why i live my life on facebook

i woke up with a start at 420 am (yeah) with some ideas that i wanted to write down. including some new antics for chausette, my new born stoner sock puppet. after writing furiously so i wouldn't forget anything, i am now completely buck awake.

coffee? of course. i fired up the espresso machine and made myself a tall water with lime.

i realized again why i like facebook & blogging. my days are so free form, around meetings and shooting and playing and creating, all on my schedule. when i write things down on facebook it's like an electrical journal for me. i still have paper notebooks too, mostly for drawing.

i remember writing a facebook note after a friend had said "what's it like with a job where you're not really helping anybody". my friend wasn't interested in the answer but i was. so i wrote it down... and then people commented and discussed... and i realized that storytelling can be the best way to help someone. so yeah, thanks facebook.

i love going off the grid just as much. i'm not big into rules or doing something just for the sake of doing it. right now i will live my life on facebook.

lisa anita wegner

boss lady of the dufferson herman arts umbrella/ mighty brave productions

Work Space, Live Space, Play Space, Solo Space.

If you'd have told me that I'd be living alone and working in my living space in 2011, I'd would have said 'no way Jose'. Well, sunrise surprise here I am living solo and working out of my front room. And the best part is how much I dig it.

With a roommate, my space would be too small to work in. And how amazing to have no overhead and half personal living expenses become right offs? Extremely amazing. For six years I had a workspace outside my house and I loved (sometimes -ha-) being able to walk away from work. Sometimes I didn't want to. Now I just unplug my work phone lines when I'm done.

I guess the real surprise is how much I heart living alone. I lived with my parents or with a partner my whole life. And one year with a highschool friend. I was always used to having someone around, eating meals at a table and being in reasonable touch with someone and sort of having a congruent social schedule. I didn't think I'd be interested in the solo living.

Sunrise surprise number two. I love the freedom; I eat candy in the morning; walk my dogs at 3am; wear pajamas all day; nap when I want; turn my phone off; go to High Park all day and anything else I can think of. I have people over when I want and then total peace when I want.

I think everyone that does something all the time (like living with someone) would benefit from taking a break from it. And then it's crystal obvious if you want to go back to it. I do think I'll partner up again, and at that time move my work out. But maybe after this freedom I won't want to.

Possibilities are delicious.

Fondly

Dr. Lisa Anita Wegner

The days & nights of an indie film producer.

Hello Public Broadcasting Readers,

I starting blogging in 2008 while I was prepping for the Cannes Film Festival. I got a lot out of it but after just a few postings I got very sick. So hello again. Nearly three years later I am back. Still creating content, telling stories, and getting them made.

Here is what's on my mind today:

I realized how much of my creative thinking I do while I am walking my two dogs. Stories, scripts, ways to pitch and problem solving are all things that come to me when I'm doing other things. And when my mind is somewhat occupied with something else. I have some techniques for helping this process but best is not to force it. Trudging through the snow in my snowsuit playing with dogs is a perfect time for a story point I had been stuck on for weeks to literally comes to me. Shazam.

It's not earth shattering news, I think this is a common phenomenon. But it was neat for me to figure out again and good for me to practice.

Coming in after dog walks and jotting everything down, made me notice how much content comes in that way. The nuts and bolts of producing fill days but the storytelling creative part of me, the part that I am proud of and that allows me to do this work, rarely comes alive while I'm sitting at my desk. So I thank my dogs. I wonder if Dufferson and Tanner will be the only canines with writing credits in film?

I am still easing in to work and currently working with a playful creative partner and happy to be back on track.

Also recently very inspired by Jim Henson and his amazing brain. I always loved The Muppet Show when I was little but investigating the worlds and characters that JH created have really opened my mind. He is a story telling inspiration machine. And the Muppet Show Cast Album is great on the ipod.

I was wanting to embed The Muppet Show season one opening here, but a link will have to do because I couldn't figure it out.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z-_QLNkh-zI

BTW who are the the 6 YouTube bastards who don't like the Muppet opening?

Looking forward,

Lisa Anita Wegner

Mighty Forces Cradle The Brave

I just realized that France is the home country of Jeanne D’Arc, my personal heroine and logo mistress of Mighty Brave. At fourteen years old she charmed the King of France and she led the army to save this very country.

