HOLLYWOODSCRIPT.COM NEWSLETTER
Welcome to the latest edition of the Hollywoodscript.com Newsletter, which is published by script consultants Craig Kellem, Judy Kellem
(http://www.hollywoodscript.com)
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The purpose of this newsletter is to share information, ideas etc. concerning the fascinating (and elusive) world of screenwriting.
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OUR LAST CONTEST WINNER, JACQUELINE STAHL WINS A REP AND PLENTY OF READS IN RECORD TIME.
“The Hollywoodscript.com contest is helping new writers like me make remarkable inroads into the movie industry. In just one week after Craig announced my win, I not only received NINE requests for my script, but I also gained representation! Such impressive results. And they came so quickly. And I’m already getting read by producers in Hollywood. Hollywoodscript.com has certainly made an impression on me. I am infinitely thankful to Craig for pushing me to develop my writing skills and then, with the contest, giving my work a vote of confidence. Craig Kellem sets the standard breathtakingly high, and then gives you the information and encouragement you need to reach that standard. He has a wonderful ear for comedy, but he also has an impressive feel for a character’s state of mind and for the emotional flow of a script. His feedback on these nuances helped me improve my script tremendously. Furthermore, his attention to detail and willingness to give generously of his time suggests a genuine love for his work. Craig Kellem, and Hollywoodscript.com, is making a great contribution to the art of screenwriting.” JACQUELINE STAHL 6/08
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JACK VANDAGRIFF STRIKES AGAIN -- THIS CONTEST WINNER GETS OPTIONED!! (We consulted and then INKTIP exposure made it happen!)
Illuminary Pictures options “Angel Hair” by
Jack Vandagriff. Masiel Lusha, founder and
president of Illuminary Pictures, has optioned“Angel Hair” from InkTip scribe Jack Vandagriff.
Lusha, who played the beautiful-but-feisty
daughter on The George Lopez Show, is building
a slate of projects to develop and package through
her various industry sources and contacts. Special
effects wiz Patrick Tatopolous (Director of“Underworld: Rise of the Lycans”) is attached to
direct. Vandagriff is a former studio publicist who has also won or placed highly in a number of
screenwriting contests. This is his second option.
KIND WORDS FROM JACK-
“Craig, once again I thank you for giving sage advice on what you always referred to as a "worthy project", through all the re-writes. Working with you is always a joy because I know you have the story and my best interest at heart (as you do with all the writers with whom you work). Thanks again”
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SERGIO F. BAMBAREN AUTHOR OF MEGA HIT BOOK, “THE DOLPHIN, STORY OF A DREAMER” (AND OUR ESTEEMED CLIENT) HITS MOVIE GOLD
Dear Craig and Judy,
I can't thank you enough for your patience and the wonderful feedback you gave us for our 3D Animation movie that will be released in 2009. The guidance you provided regarding the addition of comic-relief, strong antagonists and a spiritual message was invaluble. And your attitude towards life is an example I guess we should all follow. Thanks for being there!
I am pleased to tell you that our movie will now be distributed by one of Hollywood’s major Studios - initially in all of Latin America, with a first option for the rest of the world. Your openness and constructive criticism earned us what we were longing to hear when we showed it to industry professionals: They told us, “YOUR SCRIPT HAS SOUL!”
I will never forget the lesson of life you gave me Craig: “If you strike oil, stop drilling!” Judy, thanks for your patience and genuine interest in the project. When the movie goes to the theaters, you will find in the CREDITS: Judy Kellem – Script Doctoring. Thank you both, again, for all feedback that has helped make this Project a dream come true.
Truly yours,
Sergio F. Bambaren
CEO
Dolphin –Films (Peru)
Mr Bambaren’s iconic book has sold TEN MILLION copies worldwide so far
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TOM SHIPLEY’S OUR NEW WINNER!
BIG CONGRATS to our latest CONTEST WINNER, "MR HAPPY GO LUCKY." It's a comedy written by TOM SHIPLEY.
This is a funny and also fascinatingly thoughtful script about a young man, living in a state of loneliness and quiet desperation, who experiences something so tragic that he chooses to deem himself happy once and for all (no matter what) and actually turns his life around...or so it seems. So after seeing a TV program on positive thinking, he commits himself to this new persona and good things happen as a result. But all his good fortune is at the deeper expense of his actually mourning his loss and truly experiencing the harder aspects of life – which always bear the fruit of real growth. When his best friend realizes that this young man’s Colgate smile is doing more harm than good – and that it is really DENIAL rather than true HAPPINESS - the friend deems to help his buddy wake up and feel the pain he buried. But it will be tough to get our hero to suffer as he should, because pretending to be joyful can be so seductive!
