Indie Produced - One Writer's Journey

Have you ever heard the phrase “If you want something done right, you’ll have to do it yourself”?

Thus, Indie film, Indie books, DIY everything, Indie painting your kitchen, Indie dog training.

I’m an Indie person. I like to control what happens to my work. Be part of the process. I’m not opposed to having reps take work out, but I like to hustle, too.

I’ve had two managers in ten years of screenwriting. One took me from authorship to screenwriting and sent my work out, got me options, encouraged my writing, helped me map out a career path. (She went on to be a producer but will appear later in this story.) I met my second manager just before an accident had her disabled for months. I’d just inked up with her. Then, a writers’ strike where she gravitated to unscripted. We parted amicably having never really gotten off the ground.

I now function without a manager but have an agent who takes my work directly to streamers/network’s development executives. He’s got great hustle, and I’m hoping for a sale soon. But let’s back up a bit, and I’ll show you how I got to the point of attracting someone like this agent.

I’m a novelist and screenwriter. Writing books came first. When I first started out as a storyteller who wanted to earn money for my work, I wrestled with Traditional Publishing vs Indie Publishing because in those days (2012), Indie publishing was called self-publishing and mistakenly meant you couldn’t attract the attention of a Big 5 publisher, so you had to do it yourself on Amazon’s platform, Kindle Direct Publishing.

In the beginning, I was both traditionally and self-published with my own company, Top Ten Press. When rights reverted back to me on the traditionally published books, I was happy to be in control of my intellectual property again.

Encouraged by my manager in the early days, I adapted my first screenplay from a novel, The Dream Jumper’s Promise. I imagined a theatrical run. I did not imagine an Academy Award. Box office interests me. The first option with that script from a successful production company included a cut of the box office because my manager was clever. I also asked to be one of the producers. There was real excitement for a while the movie would be made, but the company dismantled during the option, and my dream of seeing the film produced was shelved.

For the time being.

Plan B: At this point I had eight Indie published novels and novellas. I wrote suspense with romance, but also Christmas ... because those suckers sell well. (I treat my writing like a business, with my books and scripts the products that I sell.) One day, my manager called me from L.A. at my day job to ask if I’d adapted any of my Christmas novellas to scripts. That market was wide open, and there was opportunity. Two weeks later, I had an adaptation from one of my novellas.

Over the next few years, the hustle to get a Hallmark Christmas movie filmed became my obsession. I wrote four contained, low-budget, small cast, no animals, no-kids-under-ten-years-old scripts. My work went out to smaller production companies who made these TV movies. It seemed like a realistic goal to get one made, gain street cred as a writer and eventually get the big movie made by a studio.

I sold a Christmas Romance to the people who produce Reality TV who wanted to get into the holiday movie space. It never got made. Not to my knowledge. But, I had bragging rights.

Meanwhile, The Dream Jumper’s Promise screenplay did well in screenwriting contests and won the whole Grand Prize at a festival. The win included an introduction to a producer and prize money. I never got all the prize money, and the producer had coverage done by someone who gave the script a PASS, and the producer dropped the project. BUT, the contest guys had another company option the script for optics and soon after the contest put it on their website that their Grand Prize winner was optioned, we found out they had no intention of making the movie or shopping it and got them to kill the option.

BTW, not all contests operate this way. Many don’t. Like Pipeline. Still, I used the win as a bragging tool.

In the years that followed, I had work under consideration at the CW, Universal, Hallmark and had options on scripts. No new sales, and nothing made it to production, so far. My manager, who hustled my work, left managing, so I put effort into finding another manager.

At this point, I had a portfolio of two pilots and ten features. I wanted General Meetings. I wanted to pitch, to be given a chance. I’m good in the room. I kept writing. I kept submitting to contests, because let’s face it, at this point I was addicted to contest wins. Not only did wins fill my laurel board, but it made me feel like all the work I’d put into storytelling was being validated by my peers.

As a mother, who was raising kids and carving out moments to write when the kids were busy or asleep, I needed that. I’d been feeding this beast of a writing hobby for years and making very little money with my novels. I wanted this to go from hobby to job.

A second manager jumped on board my Kim train, and it looked like a perfect pairing. We were excited at the prospects. I mentioned earlier that we’ve since parted ways. At this point, I’d been charging full speed ahead networking, meeting people, sending out one-pagers, pitching, building up my social media and promoting myself with a ferocious drive. She was pivoting into unscripted, and we parted ways.

