Film Courage: Was there a blog post [scriptcat.wordpress] or chapter in the book [Mark’s new book
A Screenwriter's Journey to Success: Tips, tricks and tactics to survive as a working
screenwriter in Hollywood] that was actually difficult for you to write?
So I know your book is a culmination of these blog posts that you’ve collected over a
5-year period.
But was there one where you thought “Oh, this is fine.”
And then you realized “You know, [writing it] this is actually affecting me.”
Mark Sanderson: Ah…interesting.
Yeah, I think going back to the slow periods in one’s career or having achieved something
and not having the results that you think…like “Look, I sold a movie.
I should be this.”
And the reality is well no, that’s not always the case.
After I sold my first spec, it was my fifth spec but it was my first spec that I sold,
I was at the time doing catering because I worked in restaurants before I went to film
school and after [film school] because I didn’t want to get into a day job where I would not
have any time to write and so a restaurant was good money and it would free you up to
be able to write (as long as you would write).
Because that’s important.
I was in the restaurant with a lot of people wanting to be actors and they loved playing
the role of an actors, but not actually doing the work.
So if you’re given the free time to do it, you better do it and I always did it.
But it was the time when I sold my spec and I was in the trade papers (Variety) and every
writer wants to be in Variety, right?
Then you say “I made it,” right?
Well the day that I was in Variety, the headline was this new company had formed and they optioned
my script and they were going to buy it and make it into their first movie.
And that day in Variety I had to do a catering job at one of the biggest producer’s in
Hollywood’s house.
And so it was this catering company and my friend and I drove up to Beverly Hills and
here we are at this giant mansion of this producer and it was a big breakfast meeting
with big power players, and I was thinking “Wow?
I’m in Variety today?
Why should I be catering?”
And also I was thinking in a way (which story is in the book) “What if this producer had
rejected my screenplay?”
Here I am in his house, serving him coffee, you know?
So just be careful of who you disrespect on the way up or down because you just might
end up in their house pouring coffee for them.
That was hard to write [in the book] and I look back on that now and I laugh.
But it’s the reality of the business because as you know, it’s a step deal.
So when anything sells, it’s in steps and you may not get the final steps.
When a screenplay sells you get a little bit of money and then a little bit of money from
the next draft and the next.
And it has to be made for you to get the bonus.
So everyone thinks that just because a script sells, suddenly everybody’s calling on the
phone and things like that.
I would say that was not difficult to revisit but I think about the time and I put myself
back into the time.
That’s what I’m trying to do when I was writing because I’m a very visual person
and I can really have the sense memory and back in the time it wasn’t funny, you know?
It was like “Oh my gosh, so now I have done this and still…I have to do this?”
And you’re like yeah, many times you have to live in these two parallel worlds and that
can mess with your head a lot.
So you have to be very grounded and say this is the reality of it and it’s not the image
of who I am.
I am a writer, if I’m catering or always doing something else at the time.
Film Courage: You know, I think this is such an important story because I think people
can be caught in two separate worlds here [in Los Angeles] for years.
Mark Sanderson: Absolutely.
Film Courage: And eventually some will definitely turn the corner and the party will be at their
house (so to speak, to use this metaphor) and unfortunately for some, it won’t.