John August

First Person

Green Umbrage, or That Escalated Quickly

First Person, Follow Up

Craig Mazin wrote in to respond to criticism of his remarks in last week’s Scriptnotes.

I typed the words “She-Hulk” a lot yesterday.

During our live podcast, I took a swipe at the intentions behind the creation of She-Hulk. Specifically, I felt that she was drawn in such a way to peddle a sexist caricature to teenaged boys.

That’s not some kind of revisionist explanation. I used the word “sexist” in the podcast. It’s audible.

I said this because I believe it. Unlike the Hulk, whose appeal was clearly divorced from any kind of normative standard of physical beauty, She-Hulk was initially drawn (and consistently drawn for many years) as slender, long-legged and large-breasted with flowing locks. Her face was the same old media-model-pretty version we see time and time again.

The cover of her debut features She-Hulk in what I guess I’d describe as a revealing monokini. There are lots and lots of additional examples of artwork on the internet (actual covers, not alt covers) that are clearly pushing sex appeal.

This is a pretty good example.

All that aside, some people felt that what I said was sexist. I used the word “slut,” which they took to mean that I think She-Hulk is a slut.

They think I slut-shamed She-Hulk.

First off, my point wasn’t that I think She-Hulk is a slut. I don’t. I don’t think anyone is a slut. I don’t think there’s anything shameful about female sexuality or the female body.

What I don’t like is the practice of pushing exaggerated images of female bodies to boys because it sells comic books or video games. Women in comics and video games aren’t accidentally drawn over and over and over again with outsized breasts, long legs and narrow waists. It’s marketing. Having a character remark recursively on that marketing doesn’t negate the marketing, of course. It’s a clever way to defuse criticism with grownups while selling issues to hormone-addled boys. John and I have talked about this issue on the podcast before as it relates to video games (specifically in support of the work done by Anita Sarkeesian).

Bottom line: I wasn’t saying that I think she’s a slut. I was saying I think the people who created her were at one time pushing a visual image of Hulk as Slut in order to make money. And I don’t like that. My comment was entirely about the illustration of a fictional character. It was not a reflection of my opinion of the mind or actions of the character.

On the other hand, using the word “slut” was a bad move. It’s far too loaded, it’s not even accurate to what I meant, and for many it obscured my point. It may be obscuring my point right now, so lesson learned… and I’ll not use it again.

Also, if the people who created She-Hulk think I’m totally wrong, I can accept that. They might not be sexist, their intentions may have been pure, and if so, I am guilty of seeing sexism where none was intended. If fans of She-Hulk suspect that I’m not one of them, and that I clumsily wandered into their culture… yup. No question. Guilty as charged. And there’s also no question that the appearance and character of She-Hulk has evolved dramatically and positively over the years. My comments were entirely about the early appearance of the character. She-Hulk isn’t being drawn in the style of a cheesecake model anymore. I think that’s a very good thing.

And that’s all I have left to say about She-Hulk for the rest of my life.

Making a short film when you’re actually a writer

First Person

Aspiring screenwriters often ask whether making a short film will help their careers. I believe it can. In terms of exposure, it’s easier to get someone to watch something than to read something. More importantly, the process of making a short film helps screenwriters understand how words on paper translate to the screen.

That said, making a quality short film is a huge investment of time and money and stamina, all of which might be better spent writing. Nick Rheinwald-Jones agreed to write up his recent experience making a short, providing useful illustrations of what happens when screenwriters get behind the camera.

first person1997 was such a hopeful year. The dot-com bubble had only begun to inflate, the TSA didn’t even exist yet, and as far as anyone knew, the Star Wars prequels were going to be amazing. Even the famously Eeyore-ish world of screenwriting was much more upbeat back then, buoyed by continued reports of million-dollar spec sales. And I, a happy-go-lucky college sophomore, had just decided that I was going to hop aboard that train as soon as I graduated. I’d move to L.A., work my way up the entertainment industry ladder, and let the magic unfold.

(If you’ve ever watched VH1’s Behind The Music, you should have a pretty good idea of what’s coming in this next paragraph. Heartbreak. Disappointment. Abject misery. And that’s just The Phantom Menace; I haven’t even gotten to Attack of the Clones yet.)

Dissolve to 2013. I’d been calling myself a screenwriter for over fifteen years — accurately, I should say; I’d certainly been writing all that time — but that all-important sale or commission that would allow me to call myself a professional screenwriter? It still hadn’t happened. There had been a few inklings of encouragement (for example, a pilot script of mine was a quarterfinalist at Slamdance), but no money, no representation, not even one actual meeting.

