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“Alice, when in Wonderland, asked the Caterpillar which road she should take, and the Caterpillar responded by asking her where she wanted to end up.” That is from the book I’m reading. Mamet, you can’t ask a question like that and not expect...

I’m reading True and False, by David Mamet. The book is interesting. It challenges some traditional ideas about what it takes to become an actor, and about what acting itself is. Here are two things that caught my eye—things that either made me think or confirmed something I kind of knew, but Mamet articulated better: Great drama, onstage or off, is not the performance of deeds with great emotion, but the performance of great deeds with no emotion whatsoever. The professional

I wrote a screenplay for a short film. I have written several, but this one went into pre-production a few weeks ago. Then the screenplay got actors through a casting call. With the roles filled, it went into production and rehearsals. Now we are about to shoot it, and I am having all kinds of doubts and jitters. We are shooting it; there's no doubt! Because if there is one thing I am, besides being creative, it is curiosity. And I am curious to know how it turns out. Even if

Hand carve erasers into stamps (and stamp the shit out of everything ink will take on!)

In her book Respect for Acting, Uta Hagen says, “Creativity—based on freedom, and freedom based on responsibility, as in life—does not follow a rigid formula.” This idea is very similar to one I’ve been using to understand the way I work: Progress is not linear. I like to think she would agree.

Learn to play the trumpet.

Nietzsche, in his Twilight of the Idols, in the section usually translated as “Skirmishes of an Untimely Man,” aphorism 26, wrote: “Wofür wir Worte haben, darüber sind wir auch schon hinaus. In allem Reden liegt ein Gran Verachtung.” Which sounds dirty, and I’m not entirely sure it isn’t. In English, it reads: “The things we have words for are also the things we have already left behind. There is a grain of contempt in all speech.” And here I am, trying my whole life to put m

I'm cleaning my house, sorting through stuff, and I can't help smiling every time I see these magazine holders. They make me realize we are hardwired for happy. Hard. Wired. For Happy!

The website went live on June 27, 2026. It finally left the sandbox and is out in the open. It was a big leap for me, and at the same time, it doesn't make me feel any different... But the website is finally live!

In the final paragraph of Chapter 10 of her book Respect for Acting, Uta Hagen says: "In defining the difference between reality in life and reality in art, Tolstoy said, "Something is added to nature which wasn't there before." That "something" is the artist's point of view and his power of selection, which comes from life and makes for new life." I couldn't have said it better. No, for real. For real.

I had a good two-week run of heightened creativity and feverish productivity. But that came to an end yesterday. I started to feel I had exhausted all my ongoing projects and had nothing left in the tank. To make things worse, there was only one game, South Africa vs. Canada, and I missed it. Instead, I found myself putting furniture back in its place, looking at the pool through the window, and deciding the air conditioning was a better idea than swimming. Not even skinny di

I'm reading My Life in Art by Constantin Stanislavski. The book was first published in 1924. Stanislavski was born in 1863. Somewhere between those two dates, he started his life long study of theater and the arts. In Chapter 8, he complains about the state of artistic education. Schools, he says, are not what they used to be. Institutions are accepting students regardless of talent as long as they are willing to pay. Standards are slipping. Teaching is suffering. I'm reading

Freedom 65 Project. Intro. The Freedom 65 Project is not a destination. It's a journey. This journal is where I document that journey. Some entries will be about creative successes. Others will be about dead ends, frustrations, and unexpected discoveries. Think of this as the project's logbook. These pages will tell the story of what happened when a middle-aged guy decided it was time to get started. We're about to find out.