/ 9 April 1998

Putting words into action

Adam Haupt

The South African Screenwriters’ Laboratory (Scrawl) is one of those laboratories which South Africa’s Oh Schucks … society would never have imagined possible during the crocodile years. In fact, many film makers (and those trying to break into the predominantly white male industry) still whinge quite tearfully that the future of filmmaking is positively negative.

If Scrawl’s first laboratory – underwritten by African Media Entertainment and funded by the Department of Arts, Culture, Science and Technology, M-Net and the British Council – is anything to go by, the stakes are bound to change soon.

Scrawl’s director, Liza Key, was the director of the Mail & Guardian Film Festival from 1987 to 1994, as well as the founder of the M&G Short Film Competition and Limits of Liberty Festival.

She’s confident that the laboratory will contribute to the development of good screenwriters in South Africa – and she recalls film courses which were presented in the past to make her point.

“You know how it used to be in the old days? We used to have the missionary kind of funded [courses] … teach the blacks how to write a script, teach the orphans how to write a script, teach the blind …This is absolutely professional.”

The laboratory owes its conception to an exchange between Key and Susan Benn, the director of Performing Arts Laboratory (Pal) in the United Kingdom. Pal, which was founded around 1990 to develop screenwriters and writers in fields such as theatre, opera and dance, differs from previous courses because it is not reserved for people who can pay, but for writers who display potential. The writers are often nominated by the industry and 10 scripts are chosen from about 70. Benn recommended Colin Vaines – head of production and development at The Film Consortium – who directs Pal’s laboratories, to direct Scrawl’s first laboratory.

Vaines, who produces independent films through his company, Synchronistic Pictures has worked with David Puttnam at Columbia Pictures and his latest film, B Monkey, was co-produced for Miramax.

The laboratories, says Vaines, are inspired by the Sundance model and involve the use of actors. South African actors worked through the screenwriters’ scripts so that the chasm between a good performance and a good piece of writing could be narrowed. What became evident was that a good looking script does not guarantee a great movie.

Actors Nomkhita Bavuma, Mark Hoeben, Shaun Arnolds, Michele Burgers, Vusi Kunene, and June van Merch were directed by Alan Rickman, known in these parts as a British stage and screen actor, particularly since his entry into Hollywood with Die Hard. He has starred in Robin Hood Prince of Thieves, Michael Collins and Sense and Sensibility and recently made his directorial debut with The Winter Guest.

The mentors were Chloe King, an American screenwriter who worked with Vaines on B Monkey, and Jim Barton, a Scottish screenwriter who has worked mainly in Europe and Australia. Vaines feels it is important to bring in a fusion of American and European energies through the mentors. He managed to get the gender balance right, but his attempts to introduce a black voice failed because the appointed mentor could not make it here in time.

The writers were Barry Berk, John Fredericks, Mathew Krouse, John Matshikiza, Mtutuzeli Matshoba, Malcolm Purkey, Anthony Rogers, Dennis Rubel, Catherine Stewart, Brian Tilley, Nadine Zylstra and Eugene Bamnhegyi.

According to Key, the writers were representative along racial lines without the organisers having to do much engineering. She does, however, point out that a mere 10 of the 80 applicants were women and that she would like to see more women applying in the future.

Vaines’s confidence in the potential of Scrawl is supported by the success which Pal has enjoyed. Two of Pal’s students were nominated for Oscars – John Hodge for Trainspotting and Simon Beaufort for The Full Monty. But, says Vaines, the laboratories are not as interested in producing good scripts as it is in producing good writers. The notion of process is therefore valued above the delivery of a single product.

Generally, the writers’ responses were very positive. Mtutuzeli Matshoba said this could be the “beginning of writers opening up to one another, rather than trying to get there first with half-finished scripts.”

Time will tell whether a new day is dawning in South Africa’s celluloid nation. Perhaps with good screenwriters producing good scripts, investor confidence in South African film may strengthen.

In this regard, the sponsors of Scrawl represent the sort of bold initiative which is needed in an industry which, too often, has been wary of taking risks.