The Perfect Martini

As some of you may know, I also blog with a group of novelists and non-fiction authors on a site called From The Write Angle. I think my recent post there might be of some use to filmmakers here, so I'm re-posting it. Any reports that I'm doing this because it's our off season, so technically my vacation, and that I'm too lazy to write a new article, are are absolutely true.

So enjoy, THE PERFECT MARTINI: THE FINAL STEP IN TRAINING.

In a previous post, I wrote about an acting rehearsal that changed my approach to life, the arts, and everything, but I only told half the story in that article. Here's the most important part.

My acting partner and I had found what was missing from the Kent/Oswald scene in King Lear by getting back to the basics. Having done that, we worked on our monologues and sonnets. I had been having trouble with the sonnet:

Some glory in their birth, some in their skill,
Some in their wealth, some in their bodies' force,
Some in their garments, though new-fangled ill,
Some in their hawks and hounds, some in their horse;
And every humour hath his adjunct pleasure,
Wherein it finds a joy above the rest:
But these particulars are not my measure;
All these I better in one general best.
Thy love is better than high birth to me,
Richer than wealth, prouder than garments' cost,
Of more delight than hawks or horses be;
And having thee, of all men's pride I boast:
Wretched in this alone, that thou mayst take
All this away and me most wretched make.

The problem was it sounded like a monologue. I talked with my acting partner about it, ending my diatribe with, "I've been talking for more than a few minutes, but why is it that – if I wrote down, word-for-word, what I just said, and repeated it, it wouldn't sound like what I just said?"

In other words, why did acting sound like acting and not real life?

So I continued to talk about the sonnet, then without notice, changed from my words to Shakespeare's. The transition was so seamless that when I was done, my scene partner's eyes were wide with excitement. "Let me try! Let me try," he said.

He did, and it was much better than he'd ever done before, but it wasn't quite perfect.

We worked on this new approach until we had a method for getting rid of everything we'd ever learned. We let every acting lesson we'd ever had slide off of us. We didn't start our monologues until we'd forgotten we were acting – and forgotten we'd forgotten we were acting.

The next week, after we'd nailed piece-after-piece in our semester finals, our teacher looked at me and said, "if you can bottle that, you'll make a fortune."

I'm still waiting for the fortune.

What we had done was take the final step in training—any sort of training.

Today, when I'm asked to speak about acting, I show up with the makings of the perfect martini. I put ice in the glass and pour in vermouth until someone tells me that's too much—which can really backfire if you're teaching kids. I then cover the ice, pour off the vermouth, making a show of how hard I shake out every last drop. Then I add gin or vodka, shake, and pour the perfect martini.

I enjoy a sip while explaining that the tiny amount of vermouth that clings to the ice is the perfect measurement for a dry martini. You have to put in too much in order to reduce it down to the right amount.

Then I turn the bottles around. Vermouth is labeled TRAINING. The gin or vodka is TALENT.

An artist, or a Navy SEAL, or an athlete, must immerse themselves in training. They have to learn everything there is to learn about their specialty—not just in their head, but in their body. They have to become so trained that a reflexive twitch of the knee is a textbook example of movement in their discipline.

That's the first step. At this level, many people think they are done—and most of the world would agree with them. A great number of successful artists work at this level. Plenty of soldiers serve our nation well by relying solely on their training, and locker rooms are full of athletes who play the game exactly as it is meant to be played.

But there is another level beyond the training. There is greatness. There is the perfect martini.

You don't get there on training alone.

You don't get there on talent alone.

It's a three step process. Learn it. Forget it. Do it.

And, yeah. The olives are the balls—which apply to either gender.

Thanks for reading.

Best of The Blogs

Every year that I've done this blog, I see a big spike in readers around the time we're announcing our lineup for that year's festival. During the off season (like now) my readership drops. Of course, I understand this. It's human nature. That, and I don't write as much during the off season.

