Today was nothin' but classes, followed by a movie screening. Please note that I took the speaker bios verbatim from the PitchFest program. The notes are my own. Let's hop to it.
Top Ten Things That Readers HATE - 9-10:30 a.m. - Julie Gray
About Julie: She's a writer and professional script reader. She's an alumna of the Writers Boot Camp as well as the UCLA Writers Program. A published essayist and short fiction writer, Julie has read for Walden Media (the Narnia movies), Cinergi (Swimfan), Red Wagon Productions (Jarhead), Bedford Falls (Blood Diamond) and Seed Productions (The Tourist), among others. In 2006 she founded The Script Department after she began to tire of the heartbreaking job of giving script after script a PASS without any explanation or empathy for the writer. The intention of the company is to provide story analysis in a kinder, more comprehensive way. Each script consultation is like a mini-screenwriting lesson, and The Script Department clients have consistently gotten representation and placed well in competitions after having worked with Julie and her partners. http://www.thescriptdepartment.com
Notes: Before giving us the lowdown on what script readers hate, Julie gave us a little exposition on who exactly readers are. The script readers who do this stuff full time often work for as many as five or six companies. And by companies, we're talking production companies as well as literary and management agencies. She said it's not uncommon for full-timers to start their day at one company, read a script or two, then haul ass across L.A. in God-awful traffic to their next employer. Many readers, though, the ones who actually care about their mental health, only do this stuff part time. They usually work for one company and are expected to read three scripts a day. Readers earn an average of $50 or $60 per script. Even if a reader decides less than 10 pages in that they don't like the script and they know they're going to pass on it, they are expected to read it all the way through and provide coverage to their bosses in the form of a two- to three-page synopsis as well as a page of notes. To help do that, many readers keep a grid at their elbow while they read, on which they rate stuff like character, dialogue, plot, and story concept. Like any other business, readers work in a hierarchy. For instance, a reader at some small boutique literary agency would be viewed as lower on the totem pole than a reader at, say, Lionsgate. Perhaps the most interesting tidbit Julie threw out was that readers are sometimes under political duress. That is, they can be ordered to pass or recommend a script automatically because of a relationship the boss has with the screenwriter. The final thing she said to preface her list of readers' pet peeves was to keep in mind that readers keep obscene hours. They usually have a day job and work as readers by night. Therefore they're usually cranky. Often readers like to remove the brass fasteners (brads) from the script as well as the covers so it becomes a loose leaf manuscript. That way, they can go to town with scathing notes in the margins they know the screenwriter will never see. Okay, now for the 10 things.
11. First off, Julie said she'd do 11. She said she could've done 30 if she really wanted. For this one, she said readers hate scripts that are too long. Ideally, if you're a first-time writer with no track record, the script shouldn't be more than 110 pages. If it's a bit more, that's okay, but if it's over 120 pages, you're on dangerous ground.
10. Readers hate it when writers send weird shit in the mail. Examples Julie cited based on her own experience include Polaroids (of what, I wonder?), candy, maps, and scripts with perfumed pages.
9. Stories that are boring, derivative, or downright plagiaristic of another film.
8. Wonky tone. Readers don't like it if they can't discern the genre. Is it a comedy? A tragedy? If scene one has sort of a high school raunchy comedy feel, and the second scene shows someone's child being drowned....you see what I mean.
7. Sluglines that are confusing or boring. For you non-screenwriters, a slugline is the first line of a new scene in the script. It usually starts with INT. or EXT. (interior or exterior) followed by the setting and the time of day. Regarding boring sluglines, Julie's example was INT. HOUSE. In other words, what kind of house is it? Don't be afraid to be a bit descriptive. But not too much. That lead to her talking about confusing sluglines, which are those that are too long. Her bottom line was to think of a slugline as a haiku. She also said that mini-slugs are acceptable and encouraged. That means that if you have, say, three consecutive scenes taking place in the same house, then only the slugline of the first scene needs to have the INT. For instance, if the first house scene is in the kitchen, then the slugline could be INT. KITCHEN. If the second scene is in the living room of that house, then that slugline could simply be LIVING ROOM. If you were already descriptive about the house in the EXT. HOUSE slugline, then you don't necessarily have to use too many adjectives on these INT. slugs.
