Throwing Some Light on the Scriptshadow
Posted by Craig Mazin on 09 Dec 2009 at 10:21 pm | Tagged as: The Craft & Trade
Why so anonymous?
First, I apologize for my absence. Work calls, and well…I hate to say it, but…I kind of got bored with blogging for a while there. It’s not that I didn’t have anything to say. I did.
I just didn’t feel like talking much. God knows there are plenty of people out there who wish that condition to remain permanent, but perhaps all I was waiting for was something juicy.
Et voila, enter “the scriptshadow.”
Before you read any further, stop now and read John August’s excellent article here.
Go. Do it. I’ll wait.
Okay, you read it? Good. Now you know what the deal is. Scriptshadow is some guy operating under the blanket of internet anonymity. He reviews screenplays, many of which are still in development. He also occasionally posts links to the scripts themselves.
I have a problem with this. But first, let me tell you the problems I don’t have.
I don’t have a legal problem with this. The studios almost certainly do, and there are all sorts of copyright issues involved here, but in this particular circumstance, they don’t get my goat.
I don’t have a “convenience” problem with this. Yes, the more guys like Scriptshadow post screenplays in development, the more annoying studios will get with their writers, forcing us to jump through all sorts of security hoops, when all we really want to do is just write the damn things and be done with them.
I don’t have a personal problem with this, i.e. as far as I know, Scriptshadow has never bothered reviewing any of my screenplays. No grudges to speak of.
Finally, I don’t have the “barrier” problem. Many defenders of Scriptshadow believe that he’s doing the Lord’s work in breaking down the barrier between the pros and the non-pros. The more screenplays in development the aspiring writer can read, the better his or her chance of writing something the studios will want to buy.
I rue how difficult access is, and I empathize. That’s one big reason I started this blog and forum (with our Ask a Pro section), and it’s why I was thrilled to be a part of the excellent Nashville Screenwriting Conference this year. I will certainly be back in Nashville in 2010. It’s also why I go after the cottage industry of nonsense books, courses and scams designed to separate desperate writers from their money.
I want you to succeed. This is not a zero sum game. Your success will not impact mine. If you write a great script and I write a great script, they’re both going to get attention, and hopefully they will both get made.
Here’s my problem. Here’s my one single problem. Sometimes, Scriptshadow posts reviews of screenplays that are in development.
So?
THE SCRIPTS ARE NOT DONE.
Let me repeat that.
THE SCRIPTS…ARE NOT DONE.
You would think writers would understand. And yet, so many don’t get it. When we write a draft, it’s a draft. It’s an attempt. We may find it absolutely awful and horrifying, and yet necessary as a basis for the next draft, which will be good. We may be writing the draft to address notes we think are completely misguided, with the optimistic (and often rewarded) belief that once the note-givers read the draft, they’ll finally see the light. We may be writing the draft to race a deadline, and we’ll fix it after. We may be writing the draft for an actor who is hopelessly miscast, and once that actor is gone, we can do it right.
And yes, of course, maybe we just stink, and this one isn’t very good.
Yet.
But dear Scriptshadow…it’s NOT YOURS. Not yet. Soon it will be. Soon it will belong to everyone. But not yet. And anyone who really gives a damn about movies should see that and believe it and just…well…KNOW it.
Why experience someone’s writing before they’re ready for you to experience it? Even worse, why critique what you know IS NOT DONE?
Do you go to a restaurant, ask for raw chicken and a glass of wine, then review the coq au vin?
Let me tell you, I’m the last guy in the world to get precious about what I do. I’ve got years of blogging here to back that up. I’m the guy who says we shouldn’t be arty-farty about the gig, that we should remember this is a job as well as a creative pursuit, that screenwriting is about writing movies and not about writing documents…
…but I deserve one thing.
I deserve to goddamn finish my script before you or anyone else in the audience tells me what you think. You can hate it allllll you want when it’s DONE. And a draft isn’t “done.”
In short, my writing process, and the writing process of anyone who does this job, be they on the top of the mountain like John August or a newly-optioned-for-a-buck rookie, deserves and requires PRIVACY.
Privacy, Scriptshadow. Privacy until we decide we’re ready to show it to the world.
Not you.
Us.
Privacy is why you should stop reviewing screenplays in development. Because hey, if you didn’t believe in the value of privacy, in the value of holding things back, in the value of protecting that which you’re not ready to make public…
…then why call yourself “Scriptshadow” instead of your name?
Right, Christopher Eads?
I wholly agree with your one issue. I’ve been commenting over on John’s site and followed your link. I drop in line with you as far as what doesn’t matter and what does. Legality, access, all of that is just window dressing on either side of the argument. What the influences are for a specific draft matters and Carson, I would say, is incapable of doing due diligence as far as finding such things out independent of the author.
A question to you Craig. Where would you fall on say a spec that has gone out wide? If we look at the script that sold, the draft the writer said ‘send this out’ on?
First, I would like to state that I believe Carson Reeves is wrong for providing download links. It’s illegal and should stop.
However, he is not wrong for reviewing scripts, no matter how they were obtained. As a writer, one of the things I hold most dear is freedom of speech. Either everything is okay or none of it is. As long as he says I obtained these scripts from sources and I can’t vouch for the script, I say take what he says or leave it. I don’t think we should care because he has the right to say whatever the hell he wants.
For a modern screenwriter to expect privacy in this day and age is completely unreasonable and unthinkable. Things will get out. It’s time for screenwriters to accept it and work it to their advantage.
Finally, you ruin your entire argument by outing Carson Reeves at the end for some misguided justice. You talk about privacy, but you show you’re just as willing to drop that for your own purposes. At least, John August kept the high ground.
Zeb:
If a spec goes out wide, I would not want it to be reviewed, positively or negatively. A spec isn’t sold as a shooting script. It’s sold as a screenplay…a draft…and that draft isn’t done until the cameras roll.
Popcorn:
So it’s hooray for free speech when Christopher reviews scripts in development, but boo for free speech when I find his name on the internet (right where he left it, btw: http://friendfeed.com/christophereads) and post it?
Look, this isn’t a freedom of speech issue. I’m not proposing that he be thrown in jail. Nor is this a question of someone voicing unpopular political opinions. These are film reviews, and I’m saying “You might want to rethink this, dude.”
Using his name will hopefully drive the point home.
I gotta agree with popcorn about the last line of your post.
You don’t seem to think Carson has any malicious intent with SS, and yet I can’t see outing as anything but a direct attack on his character.
My point is you’re completely undermining your own message. You mention privacy several times in your post and talk about how writers deserve privacy, but you violated Carson’s privacy. I know you were trying to prove a point, but it makes you look just as bad as Carson. I think if you edit the last line, it would make your argument stronger because you’d be taking the higher ground and sticking to your principle of privacy.
Sweet that’s a great answer to my question. Furthering my thought here, at that point does it become more of a business decision rather than an artistic one? I want to think that the draft a writer signs off on to be sent out they are proud of and don’t care who reads it from an artistic bend, but the business issue that becomes troublesome.
Like I’ve said on John’s site I’m outside looking in. I keep abreast of news and sales, but these sort of nuts and bolts ideas are hard to come by regularly.
It’s ridiculous people keep calling him Carson Reeves. If he didn’t know what he was doing is wrong he wouldn’t care if his real name was known. He’s hiding behind a pseudonym for a reason and it’s not because he’s humble.
I think he has malicious intent now, even if he didn’t start out that way.
He has pro writer after pro writer (the very people whose scripts he’s reviewing) telling him that he’s hurting writers everywhere and giving him suggestions as to how he could avoid or minimize the damage and yet he then almost immediately dismisses all of that in favor of continuing on without any changes.
His unwillingness to seriously consider even asking the individual writers if they’re cool with his reviewing a particular work in progress (or reviewing earlier drafts of scripts that eventually became movies – something that would show baby writers how the process can work and how scripts can change before getting to the screen) like has been suggested says a lot about his true motivations and his serious lack of respect for the profession and the people who toil within.
In my opinion.
I suppose I’ll remove his name once he removes every review of every script that’s in development.
That seems fair, right?
Zeb brought up the question of intent.
I don’t know Scriptshadow’s intent. I’ve had my intent second-guessed and misinterpreted a million times, so I’m loathe to commit that sin against another blogger.
I will say, however, that I do not agree substantively with the arguments that Scriptshadow presents as a rationale for his site.
“He has pro writer after pro writer (the very people whose scripts he’s reviewing) telling him that he’s hurting writers everywhere and giving him suggestions as to how he could avoid or minimize the damage and yet he then almost immediately dismisses all of that in favor of continuing on without any changes.”
He’s going to be like that Deformed Guy in 300, who can’t join the Spartans in battle, and so is seduced by Xerxes into betraying his people.
Awesome… Script Shadow’s 3rd act is coming. I’m afraid it’ll be a boring legal drama though.
I completely agree with Craig. “Carson” made a clear statement against privacy the day he started posting writers’ private works-in-progress without permission. Craig’s naming of Carson is simply holding him to his own standard.
True, I’m posting anonymously, but I’m also not linking to anyone else’s work.
Eads’ response to August has been pretty terrible. Joking about throwing away The Nines and Titan AE and saying he’ll ignore it. Not real productive or realistic. It will be interesting to see if the pros keep on him. I’m curious how old he is, I have a feeling we will find out he’s twelve or something.
Listen, great article and all.
But one problem.
This guy has gotten death threats from the Twilight crowd. He was pretty ruthless toward the Twihards, and they didn’t take kindly. Now you’ve published his name.
Yes, we all know his name. But we don’t want to kill the guy.
So you’ve done worse than trash a script in development — you’ve given someone an easy route to find him and hurt him.
Every minute you keep his name up there, you are sliding down a slippery slope much worse than anything he could possibly do.
Irresponsible and reckless blogging. And indecent behavior.
John August removed his name from the comments. That was a decent thing to do.
Let’s see how decent the Artful Writer is.
Eads himself dismissed the threats as being from 12 year old girls and said he wasn’t worried.
(if it weren’t so late I’d find the link to the post – I think it’s on done deal)
take it easy drunkard.
There is no way you are honestly worried a Twilight fan is going to kill the guy. It has 29% at Rotten Tomatoes so there are a few people ahead of him on the death list. Those critics use their ACTUAL NAME, they must be Dabney Coleman in Short Time.
In no way am I defending him here. But I have to nip the anger in the bud before it gets going.
At no point was it ever under the guise of being humble. It was under the guise of access. His stated worry was people being able to associate with him and not Carson Reeves. Forwarding scripts to Carson provided a buffer for all involved. Or at least that seemed to be his reasoning way back when.
Ryan, he also has Pro writers who are cool with it and even give him interviews. Plus he’s pulled scripts and whole reviews upon request. Permission ahead of time would be nice (we’ve covered that over on August’s site), but there is no malicious intent. There is no way one can claim he is actively trying to screw writers.
Additionally he hasn’t said word one about the debate. So how he has dismissed the suggestions I don’t see. You can’t make those claims. Granted he did post a new review today, but he could be wrestling with addressing the issues raised, we don’t know. He’ll have to eventually, there’s no way around it, but until he does (and let’s give the guy more than 36 hours) you can’t make such a blanket statement.
you can find word one from him – basically a non-response – on page 51 of the done deal thread.
oh, and there was his tweet yesterday that controversy=traffic
Zeb:
You say you aren’t going to defend him but then defend him a whole bunch.
