SHOOTING PEOPLE - UK SCREENWRITERS NETWORK
Supported by The Script Factory

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From: Charlie Harris, www.screen-lab.co.uk
Subject: Screenwriting Courses

"Could people advertising screenwriting courses kindly list their own (produced) credits? Otherwise surely anybody can just read up Syd Field or whoever and advertise themselves as a screenwriting teacher and ask for money from hard-up new writers?"

I've absolutely no objection to this but be aware that while credits are one useful yardstick they're not the only one.

At Screenwriters Workshop we've had people with wonderful credits, and I mean among the top writers in the UK. Some of them can teach - but some great writers can't teach to save their lives.

We've also had teachers whose credits are not particularly impressive as such, but who excel at bringing the best out of their students.

For the record, I've got credits for drama and documentary as writer and director on BBC, ITV and C4 and have won awards. And I can personally attest to the fact that teaching demands completely different skills from writing and directing.

When I run courses, the first things I say is I'm not trying to "sell" any guru (least of all myself) but my aim is to bring the best out of the writers who are there. The second thing I say is that it doesn't matter to them how good my writing is. What matters to my students is how good a teacher I am.

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From: Franz von Habsburg
Subject: Screenwriting Courses

Whilst I sympathise with the view expressed, I for one have actually worked in the film industry (many years as a production manager and production accountant working on features, documentaries and commercials with both Rank and ABC) unlike many who teach in film schools, but it is also true that writing and teaching are two separate skills not necessarily found in the same individual.

Did your physics teacher at school ever actually work as a physicist in industry? I doubt it!

Just judge on the results, and if a student comes away knowing a lot more that at the beginning of a course, what's the problem? At least I am entitled to express that opinion, having worked for many years in films before teaching, but I am not claiming an exclusive, and there are many good teachers at leading film schools which are NAHEMI members who only know the subject as academics but still produce good results because they are good teachers.

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From: Lynne Harvey, http://www.lynneharvey.com
Subject: Screenwriting courses

In reply to the debate about screenwriting courses - all these courses springing up for writers worries me greatly, it seems everyone and his dog is setting up a writers course and giving out information to writers, when sometimes their information is sadly lacking, out of date, or it nulls creativity. I blame some of these courses for the bland scripts that turn up on readers/producers desks. Writers are being scared to death to do anything different or go their own way. Writers are creative, we're not accountants with one and only one way of adding up, sometimes our five plus five will come to eleven, and so it should. Or has 1984 already happened and we're all writing to a formula. I'm primarily a theatre writer and have read scripts for a regional theatre. I couldn't give a damn if the format or font wasn't as it should be, as long as character and action were easy to define. The only one that irritated me was the one with pink smiley faces in the margin (true!) If readers will dismiss a script because it's in the wrong format then they shouldn't be a reader - and lets face it some of them shouldn't. For many months now writers have been e mailing me questions about various problems they have and I've been replying, I now have a Q and A column on a theatre website (no advertising) but I won't be setting up a writers course. Writers - please don't conform. Otherwise we'll all end up writing cop and doc series and London yuppie films - as that's all that will be left.

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From: Rita Wheeler
Subject: Screenwriting Courses

Re question on whether the (London) Screenwriters' Workshop used to hold classes for free and have a whip around for coffee. This may well have been the case, twenty years ago when it was first formed.

In the meantime, twenty years down the road, the original people who formed the SW because they realised that there were no formal classes for teaching screenwriting in England, have gained formal training and now teach at: The London College of Printing, The National Film School, The International Film School, Birkbeck College (part of London University), to name but a few. Some of them still teach at the Screenwriters' Workshop as well.

I know all this as I work in their admin department. We are an educational charity and believe me, we do not make any profit but we do have running costs. It is organisations like ours that help to set standards. Not only standards for scriptwriters, but standards for teaching. If we were not here, then yes, more and more people would probably set themselves up as fly by night teachers.

As regards the cost of courses, it all depends on the way you look at things. My view is that I'm investing in myself, not just the time but money too. I've been on many courses and whether they have cost £10 or £300 (yes, I've been on the Robert McKee course too) I've learnt something from them all. If you think you know it all, then there is no point in paying out money to go on a course, and of course as those rejection slips keep on returning it will not be your fault, it'll be the fact that 'they don't understand you' or that 'you are before you time.'

If in doubt about a screenwriting course, go to one organised by a proper establishment. They, after all, have their reputation to consider.

If anyone is thinking about courses over the summer period, our new programme is now out. An excellent one starting on June 23rd is about writing Treatments. This is given by Charles Harris and details can be viewed on our web site: http://www.lsw.org.uk

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From: Hugo Heppell
Subject: Re: Rants, ants and automobiles

"Don't pay to go on courses or workshops - you are simply subsidising writers who if they are that good that they need to subsidise themselves by running courses and workshops are not worth listening to. I often felt that, logically, it would follow that if I went along to one of these and did the exact opposite of what they suggested I might do better than they had. I have yet to test this theory out but I'd be willing to bet that everyone out there who has paid for courses or workshops has found at a later date that at least some of what they have been 'taught' has been, at best, debatable and, at worst, entirely erroneous. Experience counts. Their experience has not counted for them. I can think of no better advice on how to write better sex scenes than, DON'T PAY TO GO ON COURSES OR WORKSHOPS"

To maintain a current theme... I'm afraid that's not being particularly helpful. Film schools, courses and workshops exist because screenwriting is a craft, a skill, not an artform. There are techniques to learn, partly because a film script is simply a template, not a finished product, and partly because 'story' does follow fairly rigid rules. It hasn't changed all that much since Sophocles and Aristotle, has it? Format: you try reading twenty scripts a week. Format helps ease the pain of ploughing through the haystack in search of the elusive...

