I hate hypocrisy. There, I said it!
For me, there is nothing worse than a person (corporation, government or talent agent) who loudly declares the rules while they break the very same themselves. “Do as I say not as I do.” Worst parenting strategy ever. If writing at its best is about expressing something true, then the best compass for most writers is probably honesty. When it comes to charting a course through the shoals of showbiz, your principles are often the only thing that points the way forward. Do as you say, period, and hope for the best.
Which is why what I’m about to suggest will sound like the vilest form of hypocrisy ever perpetrated by man or beast. Here goes nuthin.
In two recent posts, I ascended my soapbox to harangue the universe regarding the eternal battle between artists and commerce. Between we noble writers and those unctuous shills who would dare to co-opt, corrupt and compromise our art for the sake of a few dirty pennies. I proclaimed that writers should write for themselves rather than the ever elusive marketplace and, more importantly, that they should protect the sanctity of their script – by whatever means necessary – in order to survive the siege of development hell. I stand by these decrees wholeheartedly and carry them before me into battle. And yet…
I’ve been a reader/screenplay consultant/Script Jockey™ for a good number of years and in that time I’ve passed my eyes over a weighty truckload of scripts. I’ve read my share of the good, the bad and the ugly, and all points in between, but most of these hundred plus page dreams were honestly written with genuine heart. That more than anything else has kept me plugging away as a script consultant and rooting for screenwriters everywhere.
And I have been rewarded for my faith. For I have had the rare privilege of experiencing a handful of unsung screenplays that were truly phenomenal. By the same token, I have engaged with a handful of unsung writers whose sublime talents still humble me (here’s looking at you, Lizanne.) This small clutch of screenplays and this small collection of writers should each be household names. I pray that one day they will be, God or Hollywood willing, and if I ever hit the Megamillions their ship has come in. I know some of these writers just well enough to grasp part of their dilemma, because it is the classic writers’ hurtle. Problem number one, through problem number one hundred, is the film industry.
We writers like to think of screenplays as the solid narrative bedrock upon which directors conjure up palaces of light and sound or as the magical blueprint for something far grander that could not exist without it. In reality, the film industry tends to view screenplays less like blueprints and more like Kleenex. Forgotten until you need them and then you go through twenty in a sitting. Best of all, they’re disposable. And don’t worry, if you need more there’s an entire box of them on the intern’s desk.
That’s what you’re up against. In theory, everyone in the industry understands screenplays are necessary, but they’re often viewed more as something to get past on the way to shooting the film rather than as the compass and map for that journey. In this landscape, scripts need someone to look out for them lest they get trampled to death on the long glorious march to the film shoot proper. Thus, the mantra. Protect the script. From death by a thousand cuts – at the hands of a dozen development execs – by agreeing to everything while secretly changing little to nothing. If you succeed, you’ve saved your screenplay from wanton mutilation and, if smiled upon by the God of Screenwriters (Billy Wilder), it may even wind up on the big screen.
But what if this gambit doesn’t work? What if they notice you didn’t make the changes “everyone” agreed were essential? What then, O’Sullivan?
Here’s where I qualify my previous clarion call with a bracing dose of truth.
Years ago, newly minted as a script guy, I landed a gig reading screenplays for the Sundance Institute, a stone’s throw from the Santa Monica pier. At some point, the head of the script department liked the cut of my coverage and asked if I’d be willing to do story notes on a handful of scripts. God yes! And that… was how I came across Delia.
It’s ironic that I happened upon this gem at the starting gate of my career. In the years that followed, I often wondered if I’d burnished it in my mind the way all ‘first loves’ are glowingly remembered. But when a script department head later hired me thanks to my radiant coverage of Delia, he spoke about it as I did. Like someone who had seen Joe DiMaggio play or had witnessed Hendrix at Woodstock. With quiet reverence.