6. Gratuitous sex and violence.
5. On-the-nose dialogue. In other words, dialogue that leaves no room for subtext because the characters are saying everything they're thinking.
4. Bad action descriptions. Sometimes the action paragraphs are the first thing the reader scans throughout the script. Don't make them too dense. Again, think haiku. Keep in mind that most of the story will be advanced in the dialogue anyway. Avoid a stuttering rhythm with too much switching between dialogue and action, dialogue and action. As part of the revision process, do a scan of your script. Do you see too much ink? The pages of any good script should be mostly white. Don't be too detailed about what characters are wearing. It'll all be decided by the director and costume designer anyway. That is, if your script is lucky enough to make it to production. And finally, avoid any weird editorial inserts (e.g. Julia Roberts would be super for this role!).
3. Scripts that are too linear and have absolutely no structure to speak of. Julie told us that Bob Schultz, the executive director of the PitchFest, calls such scripts BOSH scripts (Bunch of Shit Happens). An example of this would be a script where, instead of one long two-hour plot, the characters and conflicts happen in more of an episodic nature. Julie said to remember that movie execs are like T-Rexes: They're big and scary with tiny brains. Their attention spans are small. All they want when they read a script is to know what happens. More and more readers are looking for a plot's inciting incident to happen within the first five pages of the script, which I think his hilarious since so many movies out there take a good ten to fifteen minutes to do just that. And no one in the audience seems to care. One more metaphor Julie used for this one was to think of a script as wine: Even those that are supposedly polished could probably stand to have a few more scenes wrung out of them to make the plot more coherent.
2. Lame characters, by which she means characters who seem more robot than human. Even if your script is ultimately rejected, if you demonstrate that you can at least write three-dimensional characters, you might still score rewrite jobs on other scripts. One tip she threw out there to help with character development is to think, "What was my protagonist doing fifteen pages before this script began?"
1. Type-os! Malaprops! Proofread that script to get the stuff your spellchecker won't catch.
Julie's bottom line: To be worthy of a reader's recommendation to their boss, a script should have an original story, a unique voice, and be well executed. As an example of what not to do, Julie passed out the first ten pages of a script by one of her Script Department clients who "has a very good sense of humor." Below are the first two pages.
From Script to Screen - Launching Your Screenwriting Career - 11 a.m. - 12:30 p.m. - Bill True
About Bill: He's an award-winning screenwriter and professional speaker with two decades' experience in creating and delivering compelling messages that inspire. Bill's debut feature, Runaway, premiered to universal accolades at the 2005 Tribeca Film Festival, and continue to gather an impressive array of laurels at Toronto, Woodstock, Vail, Avignon, Tel-Aviv, and top fests. Bill also won the top prize at the prestigious Austin Film Festival & Screenwriters' Conference in 2005. Bill is currently in development on several high-profile TV and feature projects and recently completed scripting the upcoming girls' hockey drama Breakaway, which is scheduled to start shooting in 2009. He is also a partner in SagePRESENCE, rising star in the professional development world, elevating "stage presence" influence in individuals for presenting, networking, and selling. http://www.billtrue.net
Notes: As happened now and again at last year's Expo, this class wasn't exactly what the title suggested. Indeed, in hindsight it seems more like just a generic title they thought up because they couldn't think of a more accurate one. Bill's sort of a touchy-feely guy who obviously cares about us struggling writers. What the bio doesn't say is that he used to be sort of a high-up guy in the corporate world with hundreds of people directly or indirectly reporting to him. After growing extremely dissatisfied with that kind of life, even if it was lucrative, he threw it all away to become a struggling screenwriter. He emphasized that even with his recent success with Runaway, he's still sort of struggling. To wit, Runaway has yet to find distribution in the U.S. He has days where he wakes up and seriously considers quitting and going back to Planet White Collar. Here are some nuggets I took down during Bill's very spirited talk (his pits were matted by the end).
