Tales From the Script: 5 Things I Learned Interviewing Screenwriters
By Peter Hanson
Originally published in the Writers
Store e-zine
 Sitting down for intimate conversations
with dozens of Hollywood’s best writers was a transformative
experience. Although I’ve been a professional screenwriter for many
years, most of my work has been in the independent realm, so
collecting material for Tales from the Script gave me a crash
course in the realities of writing movies at the film industry’s
top levels.
1. Good things come to those who
wait . . . and wait . . . and wait.
A recurring theme throughout the
interviews in this project is the long (and painful) gap of time that
stretches from the moment someone sets out to become a screenwriter
to the moment that dream comes true. But as seen in the following
remarks from Frank Darabont, the Oscar-nominated writer-director of
The Shawshank Redemption, there’s a way to put this
excruciating downtime to good use: “Don’t talk about being a
screenwriter. Sit your ass in the chair, and even if it takes you ten
years to start working as a professional, develop and hone your
skills. Don’t think that the first thing you write is gonna sell
for a million dollars, ‘cause I got news for you: It ain’t.”
Stephen Susco, who wrote the American version of The Grudge as
well as its sequel, put the same idea into numerical perspective,
explaining that he wrote twenty-five screenplays before he got credit
on a produced movie. Bottom line? Winning the screenwriting race
isn’t about speed. It’s about endurance.
2. Don’t hold your breath if
you’re selling an original story.
Tales from the Script is filled
with inspiring anecdotes about writers who launched their careers by
creating original stories that excited the Hollywood community, from
Paul Schrader (Taxi Driver) to Ron Shelton (Bull Durham)
to Justin Zackham (The Bucket List). But in today’s climate,
the writer who rises from obscurity on the strength of a pure spec
script is a rare creature. We’re in the age of adaptations and
remakes and sequels, so very often, the emerging writer’s best hope
with a spec is to get noticed and then hired for an assignment on an
existing project. Just how bad is the climate for fresh stories? I’ll
let John August, the screenwriter of Tim Burton’s Charlie and
the Chocolate Factory, field this one: “You tend to have a lot
of ideas you would like to see made into movies, yet the reality is
that most things that actually become movies aren’t brand-new
ideas. At this point in time, the movies that get made are based on
some preexisting piece of intellectual property.” To pour a little
salt into the wound, consider this comment from Shooter scribe
Jonathan Lemkin: “If I could pitch Wheaties: The Movie
tomorrow, I’d have a better chance of selling it than I would with
an original idea. ‘There’s a cereal box, guys!’ It’s a very
strange time.”
3. Don’t underestimate the value
of cynicism.
Okay, I’m cheating on this point,
because if there’s one thing I valued highly even before I began
work on Tales from the Script, it is cynicism. I stopped
expecting things to turn out well shortly after my film school days
at NYU, when I realized that the world wasn’t waiting with bated
breath for the arrival of my grand artistic statements. The upshot of
discarding youthful naïveté was discovering the importance of
hustle, and learning that a career in film is built brick by
painstaking brick. In speaking with the writers who participated in
Tales from the Script, however, I encountered an interesting
nuance about cynicism: in moderation, it can be a positive force.
Nobody spoke to this point more eloquently (or amusingly) than John
D. Brancato, who, with his writing partner Michael Ferris, has
survived working on big-budget spectacles including Catwoman,
The Game, and the last two Terminator movies. Here’s
what he said: “I’ve read screenplays, plenty of them, where the
writer obviously hates what he’s doing, and thinks it’s B.S. That
kind of cynicism is pernicious. It hurts the project. It hurts movies
in general. So I try not to be cynical about the screenplay, about
the movie – while being cynical about every single other thing
attached to it. Staying innocent in the creative process is the
thing.”