He has responded to the debate. He kidded about throwing away his The Nines and Titan A.E. Blurays. And said that’s all he’s going to say about the topic and that controversy equals more readers. It seems like he meant it. Which is not good.
imbibed:
Dude, you can’t be serious.
You’re talking to a guy who took public and controversial stands against union leadership during a strike…using his own name.
And you want me to wring my hands over some guy dealing with TWILIGHT FANS?
The mind boggles…
I saw the tweets. The one about the DVDs was a joke. The traffic one was in bad form. And then he said he wasn’t going to talk about it. How a non-response and two glancing tweets amount to a definitive statement I can’t fathom. Like I said there’s no way around it now. If he actually trudges on and never addresses it SS dies slowly over the next few months. Any credibility he’s built up with his fans will surely tarnish (notice I said with his fans).
I see the Variety headline now:
Tween Twihards murder blogger over malicious review after he’s outed by Scary Movie scribe.
A death threat is a death threat. Doesn’t matter if it’s TWILIGHT FANS or whomever.
You guys seem to enjoy kicking him while he’s down, and you think we should be patting you on the back for this blog entry? Hopefully he’ll see the mistakes he’s making and fix them, but you’re taking it further than that by publishing his name. You know he doesn’t want his name out there, and John August was decent enough to respect that. Craig Mazin, not so much.
Look, I don’t have a personal stake in this, I just think it’s indecent. My opinion.
and ‘dude you can’t be serious’ sounds like a 12-year old.
Also, please link to his ‘controversial stands’ using his own name. I’ve heard this rumor and if true, then provide a link.
Look, give him a chance to rectify stuff — if he doesn’t, then you can crucify him. But right now, it’s unclear what he’s going to do.
re: 12 year old girls
His friend said at DD that they were legitimate threats. So I’m going by that. Just seems irresponsible and indecent. And that’s my opinion only.
Is this guy a writer? If so, I want a 3rd party review of his script posted on a popular website. Here perhaps?
Does he want to be an executive? Great. He just created the ultimate resume. Should be able to land a D-job at a prod.co within a month or so. He certainly has the requisite contempt for writers.
Does he want to produce and/or direct? If so, he’s got access to tons of scripts, some of which are probably available and/or in turnaround, so he might be able to get his hands on one of those.
My point is, what’s this guy want to do? What’s the point of this site? He’s not helping working writers. He’s fucking them. Daily. Hard. Until he respects the rights (and privacy) of writers I will consider him an attention-starved amateur who has failed at becoming all the above job descriptions and now settles for spewing bile into the faces of those who have worked hard for their success.
…and as for Mazin forcing Eads out of the shadow, Veronica hit the nail on the head. His use of an alias pretty much damns him from the get go. He knew there’d be backlash for doing this. I’m guessing he wanted it. I’m guessing it’s all he’s got.
I think Eads should be most worried that imbibed will make out with him to death.
it was a definitive and complete non-response that basically ignored every issue that has been raised by people negatively affected by his site.
my beef is that he shouldn’t say he’s helping writers, when often times he is not.
If pointing out inaccuracies in assumptions and trying to be rational is defending him, my apologies for not clarifying my stated goal. I meant I wasn’t defending him in the larger sense. The script trade is illegal and his reviews are potentially harmful. Your assumption about him being humble though is just that an assumption. I don’t mean that to sound snippy, just want to make sure we’re all working from rational, informed ground here.
And as a small note about the controversy=traffic tweet, it wasn’t his traffic he was saying was getting the boost. It was a snarky comment that John’s was. Which I say was in bad form because what does John August gain from more site hits.
fine I take back the tweet. (maybe – i think there are differing opinions on it) But what’s your response to his statement on done deal? sounds to me like he doesn’t give a shit.
I didn’t read it like he was talking about August’s traffic. That doesn’t really make any sense. I don’t think anyone thinks August is baiting anything cause he has no reason to, he doesn’t care about his hit count. I think you misinterpreted Eads’ comments. It was clearly ‘I understand that this controversy will mean more hits, for me’
You’re right Craig. He has no right posting DRAFTS without permission. Period. I’m sure he’s struggling with what to do here. I’m sure he meant nothing malicious. And I’m sure that in the coming days, he’ll realize that the very simply solution is to GET PERMISSION. Period. His site will live. Could even thrive. And he’ll be doing it all above the board.
And if, say by Monday it hasn’t changed? Then yes. It’s time to have his own scripts reviewed online.
imbibed:
Look, if the man has legitimately received death threats, it’s a matter for the police. Frankly, I’d think he probably wouldn’t want to put his own name on the internet as the guy getting great press from Wired for his Scriptshadow blog. I mean…that’s not exactly clever anonymity, is it?
But that aside, I’m not kicking him when he’s down. I’m calling him out for doing something that I think is wrong.
Todd – he posted a new one tonight.
Talk about spewing bile.
Why is it so hard to have a rational discussion?
You dislike him, understandable. Do you have to attack him with such veracity.
Question to you Jonathan. Do you know about his logline contest? Do you know about his unrepped writers week?
They don’t cancel out his harm, but they certainly don’t paint him as the unrepentant villain you make him out to be.
I think the real reason for anonymity is he wants a career in the industry. Specifically as a writer. So screwing over actual writers and pissing off studios using his real name seemed counterproductive.
Veracity is not the right word.
Vitriol maybe.
good luck with your blog Mr. Mazin. Hope the controversy and you naming names brings you plenty of attention.
Nite
I’m on central time here people I got to get some sleep.
Veronica, I would say you’re correct and that is the reason for his desire for anonymity. He is a writer. But lets say he never wrote a bad review and never screwed anyone over. The anonymity would still be nice when he sent stuff out.
Thanks Mr. Mazin for a great post.
I think it cuts to the heart of the matter.
My initial impression about ScriptShadow was that it showed screenplays floating around Hollywood that have not been optioned or sold or have sat in studio archives for some time without being developed into movies. In so doing, I thought that the ones rated highly by ScriptShadow (and readers) stood a greater chance of interest in them being revived.
However, most of the professional screenwriters on John August’s site expressed among other displeasures that ScriptShadow’s posting their work in development jeopardized that work.
I’m personally sorry this is happening. The personal benefit that I am deriving from that site is by no means more important than someone else’s work and peace of mind.
I’ll avoid the site because of that.
Zeb
You aren’t nearly as cynical about his intentions as I am. But I think there is plenty of evidence now showing he could care less about helping writers. To be honest I wasn’t positive about it until reading his responses and non-responses to August. They have really rubbed me the wrong way.
@imbibed
Seriously? Are you being serious right now? Okay, let’s do this. Let’s have you spend a month writing a novel (memoirs, perhaps?). You just finish a rough copy of it. Then, someone hacks into your computer and steals your rough copy that still needs a lot of work before you are satisfied with letting people read it and enjoy. Then, that person, under an alias, decides to post your rough copy of the novel onto the internet for everyone to see and get their feeble hands upon, while also providing a review critiquing it as if he were critiquing a finished film. How would you feel? Pretty pissed, right? You’d want to know who this dude is that stole your material, and violated your privacy, right?
Serious death threats from the Twilight fans for bashing the series? Man, if no one beats me to it, that’s definitely the premise for my next script. Re-goddamn-diculous. That crowd needs to grow the fuck up. So because someone dislikes something you enjoy, you must kill them for it? Revealing ScriptShadow’s real name isn’t going to do squat in that case. Plus, the dude had it coming (not the death threats, but the name revelation). It’s really only fair. And unless he takes down everything from his site, there’s no reason for him to become upset that someone decided to out him using his real name (which was already available on the internet, so if those Twilight fans really wanted to kill him, they would have discovered it regardless).
I’m 100% with Craig and John (and Duncan Jones/Edgar Wright, in case you missed that fiasco a couple weeks back). I’m a struggling screenwriter. I would hate it if someone took a script I was working on, in its unfinished form, and decided to post a link to it and review it without my permission.
Baby Bones:
Good points. Anyone who gathers up the lost script children and saves them from plunging off the cliff is a good catcher in the rye indeed, and for that, scriptshadow has done some good.
I don’t think the man is a villain. I just think he’s doing something that is, in certain circumstances, disrespectful and deleterious to screenwriters.
Craig,
Appreciate the comment in #10. There is a huge difference between saying “I don’t agree with someone’s arguments” and “his intentions are subversive and malicious because I can’t agree with with his arguments.” To me the latter is just an attack on the person rather than a discussion on the merits of the arguments. Always nice to see someone actually discussing the arguments (even if I don’t always agree) rather than simply making critical assumptions about the person and his character.
I mean no disrespect, Craig, but this post makes it seem as though you’ve all-but forgotten what it means to be anything other than an established pro working on draft three of an assignment with steps on a go project.
By and large, Scriptshadow is about spec scripts. It isn’t about getting an early draft of Iron Man 2 and using it to review the movie well ahead of schedule. When a writer from Bumblefuck, Missouri places in a contest and uses it to get an agent and secure a spec sale, all of that DOES say to me that he’s “ready to show it to the world.” Since that’s exactly what he’s trying to do. And I’m much more interested in reading that script–the one he decided was ready to show the world, the one that is still his baby and his singular vision, the one that he spent countless hours of his own time on with no guarantee that it would ever be bought, much less made into a movie–than I am in reading what comes out the other end of a thousand notes, a dozen rewrites, an uncredited dialogue polish, and tinkering by everyone from the director to a catering guy.
I don’t really buy into the idea that a original spec script is “just a draft” or that it doesn’t represent something intrinsically valuable in and of itself, before being purchased and going through the production process. And I don’t buy the notion that sending a spec script around town means anything other than that the writer feels the script is ready. Perhaps the studio that buys it will feel otherwise, but then that’s largely the difference between writing on spec and writing for assignment, isn’t it?
Your whole argument here seems to preclude the very possibility of a situation where “done” isn’t a decision made by committee. Yes, I think it would be appropriate for sites like Scriptshadow to avoid reviewing early drafts of big studio movies being written on assignment, coincidentally the only type of script your post appears to acknowledge the existence of. But that type of script isn’t really Scriptshadow’s focus to begin with.
I’m not endorsing what he’s doing. Or defending him. At all.
You obviously didn’t read what I wrote.
It’s a no-brainer that he needs to change his MO. I was agreeing with Mazin’s post, and then boom, he ends it by publishing the guy’s name.
Call it want you want. Indecent is the nicest way to put it. If you don’t get that, you have no empathy.
Give him a chance to change his site.
If after a reasonable time he doesn’t change…then do whatever it is you feel you need to do in RETRIBUTION, because he soooo needs some retribution.
Publish a map to his house Mazin. Get some torches and pitchforks. Really. He sooo deserves that.
but Mazin insists on publishing his name — maybe so he can be cool with his screenwriting buddies, I don’t know. It’s a bully move, and it makes Craig Mazin way lower on the totem pole than Carson Reeves, in my humble opinion.
