This is largely a conversation for the Writer's Guild / union, who control crediting rules and rights - Studios and producers simply have to play along. Currently, a director has to re-write or write over 50% of a screenplay to recieve any writing credit alongside the original writer(s). This was put in place because in the past directors would almst by default knock off the original writer's credits and just claim it for their own...whether they had really changed all that much or not.
So for the example of Alien, Dan O'Bannon is the only credited writer in the actual movie credits. With a "Story by" Dan O'Bannon and Ronald Shusett. Walter Hill and David Giler are not officially credited in the movie AT ALL. And, unfortunately, how writers are credited determines how they're paid, so until/unless the Guild allows for a whole new style of crediting that isn't entirely tied to any given writer's livelihood, this is a question of more than just how crediting feels to us in terms of authenticity.
But I also, on a purely philosophical level, am not sure I agree that changes at any level of significance makes a screenplay "based on" a previous draft, rather than a tweaked version of that draft. Especially when it comes to tonal shifts - which can be executed predominantly in the direction of the movie and not at the script level - this becomes an iffy proposition. If I co-wrote a screenplay with three other people, there's still that element of 3/4ths of the screenplay not being my pure vision. That doesn't mean the others "based" their writing on my ideas or takes or vice versa. There's too much nuance being left on the table here, imo.
That all said, I wonder how much the 2018 movie THE MAN WHO FEELS NO PAIN, a Bollywood action comedy that hit it big at TIFF and did well in North America influenced how the directors (and likely the studio) thought Novocaine had to work.
All great points, and precisely why I left said nuance on the table!
To your third point in particular, I'm not suggesting that the final screenplay is based on a previous draft, but that the finished film is based on a screenplay that the writer considers finished prior to licensing it out. The screenplay, as envisioned by the screenwriter, as a more compartmentalized entity that's iterated upon by the producers/directors/whoever for the sake of the film.
In this scenario, the screenplay would effectively function like an IP being adapted for the screen. Novocaine is based on Jacobsen's screenplay, The Electric State is based on Simon Stålenhag's graphic novel (with the extra step of a screenplay, of course); both grossly different screen adaptations from their source material, but the value of the source material remains independent from its cinematic realization and recognized in its own right.
And you're right, it's absolutely a question of how crediting feels to us right now; I'm interested in the psychological shift that could happen if we started doing this and other things to recognize the screenplay as a much more self-determined piece of writing. The weeds of x credit resulting in y payout would have to be trimmed; take that as you will, haha.
Will definitely take in The Man Who Feels No Pain down the line, too. Really appreciate this comment, Dave!
Ahh, got it. Though I will still add that "licensing" the IP wouldn't actually stp franchizing or sequelitis - when you buy the right to an adaptation of a book, play, etc., you still get franchise rights from it, always always always. Not a chance in hell that's going to change just because we start treating movies as "adaptations" of a screenplay, unfortunately.
Really I think the issue is in compartmentalizing genre elements, which is fine if you have a sharp vision of what you're making (which Berk and Olsen arguably did not).
I remember early on, I read an interview with the Duplass brothers, who I never really liked. They were talking about building a story by adding some drama and comedy and sprinkling them whenever they liked. I thought this was 100% false. EVERYTHING is drama. It's all drama, you never forsake drama. If you're making a full-on comedy, have confidence in it and move forward. But if you're making something like "Cyrus" don't shove some distracting "Step Brothers" business in there. Find where you can exaggerate the drama and let audiences find the joke.
Filmmakers used to respect audiences enough to find the joke. I'm hardly a fan of "John Wick", but those movies very delicately add humor -- mostly physical slapstick -- in a way that lets the audience laugh on their own, choose what is humorous. To go back further, the jokes in "The Graduate" are not universal laugh lines, everyone might laugh somewhere different.
I haven't seen "Novocaine", but what those guys are describing sounds a lot like losing confidence in the drama and finding ways to replace it with jokes, and then modulating the movie so they could toggle back and forth between drama (sadism, really) and gags, strictly a bid to keep the attention of restless audiences.
Exactly. It's a shame too, because it's not as though these two don't have an ear for dramedy; they did a scrumptious job with Villains (though I'd have to rewatch to stand by that with examples).
Now I'm wondering how much this fumbling has to do with Novocaine being the duo's first big studio release by the looks of things. Berk and Olsen are capable of respecting the audience; whether or not they actively value doing so is quite another, and Paramount in particular loves to prey on compromise.
