Josh Baizer and Marshall Johnson made big waves last year with their script, “Dead Loss,” about a crew of crab fisherman who pick up a drifting castaway with a mysterious cargo. It was one of my favorite scripts of the year, as well as one of Hollywood’s. Dead Loss landed on the Black List with 7 votes. It also became one of your favorites when you voted it your 24th favorite unproduced script. I wanted to thank Josh and Marshall again for doing this interview because they’ve been working extremely long hours on an assignment and were nice enough to take some time and answer my questions. There’s a ton of good advice in here so I hope you enjoy the interview.

SS: I know a lot of people want to know where to meet writing partners. How did you two get started writing together?

J: It’s definitely tough to find someone who’s willing to put up with you over the course of many long/stressful workdays. We actually met as assistants in development at Paramount (long hours/stressful conditions). We worked right next door to each other. When I realized I wasn’t going the exec route, I started writing on the sly, between phone calls. Marshall would give me notes…and it all kind of went from there.

SS: What were you doing before Dead Loss? Where were you in your writing careers?

J: We were doing whatever job we could find. Small rewrites. Even a little bit of TV. We’d actually gotten some traction after doing a rewrite on a script for a studio – but then the strike hit and it kind of put us back to square one.

MJ: Before DEAD LOSS, we had written a couple feature rewrites. One was within the studio system, and the other was for an independent producer. But we also had worked on a short-lived TV show and wrote some webisodes for ESPN.

SS: What inspired you to write Dead Loss?

J: Contrary to popular belief, it actually wasn’t a spec. It was a pitch on an open writing assignment. We’d had a general meeting with Jesse Johnston at Thousand Words right before the strike and he’d been a fan of the first script we’d written. During the meeting we discussed our mutual love for a certain cable television show. Months later, he called and asked if we’d be interested in coming up with a take for a movie set in the world of Alaskan crab fishing. It was pretty wide open – they were open to see anything from sci-fi, to horror, etc etc. At the end of the day, our take won out and they hired us to write it.

MJ: A year before we started working on DEAD LOSS, we had met with Jesse Johnston, an executive at Thousand Words, so we already had a good relationship with him, and he was a fan of our writing. Like us, Jesse, Jonah (Smith), and Palmer (West) were all big fans of THE DEADLIEST CATCH and they wanted to do something in that world. We came up with our DEAD LOSS story, pitched them, and they bought it.

SS: I liked how you built in conflict and mystery between your characters (particularly between the brothers). What is your approach to writing characters? What’s the key to writing a good one?

MJ: Good characterization can vary based on a lot of factors – genre, tone, story, etc. Obviously, the ultimate goal is for the characters to resonate with the audience, whether that’s a larger than life buffoon in an absurd comedy, or capturing the nuances and mannerism of a real life person in a biopic.

For DEAD LOSS, it was important for us to ground the crew in realism, so we did a lot of research on crab fishermen and their lives on and off the boat. A lot of the inspiration for the characters followed organically from that research. For instance, a lot of these boats are family owned and operated, and the the business is passed down from generation to generation. So it made sense to have the brother dynamic at the center of things. And even apart from the brothers’ blood relation, the entire crew on these boats becomes like a surrogate family. It’s a very difficult and dangerous job, so they have to trust each other when they’re out on the water or someone is going to get hurt or killed. Understanding those dynamics, it became much easier to look at what kinds of circumstances and conflicts would push these tough guys who live life on the edge to their breaking point.

SS: What’s your writing method in general? How much do you outline? What do you emphasize? Do you write a lot of drafts? How long do you write each day?

J: We’ve always treated it like a job, even when we were just starting out. We meet everyday for at least eight or nine hours. When there’s a deadline, the days definitely get longer – but even when we’re not actively writing on anything, it’s good for the sanity to have a strict structure. Though, when actively writing, we don’t necessarily emphasize time, but page count. Outlines are probably the most important part of our process. We try to get as detailed as possible before starting the draft, otherwise, we could find ourselves in trouble if the plot is particularly complex.

We definitely try to emphasize the tone and the world. Tone can be tough on some projects, but that oftentimes takes many drafts of tweaks in dialogue and character choices…so we tend to tinker with that for as long as we can. The world comes out of the research phase. It’s probably the stuff we love most. Our second script took place on an aircraft carrier and the navy allowed us to fly onto the USS Reagan and explore everything we needed for two days. That research helped a lot and allowed us to make the world believable.