He doesn’t ‘deserve’ to be outed. Period. It’s indecent. And Mazin will have to think about it tonight when he lays down to go to bed. If it’s still here in the morning, then Mazin will reveal himself, in my eyes, no matter how much rationalization he tries to do.
this is the ONLY reason I posted.
give a guy a second chance.
don’t rush to judgment lacking all the facts — you guys keep guessing at SS’s motives.
act decent.
pretty simple.
Well now Craig CAN’T remove the name. Yeesh.
I absolutely understand what some of the SS defenders mean, about the educational value. For instance, I would like to be a good parent someday. So this afternoon I broke into my neighbors’ house to secretly watch them have sex. Johnny law and my neighbors seemed to think that there was something wrong with it, but I told them by watching parenting at the earliest stages, I was really thinking of the kids. I’m actually writing this from the Roger Avary section of the Brentwood police station (wifi!), but I’m sure I’ll be out of here any second now…
Yes, he deserves to be named and publicly critiqued the same way he is unfairly publicly critiquing and naming other writers (do you worry about them getting death threats?).
Eads makes writers’ already difficult jobs that much harder.
I wonder what he actually does for a living, but I can tell you if I showed up and talked to his bosses about what a shitty job he was doing on any given task before it was even done (and I broadcast it all over the internet to further sway his bosses), he wouldn’t like it.
One thing aspiring writers should have is RESPECT FOR THE JOB THEY HOPE TO HAVE ONE DAY. Shitting on that job is the most amateur rookie move there is.
And when people who currently have that job are overwhelmingly telling you that your deeds are damaging to their ability to provide for their families, why ignore them?
Is that how you hope to be treated when you get employed?
Using your website (and not a great piece of WRITING – duh) to damage the careers of your hopefully future peers as a means of calling attention to yourself is about as effective as sending your kid up in a fake balloon to land a reality show.
Quit posting reviews of scripts not yet in production. And until a movie is greenlit it’s still in development.
Chris Eads seems to be the kind of guy who has to have the ‘new’ thing first and isn’t satisfied until everyone knows it, like the kid who gets the new video game and then goes to school to brag about it…..
I can’t help but think ‘dude, we get it — you’re the coolest, you got the new Iron Man script before anyone else, you can relax now’…..
Heh, well, if imbibe made a better argument, I’d remove the guy’s name. But frankly, the more I think about it, the more it’s really important that I don’t.
And it’s Nick’s post that led me to the conclusion.
He wrote:
You’re right. I mean…you’re right that this is what the site is largely about (although not always), but you’re not right that I’ve forgotten.
If someone’s struggling from sale to sale, and I know plenty of writers who are, and they write something that Scriptshadow trashes…well…that’s not particularly helpful.
This happened to a friend of my fairly recently. Suddenly, all this airy-fairy intellectual crap goes out the window when you’ve got a kid to feed and a script that’s getting nibbles…until suddenly some guy on the internet torpedoes it, and the already-overly-skittish buyer is spooked and runs.
So if our moral compass here is supposed to point firmly toward “helping our fellow writers,” I’m not sure Scriptshadow is the way and the light.
A review from the mysterious “Scriptshadow” may very well be taken seriously, while a review from “some guy” hopefully won’t be.
Unlike, say, the Black List, which is compiled by a guy who works for a buyer, using input from lots of other buyers. That actually means something.
That’s why people should care about the Black List, but not give a fart about Scriptshadow.
And yet…that’s not the way the world works. Like Bill Maher once said, if you put a velvet rope in front of a toxic waste dump in L.A., people will start lining up.
Well…um….yeah. It does preclude that, because if you’re a guy selling a spec, then I got news for you. You’re selling it to a studio and to a producer and then there’s gonna be a director and actors and marketing people and test screenings….
I mean, unless the Coen Brothers or Paul Anderson started selling specs recently and I didn’t hear about it…yes, “done” is a decision made by committee.
If I sell a spec, it’s not ready to shoot. It’s ready to sell. And I’m one of those lunatics who actually believes that other people might have ideas to make my script better.
If yours are ready to shoot, and everyone agrees, then you tell Scriptshadow it’s cool for him to rip it to pieces or praise it.
Don’t I deserve the option to not have him mess with my spec?
(and yes, I’m writing one starting next month, so this is relevant)
Look, John August’s position is the simplest, most clearly moral and appropriate. Just ASK THE WRITER. Show the writer the RESPECT she deserves, and ask if it’s OKAY.
But let’s face it…that’s not what this dude is after. He’s a child of AICN, where “scooping” is more important than anything else.
You know, I have tremendous respect for the Black List guys. They publicize scripts they LIKE…scripts that the town SHOULD like…and they get results. They rescue movies.
Those guys are doing the Lord’s work.
@SC
“And when people who currently have that job are overwhelmingly telling you that your deeds are damaging to their ability to provide for their families, why ignore them?”
Because that hasn’t actually been the case. Several pro writers responded to John August’s attack piece to throw their support behind his point (and some defended SS), but it has been my understanding that Carson has received a fair amount of support and encouragement from pros over the life of the blog. In short, they haven’t been overwhelmingly telling him those things.
I’m curious what professional writers defended ScriptShadow on August’s site. The only one I can think of is someone pretending to be Tarantino.
Can we maybe get real for a moment? A skittish buyer has memorized a thousand and one reasons to pass on a script any given day. Do you really think that his decision was based on a blog review, or is it maybe a teensy bit possible that the blog review was merely that day’s convenient excuse for a foregone conclusion? It’s marginally better than “love the writing, but not for us,” at any rate.
That’s why Scriptshadow is about reviewing spec scripts and NOT about reviewing movies on the merits of their scripts. He’s not trying to judge movies by reading their shooting scripts. He’s trying to analyze spec scripts that sell by reading spec scripts that sold.
In what way is analyzing spec scripts that sell best served by waiting until they are no longer spec scripts?
None of this really addresses the point I made, anyway. That being that your entire argument is rooted in the perspective of assignment work. Yeah, if you’re working on assignment, an early draft could be something you don’t want anyone to see. But a plain and concret difference between a spec script and an assignment draft is that a spec script doesn’t go out into the world until, well, until the writer decides to send it out into the world.
I can see two fairly egregious flaws in this argument. Most pertinent is that Scriptshadow isn’t about getting scripts ready for shooting. It’s about writing scripts that sell. Being “ready to sell” is the alpha and omega of the spec market game.
And I can understand that if you’re writing on assignment and working on an early draft where you’re just trying to hammer out what the producers want and implement a bunch of notes, you might not consider that piece of writing your best work. I certainly wouldn’t want anyone reading it if I were in that position. But to tell me that your own personal spec script isn’t representative of your work because theoretical marketing people and test audiences have yet to force your hand…that sort of mindset is simply astonishing to me.
I would absolutely rather someone read and review my spec script than judge me solely on a script that’s been ground through development hell. And I don’t mean that the development process is all bad or that nobody else has good ideas, but just the idea of not considering my own work to be a fair representation of my own work until and if a dozen other people get their hands on it…geez, I can’t even fathom thinking that way.
You just got through lecturing me on why the writer’s opinion doesn’t matter. Why would you go to the writer for permission to review a script that he sold? He sold it. It isn’t his anymore. A studio and a producer own it, and then there’s gonna be a director and actors and marketing people and test screenings…
@Veronica
Jamie Linden (We Are Marshall), for one.
sigh
This controversy could have so easily been averted if “Carson” had simply reviewed our script “BALLS OUT” (available for free download at http://www.therobotard8000.com) and engendered assloads of goodwill from A-Listers and wannabes alike.
@Craig Mazin
You wrote: “You know, I have tremendous respect for the Black List guys. They publicize scripts they LIKE…scripts that the town SHOULD like…and they get results. They rescue movies. Those guys are doing the Lord’s work.”
ME: The BL is part political. You of all people, should know this. Sure, a lot of the writing is solid. Kudos. Yet many of the stories DON’T make compelling, commercial films. Period. Most of the scripts that made the BL will never get made. A few will. More like a great writing sample. Please don’t use the Lord name in vain
They’re doing their own work. They have their own agenda.
Most of the specs bought over the past 5 years that made it to the big screen failed at the box office. This a fact. Not conjecture. Craig, why do we continue to rely on the poor tastes of many agents, their assistants, or producers that keep losing money?
Carson’s work at SS needs to be adopted internally by the studios. In other words, SCRIPT REVIEWS by a 3rd (private) party or a special group formed within the studio; not a public blog. The decision to green light a SOLD spec should be measured by (qualified) people who are not too close to the project that they’ve lost their sense of great storytelling for a mainstream audience. And that would be many of the production execs. I don’t need to discuss the horrors of development hell. Everyone already knows how and why the end product suffers from it. Let’s do something about it.
PRICELESS: “I would absolutely rather someone read and review my spec script than judge me solely on a script that’s been ground through development hell…
“Give him a chance to change his site.”
He’s already said that he disagrees with John August’s opinion, dismisses the effect of bad reviews as a result of the site being “trendy” and claims that will pass.
Since he disagrees with Mr. August’s opinion, it seems obvious he has no intentions of implementing his suggestions. If he has already publicly said he has no intention of implementing those easy suggestions, then why wait for something he says isn’t going to happen?
Some people here point out that he has the support of some writers. If so, then there’s no reason he can’t go to a “reviews with permission” site and leave those who do object out of it entirely (not this B.S. about removing the link only after-the-fact). But he clearly doesn’t want to do that and has already said he disagrees with the person who made that very suggestion.
“Until some guy on the internet torpedoes it, and then the already-overly-skittish-buyer is spooked and runs.”
Isn’t that the buyer’s fault? Doesn’t that imply a certain lack of resolve on the buyer’s part? A fearful, blind following of trends and opinions and no ability to make descisions? If they’ll cut and run from acquiring a potential revenue-generating financial opportunity simply because some unaffiliated individual on an anonymous website didn’t like it? Jesus, politicians pay less attention to public opinion polls.
Am I the only who thinks this whole argument (not neccessarily ScriptShadow itself, which I believe is not in and of itself a malevolent force but could, at the same time, definatly serve to evolve somewhat) is really revealing just how deficient and inadequate the modern Hollywood system is? And that screenwriters are attacking in the wrong direction?
Also, this attitude towards spec scripts really explains a lot. You read a lot of supposedly hot, high-profile specs and you’re just reeling back, like, WHAT is THIS? This is AWFUL….Didn’t this guy do even one revision? Didn’t he edit himself at all? This just reads like a first draft banged out in a week….and guess what? It seems it was.
But hey, whatever. Writing sequels and studio assignments seems to require three things, mainly: speed, obedience and appeal to the lowest common denominator. I guess morals and artistic ambition don’t figure into it much.
random internet dude reviews a script, so what. according to the internet ron paul would have been the next president of the usa. it’s just a big ocean of piss and no opinion has ever an impact on real life.
