Don P. Hooper

Check it out: Tubefilter.com quoted me on joining the Writers Guild East – enjoy:
TubeFilter Article

Also, Jamtown Films was mentioned in the Hollywood Reporter

This is a quick note for Sunday. Darnel Degand, Coomacka Island’s illustrator, just informed me he received a Google Alert stating that Coomacka Island was featured in today’s Jamaica Gleaner (Sunday, Feb. 17). Needless to say this is an exciting moment. It’s one of the largest papers in the Caribbean with a circulation that reaches the Caribbean population in the U.S. as well.

I’ve already received calls from family and friends back in Jamaica who have read the article. So please check it out.
http://www.jamaica-gleaner.com/gleaner/20080217/arts/arts5.html

I couldn’t have made it this far without the support of everyone, so once again Thank you for all your kind words and encouragement.

One Love,
Don P.

It’s finally here. Check out the trailer for the upcoming animated Coomacka Island cartoon, based on the Caribbean inspired children’s book series.

Please visit the youtube page for the Coomacka Island Trailer and leave a comment and rating!

Also, don’t forget to stop by www.coomacka.com and sign up for our newsletter!

Keep your fingers crossed. The WGA strike may be coming to a close in the near future. If this happens, it would be good news for everyone across the board.

• Home viewers would get to see their favorite shows return, with some only narrowly escaping the chopping block.
• Actors will begin a late pilot season audition period
• Film and production crews who were hurt hard by production stops will get to return to work.
• And it will be back to business as usual for the writers.

I’m keeping my fingers crossed. With the strike going on, pitch meetings for new shows were put on ice and auditions were slow. Hopefully, the production season can be salvaged without too much loss to reality shows. Reality TV programs are cheaper to produce, so it’s likely networks have signed on more reality shows to their roster.

Big thanks to everyone who supported the writers during the strike.

For those wondering why their favorite shows are off the air and why the WGA remains on strike, here is a video that offers clarification:

It’s day eight of the WGA Strike. Spent this day with my fellow performers and writers in support of the WGA. We lead the creative cheering/slogan section. Thanks to everyone who came through to support and those who honked their horns.

Day 2 (day 1 for me) of the 41st annual CRA (California Reading Association) Conference is now in the history books. Coomacka Island partnered with E. Andrew Martonyi of Schoolside Press and shared a booth for the conference. Martonyi is the author of “The Little Man in the Map,” an excellent book that teaches children the geography of the United States.

Here’s a picture of Martonyi and myself:

Well, here I am at Day 1 of the California Reading Association Conference. Actually, it’s day 2 for the conference, day 1 for me. I was supposed to be here for the opening of the conference, but one thing lead to another and I missed it.

I arrived at JFK fourty minutes before my flight time. Unfortunately, since I had an extra bag that needed to be checked in I wasn’t allowed to fly at my scheduled time. Airports have some rule where after a certain time, only carry on luggage is allowed on the plane. So, I ended up flying standby, several hours later.

I finally arrived in Ontario, CA only to find out that my luggage didn’t make the flight. It ended up stopping at LAX (Los Angeles Intl Airport). The attendant at JFK had only marked my checked-bag for the first leg of the flight. Of course, that was the bag with my clothes in it.

Luckily, the airport was able to locate the bag at LAX and sent it on to Ontario on the next flight. I was thrilled when I went to the hotel lobby and the desk attendant had my bag waiting for me at 10pm PST.

Well, that’s it for now, time to start on Day 1.

What is it about deadlines that pushes you beyond your creative limit? Or, maybe I should ask myself, what is it about deadlines that pushes me to work harder. Something about working under pressure just seems to push me to generate more quality ideas at a faster pace. I guess I’d call it motivation.

I remember my brother and I gave it a tag when we were growing up. Mo’vation we called it. I guess that was 80s slang at the time when everybody put the word “mo” before a word to mean more – like in the movie “Mo’ Money.” Mo’vation was just one step beyond motivation, or More Motivation.

In grade school and high school, mo’vation served me perfectly. Against my parent’s wishes, I waited until the night before a test to study for it. Then, I would pass out on my bed and my dad would wake me up around 5am because I left the light on (that’s when he had to get up to go to work). At that time, I’d jump back into my book for another hour, go back to sleep, and wake up to take the test. Somehow I passed. And, it didn’t just work for tests, it worked for essays too. I thought it was diffusion. Somehow the words from the book had permeated into my brain. Who, was I to ask questions.

The only problem with mo’vation is that it doesn’t really translate into real work after high school. Sure with the right pressure and a hard deadline I can come up with several strong ideas. But, an idea is only as good as its execution. What if the idea and it’s plan of execution are due at the same time. In high school, if your missed a couple of points on your essay or test, you still could pass with an above average mark. And, you were fine with it. But, in the “real world” (which I keep forgetting I live in, like Theo in that episode of the Cosby Show) it may be the greatest idea, but if not delivered correctly it will just backfire. And, what happens next? One your idea gets rejected, when it could have had a much larger chance for success with the right TLC. Two – a year passes by and you say someone stole your idea.

What does that all mean? It means I need to set up pre-deadlines for my deadlines. That way I’ll have time to go back and make sure a great idea doesn’t get delivered as an “ok” idea because I didn’t put the right time into it.

Would you look at the time. 1:36AM EST. Back to work.

Dear fam,

Check out the latest review by RJ Book Reviews on Book 3 from Coomacka Island : “Lenox Lizard and the Kukumacka Duppy.”

Available now on Amazon.com and Coomacka.com

One Love,
Don P.