John August

Psych 101

Writing and decision fatigue

Big Fish, Broadway, Psych 101

This past weekend consisted of three long days of meetings and work sessions for the Big Fish musical; Sunday went fourteen hours. I had a hunch that late in the day wasn’t the best time to introduce a new song, and now [science has my back](http://www.nytimes.com/2011/08/21/magazine/do-you-suffer-from-decision-fatigue.html?_r=3&pagewanted=all):

> No matter how rational and high-minded you try to be, you can’t make decision after decision without paying a biological price. It’s different from ordinary physical fatigue — you’re not consciously aware of being tired — but you’re low on mental energy. The more choices you make throughout the day, the harder each one becomes for your brain, and eventually it looks for shortcuts, usually in either of two very different ways. One shortcut is to become reckless: to act impulsively instead of expending the energy to first think through the consequences. (Sure, tweet that photo! What could go wrong?) The other shortcut is the ultimate energy saver: do nothing. Instead of agonizing over decisions, avoid any choice. Ducking a decision often creates bigger problems in the long run, but for the moment, it eases the mental strain.

Writing involves a dozen choices every sentence, a thousand every scene.

Discussing material with producers and a director means understanding and deciding between myriad possible options — and the more people in the conversation, the more choices to consider.

And casting? Exhausting. It feels like it should be one of the easiest parts of production — you’re not *doing* anything, just sitting there and listening — but it wears you out. I’ve been through casting on five projects, and each time I’m amazed how tough it is. You’re trying to compare the actor you just saw versus the actor you saw yesterday versus the actor who won’t audition.

The article explains that sugar (glucose) is one of the quickest ways to restock your willpower supply. That’s why writers get fat.

(link via [@mjeppsen](http://twitter.com/mjeppsen))

What a flop feels like

Psych 101

Conan The Barbarian co-writer Sean Hood answers a dismal question: [What’s it like to have your film flop at the box office?](http://www.quora.com/Whats-it-like-to-have-your-film-flop-at-the-box-office)

> The Friday night of the release is like the Tuesday night of an election. “Exit polls” are taken of people leaving the theater, and estimated box office numbers start leaking out in the afternoon, like early ballot returns. You are glued to your computer, clicking wildly over websites, chatting nonstop with peers, and calling anyone and everyone to find out what they’ve heard. Have any numbers come back yet? That’s when your stomach starts to drop.

> By about 9 PM its clear when your “candidate” has lost by a startlingly wide margin, more than you or even the most pessimistic political observers could have predicted. With a movie its much the same: trade magazines like Variety and Hollywood Reporter call the weekend winners and losers based on projections. That’s when the reality of the loss sinks in, and you don’t sleep the rest of the night.

Read the whole thing. It’s a great write-up of the experience.

As screenwriters, we have little control over anything beyond the words on the page. Once cameras start rolling, the director, the producers and studio executives are making the big decisions. We contribute where we can — screenwriters can be great in the editing room — but we’re largely spectators.

In the last few days before release, even those big decision-makers are spectators. It truly is a launch: you’re watching the movie follow its trajectory, powerless to alter its course by more than a few degrees.

The quality of the finished film is obviously a major factor in how it performs. But it’s never the biggest factor.

What movies are you opening against? Which movies are holding surprisingly well? Did your fourth-billed star recently marry a younger man and show up at the premiere with both him and her ex-husband, sucking up all available publicity? (For example.)

Ultimately, you may have to fall back on Hollywood’s tautological version of the Serenity Prayer: It is what it is. There’s not always a helpful lesson to learn — at least not a lesson you as the screenwriter can act upon.

Endless producer notes

Producers, Psych 101

questionmarkMy writing partner and I are young “nobodies” trying to write for film and television. While we’ve worked in the industry for years and have written a lot of work, we’re still fighting to get represented or to make a sale. Here’s where the question comes in:

About a year ago we got hooked up with a producer from a major studio who was willing to read our work and develop scripts with us. He’d read some work of ours and said that he liked the writing. That’s great! After bouncing around some of our ideas we began working on an original idea of his.

We spent hours upon hours putting together draft after draft and adjusting to an onslaught of notes that we would get back. Every time would be, “this is good but…” and then he would ask us to change the whole story. We would oblige (because we’re nobodies and he’s a working producer) and then start from scratch, re-build the story and write another draft. Most of the notes we were applying were things that we didn’t agree with and felt that they took the script in a direction we didn’t like. This was an endless cycle. But we dealt with it — in hopes that it would matter.

