Eastern alumnus Craig Titley is currently writing for the NBC-TV program “The Cape” that debuted on Jan. 9.

Titley said his favorite part of being a writer is being able to get up every day and make a living by day dreaming and imagining crazy things to apply to his work.

“Imagination is the fun part and reality is the not so fun part,” Titley said. “With the business side of things you get to see behind the curtain with the deal making, the compromises, and the budgets.”

Titley is also a consulting producer for “The Cape.”

The premise of “The Cape” focuses on main character Vince Faraday, played by actor David Lyons, as a police officer who is framed for murder and transforms into the super hero known as The Cape.

Titley said he became involved with “The Cape” because it seemed like a new and innovative idea for a TV show.

“(‘The Cape’) is not your normal doctors and cops show,” Titley said.

Other productions Titley has written include “Percy Jackson & the Olympians: The Lightning Thief,” “Cheaper by the Dozen,” and “Scooby-Doo.”

Titley said the writing involved in TV is really fast-paced compared to writing in the feature film world.

“With movies you could be writing for six months and have to wait five years for the film whereas you could write an episode in one to two weeks and not have to wait long for it to come to fruition,” Titley said.

When Titley attended Eastern, from 1985 to 1989, he majored in English and business.

“As a writer, Eastern gave me a great foundation and it served me very well to mix art and commerce by focusing on half imagination and half business aspects,” Titley said. “Few people in my profession have both.”

After graduating from Eastern, Titley attended the Peter Stark Motion Picture Producing Program, a two-year graduate program at the University of Southern California.

“When I wrote my first script it caught the attention of a lot of people including Chris Columbus and then I started writing movies and it just created a chain reaction,” Titley said.

In 1994, Titley was awarded the EIU Alumni Association’s Outstanding Young Alumnus Award.

Titley was the first Eastern alumnus to be recognized with the Outstanding Young Alumnus Award and the Distinguished Alumnus award.

Titley said there is not a lot of room to juggle projects when working on a show and when working on feature films he would juggle two to three projects at a time.

“With ‘The Cape’ I am consistently busy, but I am always thinking of the next 10 possible projects down the road,” Titley said.

“The Cape” is on NBC, Mondays at 8 p.m.

Rachel Rodgers can be reached at 581-7942 or [email protected].