Chaplin
Better off silent
Is the original screenplay dead?
Major studios prefer the 'presold behemoth'
LOS ANGELES, California (Hollywood Reporter) -- His name is Charlie Kaufman, and he writes original screenplays; even when, technically, he's writing an "Adaptation," it morphs away from the source material into an uniquely original creation.
Odds are, Kaufman will take home an Oscar on February 27 for his defiantly unpredictable original screenplay "Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind." But in the process, he has become the great anomaly in Hollywood, the exception that proves the rule.
Kaufman has grabbed so much attention for such wildly genre-busting films as "Sunshine" and "Being John Malkovich" that he has become a brand name. (Contrary to myth, Kaufman does plenty of PR; he just hates having his picture taken.) Such actors as Nicolas Cage and Jim Carrey cut their price to be in his movies. Directors Spike Jonze ("Adaptation") and Michel Gondry ("Eternal Sunshine") are happy to collaborate with him. The IMDb listing for the original screenplay that Kaufman is currently writing reads, "Untitled Spike Jonze/Charlie Kaufman project."
In a film industry known for shunting scripters aside and type-casting them like actors -- he's good at action, she'll do the chick polish -- Kaufman has achieved a measure of autonomy. And, at the same time, he admits that he sweats and suffers for fear of being dull, familiar or ordinary.
But isn't that what screenwriters are supposed to do? Not anymore.
Most people in Hollywood stick Kaufman into his Resident Genius niche and leave him there. The major studios aren't looking for writers like him. His movies aren't huge grossers. His biggest hit, "Eternal Sunshine," grossed $34.5 million domestically. In the studio universe, that's chump change.
Instead, scripts like Kaufman's have become the purview of the mini-majors and specialty divisions, which are able to produce them on a budget. This year's nominations for original screenplay, as selected by the Writers Guild of America (WGA) and the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences (AMPAS), are largely culled from the studio indie ranks, which released such titles as Zach Braff's "Garden State," Keir Pearson and Terry George's "Hotel Rwanda," Mike Leigh's "Vera Drake" and Bill Condon's "Kinsey."
Walt Disney Co. subsidiary Miramax Films, known for its unusual support of solo scripters, co-financed "The Aviator," written by John Logan, along with Initial Entertainment Group and Warner Bros. Pictures.
"There are so few contenders in that category from the studio world," says Nancy Nigrosh, a literary agent at Innovative Artists.
That's because, as the Montecito Picture Co.'s Tom Pollock observes, studios aren't interested in "doing any movies that aren't presold behemoths. It's very hard to presell anything original." Given the enormous cost of making movies, the majors know what they want: event pictures aimed at the widest possible audience.
Visuals, not words
With few exceptions, they buy straight-ahead, easy-sell scripts that are routine and familiar. Studios innovate on eye-popping visuals, not mind-bending screenplays. They don't make original adult dramas such as "Chinatown" and "The Conversation" anymore. They'd rather update "established" titles such as "Alfie," "The Manchurian Candidate" and "Flight of the Phoenix."
Chinatown
"Chinatown" (1974) had a twisty, award-winning script by Robert Towne. The movie would probably get little support from major studios today.
Paradoxically, the list of the top-grossing movies of all time includes an impressive number of originals that spawned countless sequels and imitations: "Star Wars," "E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial," "Independence Day," "The Sixth Sense" and "The Matrix." Even "Titanic," the mother blockbuster of all time, came from the fertile brain of James Cameron.
When these movies were made, each presented an enormous risk. They weren't obvious green lights. Creating franchises isn't always about adapting comics, video games, TV shows, kids books, old movies and Japanese horror picture. Sometimes, it's actually about nurturing a fresh idea, though that notion seems to have been lost.
Not entirely, though. Just as Kaufman represents an individual anomaly, as a company, so does Pixar Animation Studios. Its writers have summoned out of the ether an astonishing series of delightful, unexpected stories that played well to audiences all over the world.
