Philip Davetas [Screenwriter]: April 2009

JETWASH Makes the Quarter-Finals!

First of all, before I get started, I found this out Saturday afternoon, but I didn't blog about it because I was waiting for the website to update its info. They did, so here I am.

For a while, you've probably read about me blogging vaguely about this space opera I've been working on for about a year and a half. I've also mentioned that I've been trying to write this script since 1995. Yeah, that's right 1995. The problem for me was that every time I attempted to commit the story to paper there was a movie that would come out with similar concepts, ideas and sometimes similar execution. So several times I've put the script away and worked on other things. Then finally, some time in 2007 after finishing my children's script I said, "Fuck it. I wanna do my space opera now!" So, I stuck with it for a year and a half while also finishing ISLAND MACABRE, BOULEVARD OF BROKEN FACES (aka THE BRUISE BOX). So, I closed out 2008 with three scripts under my belt. Not my personal best as far as quantity, BUT they're three scripts that I'm proud of as far as quality.

JETWASH is essentially a story about a group of disbanded fighter pilots who run a salvage depot on one of Saturn's moons and uncover a conspiracy when a ship crashlands on their property. They head off to rescue any survivors of the ship, but only rescue one member of the crew. Soon, a group of privateers are sent in to recover the ship and are forced to confront the pilots. All this leads to is a 129-page adventure. If you're interested in reading the whole script, here it is for a limited time only! In PDF form of course.

To Celebrate or Not to Celebrate, The FADE IN AWARDS Controversy

I've been on the fence about how to feel about this contest the past couple of months. There was an article put out by The Wrap that got into some of the nuts and bolts about the contest and its winners here. I've also blogged about my thoughts on this previously. Just like any screenwriting contest, it's not the monetary award that matters, but trying to build a career as a writer. There aren't very many contest winners that we hear about that go on to great things. Most just win the contest and collect their cash never to be heard from again. So, after receiving the letter, I'll just chalk it up as an ego stroke until the semi-finals are announced.

But I will say this. I think JETWASH has a better shot at winning the action genre portion of the contest this year at least. In 2006, DEAD MEAT made the quarter-finals of the very same contest, but didn't really stand a chance considering how dark and twisted the material was. JETWASH is more mainstream and more crowd-pleasing I guess. It has better odds.

The Letter

All I can say is that I've gotten past the vanguard of writers that judged the first part. That's probably a good thing. The next part of this is the marketing aspect of the contest. Which is agents, managers and more writers. These are the people that are looking for people who could work in the industry. To me this is the more exciting part of the contest. But according to the letter, we won't find out until July.

The 13th Annual FADE IN AWARDS Quarter-finalists

The Full List of the 13th Annual FADE IN AWARDS Quater-finalists

But here's my screen capture.

Epilogue

Thanks for reading.

The Ablazin' Devil Head has spoken.

Edit:

Just got this in an email newsletter regarding The Wrap's article. It is interesting that The Wrap has never brought to light any real proof and people named in the article are refuting it in the article's comments.

AN IMPORTANT LETTER FROM FADE IN'S EDITOR IN CHIEF

As many of you who've previously entered the contest know, we clearly state on our online contest page, FAQ (Frequently Asked Questions link) and additionally in paragraph two of each and every notification letter contestants receive, who the contest judges are and who writes analysis on finalist's winning screenplays. We have never, nor would ever state that our Advisory Board members are the competition's judges or analysts. Of the approximate 200 finalists and Grand Prize winners we've selected over the last decade, until now, not one has ever accused us of this type of false advertising.

This past December, I personally received several disturbing emails from a newly-named Fade In Awards finalist.

The emails instructed me to immediately deliver to him $1,500 cash via Fed Ex in exchange for the name of an individual who had supposedly contacted him and made derogatory statements about our competition. When I refused, this individual threatened me personally, and specifically emailed me that he had my home address, had pulled my credit report and that he would do several things to me if I did not immediately meet his demands.

The threats kept coming, so we went to the authorities. When we presented his emails to the police, they immediately suggested I file a police report and additionally attain a restraining order. We were then informed by law enforcement that this person was already under criminal investigation for this type of activity. It was more than apparent that, for the first time in the competition's history, we would have to disqualify a finalist.

Last week, it became clear that he was starting to make good on his threats. In fact, as soon as this outrageous story broke, he took credit by writing on his online blog: "The town must be buzzing over this long known and even longer untold dirty secret—that was until Audrey Kelly fucked the wrong writer and [entertainment media company founder/COO's name omitted] and [company name omitted] took a stand." The vulgar, defamatory statements were removed after our magazine's lawyers sent him and Google cease and desist letters.

"No good deed goes unpunished" is the expression that best describes our view as to the other disgruntled former contest finalist that took part in this story (we believe that the quotes from the two additional contestants were actually old quotes lifted off of a contest website by the reporter.) This finalist's claim was that we promised to introduce and promote her to producers and agents then did not and had refused to give her a first place cash prize of $750 until she took the magazine to small claims court. As anyone can ascertain by reading our application, website and advertisements, only the Grand Prize winner receives introductions to the entertainment community. As a courtesy and to be supportive, within a month of her turning in her rewrite based on our detailed notes, we did email her winning script out to a number of agents and managers. Even though we made several requests, she refused to turn in her W-9 tax form and instead went on a smear campaign. The form is required by the U.S. Government prior to disbursement of all prizes totaling over $600, and we are under a legal obligation to report all winnings received by contestants to the Internal Revenue Service at the conclusion of each year.

