Coffee With David

Last weekend I spent several hours listening to Paul Guyot at the St. Louis Writers Guild Workshop. Who is he? He has “twenty years’ experience working in Hollywood, the last decade writing and producing television. Prior to moving to St. Louis, Paul was an award-winning writer and producer for the CBS drama Judging Amy, as well as several other television shows he’d rather not mention. Since the move, he has created and executive-produced television pilots for TNT, Warner Brothers, Fox, Sony, Lions Gate, and ABC Studios. Currently, Paul has a deal with Fox Studios, and he is the creator and executive producer of Crimes Against Persons, a pilot for A&E to be filmed in St. Louis.” (Saint Louis Writers Guild spotlight)

One of the anecdotes that Paul shared made me think about my time in High School, College and everywhere I have turned to learn my craft. He told a story about how an “A student” graduate from a university (I am leaving the name out) had shared a script that the student had written. This graduate had spent at least four years at this university learning how to write screenplays for Hollywood. What Paul said next only could make me agree in reflection on some of the classes I have taken along the way to where I am now. He said that he talked with the graduate and told him that the formatting and method of the screenplay was all wrong. The graduate shared with Paul that he had been afraid that was the case and went on to explain that this method he used was what his university had taught everyone to use.

As I listened to this story, I thought about everything I have read and learned in creative writing classes all of my life. Like any other aspiring writer, I took all the creative writing courses I could while in school. I never stopped to think to ask: “How much have you published and where have you published it?” “After all, the school hired them. They should know what they are talking about. They are the teacher.”

I am not saying I have had horrible creative writing teachers. I had some good ones and some great ones. What I realized later in life is that I should not have been a sponge soaking up their knowledge and taking it as gospel—and this goes for all the advice in books on writing and in writing magazines. What I have learned and continue to improve upon is shifting through all of the advice and instruction for what the truth to our art is.

There is a line in one of the Star Wars movies that goes “You must unlearn what you have learned.” Sometimes I am not sure what the “truth of our art is,” but I have learned what it is not:

1. It is not formula;
2. A story is not a simple recipe that you can throw together as a simple soup
3. You cannot submit things in a format that the publisher would not accept and expect to be published;
4. You cannot send a piece to a publisher who would not publish that kind of story;
5. What the academic publishing world wants is not the same as what the commercial publishing world wants;
6. You cannot submit something, have it be accepted to be published, and expect that the publisher will do all of the work marketing it;
7. You cannot expect a magazine or book editor to edit your work and catch your mistakes.

There are hundreds more things I have learned and even more that I need to unlearn. One of the things I have learned is to take everything I learn with “a grain of salt.”

Thanks for reading. Please visit www.davidalanlucas.com for more information on the stories I write.