2014 Screenwriters Roundtable (Part 5): Chris Borrelli, Brian Duffield, F. Scott Frazier, Chris McCoy, Justin Rhodes, Greg Russo

A special treat this week and next as I will be posting excerpts from an extensive screenwriter’s roundtable I did in December 2014 with a group of talented Hollywood screenwriters: Chris Borrelli, Brian Duffield, F. Scott Frazier, Chris McCoy, Justin Rhodes, and Greg Russo. How good are they? Between them, they have sold more than a dozen spec scripts and have multiple original screenplays on the Black List.

This is the fourth GITS screenwriters roundtable with this group of writers, the first three of which you can read here, here and here. This has become something of an annual event as it’s a great way to take the pulse of what’s happening in the screenwriting universe, track the careers of these talented writers, and benefit from the many insights into the craft they share.

Here is Part 5:

Scott Myers: Let’s jump to the project that you directed, Chris, Good Kids. “Four high school students look to redefine themselves after graduation.” The stars are Nicholas Braun, Zoey Deutch, Mateo Arias, and Israel Broussard. This is a Black List script. How did the project come together?

Chris McCoy: I wrote the script to direct myself, but I hadn’t even done a short film at that point. My reps went out with it to a few different producers who they thought would be able to shepherd it along, and from there it got out and got passed around the town. We received interest from a lot of different companies outside that first small group of producers, but at a lot of those places, when I took the meeting, the executives said to me, “Wait, you want to direct it?” I said, “Yeah!” And they said, “Errghh…”

But to back up a bit, initially we just took the project to five or so production companies that we thought might be a cool home for it and might be cool working with a first-time director. Ultimately, I went with Depth of Field, who are incredible: Chris Weitz, Paul Weitz, and Andrew Miano.

I looked at the Weitzes like, “Here are guys who did exactly what I wanted to do.” Chris and Paul were successful screenwriters who made the transition to directing with American Pie and have continued to do these wonderful films and do whatever they want to do.

So Depth of Field took the project onboard and were championing it. In the meantime, I did a short film with my friend Adam Neustadter that played at a bunch of festivals, which checked the box of directing my first short. With the script having that Black List pedigree and having different actors interested in it, we were able to put together a package that was attractive to Voltage, and they let me make the movie.

Scott Myers: You shot it in the Northeast?

Chris McCoy: I shot it in Massachusetts. I am from Massachusetts, I grew up on Cape Cod, and we were able to shoot it outside of Boston in a lot of very Cape-y communities. The towns were great to us. I wanted to shoot it back home all along, and the communities there were super accommodating. They were happy that I was from there, they liked that I knew the world and knew the people.

The central dynamic of the script touches on the fact that I grew up year-round on Cape Cod. I was a local. In my film, it’s these local kids who are able to redefine themselves when the summer people come into town, because the summer people have no idea who they are.

So the rich people that visit the Cape for three or four months of the year — I’ve seen that world. A lot of the people who were working on my crew also knew that world, and we became a team because we all had the same kind of movie in mind. There was a shorthand there.

Scott Myers: I remember in our last conversation when talking about this issue, the desire to get into directing, in large part, that’s about wanting more control. How was that experience for you, when you are actually there directing, making all these choices on set?

Chris McCoy: For me, the most helpful thing was that because I wrote the script, I knew those characters inside and out. Going back to what I was saying earlier about character motivations, I could tell my actors, “You are doing this because of this.” I could explain it in a way that maybe if I was directing someone else’s thing, I wouldn’t be as intimately able to do.

On set, that was the one thing that I felt that I could really help shape were the performances, the reasons my characters were doing things. On the fly, you learn a lot about the lighting, you learn about camerawork, a lot of technical elements, but if you have a talented team like I had around me, they are handling a lot of that stuff for you. They’ve got your back.

If the crew is committed to the project, if they love it, and everyone’s on board, it gives you the freedom as the writer/director to say, “All right, this is what I pictured when I wrote it, how do we make that happen?”

