Television – Page 4 – On Screenwriting and Media with Dr. Rosanne Welch

13 Writer Precedes Director from What Is a Western? Interview Series: When Women Wrote Westerns from the Autry Museum of the American West [Video]

Transcript:

Host: Usually the directors become the heroes of film history. What’s different between the history of screenwriters and the history of directors or actors or actresses in what gets remembered?

Rosanne: Of course. We always grant you that people go first to see an actor or an actress. They fall for that person. That’s who they are going to see the movie for. That’s just the truth. The whole writer-director thing makes me crazy. Back in the day, they recognized writers more. Writers were in “Photoplay” magazine when they had marriages or they were taking vacations. We read about people like Lorna Moon and Anita Loos, obviously. All these people and then what happens is the “Auteur Theory” shows up and the “Auteur Theory” blows us away because François Truffaut over there in France decides directors are the real author of a movie. Even though they don’t write anything unless they’re writer/directors and I always tell my students the word Writer still comes before Director in that phrase.a

The Stephens College MFA in TV and Screenwriting is building a relationship with the Autry Museum of the American West since both organizations are devoted to bringing out more diverse and untold stories. Last year we were able to take our cohort of graduating MFA candidates to the museum’s theatre for a showing of Michael Wilson’s Salt of the Earth and we had plans to present a film of our choice this year – but of course the pandemic changed all that. Instead, Autry Curator Josh Garrett-Davis asked me if I would sit for an interview about female screenwriters in the western genre and so “When Women Wrote Westerns” came to be a part of their “What Is a Western? Interview Series”.

I had a great time discussing so many wonderful women writers – from Jeanne MacPherson to D.C. Fontana to Edna Ferber to Emily Andras. If you love westerns I suggest you watch Josh’s other interviews covering everything from the work of Native Americans in Western movies to films in the western-horror hybrid. —

What this entire presentation

As part of a series exploring the significance of the Western genre and the ways in which the movies shape our understanding of the American West, Autry Curator Josh Garrett-Davis interviews Professor Rosanne Welch about the women screenwriters of Hollywood and their contributions to the Western genre.

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31 Conclusion from The Difficulties and Delicacies of Writing the First Female Doctor in 50+ years [Video] [Doctor Who]

It was great to be able to attend this year’s SD WhoCon in San Diego and present this lecture on “The Difficulties and Delicacies of Writing the First Female Doctor in 50+ years” in which I discuss how successful I think showrunner Christopher Chibnall was in making that transition.

It gave me a chance to talk about the creative work of a showrunner/screenwriter while also reconnecting to some friends we had met at this same convention some 3 years ago – and to talk about one of my favorite subjects – Doctor Who!

I recently presented a talk on Torchwood (Why Torchwood Still Matters) where I highlighted a few ways in which the show (airing from 2006 to 2011) came up with progressive and innovative ideas that are being used by other franchises today.

I always enjoy attending the SD (San Diego) WhoCon because the audiences are so well-informed on the Whoniverse and Whovians love Captain Jack and the crew that made this spinoff program so engaging.

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Transcript:

Writing of your own work and the rewriting of other people is a very important part of your job and I think this quote sticks with me from “Rosa” and I don’t know if Mallory Blackman wrote it or if Chibnall wrote it but “Tiny things can change the world” which is that lovely moment at the end of Rosa. So it’s not just a story about history in the United States because now there is this meteor named after her right? So the idea of the bigness of all of this right and they were all part of the same planet which really goes back to “Star Trek” again and we should all come together. I think that’s so truly a part of Doctor Who that he caught he captured in that line. I just love that moment. I think it’s so beautiful and I think amazing the way that stories we see on television affect our lives and help us make choices and ideas and think about who we are. So that to me is the biggest job that he did. Again he had to cast this room full of these people and I think he did a good job of all of those. So I really think he did a good job. I know we’re not all completely always happy with him but I think he made a promise and he came through on it and to me that’s pretty successful. When you’re handed a franchise that’s 50 years old and what new thing are you going to come up and do with it. So that’s my story on Chris Chibnall. Thank you all for coming.

