Thesis Green Lights

Emotions were high at 5:45 this evening as AFI finally announced the green lights (the go ahead) for thesis films that will shoot next year. They had around 80 scripts from the various disciplines submitted, of which 23 were selected for production next year.

And yes, they green-lit my script, "Morning Latte", a crazy dark comedy in a coffee shop about a guy trying to murder his boss who was raised by a Samurai. The coffee shop is a metaphor on life where the system squashes people's dreams and people accept the destiny they are handed. I will direct this in 2007, well after Captain Abu Raed, and my plan is to market myself to the studios as the quirky black comedy director. I love dark comedies, and now I will have the opportunity to get as disturbing as possible with Morning Latte. This is the American humor in me that sadly I don't think is very appealing to Arabic audiences.

To be honest, I wasn't sure my script would get green-lit because I felt it was so different and strange that it would get dismissed. Now I will have the opporunity to go crazy developing it further. I'm very excited!