If a Teenager From Hong Kong Can Get His Movie Made in Hollywood, Maybe There's Hope for the Rest of Us

Most aspiring screenwriters never get the chance to see their stories played out on the silver screen. As a young screenwriter hopeful myself, this fact alone scares me half to death. So you can imagine how stunned I was when I heard that a 16-year-old Hong Kong native's script titled Senior Project got noticed by Hollywood producers.

His name is Jeremy Lin, and no, he isn't the former Knicks (now Houston Rockets) NBA player who started the Linsanity movement. He's just a kid who had the chance to pitch his film idea to Los Angeles-based screenwriter and investor Fabienne Wen at a film workshop last year. She loved his idea of a coming-of-age comedy that surrounds five high school students waiting 'til the last weekend of school to finish their senior project. It's a Breakfast Club-meets-Superbad comedy that looks at the struggles high school students face -- friendships falling apart, sexual orientation, impending graduation and what's next for them. It's a storyline that we can all relate to, from Hong Kong to American high school students.

Lin has already grabbed the attention of Angel Gracia, who directed a film in 2011, From Prada to Nada, and is set to direct Senior Project. Brion Hambel and Paul Jenson, who produced 2011 comedy Natural Selection, are attached as producers. As a recent college graduate trying to make it in Hollywood as a writer, I was inspired by Jeremy Lin's ambition and drive at sixteen. I immediately wanted to root for him and see his film get made.

Like all films, it's a huge expense, but his script is worth it, so the team behind Senior Project have set up a Kickstarter account in hopes of raising enough money to fund it by July 22, 2013. You can check it out here and follow this amazing story on www.facebook.com/SeniorProjectTheMovie as well as on Twitter @ASeniorProject.