Book to Screen

by Frank Catalano

  However, most of you are fiction writers, so you may have works already published. In this instance a producer can look at the markets you have reached with your book and get an idea how it might do as a film or television production. But if you are going in with just a story that you feel needs to be told… they won’t really give this type of criteria much consideration. You could have proof (detailed images) of an extra terrestrial landing in a spaceship and proof that there is life in other worlds. As earth shattering as that may seem, they may still pass on your script if they can’t figure out how to sell it. They will be thinking, right now, in this market at this time how would this project do? And to this day, I have a hard time getting wrapped around that way of thinking. I can understand it from a financial perspective; but as a creative person, I just don’t understand it.

  When I first went to work at Warner Brother studios, I was so excited to be part of a landmark studio where such great films had been made. I was working at the smaller Lorimar Studio that primarily produced television programming such as Dallas (1978-1991), Knots Landing (1979 – 1993) and Full House (1987 – 1995). Warner Brothers eventually bought Lorimar and so after that I went to Warner Brothers. When I first got on the Warner Brother lot, I was a like a child at a candy store. I walked past the very same sound stages where many classic films were made; The Maltese Falcon (1941), Casablanca (1942), The Big Sleep (1946) and where great stars like Betty Davis, Errol Flynn, or Humphrey Bogart created unforgettable characters. This in my mind was a very special place but I learned very quickly, that the Warner Brothers I was thinking of was no longer in existence. The studio was part of a larger corporate entity AOL Time Warner and later after they sold off AOL – they became Time Warner. Warner Brothers was no longer a studio that just made movies, it was a corporate powerhouse creating entertainment for a multitude of media and outlets. It didn’t matter to them what they were creating. It just happened to be entertainment programming. However, it could have just as easily been electronic devices, computers or automobiles. They were a full-fledged business focused on the bottom line. Now let’s not wax nostalgic for the old studio days when the four Warner Brothers ran the company. It was a business then as well, focused on creating and releasing movies (as many as one per week) to fill company owned movie theatres around the world. They were a business, just like Ford Motor Company or GM. However, they, like every other studio head, created movies for their particular audience. Yes, they were companies and this did manufacture product, it was the same as rolling a car off the assembly line. Today, the environment is very different.

  16

  ADAPTING YOUR NOVEL INTO A SCREENPLAY

  Start Your Story at the End

  WHEN WRITERS AND other creative people interact with the motion picture business culture, they often do so at a disadvantage. They are under the assumption that a great idea or well-written script is what they will need when they walk in the door. Of course, everyone wants the work they do to be of the best quality and creativity. However, the real driving factor for any studio executive at some point in the process will be to get a handle on whether the idea or the script has a market. Will anyone want to experience in any form, what you have written? The answer should be “Yes…” but you should also know “why.” Now I have a quick question for all of you. How many of you are active screenwriters. I ask this because, I know this is a conference of fiction and non- fiction writers. How many of you have screenplays that you have written?

  (Several audience members raise their hands)

  How many of you have completed novels?

  (A larger segment of the audience raises their hands)

  Okay, great! How many of you are thinking about converting your existing novel into a screenplay?

  (A large portion of the audience raises their hands)

  Excellent. I think it’s a great thing to do. If you sell your book and that sale includes screen rights, it’s always nice to have it available as part of your package. If you have representation they will look upon it as a positive thing. However, it is not a guarantee that you will be able to write the screenplay version of your own book. Producers, more often than not, will buy the movie rights for a particular work and then assign their own screenwriter to develop it for film. Often, even then, the screenplay is often written by a series of screenwriters developing a series of drafts toward the completed version. Each producer likes to have writers that they have worked with before create the script versions of their films. Why? They might like a particular writer for his or her style or the success of their previous scripts at the box office. I am telling you this now up front so that you know that your book may be purchased for screen and you may have a fully written screenplay that will not be considered. You might even be paid for it but it might never be drawn upon and you would not receive any screen credit. It’s the nature of the way things are done in the film business. So you may be thinking, “If my screenplay is probably not going to be used, why am I sitting here today in this seminar START YOUR STORY AT THE END?” What’s the idea behind the title START YOUR STORY AT THE END?

  Why would you want to invest time into writing a screenplay? Why are we really here today? When you saw the title START YOUR STORY AT THE END, what did you think it really meant?

  (Audience member raises their hand)

  Yes?

  (Audience member: “When I am working on the story for my book, I kept visualizing it thinking this would be great on the screen – I kind of though you were talking about that as you write the original novel you would visualize your story for the screen.)

