Becoming the artist you are, getting to the you that is really the best you can be, is a really bizarre thing. Because you find yourself inspired in the weirdest places -- like a Dylan bootleg from '83, or a rom-com flop starring Jennifer Aniston; and it's strange because --- how can you build a career based on influences that no-one cares about?
But of course you can. In the extended cut of "Almost Famous" there's a great scene, I think between William and Russell, where they talk about loving a moment in Marvin Gaye's "What's Happenin' Brother", it's a small 'woo', one of those accidents that got left in--- but it's the best thing on the record.
Those are the little things that inspire us, the little things that make us who we are. If you don't like "Casablanca" but you do like "Just Friends", so be it -- that's you. Some people spend years denying they like "Just Friends" and as a result deny they love mainstream rom-Coms and therefore never let their creativity explore rom-coms and thus never reach their potential. I'm sure you all have examples where you've fought against your natural skills/instincts/interests.
I know quite a few actors who turn away from their strong points-- it's very self-destructive.
Embrace it. I'm not into "Star Wars" and I'm not into "The Matrix" so I don't really go there, it's not my ticket. Having a wide range of influences and knowledge is of course great and important; but you just gotta make sure you take care of what you love. If your skill as an actor is being a scary gangster, or being a quirky girlfriend-- you could shy away from it or you could become the best quirky girlfriend that ever was by constantly working on it. It's like right now, this theory I'm exploring of "doing stuff for the 1%" -- it might be nonsense, or it might be worthwhile; either way I'm battering away at it until I exhaust it. I'll be the authority on being creative for the 1%. That's how we all need to be about our niche things, about the things we love.
You can be pretty good, maybe even great; at doing things well like many others--- or you can absolutely nail and own the one area you're personally drawn to. There's room for a master of suspense like Hitchcock, or for a powerful woman to give Streep some competition at awards time, or for a screenwriter who can make a script read like poetry. Whatever it is you're good at or want to be good at, that's where it's at; even if no-one around you gets it yet, even if everyone says "I'm telling you there's no market for transgender thriller rom-coms!" they're right. But they're right because you're not great yet, you're still pandering to the 99%. When you nail the thing you really want to say, after years of learning, writing and redrafting, then they'll get it--- you'll have mastered your work, mastered you, and when you show everyone else who you are, they'll see themselves.
Thursday, 10 March 2011
Wednesday, 9 March 2011
Be Supportive, Not Critical
It's easy to be critical. We all have opinions. When we criticise writing, or directing or even acting -- we do it with such authority. But where do we get this authority from?
Spielberg has authority. Meryl Streep has authority. The rest of us don't. Scripts are bad not because rules aren't followed, but because the scripts aren't good. So you need encouragement.
THE ENCOURAGER should be your name, and mine. Creative people don't succeed because of critical people, they succeed in spite of them. It's the positive, encouraging people who truly listen and care and inspire-- they remind us that it's an art form, that within us we have unique ideas and stories.
As an actor -- you need teachers who teach you skills and encourage you to reach far into the depths of who you are; they need to bring that out in you. Actors who get too criticised, too often, stop acting; because they try to please everyone and when they're acting they're trying to do good by the 500 critics who've told them they're awful, rather than the two people that matter: themselves and The Encourager.
We're at our best when we're connecting with something within us. When we turn our curiosity and energy and heartaches into words or performances or beautiful photography. We only get there by believing in the truth of our own ideas and feelings and intuitions.
Critical people wreck that. But they don't GET it, we have to remember that. Create work for the 1% who get you. That's when you entertain people, that's when you touch their hearts.
Spielberg has authority. Meryl Streep has authority. The rest of us don't. Scripts are bad not because rules aren't followed, but because the scripts aren't good. So you need encouragement.
THE ENCOURAGER should be your name, and mine. Creative people don't succeed because of critical people, they succeed in spite of them. It's the positive, encouraging people who truly listen and care and inspire-- they remind us that it's an art form, that within us we have unique ideas and stories.
As an actor -- you need teachers who teach you skills and encourage you to reach far into the depths of who you are; they need to bring that out in you. Actors who get too criticised, too often, stop acting; because they try to please everyone and when they're acting they're trying to do good by the 500 critics who've told them they're awful, rather than the two people that matter: themselves and The Encourager.
