional dialogue for, Roundabout American. There were 300+ people in attendance. If it was a rush for me, it certainly was for Boris Wexler, the director. A former student of mine, he had come a long way from the back room of Chicago Filmmakers where we first met seven years before. This was special though—the premiere screening of his first feature. As we toasted the movie, Boris was already looking for his next project. “I want to do a thriller,” he said in that French tongue. “Ah, oui?” sez I. Simple as that, we were looking for a new project.

45. January BRAINSTORMING • A week later I throw a dozen ideas on a page, ship it off to him. He rejects all 12. Ooooook. I dig deeper, look into new ideas, and some very old ones. Send another half dozen ideas his way. • One of them, DREAMSCAPE OF THE FALCON, might be of interest. This was a play produced by igLoo, my old theater company back in ’86. The story is of a man whose girlfriend dies in a car accident. The man is unable to handle it, creating a Dreamscape of his own imagining. It ends with the man dead in a bathtub, victim of a sadomasochistic ritual.

46. FEBRUARY, 2013 • How to keep the trippy Dreamscape and write it for micro-budget? What can be shot cheap? Make it sexy, make it verbal, and make it something we’ve never seen before….Wait a minute… • How about the world of cybersex chat? Has that ever been done? I check IMDB, find a movie or two but nothing close. HARDCORE with George C. Scott explored a father searching for his daughter in the world of 70’s porn. My movie would be more an updating for the Cybersex realm. And it had something else going for it… • I have a friend with a light disease called Photophobia. He can’t stand light, has to wear heavy contacts and in bright sun, sunglasses OVER the contacts. What if the father had this light disease? What if he was unable to even look into a computer? And what if his daughter disappeared INTO the computer? • The story gains traction. Boris likes it, likes the father character, likes the cybersex world. It’s a natural for micro-budget. Sexy, heavily verbal, cheap to shoot (apartments are readily available and free). The world hasn’t been done in a major movie and the disease the father had, likewise, never been done. We were onto something. • I start writing.

47. MAY, 2013 • Draft 1 writes itself in 21 days. Of course this comes after three months of outlining. Weighs in at just 92 pages. Lean and mean. CHAT is a nasty little micro-budget thriller accomplishing everything we discussed in preliminary stages and hitting every Step Outline moment. I reckon the movie is 85% there. Send the PDF to Boris and wait. • Email comes back. “Impressive first draft!” He’s elated. He reckons the movie is 50% there. Great! Wait…what? We send out to our “inner circle” for a first read. • I’m stunned and amazed to discover that plenty of folks don’t “get” my central plot twist. What?! How could they miss it-- it’s right there on the page! Evidently not, as people reading independently come back with the same note. Also, that the lead character wasn’t sympathetic, or compelling, or fascinating in any way, Lynchian or otherwise. • Post-feedback, Boris informs me his 50% ready figure is down to 40%. • Sonofa….!

48. JUNE, 2013 • Life intrudes. The perpetual woe of all spec screenwriters. Your best energy lost to having to make a freakin’ living. Through Columbia College, Chicago Filmmakers, Script Gods Must Die any given day you will find me tending to north of 80 students. A-level energy is sapped, leaving leftover energy, weekend warrior energy for CHAT. • More writer meetings with Boris. I start on Draft 2. Major plot elements are joined or tossed out. Character arcs are deepened, other characters trimmed or abandoned. I’m working 40+ hours on my gigs, then coming home to do another 40+ for CHAT. • Go back to basics. What is the story about? Logline says: “A father with photophobia struggles to find his daughter lost in the world of cybersex chat.” Yes, plot-wise, that is the movie. But go deeper. Thematically, I ask: What is the movie about? • The movie, ultimately, is about disassociation. Modern-day isolation. How some people are left behind, lost, forgotten or ignored, disconnected in a world of 24/7 connectivity. That is what CHAT is about. That needs to be in every scene. That is the motor, the direction, the tone, the essence. Got it. I start Draft 2.

49. Fourth Draft, Into Production • The fourth draft of CHAT, which became the “white pages” production draft, was written in January of 2014. One full year. $44,000 was raised and production began in April, 2014. The white draft, of course, was not the final version of the script. During production, changes were required so yellow, green and blue “production drafts” followed. Even on a micro-budget, the script is constantly in flux, so be prepared for changes, even as the movie itself is being made.

50. POST-PRODUCTION: CHAT INT. SYD’S OFFICE- CONTINUOUSFalcon timidly, stranger in a strange land, stands before SYD, 48, a toad. As Syd searches the messy office for paperwork. Falcon scans the room… A video from a liposuction clinic plays on Syd’s computer. • Because we shot at Boris’ Board of Trade offices, this scene was moved from Syd’s office to the Conference Room. More spectacular visuals than a simple office scene, really opened things up. This is a high-profile Board Of Trade office, counter to the seedy backroom you’d expect from an adult chat cam operation.