The day before yesterday I mentioned at the end of a post that I had some film scripts to read. I was not kidding. I spent a bit of time reading screenplays, written by students in the USC School of Cinema-Television. This is, as you may know, one of the finest schools of its type, and it feeds the Industry (entertainment and related visual arts) with a huge amount of new talent. Just look at the CVs of the various writers, producers, directors, etc, who are nominated each year for Oscars and Emmys -and the CVs of the huge number of unsung people who work on those films- and you'll see how much USC matters in this area. Well, you might recall that I am passionate about science outreach, public science education, and helping members of society get truly involved in the democratic process (by being able to make more informed decisions about issues affecting our lives) by being more engaged with science, the scientific process, and scientific issues. A major start in this is for them to get more comfortable with scientists, learning that they are real people, in the real world, just like they are. Break down the fear of the scientist (the one that is portrayed most often in the media now) and maybe the breakdown of the fear of science will follow....... and you've maybe read my many blog posts on this (see here and also follow the trackbacks in the comment stream; also here)..... So you might agree with me that one way of advancing these goals is to get more science (and especially portrayals of scientists) in the places where people spend most of their time looking: TV, Cinema, and other media (such as this blog). So I therefore cannot ignore the fact that I'm at USC and that there is this wonderful training ground of the future leaders in the Industry not many buildings away. Turns out that every year the Sloan Foundation awards grants to students for works that advance goals similar to those I expressed above. You can read about the Foundation's excellent work here, and here is an extract:
The goal of the film schools program is to influence the next generation of filmmakers to create more realistic and dramatic stories about science and technology and to challenge existing stereotypes about scientists and engineers through the visual media. With Foundation support, prizes are now awarded at six leading film schools to stimulate top students to write and produce new film and television shows about scientists and engineers: American Film Institute ; UCLA School of Theater, Film,and Television ; Carnegie Mellon University School of Drama ; Columbia University Film Department ; NYU Tisch School of the Arts ; and USC School of Cinema-Television . In addition to screenwriting and production awards, there are now prizes in animation and a first feature film.
Yes! Somebody gets it! And Somebody with resources. Anyway, some students took on the challenge. They are required to seek out a real scientist, and get them to read the work and comment. Well, they found me. (I guess there were no real scientists willing to do this, so a string theorist will have to do. LOL!) Well, I did this with one student last year, and it turned into a really fun and informative series of conversations where we both learned a lot. Me about the process and contraints involved in writing for the entertainment industry, and the student about what science and scientists are like. I've also spoken about this sort of thing in the context of the (later) playwriting project I got involved in later last last year, about which I've blogged here and here, and will tell you more later. This year, three of them found me (apparently the University's improved online experts directory is beginning to kick in), and so I had my work cut out for me. Just as happened last year, it was a real pleasure. My initial thought was that I was going to have to cringe my way through this (bear in mind that several of these young hopefuls have never ever spoken to a scientist before....part of the problem in the industry is that fact right there.....) and then I started reading and in each case I was just hooked. First reaction...."Wow, she/he can really write!", and the second reaction... "They've taken the time to try to understand and incorporate the science!" How can I not try to help and encourage further? So as it has been a series of spectacular days outdoors here on campus weatherwise, between classes and meetings I decided to go and hide and sit in the sun near a fountain and a tree and really dig through these screenplays. This took a while, including some reading on a couple of bus trips to and from home (yes, one of those great uses of public transport I go on and on about), red pen at the ready. Then I had a series of meetings with each student in turn. Both yesterday and today were really nice too, and so I decided to make them all meetings in the cafe over in the Business School. Why? Nice space, and I recently discovered (during a meeting on Monday with KC Cole about another matter I'll tell you about later) the delights of vanilla frozen yogurts with rainbow sprinkles on a hot day; They serve them there. Fantastic! (Why had I not discovered frozen yogurts before? And I just felt like a kid again with the rainbow sprinkles...) [Actually, one of the meeting was with a Hagen-Dasz vanilla icecream bar on a bench out on campus. Did not want the staff at the cafe to have to refuse to serve me my fourth frozen yogurt in as many days.] The meetings were great. Yesterday, I met first with Bradley Richie, and then with Nick Lawrence. Today I met with Jules DiBiase. In each case, I was able to talk with them in detail about how they came to do the project, what they intended to do, what they were thinking about in constructing their scenes, settings, metaphors (if that is what they were going for) with the science, what issue they were trying to make contact with in writing this particular character, etc. I explained a bit of the science behind things they were trying to bring out sometimes, which helped them go and modify something they had written. That latter process was relatively rare compared to the amount of times I simply was just congratulating and encouraging them in what they had already done. These were really good (in some cases, simply excellent) pieces of work on which I was in the end very happy to sign off. I wish them luck. Even if they don't get the grants, the process will have been valuable. When they are rich and powerful producers, writers, or directors, in some part of the Industry, they will remember their time spent thinking about how to make science and scientists work in dramatic settings. They will remember having worked with a scientist a little bit. I'm sure that it will inform their decisions positively. -cvj
