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Telling stories for free or profit

March 18, 09 //
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How do you make money telling stories? Thousands of MFA students ask themselves that question, usually starting a few weeks after graduation when reality sets in and you find out the world isn’t really that much different than it was when you were sitting in a circle reading from a fistful of laser paper. You’ve got a degree, now what? Who’s going to read your stuff  without the classroom structure providing you with an audience?

You’ve got two options. Give it away for free, or follow the traditional market models. The power of the Web allows the former to happen rather easily. But the latter is still the best way to turn your efforts into cash money.

I’ve now earned a modest amount of remuneration for making stuff up. Certainly not enough to keep the mortgage paid. And as a Web professional, I’m all for the concept barrier-free communication. Everything I do at my day job is designed to make it easier to access information. And this is at odds with the whole notion of publishing. It’s hard to access novels…you have to walk to the store and fork over twenty bucks, or sit at home and wait for the box from Amazon. So the notion of paying for text is ridiculous. Every word I’ve ever written, which is by now numbering in the millions, would fit on a thumb drive and could be sent around the world in seconds from my iPhone.

But as a writer, I also want to get paid for the years I’ve invested in creating that text.

A part of me believes it’s inevitable that writers, novelists in particular, will be giving the goods away for free online, using sites like Scribd. Even publishers are starting to offer free content on Scribd and elsewhere, trying to figure out what the business model will be.

But my friend Mort Castle, with his razor wit and boundless optimism, doesn’t seem to think that is such a good idea.  He’ll proceed as before on his 40-year quest to be an overnight success. Few writers work at it harder than Mort does.

But is the role of the publisher changing in a world of open communication? As these fireworks at SXSW demonstrate, publishers are being forced to face this question directly. I think the guy from Penguin makes a solid point when he proclaims the importance of the filter. That’s always been the role of the publisher and agent: find the gem in the slush, make it easily accessible to the masses. In essence, readers pay publishers to find the best stuff. Won’t a publisher’s role become even more vital in a world where choice is expanding?

Still, the sticky question is how to capture a profit when shelf space and distribution is now free. Some projects would never have existed if it weren’t for the Web, these the sorts of blog-to-book scenarios that writers dream about manufacturing.

Do you wait for a business model, or do you make one? Or do you just experiment? Or do you just stick to the traditional models like Mort? For now, I’m still sending manuscripts to New York in manila envelopes. Though I’ve noticed that agents in the traditional book biz are even changing, with requests for PDFs or Word versions to load onto Kindles increasing. As for LA, I’ve never printed and sent an actual screenplay manuscript…it’s all been PDF (and a scanned release form) since I’ve gotten involved.

But I’m also giving it away. Next week I’m launching a Web comic, an online graphic novel called ‘Los Refugiados,’ with artist Santiago Uceda. We’ve kicked around adding a donate button. We hope someone will recognize our brilliance in monetary form. But we have no real business model.

In the end, telling stories is something that humans do. If the market didn’t exist, it would still happen. If the Web weren’t around, we’d sit around the fire and spin yarns or scratch it into the walls of our caves.

But it sure would be nice to get paid for it.

Thoreau, iPhones and moving pictures

December 31, 08 //
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“We are the tools of our tools,” or so Henry David Thoreau famously said. It’s true. As a species, our single greatest flaw is our obsession with inanimate objects. How many folks died for the shiny yellow metal stuff? What about blood diamonds? How many newspapers did we deliver so we could buy that Red Ryder BB gun, only to play with it for a day and then throw it in a box under the bed for the next 20 years? How many extra hours do us workin’ folks put in for an extra bedroom on the house, power locks on the car or just to have the latest gizmo or doodad, or to have real hardwood in our floors instead of that laminated stuff that looks exactly the same.

I have to admit that I’ve fallen victim to that material cycle that Thoreau warned about, even after reading Walden twice. My latest gadget of obsession is the iPhone. I know I’m about two years late on this little fad. But the old bag phone had to go. I’ll miss it. With the shoulder strap it was handy in dark alleys for self-defense.

So I’ve been obsessed with this little thing and how you can use your fingers to make stuff glide around. I downloaded games (ostensibly for my daughter) and even watched videos. The size of the screen, unlike my old phone, actually allows you to watch video rather than just preview it. I could even see myself sitting in an airport lobby and watching a feature film on this device.