-Becoming a successful screenwriter is not some mountain far away. It's more like a series of small hills.
-Writing should feel like a calling or a journey. If you're doing it just to make a quick buck, fuhgeddaboutit. To that end, have a vision for yourself as a writer.
-In addition to a long-term goal, though, you should also have an operational plan, a day-to-day type deal. If you constantly think about all the stuff you want to do over the next year or umpteen years, you'll go nuts. Plus, taking things day by day opens you up to serendipity.
-Keep up with the industry's goings-on. As a more economic alternative to Variety, Bill recommended IMDb Pro.
-While building your network of contacts, be sure to include someone who becomes your Jiminy Cricket, that person who gives it to you straight when you want feedback on your script.
-While having a literary agent would be nice, it's not a panacea. They collect 10% of what your scripts sell for, and so accordingly they'll only do 10% of the work necessary to sell a script. Bill did admit, though, that agents are good to have. He himself hasn't found one yet.
-Network, network, network! Networking is a volume business. Not everyone you meet will help your career, and those that do may not be valuable to you until much later. Bill says he meets anyone and everyone he can. You never know who you might need or who might need you much further down the line. Indeed, asking someone for help too soon can backfire.
-Find a mentor.
-The only three screenwriting contests worth entering are the Nicholl Fellowship, Austin Film Fest, and the Disney Fellowship. The Austin Film Fest offers some of the best networking opportunities. One student in the class named TJ actually won the Nicholl, which is a huge deal, but he said it hasn't helped him. Networking has been more beneficial.
-Quote from God: "I never said it would be easy. I only said it would be worth it."
-Final two bits of advice: Don't give up. Pay it forward because karma is real.
At some point in the middle of the seminar, Bill invited a director friend of his named Dean to come up for a bit to talk about pitching. Here's some of what he said.
-Pitch like a script consultant.
-Take the attention off yourself and your nervousness and appreciate the focus you're getting from the pitchee, even if they do represent an obstacle.
-And finally, if your pitch is rejected, be philosophical about it. What did you learn from the experience?
Much-Needed Lunch - Tom - 12:30-1:30 p.m.
Notes: While standing in line to pay $15 for one of the boxed lunches that had been prepared for us, a nice young Asian man with a thick accent kindly inquired as to why people were forking over fifteen smackers when they could score a nice meal for a fraction of the cost from any of the myriad fast food restaurants across the street. I kindly answered that he had an excellent point and that I didn't have the semblance of a clue.
Lunch in hand, I hauled tail back to Yahoo! so I could enjoy it in the cool, comfortable confines of my cubicle. Actually it wasn't that bad for the money. The turkey sandwich was huge. Plus you had macaroni salad, an apple, a giant cookie, a bag of chips. I mean, maybe it was overpriced, but I think we were also paying for the convenience of not having to go anywhere to get this.
Them's Fighting Words - Legal Savvy for Screenwriters - Victoria Goldfarb - 1:30-3 p.m.
Notes: While standing in line to pay $15 for one of the boxed lunches that had been prepared for us, a nice young Asian man with a thick accent kindly inquired as to why people were forking over fifteen smackers when they could score a nice meal for a fraction of the cost from any of the myriad fast food restaurants across the street. I kindly answered that he had an excellent point and that I didn't have the semblance of a clue.
Lunch in hand, I hauled tail back to Yahoo! so I could enjoy it in the cool, comfortable confines of my cubicle. Actually it wasn't that bad for the money. The turkey sandwich was huge. Plus you had macaroni salad, an apple, a giant cookie, a bag of chips. I mean, maybe it was overpriced, but I think we were also paying for the convenience of not having to go anywhere to get this.
Them's Fighting Words - Legal Savvy for Screenwriters - Victoria Goldfarb - 1:30-3 p.m.
