Latest / Bulletproof Screenwriting™ Podcast / BPS 486: Wes Craven's Secret to Writing Great Movies with Glenn Benest

Transcript

BPS 486: Wes Craven's Secret to Writing Great Movies with Glenn Benest · Bulletproof Screenwriting™ Podcast

0:03
Speaker 1: You are listening to the IFH podcast Network.
0:06
Speaker 2: For more amazing filmmaking and screenwriting podcasts, just go to
0:10
Speaker 2: ifahpodcastnetwork dot com.
0:13
Speaker 3: Welcome to the Bulletproof screen Writing Podcast, Episode number four
0:16
Speaker 3: eighty six.
0:17
Speaker 1: Assumptions allow the best in life to pass you by?
0:21
Speaker 1: John Sales broadcasting from a dark, windowless.
0:24
Speaker 2: Room in Hollywood when we really should be working on
0:27
Speaker 2: that next draft. It's the Bulletproof Screenwriting Podcast, showing you
0:31
Speaker 2: the craft and business of screenwriting while teaching you how
0:34
Speaker 2: to make your screenplay bulletproof. And here's your host, Alex Ferrari.
0:40
Speaker 3: Welcome, Welcome to another episode of the Bulletproof Screenwriting Podcast.
0:43
Speaker 4: I am your humble host Alex Ferrari.
0:45
Speaker 3: Now, today's show is sponsored by Bulletproof script Coverage.
0:50
Speaker 5: Now.
0:50
Speaker 3: Unlike other script coverage services, Bulletproof Script Coverage actually focuses
0:55
Speaker 3: on the kind of project you are and the goals
0:58
Speaker 3: of the project you are. We actually break it down
1:01
Speaker 3: by three categories, micro budget, indie film, market and studio film.
1:05
Speaker 3: There's no reason to get coverage from a reader that's
1:07
Speaker 3: used to reading tempole movies when your movie is going
1:10
Speaker 3: to be done for one hundred thousand dollars and we
1:12
Speaker 3: wanted to focus on that At Bulletproof Script Coverage, our
1:15
Speaker 3: readers have worked with Marvel Studios, CIA, w MEE, NBC, HBO, Disney,
1:21
Speaker 3: Scott Free, Warner Brothers, The Blacklist, and many many more.
1:24
Speaker 3: So if you need your screenplay or TV script covered
1:28
Speaker 3: by professional readers, head on over to covermiscreenplay dot Com.
1:33
Speaker 3: Enjoy today's episode with guest host Dave Bullis.
1:38
Speaker 4: My next guest has written two films for Wes Craven
1:41
Speaker 4: and has been the film business for over thirty years.
1:45
Speaker 4: So here we go with Glennbinest. Joining me today is
1:49
Speaker 4: Glenn and Bennison. Glenn is an award winning writer producer.
1:53
Speaker 4: He received his bachelor's degree at Harvard University and his
1:56
Speaker 4: Masters of Fine Arts at UCLA and playwriting. He is
2:00
Speaker 4: in produced film credits, including two films he wrote for
2:02
Speaker 4: Wes Craven. In two thousand and four, he wrote and
2:05
Speaker 4: produced his own independent film, Hungry Heart, which was picked
2:09
Speaker 4: up by Shoreline Entertainment for worldwide distribution. Glenn, how are you, sir?
2:13
Speaker 5: Very good?
2:13
Speaker 4: Excellent, So you know, just to get started, you know,
2:16
Speaker 4: so you went to Harvard University and you got your
2:18
Speaker 4: bachelor's degree and then you went to UCLA to get
2:21
Speaker 4: your master's in playwriting. So you know, when you were
2:24
Speaker 4: going to school at Harvard, did you know exactly what
2:26
Speaker 4: you wanted to do, Like, did you know you wanted
2:28
Speaker 4: to become a screenwriter.
2:29
Speaker 5: No. I actually wanted to be a playwright, and I
2:32
Speaker 5: was very involved in theater. I love theater. I loved
2:36
Speaker 5: the great playwright that I read, like Harrow, Pinter and
2:41
Speaker 5: people like that. But I knew very little about the
2:45
Speaker 5: actual mechanics of theater. It was mostly just what I
2:49
Speaker 5: had studied. So I decided that I would get a
2:52
Speaker 5: Master of Fine Arts in playwriting and really learn the
2:57
Speaker 5: learn about acting, learn about directing, about the stage. And uh.
3:03
Speaker 5: So I went to UCLA and it was a great
3:06
Speaker 5: experience because we put on plays and we acted, we
3:11
Speaker 5: did certain things like that. But when I graduated, I
3:15
Speaker 5: realized I really couldn't make a living as a playwright
3:19
Speaker 5: because very few people do. Maybe a handful of people
3:23
Speaker 5: make a living as a as a as playwright. So
3:26
Speaker 5: I didn't want to do it as a hobby. And
3:29
Speaker 5: I was in LA anyway, so I thought, well, playwriting
3:33
Speaker 5: isn't that different than screenwriting, so I'll get into screenwriting.
3:38
Speaker 5: That was my thought process.
3:41
Speaker 4: So you know, I wanted to I always asked this
3:42
Speaker 4: to everybody, you know, because you went to school for
3:44
Speaker 4: specific for playwriting, but you know I always ask for
3:47
Speaker 4: those who actually went to college for film. Uh So
3:51
Speaker 4: do you do you think it benefited you a lot?
3:53
Speaker 4: You know, looking back, do you think that it was
3:55
Speaker 4: very beneficial that you went to to to Harvard and
3:58
Speaker 4: then to UCLA or do you think you'll looking back
4:00
Speaker 4: you would have taken a different path.
4:02
Speaker 5: Well, for me, just because my background had been academic,
4:06
Speaker 5: and you know, at Harvard is a very intellectual place,
4:12
Speaker 5: so I really wanted to know the industry. I wanted
4:15
Speaker 5: to really know the in and out the theater. So
4:19
Speaker 5: for me having a theater, going into a place that
4:24
Speaker 5: that was big on theater and actually being part of
4:26
Speaker 5: putting on plays was extremely beneficial because it wasn't just
4:31
Speaker 5: some abstract thing anymore. But my point of view about
4:38
Speaker 5: you know, a lot of writers asked me, do you
4:41
Speaker 5: think I should go into a film school? Like after
4:46
Speaker 5: they graduate undergraduate and go to a film school like
4:49
Speaker 5: at USC or UCLA or NYU or those places. I
4:55
Speaker 5: for screenwriters, I don't really think that you need to
4:57
Speaker 5: do that. Number One, it's extra rely expensive to get
5:02
Speaker 5: a two year degree at MSA in screenwriting, let's say
5:05
Speaker 5: at UCLA or USC or NYU, those big schools, because
5:12
Speaker 5: all you to really make it as a screenwriter, what
5:16
Speaker 5: you need your calling card. Nobody cares if you went
5:19
Speaker 5: to film school, Absolutely nobody. All they care about is
5:23
Speaker 5: can you produce? And if you have a great screenplay,
5:28
Speaker 5: that's your calling card into the industry. People read it
5:32
Speaker 5: and they realize, Wow, this guy is a really good writer,
5:35
Speaker 5: this woman is a really great writer. And even if
5:37
Speaker 5: they don't buy that screenplay, they can tend to get
5:41
Speaker 5: you to write a project that they have, so they'll
5:44
Speaker 5: hire you to do other things. So what you need
5:47
Speaker 5: is not a diploma from USC. You need a great screenplay.
