A Good Scribe, or A Good Jake

Mixing film & firefighting backgrounds on "World Trade Center" movie set. I'm the small mustache...

Part II - The Screenwriter As Firefighter

(This was published on my other blog, but thought it appropriate here as well.)

I have been both Scribe and "Jake."

Well, not really a Jake. That term is almost exclusively a reference to a firefighter from the Greater Boston & New England area.

Since I did most of my Fire/Ems work in Alaska (with a brief foray into Antarctica) I guess a better term would be "Ake."

Drop the J and you have AK for Alaska, E for emergency responder ... No?

Lost Friends & Writing Credits

Before I became an Ake I was working towards becoming a professional writer, though I didn't know it.

I enjoyed writing, and had some good response from friends, but never got around to submitting it to places that could pay me wages to write. When I finished my first full-length play, and shortly after that, my first full-length screenplay, I had no idea what to do with them. I was vaguely aware of contests, writing agents, publishers etc, but my lacking self-esteem at that time kept my pages in a drawer...

Until a filmmaker friend asked me to help her work on her story and script for a feature film she had an offer to direct.

Today, I'm still not sure what my position really was on the project. Was I a co-writer? Script doctor? Story editor?

In the end I realized she did all the typing, so I wasn't a co-writer. And it WAS her idea that she came to me with and started bouncing off me as a friend -- something we've all done as writers, I'm sure.

But then the day came where we walked all the way from uptown to downtown Manhattan discussing and developing the story together. Sure, she had final say in everything, but I was there, wasn't I?

And then the work sessions began. She would write some pages, give them to me to read, and we'd meet and discuss them at her apartment, over coffee at a diner, walking around a park. Often these sessions would go on for hours, and we'd have to block out time for them so she could still spend time with her family. I spent hours, then weeks, then months discussing the story, reviewing pages, giving notes...

The film got made. I got paid some money and one of those "special thanks" credits, which at the time I thought was all I could hope for.

I mean, it wasn't my project or original idea. I was lucky just to be asked to the dance.

A few years later when I was making my own indie feature I had done a brief Q&A for an independent film magazine and mentioned I had helped work on the screenplay and story for my friend's movie, which was receiving attention in the indie scene. My friend read my statement in the magazine and called me up. I was excited to hear from her as it had been awhile since we had last spoken (Facebook did not exist then,) but quickly realized she was upset. I defended myself and we haven't spoken since.

Most of us will have been taken advantage of at some point in our life, often to our detriment. Just as we will take advantage of others, whether it be personally or in business. Thus I strive for two things:

To limit my advantage-taking when I recognize it, and to better my ability to stand up for myself.

If my self-esteem had been more fully realized, and I had understood how to stand up for myself those many years ago, I would have fought for credit -- as story editor, script doctor, anything that would have helped legitimize myself in a profession where your name on a project, good or bad, is often more important than the short-end money.

In fairness I realize there are multiple sides to every story. The friend I've lost undoubtedly has her take on things -- but this is my side to the story and since time has long marched on and I've yet to have a real "career" as a screenwriter, I'd like to get it off my chest and officially claim my credit before I pass into the ether.

I am far from alone.

Unfairness Abounds

There is a fantastic and sobering documentary about the professional frustrations of screenwriting called "Tales From The Script."

If you are a writer who has been at it for some time, whether you've had a project sold, produced, awarded, or you've worked for years on spec in between flipping burgers, you'll recognize yourself in this documentary.

I own it and pop it in whenever I begin to believe that I am kidding myself with this screenwriting thing.

Actually, before I pop it in I usually think--

Give it up. Another screenwriting blog, DVD, book, seminar... They're all the same, say the same things. All they do is bring attention to and make money for the person who's putting it on.

Not with "Tales From The Script." At least I don't think so.

I popped it in again this week and (perhaps unfortunately for me) it rejuiced me. Even the most successful of us experience the same frustrations and battles.

Unfairness abounds.

We take advantage of each other because we are survivors, or competitive, or greedy, or insecure, or there are just too many of us.

Build your self esteem and fight. Cream can't always find its way to the top.

Careful about celebrating contracts early. I certainly enjoyed the Dom, but it's safe to say I was "out of pocket" on this unproduced spec work...

You're Not Invited To The War

With that said, be smart...

I had a small one-line role in my first professional play. The play was a hit and we were extended for a few months and so I thought I could now ask for the minimum Equity (stage actors union) wages along with the rest of the cast.

I was turned down and began to get vocal about it until a friend in the cast pulled me aside and said, "Matt, you might win this battle, but you're going to get kicked out of the war if you're not careful."

It was sage advice. You don't know how long your life is going to go on for, but the longer you are here the more you find yourself wanting to keep off the streets, pay your rent with some left over for coffee and a movie.

Screenwriting is not iron work, or nursing, or firefighting. Where once you're in, you've got a pretty decent chance at job longevity. Relatively speaking.

Screenwriting belongs to that part of the entertainment business where you're in and then you're out within the same 24 hours.

If you want back in the war, choose your battles with care.

The "Ake"

Ninety-odd percent of you are making ends meet through other work as you write your scripts. I am no different. Many of my jobs have been film-industry related, but there was a period when I fell into other work and before I knew it I was a firefighter and EMT.

It's good work -- No, it's great work.

In addition to the job, where every day held the potential for something totally unexpected and exciting, I felt like I was holding my own weight in our over-populated world. I was a positive contributor.

And I found success in a way I hadn't found success in the movie world. A regular paycheck, recognition by my peers, pushing personal boundaries, travel to exotic locales (I landed one gig working as a firefighter for the U.S. Antarctic program. Cold, but still exotic.)

Now, before I continue, if any of you screenwriters find this happens for you -- that you fall into other work that feeds your spirit, fills your wallet, puts you in rooms filled with supportive peers -- throw out your typewriter, or iPad, or pen and paper immediately and don't move. Keep that job!

I didn't take this advice.

I took a break from emergency services to return to writing screenplays because I find peace in trying to create other worlds. But it's the only part of the process I do enjoy. Trying to network myself and sell my work, I find I trip over myself. I either fight the wrong battles, or the right battles too late.

Like trying to get a long ago/galaxy far away credit to help build upon my argument I belong in the game.

It's not only about writing a great script.

And if you learn this lesson late but still feel you must keep writing, then suck it up and keep going, knowing you're the old guy at the club, or become something useful, meaningful, fulfilling, and truly awe-inspiring to the rest of us.

Cold, wet, tired, and happy.  My friend Kurt post fire in winter.

S T O R Y T E LL ING

S T O R Y T E LL ING

This post is from my other blog, but I thought it appropriate here as well.

Part I - In Which We Become God

Stream Clogging
 
With all the daily utube & blog updates popping up on your device I want to make sure I'm not clogging your stream. All the news outlet updates, twit feeds... Webisodes... Vudu & hulu flicks... Kickstart requests... Faceblah gossip...There really is too much to read. And that leads me to...

Digital v. Film

Got into a documentary last year called Side By Side that asks the question "Can film survive our digital future?"

As much of my life has been spent in the world of film, both as audience member and working participant, I took quite an interest in the subject matter.

Now, however, I no longer care about the answer to the question "can film survive our digital future."

I used to, but then I finally understood that it didn't matter in the way I thought it mattered -- If I want to make film, watch film, project film, those opportunities will remain for a long time (as long as those asteroids miss us of course.) There are enough of us who appreciate and enjoy film as a medium, and will help to protect its existence, that I do believe it will survive well into future generations. At least until film stock is no longer produced, and even then our existing "films" will remain, even if they become artifacts in some museum.