  Okay. In a way I am. If you are currently working on a novel, it’s always a great idea to visualize how it would look up on the screen. Are the visual images I am creating for my book compelling and would they pull an audience into my story? Or am I writing talking heads, just kind of sitting in one spot for an extended period of time having a conversation? Which is it? I am not suggesting that your characters have to be in a constant state of motion, they can talk, they can stand still, they can relate to one another in a non-physical way. All of these things are possible. However, never forget that film and television are visual mediums that convey their story be showing as well as telling. But there’s a larger framework. I want you to all think about something. We are all consumers and when we are asked to invest or buy something, we are very careful of how we spend our time and money. We check everything out on the Internet because we can. We all want to be sure about the outcome of everything we do.

  I just attended the opening night of a wonderful new play called Minsky’s that just bowed at the Ahmanson Theatre in Los Angeles and then plans to continue on to Broadway. Now the story of Minsky’s is not a new idea. It was made into a film in in 1968 – The Night They Raided Minsky’s that was a fictional account about the invention of striptease at a burlesque house in turn of the century New York City. The new musical comedy MINSKY’S takes all that into account and adds of course great music, a love story and very creative choreography. But this is a new treatment of the idea and audiences want to know right away (in advance if we can give it to them) if they buy tickets to this show it will be money well spent. What am I hinting at? We all want to know the future when we invest our time and money into something. We want to know how it will all turn out. We want to know as soon as possible and if we can’t get the future up front, we want to have an indication of how it will be pretty early on. We are an “immediate gratification” society that needs to be pulled in quickly or we will lose interest… move on to the next thing. Okay, now back to writing.

  In your screenplay, no matter what, you have got to connect to your audience right away… I’d say the first ten pages or the first ten minutes of your movie. You don’t have to tell the whole story, but you have got that much space and time to get your audience connected and on board. If you do what I call a “slow roll out” of your story and characters, then you run the risk of losing your audience because they are not c
onnected to your characters or story. So, you’re thinking to your self “okay, that’s it… start my story at the end, then they’ll be hooked. But wait, if I’m at the end, it’s over… I’ll have nothing else to tell.” No. Maybe the title is misleading and should be called START YOUR STORY “ALMOST” AT THE END.

  (Audience laughter)

  You want to begin at a pivotal moment at the end of your story. Show them your central characters if you can put them in peril. But don’t give it all away…. Just give the reader enough to wonder about what they are see, what they are hear and ponder what will happen next. The will instantaneously want to know how it will all turn out… and you will be happy to take them there. But first they must go back to the beginning and find out what has lead them to that pivotal moment. In short, they will have to read the whole screenplay to find out. But this is something you can’t force someone to do… they have to want to read it. They have to be compelled to do it. It is the same reason; drivers always slow down as they pass a traffic accident. They want to know, as best they can, what has happened and as they drive by and get a sense of how it will all turn out in the end. Modern audiences want some sort of assurance that any investment made in either time or money will have a return. This is one part of it.

  17

  WRITE LIKE YOU’RE BUYING TOOTHPASTE

  Start Your Story at the End

  THE OTHER PART of it is, when we buy something… let’s say when we buy toothpaste… you’re thinking right now, I thought we were talking about writing. Now we are talking about buying toothpaste? Trust me this all will tie in. When you buy toothpaste, do you think about the process of using the toothpaste or do you think about the end. Now all toothpaste cleans your teeth. But why do we buy a certain brand?

  (Audience member: “Because it fights cavities.”)

  Right. But doesn’t all toothpaste do that. Is there something else?

  (Audience member: “Makes our teeth clean?”)

  Right. Anything else?

  (Audience member: “Price?”)

  Okay, so you buy one brand over another because it costs less. Right? But it still does the same things… I mean, clean your teeth, fight cavities… all of that?

  (Audience: “Makes your teeth whiter?”)

  Yes, now we’re getting somewhere. How do you know that it does all these things? How do we know it makes our teeth whiter, or brighter?

  (Audience: “It’s on the package and in advertising.”)

  Right. And that is a promise made to you. If you buy this toothpaste, it will make your teeth brighter or whiter. All advertising does this. It makes a promise to us; if you invest your time and money in this product it will do something in return. This is a promise. Now let’s go back to writing and your original idea.

  Let’s go back to that very moment when you had the original idea for the book you have written or the book you will write. It was or is an idea and you thought about writing a story that you felt needed to be told. But step away from that and put yourself in the reader’s seat and ask this question.

  “What is the promise you are making to your reader?”

  Essentially, can you make this promise -- if you read my book or screenplay I promise that you will experience a Non-stop suspense thriller, a knee slapping comedy or a tender love story. It can’t be all of these these things, but it should be a least one idea that an audience can identify with. It’s just like buying that tube of toothpaste, there needs to be a singular overriding reason that we want it and then buy it. The process is exactly the same in writing.

  Think about what you have written. Can you answer this question? Can you tell anyone or me who might ask in one sentence the type of story you have written? We all go home and slug away on our laptops and struggle to tell our story. When it’s done, we can sit back and feel a sense of accomplishment. It’s done. But can you look someone in the eye, and say read this book… read this screenplay and if you do, I promise that it will be this our that. You fill in the blank…. and whatever it is you choose to say, make it compelling. Make it sound like something they will have to read because if they don’t, they will miss out. To quote the Godfather, “make them an offer they can’t refuse.”

