SCREENWRITING
THE NEW COUNTESS
The New Countess is my most ambitious screenwriting project. Developed from my 2005 play Twelve Nights with Viola & Olivia (see DIRECTING), The New Countess imagines how Shakespeare’s creation “Olivia” would resolve the complicated situation with which he leaves her at the end of Twelfth Night: Married to the brother of the sister who has promised to marry another man who—five minutes ago—was passionately in love with her.
As with Twelve Nights with Viola & Olivia, in the The New Countess Olivia falls in love with a girl pretending to be a boy for the simple reason that Olivia is attracted to girls, and is not heterosexual. Another reason Olivia believes that “Cesario” is a boy is that she employs an intersexed man, “Adriano", as her messenger. Like her gentlewoman and bed-mate Maria, Adriano is a devoted servant who helps Olivia in her times of crisis.
My motivation for creating The New Countess, and the novel that followed in 2024 (see LITERATURE), was to help young people confronting difficult issues of sexuality and gender expression, by seeing that how 500 years ago, even though the penalties for queerness could include public execution, queer people found ways to be joyous about their lives.
Pilot: “Too Many Cesarios”
In a small town in 16th century Italy, Countess Olivia falls in love with an attractive young man with a mysterious past. What will she do when she learns that “Cesario” is really a girl?
Shakespeare’s Twelfth Night reborn as a tale of female passion in a world where homosexuality is a crime worse than murder!
Episode 2: “If I should tell my History”
Countess Olivia has just learned that her new husband is the brother of Viola, the girl that she loves. However, as long as she doesn’t sleep with Sebastiano, Olivia can annul her marriage and be single again. Meanwhile, Olivia has convinced Count Orsino to order Viola to live with Olivia until her wedding to him.
What’s a girl to do? — If she’s gay and the year is 1513?
MARIA
Were’st I an enchantress, perchance--I would [make her a man for you]
Olivia suddenly hopes Maria can do magic.
OLIVIA
Ay? Canst thou do it?
MARIA
Primero, my lady: Which of you shouldst I make a boy?
OLIVIA
Her, methinks.
Maria frowns.
MARIA
Wouldst that be just to her?
Olivia nods in consideration.
OLIVIA
Then me. Yet I shouldst dislike that.
Olivia pauses upon her realization that she doesn’t want to be a man.
MARIA
I have heard...
OLIVIA
What has thou heard?
MARIA
Very well. (pause) I have... I have heard there are men that would fain have the love of others than women.
OLIVIA
Dost thou mean? Cesario is a...?
(to the camera)
O Bugger!
Episode 3: “Where Pleasant Fountains Lie”
Judged Quarter-Finalist in the 2024 Southern California Screenplay Competition!
Countess Olivia decides that the only way to decide whether she should stay married to Sebastiano is to determine how well he can serve as a count in her family. In the process of testing him, she gains some affection for him. However, at the same time, Olivia’s desire for his sister Viola grows stronger and stronger.
Olivia rides, with Fabian trailing; she recites from Sonnet 134 by Francesco Petrarca (1304-1374).
OLIVIA (V.O.)
I find no peace, yet make no war:
I fear, and hope, and burn, and I am ice:
I fly above the sky, fall to earth,
Clutch at nothing, and embrace the world.
I see without eyes, and scream with no tongue:
I long to perish, yet I beg for rescue:
I hate myself, and love another.
I feed on sadness, laughing weep:
Death and life displease me both:
And I am in this state, Lady, because of thee.
OLIVIA
(to camera)
Know thee well, Viola: I am in this state because of thee.
TRADITIONAL FAMILY VALUES
In the feature film Traditional Family Values, a young Korean-American law student’s commitment to legal ethics is challenged when her father is charged with teen sex-trafficking and she is subpoenaed to testify against him.
TFV combines my experience of being a “2L” (second-year student) in law school, living under the rule of my strict Japanese-American mother (who unlike “Shelly,” always obeyed the law), and two real sex scandals in Minnesota.