Rather than meet with an agent who liked her script, remove her derogatory posts and simply turn in the tax form, this contestant continued with a smear campaign both online and in emails to fellow and former contestants, before finally filing a complaint against Fade In in small claims court. Ironically, she brought her signed W-9 tax form to court with her. Even more ironic, she apologized and said this was all probably a misunderstanding on her part and then requested a hug!

In the published "story," Fade In is also accused of not paying finalist Powell Weaver. We have attached Mr. Weaver's cancelled check and signed certified mail receipt for same. We have not heard from Mr. Weaver since May of 2008.

Although we also believe 2005 finalist Craig Berger's quote was lifted from a third party website for their story, we still find Berger's dissatisfaction puzzling. He alleges that we told him we would help him further by sending his winning script "Murder Girls" out to agents and managers but then failed to do so. Even though he was not a Grand Prize Winner and it was not our obligation, at his request we did in fact send his screenplay to agents and managers and also to New Line Cinema and MTV Films.

Recently, Mr. Berger posted the following statement regarding the website's derogatory story on his blog...

"A couple of weeks ago, I was contacted by a reporter for [the competitor's site]. The reporter wanted to know about my experiences with the Fade In screenwriting contest, as I had come in 2nd in the Comedy category in 2005. I agreed to talk with her. Probably my first mistake."

"The reporter asked me if I was happy with my relationship with Fade In, as she [claimed she] had spoken to a number of people who had not received the prizes they were promised. I told her unequivocally that I had received everything that was promised to me. I also told her that the notes I got from [Fade In] were some of the best notes I had ever received, and that I had been a finalist or the winner in a number of contests and none of them had done more for me than Fade In."

As is mentioned on our website, many of our competition winners have gone on to be signed by prominent talent agencies, including APA, CAA, Endeavor, ICM and William Morris, and to make successful feature films, including Blades of Glory, Clay Pigeons, Perfect Stranger, Preston Tylk and Taking Lives. This year promises to have releases of two contest winners' scripts; Javelina and Adam. Other winners are working steadily and have been hired to write or direct the upcoming feature films, The Art of Making Money, The Baster, Daggers and Need. We believe our competition's reputation for helping to launch the careers of very talented aspiring writers and directors speaks for itself.

Fade In supplied this company's reporter and its COO/founder with the correct information prior to their publishing the false and defamatory allegations. We even pointed out our online FAQ (where the first question is, "Who judges the competition?"), our online contest page, which again clearly states who writes the analysis and advised them their sources were both unreliable and impeachable, yet they chose to ignore this information and publish inaccurate statements. I question the motivation of the company and the ethics of the writer when, for instance, in their newest March 15th post the reporter claims that Doug Amaturo could not be reached for comment, when Doug called and let me know he had spoken to the reporter twice over this past weekend and also received an email from her.

"In just this past weekend, she called me a few times and we spoke. I relayed to her that I was very disappointed that she went ahead and used my name in this damaging article towards you and Fade In when she specifically told me she would not. I told her that I thought you created a great magazine and that if I could have done everything over I would have done more to continue working with you, as you were a very generous employer, not only to me but also to everyone who worked there. Unfortunately for her, I only said nice things about you. What she's trying to do is skew the information and rewrite the past. She wanted to ask me a few more questions so I told her to email me. I thought the questions she emailed were petty and her approach was a bit deceptive; fairly manipulative. In other words, she was fishing for too much for the sole purpose of molding the facts in her favor."

As for the reporter's attempt to discredit us regarding our sponsors, we called our Apple entertainment marketing contact of thirteen years, Suzanne Lindberg, who told us she doesn't speak to reporters and has not spoken to any reporter, as it's Apple's policy not to speak to the media about its past sponsorships. She said they've been cutting all of their sponsorship deals lately. They're just not doing it anymore. She went on to say that she did get a note from Apple's PR department asking about the logo on our site and she advised them that she hadn't approved anything like that lately. That Apple has sponsored the Awards before but were unable to do it anymore. (Note: The logo is still on the Awards page of our site because we have not yet updated the page to the 2009 Awards, which launch in June.)

As of this date, both the new media company and its COO/founder refuse to print retractions and continue to defame me personally by publishing bogus statements. The facts behind each of the allegations would have been easy to investigate if there was actually any interest by them in pursuing the truth. It is both unfortunate and pathetic that this emerging media entity believes that the only way it can attract attention to its new venture is to forego journalistic ethics and publish a negative story about one of its competitors.

Nobody is above criticism and we are interested in any ideas on how we can improve both Fade In and our Awards but the claims disseminated by this new company are spurious. Fade In stands behind its screenwriting competition and its process. We felt it was important to bring the aforementioned facts and documentation to your attention and want to thank everyone for their emails and calls of support, including past and present contest finalists, our publication's contributing writers and artists, industry producers, executives, agents, publicists and, of course, our Board of Advisors.

Audrey Kelly
Editor in Chief
FADE IN MAGAZINE

Then after this very letter the same The Wrap source wrote this in response Fade In Demands Retraction. I do find it odd that The Wrap is the only news source reporting on this.