I love helping writers trying to get their breaks. I read a lot of scripts for friends, and pass them on when I can. I answer questions for anyone curious, and when asked I will speak to students. That is the time I spend, on my own. I give as much as I can afford. However, script writing is my work time, not my time to help you. I am not writing scripts to educate Joe Bob the curious amateur screenwriter as to how a script should look or sound or how many verbs he should use to make it. My scripts are not movies. There are characters and plot and dialogue, so in that sense they resemble a movie. But the format is not a movie. It is a lot of elements written in a way to give a million tiny notes. These notes are to help the director figure out how the scene should look, to the actors to help them say their lines and understand their motivation. Within the script are tiny notes for the third assistant costumer on how a characters clothes should fit.
The difference between reviewing a script of a movie that hasn’t come out yet and reviewing a movie is a matter of audience. The target for a film is as wide an audience as possible. People will watch your movie, and react. Some of those people will react by posting opinions for other people within that same target audience. That’t the breaks. However, you are not the target audience of my script just because you want to be a screenwriter or like movies. When and if it becomes a movie, then you are. Up until that point, it’s not for you. The target audience are the directors, actors, producers, etc. responsible for turning it into a movie. When a script of mine goes out, I am 90% certain that it will end up in these hands exclusively. I trust my agent to send it to people he trusts will be of this audience, and he likewise trusts that the people he sends it to will only share it with people who speak the intended language. Since they are the audience for it, they get to react as they will. If they tear it apart, I will be upset on a professional level, but those are the breaks. They are the audience, and they get to say ‘yes’ or ‘no’. But not you. You do not get to decide. You don’t earn it by getting coffee or knowing someone in the know or however you think people get jobs in the entertainment business. You earn it by working very, very hard and learning a great deal and making film your life and demonstrating that you understand the language. To paraphrse: I do not want you to read my fucking script, either.
Maybe Carson really, really understands screenwriting. I doubt it (based mainly the fact that he runs a site dedicated to reviewing in development scripts as opposed to actually working to develop scripts), but I’ll give him the benefit of the doubt and say that he is in fact a revered genius of story and filmmaking who has toiled for years to hone his craft. But the second he starts a site and starts putting scripts that he has no rights to on the web for anyone to read, he has demonstrated a total lack of understanding of what being a working screenwriter is.
It doesn’t matter if it’s a spec or a adapation, first draft or draft twenty. Until that script becomes a movie, it’s intended audience is the people making the movie. After that, if you want to read it, fine. Compare it to the movie, or curl up in bed and read it while you sleep. I understand that some screenwriters may feel differently, and their milage with Scriptshadow may have varied. I had a gym teacher who thought his time in Vietnam during the war was a delightful romp. By all means, check it out on your own, but just because your comfort level leads that way, don’t presume to speak for everyone.
Dude said on his site that he makes all his money selling reviews to the wannabes. He’s not going to stop what he’s doing because he’s making money off of all these people saying how great he is for sharing stolen scripts.
CD writes:
“Isn’t that the buyer’s fault? Doesn’t that imply a certain lack of resolve on the buyer’s part?”
Can you cook up a pan of buyer’s fault and feed it to your kid? Can you pay the rent with lack of resolve on the buyer’s part?
No. At least not yet.
Maybe instead of Chris changing his site and respecting the writers who are trying to earn a living, maybe we should change the way the entire world works so that everything revolves around ScriptShadow. How does that sound?
Thanks for the great article, Craig. SS once reviewed a script of ours in development (positively…thanks Eads!). A commenter then posted a link to a PDF copy. When the studio and producers found out, they went absolutely ape-shit.
We still don’t know how SS got a copy, but now we can’t trust anyone with a draft. I know that no one cares about the inconveniences to a working writer and violating copyright, etc., so let me just say that I agree with the proposed solution: ask for the writer’s permission.
The guy’s name was ‘outed” long long before Craig used it for dramatic effect in this post. Eads/Shadow/whatever has used it on posts and pages of his own before, and I myself have seen it posted publically since well before this dust-up on August’s blog. All the hand-wringing about Craig somehow exposing this guy to some vague threat of physical harm (from Twilighters? Good god… what next — SPECTRE? Bernie Koppel and KAOS?) by referring to him by name is just silly.
Hey Butterfield:
“Maybe we should change the way the entire world works–”
Yeah. We should.
ScriptShadow is not taking food out of children’s mouths. Neither is the internet. Neither are script readers.
The ones fucking over writers are the precise people I pinpointed before: the lemmings who have so little opinion or resolve that they can be scared away from buying a script because of one negative opinion. Fortune favors the bold. Not the blind conformist chasing trends, mass opinions, and high school-style popularity, with the mentality of an advertising shill or bottom-feeding stockbroker. Writers should be writing the greatest, most heartfelt films they can, and producers should be making the best possible movies they can. And doing it with some balls, jesus.
Again, I’m not aggresively defending ScriptShadow, per se. I think ScriptShadow is really a very small fish, ultimately, in a big damn pond. And there are plenty of real barracudas and sharks people should be worrying about.
Just to be clear: Chris Eads is posting whatever he can get. They are scripts-in-progress. You might think that they are the specs that sold, but they usually are not. Often, a spec will go out. A buyer will like it but have some reservations. (Maybe they want a story that is more of a two-hander instead of one that favors only one lead.) Those reservations are communicated to the agent. The writer will then do a rough and dirty quick pass to address those reservations while the spec still has heat. (Often written within a week.) Based on that the buyer will buy the spec.
Now, you see, the buyer has looked at two drafts: the sparkly spec that went out, and the rough and dirty rewrite that the writer did to address the buyer’s reservations. Chris Ead often gets the rough and dirty draft. That is an internal document meant only for the eyes of the buyer. It does not represent the writer at their best. It does the writer and the project a disservice to put that script on the internet and then to review it — even if the review is positive.
It sets up erroneous expectations. It takes a delicate private creative process and makes it public. How aspiring writers are incapable of understanding that is truly astounding. Vomit drafts are called that for a reason. Sharing them with the public and reviewing them is the ultimate in bad taste.
Oh, and people: Last Temptation Of Christ leaked and was handed out all over the place in 1983. Two Lane Blacktop got printed in Esquire, and I mean THE ENTIRE SCRIPT, in 1970. This stuff has ALWAYS happened. Now with PDFs and the internet it’s just a thousand times easier. The film industry can either adapt to it, or go down like a dinosaur in a tarpit of outrage and frustration.
I’m not defending piracy, but there are other ways to deal with these issues.
Like, ask the writer’s permission. Yes! Absolutely! In fact, work hand in hand with the writers, and maybe even the studios! Publicize the work of screenwriters AS WRITERS, acknowledge that their work has merit on it’s own, apart from the films made from it, or as simply grist for some know-nothing’s development mill!
CD:
I agree totally.
But that’s not reality. And it won’t be reality. Or at least, it’s not my life goal to make it reality. I want to write, not lead a revolution. I realize that’s maybe not thinking big enough or being romantic enough, but that’s where I’m at.
And sincerely – if this is your life’s goal, more power to you! Everyone would be thankful.
IndyVox:
There are so many things wrong with the situation that you’re describing that I don’t even know where to start.
If it “does not represent the writer at their best”, why in God’s name is it being given to THE BUYER, the entity that is prepared to shell out money for the thing?!? You’re basically saying that somebody writes a really GOOD spec draft, then makes it WORSE at the request of somebody who hasn’t even bought the thing yet!
I suspect there is a very simple solution to this. Writers can say, “NO.” They can say, “Look. IF YOU DON’T LIKE IT, DON’T BUY IT. Or buy it, pay me to walk away, and then hire somebody else to rewrite it.” Yes, you’ll sell less stuff. You’ll make less money. But you WON’T have some really bad draft written in a week floating around forever with your name on it, either!
I mean, WTF….Why would you DO that? Why would you willingly and openly lower the quality of your own work because somebody MIGHT buy it? That’s not a “delicate creative process”. A delicate creative process is Scorcese and De Niro spending three months rewriting Raging Bull together on St. Barts…not THAT.
Butterfield:
Glad you see where I’m coming from. I just wanna write too, but if I can change the world along the way, I think, y’know, that won’t be too bad either.
I hope whatever I end up doing does improve things for screenwriters and all creative artists. And hope to see you on the barricades someday.
CD:
You do it to sell the script. As development continues, you do it again and again and again. You implement notes. You write drafts to try out certain story directions. You do them as quickly as you can to move forward in the process. Hopefully, you get closer with each draft. Sometimes you try certain things only to learn that they don’t work. But that was integral to helping you get to the things that do work. Those intermediate drafts are just as important as the first draft or the last draft. In fact, you write draft after draft after draft… to finally get it right. To get the movie made. That’s the reality of the creative process, whether it’s a screenplay, play, novel, short story, painting, or sculpture. No one is talking about lowering the quality of the work.
This is about the creative process. Really, why is that so hard to understand?
This isn’t just hurting pro writers. Chris Eads has put up and savaged Nicholl Fellowship scripts. Scripts where the writers didn’t have an agent and hadn’t sold them. It killed those writers chances to get an agent. No one wants a script that everyone’s seen. (Ask Greg Beal if you want. He runs the program.)
The only person Chris is helping is Chris. And everyone defending him? I hope you are lucky enough to get a script that starts to get attention, from something like the Black List or Nicholl Fellowship, and then he leaks it and craps on it.
The Black List comes out Friday. We’ll get to see Mr. Eads in action.
@Nick You’re lucky your script “Public, I” didn’t get hurt that way. I bet you’d be singing a different tune.
I know that Scriptshadow’s review led to firings at a big deal movie in production. Only one department had the script he reviewed and everyone in the department got sacked. The studio couldn’t determine which person leaked the script so they just fired everyone. Guilt by association.
Indy:
But it sounds like you’re describing the creative process that novelists, sculptors, painters and playwrights all go through BEFORE they sell the thing! They put it out on market once it’s DONE!
We should be like furniture makers. Build the chair, make sure it has four legs and is comfortable, then sell the thing and walk away. Don’t take it, chop a leg off, add a headrest, paint it blue, and drill holes in the arms because that’ll make it a better chair.
Now, if you’re hired to rewrite something, or write something on assignment, that’s a differant story, but still…I think that we can find a better, happier medium that involves the writer’s creative and artistic input playing as meaningful a role as everyone else’s involvement.
CD:
Movies are a collaborative medium. If the screenwriter cares, they try to stay on the project as long as possible. Just walking away after the sale is done is about the worst thing that a screenwriter can do. It’s voluntarily removing their own voice from the project. Selling the spec is not the finish line, it’s the starting line.
IndyVox,
I think it’s hard for folks to understand who have never actually worked within the business, or in any other collaborative creative process where the folks with the money get to suggest changes. CD might want to go back and read the original post where Craig details pretty clearly why and how you write a draft and the positives and pitfalls of doing so.
It’s hard to use the argument that this is just how it works, but the truth is that this is just how it works. You can often tell aspirants from actual workers because they have not yet experienced these relationships and have fairly romantic ideas about what being a working writer is. Even though my paid writing is in research, I can extrapolate what my bosses and editors want from me in a similar way to what is being discussed here. The creative process, when one is paid upfront (which I wish was true on my visual art making side) is really a CREATING process and it’s a job with writing to be done and compromises to be made. You stay on the job as long as you can and as long as you want to be part of the proces and have your original voice heard. CD: I’d add that as writers we’re not furniture makers or painters or sculptors, who often bemoan the fact that our original works of art (and our intellectual property) can be bought and defaced by buyers. That’s really NOT the solution and is pretty dismissive of creatives.