  (Audience laughter)

  Perhaps some of you can ask the question, but as yet don’t have an answer.

  The answer is everything… and if you have the answer and it is clear as day, you think to yourself that this is it, I have something. So this is the second point, make a promise to your audience. In order to do that, you have got to have a clear understanding of what your story is and more importantly how it will fit in and be perceived by an audience. So let’s summarize.

  You begin your story at a pivotal moment in the plot at the end of the story. A point that there is no return and you show your central character – hopefully in some sort of peril.

  Once you take your audience to the pivotal moment, make them a promise. If you read this book or screenplay, I promise you this outcome.

  This takes us right back to buying toothpaste. If you pull your audience in at a pivotal moment then make them a promise of how it will all be and it you fulfill it – they will be happy. Just like buying toothpaste that promises to make your teeth whiter. If you buy it, and your teeth are whiter you are happy. At that point, the toothpaste is no longer toothpaste. It has become an enabler improving your understanding of life and happiness in so many ways. Am I saying that your adapted screenplay must change the lives (become an enabler) for all those who experience it? Isn’t a good story and well developed characters enough? No, I don’t think so. I think your writing needs to go beyond just a story and characters. We are bombarded every day with images, and stories and characters in all parts of our life. Our brain filters most of these stimuli out and only focuses on those things that somehow within our presentation connect to our audience in an intellectual, emotional, physical or spiritual way. Everything else is just noise.

  18

  PRESENTING YOUR STORY TO AN AUDIENCE

  Start Your Story at the End

  LET’S LOOK AT four elements briefly. What do I actually mean when I say present your story to your reader (audience) intellectually, emotionally, physically or spiritually? You don’t have to achieve all four. However, your work should make a connection on a least one of these levels.

  Intellectual:

  Your story and characters present an idea that a reader or audience can clearly understand and connect with on an intellectual level. Most murder mysteries or thrillers connect to an audience this way. Think about scripts like The Usual Suspects (1995), The Butterfly Effect (2004) or Inception (2010), Gone Girl (2014).

  Emotional:

  Your story and characters evoke certain emotions in the reader or audience. Think about scripts like the Notebook (2004), Schindler’s List (1993) or The Boy in the Striped Pajamas (2008).

  Physical:

  Your story and characters cause the reader or audience member to react physically. This can be something they do afterwards or it can change their physical behavior. Think about movies such as Rocky Horror Picture Show (1975), Rocky IV (1985), Erin Brockovich (2000) and Jaws (1975) and Jurassic World (2015).

  Spiritual:

  Your story and characters connect to the value system of the reader that benefits their souls and connects them consciously or perhaps even unconsciously with their own existence within the universe. Think about scripts and films like Gandhi (1982), Castaway (2000) or The Life of Pi (2012).

  So let’s look at the ways we use to present our stories and characters. We can look at this presentation in terms of three formats:

  The Pitch:

  A pitch meeting usually takes place in an office setting where you will present your idea (not script) to one or more persons. Now, I want to stop here and say that a pitch meeting on its face value is of course talking about your idea. But it is not as simple as that. When you into such a meeting it is important to build a connection with this person, per
haps establishing a connection by mentioning someone you both know. This will sound strange, but I think it’s important to let them do the talking. Let them tell you about themselves, the kind of projects they do and what they are looking for. This will make them feel better about themselves and like you for allowing them to do it. Finally, when your moment arrives to talk about your idea, make sure it is prepared. Don’t just make it up as you go. You should have a rehearsed set of bullet points when you present your idea. Be prepared and start your story at the end and make them want to wonder how it will all turn out in the end. If they have any questions or criticisms, try to address them but don’t get defensive. Lastly, close them. Just like they do, you want to know what’s going to happen next and get them to give you an indication of what that will be.

  The pitch then, is a very short form way to present your story. But all the same concepts we have discussed here should apply.

  The Treatment – a summary of your script or book

  A treatment is often referred to as a blue print for a full script just as a screenplay is the blue print for the full movie. In this shortened version or preview you need to state your idea, its story, characters and somehow frame it in a way that they will love it so much that they will want to read the whole script. I will be honest with you. I hate the idea of a treatment. I’d rather do a pitch and then go directly to script. A treatment is like eating part of a meal. When you serve it, you have little or no control over whether they will like those parts you are serving. I’m having the Tuscan Chicken this evening only I am have a small bite with two carrots and a sliver of potato. I hate dark meat.

  (Audience laughter)

  The truth is, the Tuscan Chicken has both and also other vegetables but I only was served the carrots. It’s a losing proposition. I’d rather pitch the idea and make them want to read the whole script or in reality have someone else read the whole script. I think treatments are fine, if you want to use it for your own internal purposes to see how your book will translate into the film medium.