HOLLYWOODSCRIPT.COM NEWSLETTER
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JOE HOLLAND WINS TEN GRAND AND A LOT OF ENCOURAGEMENT!
Hi Craig-thanks for helping me understand what comedy
writing is all about. Your
advice to see "Sideways", create haunting images, and to keep
it real paved the
way for the rewrite which won this contest.
"
Joseph H. Holland, a former soup-kitchen minister from
Harlem, NY, was awarded
1st place in the annual "The Word On Screen Christian Screenwriting
Competition"
'05, with his script "Undercover Grace."
Holland's buddy-preacher comedy won the lion's share
of the $10,000 cash prize,
sponsored by 20th Century Fox Home Entertainment.
The entertaining story and snappy dialogue bounce between
a cynical fallen white
priest, a devout black minister and an attractive but
skeptical female DEA
agent.
"
It's like Mel Gibson and Danny Glover as sparring preachers
with Hilary Swank
as the referee," said contest director Erik Joseph. Screen Word Ent.
also
sponsored the contest, along with Hollywood Creative
Directory.
Holland was awarded $9,500 cash, a one-year option, a
first-look at Fox, and two
hundred dollars value in industry resource books.
20th Century Fox Home Entertainment sponsored the Christian-based/family
values
script contest with the goal of discovering and developing
excellent new
writing. Fox was also looking for crossover potential.
"
Undercover Grace" is preachers versus inner-city thugs, with dialogue
that
quotes scripture countered with wise-ass rebuttal.
Although Fox has first right of refusal, a development
executive for a major
male action star has requested the winning script."
_______________________
REVISITING-"IT'S THE SINGULAR IMAGE THAT HAUNTS US, BECOMES ART."
by Craig Kellem
Judy and I are in the process of working on a project
for a client which is
essentially a page one writing effort, predicated on
the client's fine story.
It's been a while since we've done something like this,
since most of the
ghostwriting/rewriting jobs that we take on involve scripts
already written, or
partially written.
This effort has reminded us to follow our own advice
and pay attention to the
basics that we espouse to others on a daily basis.
How we have approached this is as follows:
Once we agreed to take on the project (Judy writes --
I advise) we gave each
other the prerequisite task of "playing in the sandbox" --i.e.
thinking of cool
ideas for scenes or parts of scenes in order to get things
rolling. By doing
this we not only stimulated creative productivity and
gained an inventory of
assets (however disorganized at first), but eased ourselves
into the project via the confidence that is achieved
when there's something "on
the wall" to admire and provide inspiration.
Almost all of the scene ideas and creative threads have
come from that bedrock
resource: our lives and times. Indeed this never ending
asset emanates from
things that we have both felt, noticed and experienced,
all defined under Julia
Cameron's wonderful umbrella, "It's the singular image that haunts
us that
becomes art." We pooled many insights, moments of truth, fascinations
and unique
experiences which had previously lacked a "file."
Let me point out that this isn't done merely on a "write what you
know" basis
but it's dogmatic. We make constant first stops at this
source on an expectant
basis.
Is this a unique approach? Well, in a way it is considering
that so many well
intended and even accomplished writers fall into a bad
habit: When confronted
by a demanding creative agenda, they often go OUTSIDE
of themselves for ideas
and thus, inevitably either end up contriving and/or
depending too much upon a
few big scenes "supported" by a whole lot of
filler kind of material in between.
In a way, utilizing this is a kind of "method acting" approach
for writers in
that you're constantly reaching and accessing deeper
places. And if you write
from experience, you're more than halfway there.
The opposite of this can involve twirling hairballs on
your office rug while
trying to invent art--too often desperately wasting time
reaching outside for
ideas and often settling for less than stellar results
because of impatience,
exhaustion and frustration. And it's so unnecessary,
as I once explained to a
bright and affable lawyer/ new writer who slipped me
his script at a writer's
seminar. Instead of mining a lifetime of viable intellectual
property which he
undoubtedly possessed, he incessantly contrived generic,
recycled, unoriginal material. His
reasoning? To please the buyer. This was what THEY want,
he erroneously
figured from some articles he'd read.
So how does one access oneself? Well, as I mentioned,
the Julia Cameron
butterfly net is a great device, namely to start digging
into your head, heart
and memory and to spike your storyline with the extra
buzz that comes with
important memories, perceptions and adaptations of same.
Some examples:
* Say I need a scene set in a doctor's office. Maybe
I can fit in the time that
I was at the dentists and told him he could do the root
canal, but not drill
through the little bridge I have on my molar - to which
of course he cheerfully
acquiesced. Did I know what he was up to in the heat
of that miserable
appointment? No way. I was high on anesthetic. It wasn't
until I
returned later to the proud unveiling of his work when
I discovered that he not
only drilled into the bridge, but that it looked like
the Lincoln Tunnel! I
remember my rage and giggle at the recall of how I yelled
at him (so loudly that
it must have at least partially cleared out his already
nervous waiting room!).
