"The Misfortune Teller" (One-Act Link)

Strange to see a non-Oscars/movie related post on this site, I know, but I've been sitting on this thing for a couple weeks and thought it might be a good idea to share it. Below is a link to The Misfortune Teller, a 34-page one-act play I wrote for a college playwriting course this past semester. Though I don't have much intention to publish it, I'm proud of it and enjoy how it turned out, so I thought I'd share it online for everybody. This is the first piece of writing approaching formality that I've posted publicly before, so if there are better ways of sharing these things that you know of, feel free to tell me and I'll heed your words for future works. I'll talk about what it's about and all that jazz below.


Click here to read it.


The Misfortune Teller (working title) is a one-act play with five scenes and four characters. It's centered on Nathan and Martha, a couple in their twenties who are planning a big move to Atlanta after Nathan and their roommate Ben get a job offer there, a plan which is derailed when Martha's mother Donna, a self-avowed psychic, predicts that the trip to Atlanta will spell disaster for their relationship. Martha grows weary after hearing this, but Nathan is unconvinced, and believes Donna to be a fraud.

For this play, I wanted to explore how people reconcile differing beliefs in relationships, and was inspired by my generation's curious embrace of various informal "mystic" belief systems - astrology, mediums, psychics, chakras, etc. As someone who doesn't believe in those things, I wanted to try my best to not make any one character the hero or villain. I didn't want Nathan to be "the smart one", or for Martha to be unreasonable or for Donna to be a clear huckster. My goal was to present these characters as they were, and let the audience judge them based on their own experiences and beliefs. Whether or not I've succeeded in doing that is up to you, I guess.

I'm not actively pursuing a career in playwriting, but I enjoy all forms of writing and would like to write a play again sometime. This is a second draft (actually more like third or fourth, but the second complete draft after a wave of changes), so there are some errors here and there. I'm considering coming back to this work and maybe trying to revise it again, but not for a long while. For now, I'd like it to just exist and be out there and I welcome any feedback and constructive criticism you'd be willing to give me on the writing and content.

I hope you enjoy, and thank you to anyone who takes the time to read the whole thing.
(PS - My December predictions for the technical Oscar categories will be up in a few days, if you were wondering)

90th Academy Awards - December 2017 Nominations Predictions - MAIN CATEGORIES

It's been a good while since I've written anything on this site, as I've been mostly focusing on writing video reviews rather than on here, but I'm just gonna go ahead like nothing happened and post my predictions for this year's Oscar nominees. Precursor award nominees have begun to come out, enough so that we can gauge about where the conversation is at in the major categories (directing, acting, writing), but not yet to the point where we can make very specific predictions about nominees for every category, which will be later in December and in early January when guilds name their nominees. So far, the Los Angeles and New York film critics circles have announced their runners-up and winners, the National Board of Review and American Film Institute have named their top 10 of the year, and the Golden Globes and Critics Choice Awards announced their nominees in the past week. The most useful to us so far when it comes to predicting the Oscar nominees is still probably the LA and New York critics organizations. The Golden Globes are merely the opinion of the Hollywood Foreign Press Association, which is an extremely small sampling of people with particular and specific tastes, and only set the stage for the Oscars insofar as being a movie award show a month beforehand. Critics Choice sheds more light on the positions of critics, but for one thing it's not like we don't already have other ways of seeing that (critics circle awards by city, as well as Rotten Tomatoes of course), but critical acclaim doesn't always necessarily guarantee or predict Oscar nominees. The NBR and AFI lists are definitely a decent litmus test for what "prestigious" people in Hollywood loved this year, but they aren't historically incredibly predictive, though they do help us out with rounding out some nominees a bit. The recent numerous additions to the Academy membership, skewing young, female, and nonwhite, are also of possible significant weight in guessing what will make it.