LAURA
You have to let the court system work. You don’t have to agree with me, but you have to accept my decision to tell the truth.
SHELLY
I won’t! I can’t! And I won’t live with someone who would turn her back on her father. Her own father!
LAURA
Mother, just say you’ll accept my decision, and everything will be o.k.
SHELLY
I’m never going to say that! Go on! Get out! Go live with that girl, that Jewish girl, since she loves you so much! More than your mother, who gave up her life for you! And when you leave, you leave the same way you came into this house! Just the clothes on your body!
LAURA
Mom, don’t say that!
SFX: Doorbell rings.
SHELLY
Whoever it is, tell them you’re leaving!
LOS VIENTOS DE OCTUBRE
In 1846, Los Angeles looked much as it does in this 1869 image of the central plaza area. Present-day Olvera Street is here, and the site of today’s Los Angeles Union Station is off-camera, to the right. Dodger Stadium is on the hill in the background.
Like the civilians of Ukraine that suddenly united in 2022 to defend their homes, each citizen of 1846 Las Californias must decide whether or not to fight the U.S. troops that have just occupied their homeland.
In the pueblo of Los Angeles, a young stable worker and the daughter of a wealthy Californio love each other, but her father opposes them. Los Vientos de Octubre is a partly-Spanish script for a short film about the sadly-widespread experience of civilians being forced to decide whether to join a war, or submit to foreign occupation.
Written in 2021 for Screenwriting (FILM 105) at MiraCosta College, Oceanside, CA.
JESUS
Is this the stable boy I’ve heard about?
ROSARITA
Sí, this is Fernando. He was just here to deliver a message.
FERNANDO
Sí, señor.
ROSARITA
And he was just returning home.
JESUS
But he can’t go now.
ROSARITA
Why not? He means no harm.
JESUS
Tomorrow, Fernando marches with El Captáin Flores to fight the Americans!
Rosarita freezes.
THE ROAD TO CASABLANCA
Despite bearing a title fitting for a comedy starring Bing Crosby, Bob Hope, and Dorothy L’Amour, The Road to Casablanca turns a scholarly film studies argument into an entertaining short film:
“Was Casablanca a passion project that accidentally became a massive financial success?”
The Road to Casablanca was my first idea for an animated film made with Unreal Engine 5. The only major requirement is to find actors with acceptable Humphrey Bogart and Ingrid Bergman impressions. In this scene, Bogart grills Ingrid the way he challenged Mary Astor in The Maltese Falcon (1941), but this time, to find out if Ingrid Bergman is pro- or anti-Nazi.
HUMPHREY [BOGART]
You had a contract to make three pictures in Germany, but you left after making just one.
INGRID [BERGMAN]
I left to have my daughter in Sweden.
HUMPHREY
And yet, you never returned to Germany. You know, we need an actress we can depend on.
HAL [WALLIS, the Jewish-American producer of Casablanca]
We certainly do.
INGRID
I could not raise my daughter in that country! They wanted me to be a Nazi!
HUMPHREY
So you gave up your film contract rather than join the Nazi Party.
Hal nods, visibly impressed.
In the opening scene of The Road to Casablanca, when SA storm-troopers brutally beat Warner Brothers salesman Philip Kaufman for being a “Judisches Schwein” in 1936, the Brandenburger Platz looks like this:
Many models of the entire Brandenburg Platz in Berlin are commercially available, including this one.
MONTAGE: Photos of German-American Bund activities in the 1930s.
MAN 1
Half the technicians, actors, and extras in Hollywood are asking: “Why are they out of work?”
ASK the Jew Movie producers!
ASK the Jew Movie publications!
ASK the Jew writers of ANTI-American propaganda movies!
ASK the Jew actors!
ASK the Jew-controlled Hollywood Anti-Nazi League!
GRAPHIC: Poster for Confessions of a Nazi Spy.
REPORTER 1 (V.O.)
Confessions of a Nazi Spy, that recounts how the FBI just broke up a German spy ring, is the first major motion picture to expose the danger that German-sympathizers pose to the American way of life.
