Feature: Vanessa Taylor (“Hope Springs,” “Game of Thrones”)

Anne Thompson at IndieWire with a nice feature on TV and screenwriter Vanessa Taylor. Talk about range. She is on staff for the HBO fantasy series “Game of Thrones” and also wrote the screenplay for comedy-drama Hope Springs. A couple of excerpts from the feature:

Taylor’s drama is about a middle-aged husband and wife lost in a marriage gone stale who see a therapist about livening things up. Unmarried and younger than her main characters, who are somewhat inspired by her divorced parents, Taylor read books about marriage and sex counseling, and checked in with her psychiatrist father. And she’s no stranger to the therapist’s couch, she admits. “I was interested in the question of intimacy and distance, when it creeps into a previously close relationship. Is it possible to bridge that distance, the physical and emotional of it? I wondered about it in my own life. These characters were my way in to exploring that. Their problems were so stark. I wanted to see if I could imagine them solving their problems. I didn’t know where I was going. I usually outline in a more detailed way.”

Outline in a more detailed way, indeed!

She says that “Game of Thrones” is not the usual writing room, as Benioff and D.B. Weiss write most of the ten scripts per season. She got to write two, and is now in the middle of Season Three. They all worked on the outline for Season Three during Season Two, and then got their assignments. While some people are drawn to certain characters, she writes an entire show, everything: “You’re supposed to be able to cover it all. It’s so crazy, breaking the story on note cards, into colors of stories. We thought it was six storylines, then seven, then nine.”

Aha, another professional writer who relies on index cards. Not only that, color-coded index cards. For screenwriting, it’s a great way to keep track of subplots and one I highly recommend.

The larger point, it’s interesting to read Taylor’s comments about what drew her to the story material for Hope Springs. It came from a personal place. You may remember this post I did some time back about how to test a story concept including this final hurdle:

Does the story resonate with me on a personal level?

You may have stumbled upon the greatest high concept of all time, but if you don’t connect with it, if you don’t sense much in the way of enthusiasm for its narrative possibilities, and/or if the story doesn’t play to your writing strengths, it’s probably not a good idea to write that story.

You need to have some sort of personal connection with a story to find its emotional core and imbue its characters with life.

You need to have a passion for a story to keep luring you back to the writing and push you to FADE OUT. Writing is hard work. Writing something for which you do not much enthusiasm is really hard work.

One key to determining if you do have an emotional resonance with a story idea is to check your level of curiosity. Do the ideas and characters arouse questions in your mind? As Taylor said, “I was interested in the question of intimacy and distance, when it creeps into a previously close relationship. Is it possible to bridge that distance, the physical and emotional of it? I wondered about it in my own life. These characters were my way in to exploring that. Their problems were so stark. I wanted to see if I could imagine them solving their problems.” The concept and these characters intrigued Taylor, inviting her into their story to see what she would learn.

Takeaway: Does that story concept you’re considering make you curious about it, its characters, and what will happen? Hopefully it does. If not, look deeper to see if you can find something about it that does get your imagination working. If not, perhaps it’s best to move onto another story idea.

For more of the IndieWire feature, go here.

Here is the trailer for Hope Springs:

The movie opens today. Hey, Old Farts, get your collective ass out of the barcolounger, go the theater this weekend and support this movie!

UPDATE: For more background on Hope Springs, check out this article about the history and marketing of the movie.