Once upon a time, I had a MySpace page, to which I happily added anyone as a friend. But right around hitting the 1,000 friend mark, I realized my patience for the site’s embedded idiocy — the 1998-style formatting, cheesy graphics, junior high demographics — was finite. I left it sitting fallow,¹ even while recognizing it would be another way to promote the DVD release of The Nines.

Peer-pressured into trying Facebook, I added only friends I hung out with in the real world.² I admire Facebook’s clean design and overall lack of hooliganism. The news feed is ingenious, and the company shows a willingness to borrow from the best (Twitter, Flickr, etc.). Still, I’m a sporadic user; I haven’t become addicted to Scrabulous or any of the real time-sucks.

This morning, I stumbled upon the “fan” architecture for Facebook. It’s a separate kind of page you set up for a person or thing (such a band or a movie), which users can subscribe to without the mutual-approval process of Facebook friendship. For example, here’s one for Amy Sedaris.

So I’m now contemplating whether to do such a page for The Nines, and possibly myself. I’d welcome any insight from Facebook power-users, because while I see a lot of potential in leveraging the news feeds to build awareness of the movie’s existence, I don’t know if it’s going to be worth my time or others’. The discussion and message board features seem useful, yet are only slightly more advanced than the IMDb equivalents. There may be good Facebook applications to make it a no-brainer.

I don’t know, but I have a hunch some readers will. Thoughts?

1. Well, not technically “fallow,” which implies the possibility of new fertility after a period of dormancy. I’m pretty sure I’ll never be going back. ↩
2. Which is why, if I’ve “ignored” you, please don’t take offense. ↩

I am on page 75 of a screenplay that I am writing, and I was so excited about finally finishing a draft. Then today, I went to write and came up with a MUCH better first act — which would mean completely rewriting the first act and seriously reworking the second and third act. I pitched it to an exec I used to work for and he agrees that, while the old idea is viable, the new idea is much more organic and the characters are inherently more flawed, and thus, more likeable than the Kate Hudson-esque characters that preceded them.

If you were in this situation, would you proceed with the current draft, or immediately begin on the rewrite?

– Anna
Los Angeles

If your new first act embodies the movie you want to make, then grinding out the last 45 pages of the “old” movie will do you no favors. So write the new first act.

Yes, I generally caution that rewriting is the enemy of finishing — you can find yourself rewriting the first 20 pages a dozen times, and never complete the full script. And your new ideas will always seem more exciting than your old ideas, simply because they’re fresh and unimplemented.

But there’s nothing so dispiriting as finishing a script you know is fundamentally flawed. As a professional writer, you’re sometimes stuck in that situation, forced to implement notes that couldn’t conceivably work (c.f. Charlie’s Angels: Full Throttle). But for your own scripts, you should never be printing out 120 pages of ambivalence.

Continuing this discussion of mixed emotions, what is “Kate Hudson-esque?” Is it a mathematical derivative of Goldie Hawn, approximating the slope of comedy without ever achieving intersection?

Because while I can sense the stereotype you’re wrestling with — pretty, manic, girl-next-door — there’s a fairly wide swath of actresses I’d put in that category: Jennifer Aniston, Mandy Moore, Katherine Heigl. Many actresses could play a “Kate Hudson-esque” role, more or less interchangeably. And that’s not good, particularly in a comedy. (I’m guessing you’re writing a comedy.)

So as you’re rewriting the first act, and introducing your characters, create situations and motivations that will keep the reader from ever thinking of Kate Hudson. If it helps, make the oddest mental casting choice you can and write the role that way. When your script sells, and Kate Hudson stars in it, she’ll have the opportunity to not be “Kate Hudson-esque.” And she’ll thank you profusely.