In other words, it seemed like a good time to re-evaluate things. At some point optimism becomes delusion, and pessimism becomes rational thinking. I didn’t want screenwriting to be a hobby, because heaven knows there are better hobbies than staring at Final Draft all day. But if I wasn’t getting paid to do it, if nobody was even reading my scripts, then that’s what it was going to be.

As I saw it, then, there were two options: Either come up with a new approach to my career, or change course altogether. The latter was certainly tempting; I knew I was smart and hard-working, and why not put those attributes to use in a field where I’d actually be appreciated? But even after all that time, I wasn’t quite discouraged enough to give up my Hollywood dreams: I’m nothing if not stubborn.

So I opted to go with Plan A and take a different tack.

I decided to make a short film — a resumé piece, essentially; something I could easily pass around. Most people will come up with any excuse not to read a 120-page script, but a 10-minute video would be less likely to be automatically ignored. (Or so I hoped.) Although I wasn’t really looking to get into directing, I figured I needed to direct my short so nobody else could take credit for it. I’d also need to fund it myself, and on this point, thankfully, my wife was very supportive. (Actually, she was more than supportive; she pretty much insisted that I do it.)

And so I began.

Step one: write the script

Somehow, I thought this would be the easiest part. I mean, I’ve been writing screenplays longer than some pop stars have been alive. Problem is, I’d never thought much about doing an entire filmed story in ten to fifteen minutes. In a feature screenplay, that’s just when things are starting to get going.

Beyond that, all my previous material was written with a studio budget in mind. Things would have to change a great deal if I was going to be the one writing the checks.

Fortunately, the budgetary constraints actually helped me with finding the story. I decided to write something that could mostly be filmed inside our house, so I’d have more money to use on other aspects of the production.

Genre-wise, I didn’t want to do a straight-up comedy, since that’s not what I typically write, and I wanted the short to serve as a good representation for the kinds of scripts in my portfolio. I opted for an action-comedy instead. A spy-action-comedy, to be specific. That was going to be a challenge, but it also focused my thinking. (For example, I didn’t have to spend a lot of time deciding what country I’d set it in, or whether the climax should take place on an aircraft carrier or a bullet train.)

Reading John’s short script for God was also helpful, in that it reminded me the needs of a short film are very different from those of a feature. You don’t need a lot of characters, you don’t need subplots, and you don’t have to turn the world upside down by the end of the movie. You do, however, need to be efficient and get to the point quickly. Luckily, I’ve always been pretty strong in those areas.

Step two: hire a producer

Here is yet another situation where luck played a huge part. I asked one friend (a writer/director) if he could recommend a producer; he had one producer to recommend, and she was available. I sent her the script and we met up to discuss it.

I figured there was no reason not to be completely frank with her, so I told her I’d never done anything remotely like this before (shooting some videos on a Hi-8 camcorder in college was about the closest I’d come) and that I needed all the help I could get. Although I knew a fair amount about most areas of filmmaking, I was fairly clueless about the actual process of, you know, putting a movie together. Scheduling? Budgeting? Renting equipment? Hiring a crew? Permits? SAG? Big bowl of nothing, as Jeff Garlin would say.

But by the end of our conversation I felt like I was in good hands. She had plenty of experience on movies of various sizes, not only as a producer but also as an AD and even a director, so I wouldn’t be throwing her any challenges she hadn’t faced before.

Step three: pre-production; or, is it too late to change my mind?

Our shooting schedule allowed for about two months of prep. I’ll be honest: I spent much of that time freaking the hell out. What was I worried about? Hold on a second and I’ll get out the list.

I was worried that my LLC paperwork wouldn’t be filed in time. (You have to form a corporation if you’re funding a movie, for a whole variety of reasons, and this entails working with California’s legendarily crummy bureaucracy.)

I was worried that we wouldn’t find a decent location for the opening scene. (The movie only needed one location other than my house, but it had to serve a pretty specific purpose, and it also had to be fairly cheap.)

I was worried that I wouldn’t get a decent cast. (Low-budget equals open calls, and also I couldn’t afford to use a real casting agency.)

Oh, and then there was that small matter of actually directing the movie — working with real actors, keeping to a (very brief) schedule, and surviving it all without an Apocalypse Now-level meltdown. In all my years of work experience I’d never managed a single person, and now I was going to be managing an entire cast and crew, all of whom were a good deal more experienced than I was.

But it wasn’t all nail biting and night sweats. A lot of it was pretty great: Meeting a real stunt coordinator; working out the shot list with my DP; even casting, one of my biggest fears, turned out to be a ton of fun (and quite successful).

