Question about being drunk

I've always thought having a character become drunk in a film was an easy out for the screenwriter. A lazy way to have him or her become honest and revealing and even a little silly. When it happens, you just know that things are gonna get intense. And it just feels wrong.

Susan Sarandon put it best when she was acting in "The Hunger". There's an amazing love scene between her and Catherine Deneuve, and the way it was written, Sarandon's character gets drunk and falls into the affair that way. To paraphrase Susan, she said, "Don't have her do that. It takes away her choice in the matter and lessens the meaning."

It's the same with Richard Dreyfus's character in "The Goodbye Girl". After a hideous performance, he gets drunk and reveals all. And got an Oscar for it. As did Katherine Hepburn in "Morning Glory". The Oscars like actors playing drunks. Witness Ray Milland in "The Lost Weekend" and Nicholas Cage playing the same damn role fifty years later in "Leaving Las Vegas".

I've seen it used a hundred times in plays, TV shows and movies, to give the uptight character an excuse to let loose. The worst was in "The Shadow Box", when a dying gay man's companion is suddenly sloshed and gets loud and in the gay man's ex-wife's face. So I'm not prone to using that device.

Problem is...well, Adam wants to. I already have him downing a glass of Scotch to help him tolerate Orisi's antics. However, I don't have him get drunk off it. But suddenly he's had another glass...and I'm starting to feel like his entrance after being made over is too pat, with him being huffy about how he's been treated. His best line sounds like it was written for just that moment, which irritates me. And on top of it, he wants to be a happy drunk. Which would fit the next few scenes. Dammit.

So...does anyone else have ideas on that? Am I just being too dismissive of a solid tool that could help the story? It's not like I've ever used it in any of my scripts or books. Same for drugs. Maybe it's okay, for this story. I dunno.

But my prejudice against it runs deep.

Quick note on A65...

I input changes from the first act and managed to trim that half-page, but did it by intensifying Casey's character and letting Adam change his slow burn with Orisi. I'm still too focused on loading a lot of info in the beginning, but it's not really necessary to have it all right then. Doling out the info works better. Now it flows a lot better and feels much more organic.

I'm tossing my 100 page limit. The characters won't let me force something that artificial on the story. So be it. I want good, not cookie-cutter or standardized format.

Light Bulb Moment

You never know where awareness will spring from, especially self-awareness. I got a negative review posted for "How To Rape A Straight Guy" on Amazon.com. And it didn't bug me, because I'd written the book I wanted to, and I learned long ago I couldn't please everybody with it...especially considering the title.

It's been the same for any other negative response to my narrative writing. "Okay, sorry you didn't like it." But no worry or concern about the book not being perfectly acceptable to one and all.

Well...that segued into me thinking about how I write screenplays. Yes, I write the stories I want and the characters build themselves, but in that I always have an eye to pleasing someone else. In the past, I've gone so far as to change the script to suit a producer's notes, and come damn close to ruining the story...even when I knew what I was doing was wrong.

Thing is, I've never been able to shake the idea that if my script is criticized or shrugged off, that means it needs more work. And tonight I finally got the idea that the reason I fall into that trap is because I'm not writing the script exactly as I want it. As the characters want it.

One in particular is "Mine To Kill", a story about a woman who wants to bring her husband back from the dead and an empathic-intuitive intern who senses the turmoil in her soul. I've had several people tell me the story needs to follow one character or the other, because it's split between the two of them. But the story doesn't want to do that, nor do the characters. And so it's still a problematic script because I haven't accepted what the characters want.

I keep trying to make it fast and scary in the first act, and it's not that kind of story. Period. It's the story of two decent people -- one who's getting lost in evil and one who's climbing closer to the angels. It needs a slower pace to build from...but to appease the Hollywood attitude and all the Syd Field acolytes, I've been trying to make it do the wrong thing for it.

I need to look back over my scripts and just write them the way they want to be. Write the movies I'd want to see instead of what I think might sell. I should let my attitude about my books, which are really problematic for some people, to encompass my screenwriting, as well. I mean, trying to appease what Hollywood says it wants isn't getting me sold, anyway, so what've I got to lose?

Some angst, maybe?

