Interview (Part 5): Isaac Adamson

The top rated screenplay on the 2015 Black List is “Bubbles” and it was written by Isaac Adamson. It’s a terrific story, one of the most, if not the most unique ways to approach writing a biopic I have ever seen: The story is a snapshot of Michael Jackson’s life told from the perspective of his pet chimpanzee Bubbles. I would have been interested in interviewing Isaac simply based on the creative inspiration of that idea — I mean, who thinks like that — but when it hit #1 on the Black List charts last year, it was a no-brainer. I reached out to Isaac’s manager Lee Stobby and we finally arranged a time in Isaac’s busy schedule to spend an hour together over the phone, talking with Isaac from his home in Portland, Oregon.

Today in Part 5, Isaac shares how he discovered “Bubbles” had been named the top-rated screenplay in the 2015 Black List and what that has meant to him as a screenwriter:

Scott: The final lines in the script, “And so I await the return of the once and future King, the greatest King the world has ever known. This time, nothing shall come between us. This time no cage shall be strong enough to hold us back. This time, together, we shall conquer all.” Can you talk a bit about what you were going for there?

Isaac: Yeah. What I was going for was to show that Bubbles is still deeply affected by his time with Jackson. It’s not something that he’s forgotten. Yes, he’s had this relatively decent life at the ape sanctuary, he enjoys this elevated status there among the other chimps, but he’s hoping that one day Michael will come back. He’s completely unaware that Michael has died. I wanted to end on a kind of a sad happy thing.

Scott: Let me ask you, at any point in this process, coming up with the idea, working it out and writing various drafts, did you don a producer’s hat and say, “This is nuts. I’m writing a movie about Michael Jackson from the POV of a chimpanzee.”

Isaac: No. I kept that hat off at all times and just wouldn’t allow myself to even think about it. I tell people all the time, this is the kind of thing where if I’d tried pitching to somebody, it never would have been written. People would’ve likely responded, “That’s funny, but it’s too crazy. It will never work and here’s why.”

If I had put that producer hat on myself, I probably would have talked myself out of it. I did, earlier on before I started writing it, email the log line to my manager and he was like, “Oh my God that’s crazy, but you should totally do it.” That really helped. If he had said, “Meh, I don’t know,” I don’t know if I would have written it, honestly.

Scott: Is that Lee?

Isaac: Yeah.

Scott: Lee Stobby. That’s great. I know he’s a big proponent of wanting to see new, and different, and unusual stories. What was the process of writing the script? How many drafts or passes did you think you did on it?

Isaac: This one, it was really funny, because before I wrote this, I was trying to do this TV pilot spec thing. I was doing draft after draft, and pounding my head against it, and decided to put it away and pursue this crazy “Bubbles” idea.

And it turned out to be the fastest thing I’ve ever written. I wrote it in six or seven weeks. I did two passes before I showed it to Lee. He went crazy over it. He had a couple notes, but I would say it was almost like draft 1.5 that ended up going out into the world, which was great. But I read it a couple months ago and now I’m wondering whether I should’ve changed this, or done that. Just little nitpicky things. But I never had that moment to catch my breath and think about it a lot.

Scott: Didn’t seem to hurt the reception of the script, topping the Black List in 2015. Can you describe what were you doing when you found out that you made the Black List and was number one?

Isaac: It was a funny thing. The script came out in April or May ‑‑ maybe late April. It instantly blew up. I was doing all kinds of meetings. Everybody that I was meeting with was like, “This’ll probably never get made, but you’re going to be on the Black List.”

I heard it so many times, I was expecting to be on it. But I wasn’t expecting to be number one. The day the list came out, I had a horrible flu. I slept in. My wife got up and took the kids to school.

I crawled out of bed at nine o’clock, and went on Twitter, and saw the announcements start to come through. They had the Bubbles announcement with Channing Tatum doing the video. I thought, “That’s cool. He’s a pretty big star, right? Maybe this is going to finish high.”

After that, I went to sleep for another two hours. My manager and agent called to tell me, “It’s number one!” I was all excited, but I was also trying not to throw up because I felt so bad physically that day. I heard I was number one and then went back to sleep for another hour or so.

Scott: It sounds very much like the screenwriting life.

[laughter]

Isaac: Yeah, I suppose that’s it in nutshell.

“Bubbles” topped the 2015 Black List with 44 votes

Scott: The good and the bad mixed together. Has being on the Black List had an impact on your career?

Isaac: Definitely. With “Bubbles” specifically, once it landed so high on the Black List, people started looking at it in a different way. It became, “Can we figure out how to do this before someone else figures it out?”

It really breathed life back into the project. We’re looking at a couple different paths to victory. We’ll see what happens. Hopefully things will be settled soon. It definitely amped up interest in that script.

As far as my career in general, definitely getting sent a lot more books for adaptation now. People are considering me for projects they definitely wouldn’t have before.

Scott: You’ve got the adaptation for the novel, “The Ice Twins,” which was just recently announced. Could you share a little bit of backstory about how that happened?

Isaac: Sure. Prior to “Bubbles”, I had written a script called, “Forsaken,” which was more of a thriller set on a deserted island. My manager had sent that to Alcon. They really liked it and I talked with them about it. Then, “Bubbles” started making the rounds and I got back on their radar again. They had this book adaptation that they thought maybe I would be good for.

I don’t think they would’ve considered me had they only read “Bubbles”, because the tone is a lot different. This “Forsaken” script that I’d written, it was a lot darker. They thought that maybe it would be a good fit, so they invited me to come up with a take for it, and went from there.

Scott: You raise an interesting point. When I talk to aspiring screenwriters, this issue comes up about whether they should focus on one particular genre or write different genres. You’ve taken that other approach, which is you’ve written a lot of different stories. If an aspiring writer were to ask your advice, what would you say to them about that?

Isaac: I would say, especially when you’re doing specs ‑‑ essentially writing for yourself ‑‑ write what you want to write. On the more career front, I think it varies by writer. It’s what you want to do. If you’re interested in the Sci‑Fi thing, you think you can do it well, take a shot at it.

That said, I don’t think it’s bad advice to tell somebody to focus on just one genre. It’s very hard to do all genres well, and to do them equally. That’s especially true when it comes to comedy. If you can really write comedy well, I would say do comedy. There’s so few people who can consistently do that well.

For me, as a matter of keeping myself interested in the whole thing, I like to try different kinds of stories.

Tomorrow in Part 6, Isaac shares some thoughts about the craft and advice to aspiring writers.

For Part 1 of the interview, go here.

Part 2, here.

Part 3, here.

Part 4, here.

Isaac is repped by CAA and Lee Stobby.

Twitter: @isaacadamson.