Someone asked me today why I left LA, conveniently as we were leaving Flashpoint Academy, a new state-of-the-art, sci-fi fantasy come true 2-year college that teaches film, recording art, animation and gaming…and after walking through this unrealistic world of digital whiteboards and a plethora of AVID rooms (!), I was brought back to my film school days…and yes, as I currently fight over time with my beloved AVID, I sometimes wish for the Zemeckis Center of 60+ Avids and creative just floating through the air…but I guess what brought me down to reality was this:
After taking my favorite film class of all, The Business of Film, I suddenly was witness to the bubble-popping world called REALITY, and found myself bitterly disgusted with the philosophy behind the art: That a film was not art, just commerce. And although I became really good (as in REALLY good) in determining what film would be a blockbuster and what film would flop (even if it had a silly thing called a plot), this is where the jadedness and bitter resentment molded its ugly head inside my holding-on-for-dear-life Midwestern roots. It was this class that taught me commerce, not art, will make you famous, get you glory, and solidify your career in the industry…and that you could have the best story in the world, but if you didn’t get a distribution deal, who would care? Like the proverbial tree in the forest, if no one is around to see your brilliant film, is it still considered brilliant? And film school’s answer? Absolutely not. Exposure is everything, the rest you can edit in CG. And you wonder why I came back home with my tail between my legs.
Another turning point was when I met a 30 year old Production Assistant on the Fox lot…who had been there for the last 5 years and was hoping to break in “any day now”…he was a nice enough guy with a great personality and everyone knew him, yet he was still shelpping coffee and driving the golf cart around the studio for lunch orders…I just couldn’t imagine myself being 30 and still wanting to “break in”…did it mean that I wasn’t cut out for film or LA? No, it just meant that there was other ways I would like to spend 5 years besides trying to break in…I finally realized that being in film may not be in my cards, and that I was finally going to be ok with the fact that even though I wanted to do it since I was 10, I tried it, and I didn’t like it. Oh well, time to go figure out a new career. No problem, right?
I guess my whole point was that I wish I was one of those kids who knew exactly what they wanted to do out of high school…you know the type…they knew they were going to med school, they knew they wanted to be in business…I just knew that I loved film and the power that it could have over me….regardless of box office returns and critic reviews. When you are so engulfed in a film, when you can watch it on a 11″ TV screen and still be captivated by a storyline, when that story carries with you throughout your life…those are the moments that made me fall in love with film-making. I may have not liked LA (and I can’t say that I haven’t made it in LA…cause I haven’t really tried to stay there), but at least I can say that I saw my future in the blue eyes of a Fox lot PA, and didn’t like what I saw, and had the courage and opportunity to walk away, so I changed my view and headed eastward to Chicago, which was my home all along. I can’t say that I wont be back, or that I don’t have that Hollywood aspiration anymore, but I can say that since I’ve left that little old town called LA, the jadedness and bitterness of it all just melted away.
And that’s how I knew it was ok to leave LA.