Sarit Catz Blog
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Is it me? Whenever I have to fly somewhere last minute I can never use miles. Last week I decided that I had to go to L.A. to supervise the final edit of a TV pilot I’m producing and be there for the recording of the music as well. (I really went because the composer’s nuts, but I’ll get to that later.) Anyway, if I wanted to use miles, I would have had to leave and come back on days that weren’t good, change planes in Sheboygan, and fly out of JFK - also known as the seventh circle of hell. But, when I went on the American Airlines website to try to use miles, I found that they have last minute packages for sale, under the conveniently-named “last minute packages” tab. Check it out. I got a round-trip ticket from Newark plus a car for $418. Save the miles for a trip to Paris you plan in advance. I’m just saying.
Anyway, my composer is nuts. He’s a really good composer, though. He’s a really good composer who’s nuts. He’s a really good composer who’s nuts and complains a lot. In the week prior to my trip out to L.A., I had been engaged in a series of increasingly annoying phone conversations with him. I had asked him if he wanted to see an edit without a temp music track and he told me he wanted the temp track to give him some guidance. Then when he saw it, he told me he absolutely had to see an edit without music. What was I thinking? That ate up four days.
He also told me he would do his own work on spec and he could bring in the musicians, studio, and engineer for the amount of money I had budgeted. Then, he brought the package in 50% over budget and wanted to get paid himself. Okay. I’m dealing. The nearly final straw was when I gave him notes on the opening song and he told me he didn’t have time to write something else because he had to give it to the vocalists who needed two days to rehearse. At this point I figured I was paying way more than I wanted and it was going to be right or it wasn’t going to be. So, after a lot of complaining about how little he was sleeping and repeated assurances that he wanted me to have what I wanted – all evidence to the contrary - he wrote basically what I told him.
But I figured, I’m in it this far, I should see it through. And just to be on the safe side, I decided to go out to L.A. to make sure it came out good.
While I was out there, I figured I’d do the final edit with my director in person. That was cool. I landed about noon on Thursday, picked up my rental car, drove over to my director’s place and we finished the edit. We were really close already and the changes were subtle enough that being together really helped. Afterwards we went out for flaming margaritas at El Compadre, which is how all good days in L.A. should end.
Friday we were going to lay down the music so I braced myself for an annoying day with the composer. Wrong. With the musicians in the studio, he was totally cool. Well, he complained a lot about how hard he was working, but other than that he was okay. I think being with other musicians relaxed him. Either that, or he’d taken a pre-session hit or two off his hookah. Whatever it takes. Friday was reasonably pleasant and the music was coming out amazing. So, my defenses were down when Saturday rolled around.
Saturday we brought in the vocalists and Mr. Annoying came back to visit. Perhaps it’s because he wasn’t as sure of himself when it comes to vocals or because they were cute girls, or because… You know what? I don’t care. He wouldn’t let me give my notes. Every time I told him I had a thought or direction for the singers, he cut me off. And he kept cutting me off and talking over me.
As a sitcom writer, I’ve worked in a ton of writers’ rooms dominated by guys and they have a tendency to interrupt, talk over, and generally not hear women pitch. Not every guy, but at least one guy in every writers’ room does this. Usually, the woman writer just stops pitching, waits for a lull and then re-pitches. After which the interrupter waits a minute, then gets a brilliant idea and repeats what she just said.
But it’s really not okay and this time, I’m PAYING. And I’m the producer and it’s my passion project and it’s really, really not okay. So I just stood up and told him he had to let me give my notes. It was a pretty tense moment. He argued with me a little, denied the whole thing, then he realized he had to let me give my notes. Afterwards, my director and I went out for margaritas, which is how all bad days should end in L.A. also.
The music sounds really good, though, and I think it’s going to add a lot to the pilot. So it was worth it.
Sunday morning I flew back to New Jersey. You get a lot more legroom in the exit row. Not that I need it because I’m only 5’2”, but it helps to have the room if you need to go to the bathroom and you have to climb over the fat lady who’s sitting next to you and spilling over into your seat. I’m just saying.
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