Film Courage: So we’ve had a good two and half, three hours here.
Sometimes I’m in a time warp when I do these interviews but we’ve gotten valuable information
from you Wendy.
As we wrap up I would love to hear a success story from you Wendy.
And if you can Wendy, please leave out any identifying information (that’s kind of
a rule we have here).
Wendy Kram, Owner of Wendy’s LA4hire: So let’s see I think there are couple.
One would be from something that was quite awhile ago that I had read a play by a writer
and I was so enamored with the story.
It was made and it was on CBS and it wound up being called SALLY HEMINGS: AN AMERICAN
SCANDAL.
And what I love about the story is that she had written it and I had first found out about
it about seven or nine years before it got made.
And all I’ll say is that stars were aligned and what happened was I came close to selling
it within the first two years that they had the project it was under option (I think when
I was at Hearst Entertainment) and came close but didn’t sell it.
And then one day the writer and I read in the trades that Merchant Ivory had sold a
movie called JEFFERSON in Paris with Nick Nolte.
And this happens in the business.
Invariably it happens to everyone.
And right now I have two projects where there are other competing projects in the marketplace
and we’re trying to get our’s done first.
Anyway so the writer and I we were quite despondent and it was like “Alright, life goes on.”
And you put one foot in front of the other and what’s the next project?
And you put you focus there.
But I never forgot how much I loved that script.
And so Merchant Ivory movie was made and two years later I felt like I would hear of opportunities
in network television where they were interested in doing period pieces and doing lots of period
films for network and so every couple of years I would think “Maybe there’s a different
audience that we could get and reach with TV?”
And I would seek opportunities and I would call up the writer and I would say “Is that
script still available?”
And she’d say “Yes.”
And one of those times seven years later she said “Yes.
As a matter of fact such-and-such actress I was having lunch with her manager and we
talked about it and she might be interested in playing the role.”
So I would up calling CBS saying we don’t have a commitment but we have preliminary
interest from so-and-so and she said “Well send it over.”
It was originally written as a 2-hour movie and the network came back and said “You
know what?
We think we might be interested in turning it into a miniseries but instead of making
it so much about Thomas Jefferson we’d like to make it much more Sally Hemings point of
view.”
So we did.
We rolled up our sleeves, we spent a month working with her preparing an outline to bring
to the network so we could shot what the end of night one was that would ensure people
there was enough of a cliffhanger, that people would come back for night 2 so we could justify
yes this is enough material for a miniseries.
The day we wind up going into pitch, two days before, it wound up hitting the front page
of New York Times, Wall Street Journal, I think Time Magazine that they had done tests
finally conclusively with Thomas Jefferson and concluded from the DNA that he in fact
did have a long-term relationship with Sally Hemings and that they did have five children
together.
So all of our competitors were saying “Oh my Gosh!
You guys were so smart to be on it and in the network two days after.”
Little did they know that this had started about nine years earlier.
And as a lot of us have heard this expression but it’s a very good one that ‘Success
is when preparedness meets opportunity.’
If I hadn’t fallen in love with the piece, if the writer hadn’t written this wonderful
piece, if in fact I hadn’t continued every two years to inquire and see if there was
new opportunity and if we didn’t do our homework…we spent a month preparing to go
in.
I’ve seen very good writers who have blown deals when they don’t prepare enough.
Film Courage: You said something that caught me ear and I want to follow-up.
You’ve seen writers blow deals because they weren’t prepared?
Are they not prepared to research the genre that this network is dealing with?
Wendy: I would say it’s more with sometimes if you have a script it can sell itself.
But other times maybe you have a pitch, I mean I’ve seen very, very established writers
go in a room and because they haven’t prepared the pitch really well and it kind of meanders
and it could be a really good story.
But I’m a big advocate of preparing.
A lot of people don’t know Whoopi Goldberg when she started out she was an absolutely
brilliant comedian and when I saw her at a charity event and she nailed it on stage and
there’s no question that there are certain geniuses in comedy and are great at ad-libbing
and this and that but also for her and most of the great comics they look so spontaneous.
They work their butts off rehearsing and rehearsing to be able to deliver so smoothly.
So I do think it’s important if you’re going to be pitching a project to be prepared.
That’s what we as producers had to do when we were pitching the Sally Hemings piece and
it’s what I had to so all the time.
And when I’m working with writers and we’re going to go in and pitch, we have to do the
work.