I'm Julian Freedman I'm an agent and I'm
going to try and talk to you from an
agents point of view and you may not
realize it but agents are in the
business of rejection we reject a lot of
people all the time at my agency we get
about 6,000 submissions from writers
every year and we probably do not take
on more than six writers a year so we
know that there are millions of people
who want to write who want to tell
stories but we also know that most of
the time what they write isn't very good
in fact it's extremely boring and I
really want to try and demystify the
process because it appears that
storytelling is somewhat mysterious
there are many experts they disagree
fundamentally on lots of things and I
think we need to start by looking at a
really important question which is why
is it so difficult and the answer is
partly because you've got to remember
the story is much more about the
audience than it is about the characters
will plot and it's much more about the
audience than it is about the
storyteller I would even say that
storytelling cannot be taught I don't
think it's the proper study for writers
I'm involved in setting up writing
courses I must admit that I also jump on
that bandwagon but I say this because I
worked with writers for 40 years
I've been an editor publisher an agent
executive producer I'm in all of writers
I'm filled with admiration for them it
takes an incredible amount of courage to
put your soul on paper and have people
who are probably much less talented than
you certainly much less creative than
you trample
over in agents are often derided we have
a bad press which actually is fine
someone once said to me unit were you're
really good agent I said don't tell
people I want to be known as someone
who's nasty good agent was once
described to me as a marriage broker and
a bad one as a pimp and we are trying to
develop long term relationships but it's
difficult there's the story about wine
Hollywood scientists who at the cutting
edge of research into the latest cures
for cancer are now using agents rather
than rats and their five reasons for
this the first is that people in
California are crazy the second is the
animal liberation movement are targeting
scientists who are experimenting on rats
the third is there are now more agents
in California than there are rats fourth
is you can't get emotionally involved
with an agent and finally there are some
things that rats won't do
I now want to talk about adultery
because writers need to be unfaithful
and with due respect to anyone here
who's religious the Holy Trinity
adultery and the Holy Trinity for me the
Holy Trinity in my life and my work is
the writer the characters and the
audience as a writer you live with your
characters for a long time you nurture
them after will you create them you have
a kind of fidelity towards them but your
audience you very rarely meet them you
certainly if you're going to be
successful will never meet more than a
minut proportion of them they probably
have prejudices and tastes that
completely differ from yours you
probably wouldn't want to know what
their personal hygiene was like and
basically you're just there to thrill
them to turn them on to titillate them
and by doing so yourself and then leave
them so your primary relationship has
got to be with your audience not with
your characters now if the proper study
for writing is not right what is it
I think it's human behavior it's it's
why people behave the way they do why
they are so irrational why they can do
such outrageous and terrible things
irrationality is really quite
interesting my mother always used to win
arguments with me by saying don't be
rational about my neuroses and there are
some experts some people who've written
about screenwriting who I think are very
good majority I think or not layoffs
egri wrote a book called the art of
dramatic writing and what's interesting
is the subtitle the subtitle is its
basis in the creative understanding of
human motivation so that's what writers
should be doing now we know that
millions of people want to write why
what what is it that compels people to
tell stories George Orwell wrote a book
which is his probably as least
well known but but I think is possibly
his best book it's called why I write
and he describes why he writes but he
also says he thinks it applies to the
majority of writers and there are four
reasons he gives the most important and
a comprehensive one is sheer egotism
sheer egotism the other reasons are
immortality getting back at people who
put you down and trying to make the
world a better place
Samuel Johnson would not have agreed
with him he is famous for having said no
man but a blockhead ever wrote but for
money
he also said one of my favorite quotes
about writing when he was asked to read
someone's manuscript your work is both
good and original unfortunately the part
that is good is not original and the
part that is original is not good so I
believe that stories define us not
language it's often said language is
what defines us but you know dolphins
have language whales have language
elephants have language chimpanzees have
language but they don't as far as we
know have stories
despite Planet of the Apes most of the
books about screenwriting and most of
the courses tell you there is no formula
many of them also tell you you must
write out of your own experience which
is one of the main reasons why most of
the stories a lot of these people write
are very boring most of us have pretty
boring lives or is there a formula years
ago I was studying under Frank Daniel a
famous teacher and we asked him if when
in a preliterate society in others
before there was any writing when the
old wise men sat around the campfire
telling moral tales to try and bind the
clan together given that they'd not read
said field or Robert
would they have used the three air
structure Frank said the three-act
structure is actually a function of how
the human brain works you plant a piece
of information it pays off you have to
have a beginning to get to the middle to
get to the end sometimes it said the
British film industry doesn't work like
that it has a beginning a middle and an
end
actually Aristotle then described the
formula and he did that two and a half
thousand years ago not only does it did
it work then it still works today
so actually anyone who says there's no
formula it's wrong there is and
Aristotle did it in a way that makes it
incredibly easy to remember there's
three words pity fear and catharsis he
said you need to make the audience feel
pity for a character you do that usually
by making the character go through some
undeserved misfortune what that does is
it enables the audience to emotionally
connect with the character and once the
writer has got that emotional connection
between the audience and the character
the writer begins to have some control
over the audience you then put the
character into a worse and worse and
worse situation and because of the
emotional connection the identification
the audience feels fear when you release
the character from the Jeopardy or
whatever the situation there in the
audience experiences a catharsis pity
fear catharsis now the catharsis is
actually the result not of any
intellectual activity but of chemicals
being released in the bloodstream
