Why Psychotherapist (pt. 2 – tangent)
In the course of moving towards a practice (which has begun, if gradually), my wife and I have been renovating our basement for nearly the past year. Yes, one of those reno’s. The purpose of which was so that I could work out of the house as opposed to rent office space (which is not cheap in downtown Toronto).
It’s been a learning experience: learning about renovations, learning about doing long bouts of manual labour beside a loved one, learning about the ways in which two people can live together, be married and all that, yet have different approaches toward planning and executing large-scale operations. On this note, it’s also been about communicating, dealing with stress, and knowing when to take a break (from the basement).
Most recently, my wife – who is an amazing designer – designed a compact website for my practice: please visit. With the basement almost done, and a website online (heck, I also have business cards), it seems all of the hallmarks (and clichés) of “change” are ringing true.
Of course, the practice is in its infancy. I am still working hard on a Hollywood 3D dance film, and waiting to hear back from my agent (can’t get used to typing those two words) about the most recent revision to my novel that I submitted.
I will let you know how it proceeds.
Here’s an interesting question someone asked me, when they heard I was studying to practice as a psychotherapist. I will discuss this in an upcoming blog post:
“Do you feel pressure to be a better person?”
Photo: Police Station (film set)
Why Psychotherapist? (pt. 1)
It would seem a bit of a 180° turn, to go from someone who works behind the scenes of film and TV shows to becoming a psychotherapist. It’s not a dramatic story, but over time I’ve found that my strengths have always been interpersonal, particularly when talking about weighty matters. Friends have always valued what I offered in our discussions: impartiality, a different perspective – something more than just sympathy or advice. Combine this with my artsy leanings, my active life as a fiction writer, and the simple fact that I’ve had more than one person say “You should be a therapist”, I decided that it was something to look into.
Actually, it was something I mostly talked about, rather than looked into. It was my partner who happened upon the website of the institute that I ended up enrolling in. The more I looked into it, even though it had been a very long time since studying anything relating to psychology or psychotherapy, the more it felt right (or at least, worth the risk if it didn’t turn out to be something I liked).
And, slowly, I came to this place: a year-and-a-half later, an almost-renovated office in the basement, business cards and website in the works. I’m still enrolled in the program (halfway through my second of three years) and hope to take on clients part-time in the next month as a therapist-in-training. Of course, I’m still going to be working in film until I’ve completed the projects that I’ve started. I have no clue how the transition will go: slowly, quickly, easy, bumpy. Not sure.
That said, being a psychotherapist, I am discovering, feels natural. I have no hesitation sitting in the therapist’s chair and sharing time and space with someone who needs to talk. It is an obviously challenging career, but one that I feel better-suited to than what I am currently doing.
Happy New Year & More…
Hello all,
Not much updating lately. There is a reason. Actually, two:
1) I’ve signed with a literary agency who are interested in my current novel. This is great/fabulous/OMG news. However, because there are substantive revisions to be made (in order to clarify some of the details in the book and make it easier to sell to a publisher), my time is taken up with that.
2) I am beginning my career transition, from film/TV Post Production Supervisor to Psychotherapist. I haven’t really made that public here, but it’s happening. I will begin to discuss it soon, because obviously it will need some explanation. Part of the transition has been renovating our basement to be an office – while this is a great idea (even still), it’s also been a great deal of work and stress and cost.
So, as you can see, particularly when you factor-in work-work, my plate is full. I will send updates here as they happen – or you can simply subscribe to updates. I will obviously have much to share with you about how both of these developments…um, develop.
Needless to say, it’s an exciting, somewhat scary time.
Photo: In Sink
Brief Reviews: The Perfect Host
When I saw that David Hyde Pierce was going to be in a movie where he got to play a villainous dinner host, I thought it had everything going for it. When, later, I saw the trailer for the film, I found myself very much interested in seeing it.
And then nothing happened. I never saw it released in theatres. It didn’t even make the local rounds as a limited or art house theatrical release.