4. Learn to love your neuroses.
I’ve seen colleagues get the life
knocked out of them by the ups and downs of pursuing a Hollywood
career. Agents lose interest, options expire, movies that seem close
to production lose momentum . . . it’s a heartbreaking cycle, and
even the strongest people experience self-doubt after setback upon
setback. The one hope new writers have is that once they become
established writers, things will get easier. Turns out that’s not
necessarily the case. Sure, the financial side of things can become a
lot more comfortable once a writer starts selling originals and
getting assignments. But after success arrives, a whole new set of
difficulties becomes part of everyday life. Cutthroat competition
from peers. Maddeningly nonsensical studio notes. Egomaniacal
above-the-line talent. And to top it all off, the constant pressure
of trying to top, or at least match, the kind of success that gets
writers on the map in the first place. It’s true that some of the
veteran writers in Tales from the Script seem able to keep
Hollywood in perspective; we should all be as sanguine as the
eternally youthful Larry Cohen (Phone Booth). But I certainly
recognize myself, and nearly all of the writers in Tales from the
Script, in this commentary from
screenwriter-turned-psychotherapist Dennis Palumbo (My Favorite
Year): “A writer friend of mine once described screenwriters as
‘egomaniacs with low self-esteem.’ “
5. It’s worth it.
Let’s face it: Bitching about
Hollywood is the easiest thing in the world. Anybody who dips his or
her toes into the water out here immediately discovers that the film
business is an insane asylum, because there’s no clear path to
becoming a screenwriter, there’s no clear path to preserving the
integrity of screenplays, and there’s no clear path to maintaining
a long career in screenwriting. As William Goldman has said many
times, and as he repeated during his amazing Tales from the Script
interview, “Nobody knows anything.” We’re all making it up as
we go along, trying to figure out how to write great work, how to get
other people to invest in that work, and then how to ensure that the
work reaches the screen in something resembling its original form. So
why bother? Why not just self-publish novels or read poetry on street
corners? There are easier ways to share your art, and the number of
writers who achieve Hollywood success is dwarfed by the number of
writers who don’t. The reason why the dream is worth pursuing is
that the rewards are beyond imagining. Nothing touches audiences with
the power of a great Hollywood movie, and if you reach the top of
this particular mountain, you can enjoy a spectacular lifestyle. The
reason why achieving screenwriting success is so damn difficult is
that for the lucky few who get to the top, it’s worth it. I’ll
let Gerald DiPego, the seasoned writer of hits including The
Forgotten and Phenomenon, speak from experience: “I knew
I wanted to be a writer by the time I was twelve years old, and
there’s a moment in each production where I’m twelve again.
What’s more fragile than a story? It’s this wispy thing you make
up in your mind. And to see flesh-and-blood actors walking around,
being your characters, and to see carpenters building buildings, and
it all came out of this dream . . . There’s still a moment where
I’m that twelve-year-old kid saying, ‘Wow, look at this.’ “
To learn more about Peter Hanson's book and documentary, "Tales From The Script," check out the following events:
On March 17th, 2010, Peter Hanson will return to the Albany market, where he worked as a journalist for ten years, to host a special screening.
March 17, 2010
Start Time: 6:30 PM
Spectrum 8 Theatres, 290 Delaware Ave., Albany, NY 12209
(518) 449-8995 / www.Spectrum8.com
The "Tales from the Script" documentary feature will
make its U.S. theatrical debut on March 12, the opening night of a
one-week engagement at Quad Cinemas, located at 34 W. 13th St. in
Manhattan's Greenwich Village. Visit www.QuadCinema.com
for ticketing information. And on March 19, the film will open a
one-week engagement at Laemmle's Music Hall, located at 9036 Wilshire
Blvd. in Beverly Hills. Ticketing information is at www.Laemmle.com.
Please spread the word so as many people as possible can enjoy these
unique opportunities to see "Tales from the Script" in a theatrical
setting!
"Tales" DVD Available for Pre-Order!
Set
for release on April 20, 2010, the "Tales from the Script" DVD is now
available for discounted pre-order from First Run Features! Although
the list price is $24.95, customers who pre-order now through this
special offer will receive a 30% discount, getting the disc for $17.47.
(First Run offers free shipping on orders of $30 or more, so buy one
for yourself and one as a gift!) The disc includes more than an hour of
fantastic special features, including "More Tales from the Script" (a
collection of colorful stories that couldn't fit into the movie), "The
Gospel According to Bill" (spotlighting the wit and wisdom of William
Goldman), and "Advice for New Screenwriters." Spread the word, and
thanks for shopping! To pre-order the "Tales from the Script" DVD, CLICK HERE
Author/filmmaker Peter
Hanson co-edited the book Tales from
the Script: 50 Hollywood Screenwriters Share Their Stories.
He also directed the book's companion movie, Tales
from the Script, which will be
released this spring by First Run Features. His other books include
The Cinema of Generation X
and Dalton Trumbo, Hollywood Rebel,
and his other movies include Every
Pixel Tells a Story and Stagehand.
Visit his website at www.GrandRiverFilms.com.
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