Fake tears
My four-year old daughter has entered a phase I’m labeling “emotional scientist.”
“I’m mad!” she’ll declare, pursing her lips and scrunching her eyes. Most times, she’s not the least bit angry, but rather curious whether her simulation of anger is close enough to the real thing to elicit the desired response. The adults in her life are essentially lab rats. We run through her mazes as she tests her hypotheses.
Currently, the bulk of her experiments involve fake tears. Every parent knows exactly what real crying sounds like, be it a scraped knee or a crushed hope: plaintive, gasping, desperate. Real tears show up uninvited and unwelcome.
Fake crying is a caterwaul, a siren parked three feet away. It’s a performance. Lacking the ability to summon tears, children rub or cover their eyes, pausing every now and then to survey the room to see whether it’s working.
Nope? All right. Back to the wailing.
As a parent, I endure these episodes with a measured response, knowing it’s just a phase.
But as a writer, I watch her with fascination, secretly hoping she gets better at faking it.
While it doesn’t rank up there with math and reading, the ability to simulate an emotion you’re not actually feeling is a fundamental skill, one that’s served me particularly well.
This is an essay in defense of fake tears.
Writing as acting
I had lunch yesterday with a former child actor who has gone on to have a big career. I knew he got his first roles when he was four years old, but I was curious at what age he started “acting” — that is, when did he become aware of craft and technique?
His answer: at four. His father taught him to maintain eye contact with the other actors in the scene, and listen carefully to what they were saying. He wasn’t allowed to perform. He simply had to experience the moment and follow along.
Experiencing the moment is what writers do, too.
Screenwriters are basically actors who do their work on the page rather than the stage. Both professions earn their keep by pretending things are much different than they are. Actors ignore the lights and cameras and missing walls. Writers ignore the missing everything, summoning locations and characters to enact scenes which they can later transcribe.
Actors and writers are trying to create moments that feel true, despite being completely invented.
Read a good book on acting, and you’ll find many techniques that can help you as a screenwriter. Sense memory — the ability to experience a sensation that is not actually present — lets you feel the rumble of approaching tanks. Other exercises have you substituting your experiences for the character’s, letting the broken arm you got in fifth grade be the gunshot in your hero’s leg.
Once you become aware of the techniques, you find yourself pressing your brain’s RECORD button whenever you experience something remarkable or intense. The middle section of The Nines documents my disassociative disorder during production on the TV show D.C. in 2000. Even in my fugue state, I realized it was fascinating and worth recording. That red light was blinking in the corner a lot.
When my dog of 14 years passed away this summer, I was a wreck. I wasn’t faking any tears, but I was keenly aware of them. I kept mental notes on how it felt to feel that way; rather than push past the experience, I pushed into it.
My dog was a huge part of my life. He was my kid before I had my kid. In losing him, one thing I gained was that experience of profound loss. I’ll have it to use for the rest of my life.
Feeling your way through
Here’s how I wrote the last ten pages of Big Fish.
Sitting in front of a full-length mirror, I brought myself to tears. Then I started writing Will’s dialogue. I looped over and over until I got a piece of it finished, then started on the next section. It was three solid days of crying, but it was cathartic and productive.
These were fake tears, in the sense that I wasn’t actually guiding my Southern father through his last moments on Earth. But they were true in the context of writing the story. I was creating in myself the experience I was hoping to create in the reader.
One basic goal of creative writing is to evoke a desired response. That sounds clinical and scientific, but the process is squishy and exhausting. I don’t hear other screenwriters talking much about it, probably because it’s uncomfortably personal. At least writers get to do it alone, without a crew and cameras watching.
My daughter’s fake tears are writing practice, just as much as her wobbly uppercase letters. I’m hesitant to offer her much coaching on how to cry more convincingly; it’s like arming your opponent.
But as I watch her perform an ersatz lament, I find myself pressing the RECORD button. And hoping she’s doing the same.
