Harvey Is Not Hollywood

Last week I posted “#MeToo” on my social media sites with great hope that adding my voice to the groundswell of women opening up about their sexual harassment experiences might shine such a light into the dark corners of Hollywood that abuse will no longer be able to survive without the secrecy and shame in which it thrives.  I am grateful for the movement and have a relieved sense of optimism that the outrage we all share will lead to real and meaningful change in our industry.  But I have been troubled by many comments I’ve seen on twitter and Facebook making blanket statements about how Hollywood is a cesspool, that it is only filled with predators and human excrement and filled with the most depraved dregs of humanity.  No exaggeration.  I mean the comments are definitely an exaggeration, but the fact that they were made is not.  And I just felt the need to point out that it’s not just a problem in Hollywood – in every work environment, there are seedy shadows in which predators hide. 

As a teen growing up in Kentucky, I experienced harassment similar to the kind I have experienced in Hollywood at both the pizza place where I worked and on modeling gigs I was sent to around town.  I was assaulted on a cruise ship by a grown man who worked in the kitchen and laughed as he kissed and groped me while I tried to fight him off.   The mother of my friend was raped at the offices of a discount retail store by an executive after her sales pitch with him – an incident she reported and ended up losing her job over.  That experience deeply ingrained in me a fear that speaking out only makes things worse, one that I am just now starting to overcome.  And so as far as I can tell from my own experiences, and those of the women I know and am close to, sexual harassment, discrimination, and abuse permeate every area of the work force.  Wherever there is power or postion that can be exploited, whether it be a Priest or a Politician, a Boss or a Husband with a great difference in physical or financial strength, that power can be exploited.  Hollywood has had it's share of exploitation, but it does not have the market cornered on wrong-doing.  Nor is the underbelly the whole of this business.  There may be the very well-publicized nightmares lurking, but the truth is for me, it has by and large, been an absolute dream come true to work here. 

I love writing movies, and I have had the great fortune to work with many caring, hard-working artists who dedicate their lives to try and make great films to share with the world.  In fact, the vast majority of men I have worked with, from executives and directors to agents and managers have been an inspiration and a joy to work with.  Many have become good friends.  I have met encouragers of both sexes along the way, and I am forever grateful for the camaraderie we share of wanting to spread a little more hope and love into an aching world with the movies we create.  I know we don’t always hit the mark, but I can tell you that most of us are trying our hardest.  Sure, there’s crap that comes out of Hollywood, and there are jerks and criminals only here for their own selfish pursuits, but Harvey is not Hollywood.  Neither are all the men like him.  Show business is just like every other slice of humanity -- made up of good and bad, terrible and amazing people.  I have been lucky to know an enormous amount of wonderful men and women in this industry putting themselves out there every day to just try and do good work, to provide for their families, and to live their own small part of the American Dream. 

There are certainly some horrible, heartbreaking problems in Hollywood, and a dire need to make a serious effort towards gender equality across the board and around the world.  But I am proud of the films I have worked on and the people I have worked with, and I still can’t believe I get to be a part of an industry that has inspired me my whole life.  I know mine is just one perspective, but it’s one I humbly offer to the ongoing conversation with the hope that people can start to look to their own surroundings at work and in their communities where injustice is taking place, to speak up about it, and then to take some time to really focus on the far greater good that is all around.  It’s easy to get caught up in the anger and fear emanating from our computers, televisions, and phones every second of every day, and the temptation to disregard or vilify whole groups of people is great, but that ultimately only leads to a despairing kind of paralysis.  Instead, I hope we can look to all of the good friends and neighbors and coworkers we know to inspire us to take action when needed, and to remind us that it is not hard to see the beauty of life when we start to truly pay attention.

What if Every Day Were a Funeral?