So here’s where we get to the crossover with the film industry. Whenever I experience a new gadget, like those mini LCD projectors that can turn any blank wall into a movie screen with the help of an iPod or laptop, I wonder what that means for the future of feature films. Is some new technology going to suck theatres dry and eliminate the revenue stream in an industry in which I’m just beginning to play a part. I wonder if I should feel like a saddlemaker in 1902 or a punch card operator or the publisher of a major urban newspaper. Is our medium going to experience obliteration due to technology, home theaters or even the economic crunch?

The answer is no. I’d  be naive to expect that the business model and process behind what makes people sit down in a stadium seat and chew popped corn drenched in fake butter-syrup will not change. The process of how people will find their way to the cinema might work totally different. But people will still go.

I have faith in this for several reasons. First, the original Great Depression saw a rise in filmgoing. Today it’s a twenty-dollar escape from your woes. We’re social animals, and even if we are going bankrupt and it would be cheaper to sit in front of our big LCD screen before it’s repossessed, we would rather experience something in the company of other humans. That’s why people go to the bar and spend five bucks per stout rather than sit at home with their own keg and suck it back for fifty cents a glass. It’s why people go to nightclubs instead of stay at home with a strobe light. Even those in search of solitude will sign up for a ten-day Sierra Club hike rather than strike out alone across the wilderness. Most of us are social creatures at least part of the time.

Second…nothing happening now in technology even compares to the previous advances that issued in countless predictions for the industry’s demise. If film and theatres were going to die, then television would have killed it. Or VHS. Or DVD. Or home theatres. Or Netflix. The iPhone won’t kill cinema either. Actually, one of the first apps I downloaded for my iPhone was Flixster. That program finds your GPS location and then connects you with all the films playing in your area. You can watch the trailers, read reviews and then get directions to the cinema. Just like television advertising or film websites, this is a technological advance that can actually drive people to the theater.

Finally, I’m convinced that cinema has a bright future because when I went home for the holidays and returned to the theaters I used to haunt as a kid, I found that they have expanded the building to add another half dozen shows on any given night. They’ve also build a five storey parking garage. They’re doing well. Every show we wanted to see was sold out, so we bought tickets for the next showing. We waited patiently. And we enjoyed the hell out of the picture.

Roundup

December 22, 08 //
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_So with the closing of several mini-majors this year, are indy films dying? Not according to Salon.

_Another slate of comics-based films is announced. I’ve never been into comics, but I suppose I should be judging from the percentage of financing that goes into these projects. It’s a natural fit…they’re storyboards waiting to happen, and with digital production techniques making so much more visually possible. I met with a small indy production company a few weeks ago, their tastes leaning greatly toward art house features. Still, one of the projects on their slate was an adaptation of a graphic novel. Comics are no longer the ugly and maligned stepchildren of the literary world; if anything, literature is.

_As a Web designer I’m noticing not without interest how pointless official movie sites are becoming. In a scan of The Wrestler’s official Web site, which is just a subsite of Searchlight’s main Web presence, I don’t see any interesting custom content about the film…just a link to the trailer and a generic aggregation of press releases, interviews, etc. There is a link to a Fox Searchlight “widget,” plus a plain “Share” section, which is a lackluster attempt at social media marketing. But I don’t see anything interesting, focused or innovative. One would think that focused, inexpensive Web and social media marekting would be perfect for this type of film. Any film, for that matter. Why is it always left out of the marketing plan?

Collaboration

December 7, 08 //
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As of a few hours ago I received my first remuneration as a screenwriter. It consisted of a plane ticket, a motel room and a very nice meal (and a few beers) at a seafood restaurant in Santa Monica. Of course tomorrow we’ve got a full day of combing through one of my scripts line-by-line in an effort to turn it into something that this particular production company will want to option and hopefully produce. Then Monday morning I’ll head back to the real world with a dozen pages of notes and yet another draft to write while waking obscenely early in the morning before I go to work.

But in the process, I’ve learned something about folks in the film industry. First, they are business people who deal with a bottom line and the uncertainty of a market just like any of us who work professional jobs. Next, they have very clear creative aspirations which they struggle to exercise by risking their livelihoods on a very fickle and challenging industry. Finally, and probably most important, they value collaboration.

As a writer-type, I’ve heard all manner of horror stories about Los Angeles. The most common comment I get from people when they learn that I’ve won some contests and had meetings in LA about scripts I’ve written is: “Aren’t you afraid someone is going to steal your ideas?” Sometimes I hear, “You mean you just send your script to strangers?” People tend to get defensive right away. The truth is, screenwriters don’t get paid for ideas. Nobody gets paid for ideas. If that were the case, we’d all be rich. Writers get paid to write, and write well…and often they don’t get paid that much to do it. If they get paid anything.  And writing well is hard to do. If you and another writer arrive at the same idea, and you write a bad script and she writes a good one…then she deserves the payday, not you.  If you have a brilliant idea but write a bad script…sorry.  Nobody’s ever going to pay you anything for it.

