Beyond Baroque First Annual Poetry Contest

Beyond Baroque is one of the United States' leading independent Literary/Arts Centers and public spaces dedicated to literary and cultural production, contact, interaction, and community building. Founded in 1968, it is based in the Old Town Hall in Venice, California, near the Pacific Ocean. It offers a program of readings, free workshops, publishing, bookstore, archiving, and education.  Like most art / cultural centers, Beyond Baroque is struggling to meet its financial obligations.

Toward that end, they are hosting a Poetry Contest - so yes, there is a fee, but there are cash prizes for the top 3 poets ($500, $250, $100) and the reader's fee will go back into keeping the doors open on this beloved center.  The final judge will be Tony Barnstone

CONTEST RULES
1. Submit up to three unpublished poems, 40line limit.
2. All themes and styles welcome.
3. Deadline Sept. 1st. 2010 (postmarked)
4. No ID on poems; poet's name, address, phone, e-mail address and poem titles on cover sheet.
5. Send entries, including $15 reading fee, to: 

Beyond Baroque Contest

681 Venice Blvd., 

Venice, CA 90291.

6. Checks payable to Beyond Baroque
7. No SASE. Poems not returned.

Note: A reading/reception will be held for the three cash winners and five top finalists at Beyond Baroque on Sunday, Oct. 17, 2010.

LAwritersgroup.com Member - 1st Place, Round 1 - NYCMidnight

WOO HOO!!! - A big shout out to LAwritersgroup.com member Brittany Klaus for winning FIRST PLACE in Round 1 of the NYCMidnight screenwriting contest.  The second round is this weekend and she has 24 hours to write a 15-page screenplay so let's send our writerly vibes her way!

ALSO!

Screamfest 2010 Call For Entries are now open for new feature length and short films and unproduced screenplays.  Winning films receive the coveted golden skull designed by legendary Stan Winston.  Winning screenplay receives $2,000 cash and Movie Magic Screenwriter. For more information or to download a submission form, go to www.screamfestla.com

Screamfest discovered the box office hit PARANORMAL ACTIVITY.  Are you the next big thing?

"A launching pad for burgeoning directors and screenwriters, Screamfest is dedicated to celebrating the often neglected and underappreciated horror genre.  Formed in 2001, Screamfest is one of the leading festivals of its kind and many of the movies and moviemakers showcased here have found distribution...." -MOVIEMAKER MAGAZINE

"When all other festivals were rejecting PARANORMAL ACTIVITY, Screamfest was the first and only festival at the time that accepted us.  We had a great premiere screening and got positive reviews as a result.  Shortly after, we got the attention of CAA and many distributors.  The rest, as they say, is history! But it all started at Srceamfest!" -Oren Peli

Your Hyphenate Brain – How Fiction Writers Can Play the Hollywood Game to Their Advantage

Today we're happy and excited to feature Zoë Green, a guest writer for LAwritersgroup.com!

Zoë Green has recently been hired to write projects for Rob Reiner and George Clooney and is currently writing a superhero(ine) movie for Stan Lee. To learn about writing for film/TV visit her site www.script-emergency.com

******

Picture the scene. A young woman emerges from film school, secures a literary agent and writes her first screenplay with the idea that she will sell it to Hollywood. It hits all the right notes – it’s a big budget sci-fi / fantasy extravaganza, and is hailed by all studio readers as a unique blend of character and ‘world building’. Compliments fly. High powered meetings ensue. But alas, no studio can actually buy it. The reason? The work is original and not based on an existing underlying intellectual property.

