Baggage

While waiting at the baggage claim on a family trip last summer, I saw a face in the patches and zippers of boy’s backpack. I imagined it coming to life and bickering with his sister’s backpack. Suddenly, all of the luggage that travelers were rolling away started coming to life. My family and I had lots of fun on the trip imagining funny scenes involving animated luggage. The idea stuck and I spent the rest of the summer writing a screenplay called Baggage. Here’s the log-line:

When Maggie’s travel-phobic childhood suitcase Teal gets mishandled and lost on their first solo trip, they must both confront baggage from the past by making new connections with old friends and soul connections with new friends who show them the true meaning of family, friendship, loyalty and home.

I finished the script at the end of July, registered it with the WGA, submitted it to a few contests and began waiting with great hope that this might be the project to hit. I believed it was clearly the most commercially viable project I had ever written. I wouldn’t normally be sharing information about a project “in progress” - but on October 29, SNL aired this skit in which a guy at an AA meeting pitches a Pixar animated short about “lost luggage trying to find its way home.”

Noooooo!!…

But just a skit. I have a completed script with wonderful characters and a fully developed story that was recognized as a semi-finalist in the New Voices in Animation Screenwriting contest and has coverage indicating strong commercial potential.

Not giving up.

Here are some photos (not mine) that I found online and indicate the potential of character development.