Are your jack o’lanterns carved? Is your costume complete and ready to wear? Have you reassembled your lawn displays of tombstones, witches, skeletons and monsters that last week’s windstorm battered about?

Then you are ready for National Novel Writing Month!

Halloween is the last night to pretend you’re not a writer before the official start of NaNoWriMo: thirty days to write 50,000 words, the equivalent of a slim novel (200 pages double spaced), but a novel nonetheless. And a super scary prospect. But you will be in good company with thousands of other writers facing their worst fear: the blank page. Participate on-line and receive encouragement, or capitalize on all that positive ju-ju out there to create your own November challenge: finish that rewrite, create that outline or treatment; write a first act to your screenplay (a page a day gets you to Act 2), or write every day.

You pick, and maybe consider, during your month of creativity, what your story would look like stripped down to its essence; a short story or screenplay. Leave only the critical characters and the A story. Write it in seven pages and see how it reads. Is there room for a B story? Have you maximized your subtext to get the most powerful version of your story? If you have, consider submitting it as a short screenplay to our contest in January. If not, you still have a great tool to utilize in your rewrite.

So have fun tonight before settling in tomorrow. Queue up the Ghostbusters, Frankenstein and Dracula, sit back and relax. Or put on the funny wigs, costumes and makeup and have a grand, spookalicious time.

In the meantime, enjoy the spooky new video Crescendo from Coat Tail Productions (The Haunting of Sunshine Girl, Zombie Ridge) and Legendary featuring 2014 FiLMLaB alum, Paige McKenzie.

I shall drink a Corpse Reviver in your honor!

 

*And don’t forget to stop by the store to replace all that candy you ate!