About Vic: She's a graduate of UCLA law school and the University of Chicago, is an attorney and mediator, and also serves as Associate Director of California Lawyers for the Arts. In addition to oversight of the lawyer referral service, educational programs, outreach efforts, and administration, she develops and manages cases for arts arbitration and mediation services. In this role, she conciliates and mediates disputes involving members of the arts and entertainment communities, administers arbitration and mediation cases, and develops training programs for volunteers.
Notes:
-At $2 per capita, California is dead last (i.e. lower than Guam) in the U.S. in arts funding.
-Because litigation can be so horrifically costly (to the tune of six and even seven figures), Vic highly recommends alternative dispute resolution (ADR). ADR is diplomacy, whereas litigation is war. ADR also helps keep things confidential. Litigation is all about airing dirty laundry.
-She reiterated what California Lawyers for the Arts offered for those who didn't read her bio in the program: negotiation counseling, conciliation, mediation, and arbitration.
-Common disputes that she handles: Accusations of story idea theft, broken-down collaboration, disputes between actors and their agents.
-When you start an artistic relationship of any kind, ideally you should get a written agreement with ADR clauses.
Vic's tips for a healthy collaboration agreement: Establish terms and conditions in writing. These can include:
-Tasks and responsibilities.
-Timeline and schedule.
-Work out conceptual problems.
-Division of labor (e.g. research, writing, editing).
-Order of author credit. Will you credit each other as joint authors? Is it joint ownership?
-How will the payments be divided?
-Shared communication with agents, editors, publishers, etc.
-Figure out how to deal with expenses incurred.
-What will you do in the event of the other's death or disability?
-What will you do if one of you decides to back out of the project? This is where ADR can be especially helpful.
-Non-disclosure, non-competition agreement.
In general, you should always do your research and get references about the people you work with. If you're offered a written agreement, have it reviewed by a lawyer. Document all communications in hard copy. Before you start pondering a partnership of any kind, know your bargaining position and ask for exactly what you want.
Vic's bottom line: Keep those lines of communication flowing, and deal with anger directly.
How to Get Your Screenplay out of the House and into the Film World - Michele Wallerstein - 3:30-5 p.m.
About Michele: She's a former literary agent and now a screenplay and novel consultant. Her clients sold hundreds of hours of television movies, mini-series, episodic TV and numerous motion pictures, including those in the $1 million range. She served as executive vice president of Women in Film, a voting member of the Emmy Awards, a member of The Academy of Television Arts and Sciences, and was on the Advisory Board of the magazine Creative Screenwriting. She is an active guest speaker and has spoken at a ton of events including The Big Bear Film Festival, The ScriptWriters Network, Sherwood Oaks and, of course, the Great American PitchFest.
Notes:
-As tough as the movie biz is, the music biz is tougher.
-You should think of the first screenplay you write as practice, not as something you're going to sell. (Tom's note: The gal who wrote Thelma & Louise blows that rule clear out of the water.)
-Michele used to work at a big agency with a lot of other agents, but she didn't like any of them, which is why she eventually founded her own agency.
-If you're still an aspiring screenwriter, get a consultant. (Heh! Easy for her to say, her being a consultant and all).
-Don't write sequels or adaptations if you're just starting out. Those usually come in the form of writing assignments.
-Write alone. Avoid collaboration at all costs.
-Michele wasn't a big fan of agenting out-of-town writers. If you want to write for film and TV, you need to be in L.A.
-Never take a writing assignment for free, obvious as that may sound. Assignments can lead to rewrites, which you would again have to do gratis. And then the studio could change its mind about producing the script.
-Although the people you pitch to are usually young, they're also usually tough and smart and had to bust their butts to get even that far.
-If your pitch leads to a script request, send it out right away. Don't hesitate for a second.
