Behind the Curtain
My Q&A with the founder of a valuable educational resource for the online screenwriting community.
My Q&A with the founder of a valuable educational resource for the online screenwriting community.
Go Into The Story followers will know how much importance I put on dealing with what I will call primary source material. Read scripts. Watch movies and TV. Engage stories directly and analyze them in terms of characters, plot, themes, and so forth.
Almost every weekend since I launched this blog in 2008, I have featured another type of primary source material: interviews with screenwriters, filmmakers, and industry insiders. Over the years, I have aggregated approaching 1,000 such interviews pulled from a wide variety of sources including conversations I have conducted on my blog:
Also hundreds of quotes on writing:
Recently, I discovered a terrific online video resource called Behind The Curtain. Launched in April 2019, the YouTube site releases a video each week featuring audio clips from professional screenwriters, TV writers, and filmmakers. Here is an example: How I Wrote The Dark Knight — The Writing Process of Christopher Nolan:
I’ve been so impressed with the quality of these videos, I reached out to the host of the site: Nehemiah T. Jordan. Here is a Q&A I recently did with him:
Scott: What is your background as a screenwriter?
Nehemiah: I’m an aspiring screenwriter in LA. I moved out here after I graduated from college and have been working on Behind the Curtain and writing since then.
Scott: What was the inspiration for the Behind The Curtain video series?
Nehemiah: Behind the Curtain started as an excuse for me to listen to more interviews and really study the craft. My writing has benefited greatly from the online screenwriting community. From listening to interviews of professional screenwriters to watching video essays on YouTube, I’ve learned more on the internet than any textbook I was assigned in school. On YouTube, the most popular videos in the filmmaking community are video essays: aspiring filmmakers / film lovers analyze films in the video format. I’ve learned a lot from video essay channels like Lessons from the Screenplay.
However, what was missing was a source on YouTube that focused on the people who actually wrote these films. The problem with some interviews is that there will be 3 minutes of valuable insight in a full hour interview. There are many reasons for this. One, is that it’s difficult for non-writers to know what questions to ask screenwriters. So usually the same generic questions are asked (e.g. “How do you get your ideas?”) Another reason is that some interviewers end up talking more about themselves than let the writer answer their questions.
Behind the Curtain was an attempt to take the easily digestible format of the video essay and focus in on the most valuable insights from the interviews I find. Cut the fat, keep the meat.
Scott: Why do you think listening to the observations of professional screenwriters is important for aspiring screenwriters?
Nehemiah: Simple. These are the people that are doing what you dream to do. They’ve been where you are currently and figured out how to make it work. Sometimes it’s difficult for people to actually explain their “process”, but I find even listening to someone explain how they write a specific film is insanely insightful. You don’t have to adopt the writing process of whoever won Best Screenplay this year, but maybe there’s a nugget of information that will get you unstuck in your screenplay.
Scott: Zeroing in on key quotes from pro screenwriters must take a lot of time on your part. What is your process like in creating the Behind The Curtain videos? How much time does each video take?
Nehemiah: The first thing I do is scour the internet and find as many interviews as I can on a specific film or TV show. More recently I’ve also been doing “topical” videos, compiling together advice from professional screenwriters on topics like writer’s block and outlining. Then I listen through the interviews and create an assembly cut of all of the clips I find. Then, I begin cutting that down further to the most essential parts until I get to about 10–15 minutes of insight. I arrange it to create a more structured narrative for the video. Finally, I add the music, visuals, and further editing. It really varies from video to video how much time it takes, but it is a lot of work either way. Sometimes I have to really search to find enough sources to create a full video. Other times I spend more time creating visuals that reinforce what’s being talked about.
Scott: What sources do you use to aggregate the audio clips for your videos?
Nehemiah: I search everywhere I can. I have a list of the resources used in the description of every video, so that you can hear the full interviews if you want to dig deeper.
Scott: What are your aspirations for the Behind The Curtain series?
Nehemiah: I’ve begun interviewing more screenwriters myself, which has been good. I’m taking what I’ve learned from listening to so many interviews for Behind the Curtain and asking myself “what would be the perfect interview for a Behind the Curtain video?” What I’m trying to do is allow screenwriters to fully talk about their experience writing a film from idea to final draft. I only interject to encourage them to go further in detail. It’s been really good so far. I’ve interviewed screenwriters from all levels of the industry, from Jim Uhls, writer of Fight Club, to people who were featured on the The Black List in 2019, and I’m looking forward to speaking with more people.
And the other thing is, I want to create a stronger community around Behind the Curtain. I believe that having a community of writers to learn with is essential and a lot of people don’t have that.
Scott: Finally, what are some keys to screenwriting you have learned from editing all of the videos for the Behind The Curtain series?
Nehemiah: There have been a lot of things I’ve learned. Like I said earlier, creating Behind the Curtain has been a good excuse for me to listen to more interviews and really study the craft.
I’d say something I’ve been really focused on recently is the idea of the conscious and unconscious mind with writing. I’m someone who loves outlining and planning. I obsess over knowing everything before I jump in — even in life outside of writing. While this is helpful while doing the more left-brain parts of writing, like outlining, I’ve found it’s harmful to do while actually writing. When you are putting words on the page, it’s helpful to loosen your grip on the outline and just write your story. If the story goes somewhere else, let it. Don’t pressure yourself to stick to the outline at all times. Doing that has usually led to writer’s block for me. And don’t worry, you’ll be able to return to the outline after you’re done writing. But for that period in between, let your unconscious mind take control. Don’t force anything. Don’t rely on willpower. Just put words on the page. You can fix it later.
Here is another video: How Professional Screenwriters Outline:
When I broke into the business in 1987, I was not a film school graduate, quite the opposite. My knowledge base was simply a lifelong affection for movies having seen thousands of them. I had read one book on screenwriting, Screenplay: The Foundation of Screenwriting by Syd Field, and three actual screenplays. That was it. The third script I wrote was K-9 which sold as a spec to Universal. Thus, I found myself a working screenwriter and member of the Writers’ Guild of America, but did not have the depth of understanding about the craft I knew I needed to survive, let alone thrive in the business.
Therefore, I put myself through a boot camp version of film school. I watched every movie. I analyzed every script. And I read, watch, or listened to every single interview I could with professional screenwriters. My logic: Why not listen to the pros, glean what I can about their creative process, and bring what I can to bear on my own writing.
I damn well wish Behind The Curtain had been around back in the day! I think what Nehemiah is doing is awesome, culling through interviews and zeroing on specific subject areas, essentially distilling wisdom from pro screenwriters and filmmakers.
I encourage you to follow Behind The Curtain. There’s already a lot of great content there.
Medium: Nehemiah Jordan.
Twitter: @ntjrdn