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The people who organize National Novel Writing Month, which is absolute nonsense and an insult to novels, are now turning their sights to the silver screen with “Script Frenzy,” an organized fort building club attempt to get people to crank out a bunch of horrible screenplays* during the month of April. It’s called Script Frenzy, and it’s a disaster. From the official website (via iO9):
Script Frenzy is an international writing event in which participants take on the challenge of writing 100 pages of scripted material in the month of April. As part of a donation-funded nonprofit, Script Frenzy charges no fee to participate; there are also no valuable prizes awarded or “best” scripts singled out. Every writer who completes the goal of 100 pages is victorious and awe-inspiring and will receive a handsome Script Frenzy Winner’s Certificate and web icon proclaiming this fact.
Ugh. No! Hey, if you want to write a screenplay, PLEASE WRITE ONE! I think that sounds like a really great idea. But this is not how work is done. It’s not a fucking goofball stunt. I know that some people have trouble starting things, but what you have to realize is that basically EVERYONE has trouble starting things, because starting things is very difficult, and if you can’t manage to solve that puzzle out of sheer force of will and the desire to complete a fun and interesting project, then maybe you should find something else to do! As someone who genuinely likes to watch good movies (and read good books) written by people who care about what they do, I find this entire premise to be a disgrace to the entire enterprise. SO! Videogum Everywhere “Agents”! For your latest stunt, you are NOT going to write a screenplay for the month of April. If you are interested in writing one, please choose any other month. LET’S GOOOOOO!
*It would be wrong to eliminate the possibility that someone couldn’t ever crank out an actually GOOD screenplay during this thing, but I find it unlikely, and even more importantly, if you can crank out a decent screenplay in a month then WHAT WERE YOU WAITING FOR? GET OUT THERE AND LIVE YOUR LIFE, GROWN UP!
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Done. Where’s my certificate?
Lawblog, where don’t you get your ideas?
Now that April is no longer allowed, I’m gonna write a screenplay in the month of May (in the month of May, in the month of May).
What do you want most In 2011 ?
Nothing can be better than meeting the special one at this spcial time
__Se ekIn terra cial / C 0- M_
It is the most succ ess ul inter racial d a tin g c lub !
Come to get rid of your lonely sin gle life.You will like it!We’re going to need more Oscars.
I bet this is how “The Happening” was written.
Except instead of using April as his time frame, M. Night Shyamalan said, “Hey let’s see if I can write an entire screenplay by around 6-ish this evening.”
I’m going to fire up my flip video at midnight on April 1 so I can document every single moment of this mission and post it to the internet after!
I wrote you a screenplay but I eated it.
I like to think of each comment I make on Videogum as a mini screenplay; it makes me feel brilliant, awe-inspired and victorious each and every day. But I already designed some web certificates that tell me that, so I can hold off on this.
I like to think of each comment I make on Videogum as a mini screenplay, too; the thought of producing one fills me with so much anxiety about its quality that I delete them before they’re finished.
OPEN – INT. BEDROOM
The bedroom is a mess. Clothes piled upon clothes, piled upon more clothes – every piece of it dirty. Mail and paperwork litter over surface, interrupted by glasses and dishes. One glass, full of cranberry apple juice cocktail sits on a nightstand, precariously perched on top of an iPod; a nervous glance may be enough to tip it. Pan up to a man at a laptop, an abused MacBook, archaic in terms of technology. He types furiously.
DIRTYSPACENEWS (V.O.)
“I’m not very good at commenting on this blog, but it’s fun. I never really had internet friends until I met these folk. In a way, I guess you could say, they… they saved me.”
Panning around to see the screen, we finally see what’s capturing this young, small man’s attention.
DIRTYSPACENEWS (typing)
“More like POOOOOOOOOOOOOOOP, amirite?”
FADE TO WHITE
We’re going to need more Oscars.
This is where I would put a screenshot of Clint Eastwood from “Gran Torino” if (a) I had one and (b) knew how to post photos here.
Do you miss knowing joy in your life, Gabe?
For realsies, Gabe, is there anything you don’t hate?
get off my lawn?
I’m in. Though be warned: I’ve not written a screenplay in all my months.
That makes you a powerchamp in this sort of thing. Like, top of the leaderboard, million stars to you – however those strange scriptmangling people would say it on a forum.
no time to write – busy building forts.
Worked for me!
i just watched good will hunting again yesterday. i love that movie. no sarcasmo.
It’s not your fault, Welcome. It’s not your fault. It’s not your fault.
It’s not your fault.
So, did Ben Affleck get new teeth? Or was he wearing prosthetic ones for Good Will Hunting? Cause he had those, real little chicklett juice-rotted teeth and now he’s handsome!
