Movie Talk

Last weekend, I drove down to L.A., braving what had been termed Carmageddon. A 10-mile stretch of the busiest highway in the U.S. was being temporarily closed. There were signs up and down California warning drivers to stay away from L.A. (I suppose Carmageddon is much less offensive than Stay Away From L.A.) Because so many people were afraid of the potential traffic nightmare, it turns out there wasn't one. So my drive was rather pleasent.

But even if I knew the traffic would be horrendous, I would've made the trip. I was going out to breakfast with Jennifer O'Kieffe, the screenwriter for Thirteen Reasons Why.


The first time I met Jen, she was interviewing for this screenwriting job. A bunch of us were sitting around a large table in a fancy L.A. office. Selena Gomez was seated to my left, and Jen was on my right, telling us her ideas for adapting the book.

And now she's in the middle of writing that adaptation. Our breakfast was basically a low-key opportunity for us to chat and get to know each other better. We talked about our families, movies, books, and our shared excitement for this particular project.

After breakfast, since we were so close to the park that inspired some scenes in Thirteen Reasons Why, I took Jen to Eisenhower Memorial Park. (No, I wasn't very creative in renaming that park in my book.)


There, we talked a bit about some specific scenes in the screenplay. Mostly, it was me saying things like, "That's genius," and, "I am seriously getting goosebumps now." It's odd to think that my book gave Jen goosebumps when she first read it, and now that she's in charge of Hannah and Clay, her ideas are giving me goosebumps.

Of course, that's why we wanted her!

And when the movie comes out, I thought of something that'd be fun to see at the very beginning. Have you noticed that some studios tweak their logos for certain movies? I love it when they do that!

So here's my idea...


Cool, right?