Since this blog was supposed to be dedicated to my adventure in LA, it only seems fitting that I share a little on my last day. Sitting in the airport four hours before my flight gives me time to decipher my mind.
I remember being so nervous when my flight landed, shaking actually. All alone, far away from Stamford and even Chicago, I wasn’t sure what the semester would bring. Now, sitting in the airport I have no idea what my future will bring, but I’m not nervous.
The growing percentage of graduation is now at a reassuring constant 98%. But the only confirmed plan I have is spending the summer in CT.
Things still up for debate include: a job for the summer, a career choice, and of course the favorite asked question of will I return to the west coast.
Here’s what I hope the next few months will hold.
- An awesome paying nanny job for the summer to save up
- A job as a writer’s assistant to get into TV writing
- Saving up enough money to move to LA
A girl can dream! :)
As for the semester, it was definitely one of the greatest decisions I’ve ever made! On to the next adventure.

We wrapped our HPW short film! I can’t even describe how happy I am to finally be finished. All the stress of finding locations and balancing the budget is OVER! Next step is post production, which is just editing the footage to perfection and adding music.
Our team received extremely high compliments from our executive producer, but the highlight of the class for me was receiving an email from our EP saying — “YOU are awesome, Jenelle… you have absolutely KICKED HPW’s ass! ;-)”
Since we wrapped everything last weekend, this Saturday we took some of our crew to Dockweiler State Beach for a bon fire. Nothing like a good California beach bon fire with some s’mores to celebrate all of our hard work.
The next challenge of the semester is finishing up my screenplay, and getting everything ready for graduation. Being thousands of miles away from school has made the graduation process extremely difficult. Emailing professors and TIU employees can only do so much.
I have a month left in my program … it’s all gone way too quickly!

Production week is fast approaching and the stress is piling on … BIG TIME!! 

Today I didn’t have one moment to myself. After class a few people from our team piled into a car and drove through Los Angeles traffic to check out the limo we’re renting this Sunday and the next. The limo scene is one of the most important parts of our film and also the most expensive. The pictures that the company sent us made the limo look like a prom queen’s dream, decked out to the extreme. I must have asked them a thousand times to double check that the pictures were for the standard limo, since that’s all our current budget could afford. They assured me over and over again that I had nothing to worry about. In fact I remember a few rude responses to my apparently stupid question. So imagine my shock when this wasn’t the case! The actual limo looked like a 1930s antique. Cracked seats and chipped paint, not any type of limo that a rich porn star would be spotted in. (Yes our film is about a porn star … NOT a porno however.) Thankfully, they pulled out the 10 passenger Bentley before I had a heart attack. Only problem, it was over our budget. Now I had two choices. Either get the crappy limo and ruin our film, but save our money OR get the perfect limo for our script and make some difficult cuts else where. So some more drastic fiddling around with the budget and I barely managed to scrape up the needed money to afford the dream limo (you’d be proud Mom!)

One problem down, another 20 to conquer. Next big one, tackling reserving the limo. I should have realized from our lovely visit that this wasn’t going to be an easy task. The man on the other line gave me four different quotes, two for each night, and each one different from the original quote I planned our budget around. After weeding through the crap the limo guy was trying to sell me, I realized after I hung up the first time that he had ripped us off. I put my case together, called him back and gave him a little piece of my mind. Problem solved, but not without draining the last of my energy. And that wasn’t the end of the night.

I could go on and on, but just reliving them through writing them down is stressing me out, and this is more than just a venting board :)

Definitely a highlight of my week and my time in Hollywood happened last night at Paleyfest. A few of my friends and I went to see the New Girl panel, or more specifically ZOOEY DESCHANEL! The whole cast was just a dream to listen to. We got to see the new episode before it aired, and listened as they described their favorite moments shooting, insights into their characters, and the future of the show. The whole experience just boosted my love for this new TV show. I’m hooked!

Tomorrow I’m going on set for my internship! And the good continues to battle out the stress :)

Over the last few days I’ve received a good dose of reality. It’s easy to come out here and get caught up in the illusion of Hollywood and the huge success you will become. But after transitioning from a small college pond to the vast CA ocean, when you finally experience LA reality, it bites hard. Yesterday for my screenwriting class we took a field trip to Beyond Words, a panel of the screenwriters nominated for best screenplay. I was reminded, quite to my disappointment, that it never magically gets easier. Along with the years these writers spent struggling to get someone to actually read their work, they still have trouble putting their story on the page. But what helps lessen the blow from my reality check is when I get to hear people like Tate Taylor (The Help) and Aaron Sorkin (Social Network/Moneyball) talk about doing the thing they love most in the world and seeing their passion shine. Makes me believe it could all be worth it. We’ll see, I guess. I’m definitely heading back to CT after this semester, but after that its all a blur.