Digital (and whatever comes next) are only new means to storytelling. And even though digital devices ensure that practically everyone can now shoot and promote some version of a moving-image story, there will long be an audience for a story to be told well. Just because the vendor has won out the shelf space of modern-day distribution doesn't mean the audience is going to take it all lying down. Someone will always be sifting through the crap to find the gold and bringing that gold to the attention of others.

With digital, though, that sifting of material is definitely more difficult. The loads of content are so overwhelming that we need to extend our days into 48-hours (the first darkness will now be known as midday and allow for a four-hour nap and work break) just so we can catch up on a day's worth of news posts, blog entries, utube channel updates, twits, and Faceblah streams.

This is referenced in Side By Side. In the film v. digital discussion it becomes apparent that one of digital's advantages is also a problem -- the amount of material can become overwhelming.

You can keep the camera (or whatever the image-capturing devices will come to be called) running almost forever, recording as much information as your storage units can hold. We're already on the precipice of pretty much recording an entire day and then sifting through to find any good bits.

Yes. Sift through those bits. All those possible precious moments because, like some junkie, you let the camera run longer and longer, capturing every tic, every realistic "actor unaware" moment, every possible moment of a sunset - the setting, set, and setted.

Yes, you can bring in more editors and assistants to help catalog and catalog and catalog. And you can throw out a few easy ones -- the actor looked at the camera, the producer's guest walked into the shot.

But there is still so much material left, so many options...

I like the light on the trees here, but if we wait two seconds the light does this cool little flash through the leaves... And wait, two more seconds, see how that one leaf kind of twists... And now the light is, wow! ...  Hmmm. Lot of options, let's come back to this shot later. How about the goodbye scene at the coffeeshop between Jack and Jill, let's watch those. How many takes did we shoot of that scene by the way? Two thousand and thirty-seven!?!?!?!

I've been on the road collecting footage this past month for a new short project. I've played around with digital before, but this is the first time I've really delved into shooting it for my own work. It began all right. I was careful to only shoot things I thought really stood out in some way -- a nice composition, colorful subject matter, etc etc. And when I did shoot I took care to only press record when I thought it was the right time, and only for as long as I needed (with a tail and head.) All of this was due to my film experience. Knowing that film was money, and that there was only so much film on a roll...

But I quickly realized I could shoot as much as I wanted. And delete. And shoot. And delete. And shoot again...

Soon, though, I stopped deleting. I kept it all, knowing that I could sift through the material later when I really had time to study it.

There are those words again. Sift. Time.

I already have too much material, but much of that is due to my not having specific shots planned out that I wanted. I went on the road to capture a lot of "B" roll, and capture it I did.

With discipline, and a story plan, this doesn't have to happen of course. But it does. The stream gets clogged.

I'm guessing there will come a time (barring asteroids) when images will record and project as we think them. Within seconds, and with honed skill, they will be thought, shot, and edited into some sort of story, or personal update, or news blip.

And those of us in that future will cease movement and meld into one unmoving blob of super-consciousness. We will end, become anew, and, missing what we once were, create in our own image on some nearby planet.

(Part II - In Which Screenwriters Save Too Many Cats)

Script Reader Q&A (Seeking Pot O' Gold)

Arctic Circle along Dempster Highway

Last post introduced the "script reader," who can be an early hurdle on the screenwriter's journey towards a script sale. Today, we have a Q&A with three of those gatekeepers, who each kindly gave their time to answer a few questions from the reader's perspective.

They all work in the same industry, and to some degree have similar parameters to follow when covering a script, yet their answers are each unique to themselves.

Ladies And Gentlemen, Your Readers

Synthian Sharp - Synth is the reader I began a dialogue with on John August's site. He has read for independent production companies as well as the Jules Verne Adventure Film Festival, and Valley International Film Festival. He was lead composer on Val Kilmer's American Meth, and co-director of the film, How I Became An Elephant (heartbreaking, but check it out).

Jeanne Marie Spicuzza - Jeanne Marie reads for her own production company, seasons & a muse, where her film, The Scarapist, is currently in pre-production. She is a published poet, has performed at poetry slams worldwide, and has been featured at such events as Lollapalooza and Ladyfest.

Chip Street - Chip is a screenplay competition judge for the Shriekfest Horror Film Festival, and a pre-screener for the Santa Cruz Film Festival. He's optioned two of his own screenplays, and has worked in film production as a director, art director, and production designer. This is Chip.

Q&A

(I could use a new kind of free fall)

Matt Shields: You're having drinks with a visiting out-of-town amateur writer and he gets you loose enough to let him/her on some secrets... He's read the blogs, attended the Expo, subscribed to the magazines, taken McKee's course, read twenty-five of the WGA's "100 Best Screenplays," and his latest script placed well in a top comp. He's ready to take on Hollywood. What is the most important thing he still doesn't know?

Chip Street: That now it's time to stop thinking like a lone writer, and start thinking like a producer, like a collaborator. In many ways, Hollywood works like indie filmmaking, just with bigger checks. It's still a small community, where relationships matter and news travels fast. Where people want to work with other people who are fun to work with, and who are invested in the whole process. Writers who just want to take their check and disappear are less attractive than writers who are going to be involved in the project, help build the relationships with talent, be in on meetings or whatever else is needed. And for God's sake be pleasant. I've been told "I'd rather spend six months locked in a room on a project with a reasonably talented writer who's fun to work with than a brilliant writer who's an asshole." Those writers - the fun ones - are going to get more projects, and more referrals. Better yet, be the brilliant writer who's also fun to work with, and you're a god.

Jeanne Marie Spicuzza: A friend of mine and fellow poet, actress, playwright, once shared with me a great secret that stuck with me: When someone tells you they're a writer, always ask, "What are you reading now?"

Synthian Sharp: Ok, that person doesn't exist. Seriously. What you've just described is the big-fat-wet-dream submission. Primarily because, "He's read the blogs, and read twenty-five of the WGA's 100 Best." It would be hard for me to express just how far from that person most submissions are, but let me try. If even half of the raw naked spec submissions that came into Hollywood came from that person - meaning they had not only actually done these things, but had actually taken them to heart, and had actually studied and understood them - the world would not at all resemble the world you live in now. The very face of art, and, I dare say, even the political map, would have changed as a result of the severe alterations to the world's most powerful art form.

Indulge me for a moment, so that I can explain. I can say, absolutely and without hesitation, that every single spec screenplay I have ever been handed has been guilty of crimes against the standards of preparedness you mentioned above. All of them. This is coming from someone who doesn't just claim to respect the craft, but has actually taken the time to read the complete works of my favorite screenwriters, and learn from who they learned from, and count their sentences and parentheticals. If you asked me what Terry Rossio [screenwriter Pirates Of The Caribbean, Shrek, National Treasure] has to say about a given aspect of screenwriting, I can probably tell you what the blog post was called and which paragraph it's in, because I care. That's who your competition is.

Terry Rossio took the script of his idol and retyped it letter for letter, comma for comma, until he could hold the original and his copy lined up when he pressed them against a window, and see the structure standing out like an x-ray machine. Because he wanted to be a goddamned, mother-fucking millionaire. And he wanted to do it by telling stories.

As a second answer to the same question I would give you this: Read more than you write... Also, people can tell the difference between things that were inspired, and things that were manufactured. Don't ever manufacture. If you've got five screenplay ideas and four are what's hot right now, and one is that bizarre sub-genre period piece that you know Hollywood can't possibly have the balls for, but its still on your list cause you just can't get it out of your head, that's the one.

MS: Would a Preston Sturges (or any top writer from another era) script make it past any of you today?

Jeanne Marie: Yes. Especially Dorothy Parker.