But idea theft isn’t the only thing I’ve been warned about. Other knowing writers have referred to Hollywood as a “meatgrinder” or a “bloodbath.” I suppose bad things can happen to sensitive creatives in the glare of Tinsletown lights. But what I’ve learned about people in the film industry in my experience here is that they’re no more or less ruthless or conniving than your garden variety corporate lackey or your average middle manager in higher education. They’re ordinary working stiffs trading their time in hopes of making something useful for society while also paying the mortgage. The only difference is that when they’re successful, what they make can inspire or enthrall millions of people in darkened theaters all over the world.

And most importantly for writers, if you want to fit in here, you have to be willing to collaborate. Nobody can make a film on his own, least of all a writer. Sure there are the Auteurs, but then most of them have a trust fund or a boatload of luck. You need smart business people, a visionary director, talented actors (and a casting director to match) a matchless DP, etc, etc, etc. It’s all about collaboration. If you’re not willing to collaborate, you don’t belong here. If you’re an artiste (with a long ‘e’), this is probably not for you. If you’re so terrified that some producer is going to insist you insert a wolfman and a car chase into your artfully written script that you’ll bristle at any and all suggestions for changes or revisions, then this is probably not for you. If you’re desperate to quit your day job, screenwriting is not going to allow you to make that happen. You probably won’t get rich. You probably won’t become famous. You probably won’t even get a WGA card. But, if you can write, and if you’re willing to be the consummate collaborator, then maybe, just maybe, you’ll have a shot at getting a plane ticket and a motel room and a decent seafood dinner. And with a little luck, maybe you’ll have a rare chance to see something you wrote (and rewrote and rewrote based on round after round of worthy and legitimate feedback) have a shot of making it onto the screen.

Writing for the budget

November 4, 08 //
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When you first start writing scripts, one of the great liberating experiences is the ability to start a scene with something like this:

EXT. PARIS STREET – AFTERNOON

Smith steps to the curb and hails a cab...

And then, you can follow up with the next scene, with a quantum leap:

EXT. SEASIDE CAFE, HAVANA – MORNING

Pilar sits across from Valencia...

It gives you a sense of freedom as a writer to be able to jump from one location to another. After all, you just need to type the name of the place in your scene heading and you’re there. A leap from Anchorage to Albequerque is only a matter of characters on the keyboard. This is profound, because most of us spend a huge portion of our lives hunched over a keyboard in some dingy office or in the corner of a coffee shop. Maybe we hang out on the fifth floor of the library next to a stack of books nobody reads. To be able to leap around the globe via our narratives is one of the attractions of this pursuit.

But what I’m learning now is that such freedom can be a dangerous thing. Producers read scripts differently than we do as writers. When they see a location change, numbers start to click in their heads. A change in the setting, and the addition of numerous locations, can inflate the budget in less time than it takes you to complete a scene heading.

I’m rewriting a script now with budget and locations in mind. I’m eliminating action sequences and removing an entire series of scenes that take place two thousand miles away form the main center of action. I’m also collapsing characters, combining several similar roles into a single character to reduce the casting costs. A producer said that I could take the script in two directions: a big budget action film, or a character-driven drama. Their company specializes in the latter. I was presented with a challenge: rewrite the script to reduce the cost of making this film, and they’ll consider an option.

The pragmatic requirements of filmmaking are quite different from, say, novels where you’re only limited by your own imagination. When you set a scene in Cairo, that won’t require you to send the second unit to Africa to get b-roll of the pyramids. Or you don’t have to worry about the fact that a scene set in Havana becomes problematic if much of the cast and crew is made up Americans, who are forbidden to travel there by the knuckleheaded blowholes in Washington.

I’m also finding that it’s not always a matter of collapsing and contracting your script. Sometimes you’ll be called upon to increase a role, attracting a different caliber (and more expensive) level of talent. On this same project, I’m removing minor characters and increasing the visibility and prominence the four lead roles so that they can try to attract four major actors for these key parts instead of just one or two.

Writing for a budget is nothing I’ve ever had to consider doing before, writing as I have mostly fiction. My first two scripts featured international locations. My third script was set entirely within forty miles of where I live, my thinking being that this script might make a nice independent project someday, or at least attract interest from different types of production companies looking for smaller budget films.

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