I'm open to Q&A about myself, the strike, or anything else of interest.

As regards my novel, I'm finishing up a Young Adult piece. It's about a girl who starts a rock band in her high school and takes it all the way to an imaginary festival at Coachella for Unsigned Artists.

I feel pretty unqualified to talk about the ins and outs of the strike, but if people have questions, I'm prepared to answer them. Fire away.

Sorry for the long silence but as everyone must know by now, I've been on strike. I'm not prohibited from writing a blog, but there hasn't been much to talk about. I can't really give a blow-by-blow of the negotiations. I could, but you'd get better information from visiting almost any other site, including the WGA website. I've been picketing and keeping my ear to the ground, which is to say the internet, and finding productive ways to use my time until I can work again. I've been writing a novel, but there is never much to say about that process except to borrow that famous quote -- not sure who said it -- "You just stare at a blank page until drops of blood appear on your forehead." I've been working on music a little bit and am preparing to do a show at the Malibu Inn.

So I'm taking a break and I'll be back whenever the craziness ends and I have something to report. Thanks for all your interest and participation. Hang in there and trust that we, the writers, wouldn't put ourselves and the industry through all this if something vitally important weren't at stake, not just for us, not even primarily for us, but for the generations to follow.

Talk to you again on the other side.

Bruce Springsteen's new record, "Magic," is deserving of a lot of superlatives and it has garnered many of them already. It's his best record since "Darkness," it's his best-produced ever, the lyrics are more poetic than "Born to Run," it's his most political record since "Nebraska."

Continue reading "Show A Little Faith, There's Magic in the Night" »

LCD Soundsystem at the Hollywood Bowl, opening for Arcade Fire. That's the last concert I saw. Daft Punk was playing in everybody's house for miles around. They were great. I had my doubts because LCD Soundsystem really thrives in a small venue where you can see what they're doing and they're really loud. I had already had my heart broken by Wilco at the same venue a couple of years ago. I love Jeff Tweedy and will stand by my belief that he's a visionary, but he's not a performer. I mean, he could be, but when he gets in a large-ish venue he doesn't own it. I was afraid the same thing would happen to my beloved LCD, but they actually owned it as much as they could.

Continue reading "Daft Punk Is Playing In My House Is Playing In My House" »

So I took my daughter to NYC for a week of vacation.

We stayed in my apartment in Nolita, right at the edge of Soho. We did all kinds of New York things. Broadway play -- "Spring Awakening", which is amazing -- and MOMA and Bergdorf's for make-up. We went to Little Italy for copious Italian food, and La Esquina, which is just too hip for words, and Balthazar, the best downtown place to eat, and we shopped all over Soho for her favorite thing in the world -- graphic tees. (Apparently graphic tees are a movement in fashion. Instead of, you know, t-shirts with funny things on them). We even made a disastrous jaunt to Montauk in the Hamptons. Disastrous because it rained the whole time, the hotel was a bad dream from the seventies, and the train broke down when we were making our escape back to the city. (We ended up coming back on a bus called The Jitney. I don't want to talk about it anymore.) Of course, she spent a lot of time hooked up to her Bose headphones and talking online to her friends. The fact that she was doing it with a view of the Williamsburg Bridge really did change it up for her.

Continue reading "2 Girls Go to New York City" »

Two of my best friends in Los Angeles are Craig and Jen. Craig is a director, writer, photographer, fine artist, surfer. Jen works for a software company and is a great cook and hilarious. They are married. Craig and I have spent a number of hours working on short films and other projects. Since Craig and Jen always organize the surfing expeditions, we've also spent countless hours on the beach reading what I like to call "crackzines" and making fun of celebrities. (We don't make fun of all of them -- the ones who deserve it. You know who they are). And we sometimes come up with phony projects to cast them in.

Continue reading "Inside Joke Runs Outside" »

So recently I decided to take some photos for the next record/local tour. The idea behind the new one is bluegrass meets ... I don't know ... 2007? I've been inspired by the Bruce Springsteen/Pete Seeger sessions record he put out a while back. I love the idea of marrying authentic instrumentation and songwriting to modern sensibilities. That's not what Bruce did -- he just re-created the authenticity of the music, with an enormous band including everything from a trombone to a washboard. Check out that record if you haven't.

Continue reading "You Think This Just Happens?" »

Just when I was running out of things to feel guilty about, I now have the Blog. Sorry about the neglect.

So I finished the second episode of "Women's Murder Club" and I have to confess that I ended up using both "shooter" and "perp" in dialogue. Turns out, they are preferable choices to "guy who shot" and "guy who did the bad thing." I never did say "lawyered up." I wonder if that's even an actual term in police language or something that has filtered down from "NYPD Blue."

