Film Courage: Many new writers say that it's nearly impossible to get their scripts to
people that actually have the power to buy them or green light them.
That that's their problem…that it's access.
And that's the reason they're not making movies.
What are your thoughts on this?
CSUN Professor Eric Edson: I would say they don't know how lucky they are as of today.
You have to get used to the system you have.
For instance, back in the day ("back in the day"), back in my day there was ONE
way into Hollywood, TV, Film…ONE way!
And that was through an agent's front door.
And that agent's front door had layers and layers of guardians before it.
And that was also frustrating you know in a similar way but very, very frustrating.
But now what you have, you have a more creative path.
Let me put it this way.
Contests…screenwriting contest have now been around long enough to separate the wheat
from the chaff.
You know, the good ones, year after year, have gotten stronger because more people believe
in them and the less good ones (although they are all sincere.
I know they're all sincere) have kind of fallen by the wayside.
But the test is this every time I hear that.
I mean yes I have great sympathy for that, I understand that.
I remember when I was coming up myself and it felt like and it was infuriating and frustrating,
but the number one reason why you are not making it is the material is not yet good
enough because especially if you're not reading, you know, reading the stuff that's
out there you have no way of knowing how good good has to be in order to get noticed.
And coming in, you have to be better than most of the people who are now making a living
at it in order to get noticed.
But the contests offer…I was talking about reobjectification, the contests offer a concrete
way to do that.
Work on it and work on it and work on it until you've got something you are ready to test.
But now, pick your contests carefully.
The first time you try it out, pick smaller contests, more fringing.
I mean do your research, they should be decent, upstanding contests and so forth.
Try it out.
Try it out.
Did you make the quarterfinals?
Or were you swept away in the first pass through?
Okay, if that happens, you have learned something, it's not ready.
And you keep working on it and you keep working on it.
And finally when you get to the mid-level ranks and let's say your script gets to
the quarter final, okay.
But it did not make the top ten or top 15, fine.
You've learned something more.
Go back, take a vacation for a couple of weeks, try not to think about it and read it again,
make more notes and go back to work on it.
And it's a way, see that's the thing, what a lot of neophyte screenwriters, new
screenwriters don't do or don't pursue which is, you've got to be as a writer as
a craftsperson, you must be relentless in your goal of creating quality material.
For instance (I'll give you a for instance and maybe that will sort it out), I'm working
with a young lady right now who was one of our grad students (two or three years ago).
She's been my assistant, class assistant, stuff like that, so we know each other pretty
well.
She took her thesis screenplay from (I don't know) three years ago and I read it and I
told her "You've got a great idea here.
You really do.
I believe in this idea."
And we had conversations about there's no such thing as a bad screenplay, only an unfinished
one and all of that and I gave her some pointers and you know scribbled things on the pages
and she went back and she wrote it again.
This is a feature film.
And I looked at it and was "You know, this is better.
This is a little better."
And I went through the sample editing and scribble, scribble and all of that kind of
stuff and she takes it and she comes back and it's a little bit better.
She has been through this process (well in this case with me) it must be six times now.
I mean years have passed.
She had a draft of this when you went up for her thesis three years ago, right?
But I'll tell you…I'm reading it once again.
I'll probably be looking at it again this weekend, she is so close, so close!
I kept telling her, keep track of, don't lose your draft of your first draft.
Don't lose a copy of your first draft.
Because a day is coming, I would like to have that in my hand and your final draft, put
that together in a binder and use this in class, have people read the first draft and
now read the last draft and that I believe could be a wonderful, wonderful exploration
of teaching and screenwriting because this has become viable.
She is now close to having an entirely shootable casting really good social commentary screenplay.
Film Courage: What changed in those 6 drafts in the three years or however many?
Eric Edson: Craft.
Craft.
Her mastery of…I mean what most of them do is they write what they mean when they
come to dialogue.
People just blurt it out and it's called on-the-nose dialogue.
That's one of the things you teach, stop it!
People do not talk like that.
People do not talk around what they mean not that there can't be confrontation and stuff
like that under certain emotional circumstances, yes.
But it was dialogue and less is more in terms of the amount of dialogue, in description
it was about the use of language and vocabulary in description using irrelevant words The,
And, There…there's the list of the 9 most utterly useless words.
I got it back there on a sheet.
I pass it out sometimes.
All that is is filler.
All that does it slow the reader down.
It is developing a style in the way you describe and offer exposition and description in scene
with scene heading and slug lines and then what we're looking at and stuff like that.
Drawing people in, where you put things, building the plot, in an ever better way you can do
more here, you could do more here.
That's what has been going on for all those years.
Film Courage: So you liked her initial idea of the story?
Eric Edson: Absolutely.
And it was in very, rough form.
Very rough form.
She had written badly with pride.
And underneath that there was just something that really struck me.
You know this is worth saying and this is important to say.
It's a social commentary piece.
It's not like there's a big market out there for social commentary pieces, there
isn't.
Okay, but it has to be done incredibly well to catch the eyes you want to catch.
Is it ever going to be made?
I don't know if it's ever going to be made or not.
That's out of our hands.
But I am so proud of her.
Boy, she has got a work sample for the ages.
Film Courage: And you've let her know, not too soon because once she takes this brilliant
idea and it's not ready, it could…
Eric Edson: That's the end of it.
That is correct, time and again.
Oh she was planning two years ago to send it off to one of the majors (I don't know)
Scriptapalooza, one of the majors, you know.
And she asked me to take one more look at it before she sent it off and I said "I
think it's self-defeating to send this off yet."
And there was a small contest.
It's the BFA (Broadcast Education Association) has a student thing every year and they have
contests, a short film contests for students and scripts and so forth.
And I said "Try it there.
Try it there."
And she did and she learned some stuff, she learned some stuff and she also learned that
sometimes judges can be jerks and that's part of the mix, too.
But she learned, she kept working, she got better.
That is how you write.
Everybody who says you've got…when I was coming up…you've got to crank out a brand
new screenplay every six months.
That is insane.
I'm sorry, you can't do good work if you're doing that.
No, you have to live with it, you have to grow with it, you have to be able to go back
and read it again and again and yet again.
Drives my wife nuts.
When I was working on the book [The Story Solution: 23 Actions All Great Heroes Must
Take] and it was ready to send to the publisher.
And she said "You're sitting down to read it again?
What is wrong with you?"
And I said "Honey, you married a mad man.
I mean that goes with the territory.
That's what writers do."
And I read it again and I found mistakes and I fixed them.
It's endless.
So the best thing for a writer is to have been born a bit obsessive-compulsive.
It's like that is a trait that the craft requires of us.
You don't just dash it off, you don't.
And do it well.
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