The Devil’s Guide To Hollywood

by Joe Eszterhas

  “I went back to Mayer’s office and explained the situation—and he agreed to give Saroyan a check in full. I raced back to Saroyan and told him I’d deposit the check, take my commission, and give him the rest tomorrow.

  “ ‘No, I want the money in cash, now.’

  “ ‘You’re crazy, can’t you wait two days?’

  “He apparently couldn’t—his bookies had threatened him.

  Back I went to Mayer, who called Business Affairs. And they arranged for the bank to bring the money over to the studio in hundred-dollar bills. I took the loot to the parking lot, and stood with Saroyan as we counted the money out on the hood. With every ten thousand he took, I’d take a thousand for myself, until I had my fifteen grand and he had the rest. Then he went off to pay his bookie.”

  Get a piece of the ice pick and white scarf sales.

  My lawyer got me a healthy percentage of the merchandising from Basic Instinct after a long struggle with the studio’s Business Affairs lawyers.

  Of course, there was no merchandising for Basic Instinct.

  If you sell your script, try to get a credit as executive producer, too.

  There are so many producer credits these days that your agent shouldn’t have much of a problem getting this in your contract.

  If you get the credit, it means you’ll get your name on-screen and on the poster (the “one sheet”) twice—as writer and executive producer.

  Seeing your name on-screen twice might help the audience think that this is your movie and not the director’s.

  What kind of power does being executive producer of your film give you?

  None.

  I know. I executive-produced many of my films. Anyone from the actor’s manager to the producer’s son to the director’s mistress can get a producer credit today.

  “Producer” and “executive producer” credits have become more or less meaningless except for people like Jerry Bruckheimer, Brian Grazer, or Scott Rudin, who truly are old-time Sam Spiegel–like producers.

  What being the executive producer of your film might give you—if your agent insists—is your own director’s chair with your name imprinted on it.

  Naomi and I have several of these scattered around the house. Our cats love them, but because of their height, they’re a potential death trap for toddlers.

  So take care. If your director’s chair breaks your child’s neck, well, that would be the ultimate irony, wouldn’t it?

  Back-End Points

  What Eddie Murphy referred to as “monkey points,” a percentage of profits. They are called back-end points not just because the terms are defined in the back of a contract but because—since the points never pay off, due to the studio’s accounting practices—they stick it up your back end.

  ALL HAIL

  Preston Sturges!

  He was the first screenwriter to get a percentage of his film’s profits. He sold The Power and the Glory, an original script, in 1930 for a small advance and big back-end points.

  Now that you’ve sold your script, you’re really in deep shit.

  Mike Medavoy: “The average studio now has thirty people doing story notes, twenty people playing producer (and taking screen credit for it, too), and focus groups composed of disaffected Generation Xers causing entire films to be reedited into cookie-cutter models.”

  Google the studio execs you’ll be meeting with.

  The first time I met Brandon Tartikoff, I was armed with every detail about the life of Ryne Duren, a near-blind former New York Yankees relief pitcher who, I knew, was one of Tartikoff’s heroes.

  As soon as I walked in, I spotted a framed baseball card of Duren on a wall. I was off to the races, talking about Duren, telling Brandon things even he didn’t know. The object of my meeting was to try to get Brandon to approve my friend Tom Berenger in the cast of Sliver. Thanks, I am convinced, to Ryne Duren, Brandon agreed to cast Tom “as a favor” to me.

  Prepare for your creative meetings.

  Irealized a few hours before Jimi Hendrix’s sister and brother-in-law were to come to my house in Malibu that I didn’t have any paintings of Jimi on my walls, while I did have paintings of Dylan and the Stones on display.

  I quickly called a friend who had a Ronnie Wood print of Jimi, and he took it off his wall and messengered it to my house. I put it up on my wall, replacing Dylan just as Jimi’s sister and brother-in-law were pulling into my driveway.