5:52
Speaker 5: And it's a lot cheaper to create a great screenplay
5:57
Speaker 5: in a screenwriting workshop, take some classes rather than spend
6:03
Speaker 5: thirty thousand dollars a year to go to USC. If
6:06
Speaker 5: you were a if you wanted to be a cinematographer
6:10
Speaker 5: or even a director, I can see the benefit of
6:12
Speaker 5: going to a film school because all the equipment is
6:17
Speaker 5: there and you have crews that you can put. You
6:21
Speaker 5: can cobble together from your other students and you can
6:24
Speaker 5: do shoots. So that's very beneficial. But for a screenwriter,
6:31
Speaker 5: I don't I don't see the point. I really don't.
6:34
Speaker 4: Yeah, you know, that's a good point, Glenn, because you know,
6:37
Speaker 4: there's such a plethora now of resources for people who
6:40
Speaker 4: do want to do screenwriting. I know you can't see
6:42
Speaker 4: me right now because this is the podcast, But to
6:44
Speaker 4: my left, there's just books upon books on screenwriting. There's
6:48
Speaker 4: a few DVDs that I have been I've collected over
6:52
Speaker 4: the years, like you know, the one of Chris Vogler's DVDs,
6:56
Speaker 4: And like you said, there's online there's even online screenwriting
7:00
Speaker 4: classes now, you know, where you can actually take a
7:02
Speaker 4: class and actually work through your screenplay to a coach,
7:05
Speaker 4: you know, and you could be living anywhere in the
7:06
Speaker 4: world and still be in touch with one another.
7:09
Speaker 5: Yeah, I you know. I mean what I would try
7:12
Speaker 5: to do is I would try to study under somebody
7:16
Speaker 5: who really has been in the business, has gotten films produced,
7:20
Speaker 5: has has their own films produced, and really knows what
7:24
Speaker 5: it takes to take a screenplay and to get it
7:27
Speaker 5: to the point where it can be sold. And that's
7:32
Speaker 5: that's a really unique talent. Not I wouldn't study under
7:36
Speaker 5: anybody who hasn't done that, because they can talk all
7:40
Speaker 5: they want, But until you get a film produced, you
7:44
Speaker 5: have no idea really what it takes and what a
7:47
Speaker 5: screen where you need to take a screenplay. And it's
7:50
Speaker 5: not just writing one or two drafts, it's writing many
7:54
Speaker 5: drafts and keep pushing it to be better and better
7:57
Speaker 5: and better. When I was young, I was lucky because
8:01
Speaker 5: I cooked up with Wes Craven. And what Craven at
8:05
Speaker 5: that time was not famous. He had just done a
8:07
Speaker 5: few little independent horror films, but he was definitely someone
8:11
Speaker 5: on the way up, and he knew film He knew
8:14
Speaker 5: how to get a film made, and he knew what
8:17
Speaker 5: it took to get a screenplay into good enough shape
8:21
Speaker 5: so that it could be produced. And working with him
8:25
Speaker 5: taught me so much. And everybody needs a mentor like that.
8:31
Speaker 5: If you want to be a world class athlete, you're
8:36
Speaker 5: going to have a coach, and that coach is going
8:39
Speaker 5: to be able to push you to the point where
8:42
Speaker 5: you could win a gold medal. And it's the same
8:47
Speaker 5: with every other athlete. It's the same with tennis players.
8:53
Speaker 5: Who are professional tennis players on the tour, they all
8:56
Speaker 5: have coaches. There's not one that doesn't have a coach.
9:00
Speaker 5: So if world class athletes need coaches, so do artists
9:05
Speaker 5: because we're really not that different from athletes. We're trying
9:09
Speaker 5: to get to a higher level of performance and we
9:16
Speaker 5: really can't do it on our own. We need somebody
9:18
Speaker 5: who has that outside point of view that can keep
9:23
Speaker 5: pushing us, knows what it takes, and gives us great feedback,
9:28
Speaker 5: just like a great coach would be giving a tennis
9:31
Speaker 5: player great feedback into how to improve their game. And
9:36
Speaker 5: that's what writers need as well. So, however, you find
9:40
Speaker 5: that person, you know, you don't want to just take
9:45
Speaker 5: feedback from just anybody. You know, it's got to be
9:48
Speaker 5: not just some friend, your girlfriend, your wife or whatever
9:52
Speaker 5: that can help you absolutely does actly no good.
9:58
Speaker 1: We'll be right back after a word our sponsor, and
10:04
Speaker 1: now back to the show.
10:07
Speaker 5: You need somebody who's a professional, who knows what to
10:10
Speaker 5: look for, who knows how to give you really great
10:13
Speaker 5: feedback so that every time you do a path on
10:16
Speaker 5: a screenplay, it gets better and better and better. And
10:21
Speaker 5: the talent to do that doesn't come around all the time,
10:26
Speaker 5: even people that work for studios and work for networks,
10:30
Speaker 5: and their job is to give notes. Even those people
10:34
Speaker 5: who supposedly know what they're doing don't always give you
10:38
Speaker 5: the best note. So you really need to find that mentor,
10:43
Speaker 5: and that is going to be a lot more valuable
10:47
Speaker 5: than going to UFV for me anyway, to become a screenwriter.
10:52
Speaker 4: So you know when you first met you know, Wes Craven.
10:55
Speaker 4: Your first movie that you wrote and then he actually
10:58
Speaker 4: directed was Stranger in Our House which was in nineteen
11:00
Speaker 4: seventy seven, nineteen seventy eight. So Glenn, if you could,
11:03
Speaker 4: could you take us through you know, how you wrote
11:06
Speaker 4: the screenplay, meaning your process to actually write it, and
11:08
Speaker 4: how you actually first met Wes and how you guys
11:11
Speaker 4: do build that relationship.
11:12
Speaker 5: Well, a Stranger our House was based on a book,
11:17
Speaker 5: so I already had it was a novel by Lois Duncan,
11:21
Speaker 5: who's a pretty well known writer writes mysteries and suspense.
11:24
Speaker 5: So I already had that groundwork of the story and
11:28
Speaker 5: that's extremely helpful, as you can imagine for a screenwriter.
11:31
Speaker 5: You already have the story worked out. So I adapted
11:35
Speaker 5: it as a screenplay. But to tell you the truth,
11:39
Speaker 5: I didn't make that many major changes, and we wanted
11:45
Speaker 5: it was already sold to NBC. They had a deal
11:47
Speaker 5: with Linda Blair to do movies with her. This is
11:51
Speaker 5: after the Exorcist, and she was a kind of a
11:54
Speaker 5: make sure You're on sixteen or seventeen at that point,
11:56
Speaker 5: something like that, And so they wanted that movie for
12:01
Speaker 5: for Linda Blair. And we were looking for a horror
12:05
Speaker 5: director and we knew we known about Wes because he
12:10
Speaker 5: had done he had done The Last House on the
12:13
Speaker 5: Last and he had done The Hills Have Eyes. But
12:17
Speaker 5: like I said, he wasn't at all famous. Very few
12:20
Speaker 5: people knew about him except people in the independent world.
12:23
Speaker 5: And so they sold WAP to NBC, which was a
12:29
Speaker 5: great thankful less because it was his first television movie.
12:32
Speaker 5: It was really his first real mainstream thing, and he
12:38
Speaker 5: did a really good job with that. They had got
12:41
Speaker 5: good numbers and so when so when I and I
12:47
Speaker 5: wrote the screenplay called Deadly Blessing with my writing partner
12:51
Speaker 5: Matthew Barr, and so we wanted to set that up
12:55
Speaker 5: as a feature, and of course we thought of Wes
13:00
Speaker 5: because we already had this relationship with him. So we
13:04
Speaker 5: worked with Wes. He gave us note, and we wrote
13:08
Speaker 5: the script a couple times according to his notes, and
13:11
Speaker 5: then he even did a pass of his own on it,
13:15
Speaker 5: and then we were fortunate enough. At the time, it
13:19
Speaker 5: was funny because Deadly Blessing had been around for about
13:24
Speaker 5: three years. We always got great feedback for it, but
13:28
Speaker 5: nobody was willing to buy it, and then all of
13:31
Speaker 5: a sudden, everybody wanted horror movies. I don't know why
13:34
Speaker 5: that was. It was just like these cycles come and go,
13:37
Speaker 5: and so literally in a one week, we had two
13:40
Speaker 5: or three offers after three years of not being able
13:43
Speaker 5: to sell it, and we already had Wes attached as
13:46
Speaker 5: a director, So that made it way more attractive because
13:51
Speaker 5: if you have our because it's hard to find the
13:53
Speaker 5: right director, if you've already got a great director attached,
13:56
Speaker 5: then it's that much easier to sell a project because
13:59
Speaker 5: they can go right into production. And that's what happened
14:02
Speaker 5: with dead Lee Blessing. So they just bought the script,
14:06
Speaker 5: they had Wes, and they started to cast seat it
14:10
Speaker 5: was it was real easy.
