In Ben Younger’s Bleed for This, Miles Teller steps into the ring to play Vinny Pazienza, the Rhode Island boxer who won three titles after breaking his neck in a horrific car accident.

Best known for his work on Boiler Room (2000) and Prime (2005), writer-director Ben Younger connected with the uplifting comeback story after his own ten-year hiatus from Hollywood.

Creative Screenwriting chatted with Ben about the pros and cons of taking ten years off from screenwriting, boxing films as parables, and choosing what to tell.

What led you into screenwriting?

I was working in politics. I hated my job—hated it. I worked on a movie set as a gopher where I was just getting coffee, but I realized there were other options.

I grew up in a pretty traditional, New York Jewish family, so there wasn’t a lot of attention spent on the arts. No one ever said, “Oh, go be an artist.” It was more like “Learn a profession, keep your head down, and don’t get into trouble.”

It’s been nearly a decade since your last film. Can you tell us about your experiences since Boiler Room and Prime? I believe you spent time as a chef, a pilot, and a motorcycle racer?

After Prime, I tried very hard to get a movie made about the Isle of Man TT, which would have been a motorcycle-racing movie. I spent three years writing the script, and when I returned I assumed everyone would get on board the way they did with Boiler Room and Prime.

But it was my wake-up call that I had gotten very lucky in terms of the ease of setting up those first two films. Making them was still hard, but they made me think that setting a movie up wasn’t that big of a deal. So I tried, but I couldn’t get it made. Then I tried another project and I couldn’t get that made.

So then I was like, “Oh shit, this is why everybody scratches and claws their way to try and make it in this business.” I didn’t have the appropriate amount of gratitude. That’s what did it.

I took these ten years off and I got my pilot’s license. I did all of those things. I have 300 hours now as a pilot. I cooked at my friend’s restaurant in Costa Rica, at Mou Piece, and I raced bikes for a year professionally.

I had to step away so I could come back.

Why this one? Because this was basically my story. I think that’s why the boxing genre endures. It’s this huge parable that is accessible in how simplistic it is. It’s just two men fighting, but it works.

His story made me realize that I can get past this. I hadn’t made a movie in a while, but this guy broke his neck and came back and won three world titles. You’re going to be fine.

Where did you begin the research for this story?

Rhode Island. Basically, with this movie, I was as much of a journalist as a screenwriter. There were lots of great people to talk to. Vinny’s parents had passed on but Vinny has a great memory, and his sister is still around, so I talked to her.

For these people in Rhode Island who don’t have a sports franchise, Vinny is their guy. Everyone knows about every fight and they can tell you where they were when it took place. We went to the social hall next to the church, which is the place where Angelo (played by Ciarán Hinds) had actually been when he found out his son had been in a car accident and broken his neck.

We shot it in that place. There were guys in the room when we were shooting that were actually in there the night Angelo found out. There was so many people to talk to and so much reference material that it was kind of a dream to write this story.

How do you narrow that down? How do you choose what points to tell?

It’s the craft. It’s not a boxing movie for me at all. I’ve become a fan, but I didn’t get in this because I had to make a boxing movie. I couldn’t believe what this guy had come back from.

As a screenwriter, you start with the crash and the recovery and then you go forwards and backwards from there.

I knew I didn’t want to do big jumps in time. I didn’t want to do some sprawling biopic. I wanted to a show section of his life that incorporated the crash. Making decisions like that were not as difficult as you might think.

How did Miles Teller get involved with this project?

Because I picked him!

Did his portrayal in Whiplash put him on your radar?

It actually wasn’t out when we shot this. You have to remember that we shot this movie a long time ago.

You were waiting for the other boxing movies (Creed, Southpaw) to come out?

Right. Waiting for the smoke to clear. But I did see Spectacular Now. I saw that he had range and he looked like he could be a boxer. He’s not a pretty boy. He’s got the right swagger. It was everything I saw in him. He thinks that I took a risk on him and I like to continue to let him think that because he’s grateful, but there was no risk. I knew exactly what I was getting. It was not a difficult choice.

What were some of the cinematic influences for this film?

I didn’t go to film school, I’ve just watched thousands of movies. But did I look at anything as a reference material? No.

Martin Scorsese produced the film, so everyone asks about Raging Bull. We watched it, my DP Larkin Seiple (Swiss Army Man, Cop Car) and I, but I thought, “you know you’re not going to make Raging Bull, so what are you really getting from watching it?” We watched it more to psyche ourselves up because we both loved the film.

