Film Courage: Without naming names, can you tell us a story about how
a studio took was it your script or one of your ideas?
Shane Stanley, Filmmaker/Author/Instructor: Which time? I’m a really big proponent on protecting
your work. I will go on record to say don’t waste your time or your $20.00 or $30.00 doing WGA West.
It’s a waste of time, it doesn’t do anything. It’s not going to do what
you want it to do. Spend the extra $25.00 and go with the USCO (U.S. Library of Congress)
US Copyright office is what that stands for. The process is just as easy.
The copyrights last forever not five years. Copyrights cover your legal expenses to defend
the fact that you got ripped off and as we’re young and naive coming up in Hollywood we tend to
really love to share our work with people and I always tell people don’t you dare send a script
to anybody until it’s finished and copy written because it’s too easy the person you are sending
it to could steal it. The person that you sent it to could send it to a friend who needs an idea or
hey I’m thinking about getting into screenwriting. Do you have any scripts laying around that I can
look at and kind of use as a model? The easiest thing for a new writer is to look at somebody
else’s work and just copy it. It’s what happens. I’ve been ripped of over the years. I actually had
a script get produced by a studio who I’ll not name. They actually went out and made
the movie. I was a 9 million dollar low-budget film that they put the money behind to make
and they were dumb enough not to even change the title of the film or the character names
so I guess whoever brought it to them took my work and just put their name on the cover
sheet and just did it as is. I had gotten wind of this when they were in post production and what
you’re supposed to do when you get ripped off is you let the film come out like let it get on
the books and let the trailers start hitting and that Monday before the Friday is when you drop it
because they are so vested in this with the 20 million in P&A [Prints and Advertising] or
whatever it is they’re going to work out a deal with you and instead stupid here knew somebody
who knew somebody who worked at the studio when I heard it was in post-production I made noise
about it and then the film just disappeared. It never came out, it was never finished but they
indeed my friend got me a copy of the script. There was a polish on the script. They kept the
names the same, kept the title the same. I go on IMDB, it’s still there “unreleased” 15 years later
but it’s just kind of funny that this movie got made that never even got finished (no release).
So that was one. I’ve had agencies take projects and give them to show runners days after we meet
on them, sometimes hours after. I’ve had a project that was packaged by a major agency, then in 2007
when the crash hit my investors backed out. We were three weeks away from rolling film and
the ’07 recession hit. My investors had to back out so the project never got made and then
weirdly enough two years later the packaging agent got a new client who shot pretty much
the same script, wound up making it into Sundance and doing quite well
and at least they changed the title. They changed the character names
and the best part was they changed the opening scene but the rest of movie was pretty much
in step. I don’t make noise about that stuff anymore and I’ve learned. That’s probably why
I’ve become an independent filmmaker. If I have an idea that I’m passionate about, I’m not sending it
to you, I’m just going to go make it. That’s where I’ve gotten. I’m just not going to share my work
with anybody. If there is something I believe in and want to do, it stays in-house and we’ll do it.
Film Courage: So that’s how a lot of people do it if they
feel their ideas [scripts] have been stolen? They wait until the week of?
Shane: Well you will often hear about a film that comes out and you will hear
writes are making noises that their idea was taken and that is usually when the film is
coming out and what happens is that you get the studio or the network so vested in the project,
they’ve completely paid the entire process, now they are going through the marketing and
P&A [Prints and Advertising] and they’ve committed a good year (year and a half) to the project
and then all of the sudden it’s coming out. And you know it’s not common but it’s not rare where
you hear this movie is coming out and there are a couple of writers who say they were ripped off and
more often than not those stories disappear and go away and I think if you’re able to prove it,
I always say you have to take copious notes, I always say have a back-up email address so
anytime you send a script to somebody, you send it to another address you have. Keep those things,
print them out, save them on a cloud so you have a track record. If you send a script
to somebody you have a conversation with somebody, keep a journey “Hey
I spoke to this agent at this agency on this date about this actor and this project.”
Because you know if you’re ever going to make noise that you were ripped off you have to have
chapter and verse, copious notes on everything that you’ve done which ideas don’t cut it anymore.
You have to show that there was an interaction. Well it’s kind of like the guys who pointed the
finger at Zuck for Facebook, I mean they probably got two, three, four hundred million dollars.
It was an “undisclosed settlement” but they were able to prove this guy took their platform and
did something else with it and that you have to think of the same way. You have to have blueprints
for your work, you have to have detailed journal. You have to have your communications and when they
were, what they were, who they were with so yes and copyrighted with the Library of Congress.
Film Courage: So is that true that it’s easier for Hollywood to just deal with the lawsuit than pay?
Shane: I think everybody likes dealing with a lawsuit than going through the
painstaking…because everybody today wants the easy way out.