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12 LGBTQIA+ in The West from What Is a Western? Interview Series: When Women Wrote Westerns from the Autry Museum of the American West [Video]

Transcript:

…and then really in the very modern-day what I think is really interesting is there’s a show on Sci-Fi called “Wynonna Earp” and it’s out of Canada. So we have a Canadian, Emily Andrus, and so female writer. She’s taking a western icon, Wyatt Earp and she’s flipping it and giving his great-granddaughter the job of using his big rifle – which is called Peacemaker – and killing the ghosts of all the bad guys that Wyatt Earp was once up against because they come back. All right? So oh what a flip of our story, right? I think that’s a really cool and people sort of dismiss it but it also has a really lovely LGBTQ storyline because they give Wynonna a sister who’s gay and she and the sheriff – who’s a girl – are a partnership and you’re like whoa – girl Sheriff having a relationship. The whole thing is like so all this new stuff and yet there’s a really cool book called “Roaring Camp.” It’s about the Gold Rush by Susan Johnson. Using primary documents she documented all these people who truly lived in the Gold Rush and I remember this great team of two men who ran a restaurant for like 40 years together and they lived together. Of course, there’s no paperwork that says they were a couple because nobody’s going to write that down in the day but you know that’s what was going on. It’s like all these people occupied the west and we don’t talk about them and for whatever reason, maybe because women are forgotten a lot, they also like to look for those other forgotten stories and bring them to life. So I think Emily’s a pretty cool person and I’m really interested in a Canadian looking at American history. Very interesting.

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30 more On From Idea to Execution from The Difficulties and Delicacies of Writing the First Female Doctor in 50+ years [Video] [Doctor Who]

I always enjoy attending the SD (San Diego) WhoCon because the audiences are so well-informed on the Whoniverse and Whovians love Captain Jack and the crew that made this spinoff program so engaging.

RMW Rosanne Signature for Web

Transcript:

Right and even there’s a moment who’s discussing The Waters Of Mars” where but it’s not special enough. It’s just another episode but it’s one of these you know hour and a half ones. I got to do better. What would make it better? And then he writes, what if The Doctor knows all these people have to die and he can’t tell them? Now there are stakes. Now it means something. Now it’s a special and he literally – so it’s a really cool. It’s called “The Writer’s Tale.” Again it’s really thick but it’s great. You’re literally reading the on-time ideas coming through their head and then to the very end and some of the stuff when he’s doing “Torchwood Children of Earth” he’s talking about and then at the very end when he writes his last episode and they go to the table read and then he goes home and he’s like now what do I do? Like now what do I do?

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11 Edna Ferber from What Is a Western? Interview Series: When Women Wrote Westerns from the Autry Museum of the American West [Video]

Transcript:

I think we sometimes have to think about women who wrote western novels which were then adapted by men but the core characters are going to have come from the female perspective. So for me, that’s Edna Ferber and it’s always weird that she wrote you know “So Big” and “Cimarron” and “Giant” which is a huge sprawling thing and she’s an easterner. She’s a member of the Algonquin Round Table. She hangs around with you know Harpo Marx and you know Alexander Wolcott and she’s doing all that witty New York stuff but she’s writing about this period. Which is to me reminiscent of the fact that Teddy Roosevelt right is just a straight New Yorker but he comes out here and becomes I’m the West dude and I’m gonna do all that stuff. So anyone can claim to sort of own the West because it becomes our American Myth and everybody wants to be tied to that. Which is why I think Edna Ferb is someone I think you should read.

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29 From Idea to Execution from The Difficulties and Delicacies of Writing the First Female Doctor in 50+ years [Video] [Doctor Who]

I always enjoy attending the SD (San Diego) WhoCon because the audiences are so well-informed on the Whoniverse and Whovians love Captain Jack and the crew that made this spinoff program so engaging.

RMW Rosanne Signature for Web

Transcript:

Now I think it’s really important to think about how then the writer/showrunner has to decide which of these episodes will be mine and what do I want to say with mine and even when it’s not mine, I’m going to do the final rewrite. I’m going to do the polish to make sure it sounds like all these episodes are coming from one voice, right, which is really why all of Russell’s stuff sounds like Russell. In fact, anyone here ever read “The Writer’s Tale” which is his book –– oh my gosh i should have brought a copy of it. It’s really thick. A journalist named Benjamin Cook asked him in the last season of the David Tennant era “Could I email you and ask you questions about where you’re at with your stories and then we’ll publish a book out of it” and Russell was like sure whatever. So what you get are things like, okay so what are you thinking about tonight and Russell will go “I don’t know. It just occurred to me what if water was like acid and could kill you? Can I play with that?” and a few pages later it’s like “You know what? I’m trying to do an episode on Mars. What if martian water is actually what could kill you before you know it you get to he’s writing “Waters of Mars.” So you literally watch from the idea through the execution of the story.

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10 Women Writing Westerns from What Is a Western? Interview Series: When Women Wrote Westerns from the Autry Museum of the American West [Video]

Transcript:

Host: When you look at all of the histories and biographies that you learned about of women screenwriters are there a couple in particular that you wish more people knew? Maybe these are some of the ones you’ve mentioned already, but are there a couple that you just want to sort of shout from the rooftops? This is a classic. This is a person who should be on the marquee.

