The End Is The Beginning Is The End

Putting this film together has been an excercise in time management. I don't have the luxury of producing "Mister Rogers & Me" as my day job, so I'm working on it -- tangiably or not -- the rest of the time. New ideas, then, are often unexpected surprises at odd moments.

Like this morning. I went for a five mile run along the Hudson River and through Central Park, cranking tunes the whole way. What with the traffic, the chaos, and the rock 'n roll, it was kind of the opposite of meditative or reflective. It was suprising, then, to step into my apartment and immediately come up with the opening voice over for the film.

I've been puzzling as to how to pull together a few disperate strands for a few weeks. We've already taped the opening shots of me walking to work, idea being to establish the chaos of the city in order to stanf in contrast to the tranquility of Nantucket. But the audience needs to know who I am, not because the film's about me, but because the conflict in the film -- every good movie needs one -- is my conflict: being a PBS mind in an MTV world. If the audience is going to be invested in the story, I figure, they need to be at least a little invested in me. Plus I had to establish a few notes -- like my parent's divorce -- as they figure into the story. Finally I had to get the film to Nantucket, then onto the road.

I knew I'd be spending time on the film today, and knew I had to write the opening voice over, but I wasn't thinking about it when I ran, or when I walked into the door. I think I figured it out, though. And it ties nicely to how I plan to end the film. Now I just have to tie everything up in-between.

I had to smile as I sat there typing everything out this afternoon when I noticed that Abbi had placed a bunch of daffodils on our desk; Nantucket's Daffodil Festival kicks off in a month. Today, I was a few steps ahead.