This article is featured in the Novemeber/December issue of
Creative Screenwriting Magazine.
The Vampire Slayer
Melissa Rosenberg flexes her own powers to adapt cult favorite
Twilight for the screen.
the hairs on your arms. When a genuine pop culture phenomenon is
in the wind, you might look around and see people everywhere
reading the same book or come across odd stories in the news of
hordes of people traveling to some out-of-the-way hamlet where a
fictional story takes place, just to be closer to the world an
author created. Such is the case with the upcoming movie
Twilight, which by all indications could become the biggest young-
female-driven pop-cultural event since Leo and Kate broke box-
office records with Titanic.
most everyone knows by now, it’s based on author Stephenie
Meyer’s series of bestselling books, two of which are currently
occupying slots in the top 10 of the New York Times bestseller
list.
is inarguably a female version. It’s about Bella, an ordinary,
ungainly new girl in town who captures the attention of Edward
Cullen, the most enigmatic, tormented and gorgeous guy at school,
only to uncover his deep secret – that he just happens to be a
vampire.
he’ll hurt her, and you set off a Romeo-and-Juliet-level
melodrama propelled by risky declarations, noble self-sacrifice
and dangerous, heroically restrained lust.
Machiavellian struggle, but that wasn’t the case. Writer Melissa
Rosenberg says she was going about her business as a writer-
producer on the Showtime series Dexter when she got a call from
Eric Feig, President of Production at Summit Entertainment. “He
asked me what I thought of teens and vampires, and I said, ‘I
love teens and vampires.’ I really do,” Rosenberg says. “Buffy
the Vampire Slayer is one of the best shows ever on television,
in my opinion.”
to write its sequel, she was concerned she might not hear from
Summit again. She was wrong, but the new opportunity came with a
hitch – the pending writers’ strike meant there was no time to
lose.
real work is in the outline – that’s the true blank page,” says
Rosenberg, whose talent for a quick turnaround comes from years
as a writer and producer on shows like Dexter, The O.C. and Party
of Five. “When you work collaboratively with people like you do
in TV, you want to make sure that everybody knows what you’re
going to do and signs off on it.”
an understanding colleague to take over on her Dexter episode,
she plunged into the job. That meant full immersion in the world
of the story – the rain-soaked Northwest town of Forks,
Washington, where Bella has come to live with her divorced dad,
and the enigma of her moody, pale-skinned classmate Edward, who
seems to loathe her even as they’re magnetically drawn together.
Hardwicke (Thirteen, Lords of Dogtown) was casting the movie and
giving her immediate feedback on each act as she finished it.
“She’d respond within an hour or so,” Rosenberg says. “We were
running on adrenaline, and she wanted to get the movie made every
bit as much as I did.” In the end, Rosenberg says, she turned in
a first draft that was green-lit with time to spare and completed
a rewrite two hours before the strike bell tolled.
detailed,” Rosenberg says. “The biggest challenge was
externalizing it.”
Edward’s vampire family, and a pack of unfriendly, human-hunting
vampires shows up to threaten her. “They just pop up,” Rosenberg
says. “In the movie, I wanted more suspense, more imminent doom.
I decided to weave them all through it. What were they doing
before they showed up on the baseball field? What were they up
to?” She invented a series of mysterious, grisly attacks and
their discovery by local law enforcement. Together with
Hardwicke, who creates a kind of rock’n’roll outsider style for
the evil vampires, she also amped up the action for high-flying
scenes like the one where Edward races through the treetops with
Bella clinging to him, or the climactic fight scene between the
evil and good vampires after they chase Bella back to her Arizona
hometown. “There aren’t a lot of women writing action films, not
because we don’t want to, but because they don’t really let us
in,” she says. “But I’ve written on a number of shows that are
action-oriented and on dark shows like Dexter.”
with her certainty that he must be a vampire. “That was my
midpoint,” she says. “In the book, it happens when they’re
driving in a car, but I really wanted it to be that she confronts
him and drives the action as a strong protagonist. She has to
say, ‘Here’s what I know.’”
The rest of the article continues with a biography of Ms.
Rosenberg. One last comment from the article for all the lady
authors out there:
generation coming up behind me, and I think they have a shot,”
she says.
Amy Dawes, is the editor of Creative Screenwriting Magazine.
She's also a produced screenwriter (Zoe) and a published author
("Sunset Boulevard: Cruising the Heart of Los Angeles").
Creative Screenwriting Magazine.
The Vampire Slayer
Melissa Rosenberg flexes her own powers to adapt cult favorite
Twilight for the screen.
- Every so often, in observing pop culture, the sense of
the hairs on your arms. When a genuine pop culture phenomenon is
in the wind, you might look around and see people everywhere
reading the same book or come across odd stories in the news of
hordes of people traveling to some out-of-the-way hamlet where a
fictional story takes place, just to be closer to the world an
author created. Such is the case with the upcoming movie
Twilight, which by all indications could become the biggest young-
female-driven pop-cultural event since Leo and Kate broke box-
office records with Titanic.