One October, I came home from the Austin Film Festival wanting to make my awarded short film script, Chat. Up to that point, it hadn’t occurred to me that I could produce something, find the director, get funding, hire actors, and make my own film. An Indie film.

Along with a director/co-producer, we put together a cast and crew in the Seattle area and made the movie over four days in May of 2022. Sidenote: My husband had just passed away, and it was touch and go whether I’d be able to function, but with all the props in my car, I had to get to the set before filming. It turned out that the best thing to do when you lose your husband is to go to set, surround yourself with loving creatives, and make art. I got through it.

Our short played the festival circuit and won awards. We were proud of the fifteen-minute thriller we’d made. I wasn’t sure if every film set was this committed, but I wanted more Indie Film in my life after Chat.  

When you collaborate with a team of people to make a film, a family is formed—a collective goal of putting your work out into the world becomes a purpose you all share, in some ways, similar to birthing a baby. Except twenty people made the baby.

Something good came from those days following my husband’s death. Something creative. He would have been happy.

After that production, I now knew local people in the biz. I’d hired them, watched them work, and depended on them. I was collecting a tribe in the Indie film space in the Pacific Northwest. I made an IMDb profile. I went to film festivals where Chat played. I soaked in everything I could.

Then an Indie filmmaker I’d met on X put out a call for Christmas movie scripts, saying his financier and distributor were standing by. I had several, with IP. We chatted and decided on shooting my family movie script he liked instead.

The higher-ups suggested rewrites, which I did with no push back, and we were given the green light to make the movie. I signed on as Erich Cannon’s co-producer because he offered to mentor me if I went to Utah for the summer film shoot. I was lucky. At this point in my life, my kids were in their early twenties and agreed to take care of the pets and the house I’d just bought on an island off Seattle. I went to Utah.

This was a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity. To be on set all day, every day, learning the ropes of production.

By September, we had Braving Rapids, and I was a producer. The kind that fetches and totes and puts out fires and goes to get lunch and works on permitting and licenses, does paperwork in the trailer, runs stuff to set, drives the RV that houses the wardrobe and equipment, takes no days off, does the call sheet, buys props, befriends the makeup lady, and babysits a puppy. I even did a little bit of acting in our movie. If you can call my two lines acting.

That summer, I saw how a filmmaker with a microbudget can make magic. Erich showed us all how to create movie magic instead of relying on a studio’s bankroll to rent everything, buy anything, and pay through the nose to make the film shoot easier.

Movie making is a collaborative effort, and if all contributors have the collective goal of putting out the best product possible, while being kind, it’s a beautiful thing. Our set was a supportive, creative place to show up to work every day. Yes, we had a puppy to keep us joyful, but we ate great food, the weather was perfect, the people did their jobs well, and we turned out a cute movie that’s available now on TUBI, Roku, Prime, Fandango and lots of other places. You can even watch me say my two lines in Spanish if you switch languages.

After making Braving Rapids, a thriller I’d been working on writing for the Lifetime channel, got the greenlight and was filmed. Secret Life of My Other Wife releases June 6, 2025, and with both debuts close together, I look like I’m on fire, baby!

Sidenote: I have no idea what the movie will look like because a second writer was called in, and I never saw the final script after getting paid.

Winter of 24/25, I FINALLY, I sold a Christmas Romance, and it filmed, all within four months. I saw the director’s cut recently and am very pleased. Christmas by Design will be released in 2025, probably on BET. No theatrical releases for this Indie writer/producer.

As a film producer only, I signed on with two Horror movies, one we shot in 2024 on a low-budget, contained location, and limited cast, and the other was in post when I joined the production team. Both are Erich Cannon films where everyone gives 200%. I also have a friend’s Christmas movie in post and another in Development.

At this point, I’m not even sure how a writer sells to a studio unless you have a cracker jack agent with a script that has a nine on the Black List. That’s not me. I am currently without a manager but still have that agent I met through the screenwriting X event I run, ScreenPit.

What happened to that Indie book that was optioned three times? It just fell out of option for the fourth time due to government tariffs and foreign investment problems, but along with my first manager who now produces, we hope to film the movie by this time next year as production partners. With distribution from Warners Media (thanks to connections I made at Austin Film Festival!), it’s in Development, currently looking for financing and a hot shot director.

Because if you want something done well, you have to do it yourself.

*Feature photo: On set of Braving Rapids