Continue reading "Blogus Interruptus" »

Sorry for the prolonged silence but, hey, I'm writing. Episode 2 of "Women's Murder Club." I've completed an entire act and have yet to use the words "perp" or "shooter." Well, okay, I did refer to a shooter, but it was in stage directions, not dialogue. I can't promise anyone I'll get through the whole script without making a character say those things, but I do hereby swear not to say "lawyered up." No, I take that back. I can't promise anything. It's a fun show, though. It reminds me of when I was writing "Chicago Hope." There's something liberating about writing inside such a specifically defined world. And once you're inside those boundaries, it frees you up to play with the form and let the characters say witty and hilarious things. (I can't promise witty or hilarious, but that's what I'm shooting for). When I was on "Chicago Hope," I was famous for writing big conference scenes, culminating in doctors getting into near fisticuffs. I like making people argue. That's when we are at our least articulate, so all the rules go out the window. I like seeing the rules go out the window.

Continue reading "Hey, I'm Writing" »

Women's Murder Club, Oedipus and Music

Now that the "Demons" smoke has cleared, I find myself with a brand new deal at ABC to develop and to work as a consultant on one of their new shows called "Women's Murder Club," which is based on a series of James Patterson novels. The show will air in the fall in the Friday night line-up. It has lots of potential, with Angie Harmon starring and the fun idea of an enclave of women negotiating the judicial system.

Continue reading "Women's Murder Club, Oedipus and Music" »

Thanks for all the generous crankiness regarding "Demons."

But you will get to see a show about bantering vampires on "Moonlight" and wife swapping in the Seventies on "Swingtown."

I don't know if the vampires actually banter. I'm probably thinking "Moonlighting."

And wife swapping certainly reaches right to the heart of the country.

Continue reading "Silly Demons, TV is for Swingers" »

On Friday we got some encouraging testing on the pilot in Las Vegas. Networks like to test pilots there in order to get a cross section of the country. So what happens in Vegas doesn't just stay there ... it comes back to L.A. to curse or bless pilot makers. We got (somewhat) blessed. I guess this means we're going to appeal to smokers. Too bad they don't advertise cigarettes on TV anymore. I'm kidding, of course. Smoking stunts your growth.

Continue reading "Las Vegas, Coachella" »

Apparently, the waiting is the hardest part.

We delivered the film to the network last week. Now we're waiting.

I don't know about you guys, but I've been watching "The Tudors" on Showtime. I can't really tell if it's any good or not -- I'd welcome your reviews. I tend to get drawn into period pieces in general, anything to do with British monarchy in particular. There sure was a lot of beheading. And the dresses were pretty. The crowns look a bit tinny.

Most likely I'm watching "The Tudors" because the waiting part of this process feels like being in the Tower.

Continue reading "The Gospel According to Tom Petty" »

We have an edited version of "Demons," which we screened for the studio this weekend. It's an exciting movie. Whether or not it will test well in the Valley and Vegas is the current question.

Here's what I know: The film is ambitious and true to its intention, the acting is moving and organic. Ron and Jaime and Harold are all compelling and have great chemistry

Continue reading "Editing and Screening" »

Tonight we wrapped production on "Demons."

To be more accurate, tonight we are going to wrap production on "Demons." I wrapped myself from the stage around midnight but everyone else will be there till about 3.00 a.m.

I didn't want to wrap myself but I had a doctor's appointment this morning and he told me I couldn't go back to work at all, let alone until 3.00 a.m.

I had no intention of listening to him.

Continue reading "That's a Wrap" »

Today was the next to the last day of shooting. It was supposed to be the last but we added a day. Most of the actual exorcism was shot today. The director designed a beautiful and complicated scene which he chose to shoot in the order it was written. All of you film sophisticates realize what a luxury and a daunting task that can be. Because the scene builds in tempo and cadence and intensity, and because a lot of stuff gets broken, he felt it was worth going for it in this manner. It was an amazing thing to watch. I'll be honest, it was scary. Because the entire room is supposed to shake in this scene, every time the director said "action," there was the sound of a powerful generator starting up and then set walls started to rattle, and then the actors began to act in the middle of all that commotion. All my hats are off to them.

Continue reading "Penultimate Demons" »

Thanks for all the great responses to my maiden blog journey. I want to address some of your questions and comments directly but first, an update.

Three days into shooting, while on location at the USC campus, I collapsed on set.

Okay, it was just outside of the set. And it wasn't a full collapse. It was a knee buckling followed by the set medic's chair. The medic wasn't in it at the time -- good news for both me and the medic.

I'm sure this would have happened even if I were shooting a pilot about, say, cheerleaders who solve crimes.

Continue reading "Scarlet Fever, hookerbiotics and a "Demons" update" »

I don't blog. It's always frightened me as I have no reason to believe the random thoughts in my head are fit for public consumption, let alone a source of entertainment. But I keep running into curiosity about my latest project, "Demons," as well as some lingering questions regarding the fate of "Joan of Arcadia." So I decided it was time.

Continue reading "Hi and Welcome to my Blog" »