notably one called
phenyl ethyl al-amin otherwise known as
P EA or the happiness drug now you can
actually cause that release in your
bloodstream by taking speed or ecstasy
if you want to be a bit more legal
eating chocolate or having sex so we can
try and save the British film industry
by giving bars of chocolate to people
are going to see British films they'll
come out of there and tell their friends
they had a really good time
but just so you can see this is not
specific to two and a half thousand year
old Greek I found in the program notes
of a series of Beethoven concerts given
by maritza Bellini this very interesting
quote Beethoven's preference for happy
endings is not by any means a tendency
towards kitsch but rather a musical
style akin to sheilas philosophy of
suffering struggle and overcoming so you
can see the pattern suffering struggle
and overcoming pity fear catharsis
beginning middle and end it works it's
always worked and it always will work so
if you compound all this and you can do
this in your writing will you write
better no probably not
you need more you need to understand how
audiences actually use stories why we
need stories what we do with them
and there's a really interesting example
for years people have known about these
cave paintings that were done 25,000
years ago the famous caves in let's go
in southwest France
no one's ever really concluded what the
paintings meant paintings of animals
with little drawings of stick people now
if you know about the Maasai when they
go from being boys to men these kids
have to go and live in the bush they
have a spear and they have to kill a
lion it's really dangerous and what do
they do well we know that they get very
drunk we know they do a lot of rhythmic
dancing until they get into a kind of
trance and I think that those
prehistoric caves were the earliest
cinemas I think that the the hunters
would go into the caves and they would
look at the animals and they would
imagine the fear that they would feel
when they went out into the savanna or
the bush to face bears wild boars
mammoths elephants saber-toothed Tigers
they rehearsed their fear and I think
that's what we use literature for words
that we use theater forts would use
cinema for so we if you now know that
you can think well now what have I got
to do to enable the audience to have
experiences which they can then relate
to themselves is that enough and
actually it's not particularly if you're
working in film you've got to understand
that we in Europe have evolved a very
different means of telling stories for
cinema than the Americans did we know
that 80% of all box office in Europe
goes to American movies American movies
travel far better than ours why well
they have bigger budgets they can spend
more money on development they have
bigger stars we can't really compete
with that
that's the given it's an uneven playing
field they also have very accessible
characters and they also like
sentimental happy endings it's very
common in the British press to see
something same great film what a shame
it was so sentimental
well we can do it when we need to we've
done for weddings Trainspotting Bend It
Like Beckham Billy Elliot is diseased
they ordered phenomenally well so the
solutions are you have to have
accessible characters that the audience
will emotionally engage with you need
upbeat endings if possible because we
know statistically that they like it
then there's the question of dialogue
American movies have only two thirds the
dialogue of European movies and this is
really important because it means their
movies can communicate to audiences who
don't have a high level of education who
aren't even literate I can explain why
in more detail but I'm not going to
because I'm going to run out of time
the other thing that American movies do
is they tell their stories much more
visually because they aren't using
dialogue so they think in almost in
storyboards and this is important for a
very simple psychological reason we
believe what we see we don't believe
what we hear and in fact a really clever
script will sometimes
have dialogue contradicting what you're
seeing because it makes the audience
wake up and instead of leaning back as a
passive spectator they will lean forward
as an active participant in the process
of watching your film we can do that the
other thing we can do where we don't is
shorter scenes I was told by a company
that does dubbing and subtitling that
American movies on average have scenes
half the length of European movies it's
a huge difference now if you have your
scenes
you cut the beginning in the end of
every scene out without taking out
anything that's critical to the
understanding of the film you leave a
gap and the audience will fill in that
gap and in doing so it makes them feel
good they are actively watching your
film instead of passively watching it it
doesn't cost anything to cut out
dialogue it also by the way gives the
composer much more room to use music and
as we know music is a much stronger way
of connecting emotionally than words and
since your job is to try and create that
emotional connection you should now I
started out by saying we're in the
business of rejection diana rigg edited
a book once about the worst reviews ever
given of theater plays and was called no
turn unstoned
and i think in a way we need to face the
fact that there are going to be people
who criticize what writers do what
creative people do and writers have got
to get project all great writers have
had lots of rejections we know that we
could in fact do an entire TEDx on
rejection you know guy goes into his
publishing company big marble entrance
for security guy says who've you come to
see sir I've come to see my editor I've
sent in my manuscript security guy looks
on the computer screen and says well I'm
afraid your editors not in but I'll
reject it if you like
all that does is it tells you that you
will be rejected by people who probably
aren't as creative or as talented as you
and that unfortunately also often
includes agents so to end I want to read
you the best rejection letter I've ever
seen comes from apparently from a
Chinese economics journal and it was as
a result of someone submitting an
article we have read your manuscript
with boundless delight if we were to
publish your paper it would be
impossible for us to publish any work of
a lower standard as it is unthinkable
that in the next thousand years we shall
see its equal we are to our regret
compelled to return your divine
composition and to beg you a thousand
times to overlook our short sight and
timidity so on behalf of of agents
everywhere two writers please forgive us
for our short sight and timidity and if
while you're egotistical E trying to get
immortality while you're trying to make
the world a better place
while you're trying to get back at
people who put you down please don't
forget you have to entertain us you have
to enable us to look at ourselves
because when we're looking up at the
screen we're not looking at the actors
who are saying you're wonderful lions
we're not looking at the characters you
have so lavishly and lovingly created
we're certainly not looking at you we're
looking at ourselves because only we are
the storytellers and only we can give
you immortality thank
you