This is all very exciting for me...

I am a dork, and because of this I am extremely excited that we got to send our mini-screenplays to Jonathan Lethem. I'm not sure what I am so excited about since most of what I sent him was his own words just formatted differently, but I suppose it's the whole idea. A famous author is going to be reading my (mini) screenplay adaptation of his novel. Perhaps I am such a writing freak that any chance to get my (semi) writing out there and noticed is like Halloween come early (if we're looking solely at the commercial offerings of holidays, Halloween is my favorite).

I give Lethem a lot of credit for willingly and (nearly) freely putting his work out there for others to use and abuse as they see fit. So many times I’ve read amazing books only to see them slaughtered in movie format. And this makes me think, how is that book’s author handing this? If it were me, I would be horrified. You spend so much time and effort crafting detailed plots, breathing life into intricate characters, and then suddenly some hotshot young screenplay writer changes the war story into a romance and gives your main character a limp and a bad accent.

But perhaps Lethem sees the fun in this. Maybe he wants to find out what crazy things people do with his work, who stays close to the story and who gets rid of everything but the title. Judging by the Promiscuous Materials Project, I think he enjoys this all very much.

September 18, 2008: Jonathan Lethem's You Don't Love Me Yet (Pages 120-123)

The scene we chose from Jonathan Lethem's You Don't Love Me Yet (Tang Donut Shop scene) was quite a short one—only three pages—but by the time we were done writing, I was glad we had chosen a shorter scene.  A lot more work goes into adapting the material than I originally thought.  Since a good part of the book’s scene was internal thought or description, we knew we had to expand on the dialogue.  We really liked the banter between Bedwin and Lucinda and decided to add more to that.  We also expanded on the argument between Matthew and Denise to give them each more lines.  We felt the original dialogue was missing just a bit more explanatory detail so that’s what we added.  Originally we planned on scrapping the Jules Harvey manager reference, but in the end decided not to.  We weren’t sure whether Jules’ role in the novel (especially as their manager) was going to become more essential.  Also, the “armpit sniffer” reference at the end of the scene was the comedic closer and since we couldn’t think of an appropriate replacement, we decided to keep it there.  I’m happy with how the final draft turned out, though I must admit the hardest part of writing was just coming to an agreement within our group.  It’s not that we had disputes or anything, but when you have three different people tossing out ideas for lines, it’s difficult to keep track of what we actually wanted typed on the page and what we didn’t.  Despite that, the writing went smoothly and it did take us the whole time to adapt those three pages.  So I suppose I should be happy we didn’t choose a longer scene.  

September 11, 2008: Pulp Fiction

Quentin Tarantino’s Pulp Fiction is known for its subtle and sometimes blatantly obvious pop culture references. One interesting reference that I missed on first viewing of the movie a couple years ago suddenly came to my attention this last time I watched it. During the scene where Vincent has to give Mia the adrenaline injection, you can see two board games in the background: Operation and Life, two iconic games that most people have either played or at least heard of. Tarantino used them deliberately to make comment on the fact that Vincent is basically “operating” on Mia’s body and, in essence, he’s working to save her life. To add to this, he has chosen a children’s game to comment on a “grown-up” situation involving a drug overdose. This is just one of the many ways that Tarantino took something from pop culture and used it to add depth and irony to Pulp Fiction.

September 4, 2008: Paul Auster's City of Glass, pp. 3-89

Despite not being your average detective story, Paul Auster’s City of Glass features many “clichés” of detective stories. This goes with the metafiction concept of characters playing into expected roles. City of Glass’s main character, Quinn, does not play into an expected role except when he is pretending to be the detective, Paul Auster. Once immersed in this persona, he becomes the classic detective as seen in many mystery movies and novels (even in the novels Quinn writes). When Quinn acts, he thinks about what his own novels’ detective, Max Work, would do in a certain situation and Quinn copies him. When at the Stillman house, “he thought about what Max Work might have been thinking had he been there. He decided to light a cigarette” (14). He falls easily into the assumed role; he says the proper things and asks the right questions. After losing his tail on Stillman, Sr., Quinn (as Auster) reassures a panicked Mrs. Stillman that he has a few ideas on how to find the man again, even though he really doesn’t. Although Quinn has a passive and slightly nervous personality, as Auster, he becomes the traditional smooth-talking, self-assured detective. He is confident and levelheaded. He tracks his mark, keeps detailed notes, and even assumes different “disguises” with ease, just as any other typical detective would. Other aspects of the story even go along with these detective story clichés. The novel opens with a mysterious phone call, a device seen before in mystery novels. Quinn/Auster’s client is a mysterious and beautiful woman who kisses him at their first meeting, mirroring the femme fatales of classic noir films. City of Glass acknowledges its own label as a mystery/detective story by adding obvious clichés and turning its main character into the typical detective character.