Andrea Mann

Andrea Mann is a British screenwriter

The Goals Post

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James Taylor’s great song ‘October Road’, or as I am currently hearing it in my head: ‘October Goals’

I have just written down my October goals. I do this every month (write down that month’s goals, not my October goals – that would be weird, except for in October), and they cover all kinds of things, though they tend to focus on work and health/fitness.

I by no means always attain them – especially the health/fitness ones – but, as I touched on in my last post, I try to keep them to goals I can control.  There’s no point in me writing, for example, that my goal is to win a BAFTA – especially as the BAFTA Film Awards take place in February, not October. No. Instead, for example, one goal I’ve written down this month is: ‘Deliver an outline I’m proud of, to deadline’. Those are pretty much aspects I can control when it comes to my current work project – which is, you guessed it, writing an outline (a prose document written ahead of a script) for some lovely producers, to an upcoming deadline in October.

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Wishin’ and Hopin’ and Musin’

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Not saying I had a mild panic attack halfway up those steps, but… I don’t wanna talk about things I’ve gone through

I have just returned from the most wonderful holiday on the most beautiful Greek island: Skopelos, aka where they filmed Mamma Mia!. Just as it took me approximately 20 years to start watching The Sopranos – no spoilers please, I’m still on season 5! – I waited for Skopelos’s ABBA-related tourism craziness to die down a little before heading there, ie I lay low for a mere 16 years. I can attest that the craziness has indeed died down, though I can also attest that a) the hour-long boat ride which took us from Skiathos to Skopelos played the soundtrack for the final half of that hour, as did our bus to the boat taking us back; and b) my husband and I ended up in a bar in Skopelos Town on Saturday night dancing to Gimme! Gimme! Gimme! with big goofy smiles on our faces.

So… I’m writing this because I realised on holiday that I wanted to start writing about some of the thoughts that ping around my head – and the ‘Musings’ section of my website seems like a good place to post these, well, musings. They will most likely my thoughts about writing, and screenwriting in particular, and creativity in general. But no doubt other things, too – like life after breast cancer.  

I hope these posts can be in some way interesting and/or helpful; I suspect that they will at least be the latter for me personally. Because I’m also doing this as a result of being inspired by a tweet I read some time ago (apologies but I don’t remember who posted it), which advised people who do creative work – especially those of us whose work and careers are very dependent upon other people’s decisions and actions – to do something creative which is purely for you, and controlled by you from start to finish.

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Ilkley Write-In

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I’m starting a fortnightly ‘write-in’ at wonderful local Ilkley café Outside The Box.

I’m usually writing a) from home and b) alone, so thought it would be nice to start up something like this for anyone who’s in a similar boat. I’m hoping that, in the words of a certain great screenplay/novel: If you build it, they will come. 😀

The write-in will be at the café on the first and third Wednesdays of the month (so: 5 June, 19 June, 3 July, 17 July and so on), between 10am and 12pm.

It’s not a writers’ group – ie. there’s no need to share or even talk about what you’re working on – just a friendly space where you can meet fellow writers and work alongside each other in a supportive environment. (And eat cake, if you so wish. Although by definition I think the mere presence of cake counts as ‘a supportive environment’.)

Everyone’s welcome, whatever your age and whatever you’re writing – whether it’s for work or pleasure, fiction or non-fiction, a play or screenplay, poetry, short stories, articles… or something else!

Just bring your laptop (or pen and paper!), and come down for the whole two hours, or just an hour, or half an hour… drop in/out whenever you like.

Outside The Box has a great full food menu – as well as serving fabulous coffees, teas and cakes, of course – so it’s a great place to stay on afterwards for lunch, too.

Any questions, just drop me a line at andrea@andreamann.com. And hopefully see you there!