It’s easy to rip off things, it’s too easy to take advantage. I know a very prominent
producer who has since passed away so I’m going to tell the story without mentioning a name,
you know he found a script, he was a very successful producer and he had been nominated
for an Oscar and found a script from an unknown writer who wasn’t in the WGA or anything and
basically worked out a deal to pay the guy peanuts and it wound up becoming a very successful trilogy
and you know just bought and sold the script over and over until he got it where it needed to go and
you know it just seems like Hollywood is kind of copying itself anyway. I mean that’s what it
does right? Every story has been told, it’s how we tell it. You know shark movies are big right now,
let’s make a shark movie. Football movies are big right now, let’s do a football movie. We
capitalized on that Gridiron Gang. We had We Are Marshall, we had Invincible, we had We Are Giants,
we had Facing The Giants. Yeah Friday Night Lights. You had this movement of football movies
and it’s no different. I mean that’s what they do. Incidentally is the same guy who
took that script for peanuts it turned out he admitted to me later he was trying to
make Gridiron Gang with another studio and he never had the rights to do it. So it goes to
show you people will easily take an idea and run with it and he never had the rights to do it.
You know how do you feel when somebody rips off your work. I guess the old saying is ‘Imitation
is the greatest form of flattery.’ But when you’re reading the front page of trades and
a big star is attached to a project that you walked into an agency or a network you know my
dad always talks about how he had brought in a script to a studio back in the early ’70’s
and was told that’s not for us and then years later [hums theme music].
So I learned be careful with your product but how does it feel when you’re ripped off, it
hurts because you have that, it’s almost if you’ve ever walked into your house after it’s been robbed
it’s the ultimate betrayal, it’s the ultimate form of…it’s a violation. I don’t know why somebody
can’t say ‘Hey, kid you wrote a script, it’s pretty good. The idea is there and we wan’t to
take it and work where we are going to pay you.’ I mean just the deception that happens with these
things and I can’t emphasize enough that we have to. I mean it feels empty. You look at that time
and most writers especially write things on spec because one day wouldn’t it be great and then one
day you have a library of scripts that you can look back and say these ten scripts but each
script takes time whether you are a fast writer or a slow writer. I know people who spend three
months on a screenplay. I know people who spend 10 years on a screenplay. I know somebody who is
actually on their 30th year on the same script. I cannot imagine if that got ripped off. I mean
30 years, think about it.I tend to take things well. I tend to take bad news well so I didn’t
get all wrapped up in it. I said okay lesson learned. Chalk it up as a life lesson and move on.
Film Courage: Did you get any compensation for it Shane?
Shane: I never got compensated. There are three projects that I did (that I created) that got
taken. One was produced into a film that never came out. The other one went into pretty hardcore
development at a major network with a big star attached. It never it never did come.
There was another one that it was basically we had a pretty good timeline and proof that there was
a rip-off and what was interesting was that the institution (the studio whatever you want to call
it) that did the ripping off had also optioned another project from us previously. So what they
basically did is they took intellectual property that they had optioned from us
and put it into another project (a storyline into another project) that they already greenlit.
Totally separate. They were going to make that anyway. They were hoping to make ours.
Our’s didn’t really come to fruition so they kind of grabbed some stuff and threw it in there.
We hired the best of the best lawyers and they were unbelievable in how they structured this
case and their timelines. At the end of the day nobody wants to go to court. Nobody wants to sue
anybody. I’m a firm believe in the blacklist. I know people (and I don’t mean the script side),
I’m talking about people saying we’re not going to work with him because…and it just got to a point
where you know other deals, other options were made so…do you get paid for it no. Sometimes if
it’s handled in a certain way and I think right you could possibly entertain another deal or two
with an institution that would admit that maybe they wronged you or were upset you felt wronged.
You know optioning another piece of property for two or three years isn’t uncommon I guess
if you play your cards right. Basically what happened is they said look you know alright we
did what we did and if you guys want to go through with it we’re going to bankrupt you in lawsuits,
it’s going to take 12 years to engage, do you have something else we can option? And you know
they are not going to make it but that’s how they do it. That’s how it worked on the third (on the
first studio one). They will come up with creative ways to make you feel or Hey why don’t we give you
a development deal and then we don’t have to pay you anything. They just take a few gratuitous
meetings with you over the course of two years and you feel like you got yours you know.
It’s weird. It’s a deceptive business and I think that is what has driven me. I don’t ever want to
thumb my nose at Hollywood proper. I’ve had a lot of success in it and thank God for it and hope to
work again in it. I don’t count on it and I don’t care if I don’t. I went real rogue (independent)
in what I do because I just got tired of dealing with a machine. I got tired of developing. Fall
in love with an idea, put it together whether you’ve got eight dollars or eight hundred thousand
dollars and go do it. What’s stopping you? I mean the next film I am doing we are starting in a
couple of months and it started because a group of us were sick and tired of sitting around in 2020
and we figured we can toss 2020 in the garbage bin like a lot of people are or we can show something,
we have something to show for it. And it was kind of like we know two guys with two great
cameras and a sound guy. We’ve got actors that want to play. I’ve got a great writer who has
got a ton of material. I’ll direct, produce and cut the thing for free. I don’t care. Let’s
make this year something. And then it turned into something where investors have gotten involved and
better actors and bigger actors and crew and now all of the sudden we have a real movie we’re going
to make and it happened because we just got sick and tired of sitting around and started putting
things into motion. We never asked anybody for money. That was the last thing. We just wanted
to get busy and have something to show for 2020 and the next thing you know we’re in full
blown pre-production on a show so I like that. There is no development, there’s “let’s do it!”
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