(I should also note here how helpful it was to have a good producer at my side for this part of the process. Yes, I was freaking out on a regular basis, but I never actually had to worry about which forms I needed to sign, which checks I needed to write, or how I was going to find a cast and crew. She was taking care of all of that, and I am eternally grateful, because otherwise I probably would have gone insane.)

Step four: let’s shoot this thing

This is where I learned that adrenaline is a wonderful thing. Didn’t sleep for days before the shoot, definitely didn’t sleep during the shoot. And yet, while I was on set I was more upbeat and alert and on the ball than I’ve ever been in my life.

It probably helped that shooting a movie was easily the most fun I’ve ever had. It also helped that my cast and crew were superb — fast, efficient, professional, and generally just great people to be around. The cliché about a movie crew being like a family really holds true; even after a three-day shoot there were hugs and heartfelt goodbyes.

Of course there were frustrations, difficulties, unexpected obstacles, and more than a few I’m-in-over-my-head moments. But there was nothing to do with those moments but overcome them, push past them, keep things moving. Because if there’s another cliché that’s 100% true, it’s that the show must go on. There’s no time to complain, dwell, or retreat into your self-doubting cocoon when everyone around you is ready and waiting. And that’s a little bit terrifying, but it’s mostly exhilarating.

Also, this happened in my living room and it was pretty cool: Flip

Step five: how does it end? I’ll keep you (ugh) posted

Long story short: “Movies are made in the editing room” is a cliché because it’s 100% true. Certainly the process of going from a rough cut to a final cut is every bit as challenging and labor-intensive as actually shooting the film — except the timetable is far less constrained. And you’d think that would make things easier, but… remember how I just got through saying how great it is that when you’re on set, there’s no time to second-guess yourself? In post, there’s plenty of time to second-guess yourself. Plenty of time to tweak the stuff that doesn’t work, and to refine the stuff that does. The goal is no longer to get everything shot so you can pack up and send the crew home; the goal is to produce a good movie.

Luckily, my editor was a jack-of-all-trades-and-then-some, handling sound, visual effects, and coloring in addition to the already-punishing workload of cutting the picture. And one of my best friends, who has worked for many years in the music business, hooked me up with a great composer who delivered a great original score in record time. Now it’s in the hands of the festivals, so my job is pretty much crossing my fingers.

What I learned

Making a film — even a ten-minute one — completely changed my perspective on my career and my identity as a creative person. Although I absolutely intend to keep writing, I no longer think of myself as just a writer: I know now that I can do more than that. I’m excited to look for more opportunities to direct, and maybe I can even make some money at it someday (since self-financed shorts are not quite the golden goose that I wish they were).

I’m not holding myself up as some special case, either; I’d wager that a great many people who see themselves solely as writers could do an excellent job of directing. It sounds scary, and sometimes it is, but being a screenwriter is fantastic preparation for it. As John often says, when you’ve written a script, you’ve already seen the movie in your head, and that’s at least half the battle. The other half is being able to explain it to your collaborators, but if you pick talented people — and Los Angeles is positively teeming with them — it’s not really that hard.

I think people write spec scripts for two reasons: (1) They want to see their scripts made into movies; and (2) They want to get paid. And I think that for most people, the priorities go in that order. Getting a paycheck is great, but the dream is seeing your words and scenarios brought to life. You don’t need to sell your script to a big studio to achieve that. The only difference between the biggest studio movie and the smallest self-funded independent movie is money. (A lot of which is often wasted, as demonstrated in this piece by Gavin Polone.) Money is the only thing hiding behind those studio gates — not ideas, and certainly not talent. Great actors, great crew, and great equipment are available to everyone (and you’ll pay far less for all three if you’re not part of a giant expensive production).

You can spend your entire career waiting for permission to see your work brought to the screen, and you can give up if it never happens (and, like I said, I was very close to giving up). Or you can jump the line and do it yourself. Instead of being the person desperately trying to get hired, you can be the person doing the hiring. That’s a pretty nice ego boost.

So things are going pretty well these days. I’m still writing specs, but I’m working with a manager now, so my scripts are getting some exposure instead of languishing in the void. (Funnily enough, I got the meeting with him not because of anything to do with making my movie, but because I had a script hosted on The Black List that he liked. Thanks, Franklin Leonard!) I’m also having a great time writing for Previously.TV, a new online venture from the creators of Television Without Pity. The inside of my head is starting to look more like those upbeat days of 1997. Optimism is back in town.

And the Star Wars prequels might have sucked, but those sequels are going to be great!

Right? Flip

You can find Nick Rheinwald-Jones on Twitter at @rheinwaldjones.

