The rest will follow...

I go to school with people who want to be screenwriters, who are, for all intents and purposes, screenwriters. I have met a lot of screenwriters here in L.A. In fact, it seems everyone's a writer. But I haven't met many who have had movies or television shows made. And then Nancy Oliver came to my Monday night lecture class.

I expected someone younger, not that she's old, certainly not but she seems more seasoned than I'd imagined. She wrote Lars and the Real Girl and worked on Six Feet Under (HBO) and now works on True Blood (HBO). She's a writer and a director and on Monday night, she was fascinating. She was calm and insightful and very open and sounded very honest.

Over the past quarter I've heard a lot about structure and theme and plot and act breaks. I've read books about where to put the inciting events in my screenplay and what characters need to have storylines where and when. I've learned about systems for writing and rewriting and I've even done some of it. But all along it's felt a bit like a process, a bit artificial. I have done all the assignments, created all the timelines and scenes and outlines and character sketches. But I've also been writing for a lot of years and I know me. I know my head and I know how I work. And what Nancy Oliver said on Monday that screamed to me was to arrange your work habits around how YOU do it best.

That stuck with me all week. Tuesday I tried writing before going to Homeless Lunch, after reading half a script for class and before taking a shower. I was having an ADD morning. Nothing worked. So when I came home I read. I gave up writing for the day. I knew it wouldn't work at all. I know how I do it best. Today I only had a half hour before I had to leave for an appointment but I felt the need to get some things down and before I knew it, I had several pages knocked out. I'm finally starting to realize how I work best. And I think that if I let myself know that that's okay, it will be.

Nancy had a lot of other interesting insights into writing, screenwriting as a career, and Lars. I'll share a few for those who asked for reports:

On writing

• There was simply nothing else she could do - she couldn't pass the test to be a teacher in California so she had to keep writing.
• It took her five years to move from writing plays to screenplays. She had to learn to see as the camera sees.
• She discovers who her characters are through the writing. She often doesn't know what will happen to them until the end.
• There is a difference between intuitive and technical writing and we need both. You need to be able to fix something if it doesn't work - do the job required.
  
• No one does character like Shakespeare.
  
• You can be a good writer when you're young and when you're old - you can be a good writer all along. You just can't go any faster than you're meant to go. But you can do your best. It not only has to do with age but with experience. Don't edit your experience.
• Acts in screenplays are great if they're helpful, if not, throw them out.
  

On career

• There is a difference between writing for film and writing for television. For TV, it's a discipline and it's a community effort. It's writing by committee but it's worth it - moneywise and it's good to learn different disciplines. It's good to see how good a writer you can be with so many obstacles. For instance, if you're given a direction for a story, you have to write it so you might as well see how well you can do the job.
• If it works, it's okay with her. For example, it was Ryan Gosling's idea to talk to the doll in Lars. It worked so she thought it was okay.
• She believes there can be drama without conflict. Tension is more interesting.
  

On Lars

• She got the idea for Lars and then didn't write anything for five years. But she finished the draft in nine months - the draft she turned in, the draft that after rewrites were thrown away would become the shooting script.
  
• She didn't know Bianca would die when she started writing.
• She was on set for the entire shoot and she's happy with 95% of the movie. She's happier with it now than she was then.
  
• She doesn't know what happens after Lars goes on that walk but she does know asking someone to go on the walk with him was a BIG step.
  
• The scene at the late in the water was ambiguous on purpose - was it meant as baptism? As murder? The audience has to decide for itself.
• Bianca weighed a hundred pounds and had a flexible face that made nine expressions used throughout the movie.

Nancy ended the evening with advice to all of us screenwriters aspiring to be where she is: she said not to follow her example. We're already ahead of her because of where we are. Her thing was not about success or career it was about being a good writer. Tell the truth, the rest will follow, she said. And I believe her.