January 2010
I finished my rewrite! Yeah! And like God sent, doors are opening! Possibilities without guarantee, but wonderful possibilities all the same, and the puzzle seems to fit. I like the change of events as I look back at frustrations that are now turning into blessings. You just never know. The seed is planted and I am watering it with all my love.
November 30, 2009
I've been struggling these days with a pending rewrite... the images are in my head, but somehow I can't get myself to sit down and undo the puzzle. Never thought it would be so overwhelming. First I want my daughter safe, on track, headed for college... a place where she can thrive and become the beautiful potential that she is. This stage of her life is my biggest challenge, it's when she has a mind of her own, yet not formed, vulnerable to outside influence, her peers, the media, the trends, and here I am playing mother courage. But she gets it, and we don't give up. During those free moments for myself I fantasize... and dream up Jonas' story, his life as he is about to enter the world of Dali. The balance, the juggling... will never stop, if it's not one thing it's another. The challenge is what enriches our lives in the end. The balance between dreams and reality. What is most important? Both! Like night and day, they need each other. Everything about this script is amazing! Dali's magic is all over it. Timing... It's a good thing I have learned patience, and the sound of my intuition, when it speaks to me in abstract ways, or knocks on my door, I respond and see that The Duende was watching. It is disheartening to have to have to go back to square one for rewrites; struggle, torment, freedom at the end. I feel like my daughter, looking to find anything to distract me.. the fridge, the cleaning, the friends, the errands... "Sit still, lift your hand with your pencil and write, or open the laptop and type! without stop... there is something that needs to come out, and you don't know what it is, you don't have to know! not yet, later when it's finished you might know, even then you don't have to explain yourself!" Like being pregnant and not knowing what is your child going to look like, or be in 9 months. I make a promise - to myself, that by the end of December I will have a new version completed. Juan asked me for this rewrite so that he can give the script to an actor that he has in mind, who he's worked with on many films and observed being the perfect Salvador Dali. I saw this actor in a film today... and yes, very exciting, Juan is so right, "he" would be indeed, great. He and Glenn would be perfect. This is not a story about Salvador Dali and Gala, this is a story about a young man, Jonas, who gets sucked into a world of bling bling and doesn't know what hit him or how to get out of it. Because when he finds himself in that world of success, he notices the poison running through his veins. Dali and Gala are like the hurricane, they are the catalysts, and through this fable we get to learn about these Icons of the 20th Century. So yeah, Jonas is instrumental, Jonas is the main character. In a few hours it will be December 1st, I won't sleep tonight, I need to submerge myself into this story... I hope to send Juan and his family, a Christmas card along with the revised script. That would be nice. I better get to work.
THE PERSISTENCE OF MEMORY
a reading @
TORN PAGE SALON
435 west 22 street / NYC / 212.620.0399
Took place on SUNDAY May 31st, 2009 at 6:pm
A young man with delusions of grandeur meets Salvador Dali and his lascivious wife, Gala. Jonas wants their "Dolce Vita" Life-style and schemes to become Dali’s model and Gala’s lover. During this one-year roller coaster affair through New York, Cadaques and Rome, we see how the Dalis chew him up and spit him out, just as with all the other psychotic celebrity "star fuckers".
no reservations necessary
quotes by SALVADOR DALI
"Drawing is the honesty of the art. There is no possibility
of cheating. It is either good or bad."
"Mistakes are almost always of a sacred nature. Never try to correct them. On the contrary: rationalize them, understand them thoroughly. After that, it will be possible for you to sublimate them."
"In order to acquire a growing and lasting respect in society, it is a good thing, if you possess great talent, to give, early in your youth, a very hard kick to the right shin of the society that you love. After that, be a snob."
"I am painting
pictures which make me die for joy, I am creating with an absolute naturalness,
without the slightest aesthetic concern, I am making things that inspire me
with a profound emotion and I am trying to paint them honestly."
"I do not
paint a portrait to look like the subject, rather does the person grow to look
like his portrait."
"I don't
take drugs: I am drugs."
"The difference between false statements and true ones is the same as for jewels: it is always the false ones that look the most real, the most brilliant until you look closely."
"I have
Dalínian thought: the one thing the world will never have enough of is the
outrageous."
"Intelligence
without ambition is a bird without wings."
"There are
some days when I think I'm going to die from an overdose of satisfaction."
"Those who
do not want to imitate anything, produce nothing."
"When
I was five years old I saw an insect that had been eaten by ants and of which
nothing remained except the shell. Through the holes in its anatomy one could
see the sky. Every time I wish to attain purity I look at the sky through
flesh."
"Have no fear of perfection, you'll never reach it."
"The thermometer of success is merely the jealousy of the malcontents."
“I am going to my room to masturbate before I have a light lunch, if you would like to come and watch?”