Synthian: Yes. Top or not, I would lobby for rebellious material. I'd love to see "Brave New World" come across my desk. That must have been what it was like for whoever was handed "Memento". In the same sense that a hip-hop artist could make his bones today by recording over the phone from inside a prison, a Dalton Trumbo script I would beg for an excuse to get made simply because he'd been blacklisted. And the truth is, if you're a respecter of dialogue in the first place, you know that our standards have all but collapsed in that realm due to the rush-cycle of pop-culture production. Watch "Casablanca" with a pen and pad, and literally write down every single line of dialogue that became a catch phrase throughout our culture. You'll run out of paper because it's truly amazing. No modern film can do that. The dialogue in "The King's Speech" was written thirty years ago. Much of the dialogue in the Coen Brothers' "True Grit" adaptation was even older. But it's not that the capacity for good dialogue has disappeared from our fingers. We just don't respect it enough to raise it, and water it, and feed it from the ground up anymore...

Anyone interested in proof that great small-focus dialogue is still being written today should immediately head over to Amazon and watch a random episode of "Lark Rise to Candleford."

Chip: Had to Google a Sturges' script to see what it looked like. Found a copy of "Nothing Doing." It's not exactly a spec script, it's a production version, and includes shot descriptions and other details that I would hate in a spec. But setting that aside, it still suffers from many of my pet peeves: long solid blocks of description with no breaks (fifty lines!), overly specific description - down to explaining exactly how a logo is designed, and a parenthetical on nearly every dialogue slug. So, from a purely technical format standpoint, I'd have to say "no." That's the stuff that drives me nuts, and makes me want to shitcan a script instantly. Though I probably won't, not on page one. But, it will put me off, and it has to work really hard to win me back quick.

But that's the technical. Then there's the story. I do believe there's something brilliant about the economy of story in a lot of older films from the thirties and forties with regard to structure and character. It's almost poetic. I grew up on a lot of those old films, and still return to them. That's something I like to see in a script, and would be happy to let past me.

MS: You seldom (if ever) write a "recommend." What's so bad about "consider?" Don't they get a look?

Synthian: No. Writing "consider" already has some natural weights against it. Most prominently, that you didn't love the script. As a brilliant screenwriter once said, when asked what a screenwriter's job really is: "Simple. Make the bicycle fly." This of course in reference to "E.T." And they've either done it, or they haven't. Nobody wants to give a heartfelt "Eh?" Consider means: it ain't what you asked for, but the writer was so good that you didn't have a choice.

Chip: Screenplay contests are like American Idol. 10,000 people show up. Maybe 25 have some real potential, ten are uber talented, two or three are savants, and, if you're lucky, one is a true artist for the ages. You have to put 25 in the finals. That's just the rules. Those finalists are getting their look and they better deserve it. The winner's not likely to be an artist for the ages, but she damn well better be uber talented, if not a savant.

Reading for contests my "recommend" means move it to the finals. I'm not into putting William Hung, or Bikini Girl through just cuz it's good TV. I want the finals to be a steel-cage match of highly capable and brilliant contenders, any one of whom deserves to be the champ.

If I were reading for a prodco [production company], I'd probably be more demanding than I am as a contest reader. And I have a reputation for being a mean and ruthless contest reader. I get angry, physically pissed, at a truly shitty script. I hate the idea of rewarding mediocrity. And I hate the idea of wasting anyone else's time - those other hapless readers, say, who have to read all the finalists. Mostly, though, it's the rewarding mediocrity I hate. If your crappy script gets to the semis, you're going to think that what you're doing is good enough. It's not.

Jeanne Marie: Depends on the level of good, or bad.

MS: What keeps a reader honest to the slush pile of countless unknowns, instead of just promoting friends' scripts?

Jeanne Marie: Probably very little, unless he/she is of high moral character.

Chip: I got into production initially to understand how the script evolves into a finished film, the whole production process, so I'd be a better writer. I took acting classes to help me understand what actors need, so I'd be a better director. I take the opportunity to read as an opportunity to learn what really matters to a reader, what makes for a "recommend," or a "fail." I can't learn if I'm not honest - with the scripts and with myself - so, it's invaluable to put on my reader hat, be ruthless, and see what makes a great script great, and what kills a script.

As a reader, I'm looking for what most writers seem to think they're delivering: greatness. I always crack each script open with high hopes that it'll be great. I want people to be awesome. I want to find a script that makes me glad I spent ninety minutes of my life with it. If the script is truly great - it likely won't be, but I hope - it'll get a fair shake. I want the screenwriting universe to be peopled with great writers delivering great stories through great scripts. Finding great scripts by great writers - whoever they are - and rewarding that work, helps create the kind of universe I want to be a part of, and that's good for everybody. In the end, being honest to the slush strengthens the industry, and makes me a better writer.

Synthian: I have read every one of my "friends" scripts. Some, as many as three revisions, which is why the word friends must be in quotes. Their scripts are abusive weapons just like everyone else, and there is not a one I would make a "recommend" to risk my reputation for. Sorry. Nobody spends umpteen million dollars on something because they're a friend of that nice intern. Talent comes first... I'm in a luxurious position of being able to have my newest script read by some of the best and I wouldn't dare shame their desks with it. Not until it beats the ever livin' out of whatever else they may see. To illustrate that perfectly clearly to you: Last week I made a new title page in Final Draft for my current screenplay, so as to change the written by line to "Anonymous." That's how confident I have to be. Before I turn anything in, I have to be able to ask myself the question, "If this were to appear on [producer's] desks as an anonymous writing tomorrow, would it burn straight through this village like wildfire?"

I'll turn it in when the answer is yes. And if you can write that well first, then you'll beat me, and you deserve to.

MS: If the writing is entertaining, will you keep reading past standard benchmarks if things that are "supposed" to happen by then, have not happened? Or is your world hard-wired to three-act structure, etc?

Synthian: Ugh. Okay, I'm almost tempted to say I'm offended when a screenplay is Syd Fielded [Syd Field is an author of popular screenwriting books]. It just tends to show a hell of a lot less heart, passion, and instinct, than organizational skill. This is strictly a personal thing, but I just can't see myself recommending a script that doesn't at some point break at least one solid rule. Your job is to further the format. Yes, we all know what the restrictions are, but your job is to push it till it breaks. So, if you've had to make up some new convention of the thing just in order to be able to fit your universe into the limitations, I admire your needing to do that. Roll on with your Jedi self. However, you will find out very quickly that the opposite of that is true as well. Meaning, I seriously fucking challenge you to find me a script that, one, we don't know who we are or where we're going by page twenty, and two, is also entertaining writing. It just basically doesn't happen. Good writing is invisible. The three-act structure is supposed to be invisible. If you're looking for it, it's because you're an asshole. Good is good. Bad is bad.

There are basically three types of "reads." The third one we're just going to do away with because we're not talking about that here. It's where you're reading a legend, and you're there to learn from them and anything they do now becomes the new format... What we're concerned about as readers is the difference between the two first types of reads. One, the proof read, and two, the professional free-fall. What I'm asking for from you when you hand me your script, is for me to have the right to trust you're more than a pro, and that I can simply pretend your script is a skyscraper and I'm about to jump off the top, and as I fall I will hit nothing. I will keep turning pages as I plummet straight down through your story until I arrive at the inevitable conclusion, and stand up feeling only, exactly, the emotions you designed me to feel. That's what I want. Every legendary writer gives us that. Every single time. You can go pick up any David Webb Peoples script [Blade Runner, Unforgiven], or any Brian Helgeland script [Mystic River, Man On Fire] off the shelf and you will drop straight through, and the number of speed-bumps, or girders, or format errors, or confusion sessions you will hit on your way down is zero. Its what we dream of...

