Lesson Part III: Adaptations
Part of the screenwriter's job might be to adapt a screenplay from another medium. This can be both an easy and a difficult job. Adapting is easy because someone else has already created the story and the characters, but it is also difficult because the screenwriter will never please everyone. The best advice is to not worry about pleasing all members of the audience. Those who are the unhappiest with the script are those who do not understand the process of adaptation.
It is amazing that people cannot see the difference between a book and a movie. If you hold both in your hands and examine them, you can see the difference. A book goes into more detail and is usually constructed of words with few, if any, pictures. The reader's imagination creates the world based on the words of the author. A movie has designers, directors, cinematographers, and actors who create the world envisioned by the director. In a book, it is possible to go inside the head of the character. In a film, unless the writer uses the convention of voice-over narration, the audience rarely goes inside the head of the character. The book also takes more time to tell the story. A film runs about two hours.
William Goldman wrote both the novel A Princess Bride, and the film adaptation. Goldman was intelligent enough to know the difference between reading a book and creating a cinematic version. HE MADE CHANGES. In the book, there is no grandfather. The father spends about the first third of the novel trying to find the book about Buttercup and Westley. William Goldman is an award winning screenwriter. If he acknowledges that he needs to make changes, why should we complain when changes are made?
Approach a film version of a novel knowing that changes will be made. Be curious as to what the final product will be. It is usually preferable for a screenwriter to take liberties with the story in order to create a more complete and satisfying dramatic product.
There are three accepted forms of adaptations that are legitimate in the film industry.
- Literal
- Faithful
- Loose
Literal adaptations use the exact words of the author. If a writer wants to adapt a novel, this would not be the best process unless s/he wants the film to last upward of ten hours. Literal adaptations are usually reserved for plays and other films. A literal adaptation of Shakespeare's Romeo and Juliet should include the words, "Romeo, Romeo, wherefore art thou, Romeo," not, "Hey, dude, are you hiding down there in the bushes?"
A faithful adaptation is close to the original source. This is a recommended method for adapting novels. In a faithful adaptation, the same basic storyline, characters and some of the dialogue are kept in, but obviously there will need to be scenes added to explain information happening inside the character's mind.
A loose adaptation can be anywhere from "this side of faithful" to "inspired by" the work. In the early days of Hollywood, a producer would sometimes read a book that he had bought the rights to, throw it away, and tell the screenwriter the idea. He would then let the screenwriter come up with everything else. While that may seem unethical to some, it is totally within the scope of a loose adaptation.
An example of "inspired by" is the movie 12 Monkeys. The film credits say that the movie was "inspired by" the French film La Jetée. La Jetée is short film made up almost entirely of black and white photographs. The only thing similar between La Jetée and 12 Monkeys is that both protagonists' deaths take place at airports. Everything else is different.
West Side Story, however, is just a "this side of a faithful" adaptation. The names, relationships, situations, and some of the characters are changed. The ending is somewhat different and the convention has been revamped to be a musical, but the basic story is a loose adaptation of Romeo and Juliet.
All of these conventions are perfectly acceptable forms of adaptations.