Larry Cohen

by Michael Doyle

  No, I think about me.

  Do you write at a particular time of day? Do you work set hours?

  I don’t write at any specific time of day. I more or less write in my spare time. I write when I have the chance, but I don’t write to a regular schedule. I’ve never written to set hours. Back when I was first married and had kids, I used to write late at night after everybody went to sleep. I would wait for my wife and children to go to bed and then I would sneak downstairs and work from midnight until about four o’clock. I would then go to sleep, wake up in the morning and read the pages that I’d written the night before. I usually couldn’t remember exactly what I had written and I used to find that fascinating, actually. It was almost like I was reading the scenes for the first time. It was like the work was totally subconscious and was coming from a different place — the depths of my subconscious mind. I would read this stuff as I was rubbing the sleep out of my eyes and be amazed at how good it often was. I’d go, “Wow! A little gremlin must have come in here last night and done all this!” [Laughs]

  How conscious are you of theme and subtext before or during the writing? Or do you impose meaning onto some of these narratives post-mortem?

  I don’t impose any meaning; it’s just there to be interpreted by people. I don’t consciously cook up a pre-emptive theme or allegory and then start writing it. Sometimes, a moral emerges during the writing; other times, it only becomes apparent to me after I’ve finished the script. So, it’s not a conscious thing.

  Some critics have detected themes and motifs in your work that they claim relate to Judaism and Jewish-ness. I know you’ve been asked about this previously and have insisted that you are not conscious of it. Were you being completely honest?

  Oh, absolutely. It’s not something I consciously think about when I’m writing. If you are analysing my pictures and you want to fix a Jewish angle on all the work, well, okay. God bless you! But you shouldn’t ignore other things that are in there, too, as there are a lot of different themes and motifs in my movies. There’s stuff about family, social issues, politics, sexuality. A lot of things. It’s not only the religious aspects.

  What things encourage these religious readings in your opinion?

  Well, there are characters in my movies that are gods or are god-like, but I think all of that is seen from a very human perspective. Do you know what I mean? There’s always that sense of fallibility and mystery, because I don’t know all the answers. Nobody does. I just write these things and, again, it all comes out of my subconscious. Yeah, some people do see Jewishness in my work, but I always say the same thing over and over again: I don’t know where it comes from. I once went to a question and answer session with Robin Wood, and one kid claimed he’d found a lot of Jewish things in my movies. He started pointing to various scenes that supported his argument and it was all very cogent and eloquent. I just didn’t agree with it!

  Specifically, what scenes did this person refer to?

  Oh, I don’t know. One was the scene in It’s Alive where the milkman is killed and the bottles shatter and the milkman’s blood mingles with the milk. This kid felt that moment was an explicit reference to the dietary decrees of Jewish law, in that you cannot eat a meal that mixes meat and milk. What he said was very well thought-out, but it couldn’t have been further from my intentions. It was just an idea I had, that’s all. All the meanings he read into it were the product of his imagination, not mine.

  As a writer, do you often sympathize with your characters, or do you prefer to maintain a distant objectivity?

  I do sympathise with some of them. I try to get inside a character’s head. Sometimes, you sympathise and empathise with characters when you are writing them because they are feeling moments of pain, fear, doubt, and shame. You can relate to those negative emotions as a human being. As a parent, you can sympathise with the parents of the monster babies in the It’s Alive films and imagine how you would feel and behave if that was your child; if you were suddenly responsible for bringing this despised and feared creature into the world. Contrary to that, anyone who has ever felt alone or abandoned or rejected, can sympathise with the plight of the monster baby. You may not have maliciously killed anyone in cold blood, or maybe you have, I don’t know, but it’s still relatable to your own life, your own experiences, your own thoughts and feelings. If you can inhabit a character when you are creating them, never mind how despicable or undesirable they may be, I think that can only help you as a writer. Of course, if you haven’t got any personal experience of something, in the end it all comes down to instinct and imagination.

  One source of strength for your characters is the family unit and its central importance in life, but it’s also the source of the horror in your films, isn’t it?

  Yes. Horror comes from the home as surely as love does. Those you love can often do you serious harm — even kill you — and the family experience can be painful and destructive. In Bone, you have a seemingly prosperous American family, but then the underside of it is the husband and wife hate each other and their son is locked up on a drug wrap. The entire idealized version of the American family is turned inside out. In It’s Alive, It Lives Again, and God Told Me To, there are families mired in guilt, confusion, and violence, and it all grows out of the blood relations. All of the great plays that have been written by the likes of Eugene O’Neil and Arthur Miller deal directly with the family. The family seems to be the beginning of everything, and that’s where all the trouble lies. The family is the sanctuary and the battleground. It’s actually true that you are more likely to be killed by a member of your own family than a complete stranger. They say that most murders happen amongst acquaintances, and so people will kill other people that they know quite well, like a family member, a friend, or a business partner. People are always worried about somebody breaking into their homes and doing them harm, but they are often in more danger from the people they live with — and love — than any external threat.