Then, one day, I’m walking through Queen Video and I see it on the shelf. Hot damn, thinks I. I take the tag to the counter and the cool video girl says I really want to see this. I then comment on the fact that I never saw it released in theatres, that this is typically – certainly not in this movie’s case – the mark of Cain. I think we both looked at each other for a moment, then I settled up and took the DVD home.
The Perfect Host has a great premise: a bank robber (Clayne Crawford, eerily reminiscent of Ray Liotta), fleeing capture, takes shelter under false pretenses as a guest of Warwick Wilson (Pierce), a rather elegant, if odd-mannered home owner who is about to throw a party for friends. However, the thief discovers that his host is more than he seems – that he is in fact a sadistic bully who wants to have fun with his prey.
The problem, and this becomes apparent quite soon, is that Warwick’s impending dinner party is all in his head. His guests are imaginary. That’s right: HE’S INSANE. This wouldn’t be so bad if it wasn’t for the fact that the trailer didn’t really make this apparent, and suddenly what promises to be a suspenseful nail-biter (a thief hiding in a crowd of strangers sizzles on the page, after all) turns into a ho-hum, sometimes awkward two-hander. While David Hyde Pierce (who many will know as Niles Crane, from TV’s Frasier) is certainly up to the job in the role of Wilson, the script hits an early dead-end after the initial setup, leaving him and Crawford to play in a lame version of Sleuth as directed by Quentin Tarantino.
What’s worse is that, despite the low-budget compromises and lack of other real characters to impact upon the action (after all, who gives a shit about what imaginary house guests think), The Perfect Host shows promises of becoming a better film via flashbacks of the thief’s backstory, but by the last act (and certainly the ending) the logic is stretched beyond respect for the intelligence of the viewer, with far too many plot holes. Considering the talent wasted, this is sort of tragic.
The Dread of Zombies
Everyone is waiting for the zombie genre (in books, television, and particularly film) to whither away like a desiccated corpse. I argue that it’s here to stay – that, in fact, it has stronger legs (ugh) than most other genres of the macabre.
The dread of zombies imagined – the tiredness some of us feel with each iteration (Pride and Prejudice and Zombies, The Walking Dead, Zombieland) – is understandable. Less understandable than with vampires, but understandable still. There are too many zombie and zombie-like (for the record, 28 Weeks Later is not, strictly-speaking, a zombie film, yet it more or less qualifies itself by virtue of many shared) themes in books, shows, and movies these days. But I would argue that it’s because – due to our increased connectedness to each other via the Internet and social media – we are exposed to real life zombies. Thematic zombies. Metaphorical zombies. And the exposure stands to increase.
A shitload of people voted for a complete ass to be the mayor of Toronto. A shit. Load. Mind you, not many who lived downtown did. Still, it was a rout. People like me – people who prize intelligent discourse over pot shots, people who would prefer to be ruled by someone with an informed conscience rather than a bullet-list of to-dos – were incredulous. It didn’t even matter what quadrant of the political spectrum Rob Ford occupied: he was the last person any reasonably well-informed person would have wanted. And yet he won in spades.
Thematic zombies. Metaphorical zombies. The dread of zombies.
Who voted for him? Who can say that they “understand” him? Are they too not also zombies by virtue of his succession to the throne of city council? Faceless, nameless, godless, conscience-less hordes hefted Mr. Ford to office, and we stand here still – a year later – asking ourselves just what the hell happened, watching the circus of political buffoonery before our eyes.
Lest this become a solely personal treatise, isn’t this the same for everyone? Aren’t we witnessing “zombie activity” in other guises: large groups of seemingly nameless, faceless, godless, conscience-less hordes blindly enabling things we fundamentally disagree with but are powerless to dispell? For me it’s the rise of Rob Ford, for others it could be the Occupy movement. For others still, it could be the revolution in Tahrir Square. The massive, faceless but powerful other. The faceless, godless, conscience-less hordes…with agency.
Thematic zombies. Metaphorical zombies. The dread of zombies.
No, it is not going away. Make popcorn.
Photo: Me During A “Retreat”
Keyhole Trailer
Here’s a trailer for Keyhole, the Guy Maddin film I worked on: