Friday Free-For-All: Andy Kaufman

A few great clips of comedian Andy Kaufman in action:

Interview with NIGHTMARE ON ELM STREET remake writer Eric Heisserer - Part II

Go here for Part I of this interview, where screenwriter Eric Heisserer discusses how he broke in and goes into detail about a number of the creative decisions made in his script for the recent remake of A Nightmare on Elm Street. Today, Eric talks a little about his plans for The Thing remake and Final Destination 5.

I saw an interesting quote from you regarding your thoughts on using CGI in The Thing: “I don’t know what kind of authority I had as the writer, but I came in wanting them to make this a practical effect movie. I wasn’t going to write something that was going to be a CGI-fest. I held their feet to the fire on that. That may be what got me the job, or it may be that I wanted to protect the original as much as possible and to create a companion piece that we felt would work seamlessly as a double feature with Carpenter’s The Thing.”

You don’t often hear about writers dictating those sorts of terms to the studio, particularly in a system where the writer seems to be the most replaceable person on the production. Did it take a lot of guts to make that statement? Did your agent know you were going to take such a hard line, and was he discouraging you from putting yourself out there? And be honest, were you surprised when the studio said, “Okay?”


Well, let me clarify here: I came in making those demands, and the producers smiled and said basically “You’re hired.” They didn’t say “Okay” in the sense that they were heeding my demands. I felt they were already thinking the same thing, so it was a matter of meeting a kindred spirit when I showed up at their door. But the studio never makes a decision like that based on what the writer demanded. The studio decides what is the least expensive or the strategically wisest move, and does that thing. Our responsibility was to present a story with effects that could be achieved conventionally as often as possible.

I understand that on The Thing, they threw out the entire previous draft by Ron Moore and had you start from scratch. Can you discuss the advantages and disadvantages of working like this as opposed to rewriting an existing draft, as I assume you did on Nightmare?

It’s like being the first writer on, except odds are good you’ll still share credit with the first writer. I tried not to think about the politics of that scenario and just focused on building the best story I could. Ron Moore is an amazing writer who is a master at writing drama framed in a science fiction setting or concept. Just because the studio chose to start over—that doesn’t mean anything, really. My job was still to give them a movie that worked. Something they could go shoot.

How did you end up with this assignment? After Nightmare were you tagged as “the horror reboot guy?”

I don’t know if I was seen as the reboot guy, but my Nightmare script work did get me in the room for The Thing. At that point it was up to me. And what did I do? Make demands! In hindsight it was downright foolish, but I have such a love for Carpenter’s movie, and I didn’t want to see this prequel done wrong.

Do you see yourself working in other genres, or is horror your passion?

I would love to expand. Oddly enough, the work I did at Bruckheimer before I got the Elm Street gig—those jobs were all big-budget science fiction action/adventure movies. Big summer fare. Alien Wars and The Host (not the Korean monster movie, but a sci-fi novel by Peter Emschwiller) were about as far from creepy horror as you can get. I’d love to get back to that kind of epic storytelling soon.

Tripp Stryker very much approved of Mary Elizabeth Winstead as your leading lady. I can’t print his exact words, but they roughly translated to the fact that he’s excited by the casting and he hopes to see a lot of her in the movie.

I imagine Tripp will be going to see Scott Pilgrim a lot.

I might have to make him do a review of that.

I know that Final Destination 5 is still in the very early stages, but you told Twitter that you got the job with a two-word pitch: “Lasik Surgery.” I’m coming up on 10 years since I had my lasik surgery and I still had a very visceral reaction just hearing the premise of that death. May I assume you have been in that very nerve-wracking procedure?

Me? No. Oh no. Not at all. That eye procedure terrifies me. That’s why I pitched it. I try to write what scares me first and foremost.

Are there any real-life experiences you plan on drawing from for the elaborate death scenes the franchise is known for?

Yes. More things in everyday life that creep me out. I can’t spoil any more or else I will invoke the wrath of (producer) Craig Perry, but suffice it to say I don’t think the Lasik surgery sequence will be the most cringe-worthy.

Is there anything you feel was missing from the last few FD films that you’re hoping to revive in yours?

Yes! There was so much cool suspense, character development, and sense of mystery in the first Final Destination. Then you look at the fourth movie and it’s almost a porn version of the first—just one death sequence after another. And you know, it was still fun, I can’t lie, but for me it lacked a lot of what made the first movie so good. What I’m trying to do with this fifth film is make it work on its own; make it a supernatural thriller first, and a Final Destination movie second. It will have all the trademark elements fans love from the series, but hopefully it will surprise them, too. At least, that’s my hope…

Thanks again to Eric Heisserer for all his time!

Interview with NIGHTMARE ON ELM STREET remake writer Eric Heisserer - Part I

It's not often that I get to interview a writer while his first produced film is sitting at number one on the box office charts. Last weekend, the remake of Wes Craven's A Nightmare on Elm Street opened with $32.2 million at the box office, and today and tomorrow, we're hosting an exclusive interview with screenwriter Eric Heisserer about his background, rebooting Freddy and his future work on two other horror franchises - The Thing and Final Destination 5.

Be warned - this interview is RIFE with spoilers for A Nightmare on Elm Street!

Tell me a little about your writing background. What was your writing “education,” formal or informal?

Informal. No college. I’m more of an experiential learner. I started writing short fiction after high school, and eventually migrated to screenplays. I wrote my first feature script in 1997. That spec, plus the next three features, was the equivalent of a formal education. That is to say, the scripts were awful. Just terrible. But I learned a lot from them.

The million dollar question that ever reader wants to know – how did you get your agent?

I got my agent after I got my manager, which is probably the more important question. A writer friend referred me to Julie Bloom, who read one of my specs and liked it, then demanded to read another. She doesn’t sign new clients based on just one good sample. Thankfully she liked my second spec as well.

I had to network with fellow writers and people on the edge of the industry for five years before I got to the point where a peer was both willing and able to refer me to Julie.

As I understand it, your first sale was a spec called The Manifestant, all the way back in 2000. How many scripts did you write before The Manifestant?

The Manifestant, about someone who could conjure things out of thin air, was the fourth feature spec I’d written.

Was The Manifestant the first spec your agent went out with?

This predated my time with Julie Bloom. I was basically hip-pocketed by a manager for that option to Artisan Entertainment. That manager later retired from the business.

Unless IMDB is completely wrong, A Nightmare on Elm Street is your first feature credit, so what were you doing the last ten years? Were you getting rewrite work? Assignment work?

My real break happened with the sale of The Dionaea House, based on the online epistolary story I wrote in 2004. That got me in the door more than any other work I’d done prior. In the years between that sale and Elm Street, I worked on a number of assignments, rewrites, and I sold a few pitches as well, both features and TV. A few times I got dangerously close to a produced credit. In one case, the film was two weeks from shooting when the studio pulled the plug due to casting problems. Elm Street is my first produced credit after clawing my way up for the past ten years. Which is pretty much everyone’s “overnight success” story in this town.

If I’m interpreting the writing credits correctly, you came onto A Nightmare on Elm Street to rewrite a draft by Wesley Strick. What brought the producers to you?

Either the producers or the studio wanted a fresh approach to the script after Strick had done a pass, and I was the right guy at the right time. My old spec of The Dionaea House got me in the door, and my passion for the franchise got me the rest of the way.

What’s it like to get the call “They want to see if you can write the Nightmare on Elm Street reboot?” Is it exciting? Terrifying? Is it hard to take on this kind of remake knowing that a certain segment of fandom is going to oppose it on principle?

It’s all those things. In my first meeting, producer Brad Fuller pointed at me and said “You fuck this up, you fuck us all.” I had to prove I was worthy of being hired, since with no credits to my name I was obviously a huge risk. I would’ve worked my hardest anyway, but those words kept me up at night more than my fear of nightmares.

I knew there would be no way to appease every fan out there while welcoming in new fans. The original is near and dear to me, marking one of the few movies I snuck into the theater to see, so it was a daunting task.

