Friday, February 23, 2007

LITTLE MISS SUNSHINESF360 Interview With Screenwriter Michael Arndt


This is my official announcement that Susan Gerhard, editor at SF360—co-published by the San Francisco Film Society and indieWIRE—has offered me an internship! How could I possibly refuse? Especially with SFFS veering into its grand 50-year anniversary festival and so much happening film-wise in the San Francisco Bay Area. Susan has a fine reputation in the Bay Area as being one of its best film editors and I get to work with a dashing young Chilean director Miljenko Skoknik who is likewise interning at SF360. We have bullpen sessions every Thursday in the Writers Grotto down in South Park where we graph out what we're going to do for the week and—for someone who has been working alone at his computer for a full year now—this is a welcome respite, to sit outside in good weather drinking coffee and talking film writing. I consider it a dream come true.

Oddly enough, I keep thinking about the comic books I used to love when I was a kid—Superman and Spiderman—and how their alter-egos were newspaper reporters. Mild-mannered Clark Kent working for Perry White at The Daily Planet alongside Lois Lane and Jimmy Olson. And Peter Parker working as a freelance photographer for J. Jonah Jameson at The Daily Bugle. As a kid, I was as caught up in their everyday lives as in their heroic exploits. All these years later I find these comic book fantasies swirling around in my head and serving as psychic templates: a roving reporter by day and a fearless dreamer by night! Never throw away your comic books, kids!

My first assignment for SF360 was a two-question interview with Michael Arndt, the Oscar-nominated screenwriter for Little Miss Sunshine. The Evening Class will continue to be the nexus for my freelancing ventures but I'm happy to tighten the weave with online venues like SF360. Later dudes! My spider sense tells me there's a new movie opening up over at the Century 9!