We're at our best when we're connecting with something within us. When we turn our curiosity and energy and heartaches into words or performances or beautiful photography. We only get there by believing in the truth of our own ideas and feelings and intuitions.
Critical people wreck that. But they don't GET it, we have to remember that. Create work for the 1% who get you. That's when you entertain people, that's when you touch their hearts.
Sunday, 6 March 2011
1%
"I'm writing about 'The Apartment' all week. problem is, it bores 99% of readers. The good thing? 1% love it. Never forget the 1%."
That was me, on Twitter two days ago. I'd never thought about that until I wrote it, but it's been playing on my side ever since. Blogging is like making a movie; you have an idea and then try and shape it into something that everyone will like.
But when you go chasing everyone, you don't truly grab anyone. But when you do what you truly want to do, even if it's for one person, that's when it means something. The problem is, when you do it for the 1%, there's not going to be a lot of support because it doesn't make a lot of business sense.
Film is about business. Every artist suffers. Even most great indie films have a rewritten beginning or a re-cut ending. We're always changing and adapting things to appeal to a bigger percentage. But when the percentage gets bigger, the true satisfaction gets smaller.
The stuff we truly and madly love is rarely the stuff that was made for everyone. You can cook yourself a perfect pie but if you're going to sell a lot of them, you need to package them differently; and you need a recipe that will appeal to everyone.
Magic is made when you do things for the 1%. It's just hard, is all.
That was me, on Twitter two days ago. I'd never thought about that until I wrote it, but it's been playing on my side ever since. Blogging is like making a movie; you have an idea and then try and shape it into something that everyone will like.
But when you go chasing everyone, you don't truly grab anyone. But when you do what you truly want to do, even if it's for one person, that's when it means something. The problem is, when you do it for the 1%, there's not going to be a lot of support because it doesn't make a lot of business sense.
Film is about business. Every artist suffers. Even most great indie films have a rewritten beginning or a re-cut ending. We're always changing and adapting things to appeal to a bigger percentage. But when the percentage gets bigger, the true satisfaction gets smaller.
The stuff we truly and madly love is rarely the stuff that was made for everyone. You can cook yourself a perfect pie but if you're going to sell a lot of them, you need to package them differently; and you need a recipe that will appeal to everyone.
But that's the reality. That's the business. And we all cave. We take out the violent scene to get a lower rating, we hire the famous actor over the right actor to get the funding. By doing it-- we make a living. But we rarely make magic.
Magic is made when you do things for the 1%. It's just hard, is all.
Saturday, 5 March 2011
The Old Apartment - This Is Where We Used To Live
For one week I will be focusing on the film "The Apartment." This is the third in a series of articles.
In the history of humankind, the film camera is a pretty new invention. For whatever its original purpose was -- the main reason soon became: to shut us up and entertain us for two hours (or educate, or brainwash.) But of course, the effects are much longer lasting. In the past, people would die and they would be gone. Now they're living on our giant TV screens. Billy Wilder movies still get new reviews, and people debate who is more natural; Lemmon or Stewart. It's as if they're still here. There's something so strange about that, when you really think about it -- these people still shape and form parts of our lives long after they've exited. Was it meant to be this way? Did nature intend for us to be able to press rewind and bring back the dead?
A motion picture is a snapshot; something created by a bunch of people some time in the past for reasons we'll never fully know. People make movies because they're inspired, or because they want to impress a girl, or because they had three-pictures left on their contracts. There are all sorts of reasons. But these movies last for life and they take on new meanings which had nothing to do with the intentions of the creator's. 'The Social Network' means something now, in 2011, because we're all spending our time on Facebook. But what will it mean in fifty years? What does 'The Great Dictator' mean now and what did it mean when Chaplin made it? 'The Apartment' captured my heart, mind, soul and all-round-attention in a way so few films ever have done. And it leaves me longing--- longing for more Wilder dialogue, for more people like C.C. Baxter. I live my life like a guy who constantly gives back the executive washroom key, and instead holds on to his integrity --- but what does that mean? Is who I am based on the real world or based on a fantasy of 1960? Can I live in this way or will I just wind up with egg foo yong on my face?