But folks, once you've submitted your film, it's too late to apply any knowledge you might gain from this blog. The idea is that those of you facing the blank page, or just starting production, or just beginning to think about your festival submission strategy, might learn from the mistakes of others.

Now is the time to be reading, not when you're eager to find out if you've been selected or not.

To help you get started, I've compiled a list of the best of Dances With Blogs. I hope these posts will help you on your journey from concept to completion. I also hope they will help you make a better movie, because we sure get tired of seeing the bad ones.

In honor of upcoming year 15, here are, in no particular order, the 15 best posts from the past two years.

Think Positive
The important thing to note in this post is the importance of your world premiere status. Be advised, Dances With Films takes this seriously. If you get into Sundance, Toronto, or the like, fine take it. If not, DWF should be on the top of your list. We will work with filmmakers by contacting you early if you're under consideration, so keep that in mind as well. Year 15 we're going to be tougher on this than ever, so spread the word, and plan accordingly.

No News is Bad Advertising
This is another good blog to read as you're considering your submission strategy.

Artistic Cross Training
This is a theme running through all my work, here and on From The Write Angle.

Voice
Possibly the most important aspect of any of the arts.

Louder, Faster, Funnier
Tips from the stage.

Top Ten Story Lines
Trends we're seeing too much of.

The 180 Degree Rule – One of my favorites

Great Isn't Good Enough

Three Cheers For Romance

Art and Business

One Lousy Point

The Never-Ending Need For Independence

Rules of Criticism

One Worked, One Didn't

Post Production Stress Syndrome

That's it. Please tell your friends to check this stuff out now while we can still help them.

Thanks for reading.

The Grand Experiment: Quality vs. Opening Weekend

Studios, and especially young studio executives, don't realize this, but they actually don't care about the quality of the films they make.

This is not to say that each individual involved in a production isn't doing the best job possible. They are. You don't rise to the top of a business as competitive as the film industry without skills. No one at a studio would say, "we don't care if the movie's any good or not, we just want a big opening weekend," but they will say, "we want a big opening weekend."

After the opening weekend, there are a handful of people in the business who will pay attention to drop off. That is, the difference between the first weekend and those that follow. Funny thing is, they call it a "drop off." They expect the second weekend to be lower than the first. Young executives will say, "but it always is."

No, it's not.

Step over here into indie film world for a second. Let's look at two movies that came out about the same time. One a tent pole, and the other an indie film.

This is the weekly box office chart for 2001's movie PEARL HARBOR, as reported on IMDBpro. That's a classic drop off.

This is the same chart for 2002's MY BIG FAT GREEK WEDDING. Sixteen weeks into its run, it was making more money than when it opened. This is a classic build.

What does all of this have to do with the quality of the movies? Everything.

On opening weekend no one knows if the film is any good or not. It's marketing's job to convince people to get off their butts and into the theatre. We should all tip our hats to those people, they do a great job. The quality of the film is not responsible for a successful opening weekend, since no one knows if the movie is any good or not. All the general audience knows is what they get from trailers, and possibly a few advanced quotes that the marketing executives have wined & dined from critics.

Young studio executives will tell you that word-of-mouth is the most important form of advertising, and in the same breath use the term "drop off." They will say that a small drop off is due to good word of mouth.

No. Good word of mouth would create a build, like GREEK WEDDING.

The business's obsession with big opening weekends, and the belief that drop-offs are normal, has become like the housing bubble was before the recession. "Housing prices only go up." Really? How's that working for you?

"Movies always drop off in the second weekend." It ain't necessarily so.

Indie films have no big marketing machine behind them. They don't have the clout to get advanced quotes. The only thing they have to rely on to pull in an audience is the quality of the movie. "My best friend said this movie is great! You have to go." The indie filmmaker is under much greater pressure to tell a good story well, where the studio filmmaker is under pressure to sell a story well – if it's a good story, that just happens to make it easier and more fun.