I cried at my Nana's funeral.  I cried for reasons I expected: because I miss her, because I wish I could've spent more time with her, because even when it's long, life is short.  I cried because sometimes I just want to be a kid again at my grandparents' house watching cartoons on channel nine and eating cream filled donuts without a care in the world.  Yes, those are the tears I expected.  But what I didn't expect to cry over was the little spark of joy that kindled in my heart over how funerals can bring people together.  I cried in gratitude for the reminder during this deeply divisive time in our country and our world of how much more we all have in common than social media and the advent of memes would have us believe.

Facebook and Twitter alongside specialized news channels and blogs have made labeling people easier and more prevalent than ever, and labeling people makes them easier to despise, dismiss, and demonize.    Reducing whole populations of human beings to a hashtag or sound bite often identifies them by their worst traits, dehumanizes them, and builds up the false belief that "we" have nothing in common with "them."  And if we have nothing in common, than I have no responsibility to try to understand any views other than those of the people who happen to be lumped into my particular bin -- as if humans can be sorted as easily as trash.

But as I looked around that flower-filled, over-heated funeral home room filled with all types of people -- conservatives and liberals, old and young, gay and straight, skeptics, seekers, atheists, and believers mourning for a woman we all loved -- my wounded heart began to heal a little.  I watched people laugh over old stories and cry over cherished memories, I saw family members with wildly different world views catch up on each others lives, talking about work and vacations, children and parents, accomplishments and things they still hoped to accomplish.  I listened to everyone giggle at the sound of my two year old saying "Amen!" each time the priest ended a prayer.  And it was beautiful.  Because the things that truly matter and the things that connect us are bigger and more important than what may divide us.  If we let them be...

My Nana was a die hard Cubs fan (and everyone singing Take Me Out to the Ballgame at the funeral will forever be embllazoned in my heart as one of my favorite memories) my Papa was a dedicated White Sox fan, and yet, they had one of the most beautiful and lasting marriages I have ever been priviledged to witness -- becasue they had love.  They treated each other with respect, and it filtered down to the whole family, allowing us all to treat one another with respect at the funeral despite our differences.

How wonderful it would be if we could realize that we are all family in a way, because we all live in this same home -- the earth.  What if we lived each day as if it were a funeral?  Giving one another an extra amount of grace and understanding, realizing we are all in mourning over some things in our lives.  What if we helped one another focus on the light while loving each other through the dark?  What if we offered a hug before we bothered to read the label?  Even better -- what if we could just do away with labels all together?  Maybe we would see the truth that the Hollywood Elite Liberal Woman holding hands in the front pew with the Conservative Evangelical Man were just a daughter and a father comforting one another with the understanding that time is fleeting, life is precious, and love can overcome anything, if we would only give it the chance.

How an Episode of Gilmore Girls Changed My Life

A link to my blog post for Hello Giggles:

http://hellogiggles.com/gilmore-girls-life-changing-experience/

Comparisons Are Ostupidus

Comparisons are odious. Cervantes, Christopher Marlowe and John Donne have all used the insightful phrase. Shakespeare modified the saying with his own witty spin when he wrote: comparisons are odorous.  And now, centuries later, I would like to update the much-used sentiment by saying: comparisons are ostupidus.  You might not find that word in the dictionary, so I will provide my own definition here:

ostupidus [oh-stoopid-uhs] (1.) of or pertaining to a complete and total waste of time (2.) seriously, a total time suck (3.) a sad distraction from what is good and lovely and unique about oneself  (4.) a dumb lie perpetrated by the idiot inner critic

