Film Courage: How does someone know which story they should write? Kelli McNeil, Writer, Actress and Voice Over Artist: you should write the one you're
afraid to tell. If it scares you, then you know you need to do it. I
have a couple like that right now that I'm working on I have a play that is
going to be going up off-broadway next year it was it was actually one of the
very first pieces of writing I had ever done I was in a group called the Los
Angeles writers centre for years when I was kind of dipping my toe into writing
and decided I wasn't very good at it but I had written to play
it's a two-act play and I wrote it in 2007 and it's actually scary how how
applicable it is to today's current climate it's about a Mexican-American
soldier who's injured in Iraq and his illegal brother has died while they're
serving over there. So this was right after 2001 and he comes back to Los
Angeles and he discovers that his two younger siblings have been put into
foster care and his parents have deport been deported and I wrote this in 2007
oh yeah and it was it was it's called borderline and it was actually a
semifinalist at AFF last year again as soon as as soon as I started to build up
my own confidence in my writing I took up some stuff and I dusted them off and
I started to submit them out and I'm a friend of mine who I went to USC with
who runs a theater up in Manhattan and this is a issue that is that she's very
passionate about and I've never connected the dots before but I sent it
to her and she said do you want to I said do you want to read this and she
said yeah absolutely so she read it she goes why don't we do a reading so we did
a reading in April this year in New York and we have decided to workshop it and
with the intent of putting it up in the fall of 2020 now I have not done any of
the rewrites yet because I am silently criticizing myself because how do I take
the enormity of everything that's going on right now and put it into a two-act
play and again you know why am I the person to tell this story and this is
something that I wrestled with and I I hope it comes out well I hope I tell an
authentic story and I hope I create something that
really resonates and move people but my job as a writer is to really take myself
in this particular instance is to take myself out of it and to put my fear
society you know behind me so I can so I can draft the piece we need writers
right now more than ever because a lot of people's voices are being quieted and
this is not the time does it scare you
yeah absolutely why does it scare you tell that's um you
know I certainly don't want anything to ring inauthentic or Hollow and of course
you know if I'm if I'm telling a story that doesn't necessarily relate to you
know my own upbringing you know my family he's not immigrants I mean
they're they're from Italy but that was two generations ago so I wasn't directly
impacted by that going up but there are a lot of people that are hurting right
now there are a lot of people that are struggling so for me to have to you know
that's a lot of weight to carry on my shoulders but I put that weight upon
myself because I feel like this is a very important story to tell and it's
one that I want to tell so I'm doing a lot of research right now I'm speaking
with immigration attorneys I am reading you know news articles I'm doing a ton
of research it's it's my job to tell the story the best that I can I mean I'm
crafting the story as well but I find you know this is this other piece that I
worked on Daruma this this particular story it it starts to disabled leads but
the movie is not about their disability and I I wrote this as a way to deal with
my own grief after a member of my family became paralyzed in an accident now the
story is not about them it's it's not about the melody but it's inspired by
them and I went through dozens of drafts of that script because I wanted to tell
an authentic story now I'm not a disabled person I the last thing I
wanted to do was to put anything on the page that was you know inauthentic
offensive I put that script through so many
sensitivity reads which is a which is an important thing to do as a writer and
that's not to say I away from telling you know racy material or things you
know that that are taboo definitely tell those stories but it's important in this
level of heightened awareness to to put your things through a sensitivity read
and I changed things about that script I I took things out you know one thing
that I I kicked myself for are one of our leads John in the script his his
character salt is Robert but Robert is a double arm amputee and I wrote Robert
how I thought a double arm amputee would be a very limited action very limited
movement and then we cast John Lawson and my god that guy he is a private
pilot he can scuba dive he's an amazing photographer as a writer when I
initially did I I limited him and it took me meeting John and interacting and
really ingratiating myself at that community to open myself up and that's
how you tell an authentic story what is the sensitivity read so a sensitivity
read is to put your material in front of you know a person that you are writing
about so let's just say that you're writing about a disabled person or maybe
you're writing about somebody who has HIV or maybe you're writing about an
immigrant maybe you're writing about somebody with topical issues you know
and anything that can be considered emotionally or politically charged so
dealing with issues of race color economic class anything that can be
positive possibly disparaging to a particular
group of people it's important that you share those materials you you you put it
in front of you know readers and you do a table read you know do we have actors
read the parts back to you and you know there was in my play border
one of the feedback one of the pieces of feedback that I'm working into I have
sort of a Greek chorus of Dia de los Muertos characters and of course that's
you know that's something that's very traditionally you know Mexican they're
in in my story they function as a Greek chorus and they're kind of ominous
figures but I had a Latino cast and you know two out of three of them were like
you really need to be a little bit more positive with these guys because you
know the Dia de los Muertos is a way to honor family and tradition and these
guys kind of come across as as baddies and I'm like okay I didn't know that so
I was a writer you need to be open to hearing those kinds of suggestions
because you know every everybody knows the stories you know cowboys and Indians
you know what would a classically machismo you know imperialistic way of
thinking and nothing would make that movie these days it's it's it wouldn't
happen you know you go back and you look at a lot of movies from your childhood
or than 90 xoring a lot of these raunchy comedies they're creepy you know if you
you look at a lot of movies now like especially in the 80s like that's rape
culture and that perpetuates things you know people consume the media that you
write it's an it's important to have people look at your materials to make
sure it kind of passes a smell test now that's that's a that's a sensitivity
read interesting and what about the criticism that somebody who hasn't been
through something shouldn't be allowed to tell it I feel like in this climate
because somebody's voice may be censored or they may be afraid to tell that story
that somebody else who may feel like I don't know Society might view them as
they have more freedoms to tell a story should be able to then get that story
out there I have to two things to say about that the director of my play the
stage reading that we did she's Latin acts amazing young auteur we had a
conversation you know we were getting ready for pre-production
she asked me she said you are UV was Hispanic descent I said no I'm not she
was what your Spanish that's pretty good and I was like well I worked with the
translator so to get that going and she asked me she goes why are you the one to
tell the story she's like you know you were a white woman why are you the one
to to tell this story and my answer was that no one else is telling it no one
else is telling this story and you know regardless of my background or my skin
color or anything I live in this world and these are issues that I care about
so if I care about them enough to try to talk about them and to try to push them
out into the world you know my my story may not be the end-all be-all you know
you know end of the subject matter it's that's not going to be the case but this
is something that I care deeply about and I you know I live in this world
I'm impacted by these issues too so that's that's one way that I address
those particular questions I had a general a couple weeks ago with another
production company a very well known film company and you know as a writer
you're always constantly going through I'm at least I am personally you know
self-doubt and kind of self-loathing and thinking that you suck but she was
talking about a lot of the pieces that I write and she noticed a common thread
the development exactly I was sitting with she was like you tend to really
give characters that don't have a voice a voice and I started to look back at
the pieces that I would write or that I thought I'd been working on and you know
when you look at borderline that deals with the immigration issues and to rumor
which deals with disability and I have another one where the lead is a little
deaf girl and then you deal with domestic violence issues and in
Baltimore and I didn't really realize that and I mean even though you know I
didn't necessarily have the best upbringing and I certainly struggled I
am she said it very eloquently she goes
you're using your privilege to your voice to those who don't have voice so
that's something I actually walked out of the office a little teary but that
really rang true to me