14:12
Speaker 4: So now, just going back to what we were just
14:14
Speaker 4: discussing about a mentor and writing, you know, different drafts
14:17
Speaker 4: of the screenplay. You know, what were some of the
14:19
Speaker 4: things that you learned by working with Wes on this
14:23
Speaker 4: film that you were able to sort of carry on
14:25
Speaker 4: to the next project, the next project throughout your whole career.
14:29
Speaker 5: Well, you know, Wes is the master of horror. So
14:36
Speaker 5: even though I was always attracted to horror, I didn't
14:38
Speaker 5: understand horror the way that Wes did. And what he
14:43
Speaker 5: brought to the screenplay was those horror set pieces where
14:51
Speaker 5: you know a series of scenes that build to a
14:55
Speaker 5: horrifying conclusion. Those are set pieces, and they're set piece
15:00
Speaker 5: in horror, just like their set pieces in action or
15:03
Speaker 5: their set pieces in comedy. And those are the best
15:07
Speaker 5: moments of the film. So you really want to milk
15:11
Speaker 5: those more. You have to identify Number one, what why
15:15
Speaker 5: are people coming to this movie? Okay, they come to
15:18
Speaker 5: a horror movie to be scared. They don't come for
15:21
Speaker 5: character development, they don't come for great dialogue, they don't
15:25
Speaker 5: come for great characterization. Not to say that you don't
15:29
Speaker 5: want those things, but that's not why they came to
15:31
Speaker 5: your movie. They came to your movie to be scared.
15:34
Speaker 5: And I think Wes understood that better than anybody, So
15:37
Speaker 5: he would find these moments and then really milk the
15:41
Speaker 5: hell out of them to make them scarier and scarier.
15:45
Speaker 5: So I learned that from him. And it was because I,
15:50
Speaker 5: you know, after I wrote, after I did Deadly Blessing,
15:54
Speaker 5: I didn't do horror anymore. I decided I wanted I
15:57
Speaker 5: didn't want to spend my entire career writing horror movies.
16:01
Speaker 5: I wanted to try a new things. So I got
16:04
Speaker 5: into suspense. I did comedies, I did a drama, I
16:09
Speaker 5: did westerns. I mean, I wrote in every genre, but
16:16
Speaker 5: in every genre. Like I say, you need to be
16:21
Speaker 5: smart about what you're selling, and if you're selling a thriller,
16:28
Speaker 5: you've got to have great thriller moments. And I think
16:32
Speaker 5: that's the most obvious thing, and yet writers don't seem
16:35
Speaker 5: to understand that, especially beginning writers. They get so caught
16:39
Speaker 5: up in their characters and their story and they don't,
16:44
Speaker 5: you know, pull back and go, how what's going to
16:48
Speaker 5: sell this movie? And what's going to sell your movie?
16:52
Speaker 5: If it's a thriller, are great moments of thrills? What's
16:57
Speaker 5: going to sell an action film? Our great action seem quimpches,
17:01
Speaker 5: and the more original they are, the better. So if
17:05
Speaker 5: you do an action movie, and you do an action
17:07
Speaker 5: sequence that no one's ever seen before, like if you
17:11
Speaker 5: do like car chase is a perfect example. We've seen
17:14
Speaker 5: a million car chases, but what makes this car chase
17:20
Speaker 5: different and original in comparison to all the other car
17:24
Speaker 5: chases we've seen? So you have to come up with
17:28
Speaker 5: those things so that audiences who came to be thrilled,
17:33
Speaker 5: to be shocked, to laugh to whatever they came for.
17:37
Speaker 5: You have to give them that or they're going to
17:40
Speaker 5: leave unsatisfied. And that goes beyond like you know, artistic concerns,
17:47
Speaker 5: esthetic concerns. These are things that you kind of learn
17:52
Speaker 5: as you become more of a professional. And I think
17:57
Speaker 5: with like I said, he taught me that about horror,
18:01
Speaker 5: And now I'm kind of going back to horror. I
18:04
Speaker 5: just wrote a novel called Ink I n K, which
18:08
Speaker 5: is kind of a horror romance. It's a novel that
18:10
Speaker 5: just got published last year. And when I wrote that,
18:15
Speaker 5: I was also like very aware of where am I
18:21
Speaker 5: paying people came to be scared? Where are they being scared?
18:25
Speaker 5: And how original is that? And how many great moments
18:29
Speaker 5: can I find like that? And the same Now I
18:34
Speaker 5: just wrote a teen horror film and I'm very aware
18:39
Speaker 5: of paying off the expectations of the audience and they
18:45
Speaker 5: you know, audiences today are very jaded. They've seen everything.
18:51
Speaker 5: So how are you going to give them something that
18:54
Speaker 5: is going to be a little different, that's going to
18:57
Speaker 5: make them talk when they leave those movie theaters and
18:59
Speaker 5: they tell their friend, oh my god, you've got to
19:01
Speaker 5: go see this movie. It can't just be the same
19:04
Speaker 5: old thing over and over again. It has to be
19:06
Speaker 5: something unique and a little bit different in some way,
19:11
Speaker 5: even though all plots have been done over and over again,
19:15
Speaker 5: but it's how you tweak those plots to make them
19:21
Speaker 5: your own.
19:22
Speaker 4: So, Glenn, have you seen any movies recently, like, let's say,
19:25
Speaker 4: in the past five years, like any horror movies that
19:28
Speaker 4: have really stuck out to you?
19:30
Speaker 5: Yeah, well, you know, I've I like to see horror
19:33
Speaker 5: movies most of the time. I get very disappointed and bored.
19:38
Speaker 5: But there was one I saw last year that I
19:42
Speaker 5: was impressed by, called It Follows, and that was pretty cool.
19:49
Speaker 5: That was different. It was very low budget and just
19:55
Speaker 5: these teens.
19:57
Speaker 1: Will be right back after a word from our sponsor
20:03
Speaker 1: and now back to the show.
20:06
Speaker 5: But then I won't I won't go too much into it,
20:10
Speaker 5: because I don't want to ruin it for people. But
20:13
Speaker 5: that is a that was a unique plot that I
20:16
Speaker 5: had never seen before, and it had just enough scares
20:21
Speaker 5: to keep you on the edge of your seat. And
20:24
Speaker 5: it was pretty freaky. And I think the freakier it is,
20:29
Speaker 5: the better you know you learn. Like, what is it
20:33
Speaker 5: that horror fans like? Well, one thing they like is
20:37
Speaker 5: freaky stuff. They also like it. They also like gore.
20:45
Speaker 5: You know, when you when you watch The Walking Dead,
20:47
Speaker 5: which is like my favorite TV show now, there's lots
20:51
Speaker 5: of goer.
20:53
Speaker 6: It's it's pretty I mean, they really pay that off
20:56
Speaker 6: with the with the zombies and and even though they
21:01
Speaker 6: have great characters and good character development and interesting relationships,
21:09
Speaker 6: but they do pay off the horror.
