AFF X The 97th Academy Awards®

From Nancy Meyers

“My philosophy has always been, we’re gonna write it within an inch of its life to get it where it works before we show it to anybody. So no, we didn’t get a lot of notes on it, but we put so much time in it. You know what I mean about that? As writers, somehow you’ll think about notes, I’m not gonna worry about that part. That’s, I think, not a good way to go. Fix it, you know. There’s a problem, don’t wait for somebody to tell you. I do that when, before I preview my movies. I don’t wait for the preview audience to tell me it’s slow. I can feel it in the editing room, so I fix it before I get to the preview.”

For more from Nancy Meyers, watch our On Story episode Complicated Relationships: A Conversation with Nancy Meyers at onstory.tv

From Eric Roth

“I always say this to every audience who’s interested in writing that you’ve gotta know drama. And that I do know. I know classical Greek drama, you have to have a first act, second act, third act. Or at least a first act, second act, catharsis and a third act. I don’t care what movie, what play you’ve ever seen all have that. They may have five acts, four acts, it might be PULP FICTION everything stood on its head and it doesn’t matter how avant-garde the movie is- you will, you have to apply those rules or otherwise there’s, it’s nonsense. So within that sense, I’m very structured, but my mind works I think somewhat more incidentally than in classical story terms, you know? I’m very, it sounds kind of formula in a way, but I’m very big with theme- it’s the thing that’s always attracted me.”

2022 Oscar Nominee: Best Adapted Screenplay (Dune)

From Callie Khouri

“I had this crazy thing happen where I got this idea and I felt like something had come to me, and I had this responsibility to get it on paper. It consumed me. Like, literally, I would wake up in the middle of the night. I’ll never forget waking up in the middle of the night and I wrote the scene where, you know, Thelma has to call Darrell to find out what he knows, and she’s saying, if he says anything at all, I’ll just hang up, and I wrote that scene, I woke up in the middle of the night, wrote that scene, ‘He knows, *click*.’ I went back to sleep, and that doesn’t happen to me, you know. It just doesn’t, unfortunately. I wish it did, because when it does it’s a damn sight easier than sitting there having to think of it. That’s not to say I didn’t have hours and hours where I would sit there trying to think of, because I knew where the story was going at the end, but I wasn’t sure of how I was getting there. Like, I didn’t outline it. I didn’t know each scene, so each time I sat down, I just knew I had to progress the story, and I knew nothing about screenwriting. I didn’t read any books. I remember I was in a book store one day, and I picked up a Syd Field book, and I opened it and there was a diagram, and I was like, ‘Oh shit, math,’ and I was like, I closed it, and I knew if I started, like, trying to learn rules or whatever, that there were any kind of limits or anything that somebody said, I wasn’t going to be able to do it.” 

For more from Callie Khouri, watch our On Story episode Thelma & Louise: A Conversation with Callie Khouri at onstory.tv

From Cord Jefferson

“I’ve been going to lots of festivals, and I have to admit that this has been my favorite so far simply because it dispatches with this stuff that is not the art which is sort of the red carpets and the sort of photo shoots and stuff. It’s just sort of about the writing, it’s about the work and I really long for that– and I’ve really longed for the kinds of conversations that I have had since I’ve been here. It’s been a real honor to be in a room with other writers. Writing is my first love. My mother said she knew I was going to be a writer when I was in third grade, and it took me thirty years to discover that for myself.” 

For more from Cord Jefferson, watch our On Story episode On Making: American Fiction at onstory.tv

From Sarah Polley

“The doubts that you have about yourself are kind of your superpower. Like I don’t think, like for me, the message isn’t like, ‘Don’t doubt yourself, you’re great!’ It’s like, ‘Good for you for being curious and for wanting to improve and it doesn’t have to be something that sinks you and it’s not something you have to eradicate. Be curious and hope other people are curious as well about how to do better.’”

For more from Sarah Polley, watch our conversation with her on On Story at onstory.tv