But, the mistakes of the amateur take our expected free fall and, one by one, page by page, slowly convince us that we cannot trust them. They little by little stop us from watching the story and turn it into a "proof read." And that makes you suck. Because the only way of avoiding that was a decision you made forever ago, because you didn't care about my time, and you decided not to read your free 150 or so Writer's Guild Library scripts, because you're a dick. Don't... be... a dick.

Jeanne Marie: My life allows me 12-15 pages. If it isn't moving me by then, it's all over.

Chip: Hell yeah. I'm big on structure, but what that means is flexible. Some of my favorite movies are slow builders and develop very organically over four acts. I look for escalation - within a scene, a character relationship, through a story - but hitting certain marks by certain pages is in no way a requirement for me. I think deconstructing stories to find those patterns is academically interesting, and sometimes those beats work. But I also think assuming it's some kind of template for success is what leads to, at best, uninspired work, and, at worst, a lot of predictable garbage.

Have a great idea. Execute with excellence. Know your formatting (spelling is a huge deal for me). And use whatever structure your story demands.

MS: Forget that paradigm! I want to write the next rule-breaking indie hit! Do indie production companies have readers? Do they follow different rules?

Chip: I don't read for prodcos, but I submit my work to them. I've optioned two scripts to indie prodcos, so I guess someone's reading scripts. Different rules? I'm sure they want great stories told well. That's the universal thing, right? In that sense, they follow the same rules. But, indies can take greater risks with films that are less commercially driven, that tell smaller stories, and that take structure apart and put it back together in a new and interesting way. In that sense, they can have a broader range of creative or commercial expectations. If you've got a rule-breaking script that's non-traditional, an indie prodco is probably your outlet. Thanks, indie prodcos!

Jeanne Marie: I'm too indie to answer that!

Synthian: Yes, they have readers, but the slush-pile is exactly the same. You'd be surprised how many writers with indie scripts are absolutely certain their script is "Independence Day," and how many "Independence Day" writers think their script is an indie. The lines are blurred now, and nobody can tell you you're wrong if you send more to one direction than the other.

Yes, they follow different rules. An indie production company I read for had a producer who, himself, had written a 165-page screenplay, which he had perceived as having done very well... ergo, the page limit for submissions at that particular office had arbitrarily become, 165. I've been sent on a hunt for the "world's greatest chamber piece" - a chamber piece is a film that takes place entirely, or almost entirely, in a single room or location, ie, "Buried," the first "SAW," "Reservoir Dogs." Its hard for me to imagine being asked to do that for a major. And one guy had been given an ice skating rink for the summer, so he needed all the best indie ice-skating rink scripts.

By all means, make your rule breaking screenplay, but don't assume its an indie. "Good" is what's wanted on posters tacked to every signpost in the production spectrum. So, if you know what you're doing, and still break a whole bunch of rules, then yeah, I could use a new kind of free fall. Send it to me.

Hollywood's Gatekeepers

Last ride with the Transalp, Turnagain Arm

You're an amateur screenwriter and you believe your screenplay is finally ready for the real world -- or you've simply grown tired of the actual work it takes to write and re-write -- but either way, you've long suffered the crap Hollywood puts out week after week until that fateful day it struck you, "My God! I can write better than this!"

And now here you are, script in hand. Ready to cash in.

Maybe create some art on the side.

Maybe even... Nah, it ain't that good, is it? Well, that final scene did make my mom cry... Oscar nom?

You weren't born into the industry. Your Kevin Bacon number is in the hundreds, so no connections you can work there.

You have to get it to a big-time producer. Or, even a middle-time producer...

Does the porn industry buy scripts? The soft-core kind, though -- you are a storyteller after all.

OK, OK, you're not that guy. You're serious. Even took a class.

But, your Kevin Bacon number is in the hundreds, and in order to get your sweat, blood, and tears into the hands of someone who can turn them into gold, you have to get past the gatekeepers.

Aka Readers.

Aka "Bitter."

Why bitter?

Because of the slush-pile.

This All Began When

I became engaged in a discussion over on screenwriter John August's site (Charlie's Angels, Big Fish, Corpse Bride) with another of the site's readers.

Turned out this reader, was a "reader."

I brought up the, "What do readers have to be bitter about?" question.

Hitting him with, "In my old job I was bled and vomited upon," before ending with, "How cool it would be to get paid while still in my robe with a pot of coffee nearby."

Really, reader-dude, what's there to complain about?

The Slush Pile

"That's because you're not thinking of scripts as weapons ... That just comes with understanding what the slush-pile really is. If you think you can take it because of your samurai training, you are sadly fucking mistaken and shall fall like the rest of us. For it is an unearthly Hell Mouth, and the very physical manifestation of the bottomless pits of hell. If you’re laughing right now, then it is simply because you have mistaken my warnings for frivolity. Warn your village, dude."

I was laughing, but I also had to concede I have never sifted through a slush pile.

Remember how, you, the hopeful screenwriter, suffered through all those bad movies week after week? Until that fateful day you realized, "I can write better than this," and sat down to give it a shot?

You weren't alone.

Numbers I've found show anywhere from 17,000 to 50,000 scripts are registered with the Writer's Guild every year. And those numbers don't include the thousands of scripts that aren't being registered, but still make it into "readers" slush-piles.

And slush-piles can take their toll.

As the reader alluded to in one response, there is more than one way to be vomited upon:

"Try to envision taking your old day job, only imagine that what they're throwing up on is your soul ... An endless row of strangers, throwing up on your soul."

"They're Just That Rare"

Whether it's a submission to a production company, or an entry to a screenwriting competition, your script will more than likely pass into the hands of one of these bitter strangers whose soul is drenched with vomit.

And, if they perceive they are about to be wretched upon again, they may just stop reading long before they get to that really good scene that made your mom cry.

So, take your time. Read some more. Write some more.

Once it is submitted, one of three words will be stamped somewhere on your script's coverage: Pass, Consider, or Recommend

You don't want "Pass," so, you re-write.

You don't really even want "Consider," so, another re-write.

"Recommend" is the key to the kingdom. One more re-write should do it.

Now that you've put in the really tough, extra hours, the hours you know the other guy didn't put in, you're sure to get that "Recommend."

How hard can it be?

"I now share with you, the most glorious fact of my experience as a reader: I never wrote a Recommend. – It never happened. – And while you might think with my attitude that’s because I quite obviously hate everything and couldn’t tell when a great script was in my hand to begin with, (a fear that very slowly occurred to me as well)… I then took a short break to go and see if screenplays were what I remembered. And guess what? Good writing was still good writing and I could still see it plain as day. 'Back To The Future' is a perfect script. – 'The Postman' is a perfect script. – 'Schindler’s List' is a perfect script. Which is the single most searing and irreplaceable lesson of the slush pile, and the cattle-branding realization you go there to get: They’re just… that… rare."

Don't Fret Yet

Oh ye with no "uncle in the business." There may still be a place for you at (or, at least under) the dinner table.

To help with your (and my) journey, a Q&A with three Hollywood gatekeepers will be posted here in the coming week. Stay tuned.

In the meantime, stop watching anything on TV that involves a ball or puck, and get back to work on your script.

[Quoted conversation taken from this dialogue on John August site]

Chuck Keen Documentary

Happy to be here

A motorcycle accident last Saturday has put me off my work all week. My bike is totaled, my body is sore, and I'm three stories behind.

So, to tide you over, please take a moment to enjoy the story of one of Alaska's former pioneering filmmakers -- Chuck Keen.

Chuck Keen Fast Facts

Died in 2003 at the age of 65.

First came to Alaska to work in the timber industry, and later began to work as a screenwriter, producer, and cinematographer of films in Alaska.

Feature film credits include Claws, Challenge To Be Free, and Timber Tramps starring Claude Akins.