68 Responses to “Fake tears”
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February 9th, 2010 at 7:43 pm
Can you recommend a good book on acting? These techniques sound interesting.
February 9th, 2010 at 8:19 pm
Your essay is an eye opener. It seems obvious to apply methods of acting toward writing but often I find myself using memories of existing movies instead of memories of life experiences.
Which is why I catch myself recycling film cliches much too often.
Thanks.
February 9th, 2010 at 8:22 pm
Brilliant post. Thank you!
Would love to hear more about your dissociative experience because, holy cow, me too. Thank god that’s over. That said, this post made me realize that I can use that experience for a disconnected (though not dissociative) character that I’m writing now.
February 9th, 2010 at 8:26 pm
“But as a writer, I watch her with fascination, secretly hoping she gets better at faking it.”
Lol. Yeah, especially as a Hollywood writer.
Despite my laughter, and my not being a parent, I totally hear you on this. And I know that I feel so silly, but so proud at the same time, when something I write makes me (or better yet, my readers) cry.
February 9th, 2010 at 8:36 pm
My four-year-old turns five this month. He’s finally getting out of the fake tears phase, but his new thing is “I’m really, really serious.”
At the same time, the 14-month-old cries real tears if you don’t have his dinner at the high-chair within 20 seconds of sitting him in it.
Definitely understand getting in the mindset of your characters. I think that’s why some characters seem to take on a life of their own. If you’re good enough at inhabiting their skin to make them feel real, it’s almost like a borderline MPD.
I wonder what it’s like for the writers on “The United States of Tara” when they’re trying to inhabit the skin of a person with MPD.
February 9th, 2010 at 9:28 pm
I love this post. I’ve taken so many writing classes, many of which were redundant. And the tidbits of advice that weren’t redundant were often just crap: “what works for me” posing as mandate.
Refreshing to hear someone say something real about the process.
Thanks, August.
February 9th, 2010 at 10:07 pm
My 4-year-old daughter does the exact same thing. It is hard not to laugh at her “angry” face. There’s something very South Park about it.
Curious whether you’ve used the crying technique again. Or was Big Fish the only time? If so, why?
February 9th, 2010 at 10:39 pm
Interesting look at your process. I’m actually the total opposite in that I detach myself from the process. I try to let my characters feel everything by imagining the pain “in them.” Using emotion through dialog\actions as a route to personality is nearly guaranteed to evoke emotional reactions.
I do think of it in the most technical sense possible. People have told me some of my dialog concepts “take the fun out of it.” OK, one, but for my little blog that’s a lot.
I admittedly compare it to what I do as SW developer, it’s an amalgam of somewhat disparate parts that have to integrate to become a final product.
February 9th, 2010 at 11:37 pm
It’s weird because I’ve recently been thinking about something like this. Writers always claim they don’t think about the audience when they’re writing. I think this is in it’s worst form pompous and in it’s best naive. In my ever forming opinion, it seems writers should be thinking constantly about the audience, and how to emotionally engage them in the story. In the recent documentary Objectified an industrial designer says he designs his products for the extremes, the strongest and the weakest of the users. His example was a potatoe peeler he designed for his Aunt with arthritis. He said by designing for the extreme users the middle section filled itself in. I think this philosphy applies equally to writing. When you are trying to make someone cry, aim for the macho guy who “doesn’t” cry in movies. When trying to insight a lust for vengence shoot for the grandmother who spent all day at the craft fair. If you can earn (not extort) these emotions from these extres in the audience, then it seems to me the middle will take care of itself.
February 10th, 2010 at 12:32 am
Having children is the closest thing you’ll get to time travel. Everyday I see myself 25 years ago.
February 10th, 2010 at 12:39 am
This is great. Amazing and insightful.
February 10th, 2010 at 12:53 am
And this is why I come back to read you time after time. You’re just fabulous.
