Why write a book when there's a movie in my head?
Around a decade ago, I had a dream. An actual middle of the night dream. An entire movie played in my head, all I had to do was write it down. I did a fair bit of research on the topic then I spent the next 10 years working it out in my head but not writing much of anything down.
Last year, I joined a writer's group and began the arduous task of writing a screenplay. I have no idea how to write a screenplay.
One of the other members of the group has actually written screenplays and had them produced. Her advice to me was: don't.
If you write a screenplay, she told me, best case scenario is a production company buys it and makes it into a movie. But when they buy it, the first thing they do is fire the writer. Suddenly, it's not yours anymore. They'll rewrite it and you'll never see a dime (or credit) beyond the initial payment.
But, if you write a book, no one can take that away from you. With luck, it will become a movie, and they will hire someone who knows the form to write the screenplay. You will always have credit and royalties. The story will belong to you forever.
Now I'm more than halfway through a novel and very happy with it. Maybe it will be a published book and then a movie someday.
My question is: How sound is this advice? Is it folly to write an original screenplay? Is adapting the movie in your head into a book the better choice?
Notes: I am aware of questions similar to mine (Should I be a Novel Writer or a Screenwriter? and Screenplay vs Novel) but they're more about career paths and how to choose which medium suits the story best. That's why I focused my question on the publishing issues involved in the choice, something the other questions didn't address (even if a few answers spoke of it).
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I'm gonna answer to the question in the title:
Ultimately it's up to you. They are different media.
Your friend must be right on some level.
I too have the habit to imagine my stories as movies (and I suppose it's not uncommon at all). Sometimes is painstalkingly difficult to portray with words what could be done with a good placed camera shot; writing is not a visual art after all. A good movie or even a good comic can impress the audience in a more immediate way; after all we relay a lot on our sight in our daily lives and as they say, a picture is worth a thousand words. Don't take me wrong - the written word still has its own merits and advantages, but this goes a little over the scope of the question.
The point about screenwriting is that, as you noted, it gets the story mostly out of your control. Let's say you write a really good screenplay and a company buys it. Let's say that you get activetly involved on the whole process of movie-making (rather than shoved aside). Even then, you won't be the only one responsible for the final product. The screenwriter is not the director, in most cases; and even if you get to the point of directing your own film - unlikely for the first screenplay - there is a whole deal of people involved in the production and a whole lot of compromises to be made, from casting choices to business-related reasons, from the photography to the acting performance.
So it's true that becoming a skilled writer lets you keep the whole story into your own hands. No one else is involved in your book but you (apart from editors, of course; but I'd argue that a good editor can make your story better without altering your vision). If you get famous, if your book sells, it might one day become a movie; play your cards right and you could be one of the authors actively involved in the production. Of course, the same problems as above will apply, but maybe you'll be able to bargain a better deal if you have the higher ground of a strong sale record.
Then again, you should think about what your goal is.
What's more important? Telling a story, or making a movie? If it's the latter, try to get involved in movie making - it's the fastest route and it makes more sense. No point in taking an huge detour if that's what's your heart aches for. Your first screenplay won't get 100% right as you wanted it, and so for your second and third, but that's the same for everyone. And you'd be making movies.
But if you want to tell your story, as close as possible as you imagined it, and the visual representation would just be a nice collateral thing to have, you should write it down. Keep in mind that both ways will require sacrifices and compromises of some sort; it's up to you to choose.
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Don't forget that nobody (except perhaps students on a film-making or screenplay-writing courses) ever reads screenplays, even those of classic famous movies. Write one by all means if you feel compelled to, but most likely the only person who will ever see it is you - unless someone else makes it into a movie.
As other answers have said, movies are a collaborative art form. Your screen play will just be the "basic idea" for what emerges at the end of the movie making process.
The same is true for writing stage plays, though maybe not quite to the same extent. But don't forget that even Shakespeare gets rewritten in modern productions. Scenes are cut, the order of other scenes is rearranged, somebody thinks it will be more "relevant for a modern audience" if Ophelia is black and Othello is white, or if Hamlet is female …
If you don't want else anyone to mess with your text, stick to writing books!
This post was sourced from https://writers.stackexchange.com/a/42420. It is licensed under CC BY-SA 3.0.
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I agree with all the other answers so far, but let me take a different perspective on the whole thing. If you wish, read this answer as a frame challenge.
You say "there's a movie in your head". What do you mean? Is it really a movie - does it fit into ~2 hours, do you see each frame and how it's shot, do you see the special effects and how they're done, do you have specific actors in mind?
Or is it just that you see every scene in vivid colour, full surround, like you're standing there?
If the first option is your case, I can see why writing a book rather than a screenplay would feel like you're not doing what you "want" to do, but "translating" your vision to a different medium, as it where. Maybe, if this burns in your bones, you'd want to accept the risks and disadvantages, and do the screenplay anyway. Get to know people in the industry, and follow your dream. (You might want to look at options like indie productions and animated films, as a way to mitigate the complexities of trying to move forwards with a screenplay.)
But if it's just that you see your story with the eyes and ears of your mind, it's not really a movie. It's just how you see the story. (And yes, the way we think of stories, and the way we dream, are both influenced by movies, as a matter of fact. For a while, when TV was black-and-white, people used to dream in black-and-white.) Since what you have in your mind is a story, go ahead and tell it. Tell it however you feel you can best tell it, however you would most enjoy telling it, however would let you tell it in a way that does most justice to the images in your mind. It could be a novel, it could be a graphic novel, it could be an epic poem - whatever medium is "yours", use that.
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Screenplays are also very difficult to sell, for a first-timer. Books are quite a bit easier. Unlike a screenplay, a book is in its final form, and relatively easy to produce, big publishers can do it cheap, in the single-digit thousands, and have the contacts to get it reviewed and advertised.
Screenplays can cost tens of millions to produce, they are a huge investment involving many dozens of creative artists and other story tellers, and they are incomplete. It is difficult to sell screenplays because the investment is so high, and studios can't produce a hundred new films a year, there isn't that much money. They have to be very selective.
Publishers don't. They are selective, but the financial bar is much lower, 90% of the work (writing) is already done, and they really can afford to push out a few hundred new books a year.
Start with the book. If you write "cinematically" (keeping in mind that movie viewers cannot read any text of internal thoughts or description, they can only see and hear), and sell enough copies to prove you have written a good story, then a movie studio might pick it up. Sell the book through an agent. If you can't get an agent, your story is not good enough! It has to be a good book before it can be a movie.
An agent is thinking of all rights to your story from the start, she will make sure you don't fall into any traps and lose your rights, or your influence, or whatever it is you want to keep. She only gets 15% of what YOU get, so she is focused on making sure you get the most money possible out of your work, and she is a professional negotiator that knows the ropes of the entertainment industry, including movie rights and what all the contract clauses mean.
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