Now, sit back and enjoy this entertaining short documentary, which was created by the JUMP Society crew for the International Documentary Challenge.

Check Out "Go Into The Story"

Sadie prefers to "Go Into The Ocean"

Scott Myers, who runs the screenwriting blog "Go Into The Story" (which you may have noticed I like to promote) gave me permission to re-post the story below.

I could have linked to the story, but then you could have just skipped over it, and I really think if you are interested in screenwriting you should give his site a visit.

Besides having sold screenplays to Hollywood, Scott also works as a screenwriting instructor at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill -- Two of my favorite coffee-shops ever are in that area, by the way. Worth the trip down from Alaska...

Speaking of Alaska, Scott has visited here. Twice. He even wrote the script for the film Alaska. And, yes, some of it was shot up here.

But, I digress.

There are plenty of sites, books, classes, on the subject of screenwriting. The reason I recommend a visit to Go Into The Story is that it contains a nice balance of information. Some original, some pulled from other sources, and all of it relevant to the screenwriting world.

There is a lot of information on his site. His post below will help guide you through it, as well as give you a good introduction.

Enjoy!

Welcome to Go Into The Story (re-posted courtesy of Scott Myers)

During the last few months, the site has had a noticeable increase in visitors, so I'd like to resurrect a practice I do occasionally at the beginning of the month: Welcome folks and provide a tour of the site. So grab this virtual steaming macchiato and join me for a journey through the wonderful world of GITS!

First off, it should be noted I post on average six items per day. Why? (A) Because I'm just this shy of crazy. (B) Because if your writing habits are anything like mine, you like to take a break every couple of hours or so. Therefore I post here at 6AM, 10AM, 12PM, 2PM, 4PM, and 6PM (Eastern time zone), giving writers a chance to drop by for news and inspiration.

Being a military brat, I even have a schedule for the type of posts I do. Here it is:

Mondays-Sundays (6AM): Daily Dialogue
Monday (10AM): On Writing
Tuesday (10AM): Hollywood Tales
Wednesday (10AM): Screenwriting 101
Thursday (10AM): The Business of Screenwriting
Friday (10AM): Great Characters
Saturday (10AM): Interviews (written)
Sunday (10AM): Interviews (video)

In addition, during the week I collect all sorts of articles, a combination of informative, humorous, and sometimes downright weird, and post a weekly Saturday Hot Links.

Having worked for many years in Hollywood, I know how little attention screenwriters get and how much we deserve. Therefore GITS honors and promotes the work of professional screenwriters.

However as the site has evolved, a major focus has become an ongoing dialogue about the craft of screenwriting. To wit on the right-hand side of the blog, if you scroll down you'll see something called Lists. It is a veritable treasure trove of information about the screenwriting craft with literally thousands of posts on almost every conceivable topic. Here are just a few you should check out:

2008 Spec Script Sales Analysis

2009 Spec Script Sales Analysis

2010 Spec Script Sales Analysis

Every day I track the sales of spec scripts in Hollywood. At the end of each year, I do an analysis of sales trends breaking them down by genre, studio, representation, first-timers, and big dollar deals. If you want to know what the studios are buying, GITS is perhaps the best single free site on the Web as I offer solid, up-to-date inside information.

GITS Q&A Interviews

Here you will find exclusive interviews I have done with Hollywood professionals with an emphasis on screenwriters including several 'first-timers' (writers who broke into The Biz by selling a spec script). Combined with the hundreds of other interviews for which I have links -- here, here, and here -- you have a massive resource of first-person wisdom from actual professional screenwriters.

GITS Reader Questions

Early on after I launched this site, readers started asking me questions about screenwriting and the movie business. In response, I provided my two cents worth. Since then I have fielded around 200 questions ranging from minor matters such as screenplay style to big ones like how to get an agent. If you have a question about the craft, chances are I've touched on it, so it's worth your time to check out GITS Reader Questions to see what information is available there.

How They Write A Script

If you get sick of hearing me pontificate about screenwriting, why not check out what some notable screenwriters, past and present, have to say on the subject? That's what How They Write A Script is about, excerpts from interviews with such writing luminaries as Paddy Chayefsky and Diablo Cody, Alvin Sargent and Sterling Silliphant, and dozens of others.

The Business of Screenwriting

After innumerable requests from readers to hear more about my own personal experiences in Hollywood as a screenwriter, last year I started a weekly column: "The Business of Screenwriting is a weekly series of GITS posts based upon my experiences as a complete Hollywood outsider who sold a spec script for a lot of money, parlayed that into a screenwriting career during which time I've made some good choices, some okay decisions, and some really stupid ones. Hopefully you'll be the wiser for what you learn here." To date there are 30 columns. Look for a new one each week.

The GITS Club

Moderated by the inimitable Michael Scherer, The GITS Club is a peer review site where members read and critique each other's stories in all stages of development.

These are just a few of the resources GITS makes available to you about screenwriting and the movie business. And in a demented bit of anti-capitalism, they are all free and without any yucky web ads to frag your creativity.

There are also links to other screenwriter blogs, movie blogs and news sites, and tons of other bloggers who have interesting things to say.

So there you have it -- a quick trek through the mysteries that constitute GITS.

One aspect that is most definitely not a mystery is the GITS community, an amazing array of writers and readers from around the world. And to that end, if you are a frequent or even irregular visitor to the site, but have yet to post a question or comments, let me give you this chance to introduce yourself!

Go into Comments on this thread and tell us a bit about yourself -- your interest in writing, what type of movies you like, what aspirations you have as a screenwriter, TV writer, novelist, playwright, and/or filmmaker. If you have a blog you think might be of interest to the GITS community, please post your url and I'll add it to the Friends blogroll list.

And while you're at it, please consider signing up to follow GITS. At a very basic level, the number of GITS followers lets me know you dig what I do here and keeps me motivated to stick with it.

Again welcome to all you newcomers. And to my loyal readers, some of whom have been following the site since May 2008, I thank you for making GITS a part of your daily or weekly routine.

Let me end with a writing mantra: Trust the process.

Be well. Write well. Live well!

P.S.: If you have any suggestions for the site or requests in terms of subjects you'd like to see covered, please post those in comments.

Screenwriter Dave Hunsaker (Q&A)

I'm very excited to bring you this interview with working Alaskan screenwriter and playwright, Dave Hunsaker.

Hunsaker found his beginnings with his own play, "Yup'ik Antigone," based on Sophocles' "Antigone." The play was developed one winter in Toksook Bay on Nelson Island, and toured Alaska before being invited to the Theatre des Nations Festival in Nancy, France. It then found further success with a sold-out run at New York City's famous La MaMa ETC, as well as performances on ancient Greek stages in Athens and Delphi.

The play's success opened doors for Hunsaker as both a playwright and screenwriter. He was asked to help develop the Juneau-based Naa Kahidi Theater, an international touring company based primarily in Tlingit culture, and became their Artistic Director. This relationship eventually led to his being adopted by the Luxaax.ádi Clan of the Tlingit Nation.

Hunsaker was also accepted into the Sundance Screenwriting Lab, which helped begin a career writing for such directors as Robert Redford, Norman Jewison, Carroll Ballard, Roger Donaldson, Mel Gibson, Arthur Hiller, and Guillermo del Toro.

Hunsaker resides in Juneau, Alaska, with regular trips to his home in Santa Monica, California, to touch base with producers and colleagues - as well as soak up the sun and get in some warm-water kayaking. He is about to begin work on his third script for Leonardo DiCaprio.

Q&A

Matt Shields: My original intent was to focus on screenwriting; yet, as I've learned, theater runs deeply in your history. Are you a playwright first and foremost? Is that where your heart lies?

