by Angela Guess
Yesterday I shared the first half of my conversation with screenwriter Keith Giglio, author of Writing the Comedy Blockbuster.
In part two, Keith and I discuss the importance of stealing, how to break into the industry, and which scripts every aspiring comedy screenwriter should read.
LA Screenwriter (LA): You’ve said, “Professionals create, amateurs steal.”
Keith Giglio (KG): Yeah, 100%. I’m amazed how many of my students aren’t really students of film, because there’s so much to draw upon. I was reading an interview with Steven Soderbergh about how he takes so much from a James Bond movie, Her Majesty’s Secret Service made back in the 70s. And Chris Nolan says that’s where he got his ski sequence from for Inception — it’s just like a scene from Her Majesty’s Secret Service.
It’s easier to reference something. I think a lot of students spend too much time trying to create something when there’s a whole universe of film history to help inspire them. We’re not talking about plagiarism, but we’re talking about getting the tone right. You know, what do other similar movies do?