  They were impressed by the print of Jimi they saw on the wall, but ultimately they turned down my offer to do a script of Jimi’s life.

  If you’re going to your first studio meeting and you’re terrified, remembering this will terrify you.

  Keep in mind what Mike Medavoy, former studio head, said about studio people: They don’t change their underwear all that often.

  If you have a meeting at the studio, don’t park on the lot.

  Screenwriter James Brown: “I meet with the producer at Warner Bros. At the main gate that afternoon is a long line of cars waiting for the guard to check them through. Ahead of me are a Mercedes, two BMWs, and a Porsche. I am driving an eleven-year old Nissan pickup with a broken muffler, and it’s loud. People are staring at me and I’m suddenly self-conscious. On a whim I put it into reverse, and instead of parking on the studio lot as I was instructed to do, I leave my old truck at a meter down the street and walk back to the guard’s booth.”

  Don’t take any breakfast meetings.

  Novelist/screenwriter Jay McInerney: “A breakfast meeting is the nastiest and most inelegant of Hollywood inventions.”

  Tell the people who want to meet with you for breakfast that you write at night and don’t get to bed till five or six in the morning.

  Try to avoid meetings with a whole roomful of studio executives.

  John Gregory Dunne: “To attend one of those meetings is to understand the cold truth of the saying that a camel is a horse made by a committee.”

  Check your crotch before a meeting.

  Comedian Alan King: “Never walk into a meeting with a creased crotch.”

  Don’t wear shorts to a studio meeting.

  There is a dress code you should follow—jeans, sneakers, vintage rock-and-roll T-shirt or new Tommy Bahama silk shirt (not oversized, but hanging out), and a baseball cap (not a MLB hat or a trucker’s hat—they’re for star actors—but the kind that sits snugly over your head and doesn’t sit like a crown up there). Shades are okay, but they should be taken off as soon as you walk into the room.

  If you go to a script meeting at a studio, hug everyone there.

  Hugs are much better now than they were in the past,” a retired agent in her seventies said to me. “People are in much better shape than they were in the old days, when a hug meant being bounced off of some fat belly.”

  If you’re sitting in a story meeting …

  Let them talk first, even if they want you to.

  Dodge and say, “You know, I’m really interested in hearing your ideas. I’ve always been much more of a listener than a talker.”

  Someone in the room will invariably say, “That’s why you’re such a good writer.”

  Smile shyly then and, looking humble, say, “Thank you.”

  In a story meeting about a script they haven’t yet bought …

  Say as little as possible.

  There are probably people in the room who will steal what you are saying and plug it into another project they are overseeing.

  The surest way for a studio to get a bunch of fresh ideas on a doddering project is to do a series of meetings with auditioning screenwriters who want to be hired for the project.

  Chances are good that the studio will steal your ideas and then hire a “pro” who doesn’t do auditions.

  The studio will then give the this so-called pro their “notes,” incorporating all the ideas that the studio execs stole from all the screenwriters they auditioned.

  In a story meeting after they’ve bought your script …

  Understand th
at no matter how friendly these people are being to you, all they really want to do is to impregnate your script with their syphilitic story ideas.

  You can do a little kissy face, and you can even do a little petting, but don’t let them stick it in. Once they stick it in, they will not pull it out before the movie comes out.

  When the movie comes out, it will minimally look like them and not like you.

  If you let them stick it in often, the movie won’t look like you at all. It will be all theirs.

  Know, too, that if the movie is stillborn, the film doctors will blame your script for its demise. The name on the script will be yours, not that of the studio executives who stuck it into you.

  Steal their cigars.

  Screenwriter Calder Willingham felt producer Sam Spiegel was picking on him unfairly during their story meetings. So each time Spiegel went to the bathroom, Willingham stole one of his cigars.

  Studio execs know they can’t write.

  That’s why they need you.

  So as you sit there in a meeting with them, don’t take notes on the stupid ideas they are telling you, and don’t tell them how smart they are, because underneath their BS, they know they can’t write.

