MovieBytes Interview:
Screenwriter Giles Brown

An interview with screenwriter Giles Brown regarding the hollywoodscript.com Writing Competition.

A: It's called Stravinsky's Dominos - it's about a proud Polish American man who becomes convinced that strange signs from God will help him save his factory, and more importantly, his marriage.

The producers who've read it say it's probably a festival film with mainstream potential - 'American Beauty meets Being John Malkovich'.

A: I had a good look around first - money was a big consideration - I'm living in New Zealand at the moment so I couldn't afford to enter lots of contests. Plus, Craig Kellem (hollywoodscript.com) is a genuine pro - he knows the business inside out, he's well connected, he critiqued early drafts and we struck up a really good working relationship straight away. I haven't entered this script in other contests yet. I might do if I can find the right ones. There's a lot of sharks out there...and let's face it, a lot of the 'judges' in LA contests are 21-year-old College kids who can't read or write anyway, so you need to pick your contests wisely...

A: Yep - it was outstanding. I got a lot of 'genuine reads' as a result of the contest result, and the excellent feedback has continued to snowball as a result - plus, it gave me the contacts to go back to with my second script. Which I've done. So the momentum is good - maintaining it is the issue. But, value for money, I didn't see anything that matched hollywoodscript.com. What I would say though, is if your script is weak, you'll find about it fast - which is a good thing, there are enough crap films out there already.

A: I got a lot of feedback - Craig and I did about three one-hour session on early drafts of Stravinsky's Dominos before I submitted the final draft for the contest. I knew it wasn't going to win though - we'd already 'agreed to disgaree' over the ending. But I was happy with the result. Ultimately, I have to take ownership for the story - and the ending had to be the way it was - I'd played it over and over again so many times in my mind that I couldn't change it. It was effectively 'real' to me - I could walk into Wahoo, Nebraska (where the story's set) and take you to meet the Stravinsky family. I could show you where they work, where they go to school, the church, the mall, how many lanes there are in the bowling alley - the whole thing. Once I see a scene, I rarely change it - I cut scenes out - but I have a hard time changing them because, like I said, the story's already happened.

A: Absolutley. I spent two months in LA in summer 2003 - and I met two producers who loved Stravinsky's Dominos - it was great to meet them face to face. One was a co-producer on Scarface so he was a genuine player as they say (laughs). Now, I'm just trying to find the time to give them more work. It's hard doing it around a full-time job though, but I'm sure everyone reading this already knows that. I'm starting to think the only way to do it properly is to take 2-3 months off and write full-time. That's how I did my second script and it was great - working at nights and on the weekend is really hard - plus I work for a creative multimedia company during the day...it's a great job, but if I sit down to write at 10pm at night I'm hardly in great shape from a headspace point of view. Headcase is more like it. I can drink a lot of coffee and stay up until 1 or 2am but it kills you. You can do it...but everything else suffers. But in answer to the question I probably netted about 20 reads (over 18 months) as a result of the contest (mostly producers, a few talent managers) - and all the feedback was excellent...I only got one "huh, we didn't get it" type response, but overwhelmingly, I received enough encouragement to write a second script.

A: I've been writing (professionally, i.e. getting paid to do it) in one form or another for the past nine years - for government and for a range of communications companies (advertising and interactive agencies). Stravinsky's Dominos was my first screenplay - it was almost 200 pages when it was done - you all know the '120 page rule' for unproduced writers, right? I didn't care though - I was surprised how easily I pruned it - that's where Craig was really good at getting me to focus on the 'bones' of the story. Arcing out all the storylines and making cuts about whose story was really being told. A lot of sub-plots were canned or shortened that way. My second script was shorter - more 'industry standard' I guess. But I knew it would be tight when I started it. I write a lot of (non-film) scripts in my day job...for web, interactive projects, print, the odd bit of radio and corporate videos, presentations and so on. So, I guess I'm constantly writing scripts...I've only written two screenplays though. Because I work in interactive media it's really good for making me think about narrative - it's more complicated than 'linear prose' because you're constantly playing scenes in your head in different orders, juggling storylines if you like - but essentially you're still trying to make all the stories make sense (for the audience or user). It keeps you really sharp - a lot more than, say, traditional advertising scripts which are just A-B-C-roll credits-yawn.

A: My wife and I visited for two months in late 2003. We lived in a very basic apartment right off Hollywood Boulevard behind the Kodak Theatre - it was surreal. We had no green cards, no accommodation, no car, no implants (and I lost my wallet on the flight over too). Craig told me not to go - I can see his point now (laughs). I couldn't live there long term unless my wife and I had truckloads of cash - it's no place to have a family or stay sane. Everyone's nuts, people work too hard, it's ugly, raw, hot and it all looks the same. But it certainly is blunt - unless you know exactly who you are and why you're there, you'll just destroyed. So it was easy for us, because we were just dipping our toes in. Plus, coming from New Zealand (you've seen LOTR, right?) - it's beautiful, we live by the beach, there's no traffic...life is easy. We'd have to live in Malibu (laughs) if we lived in LA to have the same quality of life. It comes down to sacrifice too, how much are you prepared to give up? And for how long? So it's good to have been - but I know I don't want to spend the next ten years of my life flogging scripts in LA in the hope that I'll get lucky. There are a lot of very jadaed people working in entertainment in LA. You don't need to live there to sell a script - it helps (a lot), but if you have a great script and great contacts, it can be done. There are no shades of grey in LA - apart from the air - I really liked that (not the air)...people are so driven and obsessed with success that there's no time for small talk, which in some ways, is attractive. But it's still a mad-house...I mean, Arnold is Governor...only in LA, right?

A: I'm a little distracted at the moment. Since we got back about 6 months ago, we've taken a while to get settled...jobs, houses, relationships etc...I have about five scripts in development but there's nothing that really lights me up. They could all be good - very good scripts - but I want something that's great. Brilliant. Plus, I'm wondering whether a screenplay is even the right vehicle for these stories...if you take remakes, franchise films and a small indie-market out of the equation there's very little (studio) demand for new material. So, I'm thinking a book might be better than a screenplay...but it's a lot more work. There's a school of thought in Hollywood (and I tend to agree) that good stories don't come from Hollywood. Purchasing book/novel rights is far more bankable. Franchise films (LOTR, Star Wars Part 186, Another Teeny Titty Slasher Flick etc, etc) are more bankable. Which only leaves the (shrinking) indie-space. And you've got the Coen Bros, Sophia Coppola, PT Anderson etc - they pretty much have that space all sewn up. The reality is your (studio) audience is a 16-year-old kid working in Wal-Mart in Idaho who wants a 90-minute gun-fest with cars, chicks (and a few more guns thrown in for good measure) that he can forget by the time the lights come on and go join the Marines. (Which is why so many music-video directors move easily into features.) That's the market. They are the market. And I always knew that when I started out - I lived in NJ for a year when I was a teenager so believe me, I know. So we'll see what happens...I might try and get a 'commercial sale' under my belt just to get going...it's the same way actors will do blockbusters(basically for income and exposure), then they can pick and choose their little art-house (i.e. loss-making) ventures later on. It makes sense if you want to eat. And I want to eat. Well.

Posted Tuesday, May 25, 2004