21:12
Speaker 5: And I'm really surprised today. One thing I'd surprised today
21:15
Speaker 5: about horror is how many women and young young women, teens,
21:21
Speaker 5: girls love horror. That was not so much when I
21:26
Speaker 5: was starting to write horror. It was mostly guys, I thought,
21:29
Speaker 5: who went to horror, and they brought their girlfriends along.
21:31
Speaker 5: But that's not the case anymore. There are a lot
21:34
Speaker 5: of women and middle aged women, older women, especially younger women,
21:39
Speaker 5: who love horror, maybe more than even ben guys, and
21:44
Speaker 5: I think that really surprised me.
21:47
Speaker 4: I actually know, I have some girls that are friends
21:50
Speaker 4: of mine. They all love horror. Some of their favorites
21:53
Speaker 4: are like the paranormal activities stuff like that. They really
21:58
Speaker 4: like that stuff, not so much like the soul or
22:00
Speaker 4: the hostels, but the paranormal activities of the spirit, supernatural
22:03
Speaker 4: stuff they enjoy.
22:04
Speaker 5: Yeah, I'm not a fan of hostel and and I
22:10
Speaker 5: know they're just that just is not appealing to me.
22:16
Speaker 5: I like core that has really good stories that used
22:22
Speaker 5: to be you know, when John Carpenter was making horror
22:24
Speaker 5: films and like the Thing and with Craven was at
22:29
Speaker 5: the top of his game with Nightmarrow on Elm Street
22:33
Speaker 5: and Scream. Scream was written in my workshop, of my
22:37
Speaker 5: screenwriting workshops. So I know that film really well, that's
22:42
Speaker 5: you know, you really good stories with great characters, really
22:47
Speaker 5: good dialogue. But it paid off and the way that
22:52
Speaker 5: you know, it's scary. It was scary. It was very
22:55
Speaker 5: I a lot of horror movie I just don't think
22:57
Speaker 5: they're scary, you know, and I just go, Wow, this
23:01
Speaker 5: isn't gonna work. I mean, so it's a whole separate genre.
23:08
Speaker 5: When you talk about horror, even though it has similarities
23:12
Speaker 5: with other genres, it's really a genre onto itself, and
23:17
Speaker 5: it has its own rules and they're not necessarily the
23:20
Speaker 5: same rules as a typical drama or thriller or something
23:25
Speaker 5: like that. But you know, there will always be horror.
23:31
Speaker 5: There will always be zombie movies, there will always be
23:35
Speaker 5: vampire movies, there will always be werewolf movies. But you
23:40
Speaker 5: just have to find a unique take on them.
23:44
Speaker 4: Something so so, but I have to ask, you know,
23:46
Speaker 4: I'm sorry, I'm sorry. I didn't even interrupt you. I
23:49
Speaker 4: just wanted to ask, you know, really quickly, what did
23:51
Speaker 4: you think of The Walking Dead finale? Without giving too
23:53
Speaker 4: much a way.
23:55
Speaker 5: I thought it was really good. I you know, I've
23:58
Speaker 5: I love the Walking Dad. The one thing that I
24:03
Speaker 5: the one criticism I had the Walking Dead, even though
24:08
Speaker 5: I love the show it's one of the best shows
24:09
Speaker 5: I've ever seen, is that it seems like it's gone
24:13
Speaker 5: downhill a bit. And one of the things that they
24:15
Speaker 5: do that really annoys me is that they'll start a
24:19
Speaker 5: storyline like for example, Rick and Micheon, you know, that
24:24
Speaker 5: love affair, and then they just drop it or they'll
24:28
Speaker 5: start a storyline, like with Carl Rick's son that he
24:34
Speaker 5: was he said, I'm a monster too, and he was
24:36
Speaker 5: getting kind of dark, and then they just stop it.
24:39
Speaker 5: They just drop it and you get nothing more about it.
24:43
Speaker 5: And uh, I don't know why they do that. They
24:49
Speaker 5: just seem to lose interest. They'll start something going and
24:51
Speaker 5: then they just seem to lose interest in it. I
24:55
Speaker 5: think that's really frustrating for the audience or h or
25:00
Speaker 5: they Oh they're do something that doesn't make a lot
25:02
Speaker 5: of sense, like Carol, who all of a sudden decides
25:06
Speaker 5: to leave them. She says, I can't kill for you
25:10
Speaker 5: anymore or whatever she said, and then she just left,
25:13
Speaker 5: and that made aptly no sense to me. Mm hmm,
25:17
Speaker 5: Like why would she leave? Why would she want to
25:20
Speaker 5: do that? You know, she's been killing people for a
25:25
Speaker 5: number of seasons now. She didn't seem to have any
25:27
Speaker 5: problem with it, and now all of a sudden she does,
25:31
Speaker 5: and then she just abruptly leaves, and I just thought, like,
25:34
Speaker 5: this makes no sense. So there's there's there's certain things
25:39
Speaker 5: that they seem to be having problems. I don't know
25:41
Speaker 5: they you know, they when it's it's very hard to
25:44
Speaker 5: keep the quality of a show going, you know, year
25:48
Speaker 5: after year after year. This is what their sixth season
25:52
Speaker 5: or something. Yes, and you know, it's very difficult to
25:56
Speaker 5: keep the quality up and that's why you know, show
26:00
Speaker 5: like Finefeld or Friends or Cheers. You know, they kept
26:06
Speaker 5: the quality up for you know, many years. And that's
26:09
Speaker 5: a remarkable thing to do because most times are a
26:13
Speaker 5: show will go five six years and then they just
26:15
Speaker 5: burn out. They don't know what to do anymore because
26:19
Speaker 5: it's very difficult, and it looks like they're having those
26:22
Speaker 5: problems now on The Walking Dead. They don't seem to
26:25
Speaker 5: have a good direction of what they want to do.
26:31
Speaker 5: So although like I say, I love that show. I'm
26:35
Speaker 5: absolutely crazy about it. I'm on Twitter and all my
26:38
Speaker 5: followers basically like Walking Dead band.
26:43
Speaker 4: Because with the way you know, this season, the sixth
26:45
Speaker 4: season ended was the introduction of the character Nagan and yeah,
26:50
Speaker 4: and then when he got you know, he ends up
26:52
Speaker 4: you know, killing one of the main characters, but you
26:54
Speaker 4: don't see who because we went to that POV of
26:57
Speaker 4: the character.
26:58
Speaker 5: You know.
26:58
Speaker 4: Now, some fans are like, wow, that was very cheap
27:00
Speaker 4: way to end it, because now we have to wait
27:02
Speaker 4: October for season seven to see who we killed and
27:05
Speaker 4: you know it's you know, I mean I really didn't
27:10
Speaker 4: have that much for a problem with the ending, but
27:12
Speaker 4: you know, I can I think I can see why
27:14
Speaker 4: some people would have, you know, have an issue with it.
27:16
Speaker 5: Oh yeah. I mean the one good thing that Walking
27:19
Speaker 5: Dead is about killing off like characters that people like,
27:23
Speaker 5: you know, because that if you really invest in a
27:26
Speaker 5: character and then they kill them, I mean, that can
27:28
Speaker 5: drive you crazy. But they seem to have done pretty good.
27:31
Speaker 5: Like one show that has not done well and that
27:34
Speaker 5: way is Game of Thrones. They've killed off the most
27:40
Speaker 5: you know, the characters that you really are rooting for,
27:45
Speaker 5: and that after a while you just go, Okay, that's it.
27:49
Speaker 5: I'm gonna watch the cityway. And then because they kill
27:52
Speaker 5: off the characters that are actually the ones rebelling against
27:57
Speaker 5: the Lanisters, and that's really what keeps the show going.
