INTERVIEWS

“Writing To A Target Demographic Is Creative Suicide.” Writer-Director Wash Westmoreland Talks ‘Colette.’

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Writer-director Wash Westmoreland would describe his new film Colette as a period piece and a reflection of the times. According to the official description, “Colette is pushed by her husband to write novels under his name. Upon their success, she fights to make her talents known, challenging gender norms.

Colette, played by Keira Knightley, lived at the turn of the 20th Century. However, Colette is not just a film of its time. She was a forward thinker, which means her ideas on topics such as sexuality and gender are highly relevant in today’s world. Westmoreland thinks this contained biopic can highlight where to begin a story and where to end it.

My partner Richard Glatzer and I chose Colette’s first marriage (Dominic West) as being this natural narrative about a woman who was incredibly talented and struggling to be heard, and about a man who was doing everything he can to keep her down. The suspense is, when will she finally break free of him? asked Westmoreland.

Writing Colette is about taking all the stuff of life—all the complicated stuff and messy stuff—and distilling it into a cohesive narrative, said the filmmaker. Essentially, the writing duo decided to focus on this marriage, from the courtship until the end. “She did so many interesting things in here life, it was really difficult to decide what to leave in and what to take out. That’s a crucial decision when writing a biopic screenplay.”

During this ongoing filter, the screenwriters found the core of the story. Earlier drafts focused on the chronological story of events, but the ongoing drafts moved into themes of sexuality and Colette’s emergence as a writer trapped in an oppressive marriage. These themes were expressed through an affair in the film.

It becomes a movie about living very truthfully, which is something we see in the story. We see Colette live and speak her own truth,said Westmoreland.There are elements of feminism and critics of toxic masculinity too.As a queer filmmaker, these issues were important for the writer.

Creative Screenwriting Magazine

Wash Westmoreland

Ignoring The Target Audience

While there are obvious reference points for the LBGTQ community, as well as the #MeToo era of today’s worlds, Westmoreland’s focus wasn’t quite so narrow. When I write, I don’t really think about target audiences. Rich and I never thought about it. We just thought that if we found her interesting, others would too.”

“I don’t think about box office demographics while writing. I think about what makes a story work. As a side effect of the story working, it will connect to an audience. I feel that a story is accessible enough to connect, but at the same time, it has enough content and mystery, and keeps people thinking so it stays ahead of the audience. That’s all about screenwriting craft, rather than pleasing a demographic.

If anything, Westmoreland said the story might be for women over 35 who like period pieces,” but the actual praise came from fans across the globe, regardless of sexuality or preconceived film preferences. It’s a story for everyone because everyone has barriers in their lives and Colette is someone we see breaking barriers.”

In many stories about broken marriages, the narrative starts to turn and the character gets bogged down with the circumstances. With Colette, on the other hand, she decides to go to the stage. She gets this new burst of energy from her life force from performing. Her story came from how groundbreaking her life was.”

Westmoreland believes that Hollywood’s constant need to please a cinema demographic or target audience is “creative suicide.” The sequels and franchises have developed a process that removes some of the artistry found in independent films. “Film is really more about staying true to story and staying true to your characters.

Creating Relatable Characters

Westmoreland and Glatzer saw something unique in Colette as a character, but this also felt like the right time to bring her to the big screen. “There’s a seismic shift happening with gender roles in modern cinema. There’s so much of that, which was being reflected in these characters.”

In addition, the story of Colette is also about the unusual habits of writing such as being locked in a room. While an individual will often have a great deal to say, it’s quite difficult to find the right words to express these thoughts on the page. As screenwriters, this theory also greatly appealed to the duo.

As writers, we’re always dealing with it. We have to go to that place where you have to switch to there and go to a place where you can beat your story down into something. There’s physicality and a pleasure to doing that. We’re all in the same boat with that issue. I have been very lucky, with Colette, to work with Rich. In having a co-writer, there’s a dialogue to the way a script evolves.

Glatzer actually passed away during the writing process in 2015 and Rebecca Lenkiewicz (Ida, Disobedience) came on board with a new vision for the film. What makes me special as a writer is having good co-writers,joked Westmoreland.Two very good relationships helped this script come into its final form.”

