Adventures in the Screen Trade: A Personal View of Hollywood and Screenwriting

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Which Lie Did I Tell?: More Adventures in the Screen Trade is a work of non-fiction first published in 2000 by novelist and screenwriter William Goldman. It is the follow-up to his 1982 book Adventures in the Screen Trade. The book is divided into three parts. "Part One: Hollywood Realities" is a collection of essays on various subjects ranging from movie stars and studio executives to his thoughts on how to begin and end a screenplay and how to write for a movie star.

In this sequel to screenwriter William Goldman's first memoir, "Adventures In The Screen Trade", basically carrying his memoirs forward to the time period 1980-2000, Goldman captures the appeal and basic readability and charm of volume one. I think it's marginally inferior to its first book, but it's still very good.

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Over the years I have met and worked with a dozen prize-winning American directors, and there is not one whose “philosophy” or “worldview” remotely interests me. The total amount of what they have to “say” cannot cover the bottom of even a small teacup.” Ha! The book is filled with that kind of thing. It's not mean, just honest.

Goldman shares many wonderful inside stories, and he settles some old scores. I came away from the book convinced that no one in Hollywood can be trusted, and everyone acts in their self interest, especially famous stars like Robert Redford and Dustin Hoffman. Sure, Goldman has some nice things to say about Paul Newman, Richard Attenborough, and Joseph E. Levine, but generally Hollywood is a nest of vipers.What I love about this book is that he shows you good scripts, but he doesn’t just leave it at “Write like that!”. He also goes into the specifics of what makes it work. He also shows examples of scripts and ideas that DON’T work and explains why — at least why HE can’t make them work and that’s an important point he makes throughout the book. That there is no ‘one-true-way’ that will work for every idea and every scriptwriter. Actors in interviews always present themselves as charming, poised, and self-deprecatingly humorous. It’s an act. They’re actors, acting. The structure of "Adventures In the Screen Trade" is very odd. Chapters start with one topic, then go off into tangents in sections that are highlighted in grey. Why grey? I still don't know. Also, Goldman's short-hand got on my nerves after a while. He'd say "Mr. Warner" instead of Warner Bros. At times he uses one-name monikers as opposed to full names.

What is wonderful about this example is that it is set up as if there is a ‘right’ or ‘wrong’ answer in how the script should continue, but it’s made very clear is that it could go ANYWAY! Is the second-rateness of the world right now going to drag us storytellers down? The answer is, I don’t know; but I do know we have to try harder. It’s easier, as the audience dumbs down and expects less, to be satisfied with less than our best work.” Amen. This is definitely one of them. Fascinating stories about ups, downs, hits and flops, and how it affected him as a person. Now I’m at the point where I like this book so much I have to deliberately slow myself down reading it cause I want it to last longer. Part Two: Adventures" has stories from 11 projects that Goldman has been involved with, from Charly and Masquerade, to the Academy Award-winning Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid and All the President's Men, to some projects that remained unrealised, such as a musical remake of Grand Hotel.

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Whether you're interested in specific films, an insider's look at Hollywood, or simply care about engagingly told anecdotes, you'll find something interesting here. I particularly recommend it for new writers--not just of screenplays, but any type of writing--who may need encouragement or just a sense of fellow-feeling, because Goldman failed at his college writing classes and sent out hundreds of queries before selling his first novel and felt about as much of a failure as it's possible to be. While I wouldn't want to take his path, his experience reveals the commonalities all writers share. I’m starting to see a pattern. If I really like a book, I don’t bother writing notes about it cause I just like to read it. Access-restricted-item true Addeddate 2022-01-22 12:07:26 Bookplateleaf 0002 Boxid IA40334723 Camera USB PTP Class Camera Collection_set printdisabled External-identifier

urn:lcp:adventuresinscre0000gold_p2j4:epub:24115407-1e08-415d-843f-8d5dcc08d331 Foldoutcount 0 Identifier adventuresinscre0000gold_p2j4 Identifier-ark ark:/13960/s26424t8ggb Invoice 1652 Isbn 034910705X Enter Hollywood’s inner sanctums in this gosippy and honest book, named one the top 100 film books of all time by The Hollywood Reporter, by the Academy Award-winning screenwriter and bestselling author of The Primcess Bride.Goldman also wrote a series of memoirs about his professional life on Broadway and in Hollywood. [The first of these was this book, "ADVENTURES IN THE SCREEN TRADE".] In the middle section, Goldman gets a little personal, sharing stories about his life in the biz, working with larger-than-life names like Laurence Olivia, Robert Redford, and Dustin Hoffman. He also digs into why he believes some of his films failed. What impressed me so much about Earnie (as another commentator called him) and, now, William Goldman, too, is that they're such sweethearts. Such truly kind and caring (about the whole human race) people. Yes, they're funny, but they're not only funny because they like being funny but also because they care, and they're smart enough to know that one of the most effective ways to scare people into being nicer, is to hit them in the funny bone.