-The 1988 WGA strike killed her. "More Prozac please!" She had to fire seven of her workers and buy herself out of her office lease. And then in 1995, when she was at rock bottom, she received the most brilliant query ever. It was from a 23-year-old aspiring writer named Ronnie Christensen. Michele agreed to represent his script (was it his first one?), which Disney paid $1 million for. They still haven't made it, but they won't let any other studio have it. Michele got him writing assignments and sold two more of his scripts for $750k each. Eventually Ronnie was wooed by a bigger agency, so he dumped Michele. That bigger agency ended up doing nothing for his career. Michele said if you ever find yourself in Ronnie's position, think hard before graduating to a bigger agency. If your career's already flourishing, as Ronnie's was, is it really necessary? It's that old axiom: If it ain't broke, don't fix it.
-Always be writing your next project while trying to sell the one you just finished. Even if you're still thinking about what your next project's going to be, that counts as writing.
Here's what to do if you land an agent:
-Don't call every day.
-Build a relationship with the assistant.
-Remember the three S's the agents do: Sign, service, sell.
-Remember that your agent probably has staff meetings four days a week.
-Agents obviously have tons of reading to do. You're not their only client.
-If you insist on calling your agent, have something to give them, such as another script. In other words, have a really good reason to call.
-In general, understand the oodles of responsibilities agents have to shoulder. Walk a mile in their moccasins.
Here's more stuff Michele had to say about agents.
-If an agent offers you representation, do your research on them before you commit. Are they a WGA signatory? If not, forget 'em.
-The WGA keeps a list of guild signatory agents who read unsolicited scripts.
-You should have at least five scripts before you approach an agent. Two or three should be in the same genre. Why? Because it'll be easier for the agent to help craft a career for you. Agents don't like one-offs. They're all about building lifelong relationships.
Michele's husband was in the back row. She said he had to coax her into writing a memoir, which she's now at work on.
Michele also threw in that she thinks indie films are the only good movies left. If you've got a script and you've got the means to produce it yourself, "that's wonderful," she said more than once.
Hollywood by Phone - LIVE - JC Spink intereviewed by Chris Soth - 5:30-7 p.m.
About Chris: He developed the "Mini-Movie Method" after years of success as a Hollywood screenwriter. Chris has multiple projects in development at major Hollywood studios. This master storyteller is also an expert in pitching and selling, which are necessary tools for a screenwriter in Hollywood. As a way for LA- as well as non-LA-based writers to get connected to Hollywood, Chris started Hollywood by Phone, a weekly service with live interviews and interactions between working writers, industry newsmakers, and you. In July Chris is starting another program called Pitch Hollywood by Phone.
http://www.hollywoodbyphone.com
About JC: He's a producer and partner in BenderSpink, a diversified management and production company that opened its doors in November 1998 with fifteen screenwriting clients. In just over a year, Chris Bender and JC Spink sold twenty-four client spec scripts, co-produced Universal Pictures' American Pie and convinced Disney executives to take a chance on a first-time director for Deuce Bigalow: Male Gigolo. On the heels of such success, New Line Cinema signed BenderSpink to a first-look deal. Some of his company's credits include History of Violence, Red Eye, The Ring 2, Just Friends, Monster in Law, and The Butterfly Effect.
Notes: In addition to the smattering of people in the room, there were about 200 peeps who were conferenced in and could submit questions through the Hollywood by Phone site. JC used to be an intern for Chris. Below are some tidbits I gleaned from JC during the interview.
-You can learn a ton about selling scripts by interning at a production company or agency.
-The movie and TV markets are timing oriented. What doesn't sell on Monday could suddenly be sellable on Tuesday.
-The timing thing isn't the only variable. Many idiosyncrasies make the market tough to negotiate. The best thing any writer can do is query as many people as possible.
-JC was still an assistant when American Pie was made. The script for it was one of those anomalies that didn't have to go through the traditional coverage system by which Hollywood operates. JC is convinced that the screenplay for American Pie would have never survived the coverage system. Apparently the producer in charge didn't need coverage to know he was going to make it. Originally American Pie had a tongue-in-cheek title like $10 Film That Readers Will Hate but That Will Get Made Anyway. As the assistant, JC had to field all the calls complaining about that.
