The True Story of What Happened to The Bloom

THE FIRST TV DEAL TO NOW

So it wasn’t long before we had a couple offers. The one that looked best was with a pair of producers, one of whom has a storied career in the music industry and was a key part of some very famous artists’ success.

“We love the project,” he told me. “We’re in the middle of a slate of deals with a new $400-million Film & TV investment fund and we want to put your series at the front of all of our projects.”

This sounded like a good path to me and, over the next months, we talked regularly as I prepared a comprehensive budget and production plan for the deal.

During negotiations of the legal agreement, however, it became clear that they wouldn’t be willing to go to bat for the integrity of the story. This aspect was crucial for me as I had concerns about our story being warped to suit a more commercial aesthetic.

Of course, the series needs to be entertaining and I’m certainly happy to work to make sure it is, but, knowing the non-commercial nature of our culture, it also requires a certain sensitivity and integrity to ring authentic. My spidey senses were tingling and I got cold feet about the deal.

The experience was valuable, however. During the six months of the process, I gained a much better understanding of how the industry works and what would be needed to succeed in our goals. This is what’s behind my focus on finding the right showrunner for the series before trying to pitch to the networks as I explained in my recent post.

In essence, as outsiders to the industry, our chances improve exponentially with an insider representing our project to the networks. My intention—as much as possible—is that our showrunner will also be “one of us” in having an authentic understanding and connection to our story. I’m confident the right person is out there and look forward to them joining our project.

As other giant players launch streaming services this year, including HBO, Disney, and Apple, all of them will be vying for new content to drive their appeal, which only increases our opportunities to find the right home for the show.

GROWTH AS A FILMMAKER

After the deal fell apart, I needed to find work and took on several video projects. This is the most significant one:

While these were still uber-modest productions, they gave me a chance to dig in again and, in these cases, do all the post-production myself start to finish. As practical self-education, they allowed me to catch up my technical knowledge of each step of the filmmaking process.

Alongside this work, I’ve been studiously watching the best of what’s out there to analyze their story-telling construction. Ultimately, narrative story-telling is not rocket science. As a total noob during the original webseries, I broke one of the fundamental rules: Show Not Tell. At the same time as this was a “mistake”, being outside conventional training allowed us to create something unique with a more philosophical ideas-based character. It’s an aspect we don’t want to throw away, just synthesize better and anchor within character-driven stories.

GOING OUTSIDE THE BUBBLE & THE SHIFT IN THE ZEITGEIST

The past few years have also put me outside a countercultural bubble for the first time since I was a teenage radical. After my daughter’s birth, I’ve found myself living in a quiet, family-oriented neighborhood outside the city after living in a string of collective mansions the previous years. Having a relatively domestic life surrounded by “normal” people with none of the culture I’ve been immersed in for so long has been eye-opening. My bubble’s been popped real good.

While sometimes lonely, the transition has aligned with my mission to understand the Zeitgeist in order to effectively translate our story for a wide audience. The past several years, I’ve been purposefully absorbing a massive amount of news and mainstream culture to understand this and—after spending my adult life feeling alien to the mainstream—I feel like I get it now. It’s allowed me to see the ways the original webseries was limited by being made too purely within my countercultural bubble.

The times have changed. Significantly. Looking back at the relatively progressive optimism of the Obama era—when the original webseries was made—to now—since Trump’s presidency, the climate crisis fully home to roost and an overwhelming pile-up of interconnected crises, tragedies and alarm bells—the tone of this time has shifted to a much darker and foreboding mood. Well, you know that.

The Bloom needs to adapt to this shift in tone: Less earnest and touchy-feely, more objective and down-to-earth. While ours will be a personable and intimate journey, it will also be more pointed and journalistic when required. We need to ask the tough questions that skeptics will inevitably ask. Seeing more outside the bubble, we’ll translate and guide viewers through the journey better for the 99.98% of the population not privy to the experience itself.

RIGHT TIMING & SHOWING UP FOR FAMILY

At times, I’ve questioned whether I should have just signed that first deal. But then I also consider everything that I’ve shared with my daughter this past couple of years.

These prime attachment years are such a precious and fleeting age—when her dad is half the foundation of her world. (I’ve shared equal custody with her mom since she was one and we remain happy co-parents and friends.) If I’d been producing the series, I would have been away and missed most of what we’ve shared. Now that it feels like we’ve established a lifetime bond and she’ll soon be reaching school age, it feels like a better time to go away for long periods.

This quiet period has also allowed me to show up for my mom when she’s needed me the most. While most of the help I offer is pretty domestic and hum-drum—and I’ve certainly had many moments of yearning for all the adventures and magical connections with my global tribe of kindred souls—I’ve also realized that this has been precious quality time together during a life that is itself fleeting.

It’s taught me the values of family. That it is often just this simple showing up for each other. It’s been grounding and humbling, helping me grow to be a stronger, better person. While it’s still tough for my mom, I’m happy to report that her life has stabilized a lot too and she remains independent and active overall.

That all said, the call to tell our story remains as powerful as ever. Even stronger now with the intervening years giving me a break from the action and fresh eyes to see it with. I feel time pressing not only in my own life but in the state of the world reaching a critical crossroads.

But before I conclude with what’s next for the journey, I’d like to own and apologize for some mistakes I’ve made along the way…

READ: SOME APOLOGIES ARE IN ORDER