MJ: Most of our projects generally start with a lot of research. We really enjoy exploring new subcultures and environments. In fact, I think in many ways screenwriting can be like journalism. From there you find your characters and storylines, etc, and things usually start to crystallize in an organic way – like I was saying before about DEAD LOSS.

And yeah, when we’re getting ready to write or pitch, we usually do a lot of outlining. Josh and I both are very logic-oriented, so we try hard to make sure everyone’s motivations make sense and that there aren’t any plot holes ahead of time. It’s time-consuming to be so thorough up front, but it usually pays off in the long run. As far as schedule goes, we’re pretty diligent about writing and treat it like a day job, working regular hours together most every day.

SS: I’m assuming you guys are fielding offers in the assignment market now. Could you tell us a little bit about that world? How does a writer get into a room to pitch his/her take on, say, “Clash of the Titans?” Would you guys be able to get into a room for that? Or is that a whole nother level?

J: For those who don’t know how it works, most times your last good script becomes your resume for open writing assignments available in that genre. Your reps will know what assignments are around and put you up for those jobs. Of course, the timing isn’t always so perfect – jobs may not be in abundance. So you’ll end up going on a lot of ‘general’ meetings with production company execs around town who have read your work and hopefully liked it. A lot of jobs come out of these generals, directly and indirectly. Good relationships help so much. We got DEAD LOSS from a general meeting the year before. We were able to get another rewrite job when a pitch on another project didn’t sell…but the studio exec liked us and liked our writing (and we were the right price at the time). With something like CLASH, I’ve seen how it works from the studio side as well as from the writers’ – execs will try and go with big name writers, but there’s always room for a young up and comer with an amazing sample to blow them out of the water and get the job. Again, relationships are huge. You never know what big producer will read your sample and champion you. A big job like CLASH is in the realm of possibility for guys like us, but we’d still be up against heavy hitters…so we’d need plenty of luck.

MJ: The assignment market is pretty tough right now. It seems like there are fewer jobs each year at all levels. But there are still opportunities, from high-profile gigs like CLASH to smaller budgeted projects at companies who are independently financed. Still, in every case it starts with someone liking your writing.

From there, it’s hard to generalize. Studios obviously have conservative reputations, so unless you’ve sold something or had a movie go into production, it’s more difficult to get a job there but still not impossible. Starting as an unknown quantity, it generally just takes time to build your fan base and for everyone in town to get to know you and your writing. So hopefully, when a big project like CLASH comes along, you already have a relationship with either the producer or the studio exec supervising the project, and they will remember how much they liked your script, or maybe they had already met with you and recall how you had mentioned being obsessed with Greek mythology or whatever. Then they’ll consider you for the project and give you a shot at coming up with a take for the movie. That scenario has happened to us many times, even with DEAD LOSS. But once you’re in consideration, it’s up to you to make the most of the opportunity and come up with a fantastic take that is in line with their vision of the movie.

SS: Do you have any particular screenwriting books or scriptwriters who inspired/helped you? Who do you suggest Scriptshadow readers read to learn about the craft?

J: I’ve never read a screenwriting book. But I’ve read many, many scripts. We’ve actually got a loose writers’ circle made up of a bunch of friends at various stages in their writing careers and it’s very helpful.

MJ: I took screenwriting in college, so that’s where I learned the basics, like formatting and act structure. But there are lots of books that can teach you that stuff too (Syd Field, Robert McKee, etc). And ultimately it is very important you have that understanding – not only for writing and crafting a script, but also for pitching and discussing projects. It’s the jargon of the industry, so you have to be able to talk about act breaks, structure, etc. But honestly I found that the absolute best education came from reading scripts. While working at Paramount, I must’ve read thousands of scripts – and there’s just as much to learn from the bad ones as the good. And of course now there are so many online resources, so you can go watch a movie, then download the script and see how it read on the page. It can be very helpful to see how certain things are communicated and get a taste of different writing styles.

SS: Writers deal with a lot of rejection, and are oftentimes unsure of where they are in the journey. Are they close to that magical sale? Do they have a ways to go? When did you guys know you were legitimately able to compete with professional writers in one of the hardest markets in the world? Is there a way for a writer to know when he/she’s made that step?

