BIZ TIP TUESDAY:
SCREENWRITER SURVIVOR
The number one TV show at 8pm Thursdays in the USA is always some version of SURVIVOR. It just owns that spot.
Thursday we begin a new game - HEROES & VILLAINS - featuring the most loved and hated players from past games. One of the "heroes" form
past games is Cowboy Colby Donaldson from game #2 - SURVIVOR: OUTBACK and the first ALL STARS game.
Way back in game #2, SURVIVOR: OUTBACK most of America
watched as 40 year-old nurse and mother, Tina Wesson, won a million dollars.
The two hour final episode contained twists and turns and this
observation from cowboy Colby at the beginning of the show: "The
environment and elements have probably been the most dominant
player in this game. It drops you to your knees, kicking you in
the butt, and every time you feel like you're getting up you get
knocked down again."
Screenwriting is a lot like that - only you don't get to go
home after 41 days. It just keeps knocking you down and kicking
you in the butt for most of your life. You may not have to eat
rats or bugs or survive floods, but you're constantly being
pitched a curve - just when you think you're getting your big
break, something happens. I thought I was getting my big break
when I got the job writing NINJA BUSTERS for a local film
producer... I ended up working in a warehouse for the next ten
years with a copy of NINJA BUSTERS on video in the store down the
street. Then I thought I got a break when I sold COURTING DEATH
to a company on the Paramount lot... but they never made the
film. Though I made a couple of years worth of income and moved
to LA, when they didn't make the film I lost momentum. My career
came to a dead stop, and I had to break in AGAIN. In fact, I'm
ALWAYS breaking into the biz. Every script is breaking in again -
finding someone who wants to buy it. Usually someone you've never
met before.
The only good line of dialogue in 2 hours of Sylvester Stallone's masterpiece of sh!t DRIVEN is: "It
doesn't matter if you get knocked down, what matters is how fast
you get up again."
Colby again: "Whether you want to admit it or not, you
deteriorate. Day forty is ten times harder than day twenty was.
Because you're weaker, because you're tired, because you're sick
of dealing with everything you've had to deal with."
When you get knocked down by rejection, can you get back up
again? After YEARS of rejection, can you get back up and try
again? This is a hard business to break in to - it's not like
being a brain surgeon where you go to college for a decade then
do an internship then work your way through surgery until they
finally let you cut open some guy's head. A brain surgeon knows
that eventually he'll get to cut open some guy's head - a
screenwriter has no idea if he'll sell a script. There's no
schedule, either. On SURVIVOR you know that SOMEONE will win
after 41 days - you don't know if it will take you 4 years or 41
years to sell a script. You never know when you're going to be
rescued, so it's hard to ration the food. Even a prisoner knows
when he's going to get out and can count the days - look forward
to that day when they open the cell and he's a free man. A
screenwriter can't see the light at the end of the tunnel - it
may be there, but there's no way of knowing for sure.
The great philosopher Colby also said: "You've still got to
play the game. You've still got to stay focused. Survive the
people long enough to get in the position to win."
Can you stay focused on screenwriting even when all of this
other stuff gets in the way? Are you working hard enough to win?
Can that script use another rewrite? Are you DOING that rewrite?
I'm frequently amazed when people are searching on message boards
for information that they could easily find on their own. Are you
trying to find the answers or hoping that someone else will
provide them for you? Are you hoping an agent will sell your
script for you or are you looking for ways to sell your script?
Are you doing everything you can for your career? On SURVIVOR
Colby won a bunch of challenges so that he couldn't be voted off.
In one instance he started out dead last and still ended up
winning. He always gave that extra effort.
But even with all of the hard work, he didn't win the game.
Tina did, and here's what she had to say at the beginning of the
final episode: "Who I started out as in this game is not who I've
ended up as. I have developed into more of a strategist."
You may start out only thinking as a writer, but to survive as
a screenwriter you'll have to become a strategist, too. You'll
have to find ways to advance your career and get back on your
feet after you get knocked down. What I always say: "The race is
not to the swift, nor to the sure, nor the strong, but to those
of us too dumb to know when to give up." You have to stick with
it in order to survive. Quitters automatically lose - no one has
to vote them off.
If someone votes against you, don't get mad or get even, just keep playing. Getting votes is part of the game -
nothing you should take personally. As we move into a new year,
and fresh challenges, I hope you win all your immunity
challenges and stay in the game.
SURVIVOR: HEROES & VILLAINS starts Thursday night... who do you think will win?
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You'll find articles written by Tony Peckham on writing his screenplay INVICTUS (directed by Clint Eastwood) and screenwriters Alessandro Camon and Oren Moverman on writing THE MESSENGER and screenwriter Scott Burns on adapting THE INFORMANT! from true story to absurd comedy.
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