Pre-production on "Nova" begins Monday

Tomorrow, I head to Huntington for several days to crash at Kyle's and begin heavy pre-production on "Nova." I say heavy because technically, pre-production has already begun, with me spending this week looking for a costume designer [largely in radio silence mode here on the blog, to keep the title of the previous post prominently displayed], and Kyle planning out the early parts of our budget and filming schedule. For my part, I've found some success, with two very promising possibilities for our costume designer, both of whom have considerable skill and experience in the film. Kyle seems to be doing well too, and I'm looking forward to getting some of the big work started on Monday.

Though no master plan for the week has been set, it looks like we'll be doing a lot of last minute brainstorming, along with location scouting and at least one table-reading of the script. Kyle will also be filling me in on some of the finer technicalities of behind-the-scenes work [I'm just a writer, after all], and we'll probably focus a lot on funding -- specifically the where and how we're going to obtain it. There will probably be a lot of talk about who we want on the crew as well, and my hope is that we'll set solid dates for things like casting calls and maybe even some of the earlier shooting.

I think being in Huntington will be helpful to me since we're shooting there, and so much of the work Kyle and I have done so far has been on the phone, it'll be nice to get some actual face time. There are a lot of particulars lost in e-mails and text messages as well, and since I think "Nova" will end up being a film about the details, this could cause some surprising [but hopefully beneficial] changes to the project. I'm especially looking forward to the reading, mostly because I've never done anything like it before outside of play writing, and it'll be interesting to hear all of these words finally coming out of people's mouths.

It might be helpful too. The majority of my day today was spent working on "Nova," as I wanted a fresh draft going into this week, and I really didn't make much progress. Though at this point I'd call the script shootable, I have been trying to tweak some of the dialogue, particularly near the middle, where I think I skate by a little too much on empty rapport between characters. Catching the characters' personalities and the rhythm of the conversation is important [and something, arrogantly, I think I'm good at], but it can also cover up dialogue which doesn't really serve the story in a useful way. In longer narratives, that can be really helpful and even charming, but since "Nova" is a relatively economical script, I thought I'd easily be able to remove some of that. Not so much, or not yet anyway, and though I still have tonight, it's nice to know I'll also have the reading to get an idea of how everything sounds. I expect it to clear up a lot.

I figure there's two drafts to go, and then the only changes to "Nova" will be done hurriedly on set or in the editing room. So what I'm basically saying is if you have feedback for me, get it in quickly, because I'm really starting to feel "finished" as far as the script goes.

But then again, there's still everything else that needs done.

More soon. If possible, I'll try to update regularly while at Kyle's.