Tag Archives: writing scripts

The Process of the Epstein Brothers

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“We worked only two hours a day,” Screenwriter Julius said of he and his identical twin brother Philip’s routine. The concept of concentrated brilliance was foreign to producer Jack Warner, who believed in a full day’s work – or at least a full day’s presence – for a full day’s pay.

“One day, we came in at 1:30 or 2:00 and Warner was furious. ‘Read your contract!,’ he said. ‘Bank presidents get in at 9:00 and you’re coming in the afternoon?!’ We had a half-finished script in our office and sent it to him and said, ‘Have the bank president finish the script.’

“A year or so later, we came in at 9:00 and sent him a scene. ‘The scene is terrible,’ he told us. Philip said to him, ‘How is it possible? It was written at 9:00.’

‘I want my money back!’ Warner yelled. My brother told him, ‘I’d love to give you your money back, but I just built a pool. If you’re ever in the neighborhood and feel like a swim…’

*Excerpted from Lax and Sperber’s Bogart

The Detachable Penis Script

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I am working on a script about penises becoming detachable. It’s an evolutionary thing which initially engenders terror but, when men learn that reconnection is simple, becomes a thing. Different models sprout, versions featuring thick members at the center and colorful off shoots that look like bundles of wobbly flowers.

This version becomes in demand, although it isn’t a question of manufacturing or purchasing them, just the body producing them. Those who display these become idolized and have their flowery genitalia featured on social media.

And then one of the vaunted influencers decides that he is actually a dog and then that becomes a thing.

Sophomoric Script: Ferges in Newfoundland

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I wrote the script Ferges in Newfoundland as in my third year of Film at Queen’s University in Kingston, Ontario.

Based on my hitchhiking trip shared in Young Chronicles VII – XX of this blog, it details experiences and conversations from the Newfoundland section of the trip. I have no idea why I called the main character Ferges, except that I wanted a name that was different.

The idea was to have Ferges act as a fly on the wall for different perspectives – RCMP officers, poachers, zealots, old-timers, single mothers, ragamuffins – so that the reader go a small picture of the people of the island.

But it doesn’t work, because Ferges is pretentious and the secondary characters serve only as explication.

Nobody does anything except Ferges, who hitchhikes across Newfoundland in one day so that he can take a boat to the French island of St. Pierre Miquelon. Why? None of it is explained.

Wave That Flag: Nostalgia is Everything

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My script, Wave That Flag, details my Deadhead days back in the ’80s. Quite simply, it’s just another coming-of-age, I-can’t-believe-I-did-that, Don’t-do-what-I-do-or-maybe-do-I-don’t-care, Those-were-the-days movie. It’s all about me, a plea for attention. Me. Aren’t you amazed by the things I did? Wasn’t I crazy? No one does it like me. That’s right. Look at me.

But that’s why it works. The big theme is chasing down the music. At its essence, it is about a sound, a path as it were, and I was on it, and I went in a direction that could be so clearly understood, that everyone can understand, and it was an incredible place to be. I was astonished that I was on it, just there in the middle of magical fantastical place, through the woods and fire, where nothing but amazing things happened.

It was a communal thing of splendor and everything was ahead. It could never end. That was the certainty. This eternity, the whole thing laid wide open, it would go on forever.

And then it didn’t. And so, it’s really about losing that, never having it, or remembering what it was like when I didn’t know what I know now, if I know anything. So, yes, nostalgia.