  Don’t be afraid to tell them they don’t know what they’re talking about; they know they don’t and in their hearts (deep, deep in their plaqued-up hearts) they agree with you.

  To put it in Hollywood terms:

  They won’t respect you if you swallow. So gag.

  And spit it back up in their faces if you don’t like the taste of it.

  It’s okay to throw up after a meeting.

  Screenwriter/playwright Harold Pinter: “As soon as he read my script Accident, the producer Sam Spiegel summoned me to his office. He began his commentary by saying, ‘You call this a screenplay?’ He then said, ‘You can’t make a movie out of this. Who are these people? I don’t know anything about them. I don’t know anything about their background. I don’t know what they’re doing. I don’t understand what they’re up to. I don’t understand one thing. I think you have to seriously rethink the whole script.’

  “I said, ‘No, I’m not rethinking it. That’s it.’ When I got out of there, I was sick on the pavement.”

  Your script is probably doomed.

  Director Jean-Pierre Melville: “I’ll tell you what makes a good film. Fifty percent is the choice of the story. Fifty percent is the screenplay. Fifty percent is the actors. Fifty percent is the director. Fifty percent is the cinematographer. Fifty percent is the editor. If any of these elements goes wrong, there goes fifty percent of your film.”

  If they can’t find a director willing to direct your script …

  Remember that Elia Kazan, John Ford, Howard Hawks, Nicholas Ray, Carol Reed, William Wyler, and Fred Zinne-mann all passed on directing The Bridge on the River Kwai.

  If they can’t find a producer willing to produce your script …

  Remember that producer Sam Spiegel passed on the first James Bond script, saying, “It’s utter nonsense.”

  If they’ve been trying to cast your script for six months without success …

  Remember that Albert Finney and Marlon Brando turned down playing the lead in Lawrence of Arabia.

  If you want Spielberg to read your script and Tom Hanks to star in it …

  Convince Lori Goddard, who highlights hair in Beverly Hills, to read it.

  If she likes it, she can tell Kate Capshaw about it—Lori does Kate’s highlights.

  If Kate likes it, she’ll tell her husband, Steven Spielberg, about it and Steven will read it.

  If Steven likes it, he’ll tell his friend Tom Hanks to read it, too.

  Don’t worry about getting a big star into your film; stars don’t matter.

  When we got Sylvester Stallone into F.I.S.T., coming right off of Rocky, we were overjoyed. The movie tanked.

  Jeff Bridges hadn’t had a hit movie in many years when he did Jagged Edge; nevertheless, the movie became a hit.

  Sharon Stone was perhaps the biggest star in the world when she did Sliver, coming right off of Basic Instinct. It didn’t matter. The movie failed.

  Nobody had ever heard of Jennifer Beals when she did Flashdance; despite that, the movie went on to make 500 million.

  I got Sylvester Stallone, Jackie Chan, and Whoopi Goldberg into An Alan Smithee Film: Burn Hollywood Burn; the movie bombed.

  Also think Harrison Ford in Random Hearts, Kevin Costner in The Postman, Sean Connery in The Avengers, John Travolta and Dustin Hoffman in Mad City.

  How not to deal with the director of your film …

  You don’t have to bend over this low … or stick it up in the air this high.

  Screenwriter Ron Bass (Rain Man): “I wasn’t smart enough to get it right away, but Steven Spielberg was extremely patient with me. He talked with me until I started to realize this was not only something to get behind but was really a much better way than I’d been going. Then we started to meet with Dustin Hoffman and Tom Cruise. There were four-way meetings at Steven’s house at the beach. Tom was in many of them and Dustin was in all of them. They were cowriters. It was just unbelievable. We invented scenes together; we invented the character together. … I can’t tell you how much Dustin contributed and how much Steven contributed. Then I went away and wrote this long draft. Dustin really liked it and Tom really liked it. Steven liked it, but he felt it needed more work than the actors did. So we continued to meet and talk about what it needed. And then we reached a moment in time when Steven realized that he wasn’t going to be able to do the movie … so [Dustin] went to Sydney Pollack, obviously one of the great directors who’s ever directed. … And he’s a very gracious guy. … These are like the nicest guys, these directors. They’re not only great directors, they’re also really great people to work with.”