This charming, eventful and ever so amusing script explores not only the institution of bone deep denial and also the power of belief. It's a terrific piece of work
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Tripping the Light Fantastic
By Judy Kellem
Facing the blank page has always been, for me, a struggle of epic proportions. I spent my twenties slack-jawed, starring into the white abyss of my computer screen, the ominous terror that I had absolutely nothing to say looming about my shoulders like some steely eyed patriarch who’s cross armed and at the ready to yawn, “Give it up lady, you’re just a simpleton.”
And yet somehow, the words always, inevitably came, reminding me that no matter how silent my interior may have seemed - no matter how vacuous it may have felt as I sat there floating through it’s dark, seemingly weightless ether - there is always content waiting to be heard.
Nothing will pull you from that deafening, but substantive, silence like having a child. You are so focused on their every breath that you can literally forget that it even exists within you. At least, that is what happened to me after having my daughter fifteen months ago.
A year evaporated wherein I had barely even had a dream to gnaw on as reassurance that some part of me was still “being creative”. Of course I had an ongoing monologue of baby-related “material” streaming through my brain – as well as an unending conversation with my daughter, which had begun well before I even knew she was on her way. But that eerie, infinite, terrifying space that is my own personal cosmos and home base when it comes to writing, had seemingly vanished from my very person.
Or so I thought.
After thirteen months of being purely steeped in motherhood, I recently took a step out from that “head” and was flabbergasted to find myself landing right back into that vast internal universe, as if no baby, no time, nothing had interrupted that old, often painful, weightless journey.
I had been gifted a ninety-minute massage at a luxurious spa in NYC, which I had never had a moment to enjoy. Knowing that it was about to expire, and seeing that my daughter could forget about me for a couple of hours when in the company of her grandparents (I was always right in the next room), I decided to book myself a much needed rub-down. I arrived early to my mother’s uptown apartment, fed my daughter, played with her, got her settled and then with some anxiety, smiled, “Well, this is an experiment!” to my mom, who assured me it would be fine. This was the first time I had ever left my baby completely with another person.
As soon as I walked out of my mother’s apartment, the totally unexpected happened: that internal space began to encroach on all the worry and baby-related prattle in my head. This was the first time in two years that I was hitting the streets of New York, alone, making my way down an old worn path from my mom’s home of twenty-years, to the same subway stop I’d used for decades to get downtown. Moving along at a fresh, brisk pace, jaywalking as I pleased, noting how differently one is treated when not in the company of a baby, my imagination sky-rocketed. An ancient, uncultivated story idea tucked deep in the pocket of my soul came to the fore, and as I stepped onto the subway platform, realizing I hadn’t taken a train in over eighteen months, that idea continued to expand exponentially like a fertilized egg multiplying by the seconds. The packed train barreled southward, a storm of characters, themes, plot beats and dialogue windsailing through my inner eye.
By the time I reached my stop, made my way to the venue and was soon lead into a circular room by an earthy, woman’s woman named Annagrace, I only lamented one detail: I hadn’t brought a notebook and pen! Laying facedown on the massage table, the din of Zen music billowing about my ears, I sighed with relief as Annagrace beat solid knots out of my shoulders. “There is always something to say,” I thought. “No matter when I get that paper and pen, find that hour to myself to sit at the desk and travel the landscape of my own interior…that universe is timeless, waiting, there for the taking when I am ready. I just have to allow myself to enter that ether, and the words will come.”
I share this as a whisper of encouragement, for I gain great solace from such understanding: We are always writers. Settling down to a desk is simply the act of declaring that so.
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(The following is such a common issue, thought it would be a good idea to reissue this article)
AN IDEA ISN’T A CONCEPT!
by Craig Kellem
This is a fast world in which we live. And how anxious we all are to get directly to our (hopefully) plentiful destinies. Perhaps I notice this with writers more than with others out there, but maybe I’m just more focused on our brethren. But I suspect this aspect of contemporary living is everywhere.
What I’m trying to say is that too many writers are rushing projects, seemingly going for the final draft TO GET IT READ PRONTO BY THE POWERS THAT BE before they’ve spent enough time in the sandbox spawning the prerequisite “art.” In fact, there are more writers than you’d believe who start writing screenplays before they even have a solid concept.
I’m serious.
You need a real CONCEPT before you can DEVELOP a movie project. It needs to be thought through, fussed over, examined, obsessed about, vetted, loved etc. And please remember that AN IDEA ISN’T A CONCEPT! A concept isn’t a one or two line notion. It’s a fleshed out “creative invention” brimming with potential and ready for the next step on the assembly line, namely development.
