In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:

14 So You Want to Be in Pictures? One evening after my USC class was over, one of my students approached me. Thin, emaciated, skin too pale, he looked like death lurking. He said his name was Dan O’Bannon. His cheeks were sunken, his color pallid, his eyes dull. He handed me a screenplay and asked if I would read it. I assured him I would and asked him if he was ill. “I haven’t eaten in two days,” he replied, his voice quiet as a tomb. “I have enough money for dinner tonight and that’s it.” I took his script and asked him to call me the next morning. When I got home I started reading The Devil in Mexico by Dan O’Bannon. His dialogue was often brilliant, but his storytelling skills were quite poor. Still, this was a young talent the likes of which I had not seen in years. This kid could really write. When he phoned the next morning, I invited him to come out to my house for lunch. He gratefully accepted. As soon as he arrived he asked for some food, not trying to hide his embarrassment. I took a package of hot dogs out of the fridge 254 255 SoYou Want to Be in Pictures? and, without waiting for me to warm them, he ravenously wolfed them down. I could not convince him they would be better heated. As he ate, I asked him the history of the screenplay. He had shopped it around but could not get an agent to represent him. Nobody liked the script. He didn’t know what to do. He had to get a job, but he was dedicated to making a career for himself as a filmmaker , no matter what. It is this “no matter what” quality that is often the difference between the highly successful and the also-rans, especially in Hollywood. O’Bannon explained that he suffered from a rare disease that produces severe abdominal inflammation and accompanying pain. Doctors had told him it was inflammatory bowel syndrome, and it was genetic. His mother had bequeathed it to him along with her cruelty, according to Dan. There was no cure, merely palliative treatment for the excruciating pain when the attacks came on. For O’Bannon, poverty and pain were nuisances he would endure as the price of success. “Every dime I can scrape together goes to pay doctors,” he told me, with some bitterness. But he hoped to get an agent with this script and maybe someday even sell The Devil in Mexico. I told him what I thought was wrong with the script and how I felt it could be fixed. It needed a major rewrite. He explained he’d put so much time in on it he had neither the energy nor the enthusiasm to make the considerable changes I’d suggested, though he heartily agreed with all of them. “Why don’t you do it?” he asked me. “It’ll be like a new script, anyway. We’ll share credit.” I had such a clear idea of how to restructure the script and rewrite one of the two major characters that I agreed, telling him it would take me several weeks. “I don’t care,” O’Bannon replied, “take all the time you like; it’s not going anywhere the way it is.” The next day I began my rewrite of O’Bannon’s script. He had written a fictionalized account of the disappearance of the famous writer and newspaper man Ambrose Bierce. Bierce had attained national prominence for his short stories (“An Occurrence at Owl Creek Bridge,” among others) as well as many books and articles. He became known for the bitter and cynical tone of his writings, especially The Devil’s Dictionary, published in 1906. Having tried mining for gold, writing a newspaper column, and whatever else struck his fancy, Bierce headed off into Mexico in 1913 to find and interview the then-infamous bandit Pancho Villa. It was presumed but not confirmed that Bierce was killed in Ojinaga, Mexico, in 1914. O’Bannon’s premise was that Bierce actually caught up and rode with Villa. His screenplay was essentially the dialogue between a cynical old man (Bierce) and an idealistic but ruthless revolutionary (Villa). Dan had written Bierce brilliantly, the bitterness and cynicism of the old man was so vivid that the character had to be Ambrose Bierce brought to life. Unfortunately...

Share