Screenwriter Roundtable: Bo Burnham, Peter Farrelly, Tamara Jenkins, John Krasinski, Eric Roth…

Screenwriter Roundtable: Bo Burnham, Peter Farrelly, Tamara Jenkins, John Krasinski, Eric Roth, and Paul Schrader

Part of The Hollywood Reporter’s annual sit-downs with Hollywood players.

An excerpt from a THR roundtable with screenwriters Bo Burnham (Eighth Grade), Peter Farrelly (Green Book), Tamara Jenkins (Private Life), John Krasinski (A Quiet Place), Eric Roth (A Star Is Born), and Paul Schrader (First Reformed).

Is there one film that strongly influenced you?

BURNHAM A Woman Under the Influence [1974] and John Cassavetes. The way that people speak to each other feels like they are not only surprising the viewer, they are surprising themselves.

ROTH For years it was Giant [1956]. I believed I was doing Giant with every single movie — till I saw Giant again.

KRASINSKI The Verdict [1982] for me is the seminal movie. I grew up very Catholic, and there was this idea of redemption that felt more spiritual than actual religious teaching.

FARRELLY Something Wild [1986] inspired me in a huge way. It felt like rock ’n’ roll, it felt great. That’s why I fell in love with Jeff Daniels. After that, I was begging [the studio] to use him. It just had such a fun, happy, cool feeling to it. And for years, every time I was going to do another movie, I’d watch it again. Someone recently said we have a lot of road trips in our movie, and I don’t consciously do that. And then I thought, Something Wild. There is something about being on the road in America that feels a little Kerouac-y. You feel like you’re alive.

JENKINS Dog Day Afternoon [1975] is brilliant. And it’s about dropping characters into action without any backstory and then figuring out why they’re there when you find out they’re robbing the bank.

What advice would you give a starting writer?

BURNHAM I feel there is a specific struggle of being young and creative now — because of social media, because the internet’s creative process has collapsed in on itself. The line between writing something, testing it out, revising it, has collapsed into a single moment. If someone has an idea for a film or a book, maybe they’ll tweet out a little bit of it and see what the reception is. There’s a constant temperature-taking at every moment.

JENKINS I read a book about Twyla Tharp and her creativity process. She writes ideas down on index cards and just throws them in a box.

SCHRADER I tell young writers, “Don’t confuse screenwriting with writing. Screenwriting is part of the oral tradition, it’s not part of the literary tradition.”

ROTH It’s really a bastardized form, screenwriting. You’re not a novelist.

SCHRADER And our jobs are not made easier by people who say, “You shouldn’t do that” and “trigger alerts” and all of that. It’s not very good for the creative process.

For the rest of the conversation, go here.