Bravo to you, Craig, for not backing down and leaving this coward’s name out there for the world to see. Hopefully his career will effectively cease to exist before it had a chance to begin with all the bad will he’s built up from the Hollywood community.
Your number’s up, Christopher Eads.
Thanks Craig. – For stepping in.
(You’ll find that 99% of the “I really like SS” people are of the “I have no investment in the house I’m torching” clan.) – So it sorta ends there for me. – If you don’t sanctimoniously respect you’re fellow writers careers, you and your skateboard were never going to make it anyway.
m o o n marked:
Yes, I guess it is hard to understand for some folks who have never actually worked within the business, or in any other collaborative creative process. (Though many do get it.) Interestingly, CD went from extolling the virtue of Scorsese and De Niro spending three months rewriting RAGING BULL together on St. Barts, to suggesting that screenwriters shouldn’t rewrite specs — they should sell them and just walk away. (Or not sell them at all!) They should treat a script like a piece of furniture.
CD, it seems, is pulling our legs.
The biggest problem here, is for guys like Mazin to say that the Black List is god’s work, then to rip ScriptShadow. And here’s why:
At the end of the day, my thoughts on the matter are actually a lot in line with Craig’s. The biggest problem I see with SS is the concept that he’s reviewing “Draft” work. But the thing is, if SS has the script — that means he got it from someone, right? Most likely that behind the scenes group of assistants/readers/interns etc… who trade these scripts on a daily basis.
And these are not all the seasoned pros with insight and perspective some here would pretend them to be. Many of them are still in, or fresh out of college. I was doing studio coverage during my college internship with so little guidance, as a professional writer, I now look back at myself and my own opinions with shame and disgust.
The system sucks. We put valuable scripts into the hands of kids. The internet took Hollywood by surprise. So now we don’t even so much put paper in their hands, but electronic PDFs that are so much more easily traded.
So what’s the point here. Let’s not forget that the Black List was started by a guy who was just an assistant at the time. He relied mainly on the opinions of assistants. Sure it’s expanded, but don’t think there’s not a lot of 22 and 23 year-olds weighing in. Guys and gals who don’t know shit about what makes a good movie yet.
Sure they’re god’s gift for putting together a list saying what scripts were good but ignored. But here’s the rub — that same group of people is going online everyday trading scripts among each other — and then trashing them. Writing negative shit in private tracking boards and chat rooms. And they are most often doing at at the most critical time in a script’s life — right when the agents/managers are submitting them for purchase.
So, again, I agree there is harm in putting up reviews of draft version scripts. But when it’s coming from a guy on the outside — and viewed mainly by non-pros — it’s the least harm in the process.
The Black List kids do as much harm as they do good.
This is going on too long but here’s where I come down. I don’t want my draft work reviewed. I don’t want it read except by the very small circle of people who are supposed to read it.
And usually that’s a very small circle. Which the writer knows. So if August or some other pro here really has had such a draft exposed — he needs to start hitting up that small circle and ask what the fuck?
But in this day and age, I also realize with sad understanding, that once a pdf goes beyond a certain circle, it’s hitting the net. And with everything else we have to be worried about. ScripShadow don’t cause me no sweat. Just another asshole opinion.
I don’t even know why I cared to write so much about this, except to say, I feel like people are really using it as an excuse. No disrespect to fellow writers, but honestly… If a potential buyer really did beg off because of ScriptShadow. Get real — there were other issues at hand. And that’s not a realistic buyer.
Can someone please send me Apple’s plans for their next Iphone so I can review it? Also, will someone send me Obama’s state of the union speech now so I can judge which way he should revise it? Also, if anyone knows if Christo is planning to wrap any monuments, cities or islands, let me know now so I can spoil it. Furthermore, if anyone knows JD Salinger and can get me a rough draft of whatever he’s been working on for the last 50 years, send it to me! I’m just trying to help! I have a right to know!
Dammit, Haas– don’t go trying to make valid points here! This is the INTERNET!
You pros are going about it all wrong. If you really want these non-pros who are defending SS to see what you’re really getting at — talk to someone you know who judges any high-profile screenwriting contest, get the scripts (all the scripts, not just the finalists), post a link to them online and blast them to hell. How many times has one of them sent in a draft they rushed out the door to hit a deadline, or begged to make revisions after sending in their draft?
JJ:
First, I would seriously question anyone who puts assistants down. Assistants in Hollywood are tomorrow’s agents, producers and studio execs.
Second, the folks who run the Black List might kill puppies and hookers in their spare time. I don’t know them, and we all have our flaws. All I’m interested in is what they do publicly,.
Publicly, they champion screenplays, and by extension, screenwriters. I can find no fault in that.
When you say you don’t want your draft work reviewed, all I can say is “Congrats. Welcome to the club of reasonable people.” Is Scriptshadow’s opinion just another asshole opinion? Yes. Is he helping writers? No. Is he good for writers? No. Is he respectful to writers and our process and our work? No.
All I’m doing is making that very, very clear to anyone passing through.
@JJ #79
There’s a key distinction, IMO, between the Black List and ScriptShadow–
The Black List is a compilation of what numerous different anonymous folks with actual industry experience have deemed the best of the scripts floating around the open market.
ScriptShadow is ONE GUY — with dubious credentials — playing Caesar and giving a thumbs up or thumbs down to any script project he can get his hands on.
IOW, the former is a group of experienced hands offering their consensus opinion on the best of the best, whereas the latter is one guy praising or pissing upon early drafts which might never have been intended to be presented as read-ready.
The first case seems about advancing the careers of those deserving writers. The second case seems almost totally about advancing the notoriety of the guy playing Caesar, potential/real cost to the injured writers be damned.
¢¢
If I were President of the Earth the first thing I would do is give Craig Mazin a hack-saw. The second thing I would do is give him a License to Hack. The third thing I would do is open the door and let him out into the world.
My tolerance for people that think ScriptShadow is a-ok has been exceeded. Taking control over the distribution of another person’s work is WRONG, and any justification as to the legitimacy of that taking is pure bunk.
For those talking about specs…
I write specs every year separately from Mongo and the rest Robotard.
Every year.
The fact is, studio execs/producers are very skittish. Who gives a fuck if “they should have stronger convictions?” They don’t. So if they’re reading SS it’s very likely that he can send one of those bastards into a tailspin with a bad review…on a script that’s not done. By “not done” i mean that it’s not safely in production, it’s still vulnerable to be fucked by any random opinion be it the 13 year old son of a producer or SS or an assistant.
If I go out wide with a spec and it doesn’t sell immediately, I don’t want someone’s shitty review salting my hopes of getting it going somewhere down the line.
If I DO sell a spec–which I won’t, I don’t want someone’s shitty review making my skittish execs panic while I’m in the middle of developing it (and probably fucking it up) for them.
It takes NOTHING to kill a movie. Nothing. It takes less than nothing to derail development. That’s just how it is. Fuck why. Fuck your opinion on it. Fuck your fantasy of what you’d do if you were in the sitch, it is what it is and that is: fucked. Why add more fuck to the fuck pile, SS?
This SS guy could probably parlay this controversy into being able to review drafts that writers like if he played his cards right.
Roger Ebert should start writing reviews based on leaked dailies.
Craig, I agree, assistants are the brokers of tomorrow. Some of them… Here’s my point — When I was fresh out of college, I wrote coverage for some major players. I segued into working as a writer’s assistant and then script coordinator on a couple different TV shows.
If I think about the assistants where I interned, then where the TV shows… I’m counting 12 other people. Guess how many of ‘em are still in the business at all?
TWO — one’s now a pro writer. One’s still an assistant — cuz that’s all the person was ever gonna be.
What I’m saying is — the vast majority of interns/ assistants will not move on. And they (like myself at the time) are not informed and educated about what makes a good movie — as so many here pretend them to be.
I’m not defending ScriptShadow. Just pointing out that it’s one more bump in the road. But the system in place — these assistants who the pro writers seem to be okay with reading and discussing their scripts. They cause way more harm and have been for a long time.
The only difference (hope?) is that maybe a few of them will advance to positions of power some day and then they’ll have something good to say about a script.
Of course, they’ll also remember the crap they read when doing coverage and who wrote it. So you’re fucked if you ever wrote something they didn’t like. And they all talk to each other.
Which I’m saying is worse than an outsider’s opinion on the net. There’s no solution — just reality. And unless and until writers feel empowered to stand up for themselves with development execs, etc… to demand the material be more properly protected from trading. We’re all screwed.
“Hopefully his career will effectively cease to exist before it had a chance to begin with all the bad will he’s built up from the Hollywood community.”
I personally don’t hope for that. My hope is that he fails on his own (lack of) merits.
WANTED!
A screenplay from Chris Eads. I will be reviewing it on my blog. Any draft, any script.
Please send to:
ScriptOutOfShadow@gmail.com
Publishing reviews of UNFINISHED WORK on the internet is not remotely the same as a PRIVATE TRACKING BOARD. One is a pin prick, the other is a sledgehammer.
If someone commissions a painter to do a work, I don’t have right to see it and critique it before it’s done. If a novelist gets an advance on a novel, I don’t have right to see the pages his editor is working on and critique it.
I don’t have a right to listen to U2′s DEMOS for an upcoming album and critique them.
Not only is this flat out shitty to your fellow writers/ creators, etc, but the movies will suffer if we’re all worried about our work being online and not given the freedom to take chances and have the creative process in private with our collaborators.
By the way, most pro writers don’t share their scripts with each other before they’re done. And when we do want to read one another’s script, WE ASK. And when the scripts aren’t done yet, we wait.
That’s what PROS do. They value the profession. Amateurs steal in the name of “learning.”
If you can’t learn to write by doing, practicing it day in day out, and reading the already bajillion made scripts and various resources out there – YOU’LL NEVER MAKE IT ANYWAY.
Nick:
“But a plain and concret difference between a spec script and an assignment draft is that a spec script doesn’t go out into the world until, well, until the writer decides to send it out into the world.”
As a writer whose sold spec was reviewed by Eads, allow me deflate this hypothesis.
I am very proud of my script. I am extremely proud of it. I put a lot of work into it. Then I developed it further with the director we attached, and even further with the producer we attached. Then we sent it out to a dozen or so buyers and one of them ultimately bought it.
It was not a rushed draft. It was not a rough draft. There were no placeholders in it. It was the product of hundreds of hours of careful, deliberate work.
I’m proud of it, and I stand by every last word. But I didn’t “send it out into the world.” I sent it to a few carefully chosen buyers in a structured marketplace. If I had wanted it available to the world entire, I could have posted it on my own damn website.
Why didn’t I? Because my goal was not to write a screenplay. My goal was to write a movie. And pardon me if I don’t see how Christopher Eads’ unsolicited and unaccountable opinion and his unauthorized posting of the screenplay is supposed to help achieve that goal.
I just don’t understand some of you people.
What you’re describing is not Scorsese and De Niro revising Raging Bull, revising Paul Schrader’s drafts, which were in turn rewrites of Mardik Martin’s drafts. And it’s not Thomas Wolfe editing his novels with Maxwell Perkins, either.