J: Probably getting our first paycheck. It made it seem real for the first time.

MJ: I think there are probably certain milestones that are important to people for different reasons. Getting a key producer or talent to read your material, or landing an agent or manager is obviously important. But for me, it was getting my first paycheck. It wasn’t a big one, but that was the when I felt legitimized as a professional writer. And the idea of the “magical sale” is tantalizing, but honestly the odds of a first spec selling are very low. Obviously it happens, and when it does, it’s great and those Cinderella stories often make news, but speaking practically, it truly is a marathon and not a race. So I think as long as you’re continuing to progress in your career, enjoying it, and paying your bills (however that may be), then persistence is key. Just try to keep perspective on the bigger picture and ask yourself some basic questions about the big picture. Are your scripts getting better each time? Does your feeback get more positive? Are you getting more access with each script? And once you start getting paid, are your quotes getting higher? etc.

SS: What’s the best advice you’ve ever received in regards to screenwriting? If you could speak directly to that writer out there who’s just about to start his new spec – what would you tell him to give him the best chance to sell his/her screenplay?

J: Just finish it. You can always fix things in the next draft. Or the one after that. As for selling a spec, I have yet to do so, so I can’t speak from experience. But I would say to take a look at what’s recently sold to get a feel of the market. Passion projects rarely match what the town is buying. (I know from experience)

MJ: In regards to advice, there’s no single useful pearl of wisdom that comes to mind (omitting a few cynical ones, that is). Instead most of the wisdom I found useful came from working in the industry for several years before I started writing full time. It’s proven invaluable to have an overall understand of the process and how screenwriters fit into the bigger picture.

So maybe working in the industry is something to consider for yourself. But obviously, not everyone is able to do that. So let’s assume that you’re already writing something you like, and writing about settings, characters, and stories you feel competent portraying, then I would advise taking a step back and think about the commercial side of things.

Of course there’s artistry and craft involved with writing, but having worked in the studio system and seen that side of things, one thing becomes crystal clear: screenwriting is storytelling, but ultimately it really is just a for-profit business.

So keep in mind that the agent reading your script will be wondering how they can sell it, and the producer reading it will be thinking who will buy it. And if you’ve already got the access, then if a buyer reads and likes it, then they will also be thinking about the economics of saying yes, risk and recouping, etc.

So take some time and ask yourself some key questions like… is your movie meant for all audiences, just guys, just kids? There’s not a right and wrong answer here, but don’t forget that narrow demographics means lower box office which means lower budget, etc.

How much does your movie cost? It might be hard to estimate if you haven’t worked in Hollywood, but do some online research and find budgets of comparable movies.

Even if you write with an actor in mind, are there lots of other actors who could play the part? Because if your space epic costs $300M, there are only so many stars like Will Smith who will ultimately guarantee financing.

What does the marketing look like? Thinking about the poster and taglines is not only something that companies will have to do down the road anyway if your script gets produced, but it can also help you during the writing process to focus your story.

Obviously, in the end you still have to write a script that is going to resonate on the page and that people will like, just don’t lose sight of the business side of things so you aren’t wasting your time, or at least so that you have reasonable expectations about the response.

SS: Where is Dead Loss in the process, and what are you guys writing next?

J: Thousand Words has Chris Gorak attached to direct, and beyond that we don’t really know what their plans are. Right now, we’re in the middle of adapting a novel, LONG LOST by Harlan Coben for Gaumont, a French studio. Nick Wechsler and David Gerson are producing. Massy Tadjedin will direct and Hugh Jackman is attached to star.

Genre: Sci-Fi
Premise: A medical salesman receives a mysterious pre-recorded message from his younger self detailing an unimaginable impending horror.
About: Lionsgate bought this spec last year from “Lost” scribe Craig Rosenberg, which he was originally set to direct. But now “The Haunting In Connecticut” helmer, Peter Cornwell, has taken the reigns. Rosenberg has directed two movies of his own (“Hotel de Love” and “Half Light”), written two others (“The Uninvited” and “After The Sunset”) and landed an additional feature writing job after the sale of Panopticon for Universal and Don Murphy titled, “Second Sight,” about a detective who hides the fact that he’s going blind while working on a puzzling murder case.
Writer: Craig Rosenberg
Details: 114 pages (undated)

Gotta love the Reader Faves Voting! Staring down at my “to-read” list is often a daunting task. So many unknowns. So much risk with each script opened. I hate reading bad scripts. I hate writing negative reviews. It’s so much better when ten people tell me “read this!” so I actually know a script’s halfway decent. Which is how The Panopticon ended up on my radar.