I'm gonna keep this post pretty simple. I'm only talking about the major categories in this one, and I'll offer some brief commentary for each category if it warrants it, then list my predicted five. Okay, let's do it.


~~~BEST PICTURE~~~

As always, the writing and directing nominees/winners will determine Best Picture more clearly later on. Right now, the major threats for winning this one (and the ones that are almost guaranteed to be nominated) I think are Dunkirk, The Post, Call Me by Your Name, Three Billboards Outside Ebbing Missouri, and Get Out. Ones I think are fairly likely to round out the bottom three or four nominees are Lady Bird and The Shape of Water, which are also pretty surefire nominees but I think have a smaller chance of winning. Assuming the nominee list annoyingly ends up at being eight like usual, I see that bottom spot being taken by Darkest Hour or Mudbound (maybe they'll bring it to nine, but I don't want to overestimate the Academy's willingness to give a BP nomination to a Netflix movie). Phantom Thread and I, Tonya are other outside shots I could see taking it.

Locks:
1. Dunkirk
2. Call Me by Your Name
3. The Post
4. Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri

Very Likely:
5. Get Out
6. The Shape of Water
7. Lady Bird

Fighting for Bottom Spots:
8. Darkest Hour
9. Phantom Thread
10. Mudbound

Outside Shots:
11. I, Tonya
12. All the Money in the World
12. Downsizing


~~~BEST DIRECTOR~~~

As has been the case lately, there are plenty of completely plausible nominees for this category, but it all depends on how vanilla the Academy decides to be with their tastes. I've tried to blend optimism with realism as much as I can, but I'm not sure.

Locks:
1. Christopher Nolan (Dunkirk)
2. Steven Spielberg (The Post)

Very Likely:
3. Guillermo del Toro (The Shape of Water)
4. Luca Guadagnino (Call Me by Your Name)
5. Jordan Peele (Get Out)
6. Greta Gerwig (Lady Bird)
7. Martin McDonagh (Three Billboards)

Outside Shots:
8. Paul Thomas Anderson (Phantom Thread)
9. Ridley Scott (All the Money in the World)


~~~BEST ACTOR~~~

I really can't imagine my predicted five changing at all, honestly. Franco's spot is the most in trouble.

Predicted Five:
1. Tom Hanks (The Post)
2. Timothee Chalamet (Call Me by Your Name)
3. Daniel Day-Lewis (Phantom Thread)
4. Gary Oldman (Darkest Hour)
5. James Franco (The Disaster Artist)

Might Beat Out Franco:
6. Jake Gyllenhaal (Stronger)
7. Daniel Kaluuya (Get Out)
8. Robert Pattinson (Good Time)


~~~BEST ACTRESS~~

This is another one where I kind of can't imagine my predicted five ending up different, but the bottom spot may be in contention here as well. Numbers 6-8 would all be perfectly fine choices, but just kind of underwhelming considering the top five.

Predicted Five:
1. Saiorse Ronan (Lady Bird)
2. Frances McDormand (Three Billboards)
3. Meryl Streep (The Post)
4. Sally Hawkins (The Shape of Water)
5. Margot Robbie (I, Tonya)

Might Beat Out Margot:
6. Jessica Chastain (Molly's Game)
7. Judi Dench (Victoria and Abdul)
8. Gal Gadot (Wonder Woman)


~~~BEST SUPPORTING ACTOR~~~

Usually this category is filled to the brim with worthy and plausible nominees. This year, I think it's come down to three locks, a few that will battle it out for the bottom two spots, and then a lot of lightweight ones I don't find incredibly likely below that. That said, Dafoe has won literally every supporting actor award he could have so far, and he already looks like a surefire win even if Oscar most likely won't embrace The Florida Project as a whole.

Locks:
1. Willem Dafoe (The Florida Project)
2. Armie Hammer (Call Me by Your Name)
3. Sam Rockwell (Three Billboards)

All Fairly Likely, Will Fight For Bottom Spots:
4. Richard Jenkins (The Shape of Water)
5. Michael Stuhlbarg (Call Me by Your Name)
6. Bob Odenkirk (The Post)
7. Jason Mitchell (Mudbound)
8. Mark Rylance (Dunkirk)

Longer Shots:
9. Michael Shannon (The Shape of Water)
10. Christopher Plummer (All the Money in the World)
11. Woody Harrelson (Three Billboards)
12. Patrick Stewart (Logan)