Would C.C. Baxter survive in 2011? Would Fran Kubelik go running after him? These questions are stupid, perhaps; as they were the work of fantasy in 1960, just as they are now. But films do hold resonance in the years they are made. They have meaning, they reflect society. But when people like me and you still find meaning in them long after the fact, we're in a minority. On our worst days, we act like we're in on a secret; like we 'get it' -- but holding on to the romance of old is always accompanied by disappointment and a lack of comprehension of so much of what happens in the world around us. Do we watch these movies just for comfort, to console us in some way; or are they useful and meaningful in today's world?
Thursday, 3 March 2011
The Apartment - It's A Must, Gracious Living-wise
For one week I will be focusing on the film "The Apartment." This is the first in a series of articles.
I was responding to an email interview yesterday, about one of my own films, and one of the questions was, "what does this film mean to you?" I didn't have a clue. It's the same with the films that mean the most to me - I am terrible at describing it. It may be that I am too close to them, but I am beginning to suspect that it's something to do with the types of films I love. When you love 'The Apartment,' you might recall a particular scene, or great line, or a moment between C. C. Baxter and Fran Kubelik. But the reason you love 'The Apartment' isn't any of those things, at least it isn't for me -- it's something intangible - a magic that permeates through it. You feel it when you read the script, you see it in Jack Lemmon's face and you feel it in them musical score. Some films rise far above just picture and sound, and this Billy Wilder film is one of them.
"It's hard enough to write a good drama, it's much harder to write a good comedy, and it's hardest of all to write a drama with comedy. Which is what life is."
-Jack Lemmon
That quote is true. Comedy is tough to write, but some people can do it. Even fewer can make it work on screen. When you well and truly laugh at a movie, it's a rare thing. When you think about it, very few comedies stick out for people. For people of my generation, they'll mention a film like "See No Evil, Hear No Evil" or "Cool Runnings." They are very funny films. But why, what was it about them films? It's hard to say.
Even rarer than those, are films that mean something beyond the laughs --- that resonate with who you are, how you're feeling, and how you see the world. That is where 'The Apartment' excels -- it mixes the painful with the joyful, in a way that only a few --namely Billy Wilder, Charlie Chaplin and Frank Capra-- were able to do. Even writer/directors like Woody Allen try, but rarely quite make it, because it's just too hard to get the potion right.
I was watching 'The Apartment' last night, and it was remarkable to me how Miss Kubelik is in love with Mr. Sheldrake (the other man), right up until the very end of the picture. There's a real sadness underlying the film --- where we see the wonderful C.C. "Buddy Boy" Baxter looking after Fran, falling in love with her, while she painfully pines for another man who doesn't love her in the way she needs.
And before we get all serious, we have to remind ourselves of the premise. This is a film about a man who can't go home at night because the executives at work are using his apartment to entertain their mistresses. The set-up is a hilarious one. Its simplicity is also wonderfully complex-- and enables to plot to bend and shift in subtle, and masterful ways.
The screenplay is, for me, the greatest script ever written. I don't know if Billy Wilder and I.A.L. Diamond were on a direct line to God, or whether they were on some amazing drugs --- but whatever it was, they managed to reach for the stars and produce a document that is as beautiful, touching, poetic, and hilarious as anything ever written. The screenplay bounces into life the second you read it.
population of New York City was
8,042,783. If you laid all these
people end to end, figuring an
average height of five feet six and
a half inches, they would reach
from Times Square to the outskirts
of Karachi, Pakistan. I know facts
like this because I work for an
insurance company --"
C.C. Baxter, Opening Voiceover.
I know that many of you love this film like I do, and many of you will never have seen it. I am also aware that many of you won't share my enthusiasm for it -- but I hope you will indulge me this week, as I attempt to dig deeper into the film, to work out why it was magic (at least, to me), and to also figure out why, on a personal level, I hold it so dearly. That's fascinating to me. Why do we watch some films a million times over? What IS IT?
Where we go, my place or yours?
Might as well go to mine - everybody else does.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)