You think I didn't root for Ben to win Cameron Diaz?
The Farrellys think it's another scene that makes the movie.
Peter Farrelly says, "It was where Matt Dillon comes back and he says--wow, she's grown heavy and she's on welfare and she's got kids and she's got all sorts of problems and we show Ben go home that night and he thinks about it and comes back the next day and says, 'I still want to meet her.' And he says maybe he can help her out, I can't let it go.
"Because that's true love. Anybody could fall in love with Cameron Diaz. Come on, you see Cameron Diaz and you'd want to chase her fifteen years. Why root for that? You know, who wouldn't? But even when he thought she was a whale and she was on welfare, and had a bunch of kids out of wedlock, he still wanted her because he was in love with her. And so at that point, the audience says--he deserves it. And that, I think, is why it works."
Understand something--movie scenes, like scenes from plays, are not finally intended for the page. They were written with actors and directors very much in mind. In fiction, the novelist or short story writer is your sole companion and you view his world through his eyes. Same with a poet.
On the printed page, the explosive quality of the Zipper Scene can never totally come across. (The second time I saw it, I thought the man in front of me was literally going to die before it was over.)
But you can tell on even one reading that the quality is there.
Most brilliant movie writing tends to be ignored by the critics.
For many reasons, the writer traditionally has been ignored when it comes to kudos. Very few of us get away with it. Callie Khouri did on Thelma and Louise, Bob Towne with Chinatown, me with Butch. But we are not favored by the media. We do not get sent out to do television talk shows. That you expect. What's hard is when stars--who for the most part write as well as most six-year-olds--say they make up their parts. (I would love to have Conan or Jay ask to see a star's screenplay, then read it on the air.) And directors rarely take less than all the credit they can get.
You must deal with that as your career goes on. It ain't gonna change. But the media must love someone. If Steven Spielberg had directed the Zipper Scene, all the critics you've ever heard of would have written something along these lines: "After all these years of thrilling us with dramatic adventures, who would have guessed his genius could move so easily to farce. There is no end to the man's talents. You can feel his touch behind every line of dialogue. More, Steven, please."
If James Cameron had been behind the camera, the huzzahs would have been of this order: "Of course he is a master of size, of special effects, but who would have guessed the man was also a comic genius. There were hints of this wit in some earlier work--especially Aliens--but here he just lets it fly. Next, George Bernard Shaw? Please, James."
The fact is that both these wonderfully gifted directors are as helpless as Jo-Jo the Dog-faced Boy when given anything remotely connected with laughter. But the Mary scene is so good, someone has to get credit for it. Couldn't have been the writer, could it now?
* * *
Why Do We Write?
I write out of revenge.
I write to balance the teeter-totter of my childhood. Graham Greene once said one of the great things: an unhappy childhood is a writer's gold mine.
I have no idea if my early years were unhappy or not, since I have childhood amnesia (not as uncommon as you might think). Zero memories of my first six years of life. Oh, I've been told things that happened, there are family photos of this or that, but it's all secondhand.
I once went to see a shrink who specialized in regression. I am, it turns out, surprisingly hypnotizable. But we decided there was no reason to proceed, since my life was going along without more than the usual amount of bad stuff.
But I'll bet if I had gone visiting, it would have been dark down there.
I was a novelist for a decade before I began this madness known as screenwriting, and someone pointed out to me that the most sympathetic characters in my books always died miserably. I didn't consciously know I was doing that. I didn't. I mean, I didn't wake up each morning and think, today I think I'll make a really terrific guy so I can kill him. It just worked out that way.
I haven't written a novel in over a decade--although I hope to have a hand in Buttercup's Baby soon--and someone very wise suggested that I might have stopped writing novels because my rage was gone. It's possible.
All this doesn't mean a helluva lot, except probably there is a reason I was the guy who gave Babe over to Szell in the "Is is safe?" scene and that I was the guy who put Westley into The Machine.
I think I have a way with pain. When I come to that kind of sequence I have a certain confidence that I can make it play. Because I come from such a dark corner. I wonder if there is any connection between why you write and what you write well.
Anyway, you know my m.o., think about yours.
* * *
When Harry Met Sally
by Nora Ephron
I have known Nora Ephron a quarter century, but it was not love at first sight. She was dating Carl Bernstein when I first met her, in Washington in '74, and I was trying to figure out the story for the movie of Bernstein and Bob Woodward's Watergate book, All the President's Men.
What Nora and Carl did was write their version of my screenplay and present it to Robert Redford, the producer, without my knowledge. It was the worst experience of my movie career (see Adventures in the Screen Trade for the gorier details). We both live in New York, didn't cross paths often, but once, a few years after her betrayal, we happened to be at the same dinner party, one with placecards yet, and I still remember my feeling of triumph when I caught her shifting cards so she and I would not be near each other.
Then, I don't remember really, a decade back, maybe a few years more, we were again at a gathering and she came over and said, "I'm really sorry," and I hugged her and that was forever that.