Thanks for writing this thoughtful outside-the-box piece! Clarity in language is important. I just changed my title page to read “an original screenplay by” which just feels more accurate regardless of where it goes.
Your post also gave me an idea …. (maybe it already exists?) to create a screenplay competition where the entry fee is not $ but acting as a judge for a few of the submitted screenplays. Each judge would rank the ones they read in order of preference. Then the rankings would determine whether the scripts proceed to further rounds. If your script makes it to the next round you’re obligated to read a few more. I think it would be useful to create a forum to read unproduced scripts, would be nice to have zero or near zero $ cost, and the ones that “win” would probably be pretty darned good and I bet would attract interest from the producers and readers blocked for the duration of the competition. Ready for the “Substack Screenwriter’s Script Challenge”???
Honestly your idea of bundling screenplays for reading as literature reminds me of how we treat plays, where many classic plays are released for people to just read, which says a lot about how we think about movies versus theater I think, one is low art and one is high art. I would be so down for this, I really love reading screenplays and I hate the current way of having to read them which is on my computer. Also while my immediate thought when you said “multiple studios making multiple different versions of the same story” at first reminded me of our current remake issue, again I remembered that people put on the same productions of “Our Town” and other plays and no one cares, so I think we gotta take more from theater honestly.
You're absolutely right! And tbh this hypothetical status quo would help dismantle the problem of uninspired approaches to IP and remakes, because if it's the writers who are taking full ownership of their stories, then that means the studios no longer own them, and therefore can't greenlight any sequels or non-public domain IP unless the writers of the original material/screenplay license them out.
This won't protect against bad-faith writers who are solely in it for money, but it would nevertheless offer more deterrence to franchization, which is probably a roundabout way to deter money-chasers. I'm sure there's a few blind spots here, but I maintain that it's conceivable, and certainly conducive to a healthier cinematic ecosystem.
“What if a writer licensed the same screenplay to two different studios for the purpose of putting two totally different realizations of it” this is a very intriguing idea!
This is largely a conversation for the Writer's Guild / union, who control crediting rules and rights - Studios and producers simply have to play along. Currently, a director has to re-write or write over 50% of a screenplay to recieve any writing credit alongside the original writer(s). This was put in place because in the past directors would almst by default knock off the original writer's credits and just claim it for their own...whether they had really changed all that much or not.
So for the example of Alien, Dan O'Bannon is the only credited writer in the actual movie credits. With a "Story by" Dan O'Bannon and Ronald Shusett. Walter Hill and David Giler are not officially credited in the movie AT ALL. And, unfortunately, how writers are credited determines how they're paid, so until/unless the Guild allows for a whole new style of crediting that isn't entirely tied to any given writer's livelihood, this is a question of more than just how crediting feels to us in terms of authenticity.
But I also, on a purely philosophical level, am not sure I agree that changes at any level of significance makes a screenplay "based on" a previous draft, rather than a tweaked version of that draft. Especially when it comes to tonal shifts - which can be executed predominantly in the direction of the movie and not at the script level - this becomes an iffy proposition. If I co-wrote a screenplay with three other people, there's still that element of 3/4ths of the screenplay not being my pure vision. That doesn't mean the others "based" their writing on my ideas or takes or vice versa. There's too much nuance being left on the table here, imo.
That all said, I wonder how much the 2018 movie THE MAN WHO FEELS NO PAIN, a Bollywood action comedy that hit it big at TIFF and did well in North America influenced how the directors (and likely the studio) thought Novocaine had to work.
All great points, and precisely why I left said nuance on the table!
To your third point in particular, I'm not suggesting that the final screenplay is based on a previous draft, but that the finished film is based on a screenplay that the writer considers finished prior to licensing it out. The screenplay, as envisioned by the screenwriter, as a more compartmentalized entity that's iterated upon by the producers/directors/whoever for the sake of the film.
In this scenario, the screenplay would effectively function like an IP being adapted for the screen. Novocaine is based on Jacobsen's screenplay, The Electric State is based on Simon Stålenhag's graphic novel (with the extra step of a screenplay, of course); both grossly different screen adaptations from their source material, but the value of the source material remains independent from its cinematic realization and recognized in its own right.