Think about this experiment. What if I were to pitch a movie to studios using nothing but stars who were attached. "Bruce Willis is on board as the hard ball detective, with Julia Roberts as the femme fatale, and the kids from Twilight are the white-collar gangsters, and it's nothing but action, romance and more action." If I actually had those stars attached, the project would get funded, right?

But... this experimental movie is nothing but trailer beats. "One man, stands between her and happiness..." No actual plot. No story. Just a collection of ads for a movie that never gets made. Except, we make the movie and marketing sells it. Pretty soon you're watching a preview of Willis saying cool, tough things to Roberts, who is looking smoking hot and sexy surrounded by the Twilight kids. "That looks good," you tell your date, and plan to come see it.

Think the drop off for that would be any worse than Pearl Harbor?

Let's Talk Business, Indie Film Business, Part Two

Like so many indie filmmakers, a few years ago, I sat down to write a business proposal for a movie I wanted to get financed. Like so many filmmakers, I knew nothing about writing a business proposal, so I got all the books, read all the blogs, and taught myself.

One of the first things I learned, which will come as no surprise, is the practice of presenting comps – short for complimentary films. These are movies like the one you want to make that are already on the market. You use their performance as an example of what your film might do. Typically, a business proposal would have three comps: a highly profitable, a mid-level, and a not-so-successful.

Really? Just three?

Most of the research I'd done on the subject talked of the difficulty of finding financial information on movies. That makes sense, IMDB Pro was new, so it probably wasn't around when these books were written.

So I decided to bring the digital revolution to the business plan. First, I e-mailed IMDB Pro to find out where they got their numbers. They said they are a compilation of information provided by the production companies and the trade magazine reports. Fair enough. The textbooks all said contact the production companies to get what information they are willing to share, and then dig into the trades. For $13 a month, IMDB did the work for me.

So, I did a search for all films with budgets between one and ten million dollars released between 1999 and 2006. [NOTE: I attempted to update these numbers for 2010, but IMDB is revamping their Home Video/DVD numbers, so they are no longer available. Given the change in distribution and viewing habits, that data is vital, so my old numbers have to do for now].

Many of these lower budget movies show no income whatsoever. These films either have no distribution – which is important, more on that later, or were direct-to-video which make for difficult calculations. I removed titles with no income data.

So, my statistical set becomes all movies with budgets between $1-10 million, that have reported theatrical income.

Instead of three comp titles to work with, I now had 260. I loaded all of them into Excel and got to work.

On the income side, we have two fields: Box Office and Home Video. Box Office was required for this exercise, Home Video was not. In many cases there was no HV income reported on titles that we all know are available, like: But I'm a Cheerleader, Jesus' Son, etc. Fifty-five titles in all had no Home Video reported, so that skews my income numbers in a conservative fashion.

Box Office is only domestic, so again my numbers are extremely conservative as foreign box office creeps up to equal domestic. I have no TV numbers, domestic or international - so, again, my income numbers are well below what might be expected.

In other words, the final report will be worse than real life. That's a good thing as far as investors are concerned.

Expenses include:
Budget
Distributor Fees = 50% Box Office
Prints & Ads = 3K plus 33% of box office (more on that calculation below)
Home Video costs = 40% of Home Video
Guild Obligations = 12% of Home Video.

For studio films the calculation for Prints & Ads can be as much as three times the budget. This is another reason tent pole movies have such a slim profit margin, if any, in the theatres. My calculation is based on a rolling open. Smaller distributors may only have a handful of prints to send to theatres, so they will open in select cities to get reviews for the DVD. The movie will stay in theatres as long as it makes money, but there isn't a huge advertising budget. To open a movie in New York, theatres require proof of $100,000 in advertising. My calculation figures on a three city open at $100,000 each, plus one third of the box office which might be churned into more prints and ads. It's not a perfect calculation, but it's more accurate than the studio model, and errs on the conservative side.

Given all of these calculations, what did I conclude?

116 movies showed a profit. That's 45%. Of those, the average return was 80%.