Is it a challenge to get some measure of creative freedom when working on one of these franchise films? With something like this, surely there are plenty of people above you either weighing in or flat out dictating terms. Is there a risk of becoming little more than a stenographer?

It could have been a real problem if we hadn’t all gotten together early on and discussed the kind of movie this was supposed to be; the tone and the feel of it. Once we figured that out, I was given some elbow room to play in that sandbox.

Did you end up pitching them on how you saw the character and the story first, and then they said “Yeah, that works for us?”

Mostly. They started by saying: “This is what we want kept from Strick’s draft. These elements are important to us.” Then we discussed what elements from Craven’s original were crucial. And then I was let loose to figure out a story and characters to meet those guidelines. Even then, it was like: “Here is a hammer and a dozen planks of wood. Go build us a house.”

Were you a fan of the original films and how did that inform your take? What were the important elements for you to retain?

I liked the original and the third film, Dream Warriors. I enjoyed bits and pieces of the other films quite a lot, but those two were my favorites. The problem: The longer I dwelled on the original, the more I felt paralyzed in front of the computer. I eventually had to set that movie aside and create a story from the inside out. It was a long and frustrating process that I now feel was a no-win situation.

One thing that stuck out to me is that it took at least 45 minutes before Nancy really became the protagonist. The first 35-40 minutes it’s really Kris’s (Katie Cassidy) story. Then she hands off to the character played by Thomas Dekkar, and he’s center stage for about ten minutes until Nancy really starts to have significant screentime. Why structure the story like this? Was it a deliberate attempt to pull a Psycho-like bait-and-switch, or were there simply other Nancy scenes that got removed in editing?

This was an element from Craven’s original the producers wanted to retain. In the 1984 film, Craven leads you to believe the bubbly blonde Tina (played by Amanda Wyss) is our protagonist and that Nancy is just a friend in her social circle. It’s not until Tina is thrown around and killed in her bedroom half an hour into the film that we discover Nancy is our heroine. So I can’t claim that concept; that’s all Wes Craven (and, as you mention, Psycho, to some extent).

How do you balance the classic moments retained from the original with the entirely new elements? Does it feel like a catch-22 where you find yourself saying, “Well, we CAN’T cut out the claw coming out of the bathtub, or the girl being pulled up the wall!” as well as “But we have to do something different with this – otherwise the audience will see no point to the remake!”

In most cases director Sam Bayer just picked his favorites, like Krueger coming out of the wall, and those ended up in the movie. I tried my hardest not to focus too much on homage and more on character and whatever ideas or fresh updates I could contribute to the story. I knew that if I focused too much on the original I’d get paralyzed again by the task of re-imagining Freddy Krueger.

What “pure Eric Heisserer” elements survived all the way into the final film?

I had a laundry list of horror clichés I wanted to subvert, like the beat where Kris washes up at the bathroom mirror and we all expect Freddy to appear in the reflection, but nothing happens. Some of those moments made it all the way to the end. Others were altered, usually due to budget or production problems. For instance, I tried to avoid the “Freddy standing in the middle of the road” moment since horror fans have seen variations of that a thousand times. Instead I had Freddy appear in the car with Quentin and Nancy, and we see a second after Nancy is gored that Quentin is the one having a micronap. He wakes from it just as he crashes the car into a tree. But for a number of reasons that scene was changed during production. And some changes caused other scenes to change with them.

Microsleep was another one of my ideas. But honestly it’s hard to recall all the ones of mine that survived. You tend to remember the ones that never made it off the page.

From what I’ve seen in the reviews, one of the more controversial points was making Freddy a child molester rather than a child killer. Were you a part of that decision, and what was the thinking behind the change?

That was something Strick introduced in his draft, based on his research into Craven’s early work on the 1984 film and his inspiration at the time. But a controversial case emerged at the time that caused the studio to flinch at the child molestation backstory, so Craven changed Krueger to a serial killer.

