I
finished a second draft of THE OX this evening, which I’m hoping to get in good
shape by March for the beginning of screenplay contest season. Very pleased with
this draft – the first go-round (which I wrote last summer) was a blast to
write but a hilarious mess to read. This time I feel I cracked the story, and
the work to be done in the coming months will be more along the lines of
tightening, tuning, filling holes, and just generally upping the awesome
wherever I can. In the meantime, I will reward myself with a bag of my beloved
Jalapeno Cheetos. (It’s a problem.)
For
the moment, though, a few days of rest are in order, and possibly some
development work on the next project. I desperately want to revise an old play
of mine – one that I love, but that I have never felt was “finished.”
Anybody
out there read Robert McKee’s STORY? I’ve had the text copy of it for a couple
of years now, and read it half-heartedly some time back. Recently, with all the
attendant adjunct-professor-traveling I have to do, I’ve been listening to the
audiobook version, and have really been enjoying it – much more so than I
thought that I would. Now, I’ve always loved books on craft. When I was acting,
for example, I ate up Stella Adler’s book like it was manna. Mostly because she
insisted that acting was an aristocracy, and I wanted to see myself in a fancy
suit. As a playwright, I’ve always loved David Mamet’s books (in particular,
THE THREE USES OF THE KNIFE, and in less-than-particular, everything else he
writes. No one in my grad school program agreed with me.)
Of
course, the opposing opinion espoused by a large number of working
screenwriters is to disparage books on craft. Craig Mazin recently tweeted: “Screenwriting
Tip: Ignore screenwriting tips,” or something like that, which was much more
hilarious than Identity Thief. The
standard advice given is that the only
way to learn is by reading screenplays and writing and making movies, etc. Looking
at the big-money industry of screenplay workshops, conventions, that whole
shebang, I certainly think that opinion is justified. But there’s a big part of
me that feels like – shouldn’t we be doing both? Does it really have to be
either/or? It’s certainly appropriate to put great emphasis on industry nuts
and bolts. It doesn’t make any sense to be ignorant. But surely we can agree
that there are plenty of movies made every year that are just plain lousy, and
they get made because some persistent and charismatic people know how to work
the system. Good for you, Tommy Wiseau – I mean that. Getting even a lousy
movie made is certainly an achievement.
What
bothers me is the idea that those who don’t do (Robert McKee, the
non-scriptwriting scriptwriting guru) or those who don’t do well (Blake Snyder,
author not just of Save the Cat but of Stop Or My Mother Will Shoot) have nothing instructive to offer.
Let’s just postulate, for the sake of argument, that there are, in fact, “rules”
or “principles” which a good screenplay adheres to. I think that’s a reasonable
assumption. And let’s say that the good Working Professional Screenwriters come
to understand those principles either through work experience, through
intuition, or both, while Good Professional Teachers come to understand those
rules or principles through study and introspection, much like a philosopher would.
The Working Screenwriter may not be able to communicate those rules well, which
is the talent that the Professional Teacher has, while the Professional Teacher
excels at communicating them but can’t put them into practice as adeptly as the
Working Screenwriter. Neither one of them necessarily has a premium on the
truth of the principle simply because of the means through which they access
them. Complicating all of this, of course, is that there are so many terrible
Working Screenwriters and terrible Professional Teachers.
I
just know that, for myself, it’s a matter of balance: study and practice, study
and practice, getting out there in the world, and eating more Jalapeno Cheetos.
(I told you, it’s … it’s a problem.)