28:01
Speaker 5: Who's going to destroy the Lanisters? Who's gonna you know,
28:05
Speaker 5: lead the rebellion? And once they killed off the main
28:08
Speaker 5: characters leading the rebellion, they just floundered. There was nobody
28:13
Speaker 5: to follow, Like who am I going to follow? Now?
28:15
Speaker 5: Who do I care about? Now? And if you don't
28:18
Speaker 5: do that really well, I know he's the same with
28:22
Speaker 5: the books. The books are the same. I mean they
28:24
Speaker 5: followed the books very Do you watch that show Game
28:26
Speaker 5: of Thrones?
28:27
Speaker 4: Oh yeah, absolutely, Honestly, Gwen like that. That show was
28:30
Speaker 4: one show I didn't you want to get into, and
28:33
Speaker 4: then when I did, I honestly I couldn't wait till
28:36
Speaker 4: every episode. I was like hooked beyond belief.
28:40
Speaker 5: Yeah. No, I love the show, especially except until it
28:44
Speaker 5: hit the season where they killed off you know, the
28:49
Speaker 5: mother and the son who were leading the rebellion, right
28:52
Speaker 5: and then that which was and then the lap which
28:54
Speaker 5: was lap season was after that, and I just thought
28:59
Speaker 5: they were they really didn't know, Okay, who am I following? Now?
29:04
Speaker 5: Whose story do I care about? And I thought they
29:08
Speaker 5: you know, the only character I think that worthy of
29:12
Speaker 5: being the protagonist of that show is the Clify, you know,
29:18
Speaker 5: the mother of Dagon. She's a great character, unbelievable character,
29:24
Speaker 5: and she's worthy of being the star of that show,
29:29
Speaker 5: and you would follow her anywhere, but she was still
29:33
Speaker 5: kind of in the background. So I think they've got
29:37
Speaker 5: to put that figure out, you know. I think they
29:42
Speaker 5: lost some of their fan days because of that.
29:46
Speaker 4: And now with this new season coming up, which is
29:48
Speaker 4: going to start the end of this month, you know,
29:50
Speaker 4: April twenty sixteen. The new season now starts, and it's
29:53
Speaker 4: not based on any of the books.
29:56
Speaker 1: We'll be right back after a word from our sponsor,
30:02
Speaker 1: and now back to the show.
30:05
Speaker 5: Well it is.
30:06
Speaker 4: Yeah, well, I mean, I'm sorry, I meant to say
30:08
Speaker 4: is it is based on the books, but these books
30:10
Speaker 4: haven't been released yet because last season they call they
30:12
Speaker 4: are all caught up now, so this new season will
30:15
Speaker 4: all be stuff that is going to be so now
30:18
Speaker 4: it's going to be out before the books are out.
30:20
Speaker 5: Oh, that'll be interesting. I just hope it's. They bring
30:23
Speaker 5: in Kalisi a lot more because she's got a great
30:28
Speaker 5: story and she's a very very interesting character, very complex.
30:36
Speaker 5: You never quite know what she's gonna do. She makes
30:40
Speaker 5: interesting choices and they all kind of make sense for
30:42
Speaker 5: who she is. But yeah, she's a terrific character. I mean,
30:47
Speaker 5: here's like the perfect example. First season of Game of Thrones,
30:50
Speaker 5: the guy that you were following, who thought was the
30:53
Speaker 5: star of the show gets killed at the end of
30:56
Speaker 5: the first season, and it was like, what, you know,
31:00
Speaker 5: any other show would never do something like that. You
31:04
Speaker 5: invest in the character and he's the star and then
31:07
Speaker 5: you kill him. It was like, OHI God, I can't
31:10
Speaker 5: believe that happened. But you know, that's what they've done.
31:15
Speaker 4: So, you know, Glenn, uh, you know, just to I'm sorry,
31:18
Speaker 4: I didn't mean to go talk too much about the
31:20
Speaker 4: fucking dead, but I wanted to talk to about, you know, uh,
31:22
Speaker 4: just to talk more about, you know, your career and
31:24
Speaker 4: your work. You know, you mentioned that, you know, during
31:27
Speaker 4: your one of your screaminating workshops. You know, one of
31:30
Speaker 4: your students actually wrote Scream.
31:33
Speaker 5: Uh you know that.
31:34
Speaker 4: Actually it's actually, you know, incredibly interesting because I remember
31:37
Speaker 4: the first time I saw Scream. You know, I got it,
31:39
Speaker 4: you know what I mean. And what I mean by
31:40
Speaker 4: I got it means what I mean by that is
31:43
Speaker 4: it was.
31:44
Speaker 5: It was it was a.
31:45
Speaker 4: Love letter to the slasher genre because they they elevated
31:49
Speaker 4: it because they you know, it had so many you know,
31:51
Speaker 4: twists and turns and and uh, you know, Scream was
31:54
Speaker 4: you know, created by Kevin Williamson. I actually read the
31:57
Speaker 4: screenplay in a horror class. I actually hook and so
32:01
Speaker 4: I wanted to, you know, if we could you know,
32:03
Speaker 4: about developing that screenplay. I mean, I think you know
32:06
Speaker 4: any any sort of you know, anecdotes or any stories
32:08
Speaker 4: you have about that were you know about you know,
32:10
Speaker 4: guiding Kevin through that, if you could tell any to
32:13
Speaker 4: myself and the listeners, I don't you know, I think
32:14
Speaker 4: of you are benefic.
32:16
Speaker 5: Previously, we had developed another screenplay that he wrote called
32:20
Speaker 5: it ended up being called Teaching Missus Tingle, which actually
32:23
Speaker 5: did get produced eventually after Scream. You know, he's a
32:28
Speaker 5: brilliant writer, and he loved horror very clever, you know.
32:36
Speaker 5: So part of what I think made Scream so great
32:41
Speaker 5: was that the dialogue was very clever, very witty. And
32:46
Speaker 5: then he did the thing that he did that was
32:49
Speaker 5: so different was that he basically made fun of the
32:54
Speaker 5: horror genre, right, He deconstructed the horror genre by the
32:59
Speaker 5: character who you know that were horror fanned, and they
33:02
Speaker 5: kept saying, well, you know, in all horror films, as
33:04
Speaker 5: soon as you have sex, you get killed, which is
33:08
Speaker 5: really kind of true that you know, as soon as
33:12
Speaker 5: a couple has sex, you know they're going to die,
33:14
Speaker 5: you know. So he took all those kind of you know,
33:18
Speaker 5: little platitudes about horror and he made fun of them,
33:22
Speaker 5: and at the same time, he had a really good story.
33:26
Speaker 5: He had a backstory for the main protagonist about her
33:32
Speaker 5: mother being murdered and she put the wrong person in jail,
33:36
Speaker 5: and so it had a complexity to it. At the
33:41
Speaker 5: same time, he came up with very original, all scary moments,
33:45
Speaker 5: very original, like the.
33:46
Speaker 7: One where they're in the garage and they try to
33:51
Speaker 7: go through the doggy door and then the killer comes
33:55
Speaker 7: and then raises the door and they basically get decapitate
33:58
Speaker 7: it up there.
33:59
Speaker 5: I mean that like I'd never seen anything like that before.
34:03
Speaker 5: That was just totally original. See, that's the kind of
34:06
Speaker 5: suck you want to come up with, you know, horror
34:09
Speaker 5: moments that you go, oh, that was killer, you know,
34:12
Speaker 5: and you'll tell people about it. Those are the kind
34:15
Speaker 5: of things that you want. But with the only thing
34:21
Speaker 5: that I was a little concerned about with that screenplay
34:25
Speaker 5: was that it verged on comedy at times, you know,
34:31
Speaker 5: and a lot of times when you you don't want
34:33
Speaker 5: to confuse a reader or a studio whatever is this
34:38
Speaker 5: horror or is this comedy? And some people have gotten
34:42
Speaker 5: away with lighting horror comedy, like zombie Land that was
34:45
Speaker 5: kind of a horror comedy. But it's hard to do that,
34:49
Speaker 5: and it can easily confuse people. Well, am I supposed
34:53
Speaker 5: to be laughing? Or am I supposed to be scared?