February 10th, 2010 at 1:31 am
On Method Writing…
Not that anyone’s going to run out and buy them, but… if you want the sort-of definitive & old school books on internal observance you would read: “TO THE ACTOR” by Chekhov & “NO ACTING PLEASE” (Eric Morris). – (“No acting please.” is a reference to something he would spout out during class when he could see that someone was “acting” as a child would, rather than actually experiencing the emotion.)
To put them in perspective, INSIDE THE ACTORS STUDIO: Gary Oldman recommended “ON METHOD ACTING” – Johnny Depp recommends Chekhov.
http://www.amazon.com/Actor-Michael-Chekhov/dp/0415258766
http://www.amazon.com/No-Acting-Please-Eric-Morris/dp/096297093X/ref=sr_1_3?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1265790341&sr=1-3
If it can’t make you cry… what makes you think its going to make a million others?
February 10th, 2010 at 7:59 am
I’ve wondered more than once if simulating emotion and even a completely different personality has a cost on the actor.
Talking some years back to a writer working on a biography of Mickey Roonie, I asked him “What’s he like?” He thought about it for a bit and then said “Even he doesn’t know.” He painted Roonie as sort of a vessel of these personalities you’d see on screen, with nothing else inside there.
But that watching of your own emotions as they’re going on … heh. In some ways, it feels like you’re getting cheated. Other people seem to have these pure expressions of anger, or hurt, or whatever, and yet I seem to have only half of it.
On the other hand, when MY dog died, there was a moment when I was helplessly and totally emotional, and that — the complete loss of control — actually kinda scared me.
February 10th, 2010 at 9:00 am
As I do a lot of my writing (or plot points and dialogue working-out, anyway) while walking round the neighbourhood I think that making myself cry – on top of muttering to myself and walking the same route over and over – may not be the best plan…
February 10th, 2010 at 9:06 am
I love that you’re observing and learning from everyday life. Thank you for sharing the insight with us!
February 10th, 2010 at 9:09 am
Great article. I struggled with writing dialogue until I started doing improvs with my characters–either alone or with other actors. Helps me to make my characters come to life.
February 10th, 2010 at 9:13 am
Two great acting books to reference:
A Challenge for the Actor, by Uta Hagen
To the Actor, by Michael Chekhov
Really a wonderful essay John, this puts writing into a whole new realm for me.
February 10th, 2010 at 9:18 am
As always, relevant, insight and generous. Thank you.
February 10th, 2010 at 9:24 am
Thanks for a great article! I strongly recommend Stella Adler’s (acting coach) books – she doesn’t just talk about acting but a different way of thinking about a role and the world of the character. She’s excellent! Quite opinionated sometimes which is why some people don’t like her but I think she’s a character herself! Very useful for a screenwriter.
February 10th, 2010 at 9:32 am
Great insight and way of looking at writing from an acting perspective. It sort of put into words some thoughts I’d been dancing around lately. A few years ago, when I started seriously writing, I read a book on acting called “Hitting Your Mark”. It was a basic acting handbook, for lack of a better description. It wasn’t a deep technique book but it was a nice and interesting read for someone who didn’t want to act but wanted to understand the actor’s POV. I’ve found that books like that, as well as many film editing & shot books help make my writing more of a 3D experience in my head. The biggest thing I have to remember is that I’m not the director or the editor or the actor, but it offers me just enough to help expand my imagination while writing.
Thanks for a great article!
February 10th, 2010 at 9:57 am
It’s funny, my daughter (who is about to turn 16) used to run into the bathroom and watch herself in the mirror every time she cried to see what faces she made when she was 3-4 years old. We just figured it was a drama queen phase and it amused us, but what you wrote made sense. I never thought of it that way.
February 10th, 2010 at 10:30 am
Wonderful post. As the kind of person who used to laugh at hi-jinks and such from behind-the-scenes as a kid, this especially stuck with me – “Screenwriters are basically actors who do their work on the page rather than the stage.” Writers in general are this way, but you can especially see it with screenwriting because the actors are right there as a parallel.
