What can I say -- I've been busy!

Really busy. Classes start next week, and after the film ended, I took off for a week. Got back and had to get into the whole class prep thing. One new class, two heavily revised. Then one of those gets cancelled for technology reasons (we weren't able to get the equipment to teach it). It is replaced with a graduate seminar. My first grad course as a prof.

I'm doing that whole "need to prep, want to surf the internet, no I really need to review the texts, well maybe after reading this one thing" thing. So, not getting much done. Almost have my syllabi ready. For my directing course, I'm team teaching a section with a senior acting class from the theater department. So we met today and decided to just take the first few sessions as they come. In other words, no great need to prep. Which makes me nervous, but hey, one less thing to prep, right?

In my screenwriting course, I'm going to start out the semester with less lecture and more creative writing exercises. There's a good learning-oriented reason for that, but it also gives me less prep.

In my grad seminar, it's all about postproduction. And you'll recall I just shot this feature film... so guess what my grad students are going to be editing? Yes, we'll be exploring the role of the editor in working with a director. I need to do some research on that, but I'm being lazy. But really, we're going to do it as an extended role-play, with them acting as editor and me acting as (what else) director, so they have to understand my vision and then cut the film (and hopefully bring their own creativity to it).

Speaking of the film: I find out, while I'm out of town, that my co-writer actually BASED THE LEAD CHARACTER ON A REAL PERSON AND NEVER TOLD ME! Yes, I am shouting. He also changed the name by only one letter. Now, the real person was a crazy loon, possibly also homeless (which is why, you know, he made for such an interesting character)... and really, very little of the character in the film was actually based on him. At the most, you could say he 'inspired' our character. But still, we just HAVE to change the name now, to be careful. And the character's name is in the film's title, and is also part of the web address, and on the cast and crew shirts. Hell, this just pissed me off, if you can't tell.

But, you know, it'll probably all work out okay. Nevertheless, I just can't believe that someone wouldn't know that was a significant detail and needed to be addressed. Maybe I've been involved with the film industry so long I just assume people will know that. But I ask you, those of you who go to movies but don't make them, is this a reasonable assumption on my part, or should I have asked this specific question? (I know I SHOULD have, but is it reasonable to assume someone would mention this fact?)

As my father used to say, this too shall pass.