Film Courage: This question comes in from Stian Kallhovd (forgive me for saying the
name incorrectly) “I’ve sometimes wondered whether I should write TV series in addition
to features, but so far it seems to me that the stories I want to tell are better told
through films. Can Russell give an example of why a story would be better told as a TV
series?
Peter Russell, screenwriter/story doctor: Well if you love movie and so many people
do I know a lot of people who grew up loving movies are kind of appalled that television
has taken over.
Think of it this way you can tell any movie as a TV miniseries. You can take the movie
that you’ve been writing over the last four or five years and you can turn it into a television
miniseries more easily than you can turn it into a TV series. So think of it that way.
Now I spent several years learning genres: mystery thriller, crime thriller, horror,
all of these genres and I sort of master the deep understanding of each one of those genres
and every one of those genres is very different and they all have these cool tools that I
learned to help movie people. Well guess what? It turns out when I turn my attention to television,
all the rules of movie thrillers apply to the crime drama that I’m selling as a serial
right now Ray Donovan meets True Detective. All of those cool structural tools that work
in SEVEN, that work in all these classic movies, it turns out those secrets transfer right
over to television.
So just know that everything you’ve learned about movies works in TV. But the easiest
transition is to take your movie idea and turn it into a miniseries. Why? Which for
some of the reasons we talked about earlier which is miniseries are like long movies because
the characters have an arc. They start with a wound and they eventually heal or not.
So if you’re writing movies and you love movies, make the transition to television
by writing a miniseries, where you can simply stretch your idea into a longer form. Forget
the structure so much, but those cool tools which by the way I have on my website Peter
Russell Script Doctor (dot) com. I go each genre of movies has a set of hidden structures
and tools in it. Just take those hidden structures and tools and apply them to your television
show in the same genre.
Writing a comedy? Apply the movie comedic rules to your sitcom. Writing a romantic comedy,
same thing. Love story, same thing. Adventure romance, same thing. Write a miniseries, it’s
a bridge form. It will help you learn why television has two big differences than movies.
One is that the characters don’t really change in television and the other is you
can tell more than you can in a movie where you want to show everything (so there’s
just more dialogue).
But those are the two big differences, everything else can be the same. Especially in a miniseries.
It’s a great bridge for you to learn this new structure. And you’ll just have a better
chance of getting your story bought. I didn’t say great chance! I said better chance because
I think we’re up to 550 scripted television shows now in the U.S. A few years ago there
were 200. And I believe that’s going to continue. I think in 10 years television is
going to be five times as big as it is right now.
So if you want your work to sell learn the new forms by bridging your way to TV by using
your movie as a miniseries.
Film Courage: We miniseries in fashion so-to-speak previously?
Peter: They were in the 70’s. I know there were big miniseries in the 70’s like the
THORN BIRDS. There was another show called SHOGUN. These were big event television so
they’d be on one night for three or four nights, five nights sometimes. But then there
was a period where they weren’t fashionable. But they’ve gotten very fashionable again.
Ryan Murphy, all these guys that write these fantastic shows. The OJ Simpson trial [THE
PEOPLE V. O.J. SIMPSON]. TRUST which is a great one that Danny Boyle just did about
the Getty family, brilliant miniseries.
And THE ASSASSINATION OF GIANI VERSACE they are where I think a lot of movie makers are
going in television because it’s a more commodious form, it’s the easiest way to
transition from film to television.
And I think the miniseries also kind of satisfies our desire for seeing a movie which is I want
to see somebody change, I want to see a complete story right? When you’re watching ANIMAL
KINGDOM, well okay Ellen Barkin is still going to be a poisonous b*tch, okay, well let’s
have some popcorn. At some point you want to see what’s going to happen right? Can
we have some resolution, can we actually resolve something. That’s what great movies have
always done for us, so I think that instinct to have a complete story, that’s why miniseries
have become so much more popular. They’re sort of replacing what movies used to give
us which is the sense of a complete story.
“Ahh, we’re done. Ellen Barkin is. Yeah, two of the kids got help. They got therapy.
Thank God we can have dinner now.” As opposed to “Oh God she’s still in jail, she’s
really tormented right. Is she still wearing those awful black contacts, yes she is. She
still looks like, right?
In the movie, she would have moved on. She’d probably be or should be okay. But that’s
why miniseries I think are so popular.
Film Courage: You said in the 70’s [miniseries] were popular. Can you see any parallels between
that time and now? Is there something in audiences that wants this?
Peter: Yes, I think that we love long form entertainment. And that’s why I think we
binge series, too. I think entertainment is becoming like the Russian novel of the 19th
century. What do I mean by this? It sounds so pretentious, I’m sorry. But the Russian
novel (Tolstoy) got longer and longer and bigger and bigger, until they were 1,000 pages,
1,500 pages, right?
That’s the sign of a maturity of an art form. That’s when an art form gets its best,
when it gets big, when it gets long. I think we’re in that we’re in that (Suzy hates
me saying The Golden Age) but I think we are in a Golden Age of Entertainment because the
stories are getting so much longer. Look, you can tell everybody is neither a good guy
or a bad guy. Everybody is at a combination of traits in them.
So a movie can’t really show you that, there’s not enough time. You’re either good or you’re
bad. Television and the longer form can show both the good and the bad inside of all of
us. It’s a more sophisticated model of human behavior. I think we’re just getting to
be more sophisticated as people to know that people’s stories are complex. I’m not
all good. I’m not all evil. I’m mostly evil but there’s some good in me but that’s
the mix. And so longer form art can give us a more complete picture of what humanity is
about.