Yeah, funny story. Michael Bay on the subject: “We paid for a set of twenty thousand dollars of pearly white teeth—Ben’s gonna hate that story—uh, I always like low shots that kinda come right under your chin, just make you a little bit heroic, and he kinda had these baby teeth. So, uh, I told Jerry Bruckheimer, I said, ‘God, he’s got these baby teeth, Jerry, I don’t know what to do.’”
(Via this great rundown on why “Armageddon” is in the Criterion Collection: http://criterioncollection.blogspot.com/2005/09/40-armageddon.html)
I feel like MIchael Bay’s awfulness in every life arena is starting to become one of my constants.
Ha! Knew it! Thank you for answering my burning question and giving me something to read for the next half hour of work.
I don’t think it hurts the art of either screenwriting or literature to have a couple of dedicated amateurs (and coffeeholics) go a bit crazy over what they love.
Not the whole art as a form of human expression, no. That would be the remit of Michael Bay’s typewriting monkeys, and Dan Brown, respectively.
“We’ll be hearing from that kid, and I specifically mean a postcard.”
I think you’re missing the point Gabe. NaNoWriMo, and by extension this thing, isn’t so much about the product as it is the practice. It’s like that old adage about the journey being more important than the destination. Road Rules said that, right?
NaNoWriMo is absolutely godawful practice.
I think this is great. It fits perfectly into the mantra of all great artists: Work as fast as you fucking can.
I’m going to write a screenplay in the last few days of March.
Warning: it will be terrible.
Additional warning: no I won’t.
Plot twist: You weren’t going to THE WHOLE TIME!
Whoa, about a SPOILER ALERT?!?! Not cool, man.
Sounds like a better plan than Meth Head March was.
Question: May I still write screenplays in April if I promise they have nothing to do with Script Frenzy?
Just to be safe, start writing it on March 31.
Good thinking. I can also hold off on finishing until May 1. Even if I can be finished by April 27th, I won’t do it!
ok guys great idea for a movie:
two strong male lead characters struggle for years to finish their screenplay with no success. they vow to take a month off from writing to refocus their energy (a hall pass from work, if you will. that’s what hall pass is about, right? i didn’t see it because i don’t have time for hall passes) on other areas of their lives. in their time off they both fall in love with the same waitress (a strong, young female lead, preferably michelle rodriguez because someone should really give her the chance to do something that doesn’t involve her shooting something or getting shot, right? oh wait absolutely not that woman sucks so much. i paid to see S.W.A.T., but i guess that’s not her fault) at some shitty coffee shop (which they are somehow never at at the same time, because in LA the curfews are staggered). this, of course, sparks both of their imaginations (a love story! with young people! CREATIVE young people! and coffee! its like “friends” meets “wings” on the big screen, but without the airport or anything about pilots or whatever wings was about, but do people like wings? never seen it.) and gets the creative juices flowing. so, independently, both maddeningly and relentlessly pump out screenplays on their own (breaking the hall pass promise!!!). when they see each other they refuse to tell each other about their movies for fear of insulting the other, and out of the agonizing guilt that racks each of them for breaking their best-friend’s-promise, they burn the screenplays in the end. tragedy. a plague on both your studios.
my point, here, is that forcing yourself NOT to be productive can have its adverse effects, giving you the opposite of what you intended. be wary of gabe’s edict: you might just end up getting inspired and writing a screenplay. thankfully, it’ll probably be worth nothing more than a pile of ashes in the end, but good for you.
My imaginary script was already imaginary optioned for a movie, and then I had imaginary creative differences with the director and a lawsuit ensued, imaginarily. Also, the entire court case took place in a blanket fort with a bong and a wildebeest was my attorney.
I say whatever incentive gets people thinking and acting creatively, good for that incentive.
Counterpoint inspired by Turturro’s afro:
“In three weeks, the Coens wrote a script with a title role written specifically for actor John Turturro, with whom they’d been working on Miller’s Crossing. The new movie, Barton Fink, was set in a large, seemingly-abandoned hotel.” (Wikipedia)
This April, we are all Coenses.
Holy God, Videogabe, thank you. Thank you for feeling the same way about NaNoWriMouth as I do.
I’m just going to copy, paste, and format Monster comments into dialog between two unemployed characters, Brody and Kylee, who have a continuous conversation about the media they despise but can’t tear themselves away from.
I’m a bit insecure about this mission. I’m not sure I’m the right kind of person to not be writing a screenplay.
Also, what if I fail? What the hell am I going to do with a screenplay?
I had no idea NaNoWriMo inspired this sort of hostility. As long as you’re not expecting to actually turn out a good work in a single month, attempting to write a novel in that short a period of time has merits in and of itself. Discouraging a creative activity just because the result is going to be bad or unfinished seems to be missing the point in this case, particularly since no one actually reads the raw NaNoWriMo results.
But how else am I supposed to tell my story about classically good-looking people that devise a means to bone each other without becoming emotionally involved? This tale MUST be told people!