This journal documents the author's experiences as a television writer. To read the story from its inception, go to the beginning.

October 19, 2001

Must be the season of the witch
Somewhere between this week's rewrites, copy checking, and FEDEX runs something strange happened: I began to like my agent. Her "Hello sweetie!" now sounds warm and inviting when she takes my call. Her small talk, whether inquiring about my life in terror-stricken New York or recounting anecdotes on her difficulties getting to a meeting at Warner Brothers, is friendly and intimate. Where once I perceived fa�ade and self-interest, I now see caring and sincerity.

How can this be? Don't I resent her and her boss' requests for meat grinder rewrites? Am I not angry that every time we reach a stage in this relationship that requires effort on her part � contract signing, reading a revised script, submitting me and my writing partner to television producers -- two or three weeks pass before she gives us her attention? Why is it now, instead of thinking she's blowing smoke up my butt, I get the warm fuzzies because I feel she cares? Two words: Stockholm Syndrome.

My situation is no different than people taken hostage who end up having an emotional bond with their captors. Through the horror of solitary waiting these last two months � waiting for any word that our career is going in a positive direction � she has reeled me in emotionally with little crumbs of hope and kindness. "I just had meetings with Disney, USA Networks, and Jim Henson Productions and they are all fast-tracking comedy development." "Believe me, you guys will work in this town." "I just told Miramax about you two."

My agent made the Miramax comment just two days ago and it has put a little bit of a kibosh on our love fest. Miramax, to the best of my knowledge, has no television development division at this time. Which means either my agent is talking us up in the hopes of getting us screenwriting work (a highly dubious proposition since we have no writing sample in this area and are complete unknowns) or she was pacifying me. The third possibility, that she is just an awful representative, is too horrifying to comprehend. So I will content myself with vacillating between her bread crumbs and the black clouds erupting from my behind.

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