Dave Hunsaker: I love the theater, and still try to write at least one play a year. I prefer small productions that I can direct myself, because then I can indulge in all sorts of things that I don’t get to when I’m writing a screenplay. [Screenplay] writing is almost always at the behest of someone else, where I am more or less under the thumb of those who are paying me to write a script for them...

I like theater because what I write will probably get produced somewhere in one form or another, and the vast majority of movie scripts I am hired to write do not. Still, screenwriting is my bread and butter, and I have worked hard to make it my craft for the past twenty-plus years, so I’d have to say my heart lies there mostly.

MS: How did "Yup'ik Antigone" come to be?

Hunsaker: "Yup’ik Antigone" came about because of some striking similarities I noticed between ancient Greek theater and traditional Yup’ik ceremonial performance styles. Storytelling combined with dancers in masks, mostly. I also found a few cultural values that were similar, such as respect for the dead and abhorrence of tyranny, which suggested to me Sophocles’ Antigone'. I approached Molly Smith, artistic director of Perseverance Theatre in Juneau, and she went for the idea. Nikki Barthen, Perseverance’s producer at the time, went after grants, and ended up getting a very generous one from the Atlantic Richfield Foundation. I then had the wonderful opportunity of traveling all over Western Alaska to find a suitable village with whom to work to make the play happen. We finally hit on the village of Toksook Bay, a quite magical place on Nelson Island. I wrote my own version of the play, substituting Yup’ik or Inuit mythological references for the Greek ones, and Yup’ik story dances for the choral odes, but otherwise stayed pretty faithful to Sophocles. Designer and Art Director Jim Simard and I took up residence in Toksook for the better part of a winter, 1983-84 I think it was, and created the play there with all the cast members from the village. We ended up doing it in the Yup’ik language, which was hard for me as a writer, letting go of all that prose I’d labored over, but obvious and necessary to me as a director, since the actors all spoke Yup’ik as their first language and were simply much more believable and moving in their roles in that language.

MS: With the Naa Kahidi Theater, did you write for them as well as being Artistic Director?

Hunsaker: I wrote most of the material, adapting it pretty straight from original oral sources, working with Elders and tradition bearers. Nora Marks Dauenhauer also did some writing for us, and created some wonderful material... I was very proud of a lot of our work. Some really important artists came out of Naa Kahidi, people who have gone on to be great performers or leaders, like Gene Tagaban, Bob Sam, Diane Benson, Valerie Davidson. These experiences with Naa Kahidi Theatre and the contacts within the Native community I made led to my being adopted by the Luxaax.ádi Clan, which remains a very big and important part of my personal life.

MS: What do you find to be a fundamental difference between playwriting and screenwriting?

Hunsaker: To me, playwriting is usually more of an aural experience for audiences, unless it’s some zillion dollar Broadway extravaganza, whereas film is much more visual. Playwrights are accorded a kind of respect that screenwriters usually are not, and have, generally speaking, a lot more freedom of invention. Of course they are usually a whole lot more impoverished, too...

Writing movies, at least for the mainstream Hollywood market, which is what I do, is highly restrictive and much, much more technical than writing for the stage. Not that it has to be formulaic, but the executives who read your script have typically taken Robert McKee’s course, and they tend to look at material with that in mind. [Robert McKee teaches the popular "Story seminar," a four-day course on screenwriting]

MS: How did you first get noticed by Hollywood?

Hunsaker: It was an indirect result of "Yup’ik Antigone". While I was living in Toksook Bay a lot of the people told me wonderful stories about a mythical ancient warrior called Apanuugpak, suggesting that we could make him the subject of the next play. They were such incredibly visual, action-oriented stories I thought they would make a better film than stage play. I’d never studied film - still haven’t - or attempted to write a screenplay, but Jim Simard, who had worked as an Art Director in film, gave me a book that showed things like formatting, and I boldly set off in my ignorance and wrote a script based on the stories I’d been told. Jim helped me get it to the Sundance screenwriting lab, which was just a few years old at that point, and by odds too long for me to calculate it was one of five projects that got accepted for development that year. Jim, who was going to produce, my friend Joel Bennett - a renowned wildlife filmmaker from Juneau - who was going to shoot it, and I went to Utah and spent a month at the Sundance ski resort working on the project with some of the best writers, directors, and actors in the business, who were there as technical advisors. The idea was I was going to direct the script, too.

MS: What happened with that project?

Hunsaker: We actually were given a crew and experienced actors and got to shoot some scenes from the script, trying to make the mountains of Utah in June look like the YK Delta [Yukon Kuskokwim] in the winter. That was pretty funny, but also very valuable. In the end it was kind of a doomed project. My original idea had been to get a small, tough crew and shoot it all in 16mm up in Toksook, all in Yup’ik with subtitles and unknown actors - it would have very much resembled the Canadian Inuit film "Atanarjuat: the Fast Runner," which was made many years later. Columbia Pictures, which still existed then, optioned the script, but they wanted it to become a more 'accessible' mainstream story and they wanted me to cast actors like Lou Diamond Phillips and Toshiro Mifune because they vaguely resembled Eskimos. I couldn’t imagine doing that and going back to face the elders of Toksook Bay. At the same time, ironically, I was catching hell from Alaskan ‘experts’ on Yup’ik culture because I wasn’t true enough to it from an anthropological standpoint. One of them even managed to sabotage some support we’d been promised from the NEA [National Endowment for Arts]... So in the end it would have been a compromise either way, and probably both ways. I was sad it didn’t happen, but I learned to swim by getting thrown into the deep end for sure. With sharks.

MS: What was the experience like at Sundance?

Hunsaker: It was incredible to hang out with legendary writers like Frank Pierson - who actually came to visit us in Juneau - Waldo Salt, Ring Lardner, Jr., and directors like the late Sydney Pollack and George Roy Hill and Redford himself. I got a lot of invaluable advice on that script and a crash course in screenwriting in general...

It really is kind of like a wonderful family, and I’ve stayed in touch all these years. As a matter of fact, I was asked to be a resource person last year and mentor five young Native American screenwriters. I got a call from my friend Bird Runningwater, who runs the Native Voices program of the Sundance Institute, asking if I could come to New Mexico the following week. It’s the kind of thing you can’t say no to, and I was very glad to have the opportunity to give something back. I can’t imagine that I would have been launched on this career as a screenwriter if it hadn’t been for Sundance in general and Robert Redford personally, who gave me a small job on his film "The Milagro Beanfield War" right after I’d gone through the summer Lab.

MS: I've come across a growing number of Alaskan screenwriter hopefuls recently, and with our wired world they seem savvier than writers of yesteryear. They know the language, the blogs to visit, the books to read, the screenwriting software to own, the competitions to enter... Still, with all this at their fingertips, what would you tell a new writer in Alaska if he/she asked you how to proceed?

Hunsaker: If the writer wants to be a director too, I’d say make a really good short film that is festival worthy. Of course the competition is fierce, since anyone can get a relatively good camera and editing system now, but that still seems like the best way to get noticed. As far as being strictly a writer goes, the thing to do is just keep writing scripts in as many genres as you possibly can. That will become the key to getting a writing assignment. Romantic comedy? Sure, I’ve got one right here. Horror? Check this one out, etcetera. The worst thing you can do is write just one script and try to launch yourself based on that one alone and keep flogging it and keep reworking it and never letting go of it. A screenplay is a relatively short document, compared to, say, a novel or a non-fiction book of any sort. Crank ‘em out! Easy come, easy go!

You have to be prepared not to make much, or any money at first, probably. Once you get something on screen or sell it to a signatory company you can get into the Writers Guild, and then you’ll get paid good money, but until you do... the competition, as I say, is ferocious, but then it always has been almost from the beginning of the industry. That aspect of this business is definitely not for the faint of heart or the non-competitive.