(Photo credits: David T. Cole) 

Pepperoni, parenthood, and the zone of solitude

First Person, Writing Process

Joanna Cohen is a writer in New York. For nine years she worked as a reporter and editor at Sports Illustrated. She’s since made her living in daytime television, most notably earning three Emmy nominations as a scriptwriter for “All My Children.”

When she isn’t coming up with dialogue about evil twins and babies switched at birth, she’s working on TV pilots, revising her debut novel, writing first-person essays for The New York Times and, most important, being a mom.

first person“Pepperoni.” That’s the shorthand my husband, Evan, and I use to tell one another I’m in the writing zone. Please come back later.

Why do we need such a silly word? Can’t we pause, look up from our computers and simply say we need a few more minutes of solitude to write?

Absolutely not.

The zone is sacred and elusive. Once you get there, you don’t mess with it. You don’t take time out to be polite. It’s as if you’re possessed, almost high. Some force has overtaken your being, and whatever it is you produce — sentences, songs, jump shots — flows from you exactly as you’d wished, seemingly without effort.

To be jerked out of this state by a ringing phone or car alarm or a question from a well-meaning spouse can be devastating.

It reminds me of a moment from the 2004 Olympics. Four miles from the finish line, a Brazilian marathoner was cruising to a gold medal when a protester darted out of the crowd and pushed him to the curb. Unable to regain his lead, he ended up coming in third.

Okay, maybe it’s not that heart-breaking. But it is maddening, and has led to interactions in my house that go something like this:

Evan enters our bedroom, where I’m typing away.

EVAN

So what do you want for --

ME

I’m writing.

EVAN

Could you just --

ME

Writing!

EVAN

Lemme know when you’re done.

I slam the laptop closed.

ME

I’m done.

To be fair, Evan’s work also involves a lot of writing. He understands the zone and respects it. So if he interrupts me, it’s because he thought I was sending email or surfing the web. Same goes for me.

Neither of us is a mind-reader and we didn’t want to keep having the same fight. We needed a signal, a way to communicate immediately that it wasn’t a good time to approach. We agreed it should be a single word. Simple but memorable. Pepperoni fit the bill.

We came up with this idea shortly after I’d made the career transition from being a journalist who worked in an office to a television writer who worked from home.

I loved doing my job where I lived, mostly because I could set my own hours. I’m an early bird. My best time is between 5 a.m. and 10 a.m. I could go straight from my bed to my keyboard, stopping only to pour a cup of coffee, then crank straight through.

Early mornings were when I was most likely to find the zone. The sun would rise, the caffeine would kick in and the pages would fly from my fingers. Evan, a night owl, would either be asleep or I’d see him coming, hit him with a “pepperoni” and he’d let me do my thing. Problem solved.

Until we had a child.

When I was pregnant five years ago, I had visions of peaceful mornings, my baby sleeping by my side as I typed. I imagined she’d slip seamlessly into the routine, cooperative and joyful.

Um, no.

My daughter, Bee, would invariably awaken just as I was hitting my writing stride. I’d call for Evan to come take her. He always did. But it was too late. The moment was gone.

For months, I tried everything I could think of to preserve my precious mornings. I’d put Bee in her bouncy seat on the floor next to my desk, tapping it with my foot as I typed. I’d sit cross-legged on my chair, creating a spot in my lap where she could sleep as I hunched over her to reach the keyboard. Nothing worked.

As I prepared Bee’s bottles, I’d take my frustration out on Evan, who was only doing his best to help me. He sympathized when I ranted about what losing those hours was doing to me. Every time I was about to ride the wave of creativity, it would come crashing down. I’d pop up on the board, pumped and ready, and the lifeguard would blow the whistle and order everyone out of the water.

Evan’s proposal: Go surfing at another time of day.

I found the suggestion outrageous. (Writers can be a little sensitive.) I was supposed to change when I felt most inspired? Perhaps I could also grow another hand so I could type faster.

But then I realized Evan was right. If I lived alone in a log cabin, controlling my schedule would be easy. But I was a new mother, living in modern-day Manhattan.

Renting office space would be too expensive. I wasn’t about to give up writing to become an accountant. And I couldn’t Jedi mind trick my kid into sleeping whenever I needed to work. If I wanted to avoid resenting my family and get back to feeling good about writing, I’d have to change my habits.

The first step was learning to write outside of our apartment. In the beginning, it was tough. Every time I walked into a café, I’d stress over whether it had wifi or if I could get a table near an outlet where I could plug in my computer as it ran low on power.

There were plenty of outlets at my gym, so I tried working in the lounge there. It was like writing in a club — techno music thumping and sweaty, scantily clad people all around me. I found a nice terrace behind a local museum that had free wifi, but no outlets or bathrooms.

