First Class

The first screenwriting class was awesome. The 'book list' for the class is actually a DVD list: Dirty Dancing, The Fisher King, and Lars and the Real Girl. He made sure to point out that these movies were all made from 'spec scripts'-- that is, scripts that were written by the writer first (with no promise of getting paid or the script being made into a movie), then shopped around looking for someone who would want to make it into a movie. This is in contrast to a writing assignment where the studio knows that they want to make a movie about something (a book adaptation or an established character) and then they hire a writer for a treatment. The writer gets paid for his treatment but the studio can then decide they don't like it and throw out his/her script and hire someone else to write another one. The first writer still gets paid for his treatment even though the script was canned. The assignments of course go to the top A-list writers, folks who have proven reliable in meeting deadlines for writing and oh yeah-- have written a successful movie or two. Spider-Man was a writing assignment, as was Superman Returns, Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone... you get the idea. I can tell that the prof loves movies and a good story. You can't fake enthusiasm like that and it really carries over into the class (I'm sure we've all had classes where nobody wanted to be there, especially the instructor). Lots of energy here. This is going to be good.

First assignment is to write one scene and include a specific sentence that he gave us in the scene. And it has to make sense in the context of the scene (i.e., you can't just have a character say this sentence because he's reading out loud from a book). Since I'm there just to listen and learn I won't be handing in the assignments, but I'll probably do them for the practice anyway. The purpose of the assignment is probably to get us writing in the proper format with some semblance of a goal (we have to work that sentence in somehow). I never hurts to go back to basics, so the undergrad class is exactly what I need right now.

Dirty Dancing is on Comcast On-Demand, I have Lars somewhere though I haven't watched it yet, and I reserved The Fisher King at the library. I should be all set to go.