_______________ **** ____________
The Persistence of Memory is a rapturous one year adventure in the company of Salvador Dalí and his lascivious muse, Gala, icons of the Twentieth Century seen through the eyes of a young gorgeous man, Jonas, who’s been chosen by Dali to be his model, and eventually Gala’s lover.
The father abandoned Jonas, and his mother when Jonas was very young, (or so the cunning mother repeatedly tells her guilt ridden son).
One night, Jonas comes home from working as a ticket taker at the 42nd St. movie theater, and tells his mother that Salvador Dali and his wife, Gala, approached him to ask if he would like to model for Dali and if they could have his phone number. Jonas’ mother overwhelmed with self-interest pushes the boy to do what ever they ask, in order to benefit from the celebrity couple's favors. Jonas is impressed more with Dali’s talent then with what he could gain on a personal level. But surely the mother opens the boy's eyes to the monetary possibilities. Jonas secretly dreams of one day becoming a famous actor, thus why he works at the theater; to view European films for free, study the actors in them, and visualize his dreams. Jonas is burdened by his mother's constant financial demands while complaining that she could have been a performer had it not been for his birth.
The Dali’s enthusiastically suck young Jonas into their tantalizing Dolce Vita lifestyle, one that will change and affect Jonas forever. Jonas is happy to have money to give to his mother, and to build the hope of making something grand of him-self.
Jonas struggles not to fall, but naively finds himself entrapped in a web of sexual payment camouflaged by the newness and glitter of it all, but mostly by the genius of Dali and Gala.
Besides Dali being a comical genius, he and Gala are entertaining, witty, astute and powerful. They offer him many lavish things and quickly adopt him as their son, a son they also must fuck.
He travels to Spain with them, to Dali's hometown in Cadaques, in the Mediterranean sea, where young Jonas falls in love with a girl his age, a girl who awakens in him true love.
Gala wanting to prevent this affair, takes Jonas away with her to Rome to meet Fellini, the director who Jonas dreams of working with. He screen tests for the maestro, and though Jonas has impressed Fellini, when Gala again throws herself unto him, demanding sexual payback, this time Jonas choses to reject Gala and turns away from any and all of her offerings. He refuses to continue playing her game, playing her “boy toy” in exchange for a life of subjected humiliation, besides, he is in love with a girl Gala could never compete with, because no money could buy her youth and beauty.
On their return to Cadaques, we see that Dali has found himself another young naïve stud, a spitting image of what Jonas once was, their new acquired replacement. The Dali’s throw an end of summer party, and Jonas hoping to say goodbye with amends, brings his young beautiful Julia to come along. An enraged Gala doesn’t allow the farewell to end so politely, and upon seeing the girl in her house, all malevolence comes spitting out of her, sending Jonas and the girl out into a tragic abyss.
The film begins with an older Jonas teaching acting to a group of students, then recounting his story to one of them, as she looks at a Dali painting that hangs on Jonas’ kitchen wall and he begins with an admission that he stole that painting.
==============
This is a morality play about ambition, greed, power and ultimately redemption. Through the Dali’s secret lifestyle, we observe Dalí’s ability to explore the creative process to understand and exploit his own phobias and flaws to their potential, this aspect is exposed as an intrinsic part of the story. Jonas reveals how Salvador Dalí and his wife Gala chew up and spit out lives, impact history, culture, and either pervert or turn to gold everything that they touch. This is a fictionalized story based on real life accounts, a flamboyant comedy and a dark, perverse tragedy, all wrapped up in one, set to a backdrop of New York, Cadaques and Rome of the early sixties.
This is a film apt to have universal appeal because of Salvador Dali’s place in the world of art as being one of the greatest painters of our time, and his outrageous comedic personality that transcends race and gender. Dali and Gala are heroic business allies, and their love is original and unconventional. Gala’s shrewd commerce sense, and Dali’s genius has influenced the business of art like no other. Gala broke with social norms, and the older she got the younger were her lovers. This is a sexy, fun and yet powerfully profound story that will attract audiences from all walks of life. There is intrigue, mystery, thrill, fashion, glamour, pathos, wit, and historical facts all wrapped up in one cinematic beautiful message of redemption.
The budget for this 60’s period piece is roughly estimated at 15 million.
I am blessed that my first choice for the role of Gala Dali, the elegant and acclaimed, Glenn Close, read the script, and after a meeting and discussion of the project, committed with a signed letter of intention. The amazing Director of Photography, Juan Ruiz-Anchia, also is very interested in making this film his directorial debut.
I am working on this "hopefully" final rewrite, and focusing on the one character that needed a little more development and empathy, young Jonas. I’m getting him.
i would love for the role of Dali to be played by the great Robert De Niro, and young Jonas by a hot young unknown, someone who is a virgin at the beginning of the film and by the end, has been deflowered. For the role of Older Jonas, I see Dennis Hopper.
For inquiries, please contact: plaza.begonya@gmail.com
© WGA begonyaplaza, 2004 - All Rights Reserved.
© Begonya Plaza 2008, All Rights Reserved
Comments