~~~BEST SUPPORTING ACTRESS~~~

Locks:
1. Allison Janney (I, Tonya)
2. Laurie Metcalf (Lady Bird)

Likely Nominees:
3. Holly Hunter (The Big Sick)
4. Mary J. Blige (Mudbound)

Fighting For Bottom Spot:
5. Lesley Manville (Phantom Thread)
6. Octavia Spencer (The Shape of Water)
7. Melissa Leo (Novitiate)

Longer Shots:
8. Hong Chau (Downsizing)
9. Catherine Keener (Get Out)
10. Tatiana Maslany (Stronger)
11. Tiffany Haddish (Girls Trip)


~~~BEST ORIGINAL SCREENPLAY~~~

One of the most bittersweet rarities of Oscar season is when there are so many respectable choices for original screenplay, and that is the case this year. While I'm fairly certain of my predicted five, plenty of ways this could go that could ultimately alter the course of the Best Picture field.

The Predicted Five:
1. Get Out (Jordan Peele)
2. Lady Bird (Greta Gerwig)
3. Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri (Martin McDonagh)
4. The Post (Liz Hannah and Josh Singer)
5. The Shape of Water (Guillermo del Toro and Vanessa Taylor)

Could Shake Things Up:
6. Phantom Thread (Paul Thomas Anderson)
7. The Big Sick (Kumail Nanjiani and Emily V. Gordon)
8. The Florida Project (Sean Baker)
9. I, Tonya (Steven Rogers)

Outside Shots:
10. Darkest Hour (Anthony McCarten)
11. Dunkirk (Christopher Nolan)
12. Baby Driver (Edgar Wright)
13. Good Time (Safdie Brothers)
14. Downsizing (Alexander Payne and Jim Taylor)


~~~BEST ADAPTED SCREENPLAY~~~

Lots of possibilities in this one, but only because it's so bereft of legitimate competition. Call Me by Your Name is the only clear lock and the only adapted script of 2017 that seems to stand a chance with the Academy and is actually widely liked. It's not that none of these are deserving, but when left with so few films with stereotypical Oscar qualities, we've got some lighter entries than normal in this one.

Lock:
1. Call Me by Your Name (James Ivory)

Likely Nominees:
2. Mudbound (Dee Rees and Virgil Williams)
3. The Disaster Artist (Scott Neutstadter and Michael H. Weber)
4. Molly's Game (Aaron Sorking)

Outside Shots:
5. The Beguiled (Sofia Coppola)
6. Stronger (John Pollono)
7. Last Flag Flying (Richard Linklater)
8. All the Money in the World (David Scarpa)

Mainstream Releases That May Score Attention:
9. Blade Runner 2049 (Hampton Fancher and Michael Green)
10. Logan (James Mangold, Michael Green and Scott Frank)
11. Star Wars: The Last Jedi (Rian Johnson)
12. Wonder Woman (Allan Heinberg, Jason Fuchs and Zack Snyder)


~~~BEST ANIMATED FEATURE FILM~~~

Coco will win. This may be the first year in a while that there will only be three animated nominees instead of five; mainstream competition is mediocre and Academy doesn't historically pay enough attention to quality indie/foreign animated releases brought out with not much bluster, of which there are many this year.

Lock:
1. Coco

Likely Nominees:
2. The Breadwinner
3. Ferdinand

Fighting for Bottom Spots:
4. The Lego Batman Movie
5. Loving Vincent
6. Mary and the Witch's Flower
7. The Boss Baby
8. Despicable Me 3
9. A Silent Voice



I'm abstaining from Foreign Language Film until the shortlist is posted, which will be soon. Anyway, these are the main ones. I'll be addressing the technicals (VFX, editing, cinematography, design, score/song, sound) in an upcoming second blog post soon.