Interview (Part 4): Elad Ziv

My interview with 2022 Black List writer for his script Court 17.

Elad Ziv wrote the screenplay Court 17 which landed on the 2022 Black List. I had the opportunity to chat with Elad about his creative background, writing a Black List script, and the craft of screenwriting.

Today in Part 4 of a 6-part series to run each day through Sunday, Elad and I discuss how the Protagonist’s experience stuck in a loop, playing the same tennis match over and over, is at its core a journey into her inner being … and a journey she needs to take.

Scott: By the end of Act One, Noa discovers she’s trapped in a loop. She even says, “I’m stuck in this thing, and I can’t get out.” It’s like the loop is not just conceit. She’s stuck at life, it’s a metaphor for she’s living a loop.

So, there’s three storylines. There’s the recurring tennis match with Anya. There’s the relationship and strategy sessions with Eric. Then there’s this third one with this character, Roxanna. Could you talk a bit about her character?

Elad: Roxanna’s like a weird melding of my actual therapist in real life and my fiancée whose name is Roxanna. Again, after the Naomi Osaka thing, I started researching and then I started following…There’s a player called Iga Swiatek. She’s from Poland. I think she’s the number one player in the world.

If not, she’s been number one player in the world for a bunch of time during the past five years. Her coach, I’m going to butcher the name. It’s like Daria Abramovich or something like that. She’s very, very into the whole mental health of athletes thing. I started following her on Twitter. I started doing so much research on it.

I came upon this idea of these onsite clinicians at these Grand Slam tournaments, and I thought, what a fascinating job to be the therapist for these players as they’re winning and losing matches.

Roxanna was an amazing opportunity to shine the light on the mental health of athletes, but then most importantly, because this movie is not only for athletes. It’s so analogous to everyone’s mental health. There’s so many issues that Noa encounters in this very unique setting that I could definitely relate to on a day‑to‑day basis. You know what I mean?

The things that they talk about, the notions that they discuss, those are universal things that are human problems more than there are tennis players’ problems. They’re more than loop movie problems.

Scott: Joseph Campbell talks about how the whole point of the Hero’s Journey is transformation and that the outer journey is important, but what’s really important is the inner journey. In your script, much of that gets played out through the relationship Noa develops with Roxanna.

At one point Roxanna says, “I think it’s purposeful that you’re playing Anya.” Noa laughs, and Roxanna says, “That you two were brought together for a reason.”

Here’s what I thought was pretty interesting. There’s the five stages of grief: denial, anger, bargaining, depression, and then acceptance. That’s Noa’s journey.

First, she’s in denial that the pattern is happening, the loop is happening. Then you mentioned anger, anger, anger, oh, boy, does she really gets into that mode big time. Could you maybe talk, was that all conscious kind of a thing, or is that it subconsciously flowed that way?

Elad: It’s solely subconsciously flowed that way, which makes me as you’re talking, it makes me think of, these unbelievable notions that these brilliant psychologists came up with, I wonder if they’re inherently in our psyche that we don’t even have to think about them because I thought about this movie in totally a different context.

The way that I wanted Noa to deal with this scenario like you said, it lines up perfectly with those points, but it’s completely…It’s not coincidental, that’s the wrong word, but it lines up without me even having to think about it lining up. You know what I mean? That’s a beautiful thing that it works out that way.

What I was trying to do was take it from scene to scene and think, how would a human or how would this human specifically excuse me, “How would Noa deal with this on a day‑to‑day basis?” and make that as real as possible?

For instance, when Roxanna tells her maybe it’s on purpose, no one’s initial reaction is, “Fuck you, how dare you say this is on purpose. Do you know the shit that I’m dealing with?”

That is interesting because it’s not a movie, it’s like real life. It’s like, if you’re dealing with something and someone is “gaslighting you” and telling you, “Oh, be OK, everything’s fine, you’re fine.” It’s like, “How dare you tell me that?”

If you sit down and think about it, and you’re being honest with yourself it’s actually, you’re helping yourself by thinking that way. By being angry at the situation, Noa’s not helping herself. She’s not going to solve anything.

Those five stages of grief and everything, they’re so intrinsically true to us as a human race that it lends itself that if you’re being honest with your characters on stuff, it organically lends itself into that story.

Scott: The anger is a pretty extensive part of her experience after she accepts the fact that she’s stuck in a repetitive time loop.

Part of that control thing that you were talking about earlier, she’s not allowed herself, though she is pretty snarky with Eric, and she has moments with Anya early on, but she’s never allowed herself to go full volcano. When she does, she unleashes a torrent of anger.

That actually helps her a little bit on the court because with each rematch, she starts to get a little closer, it’s now 6‑2, 6‑2 and so on. The anger is not the solution. Roxanna keeps driving her down to the point where there’s a touching moment. It’s a breakthrough. She’s with Roxanna. She says, “No, I’m a fucking dinosaur. I don’t know which tournament will be my…” clears her throat, “Will be my last.”