It’s basically taking what you seem to consider very early, unfinished, almost rough drafts, but which are simultaneously supposed to be seen as valid, coherant accomplished works capable of being put into production the next day, and trying to sell them not on the basis of what they are but how somebody wants to change them. And then expecting to fix whatever’s wrong them through an extensive “development” process.
I’ll say it again: write the script that you consider to be the best possible script, the best possible version of the story you’ve chosen to tell. Then sell it to somebody who wants to make THAT script. And if they want to change it, take the money and move on, and don’t feel privileged to hang around and deface your own work. You’re the creator. Unless you’re staying involved as a producer, or directing the film, your job is done! You’ve given them a script to either make right or screw up, and why get dragged down with all this other nonsense?
I mean, answer me this question. There’s nothing to stop someone from doing this, right? From turning down buyers who don’t want to just purchase the script as is, and then negotiating a deal with an eventual buyer that they simply sell them the script for an agreed fee (maybe plus royalties, ahem), like selling someone a car, and get paid, and that’s it? Here’s the script / here’s your check / great, shake hands, have fun developing it into oblivion, I’m gonna go write another one.
I mean, people can legally do that, right? I was under the impression that they could. There’s nothing technically stopping that from happening. Correct? Or am I missing something?
Bravo, Craig. Thanks for shining a light.
From DDP: “Chris Eads is a fame dame.
Check this out:
http://www.realitytvworld.com/news/c…ounced-839.php
From 2003.
Look for Chris Eads.
Google is your friend.
Enough of this charlatan.
Wilson, better watch out now…got cha number, “
Surprise, surprise. Chris Eads is in it for his fame-seeking ego.
A tennis instructor! For the love of …
I didn’t want to be dragged into this blogger-world fracas this morning. Fortunately, Zeb’s comment “Do you have to attack him with such veracity.” made my morning. Does anyone remember laughter? I do after reading that. Well played, Zeb. Well. Played.
Craig, you are a genius, and watching you police this is highly entertaining. It’s a bit like watching a cat toy with a mouse. Yet we all knew that ‘scriptshadow’ was built on the backs of insufferably hard work.
Here I always thought that the lawyers would get him… The funny thing about this is that he’s still linking to your blog.
A prediction: He blindly rolls through his blacklist ‘moment’, then by early next year, the whole thing quietly disappears.
CD,
What does what you’re saying have to do with SS?
Wow. Mazin and I agree on something. Again (it’s happened before, but for the life of me I can’t remember when or what it was)… Well, sorta agree anyway.
I am absolutely, beyond a scriptshadow of a doubt, 100% against, anyone posting my material on the internet without my permission. I don’t care if it’s Scriptshadow, the Black List, or my cousin Ike from Topeka. Doesn’t matter. I don’t care if the intent is good or bad. It doesn’t matter to me if it’s done to show what a great script I’ve written or to expose my flaws.
All that matters to me is this: until I’ve sold said script, the effing script belongs to me. Mine. I choose to send it to producers and trust them (and the confidentiality agreement they have with staff readers or independent contractors) to do the right thing which is to not publicly share my material with anyone without my expressed permission.
And that’s my problem with Chris Eads, aka Scriptshadow, he does not own, nor has he paid or asked permission to use my script in anyway. And it’s wrong for him and others like him to do so…
I’m not naive, the modern age allows for people to get their hands on stuff which doesn’t belong to them. It doesn’t make it right though.
So, here’s (I’m holding up my wine glass) to Craig for saying what’s right: “Thanks, Bud!”
It’s pretty hard for me to read early drafts of unproduced specs BECAUSE I’M DEAD!
Just wanted to throw that out there.
I want to thank Craig Mazin for pointing out something that should have been painfully obvious to me. As a professional animator, I make several passes at a scene before it is deemed acceptable for public consumption and put in a film.
There is NO WAY I would want those early versions (basically rough drafts) open for critique from fan sites because duh…they were meant for the director’s eyes only. And you can’t possibly learn anything from these early versions because you can’t be in on all the dailies sessions where acting and timing was discussed (which I assume would be the same thing as character, plot, etc. notes for screenplays).
I can’t imagine losing a job or an opportunity for one because of such critiques.
It appears that your efforts coupled with August’s have brought the site to a standstill.
What shall Mr. Eads do? He done got hoisted on his own petard/nom de plume/self-regard…
There’s something juvenile about it all. The reality is, if he’d kept it positive none of this would’ve happened. He already has what he wanted – an audience listening to him. I wonder how he’s going to cope without that.
Just an aside, not trying to get into this, but I have a feeling that the more people post his real name, and the more people laugh with glee at his downfall, it probably won’t convince him to go quietly into that good night.
If you ruin his career here and on other websites, why wouldn’t he just say, “fuck it” and go balls out and continue with his reviews, betting that the Studios won’t sue him? You can argue he deserves it all you want, but that won’t make him actually stop. Just saying.
One question: Why now? He has been operating since February. So he has his site for seven months, up and reviewing scripts, and I cannot figure out why it has blown up the way it has.
Sanchez, why now? In February he had no audience, now he has plenty of eyeballs from the industry.
His stupid opinion doesn’t count. But when a stupid opinion gets written in a popular forum, it can become negatively influential.
kinda like nikki.
PS. which makes me think…how far is he from TOLDJA!
Actually, the answer to the “why now?” question is that his site was mentioned in the below article about the five sites every screenwriter should know.
http://www.associatedcontent.com/article/2456806/fivewebsiteseveryscreenwritershould.html?cat=40
Sadly omitted were johnaugust.com and artfulwriter.com, which I think are far move valuable than most of what made that list. I think the better question is why Roy Howard, the author of that article, finds Carson’s scriptsquirrel blog so valuable. In the article Roy claims to be a produced screenwriter, but I find no record of him in studiosystem or on imdb – this could be my mistake, a typo, or Roy Howard may be an alias, I don’t really care either way. I will say this, though; what I find so annoying about Chris Eads reviews is that they are so unprofessional. Many commenting here and elsewhere have said that the site is so useful and helpful for aspiring screenwriters because it gives them access to what’s selling, not many of those comments have pointed out that Christopher’s reviews are typically devoid of any assessment of structure, conflict, range of change, etc. – yes, all dev buzz words, but also elements of screenwriting that are as close to objective as we get in this business. Granted, it’s not uncommon to hear professionals use words like boring, flowery, exciting etc. when critiquing material; it is however uncommon to hear Mr. Eads use a word like structure. There are a lot of valid reasons why scriptshadow hurts both professional and amateur writers, I take take issue with his uneducated approach; I think that gives aspiring writers who don’t know any better the wrong ideas about what works and why.
So right Mr. Belvedere.
And I shudder to think people would give him money to critique their work?!
He’s never sold anything. He’s never gotten anything sold.
People should keep their hard earned cash.
somebody wrote that he gained representation from his blog. I’d like to know more about this guy.
I’ll bet Tiger Woods is so happy that Eads is taking the intense media scrutiny off of him.
Actually, Eads is promising to review the email exchanges between Woods and his many mistresses after he’s done reviewing the old and incomplete drafts of Black List scripts he manages to wrangle tomorrow.
People who do interviews in national publications have no reasonable expectation of protecting their identity under “privacy” claims. If you want to be anonymous, act anonymous. You cannot reasonably claim you have a right to both fame and anonymity simultaneously. Talk about cognitive dissonance.
Here’s something new to be annoyed with; Cris has just posted an list of scripts which he claims are likely to be on the new Black List. What is the point of this? Scooping a most mentioned list? I hate to resort to name calling, but Christopher Carson Reeves Eads is a douche.
Perhaps he is a <>, but he could probably whoop you at tennis, Mr. Belvedere, if that IS your REAL name…
Actually, this is the start of the evening drama, no?
He’s baaaaaaaaack. And he even opened the blog to comments. For about 5 minutes.
Btw, who really wrote the Castle book? It was Cannell, weren’t it? The blurb on the back has that tongue-in-cheek quality to it. . .
Can I ask, what is the most troubling aspect of it, is it the reviews or the posting of scripts? Are they equal, or is one more troubling than the other?
Can I ask, what is the most troubling aspect of it, is it the reviews or the posting of scripts? Are they equal, or is one more troubling than the other?
I’d say it was the scripts.
But then again, I’m dead.
Gilvary (92), Amen.
CD (94), Stop making no sense.
Turn down money? Have some artistic integrity? Not whore myself to idiots? Try to write something good rather then grab a quick buck? Yes, clearly I’m making no sense to you.
And if you agree with 92, then I’m beginning to think it’s not possible to communicate with you anyway. I cannot believe somebody can say, “I didn’t want to write a script, I wanted to write a movie” and still look at themselves in the mirror. Or, at least, call themselves a writer.
What a bunch of petty, narrow-minded, vindictive, self-righteous blockheads a lot of people on here seem to be. I’m really beginning to understand why so many of the playwrights, novelists, nonfiction authors, ect, I meet consider screenwriters to be such bottom-feeding hacks. I always thought that was an elitist, unfair attitude and vehemently argued against it every time I encountered it. Now, I’m not so sure.
Straw Man + Ad Hominem = Troll
Ah, CD, bless you. You’re making no sense because the suggestion that you offer a script as-is is absurd. if you’re going to offer it as-is, you shouldn’t offer it, for one simple reason. No one is going to buy a property and then invest millions of dollars into making and marketing it and then be given zero input into the process of developing the material. Let’s be clear, development goes on in all mediums. I have novelist friends whose works are edited by their publishing houses, plays undergo changes during the workshop process that many (most?) plays undergo, etc. There just is no world where you get to do it 100% your way with no input from your collaborators unless you are footing the bill. Obviously people have the option of doing that, but this blog is about Hollywood, so that’s not the conversation we’re having here. Of course there’s nothing that legally prevents people from doing what you suggest, but as a lawyer (yep, that too), I should tell you that whether something is or is not legal is rarely the point when it comes to contract negotiation and enforcement. What is the point is the relative bargaining power of the parties, the goals of the parties, etc… Anyone who did what you suggested would have no career (for a simple reason that I’ll explain below). If they were willing not to have a career, they wouldn’t be part of this discussion, which is why your comments make no sense.
You are posting on a blog written by a Hollywood screenwriter frequented by working and aspiring screenwriters. Their interests and opinions reflect that and it makes no sense for you to advise people with those goals to instead be renegade filmmakers who fund their films out of their own pockets. I’m certain their are blogs where you can find like-minded people and it would no doubt profit you to visit those as someone with your world-view and your low level of emotional self-control would have difficulty talking to people who are on speaking terms with reality, the adult world, and the industry that they (but not you, I presume) have chosen to be a part of.