It is a breathtakingly beautiful here in Biot, where the condo is located. (There is a nearby town called Biach, which made me laugh when I saw it on the car GPS.) From here is a short drive to the Cannes Film festival along gorgeous French country roads. It is lush and green with fragrant blooming flowers, interesting architecture, birds, rabbits, frogs and fountains everywhere. Bentley’s and other fancy cars line the streets and the one thing I can honestly say I am not keen on are the rich French folk who live in this area. They are not really my kind of people. The wait staff and workmen are more my speed than the snooty rich boys at the country club who radiate their belief that they are god’s gift to the world. Yuck.

I had another rough sick day, stayed in bed and sweated and slept through most of it. I remember Carlie trying to wake me. I tried to take a bath but was instantly too hot. I still haven’t made it to the festival, although I found out where there is local free parking from another producer and got a good party invite, unfortunately for when I’m gone. I also got offered services free from a concierge company.

Today I was intending to drive Carlie to the train station but kept waking in and out of delirium having strange obvious dreams. I was freezing and then sweaty and couldn’t keep food or drink down. I had a dream I was trying to call on an old rotary phone and it kept dialing the wrong number and then the dial melted. I tried to meet a friend and kept missing busses and was led astray down wrong streets.

I really feel cut off without a local phone. Carlie took the French cell because she didn’t want to travel without it. The lovely receptionist here who is less that cheerful still hasn’t given me an internet password so I’m still piggybacking my neighbour’s password which is patchy as a quilt. I tried to send Kim an email for about 40 minutes and feeling like I was going to cry then gave up. I tried several different payphones and the hotel phone but none can call out. I feel a tad helpless and cut off but have had lots of support through sporadic emails that do come through. Also the lobby of the nearby hostel has free internet that works. So I have walked over there a few times with my laptop. And the traveling students are much kinder.

I am in the lap of luxury here. Beautiful lush countryside, with a closet full of designer gowns and a BMW and I can’t make a phone call to save my life!

After sleeping and eating a bit, I feel more human and just took another of my late night walks and after raiding the BMW of the toll change I bought chips and a latte from the vending machine at that youth hostel. The chips did the trick to make me thirsty, I wanted to drink a bunch of water. I know coffee might not be the best late night beverage but c’est la vie! They don’t seem to have decaf coffee in France.

Carlie has left, she took the train from Cannes and then is flying home tomorrow. Kim is arriving tomorrow and the best news is producer John Davidson is joining her and he will be staying in the condo with us. He is a good friend of hers and a well known producer who was asked by Jen Luc Goddard to produce the master’s last film. He told Kim and I all about dining with The King of France at Cannes and all kinds of other useful and interesting tidbits. Gracious kind and fun, he is my favourite kind of people. He’s not pretentious at all, despite his acclaim.

And I also got a Cannes travel donation emailed to me from a friend. I am the luckiest girl in the world.

Tomorrow I get the condo in order, wash my sweaty pajamas do my best to get clean sheets and finally get to the darn tootin’ festival. I am going to be so happy to see the lovely Miss Poirier and Mr. Davidson. They will be like a vision of an angel and a knight in shining armour, the deus ex machina in the story of this last week.

A few other noteworthy tidbits from today:

It’s a lot quicker to use the emergency exit of the condo to get the hostel so the last time I went there I stuck a Tick Tak box in the door to prop it open. As I was walking away the alarm went off and I imagined the receptionist popping out of the bushes and accusing me.. When I got back the door was shut and my minty little whities were nowhere to be seen.

The first time I went to get snacks at the hostel I ran into French frat boys watching bad porn and they gave me change for the machine. The second time I went to use their lobby internet a sleazy guy in tight pants and pointy shoes offered me cocaine. Now that is just what I need. Last time I went out two cute well spoken French guys driving a real mini stopped me asking if I wanted to party. I was wearing Little Miss Giggles PJs and I just stared at them until they drove away.

I will end on a completely different note. My friend and writer Catherine Jenkins just found out that she got accepted into her chosen PHd program (www.catherinejenkins.com). She is working with Kate Meier and I on a little passion project of Mighty Brave’s about breast cancer entitled THE MOMENT. Kate is already working on her PHd so I have two very smart ladies backing me up on this one. Do two PHd candidates balance out one university drop out?

And that’s it. The sun is rising and I’m going to nap again before getting up for the day. It truly is beautiful here. Thank you all for the endless support and encouragement. This truly has been one memorable week.

Lisa Anita Wegner,
Mighty Brave Productions
www.mightybrave.com

Off The Grid: the true story of a Canadian film producer.

I am a Canadian independent film producer who owns a small production company in Toronto and I am currently completely off the grid. I have relinquished my work, my office, my Facebook account, my email and my cell phone to my team.