“She gets emotional, tears in her eyes, some even sprint down her cheeks. Noa relaxes her fists and falls into Roxanna like a giant, hurt child. She bawls her eyes out. Roxanna holds her.”

That’s a breakthrough because underneath the anger is the sadness.

Elad: Well, it’s fear turned inwards, anger. It’s all these wounds we have as children that we’re afraid of and stuff. Instead of being vulnerable and brave enough to show them, and I don’t even want to say brave because that’s judging people as if they’re not capable of doing it.

We’ve set up society as a difficult place to be vulnerable. That was a beautiful…Roxanna has created through these…Every day she’s created that safe space for Noa that she never had before.

Scott: That leads to that next stage of bargaining, because once Noa realizes she can survive that vulnerability, and that there is a deeper emotional thing going on there, she’s willing to explore that now. She starts to become more open to that, even to listening to Eric and the strategy.

Now, all of a sudden it’s 6‑4, 6‑3, going to tie breakers. She actually wins. She breaks service at one point. You can see this progress going on. There’s the progress in the court, but it’s mirroring or incentivized or created by the thing that she’s going through psychologically.

Elad: That’s absolutely accurate. Yeah.

Scott: Now, you did something really interesting. I would think like a typical development exec would say, “OK, I see where this is going. She’s going to finally win the big match in Act Three, and everybody’s going to cheer, big finish,” and all that sort of thing. She actually wins the match in the latter half of Act Two.

That leads us into the depression part because she wakes up the next day thinking, “OK, great.” It’s like Bill Murray in Groundhog Day. But no. Same thing again. Then she starts losing in the rematches even worse, because she can’t escape. She says, “Why am I still fucking here?”

Then Roxanna says, “Letting go means being at peace with everything,” which is a huge message. She does have that depression mode where things are not going well, and she’s got to bottom out.

Elad: Absolutely. She’s got to bottom out, but she hasn’t learned her lesson. She thought it was all about winning, and it’s not about winning. If it was about winning, and she went and broke out of it, then she would go back to being the same person she was at the beginning. She just would have had a first round win in the US Open under her belt.

That doesn’t change who she is as a person. That’s why, obviously, in the first few drafts, that was the ending, but then I started thinking about more and more. I’m like, “That’s cheap.” You know what I mean? Winning is cheap.

If anything, I want to talk about this obsession we have in this culture of winning versus losing that I grew up in where I felt great when I won, and I felt terrible when I lost. That’s not healthy for the mental health of anyone.

Scott: I don’t want to give away the ending, but I do want to make one point here. She sees Anya’s father ripping Anya. Noa comes back to Roxanna and says, “I felt protective over her, like I wanted to throw him off her and save her.” “Why do you think that is?” “I saw myself in her.” That empathy.

That’s really the pivot point for her in terms of her psychological journey where she starts to see this person, this rival in a different light, not the enemy, but someone that’s close to me. It leads beautifully to the ending. I don’t want to give that away, but it involves acceptance.

Elad: It proves Roxanna’s point that there was a reason why Anya was stuck with Roxanna in the loop, not a different player, because it was…She needed to see it in herself personified externally so that she can empathize and then internalize it, and see that was what she was going through.

Scott: It’s an interesting point you make because you could switch protagonists and look at it from Anya’s perspective. She had a realization there at the very end as well for herself going forward.

Elad: Sequel maybe.

[laughter]

Scott: Hollywood producer talk.

Elad: There you go.

Scott: I want to mention one last thing. The relationship between Noa and Roxanna is intriguing, and there does feel to be like a romance, even a kind of a sexual subtext going on. Could you unpack that a little bit what’s going on because it feels pretty nuanced.

Elad: You said it beautifully. It’s exactly what it is, and it’s nuanced. It’s not black and white. It’s not they’re either together or they’re not together, there’s nuance, and it’s complicated. Roxanna has her own complicated past that she comes from as well, but it’s absolutely…Listen, they’re obviously physically attracted to each other.

I wanted to set that up, that they’re physically attracted to each other. Then when someone makes you feel that safe and that at home, and you get along on a personal level, and they’re your friend, and then on top of that you’re physically attracted to them, it’s an organic thing to feel that for one another.

I also wanted to leave it a little ambiguous at the end. I didn’t want it to be like, them holding hands walking off into the sunset together kind of thing, because that’s not how it is in this story. It’s more complex. Now, Noa kind of wants to continue onto this journey and Roxanna has her own life, but that doesn’t mean that they’re also not ending up together.

You touched upon it beautifully, and it’s ambiguous, and absolutely it’s more than a friendship type of attraction that they have for each other. Is that to say they end up with each…Who knows?

Tomorrow in Part 5, Elad shares what making the annual Black List in 2022 has meant to him professionally as a screenwriter and Court 17 as a movie project.

For Part 1 of the interview, go here.

For Part 2, here.

For Part 3, here.

Elad is repped by Bellevue Productions.

Twitter and Instagram: @eladziv

For my interviews with dozens of other Black List writers, go here.