This is a subject I’ve always thought about, but it’s great to read someone write about it. Thanks for the insight.
February 10th, 2010 at 10:55 am
Fantastic! I always thought that most writers (besides probably medical journalists, scientific, etc.) are good if they can make me feel the emotion a character is feeling.
This is brilliant insight on what I think is kept secret by most writers and that is the pathos.
February 10th, 2010 at 11:46 am
Hey John, Kill Bill is not for 4 year olds. -Get her an instrument right away. And some books. More candy on satrday but no more ninja sword, lol-
February 10th, 2010 at 12:22 pm
Great post, John.
Am enrolled in an acting class as we speak. HIGHLY recommend them for writers.
February 10th, 2010 at 2:31 pm
Reading “Directing Actors” by Judith Weston really changed the way I approach writing. In a sense the screewriter acts all the parts of his/her story while writing it. And bad acting will show on the page…
February 10th, 2010 at 5:56 pm
I think it was actually Robert Frost who said, “No tears in the writer, no tears in the reader.”
February 10th, 2010 at 6:18 pm
I just wanted to express my sincere condolences for losing your beloved dog this past summer. I sure know what that’s like.
Thanks for sharing such a personal writing story and a powerful writing lesson.
February 10th, 2010 at 6:36 pm
Ryan Duff has a strong point. Audience is critical to writing a movie. Tim burton once talked about the nature of things. And how the studios affect how the movie turned out to be. Even you should want the audience – feedback before performing any kinda show, the world is not like that. I
m just doing what works for me. Im not playing with Maya and taking feedback on my coolest stuff on a regular basis, but if I sell just one script. Or do a cool school, then one day that may become the case. Watching Big Fish tonight, actually never seen it.February 10th, 2010 at 7:04 pm
Oh shit-anyone here ever offended Michael Bay?? Like a story about the archangel in hollywood after to get me. I better fake some tears right now, but John is right. Life is about a lot of things, and I really enjoy actually doing the critical writing at one critical moment. Great stuff, in humblenes to Mr. John.
February 11th, 2010 at 12:00 am
This is the writer of Big Fish that I remember and have missed. Best of luck always, Gretchen
February 11th, 2010 at 1:43 am
Wow, excellent post. And can I just say that Big Fish was the first film of my adult life that made me cry, and really really cry. It had me sobbing for days and had me call my father just to tell him I love him – something I had never done before. So, thanks doubly John.
February 11th, 2010 at 9:41 am
Great post.
William Goldman said that when he wrote “The Princess Bride”, after writing the scene where Westley died, he started crying uncontrollably. He said that was when he knew he was a real writer. I’m proud to say I’ve had this moment a couple of times. Writing really is an exploration of emotion, and the ability to connect to what you’re feeling is so important, and as you say, rarely talked about. So, well said. Kudos.
February 11th, 2010 at 1:38 pm
Great post. Yes, I know, it has been said before. Alright then, it was a spectacular post. Ha! Beat that!
There are some vital experiences I as a writer would not mind to have that I as a human being is quite content to leave our of life.
I’ve never had a broken relationship when it passed the level of feeling of true love and live happily ever after. The closest thing was a short depression I had where I wrote a poem to remember what I passed through.
I’ve never had a loved one dying. I have had three grandparents past away, but they were all three old, and dying for so long time that it was a blessing for everyone when they finally died. The closest thing of sudden and loved passing was my rabbit and I don’t remember the aftermaths!
But both of these experiences the writer inside me would gore herself with.
February 11th, 2010 at 2:35 pm
While I agree such a powerful response is needed for drama, what about comedy? That seems a much harder feeling to invoke, since comedy is mostly subjective, and beyond that, the actor’s craft is about taking the moment seriously (if overally hammed up).
I am curious to how one might Method Write to draw real laughter from the audience.