So if you give a filmmaker a million dollars to make a movie, you have basically a 50-50 shot at a profit. If you do make a profit, chances are, you'll walk away with 1.8 million off of your million dollar investment – and that's before international box office, international home video, pay TV, free TV, International Pay TV, International Free TV, and now, Video On Demand.

Of course, it's still a high risk investment. Remember those movies that showed no income. But as the high risk world goes, I'd say the film industry, if done smartly, is safer than most people think.

Let's Talk Business, Indie Film Business, Part One

During one of the panels at this year's Dances With Films festival, our guests pointed out that the most recent WGA strike ended with a horrible deal for top-tier writers. I asked if these people were seeing any participations (a.k.a. "backend") money. I got the reaction I expected from people used to working with studio films, laughter.

One of my many day jobs in the studio system was working in the Participations Department for both Universal and Warner Bros. I recall one of the senior analysts talking about the reports she slaved away on day-in and day-out. "I don't know why we bother. They never pay."

We were talking about tent pole films, so I asked, "What about the low-budget ones?"

"Oh, yeah, they pay."

Why would a smaller film that fewer people have heard of pay out more money than the household name, summer blockbuster? Lots of reasons.

The easiest to wrap your head around this is that they cost less to make. The film industry is a funny business. The price of the product is in no way related to the cost for the consumer. It costs you the same amount of money to see Harry Potter as is does The Hang Over. Participants – people who participate in the sharing of the profit of a film – don't see any money until there is a profit.

The more difficult reasons smaller movies pay out before larger ones has to do with the fact that the above sentence isn't entirely true.

Some participants – usually big stars – can negotiate a deal where they are paid based on gross income, not net. So their money is deducted from the pool before the other participants get to share. This makes the math really difficult.

Add to this, the initial investors are also participants. Different from the writer, director, hired producers, talent, etc. who are paid a salary to make the movie, the investors are the ones who paid these people. They must get that money, and the rest of the cost of production, back first, with interest, since they've taken the biggest financial risk. As an indie filmmaker, you want these people make money because you've probably got another project you'd like them to invest in.

All of this who-gets-paid-back-when stuff is called "the waterfall." Ideally, the people who took the most risks are at the top of the waterfall taking their fair share first. The people at the bottom may never see a drop. They are the ones you usually hear complaining about there not being backend money in the movie business.

But keep this in mind. The people at the bottom of the waterfall have already been paid. Sometimes they've made six or seven figures before there was any water in the stream. The people who paid them are at the top hoping against hope that there will be enough water to refill their reservoirs.

I've seen so many speakers at seminars wearing designer clothes, expensive jewelry, and driving fancy cars complaining that they never see any money from their movies. It's made me conclude that there are two types of people making this claim: those that have already been paid, and those that are making so much money that they don't want anyone else to know about it.

I also mentioned at the seminar that close to 50% of low-budget films turn a profit. In part two of this segment, I'll show you how I got to that number.

Until then, thanks for reading.

The Journey of a Thousand Filmmakers

For those who couldn't make the festival, or who didn't get around to reading this year's awesome program, here's a re-print of my article.

Enjoy.

Ever since Sex, Lies and Videotape, scored a big distribution deal at Robert Redford's little pet project in Park City in 1989, the term "Industry," when related to film festivals, has come to mean one thing – distribution. Yes, there is currently an argument that distributors aren't as important as they used to be, given online video on demand, etc. etc., blah, blah, blah.

I would never make that argument. One need only see the thousands of unfiltered submissions to Dances With Films to know that gatekeepers play a vital role in the arts. You as the audience do not want to be exposed to the dirt from which the gems are uncovered, believe me!

But something is lost when "The Industry" only includes distributors. At Dances With Films we know that not every movie screened here is ready for a wide, commercial distribution, but there is something about each movie – be it the direction, the cast, the photography, the script, the production value, something about each of these films that stands out above the rest.

