Written Interview: Lem Dobbs (“Haywire”)

Interview with Haywire screenwriter Lem Dobbs:

Did directing ever interest you?

I think I found out over the years that I’m quite terribly lazy. Maybe I don’t have the personality for it, and I don’t have the will to do it. Particularly, in my view, as Hollywood went into decline, and that era of personal cinema went into decline and became harder to do.

I realize as I became successful as a writer that I live a life of absolute freedom. And I jealously guard it. If I became a director, I would have to give up that freedom to a certain extent. You have to show up every day for months and months and months, and have to deal with all different kinds of people.

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What was your way into creating this story?

I hate the genre of “female action hero” so much that I ignored it. Given that, I thought of it as the opposite of that, which is like a women’s melodrama, like the kind Hollywood always used to make, about a young woman trying to find her place in the world. It’s really the opposite of an action movie.

In a typical women’s picture, it’s the emotions and psychology that’s affecting the character rather than external action. I thought that if I could do that along with the external action it would be interesting. Basically it is just a B movie, but it does have that other level simmering under the surface.

For more of the interview, go here.