MS: I imagine most writers' goals are to sell their own screenplays and see them produced. What other avenues of income exist for a screenwriter? Can an unsold/unknown writer be considered for "open writing assignments?"

Hunsaker: The only way to get an assignment is to have an agent, the only way to get an agent, that is, one of the 100 or so legitimate agents who represent working writers and not one of the shyster types who sometimes show up, is to write a stand-out script of some sort. Either one that’s just an incredibly good read or has gotten made. But as I said earlier, it’s demonstrating a wide range and command of genres that gets you assignment work.

Like most WGA [Writers Guild of America] screenwriters in the business, I’ve written waaaay more scripts than have gotten produced. I’ve either sold, optioned, or been hired to write somewhere around forty scripts by now, and only a handful have ended up on the screen. That’s beyond common, I’m afraid, it’s universal... but what it means is, you sell yourself based on what you’ve written, not necessarily on what has appeared on screen. And even if something has been on screen, people in the business will still accord you the respect to read a sample of your work, perhaps even that very film, but the way you wrote it, to use in consideration of hiring you...

If you have the fire in the belly and want to do it, I think you just have to write and write and write, and at the same time keep a sharp eye out for any opportunity that may present itself.

Playing cittern in Dau Strom's band

MS: How do you view the writing community in Alaska? Is there a support system in place here for screenwriting in particular?

Hunsaker: I honor and admire the way groups of writers and filmmakers get together and support each other, but to be honest I have mostly been something of a lone wolf here. I’ve had a great theater community with Perseverance and with my colleagues from Naa Kahidi Theatre, but I have not been much involved with other Alaskan screenwriters...

Pat Race and the guys at Lucid Reverie [Juneau, Alaska. Q&A with them upcoming] have a great salon of filmmakers around them here in Juneau, and I know there are dynamic groups in Anchorage and Fairbanks, too. There seems to be an amazing and exciting film movement coming out of Barrow, so all that is fantastic. I know the 49 Writers group in Anchorage a little bit, and they seem to offer wonderful solidarity and support, so, yes, I think the systems are in place here, I’m just not up on the specifics.

MS: You keep residences in Juneau and Santa Monica. Have you faced difficulties getting film work by not living in Hollywood 24/7? Isn't the movie business still a "meet and greet" game?

Hunsaker: A lot of the work I’ve had over the years has been for people I’ve met in Hollywood one way or another, written for them, and then worked for again. I’ve done a couple films for Fox Searchlight. I’ve done three films with ShadowCatcher [production company], I’m just getting ready to start my third script for Leonardo DiCaprio. I’ve done numerous scripts and some script doctoring for Ed Pressman. I’ve also become pretty good friends with some of the directors I’ve worked with, like Carroll Ballard and Roger Donaldson. So all these connections and friendships are an important means of getting and doing the work.

I don’t think it’s necessary to live in L.A. to be a screenwriter, but I think it’s very, very important to understand something of that world and be conversant with the way things work. I can tell you I get a lot more writing accomplished in Alaska than L.A., just because I have everything the way I want it at my home in Juneau and I have far fewer distractions. After living in Alaska my whole adult life, I’ve gotten kind of hardwired to wanting to be outdoors doing things if the weather is good... And it’s almost always good in L.A., so it’s hard to keep my butt in the chair. And my agent tends to book a lot of meetings while I’m there. I simply get more words on the page when I’m in Alaska working.

But I really don’t like the Hollywood scene very much, and don’t spend much time schmoozing. One time my wife Annie and I were having such a rotten time at a movie star’s celebrity studded party in her home that we sneaked out and had to climb over her high gate in Beverly Hills to get away.

MS: Being from Alaska used to create all sorts of interest and was a great conversation starter whenever my family traveled south. Has that worked for you with Hollywood?

Hunsaker: I used to have a certain mystique being a writer from Alaska, I think, and I used to play that card pretty hard - the shaggy hair, the whiskers, the jeans. Now they’re more used to me and I don’t think Alaska has quite the allure it once did down there. I now have to endure a conversation about Sarah Palin before any meeting can get underway, it seems like.

MS: When I first started writing I often heard the saying "writing is a lonely job," but never understood it until I began to seriously write and re-write. Would you characterize writing as "lonely?"

Hunsaker: Writing is a lonely job, but screenwriting - or playwriting, for that matter - is less lonely than other forms. Every five years or so I get bummed out by some insult or lousy business deal in the screen trade, so in a fit of pique I set off to write a novel. The first few weeks I love it - just freedom, no worry about page counts or action beats, nobody looking over my shoulder, a work that will be mine, all mine. But then, after awhile, I start to feel lonely and miss “taking meetings”, miss having the feedback, albeit at times unwelcome, from producers, directors, and executives. Not to mention, I miss the paycheck. Other than musician gigs, working as a longshoreman and a janitor, and working three years for the Aleutian Region School District back in the 70s-80s, I’ve only ever been a writer, so I’m quite positive that I’m not suited for anything else now, and probably never was anyway.

MS: Of your own written work, stage or screen, do you have a favorite?

Hunsaker: I tend to like the recent things I’ve written, and cringe at the older ones. The last play I did for Perseverance was one I’m quite proud of, called “Battles of Fire and Water”. It was about the Sitka Russian-Tlingit wars told in a "Rashomon" like way from the point of views of the divergent cultures involved.

And "Yup'ik Antigone" will always hold a special place in my heart because I think it's what launched this whole thing.

History Of Film In Alaska

Swan Lake canoe trail system

Everyone has a different approach to their field of work...

Some show up, punch in/out, and go home to enjoy their real life. Others are workaholics and bring their work home with them -- not always for healthy reasons. Still others, their work is their passion and joy.

Firefighting, screenwriting, and filmmaking have been that for me. My big thing is always wanting to know who and what came before me. The history that created the current state of things.

Every time I thought I'd re-invented the wheel I would stumble across proof that it really has all been done (or thought of) before.

Each generation has its own learning curve and voices of those who came before usually fall on deaf ears.

For all you Alaskan filmmakers here are some of those voices: Films shot in Alaska

The link also resides on my personal blog, but thought it's home should be here.

Enjoy!

Morning view with coffee near Slana

Dark Before Dawn

Turnagain Arm rain break

So Alaska's Senate Bill 23 (film tax incentive) has been shelved until next year's legislative session.

I think a lot of people saw this coming, but didn't want speak out on it too much for fear of it having a negative connotation. The old "don't crap where you eat" effect. Especially (say it with me) in such a small town.

Watching the House Labor & Commerce sessions on Gavel to Gavel -- you're getting old when you start choosing these TV shows over say, Jersey Shore -- I knew it was ham-stringed this year. There was concern mentioned over how film tax incentives really fare in other states.

I see both sides of this coin.

In a nutshell there are real concerns [discussion for future post] that can't simply be pushed past the legislative body by showering them with letters of support and appealing to people's Hollywood titillation factor through star-power elbow nudging.

That is needed, and Alaska's film booster club has done an amazing job with it, but unless there is a back room deal to be made trading votes for votes (I have no idea if this ever happens) the concerns have to be addressed.

Not just shoved aside with "win-win" comments.

Let the devil's advocates have their voice so that you can strengthen your case and shut them up... Myself included.

Yes, I care. Both filmmaking and Alaska are my own history. I want Alaska to have a strong film community and have wanted it for many years, though my neophyte efforts [mid-90s] fell on deaf ears and consisted of little more than a simple desire to see "something" happen.

I'd like to see both our local independent filmmaking community and those striving to bring film jobs to the state continue to grow, similar to my experiences working other outlying film hubs such as Santa Fe and Seattle.