Pixar's computer-animated features were, of course, visually gorgeous, but it has been the inventive stories and characters that made "Toy Story," "A Bug's Life," "Monsters, Inc.," "Finding Nemo" and this year's Oscar-nominated "The Incredibles" into global blockbusters. As a result, Pixar has become a brand name.
It's not that the other studios don't appreciate originality, it's just that they don't know how to sell it without wrapping it in some sort of brand identification. For "I, Robot," for example, 20th Century Fox developed an original script by Jeff Vintar and merged it with the Isaac Asimov title, with Akiva Goldsman (Oscar-winner for "A Beautiful Mind") working on the final screenplay.
For "The Bourne Identity" and its sequel, writer Tony Gilroy started with a premise and several characters from the Robert Ludlum novel but then veered off into his own imagination. Gilroy is now home writing his own real original, says Scott Stuber, Universal Pictures vice chairman of worldwide production.
In the case of Paul Weitz's spec script "In Good Company," Stuber adds, it was a struggle to create a modestly budgeted hit, even though the film received solid reviews. "We're a first-weekend business," he admits. "Those movies are not designed to open at $30 million-plus."
When it comes to accommodating originals, the studios do permit their favorite hyphenates -- from M. Night Shyamalan and James L. Brooks to Cameron Crowe and Quentin Tarantino -- to hibernate with idiosyncratic original material because they know that they will be able to execute what they write as well as lure name stars. "These people are gold," Stuber says. "It's one-stop shopping."
But pity the working screenwriter who wants to connect to his or her muse. "There's never been less interest in an original screenplay," says Larry Gross ("We Don't Live Here Anymore"). "Now all movies are borrowed and ripped off. They want to stamp out all signs of a distinctive original voice."
So even though several awards for original screenplays will be handed out in the next few weeks, most writers know their originals will never be produced -- instead, they use them as calling cards.
"You write something original that springs full blown from your forehead in order to launch or reinvigorate your career," says Howard Rodman, dean of the USC screenwriting department. "The studios use them to figure out who's a good writer. But they don't get made. What the studios consider a studio movie has never been narrower than it is now."
Major studios prefer the 'presold behemoth'
LOS ANGELES, California (Hollywood Reporter) -- His name is Charlie Kaufman, and he writes original screenplays; even when, technically, he's writing an "Adaptation," it morphs away from the source material into an uniquely original creation.
Odds are, Kaufman will take home an Oscar on February 27 for his defiantly unpredictable original screenplay "Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind." But in the process, he has become the great anomaly in Hollywood, the exception that proves the rule.
Kaufman has grabbed so much attention for such wildly genre-busting films as "Sunshine" and "Being John Malkovich" that he has become a brand name. (Contrary to myth, Kaufman does plenty of PR; he just hates having his picture taken.) Such actors as Nicolas Cage and Jim Carrey cut their price to be in his movies. Directors Spike Jonze ("Adaptation") and Michel Gondry ("Eternal Sunshine") are happy to collaborate with him. The IMDb listing for the original screenplay that Kaufman is currently writing reads, "Untitled Spike Jonze/Charlie Kaufman project."
In a film industry known for shunting scripters aside and type-casting them like actors -- he's good at action, she'll do the chick polish -- Kaufman has achieved a measure of autonomy. And, at the same time, he admits that he sweats and suffers for fear of being dull, familiar or ordinary.
But isn't that what screenwriters are supposed to do? Not anymore.
Most people in Hollywood stick Kaufman into his Resident Genius niche and leave him there. The major studios aren't looking for writers like him. His movies aren't huge grossers. His biggest hit, "Eternal Sunshine," grossed $34.5 million domestically. In the studio universe, that's chump change.
Instead, scripts like Kaufman's have become the purview of the mini-majors and specialty divisions, which are able to produce them on a budget. This year's nominations for original screenplay, as selected by the Writers Guild of America (WGA) and the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences (AMPAS), are largely culled from the studio indie ranks, which released such titles as Zach Braff's "Garden State," Keir Pearson and Terry George's "Hotel Rwanda," Mike Leigh's "Vera Drake" and Bill Condon's "Kinsey."
