Creative Screenwriting Expo 4: Day 3

Today we have only two items on our agenda: William Goldman at 10:00 pm and William Goldman & David Koepp at 2:00 pm.

If you're not a screenwriter -- or aspiring screenwriter -- then you know Wiliam Goldman as the guy who wrote both the novel and the screenplay for THE PRINCESS BRIDE. He also wrote the screenplays for BUTH CASSIDY AND THE SUNDANCE KID and MISERY.

He also wrote the non-fiction book MY ADVENTURES IN THE SCREEN TRADE which, in the '80s, was the BIBLE for aspiring scrneewriters!!! Before the Writer-Guru Boom of the '90s there was Syd Field and there was William Goldman!

He gave us THE INSIDE SCOOP of what it was to be a working screenwriter in Hollywood. He told us the good and the bad, his triumphs and his mistakes. And he always amused as well as informed us.

ADVENTURES IN THE SCREENTRADE recounted Goldman's adventures from the early 1960s to the late 1970s. He fell off the Hollywood radar for about half a decade, then he returned. So as we're reading SCREEN TRADE we're hearing about all his PAST adventures, and desperately wondering about his CURRENT adventures!

Then in the mid-90s he writes WHICH LIE DID I TELL which picks up where SCREEN TRADE left off. (Talking about THE PRINCESS BRIDE, MISERY, MEMOIRS OF AN INVISIBLE MAN, CHAPLAIN, MAVERICK, ABSOLUTE POWER, THE GENERAL'S DAUGHTER and more, as well as talking about NOT having written GOOD WILL HUNTING for Ben Affleck and Matt Damon.)

This guy sculpted more of our cinematic experience between 1965 and 1999 than we even realize, as he has been a credited and uncredited script doctor, in addition to the scripts that ONLY have his name on them.

I had gotten to see him last year with Aaron Sorkin. This year, though, I got to see him by himself.

He's this great New Yorker guy who has seen it all and has NO PROBLEM telling you EXACTLY what he thinks about any given subject. (He still RAILS when asked about the allegations that he co-wrote GOOD WILL HUNTING. But in a cool way.) Even though his tastes lean Old-School, his perspective is still invaluable. He has seen The Big Picture about how movies are made. He's been there, he's DONE IT. The cat KNOWS!

And then, seeing him on stage with David Koepp...!!!

Koepp is, argueable, a younger Goldman.

Koepp's IMDb.com list reads like this:

-ZATHURA (2005)
-WAR OF THE WORLDS (2005)
-SECRET WINDOW (2004) (writer/director)
-SPIDER-MAN (2002)
-PANIC ROOM (2002)
-STIR OF ECHOES (1999) (writer/director)
-SNAKE EYES (1999)
-THE LOST WORLD: JUASSIC PARK (1997)
-MISSION IMPOSSIBLE (1996)
-THE SHADOW (1994)
-THE PAPER (1994)
-CARLITO'S WAY (1993)
-JURASSIC PARK (1993)
-DEATH BECOMES HER (1992)
-TOY SOLDIERS (1992)
-BAD INFLUENCE (1991)

And that's just the highlights.

The man gets jobs.

Often more than one a year!

But more than that, he writes QUALITY!

I read a draft of SPIDER-MAN before the movie came out. It was a draft that had Doc Ock as a secondary villain (in addition to Green Goblin), and the READ was as good as the movie was!!!

So hearing these two cats talk about the craft... PROFOUND, DUDE!!!

And fun!

Plus, it was always amusing to see their differences. Goldman is Old School and believes Hollywood's best movies are in its past. He believes the corporate system is going to be the death of studio movies. (I'm certain he's not wrong.) But Koepp has to work within that system, and so he sees some silver lining, and the glass is sort of half full.

Plus, Goldman is a living legend, and therefore has no problem biting chuncks out of the hand that feeds him. Koepp is not yet QUITE a living legend yet -- he SHOULD be considered one, but not many people (even movie geeks) know his name -- and always tries to employ a more diplomatic approach.

There was one point when the moderator asked both men about their daily routine and Goldman, not finished with a rant about current-day celebrities misbehaving for talk shows and in interviews, drawing attention away from their projects and onto themselves (a certain world-famous Scientologist, in particular) continues on about how he doesn't believe an audience can buy these stars in their roles when we are so bombarded with their off-screen personaes. Goldman's not worried about offending anyone, and is rather candid with his opinions.

Then Koepp points out the opening-weekend box office for that particular star's latest movie and respectfully postulates that perhaps this new breed of star is simply marketing to a new breed of audience, then without missing a beat Koepp turns back to the moderator and says "I find mornings to be my most creative times of day..."

I think that even non-writers would have enjoyed the show!

The 2p Goldman/Koepp session was the last of the expo.

After that Kelly drove us all around downtown LA, then we took back EVE and CITY and rented REBECCA and MILLION DOLLAR BABY (and DID NOT rent THE GRUDGE) and found our way back to his pad and order some delivery Chinese food.

The food was good.

We didn't finish REBECCA.

But we did watch the shorts "Some Folks Call It A Sling Blade" -- the Billy Bob Thorton short that got hims the writer/director/star gig of SLING BLADE -- and "Multi-Facial" -- the short written/directed/starring Vin Desil, that got Spielberg to write him a role into SAVING PRIVATE RYAN, thus launching his career.

We didn't stay up obsenely late this night, as we were all pretty exhausted from the weekend.