When writing a film such as Colette, Westmoreland likes to think how the final product may alter future conversations outside the cinema. There are so many things in the world right now that need to be focused on and talked about. So, with films like Still Alice, Quinceañera, or Colette, I want to have something to say about an issue that is really important today.”

The film Still Alice—which stars Julianne Moore, Alec Baldwin, and Kristen Stewart—was also adapted by Westmoreland and Glatzer. When asked about the process of adapting a novel into a screenplay, Westmoreland replied The template was laid out and the adaptation happened very fast,” said the writer-director. “Richard and I wrote it in about five weeks…where the second draft went into production.

Creative Screenwriting Magazine

Julianne Moore in Still Alice

The “lightning in a bottle” spark of Still Alice came about for various reasons. Julianne Moore quickly signed on and Glatzer was actually living with ALS at the time of the writing process. Glatzer was able to put aspects of his own reality into the piece to make the screenplay as powerful as possible. Meanwhile, Colette took around twenty drafts over seventeen years for it it reach production.

Researching Historical Characters

Colette wrote a lot and that was the best place to start, added the screenwriter. The team read various biographies about Colette, visited some of the places she lived and worked, and they also stayed at a friend’s semi-abandoned house in her neighborhood, with no phone or Internet, so they could focus solely on the project.

It had a lot to do with distilling all of this research and the feel of the 19th Century and early 20th Century. So, we also read authors like Marcel Proust to capture the richness of that society. It was all about reading these books and becoming absorbed within the time period as early as we possible could. We weren’t writing about the past, we were writing about these people we had a relationship with.”

During one of their hunts, they were looking for a historic house that no one in the town seemed to be able to confirm or deny existed. Glatzer suggested they head to a local bookshop. The local bookkeeper drew a map of the town and the house. The screenwriting duo actually found the abandoned house, climbed the gate, and went in to see Colette’s garden and home.

It was completely dilapidated but there was a single red rose in the garden. It was unbelievable that the place fell into despair when so much history happened there. We spent the afternoon just wandering around, peering into the windows.” This in-depth research helped develop the tone of Colette’s story.

The French film, told in English, required a specific feel. For Westmoreland, he knew the genres of Marie Antoinette or Moulin Rouge! were too gaudy and wouldn’t fit with the subjects of this film. As such, the writers knew they had to create a tone that would work for their witty, quick characters.

We had fun with it. We’d write scenes, but we’d look for a humor within their forms of expression that was true to them, but also explained this creative relationship. They were sparking each other with their levels of wit.

Defining The Voice Of A Film

We don’t take a critical distance. We invest in our characters and see them as real, breathing people. We get on the side of our lead character in our minds. We look to humanism and the positivity of life, mused the screenwriter. “All of our films are about underdogs who have things against them in society. I think that was as true to our own life experiences to find that point of connection.”

Viewers of Westmoreland’s work may define his brand as LGBTQ. While he understands the label, he doesn’t believe the work should be defined as a single entity. “There’s a queer viewpoint, but they’re about heterosexual characters. It’s a mix of sex, race, class—so I don’t separate those. I don’t see it as a separate enclosure. I see it a part of the world.”

Westmoreland sees his “queer perspective in heterosexual characters” as a fresh viewpoint in film. For at least fifty years, most films were created within a white straight male perspective. Now, films are showcasing a different viewpoint on the world. It’s a viewpoint of story that resonates with the queer experience. It’s a different viewpoint of the heterosexual world.”

As the cinematic landscape continues to change, Westmoreland is both thrilled and uncertain as cinema shifts from the theater to streaming services. More and more stories are being told, but he hopes the millennial generations will eventually find a new love for the cinema.

Somewhere between Westmoreland’s many adaptations of Colette, his production of Still Alice, and finding that single rose in the garden with Glatzer, he recalls advice from author Henry James that makes him want to live his life as a movie: “Live all you can; it’s a mistake not to,” said James. “It doesn’t so much matter what you do in particular. so long as you have your life. If you haven’t had that what have you had?”

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Brock Swinson

Contributing Writer

Freelance writer and author Brock Swinson hosts the podcast and YouTube series, Creative Principles, which features audio interviews from screenwriters, actors, and directors. Swinson has curated the combined advice from 200+ interviews for his debut non-fiction book 'Ink by the Barrel' which provides advice for those seeking a career as a prolific writer.

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