And you're right, it's absolutely a question of how crediting feels to us right now; I'm interested in the psychological shift that could happen if we started doing this and other things to recognize the screenplay as a much more self-determined piece of writing. The weeds of x credit resulting in y payout would have to be trimmed; take that as you will, haha.
Will definitely take in The Man Who Feels No Pain down the line, too. Really appreciate this comment, Dave!
Ahh, got it. Though I will still add that "licensing" the IP wouldn't actually stp franchizing or sequelitis - when you buy the right to an adaptation of a book, play, etc., you still get franchise rights from it, always always always. Not a chance in hell that's going to change just because we start treating movies as "adaptations" of a screenplay, unfortunately.
That's what the guillotine is for, silly!
Really I think the issue is in compartmentalizing genre elements, which is fine if you have a sharp vision of what you're making (which Berk and Olsen arguably did not).
I remember early on, I read an interview with the Duplass brothers, who I never really liked. They were talking about building a story by adding some drama and comedy and sprinkling them whenever they liked. I thought this was 100% false. EVERYTHING is drama. It's all drama, you never forsake drama. If you're making a full-on comedy, have confidence in it and move forward. But if you're making something like "Cyrus" don't shove some distracting "Step Brothers" business in there. Find where you can exaggerate the drama and let audiences find the joke.
Filmmakers used to respect audiences enough to find the joke. I'm hardly a fan of "John Wick", but those movies very delicately add humor -- mostly physical slapstick -- in a way that lets the audience laugh on their own, choose what is humorous. To go back further, the jokes in "The Graduate" are not universal laugh lines, everyone might laugh somewhere different.
I haven't seen "Novocaine", but what those guys are describing sounds a lot like losing confidence in the drama and finding ways to replace it with jokes, and then modulating the movie so they could toggle back and forth between drama (sadism, really) and gags, strictly a bid to keep the attention of restless audiences.
Fromtheyardtothearthouse.substack.com
Exactly. It's a shame too, because it's not as though these two don't have an ear for dramedy; they did a scrumptious job with Villains (though I'd have to rewatch to stand by that with examples).
Now I'm wondering how much this fumbling has to do with Novocaine being the duo's first big studio release by the looks of things. Berk and Olsen are capable of respecting the audience; whether or not they actively value doing so is quite another, and Paramount in particular loves to prey on compromise.
Thanks for writing this thoughtful outside-the-box piece! Clarity in language is important. I just changed my title page to read “an original screenplay by” which just feels more accurate regardless of where it goes.
Your post also gave me an idea …. (maybe it already exists?) to create a screenplay competition where the entry fee is not $ but acting as a judge for a few of the submitted screenplays. Each judge would rank the ones they read in order of preference. Then the rankings would determine whether the scripts proceed to further rounds. If your script makes it to the next round you’re obligated to read a few more. I think it would be useful to create a forum to read unproduced scripts, would be nice to have zero or near zero $ cost, and the ones that “win” would probably be pretty darned good and I bet would attract interest from the producers and readers blocked for the duration of the competition. Ready for the “Substack Screenwriter’s Script Challenge”???
Thanks so much for mentioning our screenwriting competition! Truly appreciate you helping get the word out. Fantastic post, as always.
Much love, Jen!
Honestly your idea of bundling screenplays for reading as literature reminds me of how we treat plays, where many classic plays are released for people to just read, which says a lot about how we think about movies versus theater I think, one is low art and one is high art. I would be so down for this, I really love reading screenplays and I hate the current way of having to read them which is on my computer. Also while my immediate thought when you said “multiple studios making multiple different versions of the same story” at first reminded me of our current remake issue, again I remembered that people put on the same productions of “Our Town” and other plays and no one cares, so I think we gotta take more from theater honestly.
You're absolutely right! And tbh this hypothetical status quo would help dismantle the problem of uninspired approaches to IP and remakes, because if it's the writers who are taking full ownership of their stories, then that means the studios no longer own them, and therefore can't greenlight any sequels or non-public domain IP unless the writers of the original material/screenplay license them out.
This won't protect against bad-faith writers who are solely in it for money, but it would nevertheless offer more deterrence to franchization, which is probably a roundabout way to deter money-chasers. I'm sure there's a few blind spots here, but I maintain that it's conceivable, and certainly conducive to a healthier cinematic ecosystem.
“What if a writer licensed the same screenplay to two different studios for the purpose of putting two totally different realizations of it” this is a very intriguing idea!