To be sure, there are wonderful filmmakers who have made film after film with money they raised on their own and who have self-distributed their films. I’ve met some of these filmmakers and listened to others of them speak at a recent forum hosted by Film Independent. Few of them make any money on their films and those who do make very modest profits (in the 4 figures in most cases, if that). When they get distribution deals, they are always paid far less for the movie than it cost them to make it. They work other jobs, often cannot break even for their investors, and must go to great lengths to be able to make a film and still eat. That is certainly a valid life, but it is not the only one. It is interesting to note that most indie filmmakers who are courted by Hollywood, do not pass up on the opportunity that Hollywood provides for a simple reason: working within an industry that funds and distributes movies helps people get their work out to the world and even the most renegade filmmaker generally benefits from that. Everyone is not entrepreneurial and everyone is not interested in being broke and standing on principle, though I can certainly respect it if you are.
What’s different about novelists is that there is a structure whereby novelists can get teaching jobs at Universities that enable them to pay their bills, which allows them to do work that is rarely sufficiently remunerative. Some of my novelist friends also write for television because it allows them to eat while remaining committed to the work they most want to do. Some of us want to write movies more than anything else, and so we navigate a terrain that perhaps you would choose not to navigate. More power to you.
In adulthood and in life we must work within the confines of reality. Whether we choose to work inside of a Hollywood reality or a renegade indie reality, we still must understand and navigate the rules of the world we have chosen. You seem to have no grasp on this essential truth. In other words, you’re not making sense.
That’s all I’ll say on this topic. I’ll leave you with the last word.
Paula, that was marvelous.
Or, it could be, they understand that a writing a screenplay that expresses your vision of a movie is not the same thing as making a movie that expresses your vision of a movie.
And they could also understand that assigning anyone the right to produce a movie using your screenplay — even “as is”– does not in any way guarantee that the movie will be faithful to your screenplay or your vision of the movie; nor does it preclude the movie producer from creating, buying or commissioning new material to use in the movie alongside or instead of your “as-is” screenplay or creating new story and dramatic material in the medium of film itself, as the footage is shot; nor give you any degree of influence over the actual production and assembly of the final movie.
Could be, they understand that if your goal in writing a screenplay is to have written a screenplay, then you likely can probably abandon it to whoever pays you the most for the rights, without any concern for the quality or content of the movie itself.
But if your goal in writing a screenplay is to make a movie that is faithful to the vision of the movie you wrote the screenplay to express (but you don’t have the resources to finance the movie yourself, as Paula notes) — then you must have the ability to take into account other peoples’ ideas as to what the movie should be, and reconcile them in a way that is consistent with your sensibilities, aesthetic and vision of the movie; and you must make the most of your opportunities to exercise that ability.
In short, they could understand that screenwriters are not only writers whose craft is limited to writing; they may well know that screenwriters are filmmakers, whose craft is writing movies.
-Ted
@CD
I don’t mean this as a malicious, personal attack, but you really don’t seem to understand what screenwriters do. Development and rewriting is something that goes on beyond the sale. There are a lot of posts here on artfulwriter and on johnaugust about this, you should read them. In your comments 93 & 94 you seem to be saying that if a buyer wants to change something in a script they bought, the original writer should somehow be offended by this and walk away – is that what you’re saying? Or that a writer should not be expected to revise their work per the requests of the buyer? If you have any interest in working as a screenwriter, you need to understand how the job works – when someone pays you for your work, they then control it and you are contractually bound to address their requests of revisions. Now there are different kinds of deals (also blogged about here), but the basics are this – someone buys your spec because they like, they ask you to make changes they feel are appropriate, you make these changes because that’s what you’re being paid to do.
To your comment 118 – again, you don’t seem to understand what screenwriting is. Screenplays are written with the sole and expressed intent of being made into movies. Just as every play Shakespeare wrote was meant to be performed. If you’re writing just to write, write a blog or a book or little notes that you can post all over your home; but if you’re writing a screenplay, do so with the intent to see it made, any other reason is pointless.
I just smoked a couple of bowls and I’m sure that none of this has made ANY difference.
Chris Eads is apparently alive and well.
Hey, CM, so he doesn’t stop? Then what?
I say, let’s get our torches, our pitchforks, and go after Mystery Man on Film.
mysterious name [x]
reviews leaked drafts [x]
doesn’t reveal his real name [x]
rips writers to shreds [x]
reviews material still in progress [x]
failed screenwriter [x]
Oh wait, let’s wait until John August does it first, that will be so much cooler…and safer.
Whatever we do, let’s get this guys REAL NAME published. That is the epitome of Classy!!!!
This is fun, weeeee!
At twoadverbs.com, Christopher Lockhart, the story editor from WME who contributes to the website, offered one of Scriptshadow’s big supporters the opportunity for him to review her script, put it on his blog and provide a link for all to read the draft and comment. The supporter who had a really strong opinion about how script reviews were fair didnt seem to exhibit the same kind of enthusiasm when the ball was in her court. She sort of hemmed and hawed and sidestepped the issue saying that she’d do it if that was what others wanted. When the shoe was on her foot and given the opportunity to make a choice, she seemed to have some reservations. I guess it’s easy to expect other people to have their scripts critiqued in public but gets a little more complicated when it’s your own script. And on Scriptshadow’s blog writers aren’t given the choice.
@CW Wentworth
I’m the writer you’re referring to who had the run in with Chris Lockhart over at Two Adverbs. It’s a bit more complicated than you present in your comment.
There was a miscommunication which resulted in me not understanding if the offer was for real or hypothetical. This lead to me not expressing enough “enthusiasm” for some people.
On that thread, I ultimately DID agree to have my script reviewed publically by CL– not that it has any bearing on the discussion on this site.
Let’s not bring another incident from another site on to this one– esp when you don’t have all the facts straight.
To add… I pretty much have the same views on the subject as Nick at comment #43. He summed it up much more eloquently than I could have.
~LR
Wow. Kids, I’m still pretttttty stoned here. what in the f are you talking about?
Mazin. Rock.
Laura
Great. Ask Nick (sinnycal) to send you his draft of “Public, I” that he submitted to Nicholl and then put a link here for it and your script. I’m sure some of us would love to go to give them fair reviews.
@torchboy I think Mystery Man is a pro writer, so obviously he is exempt from any attempt to unmask him. Only amateurs should have their identities revealed.
@Katie
I know this idea of posting amateur scripts of the people who defend the practice of script linking seems like you’re ‘turning the tables’ or giving us ‘some of our own medicine’ or whatever…
But we run into a problem– it’s not the same situation.
Any amateur agreeing to have his/her script reviewed publicly would be volunteering. Part of the problem some people are having with SS is that pro scripts are being made public without the writer’s/copyright holder’s permission.
And the main reason sites like SS post scripts and critique them– both scripts of produced movies and specs that have sold– is to learn from them. Amateur scripts that haven’t sold or even gotten industry attention would be of little value to the newbie audience.
IOW, the point of SS is not to post any old script so it can be ripped apart, it’s to post scripts the industry thinks have some ‘value’, and to examine why a particular script is thought to contain that value— and to maybe glean some knowledge as to how to duplicate that value.
Laura, your opinions aside, you and Nick (post #43) don’t address the valid problem writers have with SS’s site.
Basically it still boils down to, “well, despite the damage SS is doing to writers whose projects are in flux, I like what he’s doing so fuck them.”
That’s not awesome, Laura. That’s opposite of awesome. That’s petite ka-ka.
Yes. I’m asking you to volunteer, which is different.
What will be the same is the feeling you experience when a thousand people download your script and laugh along when someone else rips it apart.
Link or STFU.
A congratulations on making a BLACK LIST, articleally challenged thebattledolphinzero!
Thank you, Baby Back Bones.
Appreciate it.
Why is this even an issue? The little loser doesn’t have a site of his own. He has a Blogger account. He NEVER had ANY right to post links to scripts, period. If you’re playing with someone else’s toys, you play by their rules. He agreed to Blogger’s TOS when he signed up for an account. His entire blog is dedicated to a violation of their TOS (posting links to download copyrighted material), so the account should therefore be deleted.
It probably would have been deleted long before now, but he hid the FLAG button that would have allowed visitors to notify Blogger staff. He has no leg to stand on whatsoever.
Katie:
“Yes. I’m asking you to volunteer, which is different.
What will be the same is the feeling you experience when a thousand people download your script and laugh along when someone else rips it apart.
Link or STFU.”
Don’t worry, I’ll know what it feels like soon enough. But I hope that along with the negative reviews, I’ll get some good ones too.
Nobody likes a bad review… but no artist or work of art is entitled to be loved unconditionally. You take the bad with the good.
L-a-u-r-a R-e-y-n-a
Laura Reyna:
Can’t we agree that your choice is good for you, and my choice is good for me?
Or is your choice (online reviews of drafts is good) also necessarily good for me?
Because that’s the effect of what Eads has been doing.
I would like to point out once again that Eads’s reviews are amateur and undereducated. They may and yes, do hurt writers and their projects; that is despicable, but they are also crap – just crap. All of the questions posed here and elsewhere about the harm done to professional writers, the culture of entitlement, copyright, etc. are valid and worth considering, but please let’s acknowledge that Eads’s reviews are dopey. Yeah, I said it they are dopey. Laura, you cite the discussion and review of current selling material as the value of Christopher Eads’s blog; it seems like a valid point you make, but it’s immediately invalidated by context. Eads lacks a real understanding of the entertainment industry and screenwriting; because of that, his reviews and conclusions drawn from them are truly flawed. The sheer number of scripts reviewed by Chris Eads is in no way a validation of his authority on the matter. I took the time to look at a large sample of his reviews and I invite everyone commenting here to do so; pick a script you’ve read (or written) and tell me this guy isn’t a moron. He lists Dogs Of Babel in his “Top 25″ and Jamie Linden has defended this schmuck on other websites; having read DOB and his review, I can say with certainty, Eads didn’t get it. His review of it is flat out, stupid. I don’t have to guess at how poorly Eads must have done on reading comprehension tests in grade school.
I see this comment has out-lived the glass of scotch I was working on, so I’ll click submit, but not before I reiterate that I think stupidity like Eads’s is offensive.
Having once participated in administering a writing contest with cash prizes, and had the opportunity to read the hate mail that followed, it seems to me that the failed (or at least ‘failed so far’) writers, as a group (with many, many honorable exceptions), includes a higher percentage of miserable, schadenfruede-hugging, paranoid (evil forces are persecuting their brilliance), green-eyed flamers than any other identifiable group I can think of. No, not a majority. . . but a higher-percentage.
Isn’t that what’s really behind Eads popularity in some corners? “Serving that audience” as it were?
Nashville Screenwriting Conference is a fabulous time. I would recommend it to anyone. It’s a shame they don’t offer the screenwriting competition anymore. Ahem, if you know anyone, it would be great to see it back!!!
Mr Belvedere:
I guess I’m late to the party, but just to be clear, I really wasn’t defending this particular “schmuck” — I was just pointing out that the schmucks are a reality of the current state of the business, and that we need to adapt to the schmucks because the schmucks, by nature of being schmucks, won’t adapt to us.
And since you’ve read Dogs Of Babel (did you download it illegally or get it sent to you BTW?) and since you can now speak with certainty on it… I’d kinda love to know how exactly that schmuck didn’t “get it”… but I won’t ask. I want to but I won’t. Instead I’ll just thank you for the read and ask you what kind of scotch you’re drinking…
Hi Jamie,
It occurs to me that this thread has gotten kind of ridiculous, so I’ll say I’m sorry if I misunderstood or misrepresented anything you said here or elsewhere.
