Marc Scott Zicree, Screenwriter/Author: If you take responsibility and if you take power
and if you decide that the one person who will be responsible for your success is you
then you can't be stopped. There's no way to stop you. You're on your path.
Film Courage: How does a screenwriter know that what they've written is good?
Marc: Writers are often misled in their own opinions of their work. They think
the script is great when it's really not. You need response from others and you need to really listen
and not defend your work. When you work in a mass medium and you hear back from your fans
or the show is a success then you know. Also as you get more and more polished in your craft,
you often know. You know when something is at least competent, you know what will work. But the
funny thing is I often write scripts and Elaine [Zicree] is the person I get notes from and she
often says “This needs to be better, this needs to go deeper.” It’s like Okay…and that's good,
that's good because if something doesn't have the depth or the emotional line I need to know that
and frankly I wrote one of this two-hour script of Space Command and we could absolutely shoot that
draft, we absolutely could. It would more or less work but it's not good enough so we're going to
scrap that entire draft and start over again and i've actually already done that and and there's
characters we won't see that they're in there and those characters work but but the story as a whole
isn't as good as we can make it so we're going to go back to the drawing board and that's fine
it's harder work but but eventually I may publish the lost worlds of space command and include that
script so people can see where it started because it's an entertaining read but I need people in my
life who tell me if something's working or not but at some point you draw the line and you say
okay we're we're rocking and rolling we're not gonna because you can you can endlessly rewrite
and you there's a point where that's again where television is good if they're shooting on Monday
you have got to at some point you have got to say well we're done and and roll camera so you
make it as good as you can but then remember that when you're the writer producer director you the
editing phase is the final draft of the script so in fact with space command we're editing finishing
the first the second episode with the visual visual effects and everything and I realized
there was one scene that we needed to add so we went back to the dailies we called our actors we
got some ADR lines we put together a scene that we never shot and there it is and we'll have a visual
effects shot of this ship landing and planting a part of a wrecked ship to use as an explosive on
the big alien ship and it'll work it'll and no one will know that we never shot that scene
so it's I love the so it's pressed to depress the digitation magic so it's fun what about the
reverse though what if someone says this is horrible and I know this is crap and
someone else reads it and they're not there's no agenda for this person and they go actually
this is really good no no this is terrible this is terrible if the check clears if the check clears
I mean if someone wants to buy a script of yours it doesn't matter what you think of it let them
buy us it's but but on the other end let's say you've written something and you think it's crap
right and they love it or someone loves it and encourages you the way if something if a note is
correct is that everyone is saying the same thing so in other words if five people read it and they
all say I just hated when he the dog then you better rewrite that but on the other hand if one
person loves it and you don't like it well they don't have to I mean it's like then you can say
well let me let me see if there's something of value here but don't don't be slavish to their
opinion they could easily be wrong so if they love it that's fine if they're going to buy it let them
but but don't I mean you might re-read your script just with a mind toward what maybe they're valuing
but don't trust it as holy writ because they're probably wrong and so but at the end it's
but that's very rare that someone says something that you think it doesn't work
and other people say it does that's very rare that's what I was wondering
oh it's yeah usually you think it's great and other people think it sucks
yeah what are the reality check how delusional yeah writers yeah but but but there's always
going to be people who aren't on your wavelength so for instance if I'm doing science fiction and
someone doesn't cue into what I'm doing because they're not a science fiction fan there's no right
or wrong to that it's just they are not their head doesn't live where my head lives and that's fine
but they're not going to be my audience they're not I don't need to convince them I don't need to
rewrite you have to be very careful of bad notes notes that wreck your script and you don't you
that's where you really want to make sure the people who are giving you notes understand what
you're trying to do and can make it better but not throw it out and like if they say put a bank
robbery in it when it's a love story or something it's like what and that happens a lot so I
that's one reason why I'm not that big a fan of writing groups unless it's professional writers
because you can just writers groups that's why for instance my round table is not a writer's group
because I don't want people giving each other notes and tearing each other apart and falling
into cat fights and gunfire and whatever it's like no it's like professional writers generally
will know if something's working or not they'll just be able to say well okay here's this
another thing that's fun is even in drama it's good to have comedy humor jokes but not
at the expense of character or plot so if you for instance if you look at Aliens Bill Paxton is the
one who's given all the jokes basically but and they all land but that's because that's a part of
his personality it doesn't take away from the fact they're afraid that there's monsters coming after
him that is never he's never laughing at that he's nervous and his coping mechanisms make jokes
and so that's and he's great Bill Paxton's just great in that movie so but but yeah I mean
a lot of people make mistakes you just have to be willing to grow and to learn you just have
to be willing to hear people but not be slavish to them you have to decide that no matter what
you're not going to quit and that doesn't mean you make crap it means that whatever it takes
you're going to learn what you need to learn you're going to partner with who you need to
partner with and no matter what the world does you're going to get to the finish line
that's all it is if you take responsibility and if you take power and if you decide that the
one person who will be responsible for your success is you then then then you can't be
stopped there's no way to stop you it's a it's you're on your path and it's great it's a great
thing to wake up with the knowledge that you're going to create something wonderful
and the world will see it and you're not a puppet dancing to someone else's strings you're not
you're not you're not enthralled to anyone other than your creative vision it's a great feeling
I think the fact that I mean I came out of the subway in London the tube before the pandemic
and I was going to a pitch meeting with theBBC Elaine and I and someone on the street said Space
Command Mr. Sci-fi great that's so great and I was walking my dogs recently and there was this
Russian family (we live in a Russian neighborhood) Russian family walking across the street sort
of laterally these these refrigerator-shaped people and the man saw me with my dogs he said
Mr. Sci-fi, I love your commentaries particularly Star Trek discovery thank you!
I mean it's wonderful I mean how could you not love that life it's it's great so yeah so it's
the one thing that makes it all worthwhile is that when you do it right when you've written
a script and it's gotten made and it's gone out to the world and what you wanted to say is what
you said and people really valued it it stands the test of time it lasts decade after decade
maybe hundreds of years and it's that you've done something worth doing it's a great feeling
you're not you're not just kind of punching a time clock and the lovely part is that you can
work a day job and still do your art or you can make a living from your art either path is is
honorable and either path gets your gets your work out to the world and that's what really matters.
How do you gauge the level of your writing?