February 12th, 2010 at 12:07 am
@ Kevin Johnson 36,
TOTALLY why I fear my comedy sequences. – Mostly if I’m cackling like a madman & can’t breathe its so funny… I, am, absolutely, alone. Most other people just blink at me and seriously consider calling psychologists and stuff. I’m really only prone to think something’s uncontrollably funny once its just the visceral definition of a minority of one. And so the bar is naturally moved to a new position, because I don’t dream of writing Ben Stiller with a gob of spunk in his hair… I dream of writing Mary Stewart Masterson looking up and saying, “Having a Boo Radley moment are we?” every other page and having it land in a theater where everybody shares an understanding of its GPS coordinates in the world of randomness crossed against finesse.
Tom Stoppard can do it on command. – And that’s how I know he’s an alien.
February 12th, 2010 at 1:38 am
Comedy is hard. and it
s hard making comedy new. its not just that funny having ongoing war in the world. its still funny joking about the pilot forgetting his keys to the airplane, but its not funny having this unknown force constantly trying to blow them up. the world is changing, and not in any new and funny direction. sad actually.February 12th, 2010 at 2:11 am
But surely there are many ways to skin the screenwriting cat? To paraphrase Olivier to Hoffman; “you should try acting, dear boy.”
February 12th, 2010 at 4:51 pm
Wonderful! Thank you for that gift.
February 12th, 2010 at 5:25 pm
Jason Reitman, quoting someone else whom I can’t recall, said recently that instead of trying to be funny, try to be truthful, since you really can’t know until you cut it together if it’s going to be funny. If you have a wry sense of humor, rather than a broad comedy sense of humor, that’s especially true. So passing that along in case it helps someone rethink the way they approach writing comedy. The best comedy is funny, after all, because it’s true.
February 12th, 2010 at 6:15 pm
funny is in adding to that, also presented from a place of knowing what the audience need at those spesific moments. -You should dig out the masters and studdy them, but maybe not get to attached to they`re method of funny. It helps having this fun personality getting into jokes. or you can, as Mr August points out: fake them. Create from your own, your personal touch to something maybe not God, but other people experience. Comedy is about bias, if you ever get to that level, lol. Big directors is rarer than US presidents. But learning Comedy is hard, and background-ish too. Comedy is Ok. In my opinion. haha.
February 14th, 2010 at 12:57 am
Very reassuring to me because the first thing I did when I decided to become a screenwriter was to sign up for an acting course. Best thing I ever did. It helped my writing, I’m sure, because I have a much better idea of what an actor looks for to find a rich and rewarding role. And when an acter enjoys playing a part then the audience will usually pick up on that and enjoy it too.
February 15th, 2010 at 6:17 am
“I love my international readers, but sometimes it’s hard to distinguish between difficulty-with-English and actual crazy.” JOHN: I`m never calling you gay again. I love you too!
February 15th, 2010 at 6:35 am
I was humming: “if you gutta go, safe travel.” thought that was funny. But my my opinion is shades by human darkness and confusion. real love is so fuzzy. -man and I`ve learned alot.
I think improv is better than acting. p.s if you
re doing screenwriting, you dont have to act. the masters can be looked at in films anyway. writing is about reading and learning to do the same.February 15th, 2010 at 6:36 am
then you can master writing it. and you need masters like John. btw ;=9)
February 15th, 2010 at 7:02 am
oh, sorry. The next time I
m making a better one insted of four five unfinished ones. stupid really. "if you can describe out how some master projected a well done project and replay it or make out what it takes for someone else you know who could do it and have something better, because you stick with time and know your competition, then you are not crazy, and know what a feature films is about and like." -thats what I`ve learned from this site, I guess. -posting was useful to me, but annoing to some folks and a little danger involved. brb.. Peace.February 15th, 2010 at 9:03 am
“Emotional scientist” is the perfect term for it.
