Our story opens with a momentous announcement, a glorious ending that is also a beginning. It has its roots in Spring, Texas, and a gang of boys who spun out their dreams on mini digital videotapes while they forged lifelong bonds with one other.
In the center of that adventurous and indelible world was Thomas 鈥淭ex鈥 Gresham, now in his third year as a master of fine arts candidate and teaching assistant in the writing for dramatic media program in 性视界传媒's
The exciting news is that Tex Gresham鈥檚 work has been recognized with a top screenwriting prize. , a nonprofit organization that honors and screenwriters whose creative output promotes human dignity and freedom, has named Gresham the 2020-2021 winner of its $20,000 David and Lynn Angell Comedy Fellowship for Fix Daddy, a quirky feature-length script that takes its readers on a road trip with a determined man and the only father he has ever known.
The absurd and vital humanism that distinguishes Gresham's body of work as a novelist and screenwriter has its roots in his rough-and-tumble Texas childhood.
Suburban borderlands
Gresham grew up in southeast Texas just north of Houston in a mid-sized town that straddled the divide between suburban and rural.
鈥淭here was a cow pasture right across the street from my house,鈥 Gresham said.
It was fertile ground for Gresham and his friends, an energetic group of boys who reached their teens in the late 1990s and early 2000s.
Gresham had VHS and mini-DV camcorders, and no shortage of ideas for their next masterpiece. Their epics included a remake of the entire finale of Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid and a 25-minute Reservoir Dogs parody called 鈥淩eservoir Dolls,鈥 in which a demented Mr. Blonde, the antagonist of the Quentin Tarantino film, tortures a Tickle Me Elmo toy.
鈥淲e didn鈥檛 get any parental interference on anything," Gresham said. "We were what you might call 鈥榓 little bit wild.鈥 A part of me thinks that that was important. In my adult life, I鈥檝e done what I鈥檝e wanted to do. I鈥檝e pursued my dreams. What we did together cultivated my confidence. It gave me strength to follow the next idea, wherever it might lead.鈥
Dreams of writing
What Gresham most wanted to do was script a film that would get produced, but the path to success was not clear. After high school, he wrote movies and music and had the notion that he would sell a screenplay and leap to acclaim. Writers and directors who had succeeded young provided exhilarating examples: Steven Spielberg, Christopher Nolan, Paul Thomas Anderson, Richard Linklater.
But as time passed, it seemed that youthful success would not be his. Self-doubt crept in.
Gresham stepped away from his ambitions and got a succession of jobs involving manual labor: plumbing supply, an air conditioning warehouse. He didn鈥檛 write for two years.
But then one night he found the script for a horror movie he鈥檇 penned and sat down and read it. He thought, 鈥淭his isn鈥檛 too bad, but it feels like a book, not a script.鈥 With that, he started work on a novel. He cranked out 12,000 words that night.
He attended Texas State University. At TSU, he took a graduate-level creative writing class and his professor, Deborah Monroe, encouraged him to continue his education, telling him that his writing was good enough that he 鈥渃ould and should鈥 apply to an MFA program.
Gresham was accepted into San Diego State University's MFA program in creative writing. During his time at SDSU, his focus turned to prose.
His first novel, Heck, Texas, was published in 2020. It paints a vivid, darkly humorous portrait of a divided town and its inhabitants. Werner Herzog has called it an 鈥渦nruly book鈥 whose anger ingeniously expresses 鈥渢he mood of our times.鈥
He then turned to a multi-character film script called Austin, Texas. When classmates and friends responded positively, he submitted it to the Nicholl Fellowships, a major international screenwriting competition. It got into the top 20 percent and earned Gresham a spot in CineStory, a screenwriting retreat. He started splitting his time between prose and screenwriting.
MFA redux
It was the impetus for Gresham to pursue a second MFA 鈥 this time focused on screenwriting. Enter 性视界传媒.
鈥淚 searched for programs that would allow me to immerse myself in screenwriting," he said. "I love the idea that this program pushes its students to produce as many completed scripts as possible.鈥
Gresham also appreciates the expert mentorship he鈥檚 received in the department of film, particularly from professor Sean Clark and assistant professor Charles Burmeister.
鈥淚 learn more in five minutes with Sean than in any other screenwriting class I鈥檝e ever taken," Gresham said. "He trusts ideas and our ability to run with them. He鈥檚 very into 鈥榶ou do your thing and I鈥檓 going to help you.鈥 And Charles 鈥 he absolutely cracked open television for me. I did not understand it. After one or two lectures, I had grasped the 鈥榚quation of TV鈥 and was able to craft an effective pilot.鈥
Fix Daddy鈥檚 initial narrative was loosely inspired by My Life, a film in which Michael Keaton and Nicole Kidman play a couple expecting their first child. They learn that he has terminal cancer and that the only way he鈥檒l be able to communicate with their unborn child is by recording video messages. The film鈥檚 concluding scene of the son watching a tape from his dad made a strong impression on Gresham.
What if the only way a child knows their parent is through pre-recorded tapes? It鈥檚 a premise that leads to absurdity, and Gresham uses that irony to confront our reliance upon technology for maintaining everyday relationships and even our sense of self.
David, the hero of Gresham鈥檚 tale, is looking for love and connection inside a lonely existence. How does technology both comfort and limit him? Gresham pushes his character to step from a cocoon of safety into the 鈥渞eal鈥 world, a painful yet ultimately rewarding journey.
鈥淲ith technology as our buffer, we risk nothing,鈥 Gresham said. 鈥淚n face-to-face communications, we are at risk. We are vulnerable. What we say 鈥 and what we hear from others 鈥 holds weight.鈥
