It is one thing to have an idea for a story, but another to be able to tell it compellingly from a place of real authenticity. To do this, Schwab encourages writers to start by looking at the stories that already resonate deeply with them. He advises searching for stories, “that are about what obsesses you, about what you are inspired by, about what you think about, about what disturbs you, about what you love, about the worlds you already know, about the people you already know.”
Schwab warns not to be afraid to get too autobiographical in your writing. He feels that it’s crucial to get past the fear of revealing too much of yourself because “when writers write what they know about, it elevates the writing. It helps them discover their voices. It makes their writing more powerful, more original.”
A particular trap that Schwab cautions about is writing genre pieces. He reflects on a former teacher of his, screenwriter Frank Daniel, who felt that students who create genre stories are “usually trying to protect themselves. They're believing that the genre formula will help them put together some acceptable plot...and what they usually end up with is something quite empty. They aren't in their story, and they aren't in this chosen genre, and what they end up with are cliches, empty plots, flat characters, and dull dialogue.”
Panelist Destin Daniel Cretton believes the mistake he’s learned the most from is writing from a place of insecurity, trying to create what he thinks is going to sell vs. what is meaningful to him. Instead, “it does the opposite. It turns it into something everyone’s seen before”, making the writing feel inauthentic and “cardboardy.” He considers this his own form of writer’s block, and in the same way writer’s block is a part of the typical process you must work through, Cretton usually has to work through this to uncover his voice in the piece.
Finding autobiographical connections to the story you are working on is one effective way to write from a place of authenticity. This, however, does not have to mean only writing about things that happened to you in a literal sense. Panelist Tamara Jenkins describes the jumping-off point for her films as having an “autobiographical spark”, but it morphs as they “take off and become dramatic.” She adds, “the needs of the story start to make you do things that in real life never happened.”
Similarly, Cretton just finished shooting a new Marvel film, Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings, which is the first Asian-American superhero film. While its premise is based on comic books, Cretton feels that at its core, it’s surprisingly relatable to his personal story. As a kid, he wished he had a superhero who looked like him, and now he is creating one for the screen.