Chuckleheads?

The other day, I read a script by a writing team whose movies are not only bad, they but are anticipated far ahead of time by my friends, with whom I have Bad Movie Night, which is exactly what it sounds like. BMN has watched all the movies by this pair of writers I’m talking about (not knowing the movies had the same writers), and most of you probably haven’t watched any of them, so make what you will of that. Naturally, it was shocking to find the script to be hysterical. It was one of those one wild night comedies (trend alert: there has been a rash of these since THE HANGOVER), and didn’t have much original to add to the formula, but the dialogue was really funny and the details were modern without being desperate, neither of which was expected from these guys. What I was really impressed with, though, was how easy the writing felt, even though the story was pretty complex. 

So often I read scripts where you can feel the writers are trying so hard, and have rewritten so much, and are passing off an impression of a movie, rather than that they are naturally writers – even the pros. That isn't so much an insult to other writers as a kudos to these guys, because screenwriting isn't a natural form. Yet these writers, who I would have thought would be a couple of chucklehead hacks, made it seem easy to have every line of dialogue or direction be compelling, to twist the plot and characters, to have a theme, with no airs of being artists or skilled craftsmen, just goof-offs having fun writing together. (I've read my fair share of goofball writing duos, but the scripts usually feel like hanging out with drunk people when you're not drunk. Or like someone threw water in a drunk's face and combed his hair to futilely try to make him appear sober.) I didn't feel like these writers  troubled themselves at all to tweak every phrase or joke, but it came off as if they were naturally hysterical people. Who is that carefree about screenwriting? Regardless of how their movies end up once they reach theaters, and regardless of how hard they actually worked on this script, these guys are naturally writers, and it should be disturbing to us all how rarely I think that while I’m reading.

Please don't think I haven't read enough comedy. I've read THE HANGOVER guys' work, I've read Ganz & Mandel, I've read Apatow, and I'm not saying they don't have natural ability - they obviously do - or that their scripts aren't better than than the script in question - they undoubtedly are. There is far more to screenwriting than just how naturally well you write. In fact, I'd almost wager that people to whom writing comes so naturally have a harder time coming up with fresh stories, because they don't have to spend that much time thinking and agonizing to knock out something that is entertaining when you read it. Nevertheless, since I do agonize when I write, I'm in awe of these guys who can do it so easily.