And I’m glad you alerted me to it, because it’s well-documented this genre plays on a 24 hour repeating cycle in the Reeves household. And if you’re into sci-fi thrillers like “Umbra,” “Karma Coalition,” “Signals,” and “Passengers,” it probably takes up a healthy dose of your viewing time as well. But if you aren’t up for a little ridiculous logic, a few leaps of faith, and a plot hole or two, I wouldn’t bother even transferring this to your brand new Ipad. Cause at times The Panopticon is as silly as it is awesome. Touch screen at your own risk.

Peter Burke is a highly intelligent but otherwise ordinary guy who sells medical equipment for a run-of-the-mill sales company. He’s smart, and could definitely do better, but for whatever reason, Peter’s satisfied with where he’s at, living the simple life. He’s got a super-hot girlfriend, Lisa, who works for a large corporation, and who’d like to see him take advantage of that magnificent brain of his. But he remains insistent. He likes the no-frills lifestyle. He wants to keep it simple.

And then Peter gets a package. He opens it up, finds a DVD, hesitantly puts it in, and presses play. He’s terrified to see that the DVD is of him, five years ago. He looks gaunt, and appears to be in some sort of medical facility. Peter informs him that he’s not really Peter. His name is Nick. That the end of humanity is near. And that he’s the only person who can save the world.

Yikes. Things just turned decidedly un-simple.

Naturally Peter (Nick?) is kind of freaked out about this whole thing. Grabs a canoe, jumps in da Nile, figures he’ll head home and sleep it off. But oh look! His apartment is ransacked (I’m pretty sure in every one of the scripts I listed above, there’s an apartment ransacking scene – future writers may want to avoid this to stay original). And, uh oh, there are angry men with guns at the door (ditto on men with guns post-ransacking). Peter acutely speculates these men are here to kill him and does the window jump. He somehow gets to Lisa’s work where he takes her along for the ride. But men with guns are always good at finding fleeing protagonists. And they make no exceptions here. Just when it looks like they’re surrounded and all sorts of dead, a van spins up to block the shooters and two men pull Peter and Lisa to safety, escaping the blanket of bullets just in time.

David Rohacek claims to be a scientist. He’s accompanied by a mysterious man Peter remembers seeing at Starbucks. We’ll know him throughout the script as “Starbucks Guy.” These men inform Peter that the time has come. The aliens are about to take over earth, and he’s the only one who can save them. Although Peter’s been playing the surprised card all this time, turns out he might know a little more about that message from himself than he let on. See, Peter used to be a defense bio-chemist, the pinnacle of his work being a super plague that could wipe out humanity within a few days. But during the testing process, one of the blood samples he was provided with showed some characteristics that could only have been…alien in nature. Peter blabbed his concerns to his bosses, who immediately deemed him a nutcase and carted him off to the Happy House. Once there, Peter found that the other patients weren’t patients at all, but others who had stumbled onto this alien secret. The government, probably run by these aliens, was clearly keeping them here so they couldn’t expose this secret to the world.

The only way out was some major rehabilitation with high-octane psychiatric drugs. The “doctors” needed to convince them that there were no aliens, and that it was all a psychosomatic delusion. The members anticipated their eventual brainwashing, and encouraged Peter to make a tape for his later “cured” self, so he would remember the truth. This is, of course, the tape he received. Peter, who has the ability to create a mass plague which targets only the alien blood, is the only one who can save mankind. That is why he’s been rescued by these two, so they can take him back to their makeshift lab, and he can build and unleash the plague before the bad guys kill him.

The question, of course, is “Is any of this real?” Did Peter really discover an alien blood sample? Were the other patients really rounded up by the government? Could he just be manifesting all this to deal with some psychosomatic complex? As decision time grows near, the answer to this question will have devastating consequences for billions of people, all dependent on a choice Peter must make. Is he sane or not?