When you watch Less and you realize that actors Zak Barnett and Rebecca Noon have you believing in an impossible love, and that Gabriel Diamond's words are pitch-perfect, then you'll know what I'm talking about. When you discover Jeff Gill, Adam Soule and actor-techie Gary Henoch in The Aristocrat – which also as fantastic dialogue – then you'll feel pride in the discovery you made.

When you see Charlie Anderson's photography in Close-Up you'll want to hire him for your next film. When you see the kids Caitlin Kinnunen and Joseph Montes in Sweet Little Lies, you won't be able to stop grinning. Evald Johnson's agile comedy in Stan will have you pulling for the everyman.

The cast and script of The Corridor. The comedy of Hopelessly in June. The smokin' hot intellectual erotica of Mortem, along with the talent of their cast. The "OMG, I just saw what kids'll be into in the next two years" feeling of Night of the Alien.

Rachel Boston.

Zack Parker's twists and turns in Scalene. Jamie Greenberg's mastery of comedy in Stags. The warmth of Love's Kitchen. The camp of Millennium Bug.

And that's just SOME of the features. Never mind the heart wrenching importance of docs like Certain Proof, or the cavalcade of talent in the shorts programs. I could go on and on.

For those of us in this business, the point is not so much to hit it big with one movie, but to keep working. In order for that to happen, casting directors, development executives, below-the-line agents, production houses, production executives, and yes, distributors of narratives and documentaries need to see our work. A discovery festival like DWF is a great place for that to happen. So, let's get away from this idea that The Industry means distributors alone. Let's remember; success can be a Director of Photography getting a job that pays, or a writer being hired to punch up some dialogue, or an actor that gets a more visible role.

Giant steps are great, but they come once a decade or so. If we take human-sized steps, we can cover that ground just as fast.

Post Production Stress Syndrome

When I got PPSS I thought I was the only one, but in talking with other filmmakers I've learned two things: First, it's common, and second, everyone thinks they are the only one.

A couple of days after we wrapped Jacks Or Better, I had to fly back east for a family matter. The shoot had gone great, thanks mostly to a well-rehearsed, disciplined cast and top notch department heads. Like many uber-indie productions, I, as writer/director, was the most inexperienced person on the set. My background was theatre, so I made sure the actors were honest moment-to-moment and kept my mouth shut about the film side except to constantly say, "I'm so glad Dave [my Director of Photography] and I are making the same movie."

So for the 12 days of shooting, I was calm.

A day after we wrapped I woke up in North Carolina in a panic. "What are we shooting?"

"I don't have a crew."

"I don't have any equipment."

"What scenes do I have to get in North Carolina?"

This went on for nearly a minute. Anyone who has experienced the "where am I and what am I doing here?" wake up moment knows that a minute is a long, long time. And it wasn't just once. The first night I woke up a couple of times like that. Over the next few days, panic became my morning routine.

Eventually, it passed of course, and I had seen enough TV psychiatrists to know what delayed stress was, so no harm done.

Flash forward a few years later and I'm acting in a student film. The director was a sweetheart, and cool as I remember myself being, though she faced insane challenges. Over the few days of the shoot, the weather had to be perfect, the actors were on horseback, and there was a period gun duel that had crazy-difficult coverage issues. She handled every bit of it without a problem and the days past without any major issues.

This sounded familiar to me, so I told her, "Don't be surprised if you have Post Production Stress Syndrome."

She laughed and said that wasn't like her. I told her my story, which she appreciated but didn't think it was a cause of concern.

A couple of days after we wrapped I got a call from her. Sure enough, she'd been waking up in a panic, freaking out, not knowing what was happening. She thanked me for the heads up and I thanked her for verifying that I wasn't the only one to go through this.

At the closing night party for this year's festival, I asked one of the 2-Step filmmakers – who was directing for the first time – if she had post production stress. She said yes and we shared stories.

So I'm not the only one. If you've had this, you're not either. If you're about to shoot, don't worry if you're calmer than you think you should be – your nerves will catch up to you and kick your ass as soon as they know you can handle it.

Thanks for reading.