Film Courage: How do you write good dialogue?
Shane Stanley, Filmmaker/Author/Instructor: I think the best dialogue comes from the best
listeners. I had an absolute crash course in writing dialogue. Years ago I used to write with
Charlie Sheen. I don’t care if they don’t credit him and the sitcom’s he’s been in as a writer,
I know who has been writing the dialogue. I worked with him for three years.
I never read or heard better dialogue from anybody other than that which came from him that he wrote
and I asked him one day. I used to be really good at writing scene direction and my dialogue was
flat, it wasn’t interesting, it wasn’t engaging, it wasn’t edge of your seat.
I asked him one day when we were writing
the way we worked is we’d set it up, I would write the scene direction, he would do the dialogue
unless you know it was basic stuff (it was easy). I finally said to him I said where do you get this
encyclopedia of incredible dialogue, I’ve never heard anybody with it before and he said “You
just listen.” He said “You know when this is working [pointing to his mouth], these aren’t
working [pointing to his ears]. And if these aren’t working [referring to his ears] you
can’t absorb what is happening and how people interact and find those gems.
Most of the things that I write that people like, I heard at a party, I heard at a barbecue,
I heard at an airport, I heard it while I was pumping gas.” He’ll say “I’ll get out and pump gas
and I’ll hear a couple bickering at the car next to me at the pump.” And he says “That’s gold. That
is gold man.” And this was before everybody had phones and we weren’t listening to them,
we were doing this [scrolling].” So I find the best advice to writing dialogue is listen. Put
yourself in a character’s position that you’ve created. It goes back to the old I think
keeping the audience interested in good dialogue I think also is a lot of people try to outwit
themselves with dialogue. They think they’ve got to use verbiage or words that people don’t use.
They’ve got to show you how smart they are. I think we’ve talk about this before, the drummer
that overplays everything to show how good my chops are and it’s not about that, it’s about
making things sound organic and that's a lot of things that the actors have to understand too
is that they’re acting or they are truly listening and responding with the work.
But I think the best dialogue comes from the best listeners and the people
who know how to implement those words that they've discovered over the years and knew
arenas. Obviously you’re not going be pumping gas at a gas station and hear a husband and wife.
Every script you write is not going to be about a husband and wife pumping gas at the gas station.
Where else can you implement that? That could be a film like SAHARA where Matthew McConaughey and
Penélope Cruz are walking across the desert or you can put some of that bickering in different
situations but it’s how you use it and how it inspires you to go down different paths.
That’s how I learned from him to write better dialogue. I’m still not very good but I know good
dialogue when I hear it and I’m good at adjusting dialogue when I get it and it’s about listening.
Film Courage: And now people are on phones so you can just hear one side. And I don’t think people
realize or if they care how well you can hear them or how dialed in (no pun intended) the people are
are…I mean I’ve heard some major arguments…major personal things [in public] and I’m like I don’t
think this person realizes I can hear them half way across the store? But that’s gold too.
Shane: It’s gold and it’s even better when they’re on speaker phones so you do get to
hear all of it or they’re receiver is up so loud but you’re right, sometimes
you will hear one half of the conversation and sometimes that could be better because
you’re able to imagine…I mean can you imagine if it was Hey Harold you didn’t take the trash
barrels in and that’s what the whole fight is about but you’re only hearing Harold’s side
can you imagine what you can create? Maude is yelling to him about?
Film Courage: When you were working at the car lot, did you pick up anything about dialogue? I
realize that’s not why you were there [in another video Shane talks about selling cars for a short
time and what it taught him]. But if I’m coming to look at a car…you know…I’m probably going
to be hesitant. I’m probably going to be like I don’t want this guy to sell me anything but I do
need a car but I don’t want him to know that so I’m going to be very selective with what I say.
Shane: I learned when I said when the owner of the car lot had said “Come sell cars. You will learn
more about life than you will ever known and it will be the education that you lacked,” he wasn’t
kidding. You become a good listener because you have to overcome all objectives you have to
address every concern and need the customer has. So how does that happen? It happens by listening
and I always…it wasn’t dialogue lines and I have a very retentive memory if I hear something I
remember it. There wasn’t anything said in those 18 months I worked there that stood out but it was
mannerisms, it was quirks, it was character flaws or neat things about
people that I still do this day will implement in my characters. The way a husband and wife
interact. It’s not about what’s said, it’s about how it’s said, it’s about the posture. It’s about
the 45-year-old son who is with his 70-year-old parents buying the Ford Taurus today
and you realize that the parents have a gambling addiction and they’re getting a car to drive
to Vegas every other week but the 45-year-old son still lives at home to help supplement the
overhead so they can afford to maintain their lifestyle and the kid is kind of
a deadbeat too. I mean there are all sorts of and you look at that and you go that's a story.
You’ve got this retired milkman and his wife who ran a salon and now they're addicted to
going to Vegas every…well what else are they doing when they go to Vegas that we don’t know about?
And then your mind goes what do they see on that trip to Vegas? You know it’s the Lotto winners. I
sold to a few Lotto winners. That was interesting. I actually had a salesman I worked with who had
won 24 million dollars in the big Lotto and he left his wife and two and a half years later
he was at the point selling cars with me and you want to talk about like having it all and losing
it? Friends who abandoned him when the money was gone and he said yeah you know it's funny,
my wife still has her 10 million…you know…and here I am selling cars trying to make a living,
living in a one-bedroom apartment. And he was the one who left her and was horrible to her…yeah…you
see a whole bunch of really interesting people…
Film Courage: But that two years (sorry to interrupt) but that two years
was probably very fascinating?
Shane: Fascinating. As I said I’m still very close to the family that gifted me that opportunity.
I am still very close to some of the salesman that I worked with at the lot. Sadly some of them
have perished. Some of those people in that sales class that I took Patrick just passed
six months ago I found out. Stuart who sold with me and I got the most character stories
out of anybody in the world, passed. These were people I worked with and I was very close to and
it was amazing just the people, the experiences, the encounters of just walking out having a
cigarette and encountering a guy whose car is in for an oil change and that 20-minute exchange you
have with this guy, those conversations will live with you forever but you don’t have to sell cars
to do it. You can drive an Uber, you can work at a restaurant as a waiter, you can work anywhere.
Most of the encounters that I’ve had in my life that I write about
are about are personal experiences or exchanges or encounters that I’ve had
anywhere but it’s funny you bring up the car years because that was my job five, six days a
week. I spend those eight to 12 a day dealing with the dealership with no two days every the same
fighting between salesmen for a customer or a customer…you know there’s an old saying in buying
cars - all buyers are liars. And it was about trying to…I learned something. We used to have
a salesman that sold unbelievable amount of cars and made unbelievable amounts of money and I used
to say to him “What’s your secret?” And he said “You’ve just got to remember all buyers are liars
and they’re telling you one thing because they think they can have an edge and the
secret to successfully selling cars is giving buyers - they’ve got to trust you, they've got
to like you and want to deal with you.” But he said “You have to let them think they have
control but they really don’t have an ounce of it.” And it's almost like being a film director.
Actors live to be directed and controlled but they also like to think that they’re the
show. And a good director will help steer them and let them think that they can run with it
and you've got to be able to reign them in without them knowing they’re being reigned in. It’s an
art, it’s a dance and it’s that way selling cars. But it taught me how to negotiate, selling cars
and negotiating four, five, six times a day sure taught me how to go out and raise money,
sure taught me how to negotiate with contracts and actors and agents. It’s the same thing. How
much for how much? So everybody should go sell cars and you will become a better filmmaker.
Question for the viewers: Where does
your best dialogue come from?