The current tax incentive is still very much alive, and Alaska's new film office is on the ball.

There's a year now to pick through anything that might even remotely cause concern with passage of the bill, face it honestly through the eyes of its toughest critics, and make it work.

Another Draft (Or Twelve)

Bridge over Twenty-Mile river

We held a reading last night of my Nicholl semi-finalist screenplay 'War During Lifetime'. It took place in Anchorage with a good mix of local actors

Reading was private so the screenwriter (in this case, me) could hear his work read aloud. It was also cold (no rehearsal). To my relief, it accomplished what I hoped it would and did not send me running for the hills.

Below are a few points about this reading and readings in general.

Script History

War During Lifetime placed as a semi-finalist during the Academy of Motion Picture Arts & Sciences' Nicholl screenwriting competition. That's a mouthful, I know, but I mention the entire title for the benefit of other screenwriters.

As far as screenwriting competitions go, the Nicholl (pronounced 'nickle') is one of the best, if not the best.

The winners (up to ten each year) not only field multiple meetings with agents, managers, and production companies, they are also given $30,000 to complete another screenplay over the course of a year. But what I think is one of the best perks of entering this competition is that it is taken seriously by the film industry. Finalists, semi-finalists, and even quarter-finalists receive inquiries by established industry folks.

War During Lifetime was the first submission I've had reach the semi-finals (I've submitted eight times). It made the top 110 scripts out of over 6,000 entries, and I received a decent number of inquiries to read it based on its placement.

Did I sell it, or gain representation...?

No. Like I told the actors at the reading last night:

It might have made the semi-finals of one of the world's most esteemed screenwriting competitions, but it still didn't make the finals.

A diamond in the rough. Hence, more work, another draft (or twelve), and the reading...

Reading Notes

Best part of the night were the other participants. A solid group of local Alaskan actors showed up to participate and brought very good energy to the reading.

Because of their efforts I was able to close my eyes and listen to the script for everything from plot points to dialogue.

In our discussion afterward, the actors also all seemed to be in agreement over a few character moments and plot points, which meant something was working well enough that when something felt out of character it was obvious.

The re-writes were beginning to yield results.

How Many Drafts Does It Take?

Who knows... Forty?

That's the number a script reader once mentioned. I've heard of it done in as few as one draft with a polish, and as many as 'It never ends. This is the millionth draft and they want more!'

For myself I've had to learn patience. My first three or four drafts may yield a story and some characters, but in the mountainous slush-pile of scripts submitted to producers every year it needs to be perfect.

War During Lifetime has been written, passed to friends for notes, re-written, passed among different friends, re-written, forgotten about for a year, re-written, passed to new friends, re-written, and read aloud.

The first few readings by friends are usually disastrous. The notes are either so politely generic as to be useless, or so brutally honest (you asked for them to be honest, remember) that you wonder why the hell you ever tried to write in the first place.

But here's a secret -- You knew what the results were going to be all along.

How? Because if you spend enough time writing you will begin to develop a voice inside that tells you whether your work is ready to show or not. You just didn't pay the voice any heed because you need to get past the first rough hurdle of realizing (again) how difficult it is to write.

Both Good And Suck

Now is decision time: Do I move forward and really dive in, or do I let this one go? Do I love it enough to stick with it through both good and suck?

Ok, your heart is in the story and you've jumped back in.

Now you need to pay close attention to that voice inside. If it says 'Come on man, you know deep down it ain't ready' - listen to it.

Exercise some patience and settle in for the long haul, knowing that there will be light at the end of the tunnel.

Another draft has gone by and you're ready to send it out... Wait. Are you sure?

Just because you've locked yourself in a motel room for twenty straight days without sunlight, writing your ass off, doesn't mean it's ready. It just means you put a lot of work into it.

And so have the other 50,000 writers who have registered scripts with the Writer's Guild this year.

Walk away from it awhile. Quit. Start something new. Get a job in Antarctica (the route I took).

Then, if that story still needs to be told, sit down with it again and again until you can't hear that voice saying 'It ain't ready' anymore.

Show it to someone (not your mother). Hire a professional script-analyst to give you notes. Gather a bunch of actors, feed them pizza, and have a reading.

It won't be perfect, but it might be good enough to see the light at the end of the tunnel and realize you're on to something.

And having your work validated won't always fill the fridge, but it does feed the soul.

And the soul feeds the work.

Until maybe one day both soul and labor meet in a culmination of awesome perfection that no script-reader can ignore and your screenplay is stamped:

CONSIDER

The Dilemma

Turnagain Arm sunset

I had some Q&A's compiled from a couple of Alaska based filmmakers and artists, but decided to open this new blog with a personal dilemma on screenwriting as a form of story-telling.

Like many of you I'm sure, I made multitudes of Super-8 shorts growing up. One a week to be exact.

I'd take my savings to the local drug-store on a Friday afternoon or early Saturday morning, purchase one fifty-foot roll of Kodachrome or Ektachrome film, and with whatever friends I could round up, we'd shoot an approximately three-minute story edited in camera.

Our writing was usually the discussions we'd have before we clicked the shutter on the first shot.

As I grew older and more interested in trying to develop my craft I began putting pen to paper and writing out a story before we began shooting.

But I wasn't thinking about the 'rules' of story-telling via screenwriting at that time. I was just writing what interested me. In fact my first (and so far only) indie-feature was written in this vein.

Then one day I decided I wanted to sell my works to the motion-picture industry. So I diligently began to attend courses and expos. Read books, articles, other screenplays. Dissected films...

And the rules began to take shape for me.

As did my dilemma.

The Rules & The Dilemma

If you have seven extra minutes please begin with this David Mamet interview. [link currently down, but you can get the gist of it by reading on...]

In regards to Mamet's comment -- 'Drama is about three things: Who wants what, What happens if they don't get it, Why now' -- they echo fairly consistently with every other screen-writing course, article, website etc, but I always wonder where some other elements fall.

For example: The Thin Red Line adapted and directed by Terrence Malick.

I love this movie, but would have to think hard to find those three questions answered on anything but an esoteric level. Still, this remains one of my all-time favorites because:

1) I enjoy films that help me feel not so alone in the world.
2) There is a sense of uplifting, and hope for humanity in the story-telling.
3) There is a sense of wonder and mystery.

When I started out writing this was how I wrote. I actually had a clear goal of 'touching our humanity' 'inspiring hope', and the story would just progress naturally. I even made an indie feature with a story like this.

But then I started taking courses, attending writing expos, reading screenwriting articles, and with my last 5 scripts the process always began with some version of the three points Mamet made -- Because I think that is how I am supposed to write if I want to sell a screenplay.

My question is:

Does only the filmmaker/director really have the opportunity to tell a story in a less-traditional way, because he/she has the benefit of images, music, performances to keep us riveted to the screen with or without the 'who wants what and what happens if he doesn't get it'?

Is the screenwriter who only wants to sell his work (versus a writer-director) condemned to mimicking this long existing model?

Readers

The gate-keepers to the Hollywood script-buying industry.

As a newcomer or amateur, if you present readers with anything less than an industry standard formatted script that follows the basic rules of story-telling as mentioned above, your screenplay will more than likely never be passed up the chain.

If you, so inspired, create as a screenplay a template of imagery, which when you envision coupled with the proper soundtrack is designed to elicit empathetic emotions from an audience, your script will more than likely never be passed up the chain.

But You Are So Inspired

This doesn't mean not to write what and how you want to write. But it doesn't hurt to learn the rules of a long-established industry before you break or question them.

And there is always the option of figuring out how to produce your own work. I think the dual-hatted writer-filmmakers are more often successful with creating unique works... Even if they don't bring in as much at the box-office.

Which brings us back to the original dilemma.