Before revisiting my destined date with Delia, we spring forward to a moment years later when I was the guy with a screenplay on the make. This was the Napoleon script. The work that scored me a manager and an agent, the gushing praise of several producers, and the attention of a legendary movie star. It also sent me into a crushing spiral of anxiety when I saw the fires of development hell dawning on the horizon. The issue was simple. I had poured my soul into this thing. It was my child. And now… it was being carved up like a pumpkin. When I babbled this to friends, they offered, “Hey, you’ll be getting a huge paycheck and that’s the whole point, right?” Unfortunately, it wasn’t.
Two things then transpired which kept me out of a rubber room. I told an old friend that my ship had finally come in – he was over the moon – but that I couldn’t bear what they were doing to my script. The nicest guy in the world, my buddy is also wickedly irreverent in a way that reminds you life is one big joke, so you might as well laugh. “Leo, my friend,” he observed, “by the time they’re finished, it’ll be ‘Napoleon, The Musical’.” I don’t think I ever stopped laughing. In for a penny, in for a pound. Cue the little guy’s big number!
He talked me out of the tree and my mom completed the triage by reminding me of a crucial truth. No matter how they changed the script to make the movie, I would still have my screenplay, just as I’d written it. No one and nothing could take that away. When the day came that the project went the way of all flesh – and most movie deals – I was epically disappointed but took great solace in that one truth. I still had my baby.
Which brings us full circle to Delia. My Sundance mentor had privately asked me to read it to see if I had any thoughts towards improving it. In the years to come, I learned that having thoughts about scripts was what I was born to do. More to the point, I can count on one hand the number of times I had nothing to say because the script was all but perfect… but I found something to say anyway.
Delia was the exception. It read like a great novel. Every character was completely realized and alive, the plot was tense and hypnotic, the atmosphere was palpable and the sheer prose was breathtaking. Unlike most screenplays, even great ones, there was no sense of this being a functional device, a well written blueprint but a blueprint all the same. This was a work of art. If it never became a film, it would remain so. To change anything about it would have been sacrilege. As Salieri observed in the film AMADEUS, “Displace one note and there would be diminishment.”
But my champion at Sundance had asked for notes and this was my big chance. How could I tell her I had none to give? This post began with a discussion of honesty… the only compass a writer needs. I bit the bullet and told her the truth. I had one note regarding Delia. “It’s perfect.” With amused resignation, she sighed, “Yep. It is.” I asked what was happening with it? “Nothing.” It had been around for a few years and everyone loved it, but there was one key problem. The writer was adamant that it had to be filmed exactly as written. It could not be altered in any way from script to screen. I sat there taking that in. This was a perfect screenplay. Filmed exactly as written, it would have been an Oscar winner. Surely, some brilliant producer or director could film it as is and still make it their own? She smiled and said, “This is Hollywood.”
There’s the rub. What do you do when you write a brilliant script and it gets invited to the party, but you can’t bear the dicing and slicing to come? You protect the script by any means necessary, per my earlier rant. But if that fails, if they still demand changes, you have three options. You can shoot it yourself if you have a steelwire nervous system, a fistful of credit cards and superhuman fortitude, but that’s a different kettle of fish. The other two options are clear. Walk away or play the game.
If you walk away, you’ll avoid the heartbreak of watching others play with your beloved script the way sharks play with a seal. But you’ll never see your great script become what it was meant to be. A great film. If you play the game, you’ll have all the heartbreak you can handle, but… your dream may come true. To quote Hyman Roth in THE GODFATHER (Part Deux), “This is the business we’ve chosen.” If you can come to terms with that, you’ll be ready for what comes and more than a match for it. To quote a more pedestrian opus we’ve all seen time and again: “You can’t win if you don’t play.”
Twenty-five years have come and gone, but I keep searching the marquees, hoping against hope that one day I’ll see it. A one-word title, a woman’s name, gazing down at me as if to say her day has finally come. Her moment to step out of the darkness and into the light.