I’d walk a mile to my sister’s apartment, which was comfortable, private and had all the necessary equipment. But she works at a school and would come home earlier than I could afford to knock off. I didn’t want to overstay my welcome, so I’d often finish the day on park bench or the steps of a brownstone.

At home in the evenings, I’d complain to Evan about the anxiety-producing work conditions, all the schlepping around and the seven-dollar pots of tea I didn’t want, but kept ordering just to buy me a few more hours at the café. I feared I’d swapped one set of frustrations for another.

But I hung in there — and, in time, discovered I was more adaptable as a writer than I’d thought. I learned to tune out the techno, became friends with the café manager who did his best to reserve an outlet table for me, and found that I actually could produce good work after 10 a.m. Soon I even felt confident enough to tackle another challenge: finding a way to write at home once in a while.

As Bee got older, we began to use the phrase “Mama’s working” and she’d occasionally let me stay behind closed doors while she played with Evan or my sister or a babysitter. Of course, there are plenty of days when she won’t go for it and I’ve ditched the Act Two scene that was finally coming together to make Play-Doh cookies.

But we’re miles from the bouncy seat and 5 a.m. wake-ups. These days I mostly have the pre-dawn hours to myself. Before long, I think Bee might even respond to “pepperoni.”

When you think someone stole your idea

First Person, Psych 101, Rights and Copyright, Story and Plot

Randall Girdner is a screenwriter living in Shanghai who wrote in with a question that became a conversation. I asked him to share his experience as a First Person post.

first personThis morning, I was listening to both John and Craig’s comments in regard to the billion dollar lawsuit against Tom Cruise and the general legal entanglements in regard to theft of ideas. As a whole, I agree with all of their points. I am forever astounded at the frivolous lawsuits that get bandied about and the inflated self-importance of the people that pursue them.

But something happened to me last year that was a very weird coincidence.

I have been writing for many, many years, but I’ve never sold a script, nor had an agent (and have only really tried in a half-hearted manner). I’m sure I’ve sent a couple of my scripts around at some point, but considering I’ve lived overseas for a good deal of my adult life, it’s never been a high priority.

Last summer, I learned of a thriller that was about to come out that had an idea that was similar to a script I had written in the past. Very similar.

It wasn’t “two-guys-and-a-girl-move-into-an-apartment-together” similar, or “an-asteroid-is-going-to-crash-into-the-planet” similar. The idea for this new film was unique and was almost exactly the same as mine.

I had registered my original script with the Writers Guild in 1995 and had forgotten about it until this movie came out. Suddenly, news of this movie was everywhere. I felt somewhat ill at the notion that my idea might have been stolen.

Worse but related: the premise of the movie is so unique that this particular movie has rendered my original script dead in the water.

I contacted an entertainment lawyer through friends, who advised me to watch the movie and compare plot points. I never did, partially because I lived in mortal fear that the movie actually would be similar to mine and would make my brain explode.

I wrote to John, and told him basically what I wrote above.

While I was waiting (hoping) for a reply, I ended up watching the movie.

Similar yet entirely different

Aside from the initial premise and some general, large-scale ideas, it turns out that my script is pretty much unlike the this movie at all. The execution is very different.

While I was pondering how this could be, John wrote back:1

I know it’s hard to wrap your head around that there are probably four other guys who saw this movie and said, “Hey wait a second! That’s almost exactly like the script I wrote!” But I guarantee there were. I bet some hardcore googling would find them bitching in message boards, and that might give you some solace.

Can you remember when you got the idea? My hunch is that there was a moment of inspiration/inception…And it’s a goodish idea. But that bare idea doesn’t have characters and story and detail. It has nothing protectable.

This was true and I needed to hear something like that to help calm my brain.

But those feelings are still there. Partly because there’s a sequel coming.

As a writer, my uncontrollable imagination can envision nine thousand elaborate scenarios in which someone (a studio, a producer, a writer/director) could have conspired to screw me over, but the truth of the matter is that I cannot conceive of any possible way in which my script could have been stolen.

Even if it was, the planning and execution of that theft would have to be so incredibly elaborate and dastardly that someone should have just bought it from me in the first place. Nothing is worth that much thought and energy.

Hmm…there’s an idea for a movie.

When I encounter this with projects I’ve written — or have on the drawing board — I try to remind myself, “This means I have commercial taste! People make movies like mine!” It’s small comfort, but it’s something.

You can reach Randall through his website or on Twitter @randallpgirdner.

  1. I save most questions for the podcast. In this case, I had a hunch there was a First Person post possibility, which is why I wrote Randall directly. ↩