Nicholl Fellowship 2012 open for submissions

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  • Re: Nicholl Fellowship 2012 open for submissions

    Originally posted by holly View Post
    its that the vast majority of films that get made are geared TO MEN. the statistic - that is a self fulfilling prophesy - is that on "date night" women will go see a movie that a man wants to see, but a man wont see a movie a woman wants to see.
    This is a really great point.
    Chicks Who Script podcast

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    • Re: Nicholl Fellowship 2012 open for submissions

      Originally posted by Steven R View Post
      Just go do your thing and don't worry if there's nobody around you who looks like you. God knowns there aren't that many screenwriters as it is.
      Wow. You seriously missed the point.

      Women write about the things that are relevant to women, and men write about the things that are relevant to men. Why does Hollywood buy more scripts geared toward men (which are written by men)?

      It's not about who's more talented - men or women - it's about the marketplace.
      "Do just once what others say you can't do, and you will never pay attention to their limitations again." -[/SIZE] James R. Cook

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      • Re: Nicholl Fellowship 2012 open for submissions

        Originally posted by emily blake View Post
        This is a really great point.
        +2
        "Do just once what others say you can't do, and you will never pay attention to their limitations again." -[/SIZE] James R. Cook

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        • Re: Nicholl Fellowship 2012 open for submissions

          Originally posted by JoJo View Post
          Wow. You seriously missed the point.

          Women write about the things that are relevant to women, and men write about the things that are relevant to men. Why does Hollywood buy more scripts geared toward men (which are written by men)?

          It's not about who's more talented - men or women - it's about the marketplace.
          This is two seperate issues. Movies are marketed toward the young male demographic because they are the ones who spend the money. You want more chick flicks, Gyno-Americans gots to spend more money.

          A good writer isn't stuck in one point of view. A good writer can write a man's viewpoint, a woman's viewpoint, a boy's, a girl's, a dog's, a car's, a fish's, a gay jewish black dudes. I'm a man. If I can't write a convincing woman character's point of view, I'm not a good writer, full stop. You're a woman. If you can write a scripted geared toward's a man's interest, you're not a good writer. Sorry, but there you go.

          Why aren't there more women and minority writers? Don't know and don't care. It's hard work, it's a constricting format, it's not interesting to most people, the collaboration end of it doesn't pay off ego-centrically. There was a study years ago about why there aren't more female chess players and the results boiled down to women thought chess was a waste of time. It doesn't mean chess is inherantly misogynistic, it just means fewer women want in. Make of that what you will, but it's probably the same thing. Movies are fun to watch and less fun to work on.

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          • Re: Nicholl Fellowship 2012 open for submissions

            Originally posted by seminarian View Post
            What some of us would like to see is more ability AND more diversity.
            I'd like to be a Chinese fighter pilot. That isn't real likely to happen either, in large part because forced diversity is anethma to ability.

            Good at your job, nobody cares what's between your legs.

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            • Re: Nicholl Fellowship 2012 open for submissions

              Originally posted by Steven R View Post
              I'd like to be a Chinese fighter pilot. That isn't real likely to happen either, in large part because forced diversity is anethma to ability.

              Good at your job, nobody cares what's between your legs.
              Maybe I missed it - did someone here advocate some sort of quota system, or affirmative action?

              Just a guess here - you're too busy writing to worry about how many women or "minorities" are represented in Hollywood, let alone script contests. Fair enough, keep writing, focus on your work. Maybe I should focus more myself.

              But outside our scripts and dreams lies an entire world, with bigger questions to ponder. And it's these questions that some of the writers here, and maybe even some women working in Hollywood, have to live with from an entirely different perspective from yours and mine. And I believe it's ok, maybe even healthy, to sometimes step back and look at the bigger picture.
              In the evening when the sun is sinkin' low
              Everybody's with the one they love
              I walk the town, Keep a-searchin' all around
              Lookin' for my street corner girl
              - Zep

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              • Re: Nicholl Fellowship 2012 open for submissions

                Originally posted by Steven R View Post

                Good at your job, nobody cares what's between your legs.
                Must be a really cool mythical place you live in. I've been fairly successful in a few different endeavors and industries and have yet to see one that is male-centric. Pretty large disparity between men and women in almost all walks of life.
                If a woman has to choose between catching a fly ball and saving an infant's life, she will choose to save the infant's life without even considering if there are men on base.
                Dave Barry

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                • Re: Nicholl Fellowship 2012 open for submissions

                  Originally posted by holly View Post
                  it is utterly shocking how few female screenwriters there are. its not indy 500. its WRITING. the act that females statistically - for whatever that is worth - EXCEL.
                  It seems to be a common belief that women are "more verbal"--and therefore better writers--than men, but I don't see any real-world evidence for this, especially at the higher levels of achievement. For example, more boys than girls achieve a perfect score on the verbal portion of the SAT test.

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                  • Re: Nicholl Fellowship 2012 open for submissions

                    Originally posted by MrZero View Post
                    It seems to be a common belief that women are "more verbal"--and therefore better writers--than men, but I don't see any real-world evidence for this, especially at the higher levels of achievement. For example, more boys than girls achieve a perfect score on the verbal portion of the SAT test.
                    School educational studies show women on the whole perform better academically than men. However, the absolute top performers are always men; as are the absolute worst performers. (Men populate the tail of these stats much more than they do the head, though.) I don't remember reading any convincing studies on different forms of intellectual aptitudes between genders.

