Peter Templeman: Working in L.A.

19 May 2007

Organisation

FTI member Peter Templeman continues his reports from L.A. where he attended the 2007 Academy Awards.

Well, I feel strange even apologising for the belatedness of this final report. This is so beyond being late it’s very difficult to say sorry with any kind of sincerity. Suffice to say it’s now no longer a report on the LA trip, more a wander down memory lane. I’ll try and give an overview of the experience in the hope that it might be helpful for other filmmakers who find themselves in a similar position.

Doing meetings with the studios was daunting at first. I felt like a fraud walking into Columbia Tristar with a statue of Spiderman looming over me. I don’t know if I’ve ever met so many different people over a four-week period. But everyone was easy going and genuine, so it was hard not to enjoy myself after the first couple. I certainly can’t compare the experience to what it must be like to live and work in LA fulltime, but I was offered a pretty good introduction to the people and to what is involved working in the studio system.

There is no way I would have been kept so busy without the backing of the Agency that represents me in L.A. I’ve been extremely lucky in this regard. It’s worth mentioning how I came to be affiliated with them in the first place because it reveals the last two years as a series of very fortunate circumstances, just as dependent on other people’s hard work and generosity, as anything else.

Firstly, the producer of my last two films was Stuart Parkyn and he believed in the films. After Splintered was finished Stu took responsibility for sending it out to film festivals to be seen. The success of that film resulted in me signing with Robyn Gardner Management in Sydney. When the Saviour was made Stu was similarly motivated in getting it out to festivals to see how it fared.

Annabelle Sheehan has been my principle agent at RGM. She visits the US regularly to attend the major festivals and in 2005 she showed some LA agents my reel. Some of those agents were keen so I met them while I was over there attending an enormously generous film festival called Hatchfest. I didn’t sign with anyone but over the following few months I received a bunch of scripts from some of those agencies. It was good seeing the types of feature scripts that were out there for emerging filmmakers in the U.S. but I didn’t pursue any.

Around the same time, Baz Luhrmann saw a copy of Splintered and sent it to his Agent, Robert Newman. Robert then contacted RGM and asked for the rest of the reel. He watched it, emailed me and said he wanted to meet. Next time I was over there we met and Robert offered to sign me.

When I came back to Oz I sat down with RGM. We discussed all the agents, and I learned that Newman was renowned for signing Danny Boyle, Guillermo Del Toro, Mike Figgis, Baz Luhrmann and Robert Rodriguez, all early in their careers and he still represents them now. So on RGM’s advice and thanks to Baz’s generosity I joined Newman. I have still never met Baz Luhrman but when I do I owe him some thanks.

Over the next year I worked in TV here, read scripts from the US and worked on a feature I was writing with Michael Lucas. Stu sent the Saviour out to festivals and it did well in the US and Europe, culminating in the Oscar nom. That’s when I really benefited from my Agent’s reputation. Robert knew I was coming over for a month so he and his colleague Elia Infrascelli sent my reel out to the studios and production companies, and the meetings followed.

Generally the meetings began with a discussion on The Saviour. I hated this part cos I usually had nothing very insightful to say about religion, unrequited love or much to do with anything in the film. In some of the meetings we would discuss my other films, which are all even further from my memory. Then we’d generally talk about what I wanted to do next and I’d tell them about K.A.R.M.A, the script Mike and I are writing.

I’ve been tinkering with several feature scripts over the last couple of years but KARMA is in the most advanced stages. This is mainly because I’m co-writing it with Mike. If I were co-writing this blog with Mike, you would have received it months ago. I’m definitely a convert when it comes to writing with someone, not just because jamming on stuff together is more fun than sitting alone at a keyboard. Anyway, our script KARMA always pitches well, so in most of these meetings we talked at length about that project.

After this, I would listen as they usually told me about their current slate of films in production or development. I always loved this bit cos it’s a privilege to hear so many great pitches. Makes you realise how helpful it is to have a nice tight one-line synopsis as a starting point.

Of course it’s the writing of these ideas into great scripts that is the hard part. And the making of these scripts into unique and inspiring films that is equally elusive. After the amount of scripts I’ve read over the last two years, all by people who can clearly write well, I firmly believe that if you pen something unique, imaginative and with soul it will get noticed. Because it just doesn’t happen that often, even when it’s the best in the world trying to do it.

