Advice From Pros

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  • Advice From Pros

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DTmtFBPfRp4

    Around 2 minute Rogen sums up (from someone even better writers told him) what a comedy spec should do. Things I know, but this made it so much clearer. It's all finding the heart so we care about the characters and thus love the movie even more. Sure it works for many genres.

    So maybe let's all share advice -- practical like this to me -- that helps. As i said in another thread -- advice like "write in longhand" that I heard Lawrence Kasdan say so it's not so easy to change your mind is very interesting to me.

    Adam Green a director said the best advice he got on being a director was "wear comfortable shoes."

    And yes I'm looking for well now pro writers in fiction, movies, TV -- not your screenwriting professor. That way we al know the source of the advice and can judge it accordingly.

  • #2
    Re: Advice From Pros

    One thing I think about always is a quote from Roger Ebert which is, "It's not what a movie is about, it's how it is about it."

    If you're asking others opinions too early they can shrug off anything as trite -- "Oh, another FBI agent movie or Oh, another drug kingpin movie," and dampen your enthusiasm for what you're writing -- unnecessarily. So I never tell anyone what I'm writing aside from what genre, until it's done, I've gotten notes and revised, and generally like it enough that I can't be swayed by their negativity.

    Because it's never what it's about. It's only how it's about it. There are a million different ways to tell a story.

    Another thing I think about is Tony Gilroy who said, You'll never write above your understanding of human nature (paraphrased).

    When people say "write what you know," I always think of this. You can always research a subject, or a setting. But if you don't innately understand the complexities of people in general, I think it'd be nearly impossible to write complex characters (if that's your goal).

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    • #3
      Re: Advice From Pros

      ^Solid stuff.

      Here's a relevant Hemingway quote-

      "Good writing is true writing. If a man is making a story up it will be true in proportion to the amount of knowledge of life that he has and how conscientious he is; so that when he makes something up is as it would truly be."

      A few more-

      When asked how much one should write everyday - "The best way is always to stop when you are going good and when you know what will happen next. If you do that every day when you are writing a novel you will never be stuck. That is the most valuable thing I can tell you so try to remember it. Always stop while you are going good and don't think about it or worry about it until you start to write the next day. That way your subconscious will work on it all the time."

      "Don't let them suck you in to start writing about the proletariat, if you don't come from the proletariat, just to please the recently politically enlightened critics. In a little while these critics will be something else. I've seen them be a lot of things and none of them was pretty. Write about what you know and write truly and tell them all where they can place it... Books should be about the people you know, that you love and hate, not about the people you study up about. If you write them truly they will have all the economic implications a book can hold [...] Do not let them deceive you about what a book should be because of what is in the fashion now."

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      • #4
        Re: Advice From Pros

        https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vGUN...ature=emb_logo

        south park guys

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        • #5
          Re: Advice From Pros

          https://twitter.com/johnzaozirny/sta...410171904?s=20

          See the difference between reality and what you read in a book.

          You can't put in stuff that can't be filmmed... sure... but a lot of writers do just that becuase it helps the read. And as this manager says -- often they are reading 12 specs in a wkd and need some hand holding.

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          • #6
            Re: Advice From Pros

            Originally posted by Bono View Post
            https://twitter.com/johnzaozirny/sta...410171904?s=20

            See the difference between reality and what you read in a book.

            You can't put in stuff that can't be filmmed... sure... but a lot of writers do just that becuase it helps the read. And as this manager says -- often they are reading 12 specs in a wkd and need some hand holding.
            Some good advice there. And, happily, none of the examples he gave are unfilmable. They could all be acted.

            Bono, thanks for sharing these pro-advice links. That advice from the South Park guys is solid.
            Know this: I'm a lazy amateur, so trust not a word what I write.
            "The ugly can be beautiful. The pretty, never." ~ Oscar Wilde

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            • #7
              Re: Advice From Pros

              Well, sh&t, you're welcome. And for the record -- I learned from both posts too. My current rep talks a lot about what this other manager said -- my previous 2 groups of managers barely cared to give any notes -- so there is a big range of what a rep can do for you. Some of them only care about selling and not developing. And some of them develop for 2 years and that seems wrong too...

              Key thing I keep hearing is emotion and heart. Make the reader care. Things I knew -- but it's even more so now and this is a comedy. Give them that "what a minute, those weren't just dick jokes -- but a story about friendship" movie.

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              • #8
                Re: Advice From Pros

                Originally posted by Bono View Post
                Key thing I keep hearing is emotion and heart. Make the reader care. Things I knew -- but it's even more so now and this is a comedy. Give them that "what a minute, those weren't just dick jokes -- but a story about friendship" movie.
                Yes, a script without emotional narrative, without a reason for an audience to care, is unlikely to be worth making into a movie.

                I'm almost fairly confident that in my current script-in-mind (a gonzo horror titled Code Orange) is worth developing now that I've worked out at least the beginnings of an affecting emotional story for the protagonist - one of a journey through an extreme emotional response to grief and loss.
                Know this: I'm a lazy amateur, so trust not a word what I write.
                "The ugly can be beautiful. The pretty, never." ~ Oscar Wilde

                Comment

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