Rosanne: Oh, yeah. Well, obviously I did mention Frances Marion. She wrote a series of westerns for her husband, Fred Thomson, who was a western star, right? He was right up there rivaling William S. Hart moving into the talkie world. The problem is he died young and when he died she lost her interest in writing westerns because, of course, it was too reminiscent of him. They were right up there with Pickford and Fairbanks except they were a writer/actor team. So I think that Frances Marion is someone who people have to look more into. I love Jeannie MacPherson and she wrote several westerns. Always about a woman going out west and having experiences and surviving the West. Which is really a western story. A lone person – doesn’t have to be a boy or a girl – a long person challenges themselves and succeeds. So I think she is a really big name.

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28 The Homage from The Difficulties and Delicacies of Writing the First Female Doctor in 50+ years [Video] [Doctor Who]

Transcript:

Now this homage business reminds me when I teach film history, we do this in movies all the time. Forget just remaking a movie. All you do is you take a storyline and you flip the genders and you have a new movie, right? So if you know “It Happened One Night”, it’s one of the first movie ever to win all five of the major Oscars. A very big deal. Robert Riskin wrote it. It’s the story of a –– Clark Gable is a reporter who’s following an heiress who’s run away on the eve of her wedding and of course, they fall in love on their little journey and by the time they get home they’re going to get married. If you move to the 70s and “The Electric Horseman”, Robert Redford is a rodeo star who’s become a celebrity. Jane Fonda is the reporter. He’s run away with a major expensive horse because they’re gonna like put the horse down and do something and then she follows him to get a story but they fall in love. So it’s exactly the same story. Just flip the genders right? So movies are always –– I mean writers always do this. We’re homaging something we loved by givingit a little flip. So I think that “Father’s Day” and “Demons the Punjab” fall into that.

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09 More On Women Writing Westerns For TV from What Is a Western? Interview Series: When Women Wrote Westerns from the Autry Museum of the American West [Video]

Transcript:

…but so these women have moved into tv they start doing these other sorts of westerns and then of course Leigh Brackett moves back into movies when she writes “The Empire Strikes Back” but also think about the era of tv as it expands and grows they’re done telling the same repetitive stories. So then we’re going to get Beth Sullivan and “Dr. Quinn, Medicine Woman”, right which takes the West from that female perspective and is based in real life on a couple of women who couldn’t be doctors in the East, right, but it’s still Western. We got horses. We got cute guys and you know outlaw outfits. It’s a western. It’s just a female experience. So they see much more opportunity there and then slowly maybe they’re appealing back in the movies when it comes to westerns but not as much as we’d like.

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Losing the Real Girl in Adapting Gidget with Dr. Rosanne Welch

Losing the Real Girl in Adapting Gidget

On Saturday, August 6th I had the pleasure of giving an Introductory lecture on Adaptation before a screening of the movie Gidget. Written by Gabriele Upton the film was based on the novel by screenwriter Frederick Kohner which was itself based on the diaries of his daughter, Kathy Kohner, about the summer she learned to surf.

Losing the Real Girl in Adapting Gidget with Dr. Rosanne Welch

I focused on the fact that the book is a love story between a young woman and a sport – surfing – whereas the movie became a more generic love story about a girl and a college boy. While it has been enjoyed over the years its saccharine take has kept readers from discovering the real excitement and joy of independence Kathy (nicknamed Gidget) found that summer in Malibu. She made a series of important decisions about her life and proved herself among a group of seasoned male athletes simply by working hard at being good enough to surf alongside them. I ended by illustrating how the TV series (written by Ruth Brooks Flippen and starring Sally Field in her first big role) managed to capture the truth of the novel better than the 3 films made from it – which oddly starred 3 different women in the lead role but the same male lead – as if the films belong to Moondoggie but the TV show belonged once again to Kathy.

Losing the Real Girl in Adapting Gidget with Dr. Rosanne Welch

I had the great treat of bringing my 2 MFA cohorts to the Autry Museum for the event so they could check out the museum before the show. Then we all had the great treat of being joined by the real Kathy Kohner Zuckerman herself along with a group of young female surfers who wanted to watch the movie and meet an idol. Thanks to Ben Fitzsimmons for inviting us all to create this event together. And remember whenever you see a film based on a book that reading the book will make for an even richer experience of the story.

Losing the Real Girl in Adapting Gidget with Dr. Rosanne Welch