Would you give it up for a mess of pottage?

[erastes]

But there's no-one around to chat to. Iz sad.

Just been watching a bit on Stardust.  And I hav Kwestions.

1. Which part - exactly - is that pratt Gervais supposed to be playing?

2. Why aren't the brothers Hot? They should be HOT. Surely that's not just me.

3. Why are we getting it months after everyone else?

4. Robert De Niro's character gets about 2 lines in the book.  This obviously merits his presence for half the film?

5. I don't think Gaiman even gets a mention in the trailer.

6. What happened to Mirrormask?

7.  He's producing Beowulf?  Gawd help us.

Seriously though. For ye authors and would be authors.  How far would you go?  Would you - for more money than you've ever seen in your life - hand over your baby - the book you've been living with and writing and loving and crafting for years - to Hollywood.  Would you run off in a Daffy Duck "woo hoo" manner with your money while they butcher your canon, warp your characters, add their own characters, make your gay boys bi who are only waiting for the right woman, and take liberties with costume and history?

Or would be stand firm - insist on rights, like JKR?

It's the devils choice.... And I HOPE I know what I would do with Standish.   I hope.

Comments

[cbpotts.livejournal.com]

Hell, I've given up more for a lot less. I think I could do it for a lot more money. That's the joy of writing to support your family: it's nice to think I'd be noble and hold true to the idea of the story, but pragmatically, I'd buy groceries, pay the mortgage, and so on.

[lareinenoire.livejournal.com]

I actually saw the film back in the States and was pleasantly surprised (several people I know who have also read the book were as well). They left things out (i.e. they made the market sequence at the beginning quite short) but on the whole, they at least succeeded in capturing the essence of the book, I thought.

Plus, the actor playing Tristan was just adorable. I loved him in that role.

And good question about Mirrormask. I wanted to see it but it was in cinemas for about a blink.

As for selling rights...sigh. I don't know. It would honestly depend on how much money they offered and if I had a job in academia at the time.

[rwday.livejournal.com]

No, you know I wouldn't. To follow up on cbpotts response above (and NOT to imply criticism of her opinion - it's a very valid and far more practical opinion than mine), for me that's the joy of writing for the love of it and having a secure source of income. I can and will turn away from those kinds of opportunities if I think they're going to require me to compromise too much.

I'd rather never see my book become a film than to have it butchered the way (for example) Le Guin's Earthsea was butchered. Unfortunately, unless you're JK Rowling, you don't have a lot of power once you've sold your film rights.

Not that Hollywood is exactly beating a path to my door, so it's hardly an issue.

From Carrie http://lovelysalome.blogspot.com

[carrielofty.livejournal.com]

Me = Daffy Duck. Fer shur.

[cbpotts.livejournal.com]

I think that's a wonderful spot to be in: the key is having, as you say, a secure source of income. For me, the writing is the secure source of income. I've written 20 books this year, the vast majority of which are ghost written for business professionals. I think, by default, this makes one both pragmatic and detached from the process: these are both my books and at the same time, not my books. Should I not be too pleased about the fate of any one title, there are 19 others to pick up the slack.

It's easy to get into the art vs money angle of it, and I'm not sure it has to be that way. I do have projects that I'm very emotionally invested in: however, from what I know of the market, they're not the titles Hollywood is ever going to come looking for. So it's a choice I won't have to worry about.

[rwday.livejournal.com]

I'm glad you understood I wasn't being critical at all - if I had to make a living by my words, I know I'd make a lot of compromises and be just fine with them. You (generic, not you you necessarily) do what you have to do and are grateful you have the skill to make a living doing something you love.

And yeah, I hear you about Hollywood. Hell wil freeze over before I'm involved with Hollywood as anything other than a moviegoer.

[glowering.livejournal.com]

I went to a talk Gaiman did this evening, and he was saying that the film and the book are very different entities but the way he sees it is that it's a retelling - like a fairy tale. It's how stories used to be told, listened to once and retold by a different person in a different way, and that's what happened to Stardust.

[tammylee.livejournal.com]

I watched Mirrormask on DVD. I didn't care for it very much, actually.

If someone was willing to pay me a cartload of cash I'd probably take it. But I rarely have stories I feel attached to.

Comics, art, stories, usually when I am finished with the project it is out of my head and I'm onto the next one.

I am a creative mercenary. XD

[thistlerose.livejournal.com]

Take the money and run, baby. The movie doesn't change what's in the book.

[shiawmeimei.livejournal.com]

I think a lot would depend on my situation at the time of the offer. If I were offered one right now, I'd take the money in a heart beat. I want to write full time but can't quit the day job. If I were secure financially through my writing, I'd probably fight for rights because I could afford to say no.