Last night after a late writing meeting (Life On The Edge a new script by Emily Pohl-Weary www.emilypohlweary.com) and Cannes prep my fellow producers and my lovely assistant Carlie did a life intervention on me. I’m not kidding. We are heading to Cannes International Film Festival for the first time in less than a week. I own five properties that I adore and am stoked about. My little company is flourishing and finally getting some Canadian recognition… and I am in the middle of having a nervous breakdown from exhaustion. Working usually more than 12 hours a day with my cell phone ringing most nights and weekends, I never stop. Mighty Brave Productions ( www.mightybrave.com ) is essentially me backed by a huge creative family whom I’ve been collecting for my whole life. Things are in theory set up to progress without me, but somehow the calls and questions never stop. After our last night’s intervention powwow it became clear that is not possible to go to or plan our time in Cannes if I am down for the count physically and emotionally.


We have a short film as part of the Short Film Corner 2008 22:00 called The Gospel of Phi. This is awesome but not nearly as exciting as the fact that SPOTVISION (an awesome Canadian Company www.spotvision.com) is sponsoring us so that we have a trailer spot on the ginormous screens that are all over Cannes. These spots are usually reserved for studios. Some of the screens are big as 20 meters ha ha. My folks thought I misunderstood something in that sponsorship, but no I didn’t. Mighty Brave Productions will be splashed all over Cannes 871 times during the festival to the eyes of the worldwide film community. My mug is up there too (I am an actress/ producer for those who don’t know me) so this is all excellent. We have clothing sponsors, media support, fans and people helping us. I have properties I love and a team I trust. What more could I want?

Well I want the phone to stop ringing so I can sleep. I want our generous private donors to become more wealthy and suddenly, unexpectedly generous. I want a surprise twenty five thousand dollar cheque in my mailbox. I want all my films to suddenly make residuals. I want my creative team to have zest and meet all dead lines cheerfully and graciously. I want everyone to take responsibility for themselves. I want our commercial clients to pay on time. I don’t want shoot dates to change. I want Bell Telephone to stop lying to me and remove all the unwarranted charges that I can’t afford and never agreed to. I want a phone line in the office that doesn’t cost more than my mortgage. I want to have money to pay my assistant. I want family and friends to stop thinking I’m unemployed (26 awards, a dance with an Emmy nomination, and a Canadian Comedy Award later - one CCA actress nomination lost to Catherine O’Hara For Your Consideration www.canadiancomedyawards.ca ).

I want to feel safe that my little dog won’t be taken away (family politics). I want to have enough money to pay my bills and I want to feel relaxed and on top of my game in Cannes. I want to drink coffee in my backyard. I want my neighbour to stop bullying me to pay to cut down a tree that over hangs his property. I want the electricity in the office to not short every day. I want my office landlady to see how much value I’ve added to the space by renovating and cleaning and not jack the rent.

Well. I have the coffee and the silence.

I am off the grid. If you call my cell you get my assistant. No one knows where I am. To make call I have to use a payphone just like Tony Soprano. I have peeked on Facebook from my home computer but I can’t write to my friends because I am ordered off the computer and people are watching my F’book feed. I feel free, excited and um…is that a twinge of relaxation I feel?

Now that I’ve gotten that all out of my system I have some more goodness to share. But first of all …nobody knows where I am (sing song-y voice).

Like I said before I own five properties. Can you believe it, little old me, poverty stricken little producer no one takes seriously, owns five film properties. Life On The Edge by Emily Pohl Weary is one –she is nicknamed this generations’ sleazy Judy Blume. This one has also a wicked soundtrack but together by music producer Matthew Redman from local Parkdale bands. We come by our cool honestly!
Second I’m stoked about Chasing Aces to which I have producer and Canadian celebrity actress Kim Poirier (www.kimpoirier.com) and most recently the awesome and hilarious raw talent of Montreal internet phenomenon Jon LaJoie ( www.jonlajoie.com ). Here is an article from the Star from last week about Jon http://www.thestar.com/article/420002. Currently this script has no writer… if I had two weeks of extra time I could explain why. The short film version of Chasing Aces is the film that put us on the local indie map. It got us noticed. For long and complicated reasons, I will not have a one pager to take to Cannes. C’est la vie. One cannot take blood from a stone. Unless the stone is one of those god damned bloody ones. I would like to add in here that Christine Vachon is my hero, she is an independent producer out of New York ( www.killerfilms.com ) and I always live by her creed (is that the term I mean?) “Find talent and stick to it like glue.” Just last week I added to my Facebook quotes “If talent becomes to difficult, set it free.” –Lisa Wegner. I am not sure if anyone noticed.