Eventually we finally got a story that he “liked” (because he apparently no longer liked the story he pitched us originally) and we thought we were ready for him to show it around to other producers or to agents/managers but instead he’s asked that we sit with him and go through the script line by line so that he can correct it. Line. By. Line.

We know that notes are part of the process and we’re very receptive to constructive criticism but seeing as how we’re not getting paid for this work and he’s basically asking us to transcribe his every thought into Final Draft (thoughts we don’t even see eye to eye on) — at what point are we just being abused and wasting our time?

Seeing as this is the biggest connection that we have and the best chance we’ve seen so far to have any sort of “break-in” we’re desperately holding on to it but it keeps feeling more and more demeaning and pointless. Thoughts?

– Brandon and Gabriel
Los Angeles, CA

answer iconYour suspicions are correct: this won’t stop until you make it stop.

You’re essentially doing spec work — writing without getting paid. While you own the words you’ve written, the producer can (reasonably) claim some ownership of the story. He’ll be attached to whatever screenplay you end up with.

But take comfort: you’re not alone.

This is a very common situation for screenwriters at the beginning of their careers. In fact, I’d guess that most working screenwriters have an anecdote similar to yours.

I spent six months rewriting a draft of my first screenplay with a former development executive who I later realized had few connections and zero ability to actually get a movie made. She pinned all my hopes on getting one agent at CAA to read my script. We waited two months to get a perfunctory pass.

As aggravating as the experience was, I can also look at it from her perspective: she invested many hours reading and meeting with me. She truly believed in my script, and wanted to make it better. The worst I can fault her for is over-estimating her abilities as a producer.

I suspect the situation is similar with your producer. He sees himself as a Good Guy, and doesn’t hear your groans of annoyance.

Your challenge now is to find a way out of this bad situation while maintaining a good relationship. Before starting on any new work, you need to have a conversation with him about exactly what the next steps will be.

For starters, you need an agent or a manager. Conveniently, he deals with agents and managers all the time, so he needs to pick up the phone and call a few on your behalf.

He may balk at first, not wanting to send out the script you’re writing for him. That’s fine. You have other writing samples. Agents and managers should be reading them.

You also need to set some mutual deadlines. “So, we’ll get you these changes on Tuesday. Then we’re going to send it to (appropriate director) to read for the weekend, right?”

Just so you know, these situations never really end. Producer notes will always grow to fill the amount of time you have — and then bleed past the edges. Even with an agent or manager to play bad cop, screenwriters are constantly balancing the need to keep producers happy and keep the process moving along. That’s part of the job.

You are the host of your own talk show

Psych 101

I never watched Oprah. But I’m not surprised she had some good [parting thoughts](http://www.oprah.com/oprahshow/The-Oprah-Winfrey-Show-Finale_1/print/1):

> Each one of you has your own platform. Do not let the trappings here fool you. Mine is a stage in a studio, yours is wherever you are with your own reach, however small or however large that reach is.

> Maybe it’s 20 people, maybe it’s 30 people, 40 people, your family, your friends, your neighbors, your classmates, your classroom, your co-workers. Wherever you are, that is your platform, your stage, your circle of influence. That is your talk show, and that is where your power lies.

People underestimate their influence. And use it poorly.

If you like something, don’t just click “Like” on Facebook. Say that you like it. Write about it. Let others know that something is worthy of their attention. If something is wrong, broken or unjust — speak up.

Yes: you have to be mindful of your audience. Curate. Don’t overwhelm their Twitter feeds or drone on in the break room. Say interesting things and people will listen.

But don’t say only the stuff you expect everyone will agree with. Outlying opinions are often ideas everyone is thinking but afraid to say.

Credit your sources. I got this Oprah quote from a blog called [Tin Man](http://www.tinmanic.com/archives/2011/05/28/thoughts-on-oprah/). I’ve never met the blog’s owner. I don’t know his name, or what made me add his feed to my RSS reader. But I end up reading most of his posts, because he seems consistently thoughtful. That’s not a very high bar to clear. You don’t have to be funny or clever to have an audience. Honest gets you a lot.

Obviously, you’re going to have influence over the people you know and see every day, the circle of 20-40 people Oprah mentions.

But people put a lot of trust in folks they’ve never met. Quite often — usually at Peet’s Coffee on Larchmont — a young screenwriter will tell me they moved to Los Angeles because they read my blog. That’s influence. It didn’t come through screen credits or official decree. It built up gradually, post after post.

When you think about your life as a talk show, it makes you reflect on your opinions. What topics interest you? What do you believe? Are your positions logically consistent? No one expects you to have the answers. They want the conversation.

Oprah didn’t become an icon by giving away cars to housewives. She did it by being the best talk show host she could imagine. That’s a goal that scales well.