Where the Writers Rule

Salon has a pretty blah article today about the history of screenwriters in Hollywood and their abuse at the hands of management, producers, and directors. The article itself doesn't tell you much that you wouldn't already have gathered through osmosis, but I thought this was a pretty excellent comment from Calliope30 in the letters section:

Aside from Charlie Kaufman, no one can name a famous feature writer. But throw out David E. Kelly, Aaron Sorkin or Joss Whedon's names at a dinner party and you'll get smiles and nods of appreciation. Those men are writers who've said to hell with features and turned to television.

And it's not hard to understand why. In TV land, the writers are producers and showrunners and the directors come and go and do what we say. Many people would agree that some of the best screenwriting today is turning up on TV. Look at The West Wing, Deadwood and The Sopranos - people love these shows because the writing is brilliant.

I will never understand why my friends and collegues continue to bash their heads against the wall, working in film.

TV is well paid, increasingly well respected, and the only place to be if you want to have any power at all.

With HBO and serialized TV shows stealing movieland's thunder, and with the new conventional wisdom being that we are witnessing the revival of the grand Dickensian or Tolstoyian novel in televised form, I think Calliope30's point is essential: TV is run by writers, Movies by directors, and that's why you recommend The Wire to your friends and not We Own The Night.

The audience wants good writing, story and character, and not blockbuster imagery, wacky camera angles, shakey cam, or scattershot cutting. If they can't get something they care about at the cinema, the TV is just a remote control away.

I hope when the Writer's Guild does strike, they bring the whole junky system to its knees.