-Like everyone else who's established a career, JC says the key for all writers is never to give up. He gets writers now and again who keep e-mailing him queries. He actually likes it. JC said he never wanted to be the gatekeeper who turns people away. Being accessible is always the goal.
-JC describes pitching as trying to sleep with someone without paying for dinner. He admits that he sucks at pitching and finds the whole process artificial. You shouldn't need more than fifteen or twenty minutes to pitch. By the way he was talking about it, I could tell he had no clue that tomorrow we're only being allotted five minutes!
-The two best pitchers JC knows personally are the screenwriter who just did Made of Honor (I wonder who he means, as on IMDb that movie credits two men and a woman for the screenplay) and the guy who created Prison Break (Paul Scheuring).
The most interesting part of this seminar came when JC and Chris got into a kindly debate on the recent WGA strike and its fallout. Chris thinks that writers are still paying for it, nearly half a year after it ended, and that producers didn't suffer too much because of it. Indeed, Chris believes the 100 days actually gave producers the opportunity to reconsider how and what they spend their money on and that, as a result, they've cut back on how many scripts they buy. In other words, a lot of writers who were on the cusp of hitting paydirt are now back to square zero in the query game. JC doesn't buy that at all. The producers aren't out to get anyone, he says.
Another interesting tidbit JC threw out there was that he rejected the logline for Juno. He still doesn't like it and would still reject it if you pitched it to him. As for how it got made, let alone won the Best Original Screenplay Oscar, he can't explain it. His favorite movie of all time is True Romance.
-Would YOU like to e-mail JC a pitch? You can do so at jspink@benderspink.com. Keep it to two sentences.
-A high-concept film doesn't necessarily equal a high-budget film. One example would be Signs. M. Night Shyamalan saved a ton of money by not showing too many of the aliens. This led JC to think about The Happening and a pitch he once received that was similar to The Happening but with water. The pitch was essentially, "What if water turned against us?" Screenwriter Shane Black (Lethal Weapon) still has that pitch on his fridge.
-The best part of JC's job is not knowing what's going to happen on any given day. One example was when he ran into filmmaker Peter Bogdonavitch at a kegger. Another is when he ran into Seal. JC said he cornered Seal and basically gushed like a slobbering fan even when it was obvious Seal wanted to get out of there.
-JC describes filmmaking as having different teams of homebuilders with different interpretations of the same blueprint.
The Great American PitchFest and Sage Presence Present a Special Screening of Bill True's feature screenwriting debut, Runaway - Q&A session and reception to follow - 8-10:30 p.m.
About Bill: You can read his bio up top. His was the second class I took today.
Notes: Hardly anyone came. I'd say maybe thirty at most. It made the huge Academy Ballroom look awfully empty. What's more, some society or club was using the big ballroom next door. They were having a great time over there, as we got to listen to a lot of old standards like "Stand by Me" while watching Bill's very dark flick. I was a little put off that none of the PitchFest top dawgs were there, like Signe or Bob. Where were they? At any rate, it was Bill running the show. He thanked us all for coming when we could've stayed home to practice our pitches. The cash bar from last night was set up, so I grabbed a beer and took a seat. Actually, during the one-hour break before the screening, I'd had two beers at the Daily Grill on the ground floor of the Marriott proper. I figured I could have one more and still be coherent enough to follow the movie. Hey, today was an extremely long day, okay? And I'm sick as a dog courtesy of this killer summer cold I took home from Reno on Wednesday.
I also kept a glass of water at my side during the movie to stymie my cough, and thank God I did, as it was a very quiet movie. Runaway originally premiered about this time three years ago at the Tribeca Film Festival. It got tons of good reviews, and then did just as well at the Toronto Fest in the fall of '05. Yet, as of this blogging, it still has not picked up American distribution.