That was an impossible element for us to sell to audiences today. You can’t have a man kill 20-30 children in your hometown without everyone knowing about him for decades afterward. That sort of thing is a blight on a town’s history. Strick went back to Craven’s original idea of Krueger as a child molester, and I did my best to work with that idea and have it track.

Jumping off from that, at one point in the film, it’s suggested that Freddy might have wrongly accused of molesting. It would have been very gutsy to outright state that the kids lied or the parents reacted based on bad information. Was there ever a point where you considered following through on those hints? Do you think the audience would have accepted that kind of twist?

I don’t think anyone ever wanted Krueger to be innocent. We liked it as a false assumption or a red herring, but we never entertained the idea for Krueger. Because if he were innocent, then it’s a revenge tale, and that creates two problems. One: The movie’s hero would be Fred Krueger, and two: Once Krueger had his revenge against those who wronged him, the story would be complete.

I didn’t want to write a movie where you’re rooting for the monster. There are plenty of other horror franchises where you can get that. Friday the 13th, I’m looking at you. No, we needed Krueger to be a sick son of a bitch.

That said, the idea that the kids lied was based on a real incident of a day care center where the children began spinning tales because it got them attention from the parents and faculty, and before they knew it they had invented enough lies that they were terrified of being disciplined if they admitted it was made up, and one of the teachers was arrested on molestation charges. So it’s not like we were trying to stretch the truth. We were borrowing from the headlines.

It seemed like the movie might have done with a little more closure for the character of Quentin’s father, considering he’s the one who’s really responsible for Freddy’s death. Was there anything else with that character that ended up being eliminated in either the rewrites or the post-production process?

Oh certainly. I had a second confrontation with him and Quentin in one draft. My favorite version of that backstory actually had Nancy’s mother Gwen as the one who burns Freddy, because of all the kids tortured by him, Nancy got it the worst, and I could see Gwen snapping. Also it felt more interesting to see a mother being the main antagonistic force against Fred Krueger instead of angry-dad Clancy Brown (whom I love as an actor; he’s a great guy).

We lost a few scenes with the kids and their parents due to pacing concerns.

Have you already started thinking about what you’d like to do in the sequel, if asked?

I have a binder full of ideas for a sequel. I don’t know if I’ll have the chance to work on it, but I hope this time around I could learn from the pitfalls of this first movie and better shepherd the story from script to screen.

But wait! There's more!

Part II - Eric talks about his upcoming work on The Thing remake and Final Destination 5.

You can find Eric on Twitter: @writerspry. He's a stand-up guy and was great about giving his time for this interview, so tweet him some thanks if you get a chance.

Tuesday Talkback: Advice for recent grads

Okay folks, yesterday I threw my two cents in on some of the things that students graduating this spring should know if they're coming into this industry. What are your tips?

Feel free to throw in things like the best parts of the LA area as far as rent, safety and accessibility; resume/job search tips; ways to save money, and so on.

Tips for the Class of '10

Hi guys. Miss me?

May is upon us, and that means that college graduations should be beginning any time now. Though it sometimes makes me turn pale to realize just how many years it's been since I was in that position, it's not hard for me to cast my mind back to those days and come up with all the tips I wish someone had told me as I prepared to join "the real world." Well... scratch that. Hollywood has nothing to do with "the real world."

Those of you looking to come to L.A. from out of town, be warned - the job market is terrible here. Have money saved, or at least have parents who are committed to helping you stay afloat until you get a job. It could take anywhere from four to six months to get a job out here, so be prepared.

Number two - while you're still at school these last few weeks, take advantage of the resources that their Alumni department offers. Most schools should be able to give you a list of alumni by the industry that they work in, provided those people have kept their information current with the office. I'd guess that a lot of schools even have this set-up by email directory now and may even have some kind of Job Connections network in place. This is useful because you'll know that the people getting your email have basically put themselves out there to the school, saying they want to be in a position to mentor new grads.