A number of years have passed. I (the young woman in question) have been lucky enough to build a screenwriting career from this original screenplay. It did the work of a good spec – it got me many meetings which led to much free ‘take’ work which led (eventually and often in anti linear fashion) to a number of TV and movie sales. But the cold hard truth remains that in today’s sputtering spec market an original screenplay will rarely sell unless it happens to be a commercial enough twist on a public domain concept to pique the interest of a studio. All those of you who want to see your own stories up there on screen may as well hang up your hats. But wait! There’s another way. Call it the double-edged sword. The buyers want original content to turn into movies. They are gasping for it – to the extent that producers rabidly comb short story websites, galley manuscripts, random tiny comic book imprints and blogs to find something, anything, with an existing built in audience, however tiny. So if you’re an aspiring screenwriter with a fictional bent, consider yourself as the progenitor of a multi-faceted creature ‘the idea’ and make sure that it exists in the right format for them to find. Come up with a high concept idea and get it published. Almost anywhere. And then make damn sure you have the screenwriting skills to insist that you get first pass at the script when they come clamoring to option it. It will serve you to have the screenplay version already written. They may well buy it from you and you could suddenly find yourself a card-carrying member of the WGA. You may even then be asked to write the tie-in movie novel in an interesting reversal of media. Result!

Remember this --- producers and studios have an endless devouring need for new material. So understand that a person who can strategically write both fiction and film may well be the only kind of person who can retain any kind of control over original ideas in this very precarious, ever shifting game.

Part 2 of 10: Ten Favorite Places to Write (in no particular order)

Our new South Bay writers group run by Nicole Criona starts tonight! To kick this new geographical age off, I thought I'd introduce you to a groovy place in her new neighborhood...

Java Man Coffee House is Hermosa Beach's oldest coffee house. It's housed in a 1920s bungalow! Java Man provides a variety of seating (in wonderful little niches and corners) that ranges from hard back chairs and tables to comfy couches and overstuffed chairs. They have a comprehensive breakfast and lunch menu and feature homemade soup! Of course, there is the all-important bonus of free WiFi!

The hours at Java Man would be a disadvantage (6 a.m. to 6 p.m. weekdays and 7 a.m. to 6 p.m. on the weekends) but the same people own Ocean Diner just up the street, an old fashioned coffee shop in the best tradition of formica tables and counter seating (open until 9 p.m. every day except Sunday when it closes at 3 p.m.)

Map here for Java Man Coffee House (emphasis on "house")
157 Pier Avenue, Hermosa Beach, CA 90254

Map here for Ocean Diner
959 Aviation Boulevard, Hermosa Beach, CA 90254

Rattle Poetry Prize - $5,000

We don't always promote contests but the Rattle Poetry Prize is worthy of a little blogpress.

There is a $18 reader's fee, but that $18 also buys you a year's subscription to the magazine and here's the real draw.....

First prize for a single poem is $5,000.  They also give honorable mention to ten others along with a $100 for each of them and all eleven poems are published in the winter edition of Rattle.

You can go here to read the email guidelines for submission (separate link for hardcopy submission).

"Written in California"

Join Pasadena's own Red Hen Press for an evening of poetry and art at the Pasadena Museum of California Art this Thursday, May 27th at 7:00 p.m.

Readings by California poets Eloise Klein Healy, Brendan Constantine, and Douglas Kearney.  Moderated by Andrea Scarpino.

Admission is FREE and the gallery will be open one hour prior to the event.

Pasadena Museum of California Art

490 East Union Street

Pasadena CA 91101

www.pmcaonline.org

626-568-3665

Part 1 of 10: Ten Favorite Places to Write (in no particular order)

Our newest group run by Tom Rastrelli is in Mid-Wilshire, an area rife with coffee shops but not all of them are writer friendly or wifi ready.

Massimo's Mudspot not only provides free wifi but offers a variety of seating that includes the traditional table & hard back chair or a nice comfy couch to lounge on.  Their menu includes yummy sandwiches (some on house made bread) and salads.  And if you're not in the mood for coffee, you can try their homemade lavender lemonade.

Massimo's features local artists on their walls and encourages local groups/soloists to play on their music night.