Personally, the metaphor that fits best for children in that stage is the velociraptors in Jurassic Park, testing the electric fences, looking for weaknesses. But I’ve yet to package that as succintly as “emotional scientist.”
One of my pitbulls does the exact same things. (Pressing different emotional buttons to see what works, not testing electric fences to find an escape and eat people.)
Also, thanks to all who recommended books on method acting!
February 15th, 2010 at 12:51 pm
I have been an actor for 40 years. The best, easy-to-understand book on acting (for me) has been Acting: The First Six Lessons by Richard Boleslavsky. It was written in 1918 (I think), and it contains the lessons on acting for the screen (for the first time anywhere, I believe).
http://www.amazon.com/Acting-First-Lessons-Theatre-Arts/dp/0878300007
February 15th, 2010 at 1:28 pm
Great post. The best book on writing I ever read is “Write That Play” by Kenneth Thorpe Rowe. Out of print now, but available from private booksellers for more than $400. Other than dated references to plays of the early 20th century, it rocks.
February 15th, 2010 at 8:47 pm
I have to say, I really sort of disagree with what I’m taking the point of this essay to be. It seems to be suggesting that as a writer you should adopt a sort of ‘method acting’ style in order to create ‘true’ emotion on the page. While I think it’s certainly valuable to draw on your own emotional experiences, it should also be noted that that sense memory style of acting has really fallen by the wayside, because frankly, it’s not really necessary, nor is it healthy for an actor.
It’s fine to pull that extreme emotional recall for the short term, but imagine you’re running a play for 6 months, or a year–you’ll get an ulcer, reenacting that pain, for real, each night. It happened to me playing Vanya. As Mamet/Macy used to teach their students, it’s not necessary for you to have a moment on stage for an audience to. Fake tears work as well as real ones. It’s not about you– it’s about the audience, and I think that’s a valuable thing to keep in mind as you write.
Having said that, it’s true that some of the best writers were actors: From Sophocles and Euripides to Shakespeare to modern writers like Pinter, Ellen McLaughlin, Mamet, Sam Sheperd, Regina Taylor, etc. But it’s not because of method acting–it’s because nobody knows better than an actor whether a line of dialogue is driven by conflict or not. Whether the words are serving a character’s needs or the writer’s.
February 16th, 2010 at 11:57 am
@zuckerman:
I’m not arguing that some Method-like method is the right choice for everyone or every project. Most of what I’ve written — particularly the action sequences — doesn’t have any real direct emotion-recall happening.
But is an option, and one that doesn’t get mentioned much.
As far as a six-month play, a screenwriter is creating a moment once. So that induced-ulcer is unlikely.
A TV showrunner is sort of like that actor playing Vanya every night, and part of the reason I lost my shit doing DC was that I had to run two parallel emotional worlds.
February 16th, 2010 at 9:45 pm
John, I think I overreacted a bit; honestly, I think my ‘teacher’ alarm went off. I do indeed have my grad writing students not only take acting class, but also improv class as well. I think when I read your essay initially, I had a vision of a writing student spending her writing time exploring emotional states, and not writing.
Sometimes writers fall into the trap of these ’substitutions’ for writing; rather than using a technique such as the one you wrote of to support their efforts, they allow it to supplant their actual writing.
And speaking of which, I should probably get back to my script….
February 16th, 2010 at 9:46 pm
John, I think I overreacted a bit; honestly, I think my ‘teacher’ alarm went off. I do indeed have my grad writing students not only take acting class, but also improv class as well. I think when I read your essay initially, I had a vision of a writing student spending her writing time exploring emotional states, and not writing.
Sometimes writers fall into the trap of these ’substitutions’ for writing; rather than using a technique such as the one you wrote of to support their efforts, they allow it to supplant their actual writing.
And speaking of which, I should probably get back to my script….
February 17th, 2010 at 4:30 am
You’re daughter is blessed: she learned from an early age that everything in the world is feedback.