The film watching I did for this movie was all about cautionary tales for me. It was more of don’t do this, don’t do that, and don’t fall into that cliché. Don’t bow to that trope. It was about staying out of trouble.

Can you elaborate on a quote you gave to the LA Times? It reads, “Personal growth can show up on the screen or in your writing.”

It’s been twelve years since I’ve made a movie. I was very worried.

I like all of the stuff that I did. I enjoyed being a pilot and I love cooking. I had some very rich experiences. But the whole time I was worried that my contemporaries were all going to pass me by. Everyone was off making movies and I was making seabass.

I knew I was happy and I knew my life was better for it, but I was worried that I was going to get passed up. But in the prepping for this film, I realized that those ten years had shown up on screen. I didn’t know it beforehand, but you become a better person and you become a better filmmaker.

Is there anything that you wish you would have known earlier, or any advice you could pass on to help others in similar situations?

Screenwriters are lucky in one sense. It’s the hardest job because there’s no collaboration. You’re by yourself. But the upshot is that you own something so you have leverage.

You’re not going to have leverage based on who you are unless you’re something major. It’s hard to quantify your talent, but the joy of screenwriting is that you can have ten years off and get back in the game instantly by writing something somebody wants. The advice is to keep writing. It could be the next one.

What’s the most difficult step in the writing process?

Starting. The second draft is like peanuts. The most things happen in the second pass and it’s the easiest pass. The blank page kills me. You’re alone and you’ve got no one to talk to—just thinking about it makes me anxious. That’s why rewrites are fun. Somebody else did some work and you can make it better.

With all of the reference material, is it easier writing non-fiction than fiction?

For sure. Boiler Room had a lot of truth in it and there was a lot of research I did. Prime was pretty much a memoir. You know what else? Its like an authenticity barometer. You know these things happened so you feel comfortable moving forward because they actually happened.

When you writing fiction, you’re constantly asking yourself, “Is this believable?” I never would have made this story if it were fiction. I wouldn’t think people would have believed it, but it actually happened.

What do you think about Vinny’s struggle not to drink or take any drugs, including painkillers?

For a character, it’s great. As a human being, I don’t get it. Give me the lidocaine—are you kidding me?

The other day, Vinnie told me that that was still the most painful thing he ever experienced—getting those screws out.

Do you know why he was like that?

I think that’s part of why I told the story, but you’re asking the wrong question. I think the real question is, “Why did he go back and box?” “Why get the halo in the first place?”

There are plenty of other things he could have done. He’s not a dumb guy. There are probably fifty other things he could have done with his life. Do you have anything in your life that you would risk paralysis for that’s not a child? If you told me that either I couldn’t make movies any more or I could risk paralysis to do so, I’ll go paint houses and figure out the rest later. I want to walk.

I don’t know why, but I know that’s the story I want to tell.

This may be a spoiler, but can you talk a little about the very end of the movie? Does everything come down to simply doing the work?

I’m glad you mentioned that scene. That’s probably my favorite scene in the movie. It wasn’t written to go there. It was supposed to go before the Duran fight. When the reporter says, “They call this the great comeback in sports,” it’s referring to the Duran fight, which hasn’t happened yet.

But Miles killed it. I love what he did in that scene. It’s the one moment when you realize that Vinny has a sense of self, and he sits back and reflects. He doesn’t do that anywhere else in the movie. So when we shot it and I saw what Miles did with it, I knew it needed to be more than just the lead up to the fight.

The movie was supposed to end in the ring—hand in the air—what you would expect.

To answer your other question: Yes, I do think that’s true. It’s reductive, but I’m trying to inspire people here.

I like the fact that he basically said, “I’m not going to listen to all of this noise.” Lou told him he couldn’t get the fight insured. His friend told him that he was going to kill himself. And instead of engaging in a dialogue about it, which is what most people would do, he just went and did it.

Then there’s nothing to talk about. It’s done. It might be a bit reductive, but I love it, both as a theme for the movie and for life. Because there were people who told me that I might want to think about doing something else, when I didn’t make a movie for this long.

Featured image: Ciaran Hinds as Angelo Pazienza, Miles Teller as Vinny Pazienza and Aaron Eckhart as Kevin Rooney in Bleed for This. Photo credit: Seacia Pavao / Distributor: Open Road Films © Open Road Films

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