Overheard at... Starbucks

"He makes so much money that if he dropped a $100 bill he wouldn’t even stop to pick it up"

There are many jobs that come to mind when you hear a quote like this. The ‘he’ in question could be an investment banker, for instance. Or an oil tycoon. He could be the founder of Facebook or a professional athlete. But I’d bet that for many, when we hear that someone makes a lot of money in their job, one of the main industries we think of is the media.

We have many stereotypes around the media industry: Its hubs are California and NYC. Actors must first be waiters/waitresses and or sleep their way in before making it big. It’s all about the money.

In June Romancing the Genres will be hosting some fantastic play and screen writers. So it seems like the perfect time to break some of these myths. How did they land in this specific area of writing? What drew them to it and how did they get there? Where do they live and do the $ flow like a river of lava? And, most importantly, what are the key ingredients to writing for the stage or screen and how are they different from or the same as writing a novel?

Yesterday I watched the movie, Out of Africa. I had not seen it in many years, and as I sat there, mesmerized by the scenery and by the tension between the actors, I thought about what it would take to create such a quiet movie. Like in visual art, it is not only the color, but also the white space that form the message. That white space assumes the viewers share a similar context and help to drive the tension between what is known and what is merely guessed at.

My guess is that our June writers were driven to this form of media by the added ability to work in that white space and not as much by the monetary potential. But, until June, I’ll have to live with the tension of not knowing for sure.

Deanne Wilsted
Author of Betting Jessica and Untangling the Knot
www.deannewilsted.com