                    As to the question of why fewer women are aspiring screenwriters (as opposed to successful - that's another question), I put this down to men being more prone to chasing socially high-status roles. I have a couple of professional friends in artistic positions who share the same differences with their wives. The men in both cases can't stop scratching the itch of chasing success (one of a musician, the other of a Director/DP). Their wives can't understand why their husbands don't feel they've achieved enough already - as in both cases the lads have done pretty well. The husbands are at a complete loss why their wives don't support them more, or why the wives are so contented with their own career achievements to date (both women are just as successful as their respective husbands, one of them in the film industry too).

                    Screenwriting and other such 'status-jobs' draw dream-chasers, and more men are like this. We see a script sale as an overnight vaulting up the social ladder - which to be honest it is. We are prepared to invest years in chasing that achievement and, in our lust for the approval that success would bestow, we completely ignore the odds of failure. That takes a special kind of single-mindedness. Not necessarily a healthy one.

                    I'd say a lot of western women are slowly starting to think in these terms too (can we see the men-women American Nicoll submissions?) - but the rest of the globe's female population is way behind in their appetite for personal glory (I prefer to see it that they are keeping themselves 'ahead,' but I'm yet to meet a woman that agrees with this way of looking at it).
                    Last edited by muser777; 07-14-2012, 01:20 AM.

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                    • Re: Nicholl Fellowship 2012 open for submissions

                      But why are women more drawn to novel writing than screenwriting? I'd say because authoring a novel is a more personal process.

                      And more a process. The focus is less on what happens with it once its complete, less about you the writer.

                      Might be reaching a little here, though.

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                      • Re: Nicholl Fellowship 2012 open for submissions

                        Originally posted by muser777 View Post
                        But why are women more drawn to novel writing than screenwriting? I'd say because authoring a novel is a more personal process.

                        And more a process. The focus is less on what happens with it once its complete, less about you the writer.

                        Might be reaching a little here, though.
                        No, I think that's a pretty good point. I was going to say something to that effect, too.

                        I will say this, though, that there probably is a bias towards women in certain genres. I've known a couple of female writers (one who is absolutely a great writer--seriously, it fvcking pisses me off how good she is and she's still not published) who couldn't get the time of day for certain pieces until they started using their initials.

                        On the other hand, I know a white male novelist who wrote a story from a black man's point of view, and his agent refused to try to sell it 'cause the writer wasn't black. (The novelist dumped the agent, and found another one who understood what 'fiction' meant, and later sold the piece.)

                        Hell, Joe Lansdale had a hard time selling his first novel 'cause it was from the point of view of a black detective, and he refused to change it.

                        Um, sorry for getting off the topic of screenwriting. Anyway, my own personal opinion is that screenwriting is less personal than novel writing, and that, generally speaking, women tend to be more inward-looking than men, which leads to novel writing and poetry as opposed to the more visual medium of screenwriting.

                        Yeah, that sounds sexist, but, hey, it's an opinion. If you've got facts or stats that say differently, please share.

                        HH (who's probably read too much Steven Pinker and agreed with him)

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                        • Re: Nicholl Fellowship 2012 open for submissions

                          If you agree with the whole Men are from Mars, Women are from Venus stuff, it does say that men and women think differently. The only thing I remember specifically is that men tend to be linear thinkers and women circular thinkers.

                          A man sees a goal, a threat, a target, and goes straight at it without much thought, whereas a woman will build up an emotional bubble around the decision. It's why we men got killed by a lot of sabre-toothed tigers, I imagine.

                          So in that context, I would say that screenplays represent a direct approach and novels the more circular. Not all. Just most. My girlfriend absolutely loves Bollywood and Indie films. I want Die Hard (or similar).

                          The last movie we went and saw together was Snow White and The Huntsman. To me, that movie failed because it tried to play both sides without ever actually succeeding at either. I'm not even really sure I know what theme they were going for, but it had the opportunity to tackle issues that women find real to them (I assume) with the concept of beauty, what men find desirable, body image, growing old, jealousy, what rules the world - a pretty face or a strong sword arm.

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                          • Re: Nicholl Fellowship 2012 open for submissions

                            Seems to me there are more "rules" in screenwriting - that whole three-act structure thing, inciting incident, etc. than there are in writing novels. Men tend to balk at rules, so you'd think they'd shy away from screenwriting whereas more women would take to it.


                            I find that most first screenplays and novels (including mine!) are thinly veiled autobiographical clap-trap, and that applies to men as well as women.
                            "Do just once what others say you can't do, and you will never pay attention to their limitations again." -[/SIZE] James R. Cook

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                            • Re: Nicholl Fellowship 2012 open for submissions

                              Originally posted by JoJo View Post
                              Seems to me there are more "rules" in screenwriting - that whole three-act structure thing, inciting incident, etc. than there are in writing novels. Men tend to balk at rules, so you'd think they'd shy away from screenwriting whereas more women would take to it.


                              I find that most first screenplays and novels (including mine!) are thinly veiled autobiographical clap-trap, and that applies to men as well as women.
                              Actually, I think that's a perfect example of the Mars/Venus conciet.

                              Men see the "rules" more as targets. Women are better at novels because they can explore the idea without boundaries.

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                              • Re: Nicholl Fellowship 2012 open for submissions

                                I don't know enough about the inner workings of Hollywood to say if there is or isn't a bias.

                                But don't theories that say men and women think and write differently (emotion vs action, Mars vs Venus) just justify any perceived imbalance?

                                Why stress the differences between us, especially when they're just theoretical? I don't see why a woman couldn't write a brutally violent swords and sand epic, and why a man couldn't write a deeply emotional relationship drama.

                                The differences should just come down to personal strengths. I wouldn't write a romantic comedy, but that's not because I'm a man, or action driven, or not in touch with relationships and romance.

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