Ugh...I Don't Be-lieve You!

So I started a post about achieving what I like to call The 80% Solution when swept up in the insanity that can be filming a tv series....but it was feeling too much like work, so I stopped. Then I began another post about ways to try to manage the notes and potential endless rewrites that can come from tv networks, exec producers, etc. when you're working on a tv series...but it felt dry and technical and who cares, so I stopped. Then I went back to a post I started a while back about creating turns and twists in your story entitled: What is It? What is It Really?...but it felt unfocused and meandering, and I didn't feel up to focusing it, so I saved it to draft again. How about what did I do this weekend?...boring...or 'bo-ring'.

It was then I remembered the words of great stage acting teacher Stanislavsky..."From the moment of the appearance of if the actor passes from the plane of actual reality into the plane of another life, created and imagined by himself. Believing in this life, the actor can begin to create."

Lee Strasberg took the Stanislavsky method and adapted it for two generations of American actors. Strasberg said one important thing about acting: "it must seem that this has never taken place before, that no one has seen this actress before, that this actress has never done this before, and that in fact she's not an actress."

The story goes an actress was supposed to come on the stage and find a letter hidden in a desk drawer. She flutters onto the stage, glances around a few times and then walks straight to the desk and opens the drawer.

From the back of the theatre, cloaked in darkness, Strasberg (or Stanislavsky, I can't remember) bellows: "I don't be-lieve you!"

The way we need to 'believe' the actors playing the characters on stage or screen, we as writers we need to believe what we're writing. I'm not talking true or false, or fantasy or reality - but to believe what is being written is fresh and real and true and honest and engaging and entertaining.

I wasn't believing my writing tonight.

Should it be this difficult? Blogging is supposed to be the fun part. But I guess sometimes we get tired of our own voice and need some inspiration from others.

So feel free to suggest something interesting to write about in the comments and I'll do my best to comply in a 'believable' post.

This is otherwise known as pulling a DMc