Im sitting at a friend's apartment, watching The Village, just recuperating from this fantastic semester here in LA. I know it's been a while since I last posted and I've learnt more that I wanted to write about in these last few days.
We had the wrap party for Bernie Mac yesterday night at The White Lotus: excellent place. It was a happy and sad night for me, saying bye to all these people who have shared so much with me: their knowledge, time and energies: PLUS they were humble enough to never make me feel naive or stupid. I must say, I am a changed person from four months ago. Four months ago, I was DREADING this. I did NOT want to come to Los Angeles. From my conversations with previous ICLA students, it seemed like this was a semester of relaxation, fun and games and just chilling out. Internships = getting coffee because stapling paper is too complicated for that new intern. And I thought the place was simply too expensive for a hot-tub, some beaches and cups of coffee. And, like I said, I am a changed man. LA is what you make of it and, like I've said before, for every ten bad internships, there is ONE good one. So, everyone has to just find the right internship for them and trust me, its out here.
Everyone: people at STRAND RELEASING, AKEELAH AND THE BEE, BERNIE MAC, SCRUBS, SURREAL LIFE, WATERFALL FILMS, all these places I worked at were just fantastic. Now, does that sound unreal? Well, it kind of is. OF COURSE, every place had its' share of warts and dicks, but you can get through to everyone. Some people are just harder to crack. Some just don't want to, and you need to realize that and move on. I will also say this: At EVERY single one of these internships, I found as many people who were against me, didn't like the idea of me taking initiative and doing more than interns traditionally did. Lots of these places have never even had interns so didn't know how to slot me, but each one of them came around and as I was saying bye to people, I was thinking of how different they were towards me before. All's well that ends well and so far, everything has ended really well in LA.
Thank you guys for all your questions and comments. I know I didn't answer them or post them all. If you still have more, send em off to iamsuds@gmail.com. And I don't think I'm going to kill this blog. I will post summer updates here. Any internship opportunities or other things I hear of. I have a packed summer ahead with lots of work on different films. One of the things I wanted to reach out to you for was a CALL: If any of you are interested in collaborating, I'm going to be doing a pretty ambitious project next year. Give me a call at 323-333-9235 if you would like to discuss this. Communities are why we came to film school. The point is to find your gang by the time you graduate. So, reach out.
That's all I got. I will try and update soon, Suds
