At the Santa Barbara Film Festival
A neat bonus this Oscar year … vacationing in southern CA chanced upon the Santa Barbara Film Festival. Besides films, we enjoyed a panel of Oscar-nominated screenwriters talking about their films, about the ins and outs of their screenwriting.
Nine of this year’s ten Oscar-nominated screenplay writers (original and adapted) spoke. Six of the nine also directed the film, including 4 of the 5 Oscar-nominated directors. Tony Kushner -- not a director -- co-wrote “The Fabelmans” with Oscar-nominated director, Steven Spielberg. Kushner pretty much said that he wrote for, not with Spielberg. Kushner also said that screenwriting terrifies him.
A wide range of film types was represented. And all these people felt like fairly regular folks.
Who spoke, besides Tony Kushner?
- Writers & directors (nominated in both categories): Martin McDonagh, “The Banshees of Inisherin”; Todd Field, “Tar”; Daniel Scheinert, “Everything Everywhere All at Once” (His partner, Daniel Kwan, wasn’t on the panel.)
- Writers & directors (nominated only for writing): Ruben Ostlund, “Triangle of Sadness”; Sarah Polley, “Women Talking”; Rian Johnson, “Glass Onion: A Knives Out Mystery”
- Writers only: Kazuo Ishiguro, “Living”; Lesley Paterson, “All Quiet on the Western Front” (with 2 co-writers not on the panel).
Ostund said he described the film he would make so often that it felt like he’d already written the script. The two Daniels said they meshed their one micro, the other macro ways of developing a script. Ishiguro leaned on the many books he’s written to find a way through writing a screenplay. Polley shaped lots of her script from the actors’ inputs. McDonagh found script help from what his characters didn’t say. All nine shared quite a bit. What a film festival treat for our entertainment and enlightenment.
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