I sent the latest version of my script to my agent a week ago. She's usually pretty quick about reading (she's a rare breed that way) but I have not yet heard back. What I'm hoping for is her blessing for the script to go out to a few companies that might be looking for something like this.

Originally, my plan had been to not send the script out at all. While it's what would fall under a "high concept" romantic comedy, it also has such a personal and multiethnic dimension to it that I have been pessimistic that any major studio would be interested. Instead, I decided that my movie was going to be so original and great that it would be far better to just raise some private money, get it made, and then line up some distribution after an intense seven-figure bidding war.

That was before I did a budget and realized that my "cheap" script, which I wrote with the intention of shooting for under $200,000 was probably closer to $500,000. And while I have full confidence that friends and family will want to support this worthy cinematic effort, there will probably still be a cool $300,000 missing from the equation.

That's where the companies come in. There is a growing crop of producers operating in the under one million dollar budget range, and I decided, despite my fool proof plan (see above) that it might be a good idea to show the script to a half dozen of them. At best, they want to fund it and at worst, they lose all respect for me and my writing. If they had any to begin with. So I'm putting together a list, and hopefully my agent is as well, and then in the next two weeks we'll send that script out into the world and see what comes of it. I'm actually hoping that I get some legitimate feedback on the script, beyond the usual "They LOVED it, but..." or "It wasn't what they were looking for..." or "They passed." And while I'm sure nine out of ten will respond in those aforementioned ways, maybe one will put a little bit of thought into it. Maybe even want to "sit down" and "chat."

Until then, I'll keep trying to line up people who know people who know a guy who might know somebody who was thinking about investing in a movie sometime.