  A stick that has been used to beat horror and science fiction cinema is the lack of characters that are consistently well-developed, layered, and articulate. Is that something you always strive to establish in your writing?

  Yes, totally, and I think it’s true — a lot of horror and science fiction films are shallow. Historically in horror movies, particularly those made during the 1950s and ‘60s, the characters were mostly cardboard figures, who would utter this incredibly stupid dialogue. Developing characters and giving them something important to say was secondary. The casting was often highly ridiculous, too. They would have some beautiful girl with big breasts and glasses, stumbling through her dialogue, and we’d have to simply accept that she was a nuclear physicist. You’d see the movie and say, “Sure, of course Raquel Welch is a scientist!” It was absurd. The characters in horror movies were often completely inane. They wouldn’t have any true conflicts between them except that they would be running around trying to kill the monster. If you go back to the films that were done at Universal in the 1930s, there were some solid characterisations and wonderful casts. The studio would employ fine British actors, like Claude Rains in The Invisible Man, Sir Cedric Hardwicke in The Invisible Man Returns, and Boris Karloff in Frankenstein. Those films had strong performances and they meant something. Karloff’s portrayal of the Monster is one of the great film performances of all time and certainly one of the most iconic. Later on, when you got into the 1950s and pictures like The Creature from the Black Lagoon were made, the actors were less accomplished. Those films were mostly populated with B-movie actors, who weren’t very good, playing underwritten characters in seriously undernourished stories. By the 1970s, when they started making pictures like Jaws and Alien, the acting obviously got a lot of better, as horror and science fiction were embraced by the big studios and awarded higher budgets. As a result, those movies attracted a higher calibre of actor. Even though my pictures had low-budgets, they still have some of the best acting that you will find in any horror and science fiction m
ovies. The parts that Tony Lo Bianco played in God Told Me To, Michael Moriarty played in Q, and John P. Ryan in It’s Alive, are all remarkable, regardless of budget or genre. They are at a much higher level of quality than what you usually see.

  Would it be prudent to say that the emphasis on character in genre films is often sacrificed in favor of a concentration on scares and violence?

  Sure, but it all starts with the script: discovering who your characters are; the world they inhabit, what happens to them, and how they react to what has occurred. A lot of writers will consciously punctuate a horror script with a scare or a messy kill every few pages, probably because they don’t have enough confidence in their material. I never work that way because it’s too restrictive. I think that some of my movies were not as scary as they perhaps could have been. They might have been more successful if they were less literate, less intelligent, and concentrated on being just plain frightening. At the box office, horror movies are basically more successful in direct relation to their scare ratio. In other words, the number of times the audience jumps in the theater throughout the film’s running time. If a horror movie has two or three good jump-scares, you probably have a hit regardless of the picture’s overall quality. I think my horror movies mostly contained one great jump-scare, a lot of good dialogue, sophisticated characters, and strong performances. That’s not always what makes for a big box office hit, but it does create a movie that has some kind of longevity to it. People do appreciate these pictures over a period of time and still talk about my films. In the case of It’s Alive, I think it even brings a tear to your eye at the end when Frank Davis finds the monster baby in the storm drains, picks it up in his arms, and tries to save it. That is not the typical climax of your standard horror movie, which aims for scares and violence as opposed to having an emotional impact on the audience. You don’t have a strong emotional dimension in many horror movies.

  You have complained of being left frustrated and angered by the tampering of your screenplays by various directors and producers. Did you exhibit that same sense of ruthlessness when you were adapting novels like I, the Jury and The Ex, or did your own experiences compel you to be true to the source material?

  No. I would just read the book, get the basic idea of the story, and then I wrote the script without ever once looking back. As a matter of fact, I may have only read those particular books you mentioned once and then that was it. Anyway, I was not only translating those books into a different medium, I was also doing my own version of somebody else’s story. I certainly never felt guilty or concerned about making any changes that I felt were necessary. I’ve never had one sleepless night about it.

  Some authors and screenwriters have complained about the destructive aspects of writing; how the process can deplete, damage, or destroy you. Is that something you can connect with?

  No, not at all. I very much enjoy writing — all kinds of writing. It’s such a kick to write a script, finish it, and send it out into the world. I find the whole process to be very easy, so I don’t find the act of creating to be destructive. Quite the reverse, actually; it’s exhilarating and stimulating. I mean, sure, writing can sometimes be a lonely business. You are often just sitting there alone in a room, scribbling like crazy or pounding away on a computer. That can feel isolating for some writers, but I find the actual writing, creating new characters, stories, and scenes to be a lot of fun. I see it more as a voyage of discovery, not something that can destroy you. Frustration and bitterness at not getting your books published or your screenplays produced — now that can certainly destroy you! Of course, frustration and bitterness can also come from having your scripts produced and they in no way resemble what you originally wrote. That can be almost as bad, except for the money.