A key character in The Road to Casablanca, Dr. George Gyssling was the consul-general in Los Angeles for the Third Reich, while aiding Nazi subversion and anti-Semitic activism in California before the U.S. entered WWII. The photo on his wall over his shoulder was of Adolf Hitler.
MACBETH OF THE WEST
Even in my dramas, I always find ways to include jokes and comic situations. In 2023, a team of my classmates in Women and Film (FILM 212) contributed ideas for a comedy about high school drama students.
In particular, Chase Geyer came up with the idea of making the film look like a YouTube video released to try to get students and parents and anyone to see their obviously disastrous production of Macbeth. I combined into this script for a short film about Macbeth of the West, in which my love for comedy, absurdity, and satire run wild.
Unfortunately, the team lost interest, which was a shame because I had persuaded my cat-loving acting friend Roxy Jiminez-Hernandez to play Muffin, a student that identifies as an animal. Meow!
Synopis:
In response to the school district eliminating the drama program at a typical California high school, a group of students get permission to present a production of Macbeth. With little money for costumes or scenery, the students dress up in cowboy outfits and Old West dresses—except for The Witches, who are recast as Native Americans—deliver their lines with a Western twang, and unintentionally create the most ridiculous version of The Scottish Play ever staged, complete with plastic cacti substituting for Birnam Forest.
Moreover, being a “typical California high school,” Banquo is played by a non-binary choir student who refuses to say anything on stage to protect his voice. When Macbeth’s banner are unfurled, they are the LGBTQ+ rainbow flag and the flag of international Communism, the former Soviet Union.
Finally, there is Muffin, a student who identifies as a cat, and maintains the capricious personality of a cat, attacking the scenery, actors, and ultimately the camera, leaving the bold work of the other students in ruins.
Enter CAELYN, wearing an orange wig, with an “ON VOCAL REST” sign around his neck; he sits in Macbeth’s place.
DALE/LENNOX
May’t please your Highness sit.
Mike sees Banquo’s ghost sitting in his chair, smiling while holding a card reading: “HI! GUESS WHO?”
MIKE/MACBETH
The table’s full.
DALE/LENNOX
Here is a place reserved, sir.
Mike looks at the other actors.
MIKE/MACBETH
Which of you have done this?
Banquo’s Ghost holds a card reading: “LONG TIME NO SEE!”
(to Banquo’s Ghost)
Thou canst not say I did it!
Banquo’s Ghost nods his head up and down.
Never shake thy gory locks at me!
Banquo’s Ghost makes a sad-clown face. Then smiles and honks a bulb-horn like Harpo.
DALE/ROSS
Gentlemen, rise. His Highness is not well.
Enter BILLIE Ginotmi-Luvver, high school student, with Caelyn, still looking like Harpo, Eddie, and Dale. They all speak with an Old West accent. Fake cacti stand behind them in pots.
BILLIE/MALCOLM
Cousins, I hope the days are near at hand our chambers will be safe.
DALE/MACDUFF
We doubt it not.
Caelyn holds a sign reading: WHAT WOOD IS THIS BEFORE US?
EDDIE/MENTIETH
The Wood of Birnam.
Muffin [the cat-identifying student] enters on all fours and tips over a cactus with a “paw.” Billie, Caelyn, and Dale look in disbelief as Eddie runs to prevent Muffin from tipping the rest over. Billie shoos Muffin off-stage while Dale tips the cactus Muffin knocked over back up. Billie wipes flop-sweat before resuming.
BILLIE/MALCOLM
Let every soldier hew down a bough
And bear ’t before him. Thereby we
shade our numbers to our foe.
Billie looks to Caelyn, who holding his first cue-card. Billie shakes his head. Caelyn honks their horn. Billie gives in. He reads with no emotion or accent.
We learn no other but the confident tyrant
Keeps still in Dunsinane and will
endure our setting down before ’t.
Billie/Malcolm resumes speaking his own lines.