The coffee shop also encourages its customers to get a little exercise and help make the world greener.  On the last Friday of the month, they offer 10% off to every customer who rides their bike to the coffee shop and they support that habit by putting their bike racks right outside a large picture window so you can keep an eye on your vehicle! (They're so green that on their contact page of their website, they tell you which bus lines to take to get to them...)

The hours at Massimo's would be a disadvantage (7 a.m. to 6 p.m.) but the same people own The Little Bar Lounge next door, a no muss, no fuss, no kitchen, east coast feel neighborhood bar.  If you're hungry, they'll provide you with a choice of delivery menus from the area so you can order in....

Massimo's Mudspot: 759 S. La Brea, Los Angeles, CA 90036 (corner of 8th & La Brea)

The Little Bar Lounge: 757 S. La Brea, Los Angeles, CA 90036

L.A. Literati

Wanda Coleman was born and raised in Watts.   She has been called the unofficial poet laureate of Los Angeles.  Prior to recognition as the poetic voice of Los Angeles, she had many jobs, the editorial coordinator of an arts newsletter (for the Studio Watts organization), a medical secretary, a journalist, a proofreader, a waitress, and a Peace Corps/Vista recruiter.  

What you may not know is that Coleman had a brief stint as a t.v. writer and won an Emmy award for her work as a staff writer on the NBC television soap opera Days of Our Lives (one of the very few soaps shot in Los Angeles) for the 1975-76 season. 

Coleman's poetry, which has won widespread praise from reviewers has also been sometimes deemed hard to swallow for its grim portrayals of the down-on-their-luck characters who populate Los Angeles's streets. 

Coleman's poems about love seethe with sexual and violent themes.  In the 80s she was incredibly prolific and produced new work at an astonishing rate—in addition to her many published works she accumulated a collection of over 4,500 rejection slips (so take heart).  Her poem "Today I Am a Homicide in the North of the City" is often reprinted as an example of the poet's drawn-from-the-streets subject matter.

Although the term hadn't yet been coined during the rise of Coleman's career, she was a forerunner to the "poetry slam" movement that invigorated African-American literary communities with live poetry contests in the 1990s and 2000s.

In 2003 and 2004, Coleman became the first literary fellow of the City of Los Angeles Department of Cultural Affairs. Asked at about that time by the Poetry Society of America whether gender, sexual preference, or ethnicity figured more prominently than being an American in her self-identity as a poet, Coleman responded this way: "As a Usually Het Interracially Married Los Angeles-based African American Womonist Matrilinear Working Class Poor Pink/White Collar College Drop-out Baby Boomer Earth Mother and Closet Smoker Unmolested-by-her-father, I am unable to separate these and, as time progresses, resent having to fit into every niggling PC pigeon hole some retard trendoid academic with a grant or hidden agenda barfs up."

You can read more about her life and her work here.

Los Angeles Born Poet Reads at Beyond Baroque

Los Angeles has great readings going on all the time but LAwritersgroup.com is really excited about Diane Wakoski's appearance at Beyond Baroque this weekend because although she was born and raised in Whittier, CA, she is now based in Michigan and her reading appearances in Los Angeles are few and far between. 

Her latest book of poetry Diamond Dog, Anhinga Press 2010 is the first entirely new collection of her poems to come out since Argonaut Rose in 1998.

When I was getting my Masters at USC, I read Diane's Emerald Ice and it inspired me to track her down (something I had never done before) to speak with her about poetic sensibility and the use of a specific image I had noticed in her poetry.  It turned into a wonderful correspondence and I took from it a deeper understanding of personal poetic mythos.  You can read my article about our correspondence here.

Diane continues exploring and in her latest book combines poetic-mythos with science.  She will be reading at Beyond Baroque (map here) on Sunday, May 23 at 7:30 p.m.

Submission Fees

I have submitted to contests and understand that the submission fee is to pay the prize money - makes sense when a literary journal can barely keep itself afloat.  It seems that universities are no longer supporting their journals (a shame) and the writers keep them in business....

John Fox has a great entry on submission fees - read it here and understand the future of literary journals.