Discussion Beginner Two Projects. Two Creator's Statements. One Creative Philosophy.

[Fygar]

Something unexpected happened while I was going through my screenplay development materials. I rediscovered two creator's statements I'd written earlier this year—and completely forgotten about. The first, "The Architecture of the Machine," was written for my WWII supernatural television series, THE BLACK SUN, months before I began developing my second project.

It explores how thirty years in public service shaped my fascination with institutional systems, bureaucratic power, and people whose intelligence and capabilities are underestimated by those systems. Then I encountered a short YouTube documentary about Angelina Mioccio, a young Sicilian woman whose tragic story inspired SLEEPING BEAUTY OF CATANIA. I didn't approach Angelina's story as something deserving only pity.

Instead, two questions came to mind:

Who were you?

How did you end up in that glass coffin?

Those questions sent me down a research and storytelling rabbit hole.

In May 2026, I wrote my second creator's statement, "The Girl in the Machine." This time, I recognized something remarkable about my two projects.

David Figueroa, a 54-year-old Latino bureaucrat trapped inside the American military establishment of 1941, and Angelina Mioccio, a young Sicilian woman trapped within the expectations of family, class, and patriarchy, were confronting fundamentally similar systems. As I wrote in that statement:

"David is misread because he looks like a minor functionary. Angelina is misread because she looks like a daughter."

Different protagonists. Different centuries. Different genres. The same underlying machinery of control.

It's what I've come to describe in my storytelling as Administrative Horror. What surprised me most about rediscovering these statements was realizing that I'd already articulated the creative philosophy connecting my work months before beginning my current efforts to find literary representation. Sometimes you discover something about your writing by going back and reading what you wrote when you were still figuring it all out.

Have any of you rediscovered something in your early development notes that made you understand your own storytelling differently?

 

[Michael]

@Fygar​

There's something here that could be particularly useful as you look for literary representation.

I'd suggest testing your "Administrative Horror" philosophy against the actual scripts. Can you identify two or three scenes in each project where the system itself forces a character into a difficult decision?

If those moments are central to both stories, you've got more than an interesting creative philosophy. You've got a recognizable storytelling approach you can demonstrate through your work.

I'd also prepare a one-sentence logline for each series without using the term "Administrative Horror." Let the stories capture attention first, then use your creative philosophy to explain what makes your voice distinctive.

That combination could be much more effective when approaching managers or producers.