She is very famous now, perhaps the most successful woman director in the world (Sleepless in Seattle, Michael, You've Got Mail, among others). But she has always been famous, odd for a writer. Before movies, her novel Heartburn headed all the lists. She was well known when she first came to town, as a journalist. Wallflower at the Orgy, her first book of essays, established her, thirty years back.
Her folks were in the business, too, Phoebe and Henry Ephron, a top screenwriting team--Carousel, The Desk Set, among many others. They also wrote plays about her infancy--Three's a Family and Take Her, She's Mine--based on her letters from college.
Her first screenwriting credit--with Alice Arlen--was for Silkwood, a marvelous movie. Probably her most famous work, now and maybe forever, is going to be When Harry Met Sally.
It was a total sleeper, the first movie made by Castle Rock films. Rob Reiner had never had a commercial hit. Meg Ryan--and how did she miss getting an Oscar nomination for this work?--had never costarred in a hit. Billy Crystal had costarred in a couple of films, but a romantic lead?
And everyone fell in love with it. Good as it was then, it's much better now, because the quality of movies--not counting special-effects flicks--has dropped so low.
Ephron's screenplay does the heavy lifting, so all the others can twinkle. A bubble of a film, stylish as hell, filled with short witty scenes about the impossibility of love, gorgeous montages of New York as we all want it to be, and little vignettes of older couples talking to the camera of their love experiences--try getting that past a studio executive today.
Crystal's character fucks everything that moves. Ryan's, though she claims sexual knowledge, is mocked by him. He is the stud, she the professional virgin. Then, forty-four minutes in, they go to the Carnegie Deli for a snack. And this happens.
The Orgasm Scene
INT.--CARNEGIE DELICATESSEN--DAY
HARRY and SALLY are seated at a table, waiting for their sandwiches.
SALLY
What do you do with these women? Do you just get up out of bed and leave?
/> HARRY
Sure.
SALLY
Well, explain to me how you do it. What do you say?
A waiter brings their order.
HARRY
I say I have an early meeting, an early haircut, an early squash game.
SALLY
You don't play squash.
HARRY
They don't know that. They just met me.
SALLY
(rearranging the meat on her sandwich)
That's disgusting.
HARRY
I know. I feel terrible.
(takes a bite of sandwich)
SALLY
You know, I am so glad I never got involved with you. I just would have ended up being some woman you had to get out of bed and leave at three o'clock in the morning and go clean your andirons. And you don't even have a fireplace.
(quite irritated now, slapping the meat over quickly)
Not that I would know this.
HARRY
Why are you getting so upset? This is not about you.
SALLY
Yes it is. You're a human affront to all women. And I'm a woman.
(bites into sandwich)
HARRY
Hey, I don't feel great about this, but I don't hear anyone complaining.
SALLY
Of course not. You're out the door too fast.
HARRY
I think they have an okay time.
SALLY
How do you know?
HARRY
How do you mean, how do I know. I know.
SALLY
Because they ...?
(she makes a gesture with her hands)
HARRY
Yes, because they...
(he makes the same gesture back)
SALLY
How do you know they're really...
(she makes the same gesture)
HARRY
What are you saying? They fake orgasm?
SALLY
It's possible.
HARRY
Get outta here.
SALLY
Why? Most women, at one time or another, have faked it.
HARRY
Well, they haven't faked it with me.
SALLY
How do you know?
HARRY
Because I know.
SALLY
Oh right.
(sets her sandwich down)
That's right. I forgot. You're a man.
HARRY
What's that supposed to mean?
SALLY
Nothing. It's just that all men are sure it never happens to them, and most women at one time or another have done it, so you do the math.
HARRY
You don't think I can tell the difference?
SALLY
No.
HARRY
Get outta here.
HARRY bites into his sandwich. SALLY just stares at him. A seductive look comes over her face.
SALLY
Oooh!
HARRY, sandwich in hand, chewing his food, looks up at SALLY.
SALLY (CONT'D)
Oh! Oooh!
HARRY
Are you okay?
SALLY, her eyes closed, ruffles her hair seductively.
SALLY
Oh God!
HARRY is beginning to figure out what SALLY is doing.
SALLY (CONT'D)
Oooh! Oh God!
SALLY tilts her head back.
SALLY (CONT'D)
Oh!
Her eyes closed, she runs her hand over her face, down her neck.
SALLY (CONT'D)
Oh, my God! Oh yeah, right there.
HARRY looks around, noticing that others in the deli are noticing SALLY. She's really making a show now.
SALLY (CONT'D)
(gasps)
Oh!
A man in the background turns to look at her.
SALLY (CONT'D)
Oh! Oh!
(gasps)
Oh God! Oh yes!
HARRY, embarrassed, looks at her in disbelief.
SALLY (CONT'D)
(pounding the table with both hands)
Yes! Yes! Yes!
HARRY looks around, very embarrassed, smiles at customers. An OLDER WOMAN seated nearby stares.
SALLY (CONT'D)
Yes! Yes!
By now, the place is totally silent and everyone is watching.