See also: just plain dumb

I was sure I would win my first Oscar by 23.  Never mind that I moved to Hollywood after my 23^rd birthday…I figured nine months was plenty of time to be discovered. After all, Audrey Hepburn won an Oscar for her first starring role in the movie for ROMAN HOLIDAY at the age of 23.  Of course that arbitrary dream blew away as I blew the candles on my 24^th birthday cake.  It crushed me until I realized that my heart was much more drawn to writing than acting – so I amended my ambitions.  I would win my first Oscar by 27 like Matt and Ben.  And so began the maddening game of placing my worth on the progress of other people’s paths instead of my own, feeling like I’d somehow failed as the arbitrary deadline passed every time.  I didn’t get my Oscar by 27 or a Pulitzer by 30 or a baby by 32, which was the age my mother was when she had her last child.  But it wasn’t just the progress of my career or my ovaries I compared with others – I can remember being 7 years old and getting my first perm (remember those?) because I wanted to be like “bad” Sandy in the end of the movie GREASE.  When I was signed by a modeling agency at 13 because they believed my big feet were an indication of how tall I’d be, I held on to the hope that if I could just grown to be 5’6 like Kate Moss, the shortest supermodel, I would make it.  Unfortunately I stalled at 5’3 and the agency sent me (and my lying big feet) packing by 17.  And once again, instead of embracing my own unique path and destiny, I went around feeling “less than” all of those people I was comparing myself to.  I can tell you it took me a long time before I would leave the house without my 4-inch high heels.

I know I’m not the only one suffering from comparisonitis.  In fact, I’d say it is almost an epidemic, especially between women.  It seems every time I look over photographs with my friends of some lovely time we had together, all we do is complain, “I wish my arms were more like yours” or sigh and say, “why can’t I get my hair to do that?”  And more often than not, the very trait we covet in someone else is usually the thing they wish they could change about themselves.  It’s the curling iron/flat iron phenomenon – people with curly hair wish it were straight while those of us saddled with straight hair spend hours trying to make it curl (only to have it fall three minutes later).  The crazy thing is, the more beautiful a person may be, the more she seems to only see her flaws.  I once had a meeting set with a famous actress who was undeniably gorgeous and talented.  The day before the meeting, my agent called to make sure I knew not to wear any make-up or high heels to my meeting explaining this beautiful star needed to be the prettiest person in the room because her manager made it clear she would not be able to work with someone who made her feel “threatened”.  At another meeting, a different stunning actress carried 5 pairs of sunglasses in her purse at all times so she would never be caught by the paparazzi wearing the same shades as someone else at an event, lest they win the dreaded “who wore it better” nonsense in some trashy magazine.  Even worse, when I first came to Los Angeles, I worked as an actress on a show where the lovely 15-year-old star pulled me aside during my wardrobe fitting and asked quite sincerely, “Why haven’t you had breast implants – isn’t it hard making it in this business with such small boobs?”  She felt immense pressure to look a certain way and wished she had my “courage” (ha!) to be flat, but a year later she had gone under the knife, convinced it would launch her to superstardom.  Sadly, she hasn’t worked since 2005.

Here’s why comparison are so odious, odorous and ostupidus – they are the birthplace of insecurity, and they make perfectly wonderful people feel, well, less than wonderful. Somewhere along the line, that young girl had seen an actress with bigger boobs getting more jobs and reasoned that her small chest was the reason for her non-celebrity status, when it probably had nothing to do with anything.  There are stars of all boob size and shape (if you don’t believe me, just ask Seth McFarlane). The truth is, the people who make it, the ones don’t merely survive but thrive, are the ones who take advantage of their strengths, not the ones who obsess over their perceived shortcomings.  The rest end up in rehab, or as answers to obscure questions during trivia bingo at gay bars. 

Of course it’s not just a Hollywood problem, it is a universal problem – teens compare themselves to models in magazines, men compare themselves to classmates who have gone on to greater success, people buy bigger cars, more expensive purses, higher heels in the hopes of being more like the person that they perceive as having it all.  But the secret no one seems to realize is that more often than not, that person that we spend money and time trying to be more like, is actively wishing they could be someone else.  Oh stupid us.  We never seem to notice that no one is paying attention to our shortcomings because they are solely focused on their own issues.  Which is completely counter productive, because as much as we may wish and hope and pray to be like someone else, the scary, but ultimately freeing truth is: we will never be anyone but ourselves.  

