When opportunity knocks…again and again and again.

Benjamin Meadows-Ingram; Photo: Patrick Hoelck For some folks things come easy. For screenwriter-director Eli Gessner, writing-in fact the whole filmmaking process in general-isn't one of those things. "I don't like to write," he says, flat out. "I don't like to sit down and write a 120-page screenplay, I don't like to stress out on set, and editing's not any fun either, but the truth is that I have an obsession to tell these stories that are in my head."

But other things have come easier. See, Gessner, 35, is one talented cat. And that's something you already know, even if you think you don't. Phat Farm? That was him. As the label's initial designer, Gessner conceived corporate identity of the $300 million clothing empire in the early '90s. And Zoo York? That was him, too. In 1993, Gessner, the brand's art director, and friends Rodney Smith and Adam Schatz took the name of a local NYC skateboard crew and created a cultural phenomenon.

In 2003, the onetime film student left the big city to hunt his lifelong dream in the Hollywood Hills. His writing-directing debut, Excite Loves Vita, is one hell of a shot. Conceived at a dinner meeting and written during a three-week surfing trip in Panama, the flick tells the twisted tale of down-and-out New York graffiti writer Excite and girlfriend Vita (Rosario Dawson) as they struggle with debt, drugs, money, gangsters, and love. With Lakeshore (Million Dollar Baby, 2004) behind it and shooting slated for April, expect the buzz on this film to come barreling your way soon. "It's sort of like Taxi Driver meets True Romance," says Gessner, before adding, "It's a tearjerker." Sounds like our kind of film.

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