34:55
Speaker 5: You know? So all I was advising him to stay
35:00
Speaker 5: away from the comedy. Not to say it shouldn't be
35:03
Speaker 5: witty and have funny stuff, but you're never confused about
35:09
Speaker 5: what the tone of this thing is. That it's horror,
35:13
Speaker 5: and it does, and not to say, you know, really
35:15
Speaker 5: good horror has good moments of witty dialogue that can
35:20
Speaker 5: be funny and humorous, but you're never going to be
35:23
Speaker 5: confused that this is supposed to be funny. It's comedy,
35:28
Speaker 5: I mean, it's horror. So that was the only thing
35:31
Speaker 5: that I kind of was trying to advise Kevin about.
35:38
Speaker 5: You know that you stayed with that tone. But you
35:43
Speaker 5: know what's great about being in a writer's workshop, and
35:47
Speaker 5: especially we had a great class at that time. I
35:51
Speaker 5: had Melissa mathieson I'm sorry, Melissa Rosenberg. Within that class.
35:58
Speaker 5: She wrote ended up writing all the Twilight movies. She
36:03
Speaker 5: was the execut she was an executive producer on Dexter.
36:07
Speaker 5: I mean, she became a major, a major writer, and
36:13
Speaker 5: she's really well known now. I had another student in
36:19
Speaker 5: that class, named Dana Barrada, who wrote a film called Andre,
36:24
Speaker 5: a true story about this field that got captured and
36:27
Speaker 5: became like this legend in this town. And she was
36:31
Speaker 5: in that group. So we had a bunch of movies
36:34
Speaker 5: that were produced out of this class. So the better
36:39
Speaker 5: the group is, the better the ideas you're gonna get.
36:43
Speaker 5: And that's why it's so great to be in a
36:45
Speaker 5: workshop is that everybody is throwing out the best ideas
36:49
Speaker 5: they have, and a lot of times you'll go, oh wow,
36:52
Speaker 5: what a great idea. I'll use that, you know, and
36:56
Speaker 5: it just makes for better writers. It's just like when
37:00
Speaker 5: in all comedy workshops they work in groups and everybody
37:05
Speaker 5: throws up funny ideas and the writer tkes what he
37:10
Speaker 5: can and you just pump up the script that way. Well,
37:14
Speaker 5: it's the same in any workshop. You have really great
37:17
Speaker 5: writers are going to give you good ideas and you
37:19
Speaker 5: take them and you say thank you. Well, where would
37:22
Speaker 5: you get those, you know, those great ideas? If you
37:25
Speaker 5: want in a workshop, you'd be all by yourself and
37:27
Speaker 5: you come up with stuff and you do the best
37:29
Speaker 5: you can. But I want to be around really creative,
37:33
Speaker 5: smart people who give me great ideas and That's why
37:36
Speaker 5: when I, you know, as a screenwriter myself, when I
37:40
Speaker 5: was working with a producer who was really good with
37:44
Speaker 5: giving notes, those are the scripts that got made. When
37:48
Speaker 5: I was working with a producer who was like really
37:51
Speaker 5: good with business and he was great in selling stuff
37:54
Speaker 5: and he had good connections and whatnot, but he didn't
37:58
Speaker 5: know how to give great notes to the writers, those
38:01
Speaker 5: movies never got made. So you really, you know, you're
38:07
Speaker 5: only as good as the feedback you're getting. You're only
38:10
Speaker 5: as good as the feedback you're getting. And you I
38:13
Speaker 5: keep you know, telling writers and you know you need
38:17
Speaker 5: great feedback. And it's like the same with athletes. They're
38:23
Speaker 5: only as good as the coaching they're getting. And so
38:27
Speaker 5: you need a great coach, you need a great team
38:29
Speaker 5: behind you, and you're gonna help them and they're gonna
38:33
Speaker 5: help you. So your script is going to end up
38:37
Speaker 5: becoming at least twenty five to thirty percent better, And
38:42
Speaker 5: that twenty five percent can make the difference between UH
38:46
Speaker 5: selling something and not selling something. I agree, Glenn.
38:50
Speaker 4: You know, I've been a part of different writers' groups.
38:52
Speaker 4: Some notes I think are you know, I find very helpful.
38:56
Speaker 4: Some notes I'm kind of puzzled. I'm like, what is
38:59
Speaker 4: what is this me?
39:01
Speaker 5: You know?
39:01
Speaker 4: And that's sort of you know, some of the things
39:04
Speaker 4: that I used to have, like you know what. For instance,
39:06
Speaker 4: in one screen running group, we would write ten pages
39:08
Speaker 4: of each screenplay and then that way we would get
39:11
Speaker 4: notes about you know, development and stuff like that. And
39:14
Speaker 4: some people, you know, really you know, you wrote an
39:16
Speaker 4: outline before they did so, and other people they just
39:20
Speaker 4: went in there completely blind. They just said, you know what,
39:21
Speaker 4: I'm just gonna find out like the characters, and I'm
39:23
Speaker 4: just going to go in there and with these ten pages.
39:26
Speaker 4: And it was interesting to see all the different notes
39:28
Speaker 4: you get because some people have, you know, backgrounds in theaters.
39:31
Speaker 4: Some people had backgrounds as as you know, because there
39:35
Speaker 4: are a huge movie buffles and they've seen you know,
39:37
Speaker 4: you know, twenty thousand movies or whatever, you know what
39:39
Speaker 4: I mean, and they they would use that knowledge just
39:41
Speaker 4: sort of Okay, this is what this reminds me of,
39:44
Speaker 4: you know, and this is where you could take the
39:46
Speaker 4: story stuff like that, you know, if you know what
39:47
Speaker 4: I mean.
39:48
Speaker 5: Sure, I just think it's important that you have somebody
39:52
Speaker 5: really knowledgeable who's leading those groups.
39:57
Speaker 1: We'll be right back after a word from our sponsor
40:03
Speaker 1: and now back to the show.
40:06
Speaker 5: Because otherwise, like when I was in getting my playwriting degree,
40:11
Speaker 5: we would do these staged readings and you know, if
40:14
Speaker 5: you open to anybody who wanted to come, and they
40:16
Speaker 5: would throw out all this stuff and you you could
40:19
Speaker 5: evily leave the reading going, I don't know what to
40:22
Speaker 5: do now, you know, and a writer because one person
40:25
Speaker 5: says black and one person says white, one person says
40:29
Speaker 5: I love this, I hate this. You know, you really
40:33
Speaker 5: need somebody who can lead the group and really identify
40:40
Speaker 5: exactly what is the problem here, and then they they
40:46
Speaker 5: you know, we brainstorm with the writers. Okay, we could
40:49
Speaker 5: solve it like this, We could solve it like that,
40:51
Speaker 5: because there's all even answer to a problem. So but
40:55
Speaker 5: it's extremely important to identify exactly what's wrong. And then
41:01
Speaker 5: and then you brainstorm and you may not like all
41:04
Speaker 5: the suggestions you're getting, but at least you know, okay,
41:07
Speaker 5: this is the problem I'm having. So even the ideas
41:11
Speaker 5: that you get are maybe not the right ones, but
41:13
Speaker 5: at least you know exactly what you're supposed to solve.
41:19
Speaker 5: And you should never leave a workshop being confused, never
41:25
Speaker 5: or not knowing exactly what to do next. And that's
41:29
Speaker 5: why I say it's so important. Like when I was
41:31
Speaker 5: a young screenwriter, I would give my scripts to the lever,
41:35
Speaker 5: you know, give it to my girlfriend, give it to
41:37
Speaker 5: you know, and they would give me not Sometimes it
41:40
Speaker 5: would set me back because they didn't know what they
41:45
Speaker 5: were doing and they told me some stupid shit that
41:48
Speaker 5: had nothing to do with anything, and you never want that.