- In suburban bedrooms everywhere, calendars are being crossed
most everyone knows by now, it’s based on author Stephenie
Meyer’s series of bestselling books, two of which are currently
occupying slots in the top 10 of the New York Times bestseller
list.
- Maybe it’s the imbalance of male teen fantasies at movie
is inarguably a female version. It’s about Bella, an ordinary,
ungainly new girl in town who captures the attention of Edward
Cullen, the most enigmatic, tormented and gorgeous guy at school,
only to uncover his deep secret – that he just happens to be a
vampire.
- Add that Edward is immortal and has enormous powers of
he’ll hurt her, and you set off a Romeo-and-Juliet-level
melodrama propelled by risky declarations, noble self-sacrifice
and dangerous, heroically restrained lust.
- This stuff is like crack to teenage girls: just go online and
- With such a high degree of visibility at stake, you might
Machiavellian struggle, but that wasn’t the case. Writer Melissa
Rosenberg says she was going about her business as a writer-
producer on the Showtime series Dexter when she got a call from
Eric Feig, President of Production at Summit Entertainment. “He
asked me what I thought of teens and vampires, and I said, ‘I
love teens and vampires.’ I really do,” Rosenberg says. “Buffy
the Vampire Slayer is one of the best shows ever on television,
in my opinion.”
- Rosenberg had worked for Summit before – she co-wrote the
to write its sequel, she was concerned she might not hear from
Summit again. She was wrong, but the new opportunity came with a
hitch – the pending writers’ strike meant there was no time to
lose.
- She began work in August 2007 and delivered a detailed,
real work is in the outline – that’s the true blank page,” says
Rosenberg, whose talent for a quick turnaround comes from years
as a writer and producer on shows like Dexter, The O.C. and Party
of Five. “When you work collaboratively with people like you do
in TV, you want to make sure that everybody knows what you’re
going to do and signs off on it.”
- They did – and told her she had five weeks to deliver a
- “I said, ‘Five weeks? It can’t be done!’” Rosenberg recalls.
an understanding colleague to take over on her Dexter episode,
she plunged into the job. That meant full immersion in the world
of the story – the rain-soaked Northwest town of Forks,
Washington, where Bella has come to live with her divorced dad,
and the enigma of her moody, pale-skinned classmate Edward, who
seems to loathe her even as they’re magnetically drawn together.
- It was a race to write the first draft. “I worked seven days
Hardwicke (Thirteen, Lords of Dogtown) was casting the movie and
giving her immediate feedback on each act as she finished it.
“She’d respond within an hour or so,” Rosenberg says. “We were
running on adrenaline, and she wanted to get the movie made every
bit as much as I did.” In the end, Rosenberg says, she turned in
a first draft that was green-lit with time to spare and completed
a rewrite two hours before the strike bell tolled.
- No slender volume, the first book, called Twilight, 498
detailed,” Rosenberg says. “The biggest challenge was
externalizing it.”
- She also added more doses of menace and action. In the book,
Edward’s vampire family, and a pack of unfriendly, human-hunting
vampires shows up to threaten her. “They just pop up,” Rosenberg
says. “In the movie, I wanted more suspense, more imminent doom.
I decided to weave them all through it. What were they doing
before they showed up on the baseball field? What were they up
to?” She invented a series of mysterious, grisly attacks and
their discovery by local law enforcement. Together with
Hardwicke, who creates a kind of rock’n’roll outsider style for
the evil vampires, she also amped up the action for high-flying
scenes like the one where Edward races through the treetops with
Bella clinging to him, or the climactic fight scene between the
evil and good vampires after they chase Bella back to her Arizona
hometown. “There aren’t a lot of women writing action films, not
because we don’t want to, but because they don’t really let us
in,” she says. “But I’ve written on a number of shows that are
action-oriented and on dark shows like Dexter.”
- Rosenberg’s favorite scripted scene is the one she set in a
with her certainty that he must be a vampire. “That was my
midpoint,” she says. “In the book, it happens when they’re
driving in a car, but I really wanted it to be that she confronts
him and drives the action as a strong protagonist. She has to
say, ‘Here’s what I know.’”
The rest of the article continues with a biography of Ms.
Rosenberg. One last comment from the article for all the lady
authors out there:
- Rosenberg says mentoring and encouraging newer women writers
generation coming up behind me, and I think they have a shot,”
she says.
Amy Dawes, is the editor of Creative Screenwriting Magazine.
She's also a produced screenwriter (Zoe) and a published author
("Sunset Boulevard: Cruising the Heart of Los Angeles").
| Twilight |
| By Amy Dawes |
For more on Twilight, check out these websites:
For the full article, pick up Creative Screenwriting wherever
books are sold, or check their website.
For the full article, pick up Creative Screenwriting wherever
books are sold, or check their website.
| Copyright © 2007 | www.booksandwands.com | All Rights Reserved No copyright infringement intended of any and all source material. Harry Potter belongs to JK Rowling, Bloomsbury, Scholastic and Warner Brothers Entertainment. The Twilight Saga belongs to Stephenie Meyer, her publishing house, Summit Entertainment, Maverick Films and their distributors. |
| The Ultimate Harry Potter Analysis Source |
| Choosing what is Right over what is Easy |
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