Sometimes, on the heels of an underdeveloped creative flash, and on the wings of our longing to get there, writers commence with ill-conceived projects, and via the adrenaline which ensues, don’t realize their (often) fatal mistake until it’s too late.
Often writers can misunderstand what a solid concept actually is. For example, I was talking to a writer recently who tried to justify his screenplay which was “about nothing,” with the TV shows Seinfeld and Curb Your Enthusiasm. Boy, was he ever off! These shows are HUGE concepts involving tremendous strategies which cleverly mine “the little things” in life, and frame them through a prism of a certain kind of convincing reality. What ingenuity it takes these show-makers to convince you it’s all real, and what skill and preparation it takes to explore these kind of niche creative areas that so few other practitioners have ever been able to exploit in such a way. Bet Larry David and the gang took their time developing them. Lots of hit and miss, back and forth etc etc..
Another example that comes to mind would be a recent contest winner, Jim Janosky whose concept was about a guy intent on killing himself and who takes a ride across the country as a prerequisite to the big jump into eternity. There are many writers out there who might have built nicely onto this notion but maybe not as much as is needed and this could end up on the pages. Janosky (who’s getting tremendous reaction to the script as well as some serious action-and who’s given me permission to tell you all this) had his work cut out after hatching the initial idea. THE IDEA WAS NOT YET A CONCEPT-he really had only just begun. What followed included MANY hits and misses in the INITIAL spawning process, followed by the slow carving out of the beginnings of terrific story threads and subplots, one involving a relationship with “a one of a kind” mangy dog, that he finds along the way and with whom he shares many dubious and poignant parallels; a string of unique and juicy completions of old rivalries, resentments, and lost love situations; visits to outrageous, story rich and unique places, and finally a fateful hookup with an old guy, and some nice folks from whom he derives new strength and sparkle (so much so that he finally decides to hang around on Earth a little longer). All of these nuggetts (plus lots more) had to be invented and carefully placed into the matrix, before the CONCEPT was fully realized and then fully developed.
High Concept is also a candidate for real thought and scrutiny before a script should be started. A old favorite of mine is the movie BIG. What a good idea it was to explore what would happen to a kid who makes a wish to be grownup and then gets it. But did the writer know what he had when he first came up with this fanciful notion? Could it have been, after scrutiny, just another cute idea that might make a good sketch on a SNL, or a “C” subplot in a sitcom. Many might have declared victory after coming up with this idea and started writing early, on the wings of all the obvious schtick that comes to mind and general manifest destiny -like situations. This writer didn’t. The concept was explored and tested with the many possible ways to go, and tones to take, not to mention other important considerations, such as what level of reality should be maintained and how much humor should be injected, the whole nine yards. The final choices worked well. Things such as putting the kid in a job as a toy company maven, juxtapositioning the grown up kid with his little buddy (who even while being aware of the situation, no longer fitted in) were excellent choices which enhanced this idea and helped turn it into a real concept. At some point after all this labor and sifting, a solid framework was decided upon and then, and only then deep story development commenced.
The point that I’m trying to make is that one must fully dance with the idea, allow it to breathe, grow and broaden into a fully developed concept followed by the next step, involving lists of scenes, moments, bits, and pieces and then begin to connect them into story threads, etc etc before even thinking about the actual writing. And in doing these things, allow yourself to appreciate the wonderfully uncomfortable feeling of not commencing with the screenplay until the concept and all its adjuncts are FULLY realized.
Another symptom of this sometimes “rush to nowhere” are well-intended writers who seek instant technical solutions to artistic problems. So many want to be provided with the correct note on the correct page, so that the situation or problem can be IMMEDIATELY resolved. The real problem is that we sometimes don’t grasp what’s really needed, which might be a fresh creative turn, or an ounce or two of new artistic inspiration, which only comes from REALIZING THAT YOU NEED IT, AND BEING WILLING TO SPEND THE TIME WALTZING WITH THE ARTISTIC MYSTERY PROVIDER WITHIN OURSELVES, THAT ALWAYS COMES TO OUR RESCUE IF PROPERLY NOTIFIED BY A PATIENT SUITOR. The point is that some things are simply not found even in the fattest encyclopedia!
Hopefully my point here is clear and can be illustrated by my recent communication to a young writer --”your material continues to feel like the proceeds of somehow patching things together, rather than something born out of a burning creative vision dying to be expressed. You seem more like a guy who can't wait to write a script rather than one who has a script to write. Please consider this and take your time, you do good work and it deserves to be treated more delicately”
And as for the perceived urgency of getting your script read I say this-getting your script read is NOT the problem. It's getting your script RIGHT so that when it gets read, something good happens!