41:51
Speaker 5: It's very important who you show your scripts to and
41:55
Speaker 5: who's giving you the feedback, and that they're knowledgeable and
41:59
Speaker 5: they they know about screenplays and they know how to
42:03
Speaker 5: fix screenplays. They're not just somebody who's like, either oh
42:07
Speaker 5: that's so wonderful, honey, you know, or they come up
42:13
Speaker 5: with something that has nothing to do with what's really
42:16
Speaker 5: relevant and they totally confuse you. So I get it's
42:22
Speaker 5: very important to who you're getting the feedback from, and
42:26
Speaker 5: you should never be confused. And that's how when you
42:30
Speaker 5: get the right feedback, every time you do a path
42:33
Speaker 5: on a screenplay, it gets better. And that's the key
42:38
Speaker 5: and the evidence that you're on the right track. Okay,
42:43
Speaker 5: this draft is better than that draft, and the next
42:45
Speaker 5: draft was better than that draft. But I used to
42:48
Speaker 5: write drafts and they would get worse. No, and that
42:52
Speaker 5: never happened. Never that you're writing something it gets worse. No,
42:57
Speaker 5: it should never get worse. It should always get better
43:00
Speaker 5: and better and better. So all the work you're putting
43:03
Speaker 5: into a screenplay is just elevating that screenplay. And you know, really,
43:08
Speaker 5: you can read all the books in the world, not
43:11
Speaker 5: to say it's not good to read some books about
43:13
Speaker 5: about screenwriting or you know, take these different classes, but
43:21
Speaker 5: the only way you really learn is by doing it.
43:25
Speaker 5: That's the only way you really learn. You start writing
43:29
Speaker 5: screenplays and the first one is probably not going to
43:33
Speaker 5: be very good, but the second one, hopefully will be better,
43:36
Speaker 5: and the third one will be even better than that,
43:39
Speaker 5: and you're getting really good feedback, not just somebody who's
43:46
Speaker 5: you know, seen a lot of movies and they think
43:48
Speaker 5: they're an expert. Because analyzing screenplays is a real talent,
43:54
Speaker 5: and even people whose job it is to do it
43:57
Speaker 5: are not always very good at doing it. So it's
44:02
Speaker 5: so valuable when you find somebody who really knows how
44:06
Speaker 5: to help you, you know, go from one great draft
44:10
Speaker 5: to the next great draft to the next great draft, right, you.
44:13
Speaker 4: Know, like what I was just saying about getting the notes.
44:16
Speaker 4: You know, that's something too is you know, sometimes I
44:19
Speaker 4: would come in with a draft, okay for you. For instance,
44:21
Speaker 4: you know, I wrote this slasher that was kind of
44:24
Speaker 4: like a throwback to Friday the thirteenth, and you know,
44:28
Speaker 4: some people would just give me notes and some people
44:30
Speaker 4: really enjoyed how I set this up. And I know
44:33
Speaker 4: people would just give me notes that I would say,
44:35
Speaker 4: I don't understand, you know what, So I was I so,
44:39
Speaker 4: you know, I realized that, you know, the ones that
44:42
Speaker 4: sort of made it, I knew were I knew as
44:45
Speaker 4: soon as I heard the idea, I knew I'd be like, Okay,
44:47
Speaker 4: like a bullet bulb of my head, I'm like, okay,
44:49
Speaker 4: that could actually work.
44:50
Speaker 5: Right, right, And you will, you know, when you hear
44:54
Speaker 5: something that's right, you will recognize it as right. You know,
44:58
Speaker 5: you'll go, oh, of course, yeah, that it just rings true.
45:02
Speaker 5: But like I said, if you're getting a lot of
45:06
Speaker 5: mediocre feedback or stupid feedback or whatever, it can literally
45:11
Speaker 5: set you back, not help you go forward. And so
45:16
Speaker 5: much of being a writer or any artist is self confidence.
45:24
Speaker 5: And just like athletes, when athletes lose theirself, kind of
45:28
Speaker 5: you follow tennis. But Rappa is one of the great
45:32
Speaker 5: tennis players of all time, right, and lately he's lost
45:36
Speaker 5: his confidence and he's not winning turn them into anymore.
45:41
Speaker 5: He's just winning majors. He's like number five in the
45:44
Speaker 5: world now or something. He used to be number one
45:47
Speaker 5: in the world for many years, but he kind of
45:48
Speaker 5: lost his confidence. So as an athlete, confidence is everything,
45:55
Speaker 5: and it's the same for artists to be confident about
45:59
Speaker 5: what you're doing doing So if you hear the wrong
46:03
Speaker 5: feedback and it makes you start thinking in the wrong
46:07
Speaker 5: direction and then you get confused, Now you're losing your
46:11
Speaker 5: confidence and you never want that. If you hear the
46:17
Speaker 5: right feedback and you go, oh, of course, and here's
46:19
Speaker 5: how to solve that problem. Now you're feeling confident. I've
46:24
Speaker 5: identified what the problem is and I have some great
46:27
Speaker 5: ideas on how to fix that problem. Yeah.
46:30
Speaker 4: You know, when I interviewed Krey Mandel for this podcast,
46:33
Speaker 4: he actually mentioned something along those lines too, because he
46:36
Speaker 4: actually recommended a book about to all screenwriters and it
46:39
Speaker 4: was a book on psychology because he says, you have
46:42
Speaker 4: to have this confidence inside you, and you know, he's
46:45
Speaker 4: there's a in the book. I think it's a book
46:47
Speaker 4: by I think it's cowl Zwhack is her name, and insights.
46:50
Speaker 4: She actually talks about the fear of your mind and
46:54
Speaker 4: if you give you know, seating so to speak to
46:58
Speaker 4: all these negative thoughts inside your brain. It's like they're
47:00
Speaker 4: getting front row seats on the of the stage. But
47:03
Speaker 4: she said, you need to take them and put them
47:05
Speaker 4: in the back and put all your positive you know,
47:07
Speaker 4: thinking in the in the in their front seats. So
47:09
Speaker 4: that way, you know, it's about having that confidence, about
47:12
Speaker 4: having that you can do that in that positive mental
47:14
Speaker 4: attitude right now.
47:16
Speaker 5: That makes a lot of sense. And you know, the players,
47:19
Speaker 5: like I relate a lot of things to tennis, is
47:22
Speaker 5: because I know a lot about tennis and I watch it. Is.
47:26
Speaker 5: What gives a lot of confidence to these players is
47:31
Speaker 5: their team. They all have a team around them. They
47:34
Speaker 5: have a coach, they have a nutritionist, they have you know,
47:37
Speaker 5: people that they hit with. They they travel with teams,
47:40
Speaker 5: you know, and they have five or six people that
47:42
Speaker 5: travel with them. And those people give them confidence because
47:48
Speaker 5: they're on totally on their side and they're doing everything
47:51
Speaker 5: they can to elevate that player to excellence. And it's
47:56
Speaker 5: the same for an artist, you need a team of
47:58
Speaker 5: people around you who are going to be there just
48:02
Speaker 5: for you. They're not there because they're jealous. They're not
48:06
Speaker 5: there because they want to knock you down. They're there
48:09
Speaker 5: to make you great and they're saying the right things
48:13
Speaker 5: to get you to that next level. So that's why
48:17
Speaker 5: it's important to have that team, that team around you.
