Adventures In The Screen Trade: A Personal View of Hollywood

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William Goldman, the screenwriter of two of my favorite movies (and in my opinion, two of the best movies of all time)--"Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid" and "The Princess Bride"--offers an witty, insightful, acerbic and neurotic look at the world of writing in Hollywood. I haven't read this book's predecessor, "Adventures in the Screen Trade," but I have no doubt it was equally enjoyable and eye-opening. I’m starting to see a pattern. If I really like a book, I don’t bother writing notes about it cause I just like to read it. In this sequel to screenwriter William Goldman's first memoir, "Adventures In The Screen Trade", basically carrying his memoirs forward to the time period 1980-2000, Goldman captures the appeal and basic readability and charm of volume one. I think it's marginally inferior to its first book, but it's still very good. According to Goldman, the single most important fact in the movie industry is that "Nobody Knows Anything". It get really interesting when the people he’s sent the script too start commenting on it. Right away they have great suggestion that make the film even better.

Which Lie Did I Tell?: More Adventures in the Screen Trade Which Lie Did I Tell?: More Adventures in the Screen Trade

Access-restricted-item true Addeddate 2021-06-25 13:01:15 Boxid IA40150812 Camera USB PTP Class Camera Collection_set printdisabled External-identifier urn:lcp:adventuresinscre0000gold_y9m1:epub:7749688e-6936-4d5f-8588-dc0fad0845b2 Foldoutcount 0 Identifier adventuresinscre0000gold_y9m1 Identifier-ark ark:/13960/t9p39g71b Invoice 1652 Isbn 0446512737 Lccn 82017602 Ocr tesseract 5.0.0-beta-20210815 Ocr_detected_lang en Ocr_detected_lang_conf 1.0000 Ocr_detected_script Latin Ocr_detected_script_conf 0.9732 Ocr_module_version 0.0.13 Ocr_parameters -l eng Old_pallet IA-WL-1200071 Openlibrary_editionThe situation was now getting the least bit uncomfortable. “If it’s a woman it’s either Streisand or Julie Andrews.” Bottom line: Goldman knows his way around a screenplay, and this book is his behind-the-scenes look at his experience of the movie-making process. This, for me as a struggling screenwriter, was perhaps the best takeaway from Adventures in the Screen Trade - that the biz is always hard, it's always going to be hard to break into it, and at a certain point you just need to shut up and write. Goldman never says that phrase exactly but his famous phrase, "nobody knows anything," says more than enough: all you can rely on is our own work, so try to make some good work and let the stuff you can't control take care of itself. The last section of the book is a particularly helpful exercise where he takes one of his short stories, wrestles it into a screenplay, and then interviews a cinematographer, a production designer, an editor, a composer and a director about what they would do with his finished product. (The director's critique is withering, and hilarious.) He admits that those interviews were the first time in his career that he had spent more than five minutes alone speaking with any of those film professionals, with the exception of the director. But I do love his style. His self deprecation and brutal honesty are what make him so endearing. You feel like you're sitting in a class and learning everything the master has to teach. I was inspired and learned a lot.

Adventures in the screen trade : a personal view of Hollywood Adventures in the screen trade : a personal view of Hollywood

Apart from recounting his own experiences in Hollywood (or "Out There" as Goldman calls it) from 1985 until just prior to the book's publication in 2000, Goldman also analyzes key scenes from films like "Fargo" and "When Harry Met Sally," explaining what makes these scenes work from a filmmaker's point of view. He also introduces several story ideas, presents a potential synopsis that could lead to a "selling script" (the script that gets the studio to buy your work and make the movie), and then explains why or why not he personally would be interested in that script. Finally, he presents parts of an original screenplay ("The Big A") and gives the reader the responses of several fellow writers who looked it over to give often harsh but potentially helpful pieces of advice. William Goldman is incredible. Prolifically incredible. In several genres. I read this book on 3-18-97 straight through. I know I did because I wrote this quotation: By far my favorite part in the book is Part Two. Nothing is more entertaining than reading about Bill Goldman in the trenches, trying his best to ensure that a movie he's working on will actually get finished. More often than not he succeeds, but sometimes insurmountable obstacles make failure a certainty.Wow! This book is amazing. It tells the kind of wisdom that can only be gained from being in the trenches. The very words and ideas and id’s that can show why it’s almost impossible to get ANYTHING good made in Hollywood. A master class. There is no ‘right’ answer except the one that you feel makes it ‘play’. Makes it ‘work’ as a movie! “(I am smiling as I wrote that last sentence because you probably think I know how [the scene should go from here]. And the truth is: not a clue.)”

Adventures in the Screen Trade by William Goldman | Goodreads

His tomes Adventures In The Screen Trade and Which Lie Did I Tell? remain at the top of the list in the screenwriting how-to space, and he popularized the so-simple-but-couldn't-be-more-true line that in Hollywood, "nobody knows anything."I glanced inside the cover. I knew that there would be interesting tidbits about the writing of The Princess Bride , both the movies and the book. Also discussed is one of my favorite horror films of all time, "Misery." And there's that quality I associate with the name (yes, even "The Stepford Wives" I liked).

Adventures In The Screen Trade by William Goldman - Waterstones Adventures In The Screen Trade by William Goldman - Waterstones

Goldman has many funny stories to tell about Hollywood insiders and a lot of the silliness that is present in the industry. Although he himself is a bona fide insider, it's clear that he holds Hollywood at arms'-length and doesn't take it or himself too seriously, which allows him to be free and candid with his observations.

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Goldman shares many wonderful inside stories, and he settles some old scores. I came away from the book convinced that no one in Hollywood can be trusted, and everyone acts in their self interest, especially famous stars like Robert Redford and Dustin Hoffman. Sure, Goldman has some nice things to say about Paul Newman, Richard Attenborough, and Joseph E. Levine, but generally Hollywood is a nest of vipers.