Day 7: Roadmap into the industry

This week, Ricky commented on the post, "Day 3: Roadmap into the industry."

Ricky says:

"Take the hardest course first and succeed. Scramble! Learn, get in there and go for it!" That's some good advice.

The quote Ricky mentions came from Wendy Apple, who, in addition to teaching in the USC School of Cinematic Arts, is a documentary filmmaker. Wendy was responding to news that the writing program I was taking at the time was being redesigned. Students entering the program would be required to take introductory writing courses before registering for specialized writing courses.

As a documentary filmmaker, Wendy captures stories as they unfold; she's a keen observer and was commenting on people she had seen who had become successful in the entertainment industry.

I'm glad I finished the writing program before the changes affected me.

I was so excited about screenwriting that even before getting accepted into a writing program I went onto Amazon and visited local bookstores and read about 15 books about how to write a screenplay. I dove in!

The first course I took was a screenwriting course with students who were finishing the writing program. I enthusiastically made huge mistakes that provided great entertainment for the teacher, and I never stopped learning.

USC alumni are permitted to take any class they desire, as long as the department offering the class approves the request. And so after completing the master of professional writing program, I asked permission to take courses from the School of Cinematic Arts.

The School's writing division asked that I first take beginning screenwriting. I was so excited about taking a class from the School that I decided to treat it like a master class in screenwriting.

I went online and looked at the faces of the professors teaching beginning screenwriting and chose what I thought was the kindest face--it was Ron Friedman. Wow, the first couple of classes he raised his voice and made the topic seem unattainable, and I'd seldom heard the language he used! I would've dropped but so much was going on at work that I didn't have time to do the paperwork.

Several students did drop the class, a couple of students joined, and then we started to work on assignments; brief five- or six-page stories on themes Ron chose. By the fourth week of class, Ron's demeanor changed and he became the one of the strongest champions for beginning screenwriters that I've ever experienced. I admire his brilliant strategy--students who were only there to have fun, or who didn't want it enough dropped and the remaining students were there to learn, and try no matter what. It was an incredible experience.

Midway through the semester, I told Mr. Friedman that even though I'd completed a graduate-level writing program with an emphasis in screenwriting that for me, writing screenplays still felt as if I were struggling with an octopus--it's the hardest type of writing I've ever attempted. He said not to worry, that the octopus would be tamed by the time I finished his class.

And it was. Every week we watched classic films and discussed their structure (and I tweeted from class). He taught us about the palette of paints: dialogue, setting, music, architecture, psychology, costume, that writers choose from to bring the story alive. He taught us how not only how to create a scene, but to write it so that the audience will look at the exact point on the large movie screen that we wanted them to.

On the final night of class I told Ron that if his students were listening, I was convinced that more working screenwriters would come out of his class than any other I'd taken.

And I'll continue to share what I've learned from Ron and many patient professors and mentors and friends...step by step.