Although It Wasn't Cannes -

What happened was this: I had sent my screenplay into yet another competition. This time, it was a film festival in Los Angeles -- the LA Femme Film Festival. It cost quite a bit to enter, but I was impressed to do it anyway. Films by women and/or about women. I fit both requirements. 

 I forgot about it. Once in awhile the thought would intrude; I knew announcements might be made in October. On 9 October, I retrieved a phone message from my answering machine congratulating me on being a finalist in the screenplay category. One of ten finalists. The email that followed was meant for a different category, so that confused me. I made several calls to the festival office hoping for clarity. I called my son, Jamie, seeking some kind of sense to the thing. He looked up the festival, told me it appeared prestigious, congratulated me, and told me that even though I couldn't get out to LA it was great to be a finalist. Okay. I didn't spread the news around. I needed to absorb it. On Tuesday morning, now the 13th of October, I sat up in bed and asked myself when the hell I expected this to happen again. Given my age, and the slow way life often works. I knew I couldn't afford to attend from Thursday to Sunday. But I figured I could manage Friday night to Sunday night -- see some of the films, meet the people and attend the awards ceremony. And that's exactly what I did.

The Cheaptickets hotel wasn't really cheap although it felt that way.  But it was only a mile to the venue.  It was late when I arrived, so I went to bed.  In the morning, I walked out and found a Starbucks where I had breakfast.  Then I went off to the festival which was being held at the Renberg Theatre.  A charming place with two theatres actually and a delightful courtyard.  In an adjacent building was a gallery and offices.  The complex was the Gay and Lesbian center, a fact which had nothing to do with the nature of the film festival.  I was greeted warmly by the folks running the festival, given my VIP pass and the program for the remainder of the weekend.  I saw a couple of short subject films and then a feature which was a horror movie.  I don't care for horror films, and this particular one was reminiscent of every other one I'd ever had the misfortune to see.  But this was followed by a three hour seminar on how to pitch your film.  That part was extremely interesting, and at the end of the three hours I walked away with the peculiar knowledge that one pitched oneself -- they have to fall in love with you before they fall in love with your film.  The second important ingredient is luck and/or nepotism.  I was on over-load by then, so I went back to the hotel, attempted to arrange my limited wardrobe so I'd be cooler (it was 95 degrees in LA and I'd arrived from a snowstorm in Massachusetts).  
I grabbed my camera and walked to Hollywood Boulevard where the Walk of Fame began.  Well, it occurred to me that getting to LA again might be a remote idea.  So I snapped pictures, and was delighted to find myself in front of the Chinese Theatre.  I was, for an hour and fifteen minutes, a tourist.

A friend from college days with whom I'd kept in touch over the years picked me up at 6:00.  We drove through Beverly Hills and Brentwood to the apartment where he lives with his second wife (his first wife, also a classmate of mine, had died several years ago).  His daughter was there also.  She and my oldest son played together as kids.  And she is a poet also.  So it was great to renew friendships. A terrific visit.  

On Sunday, after my Starbucks breakfast, I checked out of the hotel leaving my little suitcase with the front desk.  I was taking the Red Eye back to Boston that night, and didn't want to shlep the suitcase around all day.  I was at the festival in time to see several films.  At 3:00 I sat in the courtyard at an umbrella table waiting for another friend from the past.  Steven was my star actor at the Boston Children's Theatre years before.  Now he is a film maker, actor, writer in Los Angeles.  We had a lovely reunion, sitting in a coffee shop catching up on each other's life.  This visit also gave me the inspiration to think about making my movie myself -- well, with a team of folks who know how.  It is not an impossibility.  Although being currently unemployed -- well, the important thing is to keep the thought perculating, sending out positive vibrations.  Stranger things have happened. 

The Awards evening was charming; cameras clicking away; celebrities being honored along with several awards to the film makers and screen writers.  I didn't win in my category -- screenplay -- but it was a winning weekend nonetheless.  My screenplay has credentials.  And even though it wasn't Cannes -- I was there.