February 17th, 2010 at 3:20 pm
John,
Huge fan and longtime reader, never commented before but thought I needed to in this case. I find it sort of ironic (maybe in the Alanis Morrisette sense, at least) that you had to bring yourself to tears to write the ending of Big Fish, since the last few minutes of that film are the only ones in the entire cinematic universe that never fail to make me cry. I’m a pretty manly-man kind of guy most of the time, but I’m getting a little choked up just thinking about it.
February 17th, 2010 at 4:16 pm
This was incredibly helpful. As an aspiring screenwriter searching the internet for information and advice, this is like finding a $20 bill on the sidewalk. Thank you.
February 17th, 2010 at 10:13 pm
Intriguing column.
Do you think that you wrote more effectively using this technique for Big Fish? I ask because I simply do not know if it is more effective or less effective than what the approach you otherwise would have used was. I remember being very moved by the end.
When I was very young, in elementary or middle school I forget, I saw Lee Strasberg’s A Dream of Passion on vacation in a Manhattan book store. I used all my savings to buy it. I think it was about $17, an astronomical amount for me. I can’t describe how well worth it it was. I read the book all during vacation & did the exercises. I particularly remember the emotional memory one.
It’s funny but the sense memory brings about the physical sensation but then the emotions are real. When I act, interview or audition, I am experiencing true grief once the situation has become immediate for me through the physical sensations. Therefore, in response to posts above, it is actually exhausting when it has to happen for a particularly emotionally exhausting situation in the scene. The nature of the grief & loss one experiences in one situation, in which one is brought to tears, is, for me, an entirely different experience than that in a completely different situation. It was not the case when I was younger. I remember I first started using the techniques from the book in middle school acting class & it was not so visceral. I think when I went through life & saw tragedy in others’ lives & my own, I remembered it so that it is real tears I cry now once the stimuli are simulated through sense memory.
Another great book though very different is Uta Hagen’s Respect for Acting.
I remember hearing that Ray Bradbury also cried upon completion of the beautiful short story, “The Lake,” & that is when he knew he had become a true writer. He said it was based at least partially on a true incident that had occurred in his life.
I started a novel during the writing of which I could not help crying about every hour or half hour. I was not sure if this was good or bad. For a variety of reasons, I had to put it aside. That is why I wonder, although I think what is said in this column, by Bradbury &, as mentioned above, regarding The Princess Bride is pretty compelling.
Thanks.
February 17th, 2010 at 10:18 pm
P.S. An excellent acting class I recommend for writers is a strong improv class as well as the Larry Moss acting studio. I can only speak regarding Michelle Danner though I hear Larry is excellent as well. It is very exhausting though. She really makes you go to all the uncomfortable places.
Also, to clarify, even though I also cried true tears & experienced grief during the scenes using the exercises in middle school, I think the weight of the grief is heavier on me now because of having lived & understood at least a tiny bit more in life. I have empathy for the character’s situation because I have lived it or seen it & the situation is experienced in quite a real fashion for me during the scene. There is less of a translation of what I know into the scene because the connection is closer so the grief has more immediate weight.
February 18th, 2010 at 6:33 am
Michael You’re daughter is blessed: she learned from an early age that everything in the world is feedback.
haha-you know that one is not true. Please stay off the michael name. you choose, but michael bay is a guy standing in Japan talking about zen and not doing anything about things. don`t need iq 300 to make out what he still thinks about.
here are the 3 directors changing the lapse of time to get rich:
since michael said there where 3, I
m sure there are 5 or something. Im sure it`s gonna work….for writing, seing tf2, theres no magic but cash to make a script work. you don`t need to cry, you need money.
February 18th, 2010 at 7:09 am
personal to John: when writing the nines, did you ever cry??
I don`t agree you have to cut your writst if you dump a fat chick hiding a kid from you. but again, when you change time in a film and decide for folks. why not
February 18th, 2010 at 7:22 am
I don
t know how you people do this. but I get "crazy"-in return. maybe theres other international readers out there, I dont know.but the nxt time anyone get to change the time and rule over peoples lives. why can`t you write something cool??
