Hi all. I am new to this site but not to screenwriting. I have churned out a few now but something new has cropped up. A close friend of mine has written an autobio based on lifelong correspondence with another person. It is a great read and I am in the process of developing it into a script. I am not really stuck but would like some feedback about translating "letters" into action. I am rewatching "Vincent and Theo" after having read all the Van Gogh letters that I can find. But some friendly input would be helpful. Thanks.
Screenwriting : Looking for some advice. by Richard Stephens Ely
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Develop the theme first. If it's biographical, what runs through all of the letters, or least most of them? What lesson or truism can be exposed? Technically, I've seen where mini-stories backed up by the prose in the letters (V.O.s or real-time readings)has worked well. Letters are snapshots of a person's life at the time of writing them. This lends itself to developing sequences of scenes that visually explain poignant pieces of the letters - while each sequence explains and/or confirms the theme.
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Check this out and do some cross-referencing: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Epistolary_novel#In_other_media
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Not sure if this will help you, but Epistolary is a literary term that describes novels based on letters and other writings. Many of those novels have been made into films. If you Google it, I'm sure you'll find a lot of great info and examples. Sometimes letters can be the basis of the action, sometmes the action is a result of the letters. Beaches, You've Got Mail, The Shop Around the Corner, 84 Charing Cross Road, PS I Love You, The Lakehouse, Possession, Letters to Juliet, The Notebook, The Love Letter, The Letters, Letters to God, Dear John....war movies like Last Letters Home....Letters from the Inside...there are a lot of great films based on letters. Good luck, bro!
Hello Richard, It is known that not all biographies do make good scripts. What is of great interest in a life story does not always qualify as a great fiction or movie, and to do so there needs to be something truly "life changing" about the events (to the main protagonist). If not, then the events can nevertheless have importance for a specific reason, or act as some sort of testimony - but in those cases you are then writing something that is more of a documentary or a docu-drama. A documentary is of course a very specific genre, and a docu-drama is a compromise that can look like a fiction and allow minimal change to the protagonist since the focus is on society or historical facts. The protagonist is then only the point of focalisation, or privileged witness and hence brings some freedom to the narration structure. Either way, you will have to juggle with the time bracket you wish to write around knowing that ellipses can be a hit or miss. Then again it might be an obligation since in some cases the important change requires to track down its roots from early on - as in the things we only understand way later in our lives. I hope that it's clear enough and that it helps you somehow.
Thank you all for taking the time to reply. It has certainly given me a lot to consider. My source is a heart-warming account that contains suicide, alchoholism, deaf parents, homosexuality and a premature death. So there are a lot of elements to draw from. Your comments are truly appreciated and I think have set me on the right track to at least bash out a decent draft. Thanks again.
The first question my venerable entertainment lawyer would ask is: have you obtained the RIGHTS? This is your first concern. See your own lawyer before going any further.