Copyright 2006--2008, all rights reserved
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FYI, WE HAVE A “HOMEGROWN” AND VERY INFORMATIVE ARTICLES SECTION ON OUR SITE (FREE OF CHARGE OF COURSE). PLEASE FEEL WELCOME TO CHECK IT OUT--
http://www.hollywoodscript.com/articles.html
THINK OF STORY AS PROTEIN!!
By Craig Kellem
The element of STORY in a script is like PROTEIN in your diet. You can eat tons of salad, potatoes, veggies and even partake of dessert, but if there’s not enough protein you can still feel hungry. There’s a similarity with screenplays! Load them up with character dimension, schtick, stunts, cute scenes etc, but if there’s not a story making itself felt, and percolating along the way (making you wonder “what’s going to happen next”), then it can feel as if something vital is missing: STORY!! STORY RULES!!
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SO HOW ARE SCRIPT NOTES REALLY GIVEN IN HOLLYWOOD?
BY CRAIG KELLEM
The short answer to this question is that folks creatively involved in projects, where the success of the script will often make the difference in their selling season (and help keep their jobs, do WHATEVER THEY NEED TO DO to make things go in the “right direction.”
Needed creative input may range from an “all nighter” type session, to a necessary “philosophical” discussion, like the one I once had with a writer who was about to start writing a pilot for CBS, that had real potential, but whose downside was that it could also have turned into a very corny and embarrassing mess. The basic idea was a show involving a family that would end up with one kid from each race at the end of the pilot. Typical gimmicky TV!
But there was a way to do it and to make it a formidable “eight o’clock” show.”
The message I delivered was to simply write this “high-end,” avoiding the obvious clichés. I suggested that the writer think of the family as an honest to God contemporary entity mired in all the realities and verities of real life, who, with real credibility, end up in this unique position and that he should inject real life sensibilities and nuances into the heart of it. I asked him to take what was unlikely and contrived and make it likely and sound, and to then give it all the credible jazz he could muster. The result was that the final draft retained the high concept cutesie “one of each kind” aspect, but it also had real dimension and quality and got on the air.
There were also times when a chat and conventional notes were not going to solve a script problem. Perhaps issues were too subtle or too hard to identify without a certain kind of quality “inspection.” Under such circumstances, we’d “burn the midnight oil” and go PAGE BY PAGE if necessary. No “slam-bam” cookie cutter type written reports here, just hard, scrutinous “whatever it takes” type work.
Or perhaps a script would come in with some glaring problem creating a need (and opportunity) for a quick “go home and fix it” mandate, BEFORE proceeding with the notes.
In delivering script notes to folks via our consultation business, I tend to use the same methods, which is more about GETTING IT DONE, BY WHATEVER MEANS, than—“one size fits all,” type methods, if you know what I mean.
Although most scripts receive what’s stated on our site, which is a thorough read, a full conference, written notes on many pages of the script etc etc, others can sometimes be handled in different ways, depending on what's best for the project.
For example, there have been times where I believe that some macro aspect of the script is not working and I've been known to call the writer, point out the issue and if he/she agrees with the note, they're invited to fix it and send the script back, no charge.
In other cases, if the script is not working but it could (with an important adjustment or whatever), and this is very apparent say by mid script (but I've put a lot of time into it), I've called and discussed the issue with the writer, (and after offering a (suggested) remedy), have given the writer the chance to fix the first half, and then return it to me, to reread this section, (as well as the rest of the script) for a one-half script fee.
The idea here is, to give the writer a chance to fix a glaring, basic problem early on, so that we can be more productive in working with the overall script. By possessing a stronger draft, we can get to a more advanced stage of things much sooner.
There have also been times when I think a script needs serious developmental attention before the writer moves forward with their draft. Under those circumstances, I can sometimes suggest that the job be converted from a straight consultation to a developmental, “Works in Progress” with little or no additional money changing hands.
Obviously these choices are up to the writer, but they often go along with them (and appreciate this extra caring as well) since they usually want to cut to the chase and get the material closer to the finish line sooner rather than later.
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CHECK THIS OUT!
The True Story of a Script, Big Dreams and Vanishing
Private Equity
By BROOKS BARNES
A would-be filmmaker is left in the lurch by nervous
lenders, and his tale is becoming a common one as private
money has become harder to obtain in Hollywood.
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/05/19/business/media/19pitch.html?th&emc=th
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