The cool thing about The Panopticon is that it separates itself from every other spec within the first five pages. The story is told mainly from the point of view of…you! Because YOU are Peter Burke. So when Rosenberg writes, he’s saying things like, “You go over and hug your girlfriend. She’s hot. Damn you’re lucky…Afterwards you go to grab a piece of toast. You burn your fingers. Oww.” I know this sounds cheap and traditionalists are already rolling their eyes. And I admit, when done wrong, this shit is amateur. But Rosenberg nails it and within two lines I was so used to it, I actually preferred it. It made everything feel so personal. Hey, *I* was the hero. That’s pretty cool. — I also wondered if this was just a writing choice, of if the movie will be shot from our point-of-view. Like a first person video game. I remember this being attempted a long time ago in an independent film. I never saw the film but always thought it would be a unique way to tell a story. Is that what they plan to do here? No idea, but it would definitely be wild if they went that route.

I also love how the script plays with whether you (“Peter”) are crazy or not. We see evidence for both possibilities, and Rosenberg expertly shifts that evidence in and out of your favor throughout the story. Sometimes you’re positive you’re crazy. But then a scene occurs that 100% convinces you you’re not. Then ten pages later, you’re doubting your sanity again. By the time the climax hits, we really have no fucking clue one way or the other. And it’s that uncertainty that leads us to one of the better thriller endings I’ve read in awhile. (minor ending spoilers here) In fact, I was going to give this a simple “worth the read,” right up before the last three pages. But then a big twist comes, and it’s one of those endings that makes you go, “Fuck,” because you can’t believe you didn’t see it coming. But you smile because it worked. That made this a “double worth the read” right away.

The only problems are the aforementioned plot holes and implausibilities. I think everybody has their genre where they allow the writers to play hard and fast with the rules, and this is mine. I didn’t mind the plot holes in Karma Coalition. And I didn’t mind them here. Why? Because there’s a certain kind of fun absurdity to it all that shuts down my logic-checking circuits. Logic-checking circuits? What am I, a droid now? Am I taking over the world?

Nah, that would be Steve Jobs. That damn Ipad is everywhere. And strangely, I want one.

The Panopticon is a cool thriller written with a unique style that separates it from the glut of scripts piling up on executives’ desks. If you like this type of story or you want to know how this separated itself from the pack, check it out.

Script link: The aliens took it.

[ ] What the hell did I just read?
[ ] wasn’t for me
[xx] worth the read
[ ] impressive
[ ] genius

What I learned: Make sure your writing style is a natural extension of your story’s tone. Rosenberg has a lot of fun with character names here. For example, Peter’s co-workers are named “Fat Guy Passing Time,” and “Divorcee Trying To Make Ends Meet.” This works because the tone of the script is fun, intense, bordering on absurd. But you probably wouldn’t do this in a script like, “The Hurt Locker.” The writing’s going to be more serious, more literal, more reflective of the tone. I bring this up because I’ll often see young writers using a really flashy and crazy style when they’re writing something like, “Up In The Air.” If you’re writing a crazy script like “Repo Men,” your style should be crazy. If you’re writing something traditional like, “Remember Me,” your writing style should be traditional. If you’re writing something like “The Hangover,” your writing style should be funny.

Hello everyone. Welcome to another week of Scriptshadow! This week we’ll be tackling some sci-fi, one of the greatest comedic screenwriters of all time, and…pirates?? Oh yeah, you bet. But right now, Roger’s going to review another Black List script. So let’s get on with it!

Genre: Historical Adventure, Heist, War
Premise: A spy and twenty Union soldiers in disguise board a train in Georgia to execute a scheme that could bring a quick end to the U.S. Civil War.
About: In 2005, Chase Palmer was profiled in Filmmaker Magazine’s article, “25 New Faces of Independent Film”. Palmer has several projects set up around town. Among them are Evolution’s Captain, a film about Charles Darwin for Academy Award-winning producer Cathy Schulman (Crash) and Dune for director Pierre Morel.
This is a script off the 2009 Black List and is being produced by Kevin Misher (Public Enemies, The Interpretor, Dune) for Paramount.
Writer: Chase Palmer

Genre: Horror/Fantasy
Premise: A 14th century Crusader must transport a witch through plague-filled France, the very witch it is believed, who cursed the country with the disease.
About: Bragi Schut, the writer, was one of the five contestants to win the Nicholl Fellowship back in 2003. He did so with this script, becoming one of the rare exceptions from the prestigious competition to get his winning script into production. The film is already in the can and will be released sometime this year. Schut, while not having a lot of produced success since 2003, recently made a big splash with his sale of “The Last Voyage of Demeter,” which follows the ill-fated crew aboard the ship Demeter, which carried Dracula’s coffin from Transylvania to England. Obviously, we can see why he was attracted to the material, as the storylines are almost identical.
Writer: Bragi Schut
Details: 2004 (2nd draft) – This is not meant to be a review of a movie, but rather a look at an early draft of the script. I wanted to get as close as possible to the Nicholl winning draft, so you guys could see what won the contest. The final film is likely to be very different.