The basic problem, it's true, is coming up with the right idea and then working it through. Take Andrew Niccol, for example. Genuinely original creative writing. Or, find a genre and make something different and fresh. A staple of US indie cinema is the story of a bunch of people in a country house dealing with some kind of 'situation'. But not one comes close to Festen in terms of skill in storytelling.

Do not kow-tow to the film industry, but don't dismiss it either: there are people who can help you, advise you and encourage you.

Paul Moyse is absolutely right: as a producer, I want to know how far developed a script is and how 'exposed' it might have been. It isn't that I will read a script with a different eye, knowing it to be a 17th draft or a first (the only one that gives me a sinking feeling is 'final draft' - it's too definitive, and usually wrong). It's that I want to know how fresh the writer is, how receptive to rewrite suggestions, etc. Naturally, this varies from writer to writer, and script to script, but I don't want to read a first or second draft and find out the writer has been working on it for ten years and is really played out...

I've said it before and I'll say it again: give me something to read that makes the hairs on the back of my neck stand up (and I'm talking emotion, not horror here). Thanks to all of you who've sent me stuff to look at, but nothing's done it yet. Come on you guys (in the non gender-specific sense), make my day.

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From: Alex Francis
Subject: Re: Cover Page Plus Rant

The UK industry is already pretty laid back about formatting issues. As long as you are roughly following the 1 page per minute of screen time rule (available from books, specialist programmes and free macros for word processors as discussed here recently), and it is neatly laid out and readable, no one really cares how many holes you've punched in it, or what you have fastened it with (although try not to have sharp metal sticking out. Scraping a groove on my wooden desk a while back after pushing a pile of scripts out of the way did not help my reading mood!). The Americans, however, who receive tons of scripts and are looking for reasons to whittle them down to manageable numbers are more fussy. No point blowing your chances for no reason.

Also, I would suggest that in order to get a sense of what it is like to be one of those 'faceless, voiceless script swamped execs' he try reading a hundred or so unproduced spec scripts from first time writers (you can find some at the American Zoetrope website, among others). If he still believes that no one could benefit from learning the basic elements of structure, drama, characterisation, dialogue etc. then fair enough, but I would encourage people to take advantage of whatever information is out there, and make their own minds up about what to pay attention to and what to ignore. Obviously the story you choose to tell is the most important thing, and should come first, but most of the rules out there are not arbitrary ones imposed for no reason, but exist because, for whatever psychological reason, they work and resonate with audiences. Some people can understand this instinctively, but sadly, based on the vast number of weak scripts I read, most can not.

Just my view, anyway.

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From: Jonny Kurzman
Subject: expensive shoes will sell your script

"If you cannot write stories, I'm afraid nobody - not even the Dalai Lama can change that - you're simply flushing your hard-saved cash down the pan."

Really? On that basis no footballer will improve by being coached, no artist need attend art college to reach their potential and... Shooters, this is your opportunity to try the new interactive feature and fill in your own examples of what I'm trying to say!)

And by the way, how does anyone know if they can write or not? The only 'objective' measure that comes to mind is the completely arbitrary one of being paid for your work. The thing about that is I wrote for years and years and got absolutely nowhere and but despite all the de facto 'evidence' that I could not 'write' I still believed in myself and my writing. The irony is, the script that has made me a 'professional writer' had already been turned down by a number of companies (subtext: this is a rotten script/I cannot write) before becoming quite sort after (subtext: this is a hot script/apparently I can write after all!).

The fact is, whatever you may think about William Goldman he was right when he said 'no-one knows anything'.

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From: Alex
Subject: Co-writers

A while back I wrote a script with a friend of mine. He was supposed to direct the movie. Even though we were friend, we were professionals and had a contract drawn up. It stated that the profits from any sale would be split 50-50. He would also control what was going to be done with the script. If he was going to produce it or just sell it out right. I moved on to other projects.

We never settled the issue of rewrites. He had 30 percent of the script done when he came to me in the beginning. I helped with the middle and wrote the last part myself. We went back and did a polish. I was about to move into production with a movie I was working on, so I told him I did not have time to write a new version of the movie. He was not making any headway into getting money to produce the movie. So, I went off and did my movie, which had a slim budget, but it was ready to shoot.

He pulled aboard a new writer. Still there was no money for the movie.

Then he came to me after I had finished my movie and told me I should give this new writer 25 percent of my take on the last movie because I "abandoned" the movie when I went to work on my movie. I said, no, after telling him I did finish the script with him and a polish. Which was all he did tell me he wanted me to do. I never agreed to keep rewriting the script till he was satisfied.

I did give back 10 percent of my 50 percent for him to give to the new writer if he wanted to. I didn't have to do this, but I wanted out of it. I told him, I was finished with the script and would not do any rewrites or anything. It had been a year and I had shot two digital features and he was trying to get money to shoot his script in film and all his so-called investors keep falling out. In fact, I was out of the loop with the investment prospectus, but I saw it one time and I had a brief mention as being the writer, but it didn't list any of my credits. And I have an Emmy for a TV Movie I wrote.

So, to make a long story short. While me and the guy are still friends, I would not help him with any future projects. Yes, we had a contract, but it did not spell out the number of times he wanted the script rewritten and it certainly said nothing about me having to give up my percentage if he brought a new writer on board.

I would suggest you and your friend take the time to spell out what each one of you will be responsible for with this script. It will save you time and anguish later on.

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