  Don’t be open to too many ideas about changing your script.

  You’re the writer; they’re not. Plus this: Most of their ideas will be asinine. Believe me: I’ve heard thirty years of asinine ideas.

  Gather around, class, here’s point number one: A gaffer on the Betrayed set told me he had an idea about my script that he wanted to discuss with me. I grabbed him by his lapels, bounced him off the wall, and hit him in the liver with a beautiful left hook.

  Point number two: I carry a hunting knife with me to studio meetings sometimes. I began one meeting by taking the knife and sticking it into the middle of a studio conference table, a stunt I had learned while I was a writer at Rolling Stone.

  Point number three: I left a gigantic dent in a William Morris Agency’s conference table by smashing it with my African Dogon walking stick.

  Class dismissed, boys and girls.

  If they mess with you, give them a little taste of the old ultraviolence.

  Fight the morons if they want to change what you’ve written.

  Paddy Chayefsky: “You spill your guts into the typewriter, which is why you can’t stand to see what you write destroyed or degraded into a hunk of claptrap by picture butchers.”

  After a young director butchered one of my scripts behind my back, I sent him a twenty-page memo when I discovered what he had done. The memo questioned his brains, his lineage, and his masculinity. He had a heart attack after reading the memo and almost died. He was in his thirties.

  Don’t let ’em convince you to rewrite it.

  A playwright completely rewrote his play when producers told him it was unproducible. They also told him to change the title to Free and Clear.

  He threw his rewrite away and decided to go with his original title. Arthur Miller did very well, thank you, with Death of a Salesman.

  ALL HAIL

  Harlan Ellison!

  When Star Trek producer Gene Roddenberry rewrote one of Ellison’s scripts, the screenwriter/novelist publicly said this about him: “Gene Roddenberry has about as much writing ability as the lowest industry hack.”

  If your script gets butchered, Robert McKee may have done it.
r />   McKee told a reporter in Melbourne, Australia, that he works for studios sometimes as a “story doctor.”

  This is a doctor whose patients (his own scripts) have all died (unproduced) except for the one patient who lived and became a television movie.

  First he teaches you how to write and then he kills what you’ve written.

  Don’t worry about hurting their feelings.

  I’ve said things like this to studio execs:

  “You don’t know what the fuck you’re talking about.”

  “That’s the stupidest thing I’ve ever heard in a meeting like this.”

  “I make more money than you do, so don’t give me any suggestions.”

  One executive called me “temperamental.”

  Another executive said, “That’s why you write so well. Because you believe in yourself so much.”

  Another thanked me for my “passion” and said, after I’d insulted her, “That’s why you’re so successful, because you’re so passionate.”

  I grabbed her and kissed her hard, put her across her desk, knocking the silver-framed picture of her husband and kids down, and tore her black Prada. (Just kidding, and apologies to Mickey Spillane, Frank Miller, Michael Ovitz, and my friend Gloria Steinem.)

  If the studio gives you script notes …

  Tear them up.

  That’s what screenwriter/novelist Michael Crichton does when the studio gives him notes. When he finishes writing his first draft, he walks away and says, “Thank you very much and fuck you.”

  Most of the people who are writing these memos today have MBAs, don’t read, are too busy writing script notes to see too many movies. Their references in the script notes are to other movies—none going back past 1985—few of which they’ve actually seen, and certainly none shot in black and white.

  If you listen to the suggestions contained in these notes, it’s possible that you’ll get your script made, but it is also very possible that critics will eviscerate it (and you) and other studio execs won’t hire you to do anything else or buy any of your other scripts.