I have had writers who are just starting out ask me urgently, “How did you get an agent? How did you get your script read? How can I get to where you are in your career?”  To which I give them a little practical advice followed by the admonition, “But no two paths are ever the same.”  I recognize that there is a difference between aspiration and comparison.  We can be inspired by others, and I have many people that I look up to, but those people make me want to be the best version of me I can be, not some knock off version of them.  So I believe that instead of wasting our time and energy feeding our insecurities with comparisons, we should strive to make the most of what we already have, and who we already are.   Because the wonderful truth is, there is only one you in the world, and you have already made a difference just by being here – the rest is frosting.  So go ahead and treat yourself to a bite... Chris Martin is already taken, so there’s really no point in killing yourself to get Gwyneth’s abs.  As for me, I’m going to subscribe to the Jessica Tandy Oscar timeline…and if I never get one, well my goal is to look back on my life and know that I sure had fun trying.

Soul Surfing

While writing the movie SOUL SURFER, (a true story about a teenage surfer, Bethany Hamilton, whose arm was bitten off during a shark attack) I discovered that Bethany went back into the water to try surfing again less than one month after the horrific attack.  When I asked her how she could have possibly gotten the courage to go back into the water, especially so soon after the terrifying event, she told me quite simply that she knew if she waited even another day longer, she may never have gone back in again.  She told me how some surfers can “psych themselves out” after a gnarly accident thinking about all of the "what ifs" and replaying the terror of the moment until they become paralyzed with fear.  And they never surf again. 

How often we are faced with just such a thing in our own lives – the waves beckon, but we stand frozen on the shore, wanting assurances of perfect safety before we dive back in.  And because safety is never guaranteed, we often never get past dipping a toe in before we turn away, too afraid to try again.  When our idea gets shot down at work, we decide it’s easier to just keep our thoughts to ourselves; if a movie we love gets put in turnaround once again, we become jaded and begin to cater to the lowest common denominator so we might not have to feel the sting of failure for something we care too much about; and then there’s always the feeling of disappointment after a broken relationships that keeps us from wanting to put ourselves “out there” again, lest we be rejected.  Fear threatens to keep us stuck on the sidelines of our lives.

The great paradox is that vulnerability takes courage…you have to be strong to let yourself be soft.   

In a way, it wasn’t just Bethany’s body that was maimed in that accident – her heart was broken when that shark took her arm, and in so doing threatened to take away the thing she loved most in the world – surfing.  She could have walled up her heart, wrapped it in bubble wrap to make sure she would never risk enduring such a loss again – but instead she decided to leave the wound open and let the saltwater heal it, taking back the waves she loved and refusing to let fear win.  Today she is one of the greatest surfers in the world.  A champion many times over – and an inspiration to millions.

Risk is not easy, but I think it is much harder in the long run to let loss trap you into living a bland existence, devoid of the joy of triumph, and the glory of love.

Bethany told me that the fear of never surfing again was far greater than the fear of another shark, and so the only thing that made sense was to get back in the water.  And the truth is that for me, the fear of not living, of never knowing love, is way worse than the fear of getting hurt from time to time.  That is the reason I immediately write a new script after I go out with the pitch that doesn’t sell.  The reason I am blessed to be in an amazing marriage after a painful divorce.  It is the reason that I will open my arms and my heart to a new puppy even after the heartbreak of having lost my sweet old dog Alfie. I don’t want to watch my life from the shore, blistering in the heat of loneliness, weighed down by a stonewalled heart.   Sure, sometimes a wave of disappointment crushes you, and sometimes you lose pieces of yourself to the sharp teeth of loss – but more often in this great big ocean we call life, you get carried along on the crest of something beautiful, a wave of sheer love.  But you can’t ride the wave if you never leave the shore.  So go ahead, dive in – plant your feet firmly on the board, feel the wind in your hair, the taste of salt

The Windex Factor

I wear glasses.  I eat a lot of chips.  I haven’t seen anything clearly in years. 

