Chris and I are making a movie. It’s short - five or six minutes long. We are filming in early June in a sweet, residential part of London (Zone Two). The movie was inspired by an email I received from my mother in 2007. Ten months before, feeling stuck and uninspired, I had quit my job, left my home and ended a relationship to go on the road and stay with friends for as long as – for as long as a piece of string, actually.
Almost a year into my trek, my mother, understandably, wanted to know when these travels would end. Had I given serious thought to getting another job? If not, why not? Wasn’t it time to face reality and fend for myself?
I look at the email now and feel a surge of tenderness for her. I hear maternal anxiety.
At the time I wanted to haul out an axe, hack at the computer until it was broken in to a hundred little shards and use each shard to carve a message onto the walls (of my sub-let flat) saying ‘I Am Not A Failure’.
Yes, yes. I hear the sub-text myself, you subtle reader you. Only failures carve messages onto walls protesting they are not failures.
Only people who see themselves as failing.
And that is what the movie is about.
My fury raged for days. I talked to everyone. I button-holed people on buses, I bored strangers in lifts. ‘I am on a journey of self-discovery, a deeply challenging and terrifying journey and my mother wants me to get a job!’ ‘Reality, my mother talks about reality, what’s reality??’ ‘My mother says my friends will get TIRED of me on their couch! ME!’
I couldn’t sleep, I couldn’t write. I lay on my (temporary) bed and imagined some huge undeniable success, evidence of which I could send home. An award. A mega commission. A new and famous friend who would slide me into her world of limousines and flashbulbs and Manolo Blahnik heels. A big throbbing mass of money.
I felt the inanity of these desires even as they provided the only relief in my days. They confused me, too, as I knew it didn’t matter whether I wanted or didn’t want these things. I just wanted my mother to be proud.
One late night, a week after the email, unable to sleep as I ran her words through my head, hearing each syllable as a burning accusation, it occurred to me – I could fake success. I could line up fictitious evidence of singing gigs, of writing deals – of a boyfriend! – and She Would Never Know. She was thousands of miles away in Canada. All she knew of my life was through me and my stupid mouth.
I was one step too close to sanity to actually do this. But the idea for HOME MOVIES was born – a woman who works as a temporary receptionist, fakes a life that she films and sends home to win her mother’s approval.
I wrote the first draft of a script (I’ve written five since then). Here is a scene from that initial attempt which gives you a sense of the flavour of the piece. Or of my hysteria:
Int. National Theatre Foyer. Day.
STEPHANIE has just told a friend ANNA that she needs help filming a fake life to send home for her mother’s approval. Anna frowns at the idea. Stephanie sulks.
STEPHANIE
You could be a little bit positive about it.
ANNA
I'd have to pretend.
STEPHANIE
Then go ahead pretend. I've seen you pretend to be 29 for seven years, you could pretend to be positive for one moment.
ANNA
There's not really the same pay off, though. Is there.
STEPHANIE
I'm not asking you to do or be anything other than you are. My mother just needs to see that I'm okay. She needs to see that I'm in London, that I'm fine -
ANNA
That you are “a success”.
STEPHANIE
What's wrong with that? What, what, what?
ANNA
No, no. Nothing. Nothing.
STEPHANIE
What's that tone?
ANNA
No. No. Nothing.
STEPHANIE
You don't think I'm a success. As a singer.
ANNA
I'm sure you are.
STEPHANIE
I'm bloody good.
ANNA
Oh yes, yes.
STEPHANIE
I just haven't found -
ANNA
-anything -
STEPHANIE
I'm not yet -
ANNA
- original.
Beat.
STEPHANIE
I'm not?
Long pause.
STEPHANIE
Is that what you think?
ANNA
It would explain things.
STEPHANIE
What things?
ANNA
Well, your failure, I guess.
STEPHANIE
You're worse than my mother.
ANNA
I can't help it, I agree with her, what are you doing with your life?
STEPHANIE
Oh for God's sake.
ANNA
You've quit your job, you're living on friends' floors, you're still single, you're 42 -
STEPHANIE
Someone told me last week I looked twenty. TWENTY.
ANNA
How old was that person?
STEPHANIE
Why does that -
ANNA
How old was the person who told you you looked twenty?
STEPHANIE
Young. Ish.
ANNA
He was nine. How old did he think his father was?
STEPHANIE
Older.
ANNA
A hundred and seven. How old is his father?
STEPHANIE
Fifty -
ANNA
Thirty-two. Admit it - you've given up everything for your art -which is - you know - noble -
STEPHANIE
- but insane. Right? Insane? (waving a letter) Here's her address. You two should start a correspondence, you have so much in common. No support. No respect, no understanding.
Anna is unable to meet Stephanie's eyes.
STEPHANIE
Fine, don't help me. I'll do this on my own.
ANNA
No. No, I'll help, I'll - pretend - if you promise that you'll take that job in my sister’s office at the end of the month. If nothing else comes up. (beat) It's got all new carpeting. And a paper shredder.
Stephanie stares at her.
STEPHANIE
Could I fit? My life? In the shredder?
Anna doesn't flinch.
STEPHANIE
Something will come up.
ANNA
Then you'll be fine.
STEPHANIE
I won't have to take it.
ANNA
I'm thrilled.
STEPHANIE
You'll have to help me.
ANNA
I'll have lots of energy to help you with because, you know, I'm only twenty-nine.
Chris, even before she was the producer for MYPC, was a reliable reader and I gave it to her in early draft form. For some reason, she related to the central character. We gave it to the actress Emma Powell who also liked the idea.
We mentioned it to people, describing the woman who desperately wants her mother’s approval and every single person, to a soul, stared at us, their eyes glazing over with a feverish understanding. Every one nodded. Every one said ‘F**ing brilliant idea.’
I was onto something.
It was in the middle of collecting this compelling data that I remembered a story I’d heard about the astronaut Edwin ‘Buzz’ Aldrin. I was twelve at the time, on the verge of adolescence, and the details tattooed themselves on my brain.
Aldrin had graduated from the prestigious West Point Academy at 21, was a successful fighter pilot during the Korean War and was the second human being to walk on the moon.
He was visiting an air force base in Western Canada, an honoured guest for the officers and men, and one evening in the mess, getting slightly tipsy, he began to talk. And he didn’t talk about his days at the Academy, coming top of his class or about manoeuvring the F-86 Sabre jet over the skies of Asia. He didn’t speak about the mystery of seeing the earth hanging in space, like a sapphire orb. He talked about how he had never done enough to impress his father. He wasn’t good enough for his dad.
He felt like a failure.
THE MAN HAD WALKED ON THE MOON.
How much higher can you go?
This story, combined with the reactions to HOME MOVIES, convinced me there was something universal in the desire to go to ridiculous lengths to make your mother say you are a good girl.
MYPC has been granted the right to promote the film with a two-minute video on the WeFund UK website. You can read more about the plot, meet the actors and be hugely entertained by my witty annotations scrawled under their unsuspecting faces. You can also allow your heart to be inspired by the list of luscious perks we offer to everyone who pledges £5 or more to the project. We wanted to advertise that for £4,000 you could have access to a petting zoo, staffed by the actresses. For obvious, hygienic reasons, this was prohibited. (But if you write privately – we’ll negotiate.)
This movie is the first scene of a television pilot we will pitch later in the year. We are planning six to 12 episodes. There is material for 26 parts but I think that would be a bit excessive.
My mother should have noticed my triumph by then.
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