Third property is a story by Morgan Drmaj (producer writer director of The Smart Women’s Survival Guide http://smartwoman.wnetwork.com) David Kohn and John R. Taylor called The Harrowing. Also starring Miss Poirier. This one pager and script will be ready to go, thank god.

Fourth script is Pandaemonium Rising, a terrific thinking man’s script based on Milton’s Paradise Lost. I picked this up from Isaac Rayment and James Hobday. They have been working on it for seven years before I came on board. It is a script with terrific potential. I gave my focus, my money and my team to them for weeks and the script was getting exciting. And in the last months the writing has fallen apart. What’s a girl to do? I used to want to play Vee the main female character, but the way the script is progressing I am no longer interested. There will be a one pager and I will get these writers inspired somehow. If you look at the MySpace site set up by Isaac you can read about the film. The owning shares idea is his and is not legally valid to do in Canada for some reason I don’t completely understand. www.myspace.com/pandaemoniumrisingmovie

I will insert here that during all this my awesome little dog is having some kind of stomach barfing pooping problems. We went to the Promise party in High Park under the cherry blossoms Sunday afternoon (http://www.tribe.ca/gallery_test/?level=picture&id=65) and Duffy somehow got his head right into someone guy’s Indian food and scarfed a lot of it before I could stop him. The guy was a hippy who didn’t seem to mind and kept eating. So Duffy who never eats any people food and is 12 (that is an 80 year old man terrier) ate spicy Indian Lamb Curry. So since Sunday he’s been eating grass trying to puke and last night his little stomach was guggling and chugging so loud it woke me up. He was crying softly and I massaged his little belly. I friggin’ love this dog he is my little lifesaver through stress. He is getting me through this. I don’t know where he’s going to go when I go to France. And I cry when I think about him being taken away from me.



This morning Duffy thought the Canada geese flying overhead might be some sort of security breach (he is a guard dog by nature, I am his charge). He there was honking and barking and then a neighbourhood skid yelled “shut the f*&k up!”. Parkdale.

What do I need so I can relax and get my mojo on for next week? Radio silence, with no responsibility is a great start. I need a free vet. I need friends to take care of me. I need three thousand dollars so Morgan can come to Cannes with us. He is my biz guy. Morgan is a white gracious male producer and as much as that sounds ridiculous, it is true that he will add a weight to our meetings. Hollywood trusts the white guy who was educated in the USA. And I trust him completely and love him for the life intervention. Time is tight. Flights are booked. My credit is stretched to the hilt. My phone and gas are being threatened. Without the additional funding it will be three lovely ladies going to conquer Hollywood. With brains and passion and guts. And high heels. Ha ha.

And then I will come home to creditors but I will sure will inspired be inspired creatively.


And another ten thousand dollars would allow me to breathe so I could be the creative producer I am meant to be without the wolf howling at the door. Several projects this season got postponed and I have been floating myself on love and rainbows for months. And my acting career is paying my bills and now for personal reasons my wonderful manager is in the USA (I am taken care of by the management agency). I have been encouraging people to pay back money they owe me. It’s dribbling in.



Twenty thousand from an angel investor would be the miracle I’m looking for. I am used to charming rich non-film industry folk and getting them to give me small amounts of money for my creative projects. One such gentleman once said “you have enough passion to fuel a small city.” Right before he cut a cheque.

I am excited to get to Cannes and learn how to pitch and talk to the “right” people. By that I mean film people who have more than five grand in their pocket.

There is a small commercial Mighty Brave Media gig shooting this weekend in the lovely city of Cornwall Ontario at the airbase. French and English both, we are a bi-lingual company. I have been grooming Aidan my Production Manager to produce and he is completely heading that project. I am proud of him. It is the first time I have been relatively hands-off on a project (well I still put a few days work in at the beginning). And I won’t be on set. Yay!

I have a great team, a great family and great friends. And a great little sick terrier gurgling and growing on the floor from stomach pain.

And I believe in miracles. I see them everyday in independent film and in my life. At least my life isn’t boring.

Now I’m pouring another cup of coffee and going to lie back down with my little feverish terrier. And then take him for a walk if he’s up to it.

And so goes another day.

Lisa Anita Wegner, big boss lady
Mighty Brave Productions
Mighty Brave Media
Zebra Pictures

& Duffy, excellent canine