Get that list, and start writing letters to those people. Do not beg for a job! If one of your alumni connections happens to be the star of a major network show, don't ask if he or she can get you an audition, or get your script to an agent. Introduce yourself, say that you're planning to move out to L.A. and are looking for advice about getting started. If you have professors in common with this individual, mention that. Don't be shy about bragging about what you accomplished in school. Most of us are nostalgic for our college days and it tickles us a bit to see what the recent classes are up to.

My school had several prominent alumni in the industry. In fact, there was one individual who was a major executive at the time. Originally I didn't even bother writing him a letter because I figured there was no way he'd read it. Then, on the advice of one alumni who contacted me following my first batch of letters, I wrote to him. I got back a nice email from one of his secretaries, explaining that while that individual's time was very booked and valuable, they would be more than happy to arrange a meeting with one of their VPs, who also happened to be a graduate of my college. I jumped at the chance. While that person didn't get me a job, they gave a lot of useful advice and helped me get the UTA list.

If you're starting out, you're probably going to need to do internships to get your foot in the door. While a lot of places require college credit, there are many internships that don't. Don't be too good to work for free when you get here. The goal is to get some industry experience on your resume so that you can very soon turn that into paid work. Most internships will only require you to come in two or three days a week, so you can use the rest of that time to get a part-time job and pound the pavement for work.

Also, don't be afraid to try the long shot approach of writing to some of your favorite people in the industry and ask them for advice. Sometimes they surprise you by writing back. When I graduated, writers, directors and producers were just on the verge of embracing the internet as a way of interacting with their fans. As such, their personal email addresses were hard to come by, and Twitter didn't even exist! Today, major people in the industry are probably a hundred times more accessible, so take advantage of that.

I've blogged before about how a fan letter to Ron Moore got a surprisingly personal response, and I also got a personal letter from Jane Espenson back before she started blogging. If there's someone you really admire in the business, take a shot at writing to them.

Always be gracious. Always thank people for their time, and don't come to town with an attitude. If you're a hard worker and give it your all, someone will notice and it will eventually pay off. Success doesn't happen overnight.

Oh, and since it can't be said enough - you know that script you wrote in Screenwriting class your senior year? Don't show it to everyone you meet as if you're sure it'll be the next hot spec. Keep rewriting it, and then wait at least a year before burning a major contact on it. Have other people read it before you give it to that manager you've been interning for. Trust me.

Guest Blog: Remakes and Adaptations

Tripp Stryker week is almost over! The Bitter Script Reader will be back on Monday, tanned, rested and probably with a script that still needs work.

A Nightmare on Elm Street is coming out today and I couldn’t be more thrilled. It’s about time someone did a back to basics approach with the series, a total restart to clear out all the detritus. Thing is, I’m seeing a lot of whiners all over the internet, decrying the fact that this movie was even made.

Get a life, will you people?

This is a fucking business. More than that, movies are modern mythology. They’re campfire stories told again and again for the enjoyment of the masses. Did anyone really want to see Robert England haul his geriatric ass around one more time? I’ll give them this – that rumor about New Line doing the Nightmare prequel was pretty cool. Had they told the story of Freddie when he was just a child killer, that might have had merit.

But hey, they didn’t and now we have a fresh start and a new interpretation of one of film’s greatest monsters. This sort of relaunch happens all the time in comics and no one complains, so why is it such a big deal when a movie series starts over from ground zero? I checked this morning and my Nightmare on Elm Street box set is still sitting on my shelf. It didn’t crumble into dust at midnight, and whattya know, the DVD still works and everything. The old movie is still there so who am I to piss on the people eager to see the new one?

I’ve also heard a lot of bitching about the Battleship and the Monopoly movies. So fucking what? I’m excited for these! I know it would have to take a shit load of imagination to find a story in those premises and I bet it’ll be goddamn entertaining to watch. The doomsayers are acting like this is the first time something was translated from one medium to another.

The same thing happens when a recent popular novel is adapted. Have you heard the whining about Nicholas Sparks’ novels being filmed as movies before the book even comes out? So what? I think it’s great! Synergize. Strike while the iron is hot and all of that. If they’re smart, they’ll get to work on a new Twilight novel and release it the same day as its movie adaptation. Can you imagine the hype and the cash they could make from that?