  Have you ever experienced writer’s block?

  No, never.

  Is there a secret to your immense productivity?

  If there was a secret to my being so prolific I would certainly tell you. I just find it very easy to write and I tend not to examine why that is. You are only truly a writer when you are writing. Maybe that’s why I keep on doing it. If I could point to one thing it would probably be the fact that when I am writing, I’m excited to see where the story is heading. I don’t know where it’s going and I’m anxious to find out. That keeps me energised and working hard every day. Maybe that’s the secret.

  Do you do much in the way of rewriting?

  No, not a great deal. I really only do a small amount of rewriting. Some scripts need a little polish and a few loose ends tidied up, but once it’s done it’s done.

  I once read an interview in which you revealed that you actually write your screenplays with the aid of a pen and paper.

  Yes, lately, I do. I used to write all of my earlier scripts by dictation. I used to dictate into a tape recorder. Before that, I used to dictate the words to a secretary, but I eventually wore all the secretaries down. They would quite literally collapse, so I purchased a tape recorder. After that, I then started writing in longhand.

  Was there any particular reason for why you didn’t use a typewriter, a word processor, or a computer?

  I just enjoyed the process of writing more by doing it that way. Actually, and this is going way back, I once got a staple stuck in my finger. It seemed pretty innocuous at the time, but the wound just wouldn’t heal itself. Eventually, I had to have an operation and the surgeons had to graft some skin from my arm and put my hand in a cast. This forced me into dictating my scripts, but I quickly realized that I could get a lot of work done. So, out of that misfortune came something good. It was so easy and I found it very comfortable and productive to work that way.

  Didn’t you find it difficult not actually seeing the words appear or emerge on the page in front of you?

  I don’t like to see anything on a screen. I like to write the whole script and then look at it afterwards. I don’t like to read it while I’m writing it. I don’t like to judge what I’m writing. I like to get fully involved with a story and then just speed on ahead.

  Do you think the process you use directly affects the number of pages you write, the length and structure of the script, and the duration of certain scenes?

  That’s a good question, but I never think about things like that. I don’t like to write to any particular form at all. I just write the screenplay as I see the movie unfolding in my imagination. I certainly don’t follow any kind of formula, procedure, or structure that you might read about in a book on screenwriting or might hear in a class about screenwriting. I mean, you have that famous guy who apparently teaches the rules of screenwriting …uh, what’s his name?

  Robert McKee.

  That’s him. I hate McKee’s writing class and everything he stands for. The fact that he is telling everybody where everything has to be in order for a script to be considered a good one, it just seems ridiculous to me. Far too many people have read his books or attended his classes, and this is viewed as some kind of proof or endorsement of McKee’s methods and suggestions. To me, it just seems stupid. Here is a man who has never sold a script and never had a picture produced, and yet he has the audacity to tell everyone else how to write screenplays. What the hell does he know about screenwriting? The man is a fool — or perhaps he isn’t. I mean, people actually pay him to be told about Casablanca! What amazes me is the fact that Casablanca is the most atypical screenplay ever written. First of all, it’s a stage play adapted into a movie. Secondly, it mostly all happens at Rick’s Café on the one set. Thirdly, the ending was written at the last minute. That’s not the way screenplays are written. McKee doesn’t know anything about anything, except for taking people’s money.

  Do you detect McKee’s influence on how screenplays are being written?

  I think several things have happened in the wake of McKee’s success: firstly, studio executives, who have taken his class or read his books, now believe that McKee’s model is the law. If a script comes in that doesn’t follow McKee’s form, they imm
ediately assume that it’s bad because they don’t know any better. Studio executives have no creative ability anyway. Most of them are a bunch of pretentious fools. They can’t really do anything. They can’t write, they can’t produce, they can’t direct, they can’t compose. All they can do is sit there telling everybody else what they should or should not be doing. They have no credentials whatsoever, no knowledge that gives them any kind of insight, and yet they can still come in with their little notepads and tell everybody what to do. They are a bunch of idiots, frankly, but you have to put up with them. Of course, I don’t have to put up with them too much because I usually write screenplays on spec. I just sell them the script when it’s finished, so I don’t always have to endure their wisdoms.

  If you don’t subscribe to any particular structure or method of screenwriting, what about the actual layout of your scripts?

  I don’t follow any layout. I just write the scripts. I start telling the story as I’m watching the movie in my head and I just lay it out. Again, it’s like I’m freely drawing everything out of my subconscious. I speak into the tape recorder, or I write on a piece of paper, what the scene is I’m imagining. I don’t know what’s coming next and I don’t know where it’s going. I just make it up as I go along. I’m not working from a step outline, as I’m just taking an idea and letting it evolve naturally. It’s almost like automatic writing, really. That’s the only way I can explain it that makes any sense.