Who: Jana L. Williams
What: Writer, Photographer
Source: wordsmythe
I recently had the privilege of interviewing writer and photographer Jana Williams. Jana is a published novelist and playwright who has been writing screenplays for the better part of the decade. Her background includes stills photography, high-speed motion picture photography for the U.S. navy and more recently work as a post coordinator for feature films and Visual Effects. Jana alongside her 7-year-old daughter currently live in Vancouver where she teaches screenwriting at Emily Carr University and in addition to also teaching throughout North America with her own series of independent seminars on the craft of writing. Jana most recently launched her ONLINE Screenwriting Tutorial.
Below are Jana’s answers to the questions that I thought would be most helpful to screenwriters, both aspiring and professional. You can contact Jana here.
Were you already interested in writing movies when you were younger?
I watched a lot of movies as a kid. I grew up in an era when you could come home from school every day and see classic feature films on TV ’cause broadcasters were desperate for filler. I also read a ton of books. It wasn’t until I visited my aunt in Tucson for a vacation one summer and discovered she was a writer (as well as teacher) and had her very own office at home with a typewriter and tons of books on the shelves…. that I really started dreaming about becoming a writer.
Did you already write stories or screenplays as a kid, or is it an interest that developed later on?
My job in the family constellation was to be the clown, the storyteller the ‘professional’ happy person. So I created lots of skits, and plays and stories that I made my sisters act out with me in order to keep them happy & occupied (myself too). The ability to down and write down was a discipline I tortured myself into learning later; much later.
How do you decide which story idea you have is going to be your next project?
Like every writer I have tone of ideas; some stick, some don’t. But also, it’s kind of serendipity too. It’s a funny combination of the right idea, coupled with the right timing in your life. It’s not every day that I’d sit down to write FEELS SO NEAR (Nicholl’s quarterfinalist) because that was a grueling rewriting of a lot of my own history as a child. But the day came when my life was balanced enough that I could go to those ‘difficult’ places and create characters on the edge and stay sane doing it. Serendipity!
Where do you take your inspiration from?
It’s more like – where don’t I get ideas from? I look to life, newspapers, books, other people’s bad movies that I want to make good, songs, snippets of conversations I overhear on the bus.
How long does it take for you to write a new screenplay?
It really varies with how ‘fully formed’ the idea is when it arrives in my brain’s ‘inbox’. I wrote a historical feature film about Marilyn Monroe in the Rockies that practically wrote itself. I had 3 weeks before I was to leave on a camping vacation (no computer allowed) and NEEDED to get the story down on paper before I left. It burned its way out of me. On the other hand I ‘discovered’ the lives of the women airplane ferry pilots of WWII about five years before I actually felt I was a capable enough writer to do their stories justice. I quite wisely set that idea aside until I had learned enough to write it. I wrote it as a TV series and spent nearly a year on the Bible, the treatment and the first 6 episodes. I loved that piece…. and it has never quite found the right time to be born. Yet!
Do you go through a lot of drafts?
Yeah, always! It’s the one daydream I forced myself to give up, early. Very, very rarely does a screenplay (or novel or theatre play) emerge from the writer’s head fully formed. I always tell my students you’re only job in the FIRST DRAFT is to FINISH! But, there is a joy that can be discovered in rewrites. The joy a carpenter finds when she finally gets around to fixing the squeak in the rocking chair; or the wobble in the kitchen table that has bugged everyone for weeks. In the rewrite you get to go in a lay to rest all the dicey dialogue that you knew was bogus to begin with; the opening scene that got you going but really sucked – and you knew it! In the rewrite is where you own your craft as a writer!
How do you schedule your writing time?
Well, at first I was a rabid disciplinarian with myself – I was so afraid I just wouldn’t write. So, I created a schedule and stuck to it; sometimes stupidly! But like diets, or exercise routines – once you have the habit down pat; you can relax a bit. I’m not the schedule Nazi with myself that I used to be. But if I am working on something creative – I tend to write late at night once my little girl is in bed and I’ve had time to putz around the house a bit working my way up to actually sitting & writing.
How do you go about considering what your audience will find interesting? Or do you write for yourself first?
I write the movie for myself; the movie I would like to see if this TOPIC or STORY we’re going to be playing at my local theatre. I like to think I have a broad enough taste in films that what appeals to me will inherently appeal to someone else out there…. or not. I always say, WRITE WHAT YOU LOVE; the real pay day is the act of creation.
You are also very active in giving seminars about screenwriting, traveling all over North America for it, and also in giving people personal advice about writing screenplays. What inspired you to become so active in helping other people write their screenplays?
Simple. I can’t write 24 hours a day; but given enough time zones and the internet I can sure TALK about writing 24 hours a day!! I love teaching and helping others figure out how to get their story on the page.
Do you see it as a process where you are maybe also learning from your students?
Absolutely! What writers need in their lives are others who are passionate about storytelling and craft; that’s what I find in my students. It doesn’t make any difference if they’re from India or Indiana that passion to create translates universally. I like to think it is a 2 way street – I happily give them the stuff I’ve learned and they give me their start up enthusiasm to go back to my own writing. It’s very cool.
What can people who are interested in following one of your seminars expect from them?
I think the most important thing I bring to my seminars is my passion for storytelling and my utter faith that anyone can learn the craft of screenwriting if they do the work to understand the principles. I am not a genius…. but I am disciplined enough to take an idea and break it down and build a screenplay from it. Inspiration is lovely – it fuels the beginning of your work; but PERSPIRATION is critical to finishing any creative project – especially screenwriting. Screenwriting is like the rubics cube of storytelling – its intuition combined with dogged determination. I love it.
What do you think makes a good screenwriter?
Passion for story and the willingness to risk emotional involvement to create good characters.
What do you like most and like least about writing screenplays versus other types of writing (such as articles, novels, etc.)?
I like the creative pressure to pour my story into the mold of the screenplay format – when it works; I hate that aspect of it when it isn’t working. But that balancing of right brain/ left brain function is what keeps me hooked on screenplays as a creative outlet.
The City Spotlight: Jana Leigh Williams – PART II
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Tags: Jana Leigh Williams, screenwriting, Script Writing, sreenplay, The City Spotlight