Okay, the second you say to me, “Carson, I have a script about witches! Will you read it??” I will say, “No,” and then probably run screaming in the opposite direction. And I hope you take no offense to this. Believe me when I say I’m saving both of us a lot of disappointment. I just don’t care about witches. Or wizards. Or vampires or werewolves. My idea of hell is a Twilight/Harry Potter double feature. But you can only ignore people telling you a script is awesome for so long. And I’ve received so many endorsements of “Season Of The Witch,” that I could probably fill up an entire new Harry Potter sequel with the e-mails. But it was when I updated the Reader Top 25 list that I could continue my denial no longer. The script received over 40 votes, unusual for a script that hasn’t been featured on the site. So I did something I almost never do. I read a script I knew I was going to hate.

And then…

The magical wand of screenwriting came down out of the sky and proved, once again, that it doesn’t matter what the subject matter is. If you write a good story with good characters, people will come Ray. People will come. And I found myself smack dab center inside that cornfield: a believer. In fact, between this and “Oh Never, Spectre Leaf,” I may become an official card-carrying fantasy club member by next week.

Season Of The Witch is about a great knight who has lost faith in God. He and his loyal companion have just come back from the Crusades, where they witnessed unimaginable horrors, women and children slaughtered as ruthlessly as soldiers. It was enough to make a man lose faith in humanity, to make a man lose faith in God. And that is where LaVey finds himself, a lost soul whose faith has been broken. He can barely muster the motivation to journey back to his hometown, Marseilles.

But for better or worse, LaVey won’t have to worry about that. That’s because the French countryside is eerily empty. There isn’t a farmer or a traveler in site, and the two blindly trudge forward, becoming more confused with each step. What the hell’s going on here?? Alas, a stop at a local farmhouse explains it all. A couple, in their bed, dead, covered with boils and puss. LaVey and his fellow soldier have had the unfortunate luck of coming back to France during……..THE BLACK PLAGUE!!! – a pandemic that killed 3 out of every 4 people ON EARTH.

No sooner have they run from the house than they are approached by a bishop. The bishop surprisingly calls LaVey by name – tells him the Cardinal needs to speak with him at once. To the church they go, where an ailing Cardinal fills in the blanks. Everybody’s dead or dying, including him. The only good news is they have who did it, the one responsible for the plague. It is a witch, and she is chained up in the dungeon below. The Cardinal needs LaVey to escort her to a town in the mountains where monks are waiting and will sacrifice her – thereby ending the curse of the Black Plauge.

The thing is, LaVey doesn’t believe in hocus-pocus anymore. There is no Heaven. There is no Hell. Therefore this woman cannot be a witch. Tis impossible. So he agrees to take her on one condition. Once they get there, she is tried as a human. If she is considered to be guilty, then fine, they can fry her. Or, you know, shoot arrows at her head. If not, she must be let go. The Cardinal is incredulous, but what choice does he have? LaVey is his last hope. He agrees. Accompanying LaVey will be his comrade Felson, Sancierre (the knight) Debelzaq (the priest), Hagaman (the swindler), and Kaylan (the eager 17 year old dreamer, who hopes to one day be a knight himself).

The faux-fellowship finds themselves travelling through the eerie lifeless roads of France, occasionally steering through towns where the dead are piled up like old garbage, rotting against the sides of buildings. Disease is everywhere, and could strike at any moment. But the real danger is from within. The witch, who can be equal parts charming, innocent, evil, sly, and vindictive, is constantly testing the members of the caravan, especially LaVey, who she confesses to that she is the devil. But he dismisses it as the ramblings of a sick woman. There is no Devil. There is no God. And thus, he focuses only on his job. Get the woman to the town. Try her. And be done with it.

