Writing drama

Here’s a Friday Question that led to a rambling answer and dedicated post:

It’s from suek2001

Ken...your episode "Billfold Syndrome" was on last week....it remains a classic in my book. I do have a question. For the meatier guest roles like Jerry Nielsen, did you have to audition them or were they just sent to you? Your gift of comedy is well known but that episode showed a fantastic drama narrative...Did writing for a clear drama become a desire for you?

First off, thanks for the kind words. That’s one of my favorite episodes too.

Actors were brought in to audition. Sam Christensen & Joyce Robinson were terrific casting agents and consistently brought us terrific choices. Kevin Geer was awesome as Jerry Nielson.

As for the second part of your question (and here’s where it gets winding), I’ve always enjoyed writing drama. So has my partner David Isaacs. In our time at MASH we never shied away from it.

But I have to admit we didn’t have very much prior training in it. When we pitched showrunner Gene Reynolds the very first time, the one story he really sparked to was Hawkeye being temporarily blinded by a heater explosion. Gene's one reservation though was that it was very dramatic. Had we written any drama?

We both lied through our teeth and assured him we had written tons of drama in college and that it was a piece of cake. There was no way we were walking out of there without a MASH assignment. (Neither of us had ever written any drama at that point.)

He took a chance and we took a chance and fortunately it all worked out.

About fifteen years ago I was writing spec screenplays, many on my own. I had some success (sold a few) and some misses. They were all comedies.

But there was subject matter I was interested in that was not particularly comedic and did not lead to a happy ending so I decided to write a straight dramatic screenplay instead. It was very cathartic to write (and also quite painful).

Ultimately I was very proud of it. Larry Gelbart read it and thought it was one of the best things I had ever written.

So I called my movie agents at the time (they worked as a team) and said I was bringing in a new spec script. They were both very excited (meaning: they SAID they were excited). Then I happened to mention it was a drama.

Silence.

You could hear crickets. It’s as if the phone went dead. Finally, one of them said tentatively: “Well… why’d you do that for?”

They were not pleased I was not handing them a comedy.

I told him the issues I wanted to tackle in the script were dramatic by nature and my desire to be true to the subject matter.

More silence.

One then said, “Well, is there any comedy in it?” I said that there were light moments. This wasn’t an exercise in gloom like INTERIORS.

“Could we sell it as a black comedy then?” he asked.

“No!” I said. “It’s a drama. I’ve written a drama.”

They said, “Okay, we’d love to read it” with the same enthusiasm I would have if a distant relative gave me a thousand page mini-series about crossing guards to read.

They read it, said they liked it, but there was a problem. It was set in the present day. Unless it was a period piece they claimed they couldn’t sell a drama. I said, “So I do the same movie but put wigs on the men you could sell it?” They didn’t realize I was being sarcastic.

I never sold the movie. I’d still like to find some investors and make it. But I did leave that agency. So one good thing came out of the experience.

I suspect one or more of my plays will become more dramatic depending on the subject matter. I base my work on the idea and my passion for it, not how comedic or dramatic it might be. I enjoy writing comedy the most but welcome any chance to stretch myself and tackle more dramatic subjects.

And that’s how a question about MASH resulted in a post about agent-bashing over something totally unrelated that took place twenty years after MASH ended.