A scene like this will absolutely work as the
needed "doctor scene" of the script because it will be written
with all the true
emotion, sense of detail and experience memory has brought
right back to life!
*What if I need a scene involving someone in a dangerous
physical dilemma, where
a character has to save the day? I'd steer it towards
a scene I've had in mind
for a few decades, since, as a child, I watched some
nutty kid as he climbed the
underside of a breathtakingly high bridge and I wondered,
at the time, how
anybody could possibly do that. How it affected me then!
What heat I would
access in tapping into that still hotly buzzing place
in my heart.
*Writing something scary and want to get in the mood
to be afraid? Heard a true
story recently about a couple of teens out looking for
someone to kill. Went
knocking on doors to find their prey. Showed up one spooky
night at a guy's
house and knocked, hoping to gain entry by asking phony
directions. Now get
this--the man inside (with a young son) had a bad feeling
about this situation,
mostly based on the way THE KNOCK SOUNDED! He was an
ex New Yorker and just had
a certain kind of street smart hypervigilancy and he
simply didn't like the
demanding urgency of the knock. So he grabbed his gun,
refused to open the door,
and made sure these 'kids" could see the pistol tucked neatly in his
pants as he
gave them their "directions." They finally left. The "boys" got "lucky" later
on that night and found two poor souls to kill. The next
day, the guy who
refused to answer the door was looking over his property
and discovered that
these two miscreants had actually dug two graves before
knocking on their
door...one for him...and one for his son. (The teens
later admitted doing this
when they were eventually caught). Talk about chilling!
How this would play as a
predicate for a scene, part of a scene or even the inspiration
for one!
*Suppose I need to access a theme, say one about the
enormous effects of
ostensibly small acts. Perhaps my inspiration could come
from a recent TV
commentator who pondered that the Clinton/Lewinsky Oval
office extravaganza may
have not only caused Al Gore to lose the election but
allowed for the
war. What a platform to thrust from creatively!
The list goes on, endlessly!
Looking for juicy hits on corporate bureaucracy; a bad
time with a traffic cop;
a child at risk; geographic cures; disastrous funerals--you
name it. Look inside
yourself. There's gold to be accessed! Get into the habit
of soul-searching.
And expect success.
The next time someone tells you to write from your heart,
(as Judy and I
reminded ourselves), remember that there are big implications
to this because
it's not only an ideal, but a fact that we all walk around
with a wealth of
material just dying to be considered, reshaped and wonderfully
utilized. And,
writing from "what you know" will take on a greater dimension.
When you realize
the depth and breadth of your creative repository, especially
after getting used
to accessing this magic on a regular basis, exciting things
can and will happen on the pages.
_______________________
MORE CONSTRUCTIVE CRITICISM! (BITS
AND PIECES/SAMPLES OF FEEDBACK WE'VE GIVEN TO
OUR WRITERS. OUT OF CONTEXT BUT REASONABLY SELF CONTAINED)
(we're careful to
keep it generic but hopefully helpful).
*My basic theory (based on plenty of experience) is this--getting
your script
read is NOT the problem. It's getting the script RIGHT
so that when it gets
read, something good happens!
*Planning a script is an act of simplifying rather than
the opposite. And above
all it's a blueprint for a practical, doable approach
to getting something down
on paper.
*In this piece of work the high-concept aspect could
work well but when you get
into the script itself it must, to a reasonable extent,
be embedded in reality,
rather than the continuation of things that are so contrived
that it loses it's
credibility. When that happens, it's hard to score.
*My suggestion is that you track your various story/character
arcs, making sure
that each one has a true beginning, middle and end, has
surprises, pays off, and
is sprinkled with eventful and meaningful scenes. I'd
also consider implementing
a "wraparound" wherein the movie begins at the scene of the crime
and then,
using flashbacks, shows how we got there, occasionally
renewing the present
tense dilemmas until we catch up with real time. In that
way you can avoid
having a script that may feel imbalanced with "nothing happening" in
the first
half and too much happening in the second half.
*So let me put it this way: what you have, in a way,
is the best and worst of
all worlds - a good concept, effective action, a worthy
villain, and a
protagonist with a cause. That's a lot! But, as stated,
it now needs a better
sense of orchestration, confluence, continuity, and context
to pull off what is
a busy and ambitious piece of work. Sometimes, the more
unusual and intricate a
script is the more case and story management it requires.