What I loved so much about this script was that it’s basically an anti-contained thriller. So many people are trying to write these contained thrillers lately, not understanding that there are other ways to keep a group together and retain the same type of tension. These six may not be contained by walls, but they all must stay together because of the situation. If this witch were to escape somehow, she would complete her curse, damning the last ¼ of the population. They, and every remaining man and woman, would die. It’s the same life or death stakes…from a completely different angle.

I also enjoyed watching the witch play with LaVey. She’ll trick one of the weaker members and slip out of her cage, have everyone chase her, get caught again, slammed back into her cage, and LaVey will ask, “If you’re a witch, why not strike us down right now? Why not conjure a lightning bolt to destroy your cage so you’ll be free? If you were so powerful, you could leave whenever you wanted.” And she basically says, “Cause it’s so much more fun fucking with you.” It’s that combination of threats from inside, a haunting countryside, the likelihood of disease, and each character’s, especially LaVey’s, own inner demons, wrapped inside a ticking time bomb, that give this script such a unique quality. When you add the perfectly baked macabre tone, you can practically hear the echoing clops their footsteps make as they trudge through these empty fog-filled towns. You can smell the dead. You can sense the despair. It’s really good stuff.

My only real problem with the script is LaVey’s belief system. He’s convinced this woman is not a real witch, because that would mean there was a God, and he doesn’t believe in God. But when someone’s able to summon wolves out of the forest to attack you, and then after defeating those wolves, she reanimates them to fight you again…I mean, I think at that point you have to admit that the woman in the cage is probably a witch.

Anyway, this was a very surprising read. Thought I would hate it. Ended up liking it a lot. Check it out!

[ ] What the hell did I just read?
[ ] wasn’t for me
[xx] worth the read
[ ] impressive
[ ] genius

What I learned: One of my issues with the Clash Of The Titans script was that Perseus sort of hangs back the whole time and lets everybody else do the doing. This is neither a good or a bad thing. It’s a choice, and one many screenwriters make. Neo’s character does it. Luke Skywalker’s character does it. And it works because we like the underdog. But your character definitely possesses a more “weighty” quality to him when he’s the one leading the charge from the get-go, which is how LaVey is drawn here. He’s the Crusader, the hardened knight, the alpha male. There’s something comforting about having a hero take charge, proactively dictating the story from page 1, and it was a good reminder that you don’t always have to transform the wimpy schlep into the surprise hero to craft a good screenplay. What’s wrong with making your hero the badass from the start?

Genre: Biopic
Premise: The story of how Washington Roebling built the Brooklyn Bridge.
About: You might know Tomasi, writer of “The Bridge,” from all his comic book work. He started as an editor at DC in 1993, working on Green Lantern and Batman. A decade later, he was promoted to Senior Editor. A few years after that, Tomasi left his post to pursue a writing career, working on such titles as “Green Lantern Corps,” “Outsiders,” and “Nightwing.” During that time, he also wrote a screenplay titled, “The Bridge,” that ended up on the 2005 Black List. Whenever I passed over the synopsis, I was always intrigued. I’m not a huge biopic guy (as we all know) but I love stories about impossible pursuits, and there aren’t many pursuits that seemed more impossible than the building of the Brooklyn Bridge, which was the largest ever conceived bridge at the time by 50%, and took thirteen years to complete.
Writer: Peter J. Tomasi
Details: 123 pages (undated)

As I pushed through the first 30 pages of “The Bridge,” one script kept coming to mind: “The Muppet Man.” Now if you go back to my review of that script, you’ll remember I had a big problem with the first couple of acts, that problem being I felt like I was reading a history book, that important information and events were being provided, but not dramatized. Sure, we were learning all about Jim Henson, but the education wasn’t nearly as entertaining as it could’ve been. That’s the same way I felt here. We learn about Washington as a child. We see him in the Civil War. We watch him interact with his father. But outside of some rare flashes, there’s something too straightforward about it all. Once again, I felt like I was cracking open the history books. However, this script really finds its groove at the midway point, and like Christopher Weeke’s script, entertains in its own way, turning a simple life into a complex and sometimes impossible journey.

Back in the late 19th Century, John Roebling was one of the premiere bridge builders in the world. He had built some of the biggest bridges in the United States. So when New York wanted to do the unthinkable and build a bridge from Manhattan to Brooklyn, Roebling was the first engineer they called. The assignment would be the most difficult in history, requiring skills and methods that, up until this point, had not even been attempted. In many ways, it would be just as much of an experiment as it would be a job.