In LA they spend hundreds of millions of dollars every year attempting to uncover and nurture quality stories and storytellers. As much as we love to bag the commercialism of the industry over there, they are actually in the business of innovation. While blockbusters are in some ways their bread and butter, almost everyone I spoke to is searching for those elusive smaller films that cut through on the strength of a unique story and vision. This is partly because many are in it for the same reason we all are – to do good work. Sure the trade-papers flaunt weekly box-office earnings like the premiership ladder, but it is clear from the last ten years that it’s the smaller films receiving the critical acclaim, and most of the Oscars.

For any Screenwriters trying to crack the Hollywood market, the system often works like this (from what I can gather): The studio will buy the script off the original writer. This guy’s contract will usually give them another crack at developing it further to get it closer to the perceived potential of the story. They may do up to three more drafts (well-paid ones) before the studio decide to bring in someone fresh. This is either the Director – who works closely with the writer – or a proven scriptwriter, who does another draft or two alone, or with the director if one is already attached.

Director usually comes on board once the producers feel the script is developed enough to attract the guy they want to make it. Or they put the script out earlier, a little underdone, to encourage directors to pitch for it to show how they would develop the story to its potential. Seems there is often a close collaboration between writer and director before the script is finalised, and in some cases the director may do their own pass of the script for shooting.

For a Director, if it isn’t your own script, then you really need to be living there, putting together strong pitches with script notes, visuals and music to be in the game. That’s not a rule, but for someone like me, who hasn’t made a feature, it’s probably essential to be in the room pitching if you want to try and land a project that’s financed.

Most of the people pitching for the scripts that I get sent have already made one or two features, so although short-film success may get you in the room, you’d have to do a lot to sell your interpretation over someone with runs on the board. Which is not to say you couldn’t do it if you loved the story enough, and created a blinding pitch. But for myself, I’m sticking with the independent model for now. That is, write the script in your own time then don’t sell it to anyone unless they let you (or your mate) direct.

So I’m back home pottering away trying to finish what I’ve started. Mike and I have received AFC development funding for K.A.R.M.A so that will keep us writing for a few months more. Life isn’t that different from before I left for the Oscars. I guess the main advantage I have now is that once our script is finished, it will get read by a lot of people. So if it’s good, there’s a strong chance it will get made. If it’s no good, lots of people are going to know about it.

I have one story worth sharing. This was my second meeting with a Major (that’s Hollywood-speak for one of the big studios we all know well). I chatted for about an hour with the V.P of the company – a Big dude in all respects. Loud, passionate. He reminded me of the Chief of the Daily Bugle in Spiderman – J. Jonah. Jameson.

As he was seeing me out, Jonah bypassed his office to get me his business card. “That’s the Captain” he said as he rummaged in a drawer behind his desk. He was referring to a dog sitting on his leather couch – mangy Pomeranian thing in a vest. I extended a hand for the dog to sniff. He didn’t move. Just sat there staring at me coldly, like I was some phony who’s just made a few shorts. I asked Jonah if the dog bites.

Jonah mumbled something that I didn’t quite catch, cos of the cigar in his mouth. Then he pulled out a brown paper bag and thrust it at me. I thought he was offering me jelly babies or dried fruit or something and I was going to say Nah I’m fine. Until I looked in the bag and saw it contained pieces of meat. Like jerky or something.

I swear, in that moment, the thought of J. Jonah Jameson grazing on pieces of meat during the day seemed perfectly logical. Sitting behind that desk, puffing his cigar, shouting simultaneously at two telephones and tossing bits of jerky into his mouth. Definitely seemed American. Seemed blokey. And eccentric. So naturally, I wanted to be part of it. I shoved my hand in the bag, pulled out a piece and gobbed it.

Took me a couple of seconds before I noticed Jonah, frozen, staring into my mouth as I’m going to work on this piece of dogfood. I stopped as soon as I saw his face. Stood there very still with my mouth hanging half-open. For the first time since I met him, Jonah was lost for words.

It was a bizarre stand-off. Both of us just staring at each other. My mind was racing, wondering if I could still cover by suggesting we always share the dog’s food in Australia. Then I realised Jonah was just as uncomfortable as I was, only he did something about it.

Suddenly, without a drum-roll or anything, Jonah shoved his hand into the bag, pulled out another bit of jerky and threw it into his own mouth. He said “It’s fine, it’s good meat!” And we both stood there together, chewing in silence.

It was weird. Just standing there kind of stranded in this plush office with Jonah and his dog, listening to the sound of our jaws working out on jerky. Jonah played it cool but as he swallowed I could see from the stiff smile – This was definitely this Hollywood Exec’s first time eating dog-food.