My glasses are in various states of smudginess throughout the day.  But the funny thing is, I usually don’t even notice until my husband pretends his fingers are windshield wipers and comically swishes them across my gritty spectacles.  He usually says something like, “Good God, woman, how can you see anything?”  At which point I just laugh and remark that after a while, I don’t even notice.  It’s easy to get used to seeing the world a certain way.  But when I actually clean my glasses, the world looks so much better, so much brighter, that my whole mood can change.  Restored sight is a beautiful thing.

So what do my greasy glasses have to do with Hollywood?  Well, for me – everything. 

In her book, A Small Rain, my favorite author, Madeleine L’Engle writes about a character who says he washes windows for a living.  When pressed further, he discloses that he is a pianist, and that he believes great art washes the windows of our souls, giving us a glimpse into something greater, helping us see God and one another more clearly.  It is based on a scripture in the New Testament, “For now we see through a glass, darkly; but then face to face: now I know in part; but then shall I know even as also I am known.”  In other words, it’s hard in this life to see clearly – there’s a lot of dirt and grime (prejudices, fear, pain and anger) that gunk up the windows of our spirit.  And like me growing accustomed to my smudged glasses, we don’t always notice it ourselves – sometimes we need someone to point it out for us, to rub our gunky glasses on their shirt and give us a glimpse of how beautiful the world really is, and how alike we all are in what really matters.  

I believe movies at their best can do just that – they can be a soft cloth to wipe away our cloudy judgments.

Not only can a great film help us see others and the world around us more clearly – the best ones can help us to get a better view of ourselves as well.  There are times when that silver screen becomes a mirror, reflecting deep dreams we may have buried under years of grimy doubt, showing us the potential we forgot we have.  When we see a story of redemption unfold in living color (or even black and white) before our eyes, we are reminded and that forgiveness is possible, new starts are achievable, and if we believe we can overcome any circumstance.  Just look at Rudy or George Bailey, Andy Dufrain or even Ron Burgundy – we root for them because we see a piece of ourselves in them. And so we are inspired when they reflect back a clear vision of what we could be.    

Who of us hasn’t been beat up by life and misunderstood by others? Who of us hasn’t failed something or someone?  We’ve all messed up and hoped it wouldn’t be the thing that defines us.  Each failure and disappointment is like mud flung at the windshield, or so many bug splats – after a while, our view becomes limited.  Where we used to have a clear window to the road ahead, now it may seem there is no path at all.  That’s where discouragement sets in.  But a great movie (book, song, or painting) can wipe away that gunk, even for just a fleeting moment, and remind us there’s a whole world beyond what is directly in our view.  The wipers pull back the muck revealing a glimpse of he road just beyond, and we are encouraged to keep moving forward. 

At least those are the kinds of movies I hope to write.  When I am pondering whether to take a project or not, I like to determine the Windex factor.  Does it have the potential to clean some windows?  To show a view we may not have seen before?  Will it help reflect the beauty of life a little more clearly?  Might it wash away the dirt of isolation with the clear waters of compassion?  I hope that while I may be a screenwriter by trader, I’ll always be a glass cleaner by vocation.  Because I know from experience that it feels pretty great to put on a fresh pair of sparkling spectacles.

This is a poem my brother wrote for me over a decade ago, before I was even a professional writer – back when I was just dreaming that I might be so fortunate some day.  It serves as a reminder to me, of how far I have come, and how far I still want to go; as well as being a reminder to keep cleaning my glasses. It has a special place in my office now and has become something of a mission statement for me.

WASHING WINDOWS

for Kara

light smudged across

grit&glass

a wash of diffusion-

threatening opaque

for now we see but a poor reflection,

darkly;

but then?

on the otherside, outlines:

the semblance of faeries

and saints

diffraction,

an inheritance

we remember not how to claim,

a foot suspended above the living sea

and you?

it’s you who would dip her pen

in water.

tracing these shapes for us

fleeting, faithful

in dimming streaks of clarity

excavate the pictures

of what we once were,

but failed to become;

engrave for us the lines

of restoration.

~Andy McLeroy