Overheard at Table 3: Morning Mist

 

"Driving in today, the fog was so thick you couldn't see from one streetlamp to the other.  I like that.

It's eerie, but quiet ... somehow calming.   I was so relaxed when I got to work.  Not stressed at all, like I usually am."

Overheard at Booth 2: Lucky's Take on Santa Claus

Lucky Moran: I don't really see how Santa can be such a 'right jolly old elf.'

Otis Redwing: Because he only comes once a year?

Lucky:  HEY!  How did you know I was gonna say that.

Otis: The year may change, but your jokes stay the same.

Lucky: The classics never go out of style!

Otis: Keep telling yourself that.

Overheard at Table 2: Psychological or Spiritual

1: Is it psychological or is it spiritual?

2. Is there a difference?

1: Of course there is a difference!  One is the mind and the other is the soul.

2: But what if they are both the same?

1: How can they both be the same?  One is one thing and the other is the other.

2: But how do you KNOW?

1: I know it in my mind and I feel it in my soul.  THAT's how I know.

Overheard at Table 2: Tehrangeles

 May have been the same BBC show, think it was “News Hour” with Nikki Beatty, but they were talking to other British actors and there was one of whom they asked to describe how it was to work in Hollywood.  She replied that she liked working in LA and the main difference was that, in England, everyone did every job on set, while in Hollywood, every job was compartmentalized: A gaffer was a gaffer, a set designer did set designs, and she was free simply to focus on nothing more than her lines.  She found it freeing.

She also mentioned that she found a sort of “home away from home.” The actress talking was Israeli, born to Iranian parents, and she met a lot of Iranians in Hollywood.  She said, in fact they called it “Tehrangeles.”  (Tehran + Los Angeles)

Overheard at Table 2L Matthew McConaughey on the Future of the Movie Theater

Strange how we need to hear Biblical lessons from people of the world.  Non-believers.  Or, if they are believers, you would never be able to tell from their lifestyles.  Anyway, though, heard a BBC interview with Matthew McConaughey a few weeks back and he said something really insightful, truly insightful.   

They were discussing the death of the movie theatre as we know it: COVID has killed the movie-going experience.  They asked McConaughey if he was afraid regular movie going experience would never return.

His answer: “I’m not ‘afraid’ of it.  I don’t have any fear of anything I can’t control. What happens with movies is totally out of my hands.  It’s like when I fly on a plane.  I don’t have any fear because I know I’m not the second best pilot of the plane.  So I just accept that whatever happens to the plane is not up to me.”

And even though the questioner probably meant something different than actual “fear,” the response was brilliant, and Biblical.  “Take no thought of today, tomorrow has succifient evil.”  This whole philosophy is to teach us that we can only control what is within our control, which is, at the end of everything, our reaction to circumstances.  Almost everything else in this world is beyond our control, and so, it does not good to fear it or worry about it.   That only prevents us from preparing ourselves how to react adequately to it.

Overheard at Table 3: Cadejo

 "I'm not really sure about the story line yet," he said, "but I've got the main character.  Her name is Cadejo, and she roams the Mexico/US border looking for coyotes and traffickers ... and kills them.  Frees the kids.  Gets the kids to safe houses.  She leaves water in the desert.  She's no friend of the cartels and she's no friend of the CBP, and she gets into run-ins with both of them.  But she's badass.  Like, super-badass."

Overheard at Table 2: Redemption

Script Idea:  A Televangelist comes to know Jesus Christ and then seeks redemption.

The beginning of the movie shows the televangelist at the top of his game - his church is filled with 20,000 people each sermon, all cheering at the end of almost every sentence.  He has the "hot" blonde wife, the private jet, the mansion, everything.

Then, one time he doesn't have a stock sermon ready, so he decides to actually open the Bible and begin to read it.   This is important: most movies would have some "Shock!" moment, that would change his life.  This should be as he reads the Word, he becomes more and more convinced that he is living outside of God's will.  

Gradually he begins to change.  People start to notice.  His wife starts to distance herself from him.  His staff gets more and more disgruntled.  and his congregation begins to turn on him.  They do not want to hear the real message of Christ.

How to end it?

Having him in a small church in an inner city would be too stereotypical.

It would be better to have him not be able to get a job, even at small churches, because his face is still recognizable.

Better to have the movie end with him in a totally different profession altogether.

And the last scene could be a small Bible study group in his living room.