Screenwriting 101: Elgin James

“That’s such a thing where people just sell themselves short anyway and be like ‘What is my shortcut?’ As opposed to trying to tell something interesting and figuring out who you are through writing — and that’s really what it is — we have all this horrible or beautiful wreckage inside of us and then you try to just get it out somehow. That’s the beautiful thing about words. Even when you read a book, or in a screenplay, when someone puts together these words that you’re familiar with, but puts them together in a certain way… it’s like ‘I feel that way all the time and I could never figure out how to articulate that’… that’s just like magic. But then other people are like, ‘Oh, I want to be in the movie business and what do I have to do? I have this great idea about boy meets girl… and what are these other films like? How can I do that? Let me buy ‘Save The Cat’. What’s the gist? What can I just get through? How can I just break it down?’ I feel as an artist, you’re just selling yourself short.”

— Elgin James (GITS Interview, September 3, 2012)

Comment Archive