THE HISTORY OF THE SANTA BARBARA WRITERS CONFERENCE — 1999

An excerpt from the upcoming book by Armando Nieto, Mary Conrad, and Matt Pallamary:

Catherine Ryan Hyde and screenwriter Leslie Dixon (Outrageous Fortune, Mrs. Doubtfire, Pay it Forward, etc.), were introduced by SBWC workshop leaders and screenwriting team of Vicki Patik and Walter H. Davis. At conference time Dixon was still finalizing rewrites of the screenplay adaptation of Pay it Forward which would star Kevin Spacy.

Catherine was an unpublished writer when she first came to the SBWC as a student in 1993, and then returning as a successful author in 1999. She appeared a tad uncomfortable with her newly acquired fame.

“Leslie, maybe you should tell them about Pay It Forward,” said Ryan Hyde. “Because you didn’t write it and you can be more effusive than I can.”

Dixon began by speaking about screenwriting and the adaptation of an original work to the big screen. “I think when it comes to being a screenwriter and adapting a novel, the biggest thing is; is there a movie in this book?

You look at Beloved, which is one of the best books ever written, and you look at the movie which is a downer, and you ask yourself, what happened?”

Dixon talked about Gone With the Wind, and other novels which became great movies. When adapting a novel to film she said she looks at how the story can be told best by film — without a dreaded “voiceover.”

Where Pay it Forward was concerned, Dixon said she was reading it in bed and kept wondering, what happens next? When she finished reading she turned to her husband who was asleep next to her and said aloud, “I’m going to get this project,” and then to the SBWC audience, she said, “And I did!”

“See,” said Catherine, “I knew she should tell the story!”

The story of how the two women met and worked together was part of the SBWC magic, containing a series of coincidences including a mutual friendship with Barnaby Conrad. For attendees at the 1999 Conference the lecture had a Cinderella-esque aspect that captured the attention of more than one aspiring writer. The enthusiasm of the speakers also bespoke the sense that Catherine and Leslie both knew how rare the Pay it Forward Hollywood experience was for them.

If you are in Santa Barbara join us for the Santa Barbara Writers Conference Scrapbook publication party!

https://youtu.be/KZIkSZWKg4g

THE HISTORY OF THE SANTA BARBARA WRITERS CONFERENCE — 1998

An excerpt from the upcoming book by Armando Nieto, Mary Conrad, and Matt Pallamary: On Sunday night the SBWC heard from Robert McKee, an acknowledged guru of Hollywood screenwriters, and a master at any form of story-telling. The title of his lecture was “Character vs. Plot Driven,” and he began by citing one of the earlier teachers and story-tellers, Aristotle in the Poetics.

“What is more important in a story? The story told, or the characters in the story?

“Aristotle also had a hierarchy of good writing,” McKee said, “which included plot, character, idea, dialogue, music, and spectacle.”

According to Aristotle, “Spectacle is the least creative aspect of a production. It is the least important aspect of the production. It just costs money.”

McKee noted that Aristotle had a lot in common with modern day producers. “In fact, Aristotle sounds like a Hollywood producer, more than once in the Poetics,” McKee said. He guided the audience through an examination of modern film and Broadway productions and other forms of story telling, noting Aristotle’s litany  scrambled.

“In what order are things promoted today?” he queried, “Spectacle. Second? Music. Third? Witty dialogue. Number five? The idea. And number six the story.”

McKee said that Aristotle also noted that when story telling goes bad in a culture so does society. The result is decadence.

“Compare for example the last two Oscar winners,” said McKee. “Titanic, and the abysmal The English Patient.” Spectacle and so many caricatures in the movie making.

He continued, “Just once, I’d like to hear the stiff-upper-lip British ship’s captain say, ‘I’m fucking scared man!’”

The lecture continued with a recitation of the intervention points required to stop the decline in culture represented by films, plays, and literature in the U.S. and he discussed character vs. characterization, saying that the only way to know the true human nature of a character is by their choices under pressure. It cannot simply be a good or bad choice because the character will always choose the good or the right from their point of view. It’s one of the laws of nature.

