The other day I was at work doing my boring supermarket job when I looked across to the book section and saw The Guinness Book of World Records 2015. It gave me a surge of excitement to know that I had some small part of page 165.
My script Last Chance was one of those chosen for 50 Kisses and I’m happy to say that it even made it into the finished feature. I attended the premiere, brought my mum along too, and couldn’t help but feel proud when Chris Jones made all the writers stand up and pointed out that, “It all started with you guys.” That moment was better than my graduation; it was recognition in an industry where the writer is mostly invisible.
Being made a Guinness World Record holder was definitely an unexpected consequence of sending my script off to 50 Kisses, but there was another one to come.
Three years before 50 Kisses came along I had an idea for a short comedy script about cupids, called... Cupids. Not a very imaginative title, I’ll admit.
The idea was that cupids are all around us, invisibly working to try and set us up with potential matches. Every person who is single has a cupid assigned to them, and their job is to run around convening with everyone else’s cupids trying to find a match for their human charges. The script tells the story of two cupids struggling to get their two humans to meet and talk to each other in the brief moment that they are in the same place. A kind of short rom-com, but from the cupid’s perspective.
None of the directors I approached liked my script; they felt it wasn’t visual enough being entirely set in one location. Not to be deterred I submitted it to a writing group I attended on Great Portland Street. The other writers were pretty positive about Cupids, especially an Italian guy who was sitting in the corner.
Three years later and someone adds me on Facebook, but I look at their picture and decide to ignore the request, pretty sure I don’t know any moustachioed Italians - aside from Mario and Luigi. Then I get an email from the same person, “Hey, I saw your film on 50 Kisses. Did you ever make Cupids?” Low and behold it was the guy from three years earlier, he had remembered me, Cupids, and been prompted to get in touch again from 50 Kisses.
I replied that no, no one had ever made Cupids. We met up to discuss the possibility of making it together, with him directing. We met once a week for months to develop the script further, that was in March and now we have just launched a crowdfunding campaign to raise the budget.
It seems appropriate that an Italian should be directing a film about love and angelic beings, especially since his name is Angelo. It may have taken three years but everything is starting to fit together for Cupids, but it wouldn’t have happened without the exposure provided by 50 Kisses. Not to mention the greater confidence I feel through seeing my work go around the world from Birmingham to Rhode Island.
Plus there’s the shiny cover of the Guinness Book of World Records 2015 to encourage me, until another unexpected item in the bagging area.
These things take time, but 50 Kisses has made me feel like I’m one big step closer.
If you would like more details about Cupids you can check out our Indiegogo page https://www.indiegogo.com/projects/cupids-the-movie
Twiter & Instagram: @CupidsTheMovie
Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/SaveTheCupids
Tumblr: http://savethecupids.tumblr.com/
Vimeo: https://vimeo.com/channels/824565
Youtube channel: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCq09rpUsJ-7W4GraHW38DMg
Nick Grills
Write a comment
Sue Phillips (Tuesday, 04 November 2014 16:24)
Great to read this . Would love to see 50 kisses, too . is it ever going to be on DVD ? or released more generally ?
writingtv (Friday, 12 December 2014 15:42)
@Sue yes watch out for Xmas release