Better still, do that with Harry Potter 8. The hype from that would totally break the internet in half.

Film adaptations have been around as long as film existed. Open your ears to this – The Grapes of Wrath was published in 1939, and I know it was acclaimed because I was forced to read it in 9th grade English. You know what else I remember from that snorefest? That there was a movie adaptation that I watched in lieu of reading the book. Guess when the movie came out? 1940.

Yeah, they didn’t even wait for the ink to dry on the first run before adapting it. John Steinbeck was the Stephanie Meyer of his day.

So do me a favor: If you hate the very idea of a new Nightmare relaunch, just don’t see the film. Don’t be one of those pussies who walks in with an attitude of “This is going to blow and I can’t wait to rant on the internet about exactly where they went wrong with this and failed the make the movie I wanted them to make.” If you want to hate the movie, I can guarantee you will. Don’t pretend like you’re going to give it any kind of fair shake by going to see it.

And if you are going, I’ll see you at Graumann's Chinese at 7:30. And possibly at 10:30 if the film kicks as much ass as I expect.

I had a blast this week, team. When you get to Development Hell, tell ‘em Tripp Stryker sent ya!

Tripp Stryker is tired of getting hate mail at TrippleThreat69@hotmail.com but he welcomes any and all scandalous pic from smokin' hot chick readers. I'm casting a movie soon and need a ton of hotties. Send something that shows of your bod and I might make your dreams come true.

Guest Blog: Paying for coverage

Back for more, eh? Don't worry, Tripp's not gone yet. Bitter's out either sunning with his lady or trying to figure out how to watch Tuesday's Glee online from his hotel room. He'll be back Monday.

When The Bitter Script Reader told me that he got at least one offer a week from someone willing to pay to have him read their script, I couldn’t believe it. When I explored the internet a little bit and got a sense of just how many people want you to pay them for their opinions, I really couldn’t believe it. Talk about flushing your money down the toilet. How is any of this supposed to help you?

And then there are websites where you can upload your script for anyone to read and give you notes! At least they don’t charge, but why do you care what Jonas Bumblefuck in Montana thinks about your script?

Ask any writer and they’ll tell you that the worst part about being a screenwriter is all the notes from every idiot with an opinion. No script was ever made better from the development process. How many screenwriters have you heard rail against the idiot director, agent, producer or studio executive who made them do something that ruined their script?

I’ve got personal experience in having scripts get ruined by the idiots at the studio. In fact, I’m pretty sure that studio tool Camden Carr personally destroyed one of my projects with his input, then had his boss kill the movie when I wouldn’t play ball. Then somehow a year later, they release a film - by another writer – that bears a shocking resemblance to my script, plus the ideas they wanted me to do. It’s pretty clear they just brought in a writer on assignment and more or less dictated the story to them.

Real screenwriters have their own voice. Real screenwriters know every inch of their story inside and out – and real screenwriters don’t need anyone else telling them how to write.

Look, did Da Vinci ask all his friends for their input on the Mona Lisa, or did he just fucking paint?

So why would you not only ask people to give you their opinions on your script, but then pay them for all their misguided ideas? Who bothers posting their script on a website so any idiot can comment on it, so long as they reach the minimum standard of having a modem and a computer?

No one should tell you what to write. Screenwriters have bought into this myth for years, and that’s why screenwriting is a compromised art. Some idiot whose only qualification is that they’ve seen a lot of movies is gonna tell YOU how to write? Fuck! I have season tickets for the Lakers but I don’t act like I could get on the court. (I can - and have - gotten on some of the Laker Girls, though. I know, like that's hard.)

Stand up for yourselves. Never take any notes. You obviously wrote it that way for a reason.

Don’t let anyone make you question your art. Now go out there and write!

Tripp Stryker thinks that losers always whine about their writing. Winners go out and fuck the D-girl! Show him some love at TrippleThreat69@hotmail.com