Dogs Of Babel was sent to me as a sample for an open assignment and I liked it very much.
I was drinking Caol Ila, it’s a favorite of mine.
Cheers
Mr. Belvedere,
So your a producer or exec. Curious to know (and forgive me if you’ve already said — this thread IS getting out of hand), how much impact are Eads reviews having on opinions around town?
The conversations I’ve had about this start with dismissing the blog as cheesy, but then acknowledging the damage reviews of leaked scripts can do. The harm to writers is obvious (for the many reasons above), but it doesn’t end there, reviews of leaked scripts can cost directors and actors jobs and put projects into turnaround.
Mr. Belvedere, thanks for that answer that no one will listen to.
Mr. Belvedere, thanks.
thebattledolphinzero, yup. What’s your Black List script if you don’t mind my asking? I just read one Black List script this week (a friend’s) and plan to read a few more. Of course, if you prefer not to name yourself here, I can dig it.
Paula,
His script is called Balls Out.
Paula, you can download the script on http://www.therobotard8000.com
Mr. Belvedere, you make an interesting observation that frequently SS’s reviews are just plain terrible. I think I stopped reading when he described UP IN THE AIR as just okay, not great, rambling. And then his little fans implied that the script only got bought because it was Reitman’s daddy’s company. I’m sorry, but that’s one of the most pitch perfect, well-crafted, nearly-flawless scripts I’ve ever read.
But I think Geo really sums it up best of all with his (her?) post:
“….the failed (or at least ‘failed so far’) writers, as a group (with many, many honorable exceptions), includes a higher percentage of miserable, schadenfrauede-hugging, paranoid (evil forces are persecuting their brilliance), green-eyed flamers than any other identifiable group I can think of. No, not a majority. . . but a higher-percentage.
Isn’t that what’s really behind Eads popularity in some corners? “Serving that audience” as it were?”
I’m just your average barely-squeaking-by pro writer, and I’ve always gone out of my way to help aspiring writers as much as I can. But seeing the nasty attitude so many of SS’s “fans” have shown towards pros (coupled with a complete unwillingness to even consider that WE DO KNOW WHAT WE’RE TALKING ABOUT, FROM PERSONAL EXPERIENCE when we say that this truly is making it harder for us to make a living)….I’m seriously going to think twice about helping any aspiring writers from now on. I know they don’t all resent pros, but it sure leaves a bad taste in your mouth.
thebattledolphinzero, laughing because I read it already. In fact, I know one of you (in fact, I just got a holiday card from one of you today). Hilarious! Laughed my arse off.
Craig –
I’m with you.
Here are the facts:
FACT: ScriptShadow posts and reviews scripts that aren’t done.
FACT: A “draft” is not a script that’s done.
FACT: Christopher Eads asked John August to remove his name from the comments of his site, after posting with his real name.
FACT: Despite people harping about his privacy, he’s going to be on a WB reality show, which is the very definition of non-privacy. And he wants to do this.
So don’t fucking tell me posting his name is somehow a “violation.” It’s his fucking name. If he’s worried about his privacy, maybe he shouldn’t, y’know, dig up scripts that haven’t been finished, and review them in front of the world? And then no one would give a shit about whether or not his name should be posted.
Paula, I suspected you were Paula P (or formerly “P”, congrats).
But when I see an opening to post http://www.therobotard8000.com , I post http://www.therobotard8000.com
excellent, excellent points, Craig. Exactly! It reminds me of scavengers who want things until they have something and then realize, oh yeah, I kinda don’t want to fight for things anymore, because I need to protect what I have.
It realllllly sucks as a writer for people on the outside to not get the development process. It is NOT DONE.
Scriptshadow would be much better off it had more of an educational feel and approach instead of pushing their own agenda, I think.
Thanks for your clarity on this because I think there has got to be a way, a happy medium, for new writers to read scripts going around (a good thing) and screenwriters protecting drafts in development.
As writers, we control our work… as screenwriters in Hollywood, there is very little we have and can control and it fries one to think of someone deliberately effing with that! I believe that sharing of scripts, from a learning pov is very impo., but that isn’t what’s going on here. It’s someone promoting their own agenda (power and self-promotion). How would these writers feel if their latest spec was trashed? all I can say is WGACA — karma.
thebattledolphinzero,
I can dig it. Love the site, by the way. Proves yet again that you’re a genius.
Hi Craig,
A journalist once managed to get into one of Peter Greenaway’s art exhibitions (Icaros) before it was ready to be shown to critics and the public. Peter Greenaway caught the journalist sneaking around the exhibition, gave him a backhand slap, and kicked him out. A bit harsh perhaps, and I feel sorry for the journalist, but I admire Greenaway’s hot-headed insistence that his vision be complete before anybody can judge it.
WORD
Totally agree all the way! The author should decide when a work is done, and drafts are for your writing group to critique!
I din’t send no holiday card to this Paula chick.
Did you, BDZ?
Yes, Mongo. I did. And I went to her wedding a few weeks ago.
Well, I didn’t get a Christmas card from you guys. I’m a little hurt.
I’ll send you a pair of my panties, Belve.
I’ll send you a pair of my panties, Belve.
I think Mr. Belvedere has suffered enough.
LMAO Mongo, BDZ, etc., and glad I’m not the only one who’s still reading this old ass post.
Well said, as usual.
Is Craig still on blog sabbatical to earn a living rather than giving his genius away for free here? What’s up with that? I need my WGAw politics fix here. . .
Craig…
Pretty much love everything you do and say. Agree with most here except, “If you write a great script and I write a great script, they’re both going to get attention…”
Totally dig that you divulged the name “Christopher Eads.” No qualms there. Feel if you’re on the internet-nothing is private, and if you’re trying to hide while exposing other peoples work that you somehow lifted than you too should be revealed. Howdy-ever… Correct me if I’m wrong. Or don’t. But I don’t find your reasoning validating… Once a script is sent out to industry, to an actor etc etc etc, as you indicate, shouldn’t the script be pretty darn close to complete – shy of tweeks, rewrites (hell yes-all can go on through shooting if you or a director want depending on lots of things starting with how you contracted)… But when you put a script out, if you are putting out crap – that is your problem as a writer. Take responsibility for your actions. If you think you are too cool because you can now apply the word “pro” to your resume, to not follow the same rules you would tell anyone else to (or those of us who may not be recognized as a “pro” because we don’t know someone to get us in a “Hollywood” door yet, or just aren’t a good writer), then cry “it ain’t finished” all you want, but you have no one to blame but yourself. And at the end of the day it’s a business and has always been a business (pre-internet) where one person might love something, and another might hate-that’s just the way it goes across the board whether it be coming from a critic or a fan. A writer must accept that-period. That to me is where the art is always at play regardless of style, genre etc…
Not for nothing, but more so than not, an actor is always blamed for film failure. To the viewing public, rarely the director, writer or editor, etc… With the advent of the internet, I think you writers are getting to see what that feels like a little more. Nine times out of ten the reviewer may be way off, and definitely clueless. But at the end of the day, it’s just the way it goes…
If anything, as a writer, I’d be looking at these reviews as a way to help, not hinder me – even if nine times out of ten this dude is just clueless.
Derek Haas – your comment as usual lacks the 360 view and you try to pass off your outspoken cynical nature as intelligence on the matter. I’m onto you. It’s old.
Umm, your scripts have coverage done by interns in high school before anyone important ever touches it. Isn’t this a better option?
Boozer,
I think you’re joking but just in case you’re not:
once you “put a script out” / set it up at a studio, the development process has just begun. The studio will almost always seek to make many major changes to your script, if not take in several completely different directions. This usually has nothing to do with “quality” or a “good script.” It has to do with marketplace trends, mandates for the individual studio, etc. Meaning, 9 out of 10 times, a script that sells will be changed regardless of how “good” it is.
Let’s say Warner Brothers, Dreamworks, and Fox all bid on the same script. All three studios will have different needs for what “types” of movies they need. All three will almost certainly have different sensibilities as far as what they think the movie is.
So, Boozer, if you sell a script… and the fickle studio execs are excited… and while they’re paying you to change it they read an article by Script Shadow slamming your script… can you see how damaging that might be? All of a sudden, your script goes from being hot on the development track to being ice cold because your exec read Script Shadow and freaked out. And remember, execs are VERY easily scared.
Anonymous,
Development execs aren’t reading random coverage, nor are they reading random sites. They’re reading their own in-house coverage and Script Shadow’s site.
So…if your script got set up, the coverage at that studio was probably good. And now you’re in that bubble, working away with your development exec until they read Script Shadow’s review on a draft that’s a year old and your project dies.
Uh Malcom….
I’m very aware of the development process, though thank you for thinking I was joking simply because I didn’t spell everything out in more detail. It wasn’t really the point that obviously you missed. And we aren’t talking about scripts that have already gone through that process being covered by Script Shadow or anyone else for that matter.
But my point, again, speaking about the writer… I could care less about the market place at this point. Whether you know or not what direction some studio will want you to change your story to, in order to fit their ever changing mold at that moment – you still arrive prior with a script in hand that you the writer wrote (which Craig is talking about). Why are you going to start with crap one way or the other. If you do, again you’ve no one to blame but yourself. And I know very few writers that want to show up at a studio with a draft going “direct me, please, what to write now…” AGAIN I repeat myself, it is a business that allows people to have varying degrees of opinion often coming from people who are technically clueless. That’s the way it goes-period. It starts with the intern.
I could actually understand better, if Craig or any writer was angry for being critiqued after being forced by his paycheck to change his story to suit the studio… A treatment – I could understand your point. But your not even making sense – and your entire post is a paradox between ur response to me and anonymous.
And you are seriously going to try and arbitrate this mainly stating we must remember that “execs are all scared.” Are you friggen for real. And now this one guy “Script Shadow” is the be all end all that could change the light from green to red.
Hey “fickle studio execs”… BOO! Jesus christ – the ignorance starts here.
You’re just wrong.
Aw Malcolm,
What’s the matter – you didn’t get over on trying to have a “listen I’m smart and I got this stuff down” moment, so your audience here might take you seriously…
You are exactly the biggest problem circulating in the industry today- ever revolving ignorance. People running the show who have no business being there. So you keep hanging here and kissing ass-someone might throw you a bone-you’ll fit right in, and then we’ll continue to see these great written masterpieces coming from the Hollywood regime brought to fruition on the screen. You’re in good position-really!
Nice reply-what are you like ten years old?
Booz, I spoke a fact. You are wrong. I didn’t really understand your post 172 but I bet it’s wrong simply because I have proven so previously. Still, just because you got destroyed in our debate doesn’t mean there needs to be hard feelings. I’m kinda known for being clever, which I’m sure you’ll agree on.
Better luck on the next topic!
BLOOD!
THERE’S BLOOD IN THE WATER!
ATTACK!
A T T A C K ! ! ! !
Actually, I found Scriptshadow’s negative review of my script “O’Gunn” to be great free publicity.
That said, the final script will vary differently as it is a draft and a work-in-progress, and the woods are lovely, dark, and deep, and I have producer notes to obey, and miles to go before I creep (cue T.L.C.)