Script File
Fixin' to be Fancy
When a gleaming new luxury development called Willow Creek Estates rises across the fence from the aging but proud neighborhood of Cedar Hollow, Arkansas, the longtime residents suddenly feel obsolete. Their brick ranch homes, mature oaks, and slightly crooked driveways now look “dated” next to identical beige McMansions, golf-cart patrols, and an entrance sign with its own uplighting.
One hot Saturday afternoon backyard barbecue changes everything. In a moment of brisket-fueled envy, the neighbors realize the only thing separating them from “fancy” is money and a Property Owners Association. They don’t have new money… but they can damn sure get a POA.
What starts as a half-joking, paper-plate vote in Big Ray Thompson’s backyard quickly becomes Cedar Hollow’s accidental government.
Led by reluctant chairman Big Ray Thompson (the lovable pitmaster who wields his spatula like a gavel), his high-strung wife Shelly, entrepreneurial nephew Travis “Scooter” Hayes, dry-witted Crystal Washington, symmetry-obsessed Big Earl McCoy, documentation-obsessed Miss Rhonda Jenkins, tactical Chief, and the slightly-too-polished newcomer Adrian Vega, the group launches into Season One.
Early episodes are filled with hilarious growing pains: logo wars, mailbox harmony battles, a chaotic first newsletter, holiday-decoration arms races, and one very dangerous fundraising gala. Beneath the laughs, something deeper is happening. What began as status anxiety slowly turns into the very thing Cedar Hollow needed most—a community that refuses to let its people feel forgotten.
By the end of the pilot, the neighbors come together for an accidental block party to fix their faded entrance sign. When the new lighting and irrigation system spectacularly fail in a spray of water and flying mulch, everyone ends up soaked and laughing—proof that pride isn’t about looking rich. It’s about refusing to let your people look forgotten.
Tagline: “The future moved in across the street.”
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David MillerWriterBook of the Month, And Justices for All, Wrongs and Rights, Dee3p Within Us
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Project Type:Television Script
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Number of Pages:44
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Language:English
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First-time Screenwriter:No
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Student Project:No
David A. Miller is a produced and award-winning screenwriter, playwright, and novelist whose work explores grief, faith, moral ambiguity, and the quiet moments that shape who we become. His stories are character-driven, emotionally precise, and grounded in lived human experience—often placing ordinary people inside extraordinary ethical and spiritual dilemmas.
David’s screenplays have earned multiple Best Screenplay awards at international film festivals, with projects spanning intimate dramas, historical narratives, faith-adjacent stories, and high-concept political thrillers. His writing frequently examines legacy, belief, family fracture, and the tension between private truth and public consequence.
Notable works include 21 Days, 21 Lemons (a romantic drama set along Italy’s Amalfi Coast), What Was Hidden (a dual-timeline historical drama about hidden faith during the Nazi occupation of Poland), The Last Chord (a grief-driven musical drama), and the political thriller And Justices for All, centered on cyberterrorism and the moral cost of power. He is also the author of the stage play Loved Ones of Loved Ones, a quiet, devastating examination of grief’s second circle.
David approaches storytelling with a craftsman’s discipline—favoring specificity over sentimentality and restraint over exposition. His work is often described as emotionally resonant, visually economical, and spiritually curious without being prescriptive. He writes with the belief that the most powerful stories are not about spectacle, but about what remains when the noise falls away.