I
m getting back to school now. after having a professor cooling the class with hypnosis. awesome. and birds are playing megatron on the rooftops in the neighbourhood. even trowing me off a building-ish construction was not so bad. at the exact time mr helm was writing it. Im glad that bus got smashed in transformers. lucky me. I`m not mad, not at all.my question: do you guys know, or are you robots in a reality I`m stuck in??
February 18th, 2010 at 12:14 pm
therapy is a good bet, going there soon ;=) hopefully there will be better times, and guys not get judged that much in films in the future. and my life, lol.
btw, I got all of you guys ferrari in the next transformers movie, cause I cried too much about it. I know, you`re all welcome!!
February 19th, 2010 at 6:44 am
but my script got rejected, and I was too proud to write in all the cool stuff, so go figure TF3 is gunna be ordinary and totally predictable. I may only be blamed for the ferrari in this one. sorry. if not my computer got hacked! almost hopefully lol. btw @ john, my soul is so difficult to sell, and all the producers are hard to get in touch with…. like the industry is donnie darko to me. How do you get important figures to reply or really want you, when they don`t actually need it?
and happy birthday Michael. Go to his site asap. days are moving now, but this guy has a week long party. bar no-doubt.
cheers people, stay off selling soules, and just make films, lol. ops.
February 19th, 2010 at 5:56 pm
my shrink said I should act careful. and say I
m sorry to all the folks I dont really know, but offended. and stop posting after that, specially since I said so. -I have this course telling me getting off the internet forums for 30 days and do other activities. Nobody likes psychotic people, and if you add asshole to that…. well. Im sorry John, I was sure nothing would flip in me, but it did. Heaven or hell, sometimes its up to myself.February 22nd, 2010 at 4:47 pm
@shayne dawson: my stuff don`t suite you. @america: I wrote a little piece on a blog right now, again to make up for any personal mistakes. You screenwriter junkies should go to this ASAP, cause your leaders fail like every day on this. Please read and think about it. A little more than cameron please.
Everybody knows MB just used a swedish masters tricks and failed at it. ROTF is not a masterpiece….
Michael Bay is so dumb he stands in Japan talking about zen. “I
ve decided not to do anything, like zen"-when his cab didnt show up. Idiot.Michael is rejecting any real firepower in his films and hire startreck writers to do the job. And the fallen looks like the Iran leader. Idiot.
Some of the decepticons has dragon faces like they are chinese. Idiot.
ROTF is completely brainless and not thought tru, at all. Just random streetware of thoughts that Michael brings up in the film. I personally enjoyed the scene shifts were he has a military dude (us military arnt gay)-going down and up with his ass. Showing how gay Michael Bay really is.
And he uses the “god”-finger as so many in hollywood latly. Stranger than fiction. I guess MB watched it, but didn`t actually get the film. haha. Transformers, lol.
February 25th, 2010 at 9:03 am
My best tip is getting in information as soon as possible (what you need to know to be the coolest character), and everything else the child would love as soon as possible. (solid friends are maybe the most important) OPS: I was over 18 before I discovered the world was a hostile place. I needed that a little sooner.
February 25th, 2010 at 9:16 am
America are doing OK. -sorry for complaining about that one. many americans do very hard work now after the tragedy 911. The world woke up, again. I wish that would be fake, and it really is an illusion. But what if it
s not. why cant we all get along, when we call ourselves a modern society? what dont we get about living with 8 billion others? Norway has given piece prizes for so many years now, and we still dont get along. Why. Its dangerously interesting to see how conflicts cant be solved. We have cell phones, but everyone is not happy having them. And the ones never getting ones is angry too. I hope humans solve that. Peace. I hope one director solves it in a movie, that`s why I came. Then I started failing posts. Try to cry about that.