Walt Disney Co. subsidiary Miramax Films, known for its unusual support of solo scripters, co-financed "The Aviator," written by John Logan, along with Initial Entertainment Group and Warner Bros. Pictures.
"There are so few contenders in that category from the studio world," says Nancy Nigrosh, a literary agent at Innovative Artists.
That's because, as the Montecito Picture Co.'s Tom Pollock observes, studios aren't interested in "doing any movies that aren't presold behemoths. It's very hard to presell anything original." Given the enormous cost of making movies, the majors know what they want: event pictures aimed at the widest possible audience.
Visuals, not words
With few exceptions, they buy straight-ahead, easy-sell scripts that are routine and familiar. Studios innovate on eye-popping visuals, not mind-bending screenplays. They don't make original adult dramas such as "Chinatown" and "The Conversation" anymore. They'd rather update "established" titles such as "Alfie," "The Manchurian Candidate" and "Flight of the Phoenix."
Chinatown
"Chinatown" (1974) had a twisty, award-winning script by Robert Towne. The movie would probably get little support from major studios today.
Paradoxically, the list of the top-grossing movies of all time includes an impressive number of originals that spawned countless sequels and imitations: "Star Wars," "E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial," "Independence Day," "The Sixth Sense" and "The Matrix." Even "Titanic," the mother blockbuster of all time, came from the fertile brain of James Cameron.
When these movies were made, each presented an enormous risk. They weren't obvious green lights. Creating franchises isn't always about adapting comics, video games, TV shows, kids books, old movies and Japanese horror picture. Sometimes, it's actually about nurturing a fresh idea, though that notion seems to have been lost.
Not entirely, though. Just as Kaufman represents an individual anomaly, as a company, so does Pixar Animation Studios. Its writers have summoned out of the ether an astonishing series of delightful, unexpected stories that played well to audiences all over the world.
Pixar's computer-animated features were, of course, visually gorgeous, but it has been the inventive stories and characters that made "Toy Story," "A Bug's Life," "Monsters, Inc.," "Finding Nemo" and this year's Oscar-nominated "The Incredibles" into global blockbusters. As a result, Pixar has become a brand name.
It's not that the other studios don't appreciate originality, it's just that they don't know how to sell it without wrapping it in some sort of brand identification. For "I, Robot," for example, 20th Century Fox developed an original script by Jeff Vintar and merged it with the Isaac Asimov title, with Akiva Goldsman (Oscar-winner for "A Beautiful Mind") working on the final screenplay.
For "The Bourne Identity" and its sequel, writer Tony Gilroy started with a premise and several characters from the Robert Ludlum novel but then veered off into his own imagination. Gilroy is now home writing his own real original, says Scott Stuber, Universal Pictures vice chairman of worldwide production.
In the case of Paul Weitz's spec script "In Good Company," Stuber adds, it was a struggle to create a modestly budgeted hit, even though the film received solid reviews. "We're a first-weekend business," he admits. "Those movies are not designed to open at $30 million-plus."
When it comes to accommodating originals, the studios do permit their favorite hyphenates -- from M. Night Shyamalan and James L. Brooks to Cameron Crowe and Quentin Tarantino -- to hibernate with idiosyncratic original material because they know that they will be able to execute what they write as well as lure name stars. "These people are gold," Stuber says. "It's one-stop shopping."
But pity the working screenwriter who wants to connect to his or her muse. "There's never been less interest in an original screenplay," says Larry Gross ("We Don't Live Here Anymore"). "Now all movies are borrowed and ripped off. They want to stamp out all signs of a distinctive original voice."
So even though several awards for original screenplays will be handed out in the next few weeks, most writers know their originals will never be produced -- instead, they use them as calling cards.
"You write something original that springs full blown from your forehead in order to launch or reinvigorate your career," says Howard Rodman, dean of the USC screenwriting department. "The studios use them to figure out who's a good writer. But they don't get made. What the studios consider a studio movie has never been narrower than it is now."
good article!
) - but what type of hitchhiking technology wasn't around when The Hitcher was first made? 