“This is true, from Genghis Khan to Adolf Hitler. Choice and dilemma of the character reveal the nature of a character. Characterization is what is said about the character, what the character says or does, the story. Characterization is not character.

"It is the pressure combined with choices made under pressure that reveals the true 'character' of a character."

McKee said this is true in films, as it is in literature. “Sophie’s Choice, for example,” he proffered.

Increasingly difficult choices that lead to change are the milestones of a good story, movie or production.

JUNE 18-23, 2017

January 11, 2017 Early Bird Registration   $575--full conference! Through February 15  Register here. Improve your craft. Find your tribe. Make lifelong connectionsSpend your conference week beachside at the charming Santa Barbara Hyatt. We're pleased to announce that the very talented Catherine Ryan Hyde has been added to our list of speakers for SBWC 2017. She's an alumna of this conference with 32 published novels and counting. Her latest is Say Goodbye for Now.Another alumna and longtime friend of the conference, the charming and funny Fannie Flagg, will honor us by speaking opening night. Her most recent novel is The Whole Town's Talking. Over the past 45 years, SBWC has created a learning environment that can transform talented writers (beginners included) into bestselling authors ... well, that and a lot of hard work on the part of the authors. One of the best things about the Santa Barbara Writers Conference is the faculty. Our teachers cover a broad range of genres. The 2.5-hour workshops allow time for learning craft, as well as getting individualized feedback on your work. Early bird registration is open now. Please call 1-888-421-1442 and say you are attending the Santa Barbara Writers Conference to get the discounted rate. On February 1, we'll open registration for meetings with agents. You must already be registered for the conference to signup. Since its origins in 1972, SBWC has given writers an oasis of time, place and focus to hone craft and connect with mentors, agents and publishers. The Santa Barbara Writers Conference Scrapbook, a history of the conference written by founder Mary Conrad and longtime friends of SBWC, Y. Armando Nieto and Matthew J. Pallamary, is now available on Amazon. There is a documentary film of the same title debuting at the SBWC in June. The film and the book are labors of love, and both reflect the special nature of this conference. New York Times bestselling author Christopher Moore says: "I went into the Santa Barbara Writers Conference a foundering insurance man and came out a writer. I wouldn't have made it without the camaraderie and enthusiasm for the craft I found there."  We invite you to be a part of this ongoing literary legacy. I hope to see you June 18-23, 2017. Grace Rachow SBWC Director

THE HISTORY OF THE SANTA BARBARA WRITERS CONFERENCE — 1997

An excerpt from the upcoming book by Armando Nieto, Mary Conrad, and Matt Pallamary: The 25^th Anniversary of the Santa Barbara Writers Conference would have been SBWC Chief of Staff Paul Lazarus’ 20^th anniversary with the conference. Unfortunately, Paul suffered a heart attack after hip replacement surgery.

William Styron (Lie Down in Darkness, Set This House on Fire, Sophie’s Choice, and Confessions of Nat Turner), not seen since the Conference’s early days returned to receive the inaugural SBWC Lifetime of Literary Excellence Award. Charles Champlin introduced him for brief comments on “The Writing of My First Book.”

Styron shook his head and said, “For years people have been calling my first novel LAY Down in Darkness. It’s Lie Down in Darkness.” Regarding the editing demanded by his first book’s publisher, the story would have been tame by modern standards.

“There’s not a single four-letter word in it,” Styron announced to the Miramar audience.

“Thank God,” some said out loud.

The road to writing and publishing was about as straight forward for Styron as for any aspiring writer. His first book made the best-sellers list at number seven when he’d been called to service in the Marines for the Korean conflict. He was in good company, as that list also included Norman Mailer’s From Here to Eternity and J.D. Salinger’s Catcher in the Rye. Time magazine spurned the three young writers as “doomed to obscurity.” Styron enjoyed telling that story to the SBWC students.

The story of how he came to write his first book was also interesting. He quit his job reading manuscripts for a New York publisher in 1947. “I burned to write a novel,” he said, “but what about?”