Unfortunately, John had his foot crushed in a boat accident and died after refusing to have it amputated (thus incurring a severe infection). With construction on the biggest bridge in history not even yet begun, the committee had to make the impossible choice of finding a replacement to complete John’s vision, even though his vision was revolutionary to the point where others might not understand it. Did they start over? Did they scrap the project? With heavy reservations, they went with plan C, hiring John’s son Washington, to realize his father’s vision. Although young, Washington had studied under his father for years and was the most familiar with the design his father had created.

“The Bridge” is about Washington’s pursuit to get something done that, for every reason in the world, couldn’t be done. It’s about how impossible pursuits can break a man down, both mentally and physically, about never compromising your morals and methods, and most of all, about never giving up. And for those reasons, it’s a pretty damn good story.

Once we get past those first 50 pages, which are plagued by that “history text” feel, the building of the bridge begins. And that’s where the story really takes off. I think the moment I got roped in was when I realized just how fucking crazy building a bridge is. Particularly with 19th century technology! One of the things they had to do was use a relatively new method of digging with huge inflatable structures called “caissons,” which would stretch from the surface to the sea floor, blocking out the water, which allowed the workers to dig into the rocks sans scuba gear. In addition to this method being extremely dangerous (a sudden fire or flood could kill everyone instantly) nobody knew about decompression sickness back then. So men were climbing up and down constantly through sea level, and terribly sick and dying as a result. And nobody understood why. And that was just the first of many obstacles Washington had to find solutions for.

On top of the physical building of the bridge, it’s 19th century New York, so of course every politician in town is angling in pursuit of their own interests. So you had ferry businesses paying politicians to try to scrap the bridge. You had steel companies paying committee members to choose their steel for the bridge. You had a bridge being built through multiple terms of mayors and committee members, each elected official posing their own unique challenges for getting the bridge finished. Because of all these unforeseeable problems, what started off as a 5 year endeavor, turned into a 13 year ordeal.

But where the script really shines is in the story of Washington himself, who became so physically ill because of the decompression sickness and overwhelming requirements of the job, that he eventually couldn’t be on site anymore. He retired back to his house, where he observed and advised the building of the bridge from his window through a telescope! The fact that the builder of the biggest bridge in history was doing so from his living room window was, not surprisingly, quite controversial at the time.

Much like The Muppet Man, which has a great third act, this script also has a great finale. If you don’t tear up when Washington Roebling, beaten down and crippled after 13 years of the hardest work any man has ever had to endure in a lifetime, walks across his bridge for the first time, well then dammit, you don’t have a soul.

Check this one out. (fun fact: The reason that the Brooklyn Bridge still stands over 130 years after it was built, while every other bridge from that time has been destroyed, is because Washington accidentally overestimated how strong it had to be, building a bridge 6 times stronger than is required by today’s standards)

[ ] What the hell did I just read?
[ ] wasn’t for me
[x] worth the read
[ ] impressive
[ ] genius

What I learned: I’ll start with something technical, since I rarely use this section to do so. I’ve noticed, after reading as many scripts as I have, that when you’re jumping forward in time a lot, simply telling us the current year isn’t enough. Because we don’t remember what the past year you listed was. It was 20 pages ago. So when you write, “1863,” on page 17. Then “1871” on page 37, I don’t know how much time has passed unless I begrudgingly go searching back through the script to find the previous year. A better option, unless the previous year you listed was a few pages ago, is to maybe put in parenthesis “1871 (8 years later).” That way, I immediately know how many years have passed. May seem trivial but it’s a big difference if 2 years have passed as opposed to, say, 7.

But the big lesson here is obstacles. The best stories provide a character with a strong goal, and then throw obstacles at that character in his pursuit of that goal. The obstacle has the effect on the reader of, “Oh no. He’s screwed! There’s no possible way he can beat this!” “The Bridge” has building methods that don’t work, impossible delays, not enough money, politicians trying to kick our hero off the project, ill-health, fires, death, everything you can imagine. 12 years into the building of the bridge, the mayor of New York tried to say Washington was mentally unfit to finish the bridge, recommending a new engineer come on. At that moment I practically burst out of my chair. Are you fucking kidding! After 12 years he’s not going to get to finish his bridge! How’s he going to beat this?? That’s the power of the obstacle.