*It's simply a case wherein you made the classic mistake
of going hog wild with
comedy on top of comedy on top of comedy, without considering
the important
factor that the best comedy is derived from relatability
and reality. That
doesn't mean that one cannot have wonderfully over-the-top
and silly moments and
situations, but it must, on some level, be believable
and grounded in something
with which we can identify.
*My main issue with the material is that I think that
you try to accomplish too
much: you've combined a mystery with comedy, and relationship-type
character
piece to boot. In some cases this might be a good combination,
but with this
script it creates a sense of disproportionality wherein
the mystery aspect seems
shortchanged, and the comedy-like character stuff often
seems overdone and
misplaced in this venue. Let me point out that displaying
a sense of humor and
offering a healthy portion of character interaction is
not a bad garnish for a
mystery. In fact, there have been many over the years
that have worked fine in
this department. But in this particular case something's
not quite right about
it. I feel it's a first-things-first kind of issue, where
the MAIN EVENT must be
properly serviced before one can spend a lot of time
in other avenues. ...In
other words, present a first class, believable, serious
mystery, COMPLEMENTED by
an intriguing character study, and everything else is
FROSTING on the cake.
*I'd suggest exploring all plots and subplots via story
arcs before revising.
Let them pass a stringent assembly line which requires
that each has a strong
spine with lots of eventful scenes, surprises and purpose.
*In a nutshell, it's too plainly written and underdeveloped
and needs much more
nuance, eventfulness, and invention to properly keep
the ball rolling, since
this is a character piece and doesn't have a built-in
gimmick type concept to
keep the engine hot. This also applies in the added need
to come up with more
ambitious characterizations, rather than the simplistic
ones that now exist.
*A la potent Garden State and Lost In Translation you
really need to max out
scenes. Every one should have a certain dose of magic
and raison d'etre.
Examples of this kind of creative ambition (in and out
of the script) would be
scenes like the Woody Allen/Diane Keaton classic when
lobsters get loose in the
kitchen scene; John Goodman ranting at the hippies in
The Big Lebowski "your
revolution is over...condolences, the bums have lost;" and Bette Midler's
grand
orgasm in Down and Out in Beverly Hills etc.
*A greater sense of the wonder of the future would be
welcome, not only from a
physical and technological point of view, but also from
a macro-geopolitical
point of view as well. Our appetites should be whetted
in curiosity about where
we are and what we've become, including the always underrated
but oh so
important areas of morality, religious beliefs, social
justice, etc...I'm not at
all saying that this becomes some kind of a preachy,
didactic piece, it's just
when you hang out in this amazing territory these questions
are so obviously in
our minds and hearts. Also, most good sci-fi dishes this
out in eclectic and
fascinating helpings because it's always welcome...so
I would encourage you to
make everything much BIGGER in order to live up to this
ambitious vision.
________________
Q-WHAT ARE THE DIFFERENCES BETWEEN MACRO AND MICRO NOTES?
A-*MACRO NOTES ARE COMMENTS THAT REFLECT LARGE ISSUES
SUCH AS STRUCTURE, THEME,
OVERALL CHARACTER AND PLOT DEVELOPMENT, STYLE, MOOD,
TONE,
PACING...AREAS THAT SPAN THE LENGTH OF THE SCRIPT AND
ARE OVERRIDING, NOT SCENE
OR LINE SPECIFIC.
*MICRO NOTES ARE SMALLER COMMENTS MADE ON INDIVIDUAL
PAGES AND REFLECT VERY
DETAILED, SPECIFIC PROBLEMS LIKE A LINE THAT DOESN'T
READ TRUE, A MOMENT IN A
SCENE WHERE THE CHARACTER STOPS SOUNDING LIKE HIM OR
HERSELF, A GRAMMAR PROBLEM, A DESCRIPTION THAT DOESN'T
MAKE SENSE. VERY SPECIFIC NOTES THAT ARE RELEVANT TO A
CERTAIN PAGE RATHER THAN THE SCRIPT AS A WHOLE.
____________
NOTE-OUR ANNUAL, "INSIGHTS FOR 2006" WILL BE COMING TO YOU IN
EARLY JANUARY.
HAPPY HOLIDAYS. ALSO SOMEONE WANTED TO KNOW WHEN THEY'LL
BE NOTIFIED IF THEY'RE
A CONTEST WINNER. THE ANSWER IS BY THE 7TH OF A GIVEN
MONTH. (ALTHOUGH THE
COVERAGE, ETC DOESN'T GO UP ON THE SITE UNTIL LATER IN
THE MONTH AS IT TAKES
TIME TO CREATE AMONG OTHER TIME CONSUMING FACTORS)
__________
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so industry
professionals will respond directly to you. (http://www.scriptblaster.com)
___________________
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