48:21
Speaker 5: And you know when I mean, I have many workshops
48:25
Speaker 5: and every once in a while I get a group
48:28
Speaker 5: that's just unusually talented and great. And as a team,
48:36
Speaker 5: we can do so great on people's screenplays because we're
48:39
Speaker 5: just giving the best ideas and we're there to help
48:42
Speaker 5: them to fight. They're there to help us. So you know,
48:46
Speaker 5: that can make all the difference. When you're working on
48:49
Speaker 5: a screenplay. You have all these right brilliant people who
48:54
Speaker 5: know film and they're there jets to make your screenplay better.
48:59
Speaker 5: And that's and that gives you confidence, and that gives you,
49:03
Speaker 5: you know, a leg up.
49:05
Speaker 4: You know, that's very that's very true, Glenn. You know,
49:07
Speaker 4: I I noticed, you know, by the clock we're almost
49:10
Speaker 4: running out of time because I know you you know,
49:12
Speaker 4: I don't want to keep to eat up too much
49:13
Speaker 4: of your time. But one of the questions that came in,
49:17
Speaker 4: which is that I'm just going to ask because a
49:19
Speaker 4: couple of the uh, it actually came into a couple
49:20
Speaker 4: different iterations. It's actually do with what we were just
49:22
Speaker 4: talking about about building the team and your writing and
49:25
Speaker 4: ideas and stuff, and basically is you know, what advice
49:29
Speaker 4: do you have for a screenwriter that's writing their first draft.
49:33
Speaker 5: Don't be critical for yourself. In other words, don't Number one,
49:37
Speaker 5: don't expect that it's going to come out good, okay,
49:39
Speaker 5: because most first drafts are not good. Just let it
49:43
Speaker 5: pour out. Don't judge it. Just you know, hopefully you
49:48
Speaker 5: got a decent outline. You know where you're going. You
49:52
Speaker 5: have the beginning, middle, and end.
49:55
Speaker 1: We'll be right back after a word from our sponsor,
50:01
Speaker 1: and now back to the show.
50:04
Speaker 5: And then just let it pour out. Don't worry about
50:07
Speaker 5: how long it is, how short it is. If you're
50:12
Speaker 5: you know you're having trouble, your dialogue isn't so great,
50:15
Speaker 5: it doesn't matter. Just let it pour out. And then
50:20
Speaker 5: once you've written it and you've got it all there,
50:22
Speaker 5: now you've got something to work with. And then in
50:26
Speaker 5: the second draft you can solve certain problems. In the
50:28
Speaker 5: third draft, you'll solve other problems. In the fourth path,
50:31
Speaker 5: you'll solve other problem. You can't solve everything at once.
50:34
Speaker 5: Your only solve a few things. And all you want
50:38
Speaker 5: to do is just let it pore out of you.
50:42
Speaker 5: And don't you know the reason people get blocked is
50:45
Speaker 5: they expect that it's going to come out wonderfully the
50:48
Speaker 5: first time. And that's ridiculous. I mean, if you were
50:51
Speaker 5: going to learn to play the piano, classical piano, you
50:56
Speaker 5: wouldn't think that you would just sit down and play
50:59
Speaker 5: most I mean, you just would never think such a thing.
51:03
Speaker 5: And yet for some reason, people think if I'm writing
51:06
Speaker 5: my first greenplay, is it's gonna come out it's gonna
51:08
Speaker 5: be great. No, it's not gonna be great. It's gonna
51:11
Speaker 5: be very rough and it's gonna need work, but that's okay.
51:15
Speaker 5: You just want to get it down for now. So
51:19
Speaker 5: my biggest advice is to don't judge yourself. Don't don't
51:22
Speaker 5: think it's gonna be wonderful. You're you're just trying to
51:26
Speaker 5: get it out, let it pour out of you, and
51:29
Speaker 5: you're gonna discover things. And then once you have a
51:34
Speaker 5: first draft, that's when you start looking for feedback, and
51:40
Speaker 5: really good feedback like we talked about, or somebody who's
51:43
Speaker 5: really knowledgeable can help you identify exactly what's working and
51:51
Speaker 5: exactly what's not working, and then you solve the problems
51:56
Speaker 5: of what's not working.
51:58
Speaker 4: That's a great advice, you know, Like I said, you know,
52:01
Speaker 4: the uh, there's a couple of different versions of that
52:03
Speaker 4: was the number one question that came in, So I
52:05
Speaker 4: wanted to make sure to ask that, So, you know, Glenn,
52:07
Speaker 4: you know, in closing, do you have any any sort
52:10
Speaker 4: of final thoughts that you wanted to sort of add
52:12
Speaker 4: to sort of port a period at end of this
52:14
Speaker 4: whole conversation.
52:15
Speaker 5: Well, you know, for anybody that's listening, please feel free
52:19
Speaker 5: to call me at my home. You're perfectly. I like
52:24
Speaker 5: to talk to new writers. I like to help writers.
52:27
Speaker 6: You know.
52:27
Speaker 5: If I've been a screen a professional screenwriter my entire career.
52:30
Speaker 5: I'm still at it. But I've also been an instructor
52:34
Speaker 5: and I have these workshops. I've had six films produced
52:37
Speaker 5: from my groups, and I like to work with young writers.
52:42
Speaker 5: I like to mentor people. So feel free to call me.
52:47
Speaker 5: My numbers eight one, eight, three, nine, six five seven
52:51
Speaker 5: two four. That's eight one eight three nine six five
52:55
Speaker 5: seven two four, Or you can email me at g
52:59
Speaker 5: bennist atpacbell dot net and I'll be happy to talk
53:07
Speaker 5: to you and you can tell me what your if
53:09
Speaker 5: you have any questions or any way I can help you.
53:12
Speaker 5: And uh, you know, I get I get a great
53:14
Speaker 5: deal of uh satisfaction from that, especially like something like Scream. Oh,
53:20
Speaker 5: if I can help somebody get screen produced, it gives
53:24
Speaker 5: me a tremendous amount of satisfaction. So I like to
53:31
Speaker 5: work with with young writers, you know, and I like
53:34
Speaker 5: to be a part of the process. And every once
53:38
Speaker 5: in a while we're lucky enough to get a film produced.
53:41
Speaker 4: Well, you know, that's amazing Glenn, that you know, you
53:43
Speaker 4: allow people to call you and uh and uh and uh,
53:47
Speaker 4: you know everyone. I want you to check out Glenn's
53:49
Speaker 4: website at Glenn Bennis dot com. I will link on
53:51
Speaker 4: the show notes along with Glenn's latest novel, inc. I'm
53:54
Speaker 4: going to link to that in the show notes as well.
53:57
Speaker 4: But Glenn, I want to say, you know, thank you
53:58
Speaker 4: so much for coming on. Thank you, thank you for
54:00
Speaker 4: talking to us for you know, fifty minutes. I really
54:02
Speaker 4: appreciate it, and you know, honestly, Gwenn, I really look
54:06
Speaker 4: forward to just seeing you know everything you come up with.
54:08
Speaker 4: And I might actually email you too, I ask some
54:10
Speaker 4: screenwriting questions.
54:11
Speaker 5: So I mean, all right, Dave, we'll spend a lot
54:13
Speaker 5: of fun talking to you. You too, glad.
54:15
Speaker 4: I will talk to you soon, my friend, Take care, goodbye.
54:18
Speaker 3: I want to thank Dave so much for doing such
54:20
Speaker 3: a great job on this episode. If you want to
54:22
Speaker 3: get links to anything we spoke about in this episode,
54:24
Speaker 3: head over to the show notes at Bulletproof Screenwriting dot tv.
54:27
Speaker 3: Forward slash for eighty six. Thank you so much for
54:30
Speaker 3: listening to guys, as.
54:31
Speaker 1: Always, keep on writing no matter what. I'll talk to
54:34
Speaker 1: you soon.
54:34
Speaker 2: Thanks for listening to the Bulletproof Screenwriting podcast at Bulletproof
54:38
Speaker 2: Screenwriting dot tv.