When I set out to write these essays, it was my intent to reserve a place for creativity in my life. The concrete nature of pushing out an essay regularly was an immediate way to build courage for sharing my work and connect to a friendly audience. Books and films take time—years perhaps—before anything comes of them, if anything comes of them, other than myself and my writing partners arguing over the number of times I have to correct ‘it’s’ to ‘its’ in yet another final version.
I haven’t been writing much at all in these months of not sending out a missive, other than an occasional abandoned journal entry, a memo for the business strategist side of my life, and a lot of Trello board items. The creative one within has been dormant—resting, recovering, finding new ways of being. Reading a lot. Adjusting to change.
My writing partner of the last four years has found himself booked solid doing what he loves—directing films and acting. I have finally accepted that the freedom to prioritize writing together for ten hours a week is gone for him, that the sweetness of having the greatest excuse in the world to indulge in art for art’s sake has shifted—the world is once again out and about making movies.
I have settled back into being mostly in L.A. as I realized that this is home number one for me. I have moved forward in partnership, parenting, and career. I have become disciplined again in working out, practicing yoga, meditating daily, and tracking my nutrition. I’m doing better now that my daughter is achieving independence. It looks like she will continue her creative writing studies this fall in Paris.
It’s not perfect, but it’s better, and it’s spring. The dormant one wants out with her pen and keyboard and drawing tools. It’s the first morning I’ve woken up with a first sentence in many months.
As I listen to the pouring rain this morning, sniffly from the second round of sickness this winter, I’m struck by the silence of 6am on a Saturday morning. There is still space here for me. Quiet, creative space in which I can emerge. I don’t think I’m done being a writer yet. In fact, maybe there will be more to share than ever.
Hollywood is everything everyone says it is, and it’s not easy to find someone who truly cares and who can unhook the red velvet rope at the back door, which seems to be the main entrance. But, there are always good people in bad systems, and my now-writing partner, Gil Junger (Remember the hit, 10 Things I Hate About You?), is one of them.
So the good news is we got a writing contract for a pretty cool movie. It’s a page one rewrite with Gil attached to direct (meaning it might actually get made) for a ridiculous amount that only he can command. The other news is that the contract was sent without my name on it, in spite of the ten emails or so where Gil said, “Put Naya Elle James on page one, she’s writing this movie with me.” With my name on the long form, the Writers Guild will accept me into their graces and I get to start the uphill, sometimes upside down and backwards, battle for credit as a real Hollywood writer.
So what happens next?
Well, attorneys and agents, of course. Whatever nonsense I get to learn about over the next week as the powers-that-be explain that, “No Gil, you cannot just add her name and shoot it back over to us,” (which he did). Time will tell. Although I haven’t been in the heart of Hollywood these last two decades, I have been just outside the right ventricle. This can go a number of ways, and right now it’s a cliffhanger.