[paintedponyxox.livejournal.com]

I don't think there are many authors who ever do give the rights for their work to be adapted knowing that it won't be done in a way they don't like. I guess if they're then disappointed by the finished product, it's their fault for taking the risk and they can't complain too much, but when something like that happens it doesn't make me feel like the author has sold out or something.

I think if a movie based on my book really messed up my original vision of so many things, my disappointment would mostly just be out of how I missed out on a possibly more fulfilling experience rather than a feeling of being protective of my original work. The original work would still be unharmed. I think adaptations are just interpretations and, in some ways, should not be taken any more seriously than fanfic. JKR, by all means, should have put her foot down so she got exactly what she wanted because she was lucky that she could. That franchise was the kind that was going to make tons of money no matter what it was just because of the name, so anybody would want to take it, but it also could have easily been fucked up because they didn't even really need to try to make it good for it to be successful. I guess I could say her baby was in more danger of being cruelly exploited than other books. And there would be an extent to which a movie of my book could majorly suck that would actually make me ashamed to have the book's name on it, but I'd hope I would be a part of the process at least enough to avoid anything that terrible.

It really does seem like Neil Gaiman in particular will approve of anything, though. He obviously doesn't care much what people want to do with his work. A long time ago there was a finished screenplay for a Sandman movie that the writers were trying to get made which Neil had read and approved. I found it on the internet after it was an abandoned project, and it was not too good. Heh.

[nagasvoice.livejournal.com]

Unfortunately, I suspect that you wouldn't realize it was All Wrong in time.
Hollywood schmooze and con artists specialize in sounding convincing, important, substantial, and even considerate. The problem is that it will all sound cozy and great and just fine until it's All Far Too Late.
Unless you have very good attorneys and quite a lot of lolly to back them up, you aren't going to get much chance to fix whatever terms you already signed away.
It's a good option if you have the *chance* to throw up your hands and walk away and disavow it, the way Stephen King has done on some of his movies.
That said, if you're actually working with real filmmakers, it's in everyone's interest to make something watchable and support.

[galadhir.livejournal.com]

I don't know, to be honest. I don't suppose I'll ever have to think about it :) But as an ex-fanfic writer, I tend to feel that once the work has been launched out there for people to read, I don't have any real rights over the re-telling of it. If people want to make a film of it, and the film is as bad as bad fanfic, well, I guess that's their choice. I can at least hope that it'll make some people want to read the book.

[anderyn.livejournal.com]

I was at a talk Paula Gosling gave once. She had sold the rights to one of her books (one I really liked, btw -- "Fair Game" aka "A Running Duck") to Hollywood, and it was made into the Sylvester Stallone pic, "Cobra". She hated it. I don't blame her. So she took her revenge. She based a drunken bum in her next book upon Stallone. Of course, he "came alive" and didn't come to the horrible end she'd planned for him, but at least she had the enjoyment of snikering while she wrote his scenes.

Vis a vis money vs. art in my personal life -- hell, if I *ever* finished anything, I have no idea what I'd do. But I'd probably take the money, because, well, you know, one does have to live!

Vis a vis "Stardust" the movie -- I loved it. It wasn't the book, no, but it was more... involving. The book can be very dry -- I know, it was written as a fairy tale, so it wasn't supposed to have deep character moments, per se, but it doesn't grab you and shake you by the throat and say "read me" either. I liked the book a lot. But I enjoyed the movie a lot more. And I adored De Niro's pirate. (And I thought the brothers WERE hot, at least two of them!) And, you know, Gaiman was there as executive producer, so he did get say in what was filmed.

Meanwhile, I hated "Mirrormask" and gave the video away.

[aerialscribe.livejournal.com]

Stand firm.

[vinnie-tesla.livejournal.com]

I think "selling out" is a reasonable choice. A bad movie doesn't make a good book bad.

[lee-rowan.livejournal.com]

It would depend on a lot of things. If I had an ironclad guarantee that the same dude who's doing Torchwood would be at the helm for Ransom or Walking Wounded, no problem. But even so, I'd hold out for as much control as was humanly possible. And I'd want a % of the GROSS, not the net. From everything I've read, the writer makes less money, overall, than folks like the wardrobe and camera crew. That's just not worth it, because more people will remember the film than the book. I suppose it's good advertising, though.

Tony Hillerman's comment about the film made from one of his Navajo mysteries was the perfect description of a book-to-film: "It was like seeing a car wreck involving people I knew--even though nobody was killed, I didn't like the results."