He was motivated when he learned that a 22 year-old woman from his home town that he had a crush on, but never pursued, had committed suicide. “He’d never so much as held her hand,” Barney Brantingham wrote in a Santa Barbara News-Press article at the time.

Styron worked long and hard on the novel in a state of shock in his Brooklyn Flatbush neighborhood rooming house, and eventually finished Lie Down in Darkness. It was during that period that he met a fellow boarder, a Polish woman who didn’t speak a lot of English and had a tattoo from a German death camp. He developed a crush on her too, although his timing was bad because besides the language barrier she already had a boyfriend. Years later she became the title figure in Sophie’s Choice.

At the time there wasn’t a lot written about the holocaust and he had been working on a novel that wasn’t quite coming together.

“I’d become preoccupied with the camps. One book had the story of a gypsy woman forced to make a choice between her two children, forced by the Nazis to become a murderer of her own child,” then it occurred to him to marry the story of the woman from his boarding house twenty-odd years prior. He put aside the incomplete novel and began anew. Four years later Sophie’s Choice was the result.

1997 ended on a sad and somber note for the Santa Barbara Writers Conference family. Susan Miles Gulbransen wrote about the passing of Paul Lazarus in a December 1997 column with affection.

“Every once in a while, someone touches your life, makes a huge difference and leaves you a much better person. Paul Lazarus was that kind of someone. As an insider in the movie business, the retired studio executive could have been a pontificating guru or a larger-than-life celebrity. Instead, Paul always remained a gracious, humorous and supportive friend whether in the company of deal makers or aspiring writers.

“Few people knew the movie industry like Paul Lazarus. As the middle of the Lazarus generational sandwich, he grew up in the movies. His father began a film career in 1916 while the industry was still in its infancy and warned his son not to try the crazy business.”

Paul Lazarus, retired Hollywood studio executive and SBWC Chief of Staff did end up working in the film industry. He brought his wisdom and experience in the genre to the SBWC, and a generation of writers thank him. He was loved, admired, and he will be remembered.

Paul and Ellie Lazarus

THE HISTORY OF THE SANTA BARBARA WRITERS CONFERENCE — 1996

An excerpt from the upcoming book by Armando Nieto, Mary Conrad, and Matt Pallamary: On Monday night two accomplished writers took the stage, one a newcomer, the other an old friend of the Conference. Elmore “Dutch” Leonard author of 32 novels including Mr. Majestyk, Hombre, Stick, and 52 Pick-up, fifteen of which were made into films and Scott Frank an accomplished screenplay writer, including the screen version of Leonard’s Get Shorty.

Dutch opened with a reading of how he wrote a scene in the book Get Shorty, where the character Chili Parker played by John Travolta meets the producer played by Danny Devito, as a way of showing how the written word gets transposed on film. True to his style, Leonard’s read words were short, crisp, and pithy.

“If only I was a light skinned black chick I could sing and do it on my own,” he read, the words of a transvestite reacquainting herself with Chili.

The patter between Chili and other characters continued in Leonard’s gravelly, cough-accented voice for ten minutes. Short bits, (cough), “inflict pain if I need to,” the character said. “Look at me,” Chili said, “no, I mean look at me like I’m looking at you. You’re nothing to me. It’s nothing personal. It’s just business...”

The audience was then treated to a slice of the Get Shorty movie and a scene played out by Danny Devito and John Travolta. Oddly enough, the dialogue between Devito and Travolta was close to what Dutch had read, but the rest of the scene so crisply read by Leonard was fleshed out with an overacting transvestite character. Clearly, the best part of the scene was the dialogue that Travolta and Devito delivered almost exactly as Dutch had written.

Scott Frank related the story of a two hour lunch with Leonard where he told of how others had made movies of his novels that were horrible. Scott went home and said to his wife that he didn’t want to give Leonard another horror story.

For that reason more than any other the scene with Devito and Travolta rang with verisimilitude, to the pleasure of the audience, author, and screenwriter.

Elmore (Dutch) Leonard