Scott Myers: Another way to exert control is TV. Greg, I’d like to jump in with you because you spent some of your time and energy this year on the TV side of things. You’ve got a project at Fox with Chris Morgan producing.

“Show centers on a suburban family man, who on the side runs one of the most-successful, custom-ticket auto-theft rings in Los Angeles.”

What’s the background on that project?

Greg: My big goal for 2014 was to find a way to branch into television. The perfect career for me, would be to have a foothold in film and also be working in TV.

My hope was that I would be able to leverage the work and relationships that I’d done on the feature side, and start setting up my own projects.

It was a wild experience, and it’s been eye-opening. I’ve thoroughly enjoyed it. As for the project, Gone in 60 Seconds is kind of the loose pitch. As a TV show, it’s big, it’s fun, it’s Fast and Furious. I had come up with the idea a few years ago. It’s one of those ideas that you put in a folder on your desktop and forget about.

Back then, I was working with Chris on a project, and I floated it to him, he was like, “it’s pretty good.” I never had much, so I said, “I’ll put it aside for a while.” At the beginning of the year, I said, “I’ve got to get back to that goal, to get into television.”

I sat down, took out all the ideas, and I went through them, picked out about 15 of them that I had in that folder, took them into my managers at Madhouse, sat down, and I said, “Here’s 15 ideas, you tell me which one I should work on.” They picked this one out, and secretly that was the one I was hoping they would pick, so, that’s always a good sign.

The TV pitch season is quite an interesting thing. I went back to Chris, I said, “Hey man, remember that idea. Well, I fleshed it out.” I pitched it to him, and he said, “We’re going to 20th with it.” It was weird — I was flying to Ireland on a Friday and I pitched Chris, I think, on a Monday.

We went to 20th two days later, and they said yes in the room. I told everyone, “I’m getting on a plane for two weeks. We’re going to have to push this.” I got a call the night before my flight, saying, “Push your flight back. We’re going to Fox in the AM.”

Fox bought it in the room It was pretty wild. Everyone got it, they saw the idea for the show, they know the material that Chris develops really well, and this fit perfectly into his label, and the stuff he produces. The writing and notes process has been fantastic so far.

You always want to work with people that give good notes and a lot of people here, have worked with Chris, so, they know, he gives some of the smartest notes. I also have nothing but good things to say about the people at 20th and Fox too.

Scott Myers: Speaking of which, do you guys hang out over at Chris Morgan’s office? Three or four of you have worked with Chris, right?

Chris McCoy: Not me. Still waiting for the call, Chris Morgan.

[laughter]

Each day this week, I’m going to highlight one of the writers. Today: Justin Rhodes.

Justin Rhodes writes and lives in Los Angeles. Past projects include spec sales to Warner Bros, Summit, and Legendary, as well the indie film GRASSROOTS starring Jason Biggs, Lauren Ambrose, Cobie Smulders, and Cedric the Entertainer. Current work includes projects for Lightstorm/Fox, Arad/Legendary, DiBonaventura/Phantom Four/LionsGate, Bluegrass/Universal, Chris Morgan/Keanu Reeves, and Letter Eleven/FX. He has been writing since 2010.

For my March 2012 interview with Justin, go here.

Please take time to leave a reply with your observations and follow-up questions, and while you’re there thank these writers for taking time out of their busy schedules to do this roundtable for GITS readers and the wider online screenwriting community.

For Part 1 of the Roundtable conversation, go here.

Part 2, here.

Part 3, here.

Part 4, here.

On Twitter:

Brian Duffield: @BrianDuffield

F. Scott Frazier: @ScreenWritten

Chris McCoy: @thatthere

Justin Rhodes: @twopointfour

Many thanks to Wendy Cohen for logistical help with the roundtable.

Tomorrow: Part 6 of this exclusive screenwriter’s roundtable.