John August

News

Sundance panels

News, Sundance

In addition to the screenings, I’ll be a panelist at two different events at the festival.

HD House
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Cinematographer Nancy Schreiber and I will talk about the HD of it all, with clips from the movie.
Monday, Jan. 22nd, at 7 p.m.
Yarrow Theater 2

BMI Composer Roundtable
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Composer Alex Wurman and I will be talking about the music in The Nines, including the cool Yahama thing we did.
Wednesday, Jan. 24th, at 11 a.m.
Sundance House / Kimball Art Center
More info [here](http://www.bmi.com/events/entry/534226).

Sell out

News, Projects, The Nines

No, that’s not my advice to aspiring screenwriters.

[The Nines](http://lookforthenines.com) sold out its first three screenings at Sundance, including the 1300-seat premiere. As of this morning, the only tickets available are for the final screening on Sunday, January 28th at the Rose Wagner.

Keep in mind, everything sells out at Sundance. That Ukrainian documentary about bottle caps? Gone.

But still, it’s exciting-slash-terrifying to realize that no matter what, a heckuva lot of people are going to be seeing my film one week from Sunday. It’s literally out of my hands–we shipped off the screening copy to Utah last week. At this point, I’m basically a passenger on this trip. And a little airsick, frankly.

Four for four, or Hooray for Chad

Education, News

Longtime readers will note that my former assistants have done well for themselves. [Rawson](http://imdb.com/name/nm1098493/) has directed two movies, [Dana](http://imdb.com/name/nm1401416/) has become an in-demand screenwriter, and [Sean](http://imdb.com/name/nm1091301/) is a TV staff writer with a pilot in production.

I’m happy to add [Chad](http://imdb.com/name/nm1548657/) to the list of successes. After many delays, his script “Sydney White” is going into production on February 12th, with [Joe Nussbaum](http://imdb.com/name/nm0638271/) directing. Variety has [the story](http://www.variety.com/article/VR1117956518.html?categoryid=13&cs=1) in today’s issue.

“Sydney White” is basically Snow White set in college, with Amanda Bynes playing the titular character, and seven outcasts taking over as the dwarfs. The project is a family affair; Chad’s wife Dara is co-producing. You may recognize her as an occasional poster on the site.

What’s the secret behind my assistants’ success? It’s certainly not me. I rarely read their scripts, never take them to meetings, and only sporadically offer advice. I think one main factor may be that there’s only a limited amount of work to do in any given day, so that leaves lots of time for staring at the computer monitor, wondering what the hell they should write.

Another common factor: except for Sean, they’re all [Starkies](http://cinema.usc.edu/producing/index.cfm). So I’m hiring from a pool of people who are likely to be successful regardless. But that doesn’t make me any less happy for them.

More in the Store

Meta, News

I’ve had the [Store](http://johnaugust.com/store) sitting in the sidebar for a few months now, with Amazon links for DVDs of movies I’ve written. To my surprise, people do actually buy some of these — I made a whopping $16.43 in referrals last quarter. That almost covers, oh, half of the hosting fees for this site. But still, thanks for shopping.

In particular, I’d like to thank the reader who bought [Chemistry: The Central Science (10th Edition)](http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0131096869/103-3950287-6831863/johnaugustcom-20), which retails at $145.66, netting me $5.83. Sweet.

Amazon recently started a system called aStore, which allows for much slickness in setting up off-site storefronts, complete with shopping carts. So, looking to avoid the actual work for which I get paid, I set one up to replace the pathetic Store here on the site. You can check it out in the sidebar. Basically, everything in the center of the screen is really a page on Amazon’s servers, embedded inside my own. The shopping cart lives at Amazon.

Mostly, the new version is an opportunity for me to make snarky comments about various books and movies, but if it gets one more reader to check out [The God Delusion](http://astore.amazon.com/johnaugustcom-20/detail/0618680004/103-3950287-6831863) or [The Book of Bunny Suicides](http://astore.amazon.com/johnaugustcom-20/detail/0452285186/103-3950287-6831863), I’ll consider it worth it.