Oops...dug myself a hole...

I got into the party sequence of A65 and now am totally lost. It was long and boring and needlessly so, really, so I started cutting nonsense...and now I don't know what the hell's going on. I think I need to go back to page 1 and input my changes, because many of the pages have a lot of red ink on them, some of it scratched out and newer changes made to locations and positioning...it's mind-boggling. Begone with the confusion, is the best method.

It's been an odd day, anyway. I had a hell of a time concentrating at work, and when I got home I could barely get myself to sit down to write. Instead, I watched silly stuff like this...

That fox is a trip. "Juuuuuust messin' wit' ya!"

I guess I'm just overwhelmed at the need for something to keep this script from being lost in nothingness. Or stupidity. Or repetitiveness. Like that fox doing the same damn thing over and over and over...

God, my brain is fuzzy. What gives?

Digging...digging...

...Deeper and deeper into "The Alice '65", and in doing so I'm finding Casey. I've been keeping her too down to earth and not at all interesting. But I've adjusted her first interaction with Adam and several aspects along the way to the premier and party, and it's getting closer to what they need to be.

Lando's still being difficult, but he's starting to realize he's got to do something or he's going to vanish into the shadows. And I've trimmed back some nonsense bits that added nothing but space to the story. I can keep them in the book version.

I found the perfect placard for me. I nearly died laughing the first time I read it, it's so damn true. Of course, I never did make friends easily, and living in Buffalo, which is a very insular town, makes it even harder. So my best buddies right now are my characters.

I'm still able to feel pain and sorrow for real people. In fact, when I once made the comment I might become a serial killer, a coworker instantly said I'd never make it as one; I have too much empathy. Maybe that's why my most vicious work, HTRASG, keeps getting basically good reactions; I felt both for Curt and the victims of his revenge, and it showed on the page.

I wonder if I ever could write a character devoid of a heart or pain, just nothing but cruel? I doubt it. Even Allen, who causes so much grief in "Bobby Carapisi" has himself explained in such a way as you can understand why he became like he did. And his punishment is beyond cruelty. But I show that it is unacceptable. Show that what happens to him is evil.

Of course, I could just be talking myself into an arrogance unjustified in my actual abilities...which I wouldn't mind, right now.

Dismal Oscars

Emmanuelle Riva got dissed by a 21 year old who can't even walk. Shit.

Tarantino won another one. Gag.

Who said Seth MacFarlane was brilliant? Seen zero proof of it.

The opening was an embarrassment.

And I still want to be part of it. What does that say about me?

I'm a psycho.

Quick note...

This blue suit is the exact feel I'd want for Adam's transformation...

Albeit, without the sequined shirt and blue boots.

Act 1 on A65

 I say I'm going to cut, so I add half a page. It's crazy. But I've gone through the first act four times and it stays the same length. I'm fighting a losing battle, there.

That said, I am in the leanest part of the script, and Act 2 is so much sloppier. I should be able to cut in there; I have way too much chit-chat.

Act one's tight because it's where Adam's established as a cloistered lad en route to being old too soon, then he's being talked into working with Casey, and then he's being made over by Orisi. He goes from this...

...to something along the feel of this, just not as "City" as that. And then through the second half of Act 2 is totally deconstructed.

I'm having more fun with the interplay between him and Orisi, but Casey's too much in the background. For this to be a romantic comedy, she needs to make more of an impression, and she's still being reticent. Dunno why. I'm giving her the chance. Maybe it's because Patricia's around taking up all the good air. She's Casey's manager, backup, and entourage...AKA: Mom. How many girls want to be all they can be in front of mommy?

Damn, I'd like to win the lottery and make this movie. I'd cast Russell in a heartbeat, along with Eliza Dushku. It wouldn't take a lot to do -- $5-7 million. I know the perfect cinematographer who'd add immeasurably to the project.

That said, again...anybody know any millionaires who like to gamble on long shots?

Addendum...

I may take this too deeply to heart...but it does seem right.

Are the fates speaking?

I ran across this on Tumbler -- 

Mark Twain's house in Hartford, CT.

Photos by Frank C. Grace (Trig Photography)

Wow…just wow…