Greetings Devon and Cornwall Film! Phig Billy here, resident gonzo cartoonist on our sister site the PRSD. I have been given the fantastic opportunity to report on this year’s Screen Writer’s Festival: a three-day annual event which takes place in the gorgeous grounds of the Manor by the Lake in Cheltenham. Yesterday was the first day of the festival so I thought you might appreciate a rundown of the highlights…

The opening address was from Barbara Machin, screenwriter and creator of Waking the Dead. Entitled “Innovation is a Must”, the matter of her speech I think was not particularly… er, innovative… I mean, I think it’s an oft-discussed topic in media circles how American TV is better funded, better marketed, but moreover more creative and daring than British TV. But Barbara’s passion was extremely compelling and inspiring, and she presented a positive and hopeful picture of the British TV industry with the power to raise its viewers out of the Lazy Audience Syndrome which they have fallen into.

Afterwards I attended a panel discussion on innovative ways to make a living as a writer and support yourself while working on your screenplay. The panel contained screenwriters who cut their teeth / support themselves writing for alternative media such as comic books, doing stand up comedy or web-based comedy shorts. The panel was chaired by business coach Suzy Greaves (who had more than a little Susie Dent about her… you know, the dictionary corner hottie from Countdown). She was enthusiastic and inspiring in encouraging writers to be enterprising in finding new ways to support themselves. One idea which I thought bonkers but really intriguing: one of Suzy’s clients had designed a tarot deck specifically to help writers write!

As a comic book auteur myself, I was extremely interested to attend the panel discussion on comic books which included ex-2000AD editors David Bishop and John Tomlinson, writer Robbie Morrison and writer and editor Deborah Tate. In this day and age where graphic novel adaptations are all the rage, the panel discussed the differences and similarities between writing for the page and the screen. I liked David’s explanation of how, when he writes comic books he sees it as a movie in his head, what he gets back from the artist is a series of still images from that movie. He went on to explain how the crucial action in a film is up on screen at all times but in a comic book, the crucial action occurs in the blank spaces between the panels… I love this conception of comic books as haiku storytelling! I also managed to score a quick interview afterwards with Robbie which I shall be posting post-festival posthaste!

In the afternoon, I attended the screening of the first winner of the British Short Screenplay Competition, which was presented by the creator of this competition: Arif Hussein of Kaos Films. The 15-minute film, set and filmed in America but starring British actress Greta Scacchi, was written by Tom Beech and entitled The Handyman. I enjoyed the film… it was an interesting story with more than a little Twin Peaks about it, but the question and answer session afterwards was a complete waste of time and without doubt the dampest squib of the day…! Mr Hussein proved an elusive, terse and tight-lipped interviewee unwilling to really disclose anything. I tried to press him on why the BRITISH Short Screenplay Competition picked an American writer with an America-set story for its first ever winner, but Mr Hussein didn’t seem to think there was anything wrong with this: it is an international competition open to people of all nationalities writing in English. Just… co-incidentally marketed as British…

Mr Hussein did, however, return to the stage later with some interesting news. He announced the British Feature Screenplay competition which will be started this year and will be awarded for the first time at next year’s Screen Writer’s Festival. Doubtless one for all you aspiring writers to check out.

The Keynote Speaker and first day main event was British film legend Mike Leigh. Mr Leigh looked physically a little frail as he took the stage, but as soon as he started speaking, he projected incredible energy, passion and eloquence and filled the room [er, marquee] with his personality. It did strike me as a little odd that a festival devoted to writing should have as its keynote speaker a film-maker who famously eschews traditional script-writing, but his description of his singular approach to collaborative film-making was absolutely fascinating and hugely entertaining, as was the mischievous softly-spoken disdain with which he reponded to subsequent questions from the floor. He even said at one point that if any of his 18 films had been written down after filming and submitted as screenplays then they would never be approved, but he was keen to assert that despite the absence of a traditional script, nonetheless the sensibilities which motivated him as director in controlling and contriving his actors’ improvisation are nontheless very writer-ly. He spoke of his time at RADA in the 60s and how austere and sterile he found it, and that it wasn’t until going to the Camberwell Arts School that he realized how actors could and should be artists, and that this is the foundation on which he was built his body of work. He talked about his enthusiasm for silent movies as fluid and flexible and the spontaneous creation of image, and how he feels that film-making - with the emphasis on making is a journey of discovery of which the subsequent film is only the document.

In conclusion, a fascinating first day! Hanging out with lots of very lovely creative people is always fun. Anyway… I’m off for more, stay tuned for the next
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This entry was posted on Wednesday, July 2nd, 2008 at 11:39 am and is filed under Festivals/Events, News, Reviews . You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.