Screenwriter Derek Kolstad is best known for creating the John Wick franchise. His latest film Nobody stars Bob Odenkirk as the hapless Hutch Mansell is in the same action-comedy wheelhouse as the action films he grew up with.
We asked him how Odenkirk came to be involved in the project.
“Bob reached out to me after watching John Wick and wanted to do something that wasn’t exactly Falling Down, Taken, or Michael Douglas,” said Kolstad. “He wanted to do something with soul, levity, and humor with his character in Nobody.” Odenkirk also coaxed more humorous aspects of the film from other characters to set its tone.
Movie ideas come from the most unusual places. Nobody was no exception. “The day before I met with Bob, I had a dream of a ‘The Third Man’ [the 1949 film] black and white shot of Bob sitting behind a table getting beaten up. Bob reaches into a pocket and draws a packet of cigarettes. Then he grabs a kitten from another pocket, a can of tuna and a can opener. The aggressor asks Bob, ‘Who the fuck are you?’ and he replies ‘I’m Nobody.‘”
Derek told Bob his dream and it became the opening scene of the film. After Odenkirk was on board, Kolstad began writing the screenplay immediately. “We wanted to show a man who was crushed by life. He loved his family and his job, but there was a disconnect between them and his life.”
The first act of the screenplay was thirty-seven pages to cover the set up of Hutch’s life. There is no action, only learning about him and his detachment from everyone and everything. “Suddenly you had this unspoken montage progressing through the days of the week in the film.”
Derek Kolstad (Photo by Shannon Cottrell)
The majority of the first draft remained intact through to the shooting script. “The foundation of Nobody was set in the first draft.” The deleted scenes were either not filmed or edited out mainly due to budgetary constraints rather than to tighten the story.
Bob Odenkirk was so invested in Hutch Mansell’s character, he became Derek Kolstad bona fide ghost writer. Derek cites an example where he simply wrote a scene when Hutch and his wife Becca (Connie Nielsen) slept apart due to marital strife. Bob brought in the subtle elements of Becca putting a pillow barricade between them.
David Mansell, Hutch’s father (Christopher Lloyd) also added many nuances to the film. “Nothing is biblical,” added Kolstad because so much footage can be fixed in post-production.
Who’s a Nobody?
Action heroes typically star an Everyman rather than a Nobody. Bob initially explored this concept to reflect becoming famous later in life. “There are days before you break in and you’re standing in line at Whole Foods [grocery store] thinking ‘Is this it? I feel like a Nobody doing nothing all the time.'” He wanted to capture the feeling of nobody listening to him or being aware of his existence. There were casual dismissive comments that were made previously in Hutch’s life which made an impact. “These moments are still with us.”
A large part of Hutch’s journey is demonstrated in his bombastic violence so people might take notice of his existence. As a counter to his excessive force, Hutch cheekily squeaks, “Maybe I over-corrected?” We expect the major curveballs in life so we can prepare for them to some extent. It’s the little things that set us off. Hutch included.
Team Kolstad and Odenkirk struck a fine character balance in generating empathy for Hutch. “He wasn’t pathetic or pitiful. He’s detached and unsure of himself. You can’t go too dark with a character or there’s no coming back. If you go too light, you become too Gene Autry as a singing cowboy.” Derek likes to play with these tropes while paying homage to the black and white classics movies which influenced his writing voice.
Kolstad has largely built his screenwriting career in the action genre. “I love the cathartic notion of having fun.” Action movies are timeless and are perceived differently through various stages in life. He cites Die Hard as an example. “When you’re twelve or thirteen you see it as an action film. When you’re in you’re twenties you see John McClane still in love with his ex-wife and wanting to reconcile.”
The screenwriter finds these moments in high-octane action films the most satisfying. “That’s why we love these characters. There’s a little heart and soul amidst the chaos.” He also loves the world-building of the genre which raises the potential to write spin-off movies.
Action movies are what I want the guy at the lectern preaching to me
Once Derek cements the soul of the script for Nobody on the page, the action begins and he can really have fun. “I wrote the treatment fast and furious.” He defined the treatment as “either two-thirds of a movie or five movies.” Then he searched for the pulse of the film which admittedly took a while. The writing process was equally fast because everyone had a clear vision of Nobody. During its five year gestation, Kolstad pitched it around town until it finally found a home.
As he did rewrites, he folded in additional subplots and character layers. “In an action movie you spend far more time on everything but the action.” Kolstad is especially inspired by films with minimal dialogue where you know exactly what every character is doing through gestures. They are slow burn movies and then one character goes too far setting of a spiral of events.
Kolstad doesn’t aim to set new ground with his films. Every story has been told before. “If it’s done with a sense of endearment with a slight shift in perspective, it works as a new film. There’s no reinvention. Nobody is a love letter to everything you’ve seen that’s made you who you are,” he mused.
Derek Kolstad grew up in the Mid-West and always knew he wanted to write movies. He read The Maltese Falcon, Alistair McLean, Tom Clancy and all the spy-action-adventure novels he could get his hands on. He added his love of video games to shape his hyperbolic style of action. He cites Robocop (1987) as a seminal action film which influenced his writing. “Once you go down that creative standpoint, everything becomes a potential movie from that lens.”
Every screenplay he writes must toggle the familiar with the unique. It’s all about his take on a movie people have seen before.
The writer doesn’t settle on a single writing process for each screenplay. Sometimes he writes in long hand, other times he writes a treatment, and other times he starts the screenplay straight away. “Every day I like to open a brand new file, type in ‘Fade In’ and see what happens. I like to see where my imagination meanders. What I write is me,” he pondered.
In conclusion, Kolstad offers his advice of brevity to other screenwriters. “Cut out dialogue. Pare your script down a few pages.” He has no issue with emulating his favorite screenwriters, but you run the risk of becoming a cheap version of them. “At a certain point you find your voice and break away from your heroes.“