SALLY (CONT'D)
Yes! Oh!
(still thumping table)
Yes, yes, yes!
SALLY leans her head back, as though experiencing the final ecstatic convulsions of an orgasm.
SALLY (CONT'D)
Yes! Yes! Yes!
She finally tosses her head forward.
SALLY (CONT'D)
Oh. Oh. Oh.
SALLY sinks down into her chair, tousling her hair, rubbing her hand down her neck to her chest.
SALLY (CONT'D)
Oh, God.
Then suddenly, the act is over. SALLY calmly picks up her fork, digs into her coleslaw, and smiles innocently at HARRY.
A WAITER approaches the OLDER WOMAN to take her food order. The woman looks at him.
OLDER WOMAN
I'll have what she's having.
FADE OUT.
What you cannot imagine now is the shock value of that scene. Yes, huge laughs, all that, but people simply could not believe that Meg Ryan FAKED AN ORGASM! When people talked about the flick, there was the usual have you seen? and then the bleed into didn't you love? and from there, quickly, could you believe it? And then the babble babble babble, is it true?
For those who could not resist this book because of my justly famous writings on sex in the twentieth century, here is what a famous therapist told me: Yes, all women do, and should. (To make the man feel, well, more manly, or when they are tired and want to get to sleep quickly.) Also, yes, all women deny they have ever done such a thing. They will admit they have heard of such behavior, perhaps even some of their friends have done it, but, no, they have not. And, alas, no, men cannot tell. Sorry, guys, no matter how magnificent our studliness, we cannot tell. The only change in a woman is this: for reasons known only to God, there is a slight rise in the temperature of the roof of her mouth. (Who else but me and Suzy tell you these things?) And if you can figure out how to measure that, I don't know what it is you're interested in, but it sure isn't sex.
One of the most unusual things about the scene is this: it ends on the biggest laugh of all, the Billy Crystal-inspired line, spoken by Rob Reiner's mom, Estelle, "I'll have what she's having." (Crystal is also responsible for one of my favorite lines in The Princess Bride. Miracle Max and his wife have just made this gigantic chocolate-covered miracle pill to bring Westley, the hero, back to life, and then they say that Westley shouldn't go swimming for at least a good hour.)
Love that.
Which is not to say I like it a whole lot when performers ad-lib over my lines. Because few do it well. Most suck. I am more aware than you are of my limitations, but I am a waaaay better writer than just about any actor you can mention (just as they outclass me in their discipline).
The problem comes when the star decides to ad-lib. Actually, this is as much the director's problem as mine, since hopefully I am not on the set. But if the director forces a smile and encourages the star, guess what--
--the star, feeling loved, which is all he wants to feel, will ad-lib forever. And if the director squelches the star, guess what--the star may well soon be sulking in a nearby trailer.
As you must realize by now, screenplays are not just dialogue. So does it matter, really, if a star misbehaves? Just to us, mainly. But there is nothing, spelled n-o-t-h-i-n-g, that a writer can do about it.
Most comedy scenes reach a peak somewhere in the middle and then it's a race to try and get out fast. The orgasm scene in Harry builds, then builds some more, and then takes off.
Clearly, Ephron and the Farrellys write in somewhat different
styles; overall, she relies more on wit, they are more at ease with physical comedy. But both these scenes have one crucial thing very much in common--
--the core of the comedy is based on embarrassment. A great deal of the laughter comes from the figure who is really doing nothing. Billy Crystal just sits there, first confused, then intrigued, then stunned at Meg Ryan's behavior. Ben Stiller gets huge laughs just standing, huddled, facing the corner of the bathroom as nightmares swirl all around him.
One of the reasons these are classic screenwriting scenes has to do with the skill of the writers in making those moments play so strongly. The funny moments shout out at you when you read the scenes. I think one of the reasons I admire these scenes so much is that I can't write them. There are occasionally funny things in Butch and The Princess Bride, but I did not set out to write a comedy scene. The laughs happened to be there.
I wish I could write funny, I think we all wish we could, but when I read stuff like this, here's what I think: Thank God somebody can.
* * *
Spitballing
People who know me well are well aware that my view of myself is less than Olympian. There are certain fields in which I can and do hold my own. No one is a greater sports nut, for example. (Not counting hockey.) Few are more passionate eaters. I will give anyone you know a run on their love for red wine. (Provably so--what other wine aficionado has written as big a disaster as your correspondent? viz: The Year of the Comet.)
But what I do better than anyone else on earth is spitball.
If you are a young screenwriter and for some reason unfamiliar with the term, write it down. You will be doing it for the rest of your life. It is possible to spitball on the phone, by e-mail, etc. But it is my view that it is best done in person. And it should not be done in a hurry. Spitballing sessions should run, at the least, several hours.
Spitballing is this: two or more people trying to find a story.
It's understood that the writer, the one who is drowning, is trying to tell a tale that at present is just lying there like toothpaste. Inert, barely breathing.
Which Lie Did I Tell?: More Adventures in the Screen Trade Page 16