Film Courage: Should a new writer look at writing as a fun endeavor or should they really
check themselves in the beginning and say "Okay is this something I want to take on,"
the time commitment, time away from maybe friends and family, maybe there are going
to be parts that won't be so joyous?
Brooks Elms, Screenwriter/Filmmaker: It's a great question and yeah absolutely, do it
because it's fun.
There's no other reason to do it and if it's not completely fun, do anything else.
Find what is fun for you.
Film Courage: If there was something that was a hobby for you that you loved but you
didn't want to take it on as a career, could you say the same for writers maybe?
They just want to write for the sheer joy of it, for creating characters but they don't
want the pressure of having to pitch and have to pay their car payment based on whether
they sell a script or not?
Brooks: Yeah of course, that's one of the most satisfying experiences I get from writing.
The fact that I get paid well to write is separate from my experience of writing.
I mean if I didn't make a dime from anything I wrote the rest of my life I would still
write I mean it's because it's so deeply satisfying in terms of executing my vision for how life
occurs to me.
What are my deepest challenges?
What are the insights that have sort of gotten me through different parts of my life how
do i how do i make a transformation from this stage to that stage i mean that's what we
do in any screenplay and if i'm writing about an astronaut or this or that um you know i've
never been an astronaut but i've written about several um but it's the emotional journey
of those characters that's it's as personal to me as if i'm writing in a journal so um
if somebody is drawn to screenwriting for the sheer joy of it that's absolutely what
they should be doing and they and nobody really should be worrying about the money side of
it if it's so fun for you to write a screenplay and so fun for you to share it with anybody
and so fun for them to say i love it and so fun for them to sort of give you feedback
and so fun for you to take that feedback and find a way to serve them even better and so
fun to keep that going then absolutely that person should allow the professional part
of it to come to them and if they stop at any point in that path and they're happy just
writing it for themselves and showing it to nobody that's great i mean it's really about
what makes them happy is that the litmus test is it fun yeah really so is that how you approach
most things in life though it has to be where it's not creating huge amounts of stress for
you yeah um absolutely i read a wonderful book years ago about ben and jerry's ice cream
company um i love i loved it so much i cried when i finished uh reading it and it was because
they to my mind had a beautiful vision of fun and business you know it's show and its
business and the way they articulated it was this double bottom line anything they did
had had to be fun and it had to be profitable right um and the truth is um if you approach
it the right way um you absolutely can do both and if you're not seeing the way to do
both have something be profitable and lucrative and fun and easy you're not looking in the
right direction it's probably like right behind you you got to turn around and look someplace
else but it really is and how in my writing process or my life certainly things come up
and it feels there's a resistance or something's not easy and then that's just a reminder to
go dude it's you know you're this is you're forcing it it's too much and then i go okay
well what's the easy what's the easy way what's the easy way and that's oftentimes it's stopping
and breathing or we're not thinking about it think about something else that is easy
in the moment and then going to that um and then um when i hold those spaces open the
easy ways come have you had people challenge you students mentees that say work isn't supposed
to be fun aside from this interview where i'm playing the devil's advocate i love it
well it's um i mean that's the standard right so um uh and and and so it's where and and
people are people have to i can sit here and tell them this or that or the other and uh
they they need to figure it out for themselves and they need to try it if they're interested
and not try it if they're not interested it's not right for them if they hear it it's too
crazy and you know that's fine so um i have no interest in um uh convincing somebody of
anything i mean if i you know when i used to teach this class at uc ucla extension i
would absolutely speak to these ideas um and they wouldn't really challenge me i'm sure
some people were very skeptical and some people were flat out like that's crazy that can't
work and that's fine you know it certainly can't work for them if that's the way they
think um and um it might work for you even if you're skeptical if you try it and you
say okay i think it's probably not going to work but i'm going to be open to it and i
might try it and you see and what will happen at least in my experience is um a it feels
better and if nothing else if the ah if there's no law of attraction if it's all hui and um
the odds of something happening are exactly the same but your approach to life feels better
and you've got the same odds it's worth doing it so my invitation to anybody who's skeptical
is i honor the skepticism try it out see if you enjoy it more see if the odds are at least
the same of getting what you want as soon as you want and and see if you don't have
the experience that i've had and i've seen pretty much everybody that embraces the theory
have you actually get things faster because i'm open to opportunities in a way that's
different when i'm closed off and i'm focused on oh crap this is going to happen i'm scared
of that or this didn't happen or i'm not good enough or i'm an imposter or all these things
these voices that come up um you know it's good to notice that they're there and just
let them go and if we spend too much time on them or we'll spend any time just just
notice them like the wind and let it go through because the more we sort of give them attention
the more we're sort of limiting ourselves so you're also not attached to other people's
opinions it sounds like too which is a beautiful place to be it's the best place to be because
um my i'm here to serve my audience so um if i have um you know so so you know i'll
have a bunch of ideas in my script that i've put down and when i get feedback i'm it's
not me getting feedback it's like these ideas came to me they're in service to the audience
and my job is to sort of get out of the way whatever the best idea from anywhere to better
serve the audience and so when i get feedback and criticism if there's any peace in that
that's going to be more of service to the audience awesome and if it's not going to
be in service okay fine thanks for at least you know trying to give me feedback you know
so uh does that answer your question it does yeah.
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