What's the movie about, you ask? Unfortunately it's got such a killer twist (literally) at the end that I shouldn't tell you too much. Here's what I will say. You've got this teenager named Michael, played by Aaron Stanford (Pyro from the X-Men flicks as well as the main character from 2002's Tadpole). He's run away from home and is now taking refuge in some dive motel with his kid bro Dylan. He eventually lands a nightshift gig in some gas station minimart where he falls for his coworker Carly. She's played by Robin Tunney, who in my opinion is one of the most underrated actresses ever. Yeah, she was okay in that mainstream stuff she did at first, like Supernova and Vertical Limit, but she's usually at her best in the indie stuff. Did you ever see Cherish from 2002? Liz Phair of all people was playing her nasty coworker. I'm sure you missed it. Liz Phair being in it did absolutely nothing for its visibility. At any rate, Mike and Carly fall for each other. Meanwhile, though, we keep seeing snippets of flashbacks that slowly but surely build toward the reason for Mike's taking Dylan and getting out of Dodge. And that reason is a doozy. Oh and speaking of, Mike's ma is played by Melissa Leo. She was Benecio del Toro's wife in 21 Grams. Like Robin Tunney, she is one criminally underused actress. At any rate, by the end of the flick we get to see the whole puzzle put together as to what Mike's situation really is. Those flashbacks also include sessions with his shrink, which cumulatively help shed even more light on his decision to be a runaway.
The director of the film was this guy named Tim McCann. He's a film professor at SUNY Purchase who's done a few other little films that no one's seen.
The biggest strength of Runaway was the acting. The writing was good, too. Bill obviously knows how to dream up three-dimensional characters. In the end, though, the movie made me feel kind of hollow inside. I suppose part of this comes from the fact that Michael doesn't really change. One of those unspoken rules (there are no rules!) of writing is that by the end of the story your protagonist shouldn't be the same person s/he was at the story's beginning. If they haven't changed, then perhaps their worldview has changed somehow. I dunno. Point is, there needs to be a point for the audience to have followed them on the journey. For all its great acting, writing, and directing, the gaping flaw with Runaway is that Michael is absolutely no different at the end than he was at the beginning. At all. Indeed, as I walked out afterward, I heard someone say to their neighbor, "I didn't get the point."
During the Q&A, someone asked Bill what made him dream up such a story idea. Bill said he has a lot of mental disorder in his family. His brother, for instance, suffers from schizophrenia. While Michael doesn't have schizophrenia in the movie, he is clearly messed up. I won't divulge how that is, but suffice it to say that Bill wanted to create a "hero" who's suffering some mental ailment that's been allowed to progress unchecked. Also, he wanted to present a scenario of how such a sickness can be engendered. It's not always simply in the genes. It can come from external influences as well.
I piped in at one point and asked Bill a few things. First, I asked how long it took to shoot. About a month, he said. And they shot it mostly in upstate New York. That makes sense, of course, that being Tim McCann's neck of the woods. I'm glad he told me where because it's impossible to tell where the story takes place in the film. I hate it when I watch a film and can't tell where I'm supposed to be.
Since this was a PitchFest after all, I also asked Bill how he pitched it to the producers. His answer? "Not very well." This wasn't a movie that was made based on a pitch. He busted his ass on the screenplay and then shopped it around until he could score an interested buyer. And even then, he didn't sell it for very much.
The last thing I asked was where in Christ it HAD scored distribution, if not in the U.S. Apparently Runaway has only been distributed in France, Brazil, and Greece. Bill said the film did huge in Greece. I can sort of guess why distributors here haven't scooped it up. It might have something to do with what I said above. The audience spends an hour and a half piecing together what exactly happened to make Michael run away from home, and by the end of the film he's no different from the person who ran away.
As for the reception following the Q&A, what reception? They had a selection of veggies and chips that looked even more meager than the night before. Where were Signe or Bob? For Christ's sake, I just got the feeling that no one was in charge. Hardly anyone came to this fucking movie, so how was there supposed to be a reception? Part of what made the Expo fun was all the networking. Every single night there was a networking function, and tons of people came. There were tons of opportunities to give your business card to somebody. Not here, though. I hope I get feedback solicitation from the PitchFest folks because they need to understand the importance of networking as much as Bill True obviously does, based on his class this morning.
