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Today I’m going to do something I’ve never done at Substack. I’m going to break a personal rule to never speak negatively about artwork in a public forum like this one. But I just think there’s too much going wrong over at Disney to not try to make sense of why Star Wars audiences continue to grow disillusioned at best or abandon the brand altogether at worst.

I mean, this is Star Wars we’re talking about. The biggest franchise in the world. How could it come to this?

The reason involves regularly ignoring a golden rule of commercial storytelling — and, as a screenwriter with almost 20 years of professional experience, I’m going to try to break it all down for you as well as how to fix the problem. What I have say will also have implications for anyone trying to write commercial stories in any medium – but especially for the big screen.

I should start by saying, you should know I grew up on and love Star Wars to this day. I’m one of those fans who read countless novels about a Galaxy Far, Far Away long before the Prequels and afterward — at least until the Expanded Universe (Legends as it’s now called) was mothballed to make room for the Disney brand reboot. With very few exceptions, I’ve seen everything every produced for the screen about Star Wars, too, before and after George Lucas sold Lucasfilm.

So, just know: this isn’t some anti-Disney screed. I’m not here to bash Kathleen Kennedy. In most cases, I’m actually defender of almost everything she did that toxic misogynist, racist goons attacked her for.

I instead want to shine a very specific light on why I think so many of Disney’s efforts to produce culture-shifting Star Wars products – or at least box office and TV ratings – have failed and, if nothing changes, will continue to diminish the value of Star Wars.

We’re talking about a brand that eight years ago decided to just stop releasing feature films because the audience had so dramatically turned on it. That’s how many years it was between Solo and The Mandalorian and Grogu.

Yet despite the inexplicable wait, that time allegedly dedicated to addressing the problem: both of these films suffer from the exact same problem – a problem a lot of the Star Wars TV series continue to suffer from too.

And that problem is why audiences have been checking out for a while now.

So, what is it – what’s this problem with Star Wars today?

I’m getting to that, don’t worry.

To tell you what it is, though, I first have to identify a golden rule of commercial storytelling that – if you break it – pretty much ensures no audience will ever be emotionally moved by the story you put in front of their eyeballs.

And if your audience isn’t moved, if it’s only showing up for a brand because they liked it in the past, then they’re going to get bored.

They’re going to increasingly find reasons to put off watching a series or buying tickets at a movie theatre.

They think, “Enh, maybe later.”

Then, they forget about that, too.

That’s how you end up with two Star Wars box office bombs in a row and numerous TV series that most people gave a “yeah, alright, sure” shrug over.

Disney is so preoccupied with playing it safe that it’s forgotten characters – its heroes – should change or grow or experience something that remotely feels emotionally new. It’s consistently failing to answer the question: “Why should I, an audience member, care about what’s happening to this character?”

Why does what they’re doing matter to their growth and the bigger story’s growth?

Well, beyond the brand, of course. But that seems to be the number one reason you’re expected to watch now, not because you’re being offered something exciting and unmissable.

There’s almost no chance of missing out on anything in Star Wars these days. And what I mean by that is, if you watched Solo and The Mandalorian and Grogu, you would know that nothing in either of those films changes one thing about the Star Wars universe.

Think about that: a Star Wars movie just came out in which nothing of relevance happened.

I mean, things did. There’s a story. It’s episodic in a way that makes it feel more like a television show than a film and it doesn’t have a clear mission statement – but it’s a story and, I’ll be honest, I had a good time because I love Star Wars.

But as my 11-year-old said when we left the theater – “It was fun – but terrible plot.”

His parents are both screenwriters, so he understands what a plot is.

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A plot is something audiences want to follow in commercial storytelling. They need to pay attention so they don’t miss anything. Most importantly, it leads to an ending that somehow leaves characters, a story, a brand – someone, anyone, anything – dramatically changed.

Changed is the key word here.

It’s everything.

But in the case of The Mandalorian and Grogue, there’s nothing about the characters that’s substantively different than how “The Mandalorian” Season 3 ended.

Which you can also say about the end of Season 3, where the characters are in the same place they were when “The Book of Boba Fett” ended – a sort of “The Mandalorian” Season 2.5.

In “The Book of Boba Fett”, you’ll recall, everything that changed at the end of Season 2 was also undone. Grogu is reunited with the Mandalorian, for example. I mean, so what if Luke freaking Skywalker showed up to save the day and take Grogu away to be trained. That was a complete story. All the characters and their fates had changed…for a blip in time, that is, because a corporation needed cash in on cute Baby Yoda again.

Then there’s “the Mandalorian is a Mandalorian no more,” setting him on a new path. But don’t worry, we’ll fix that.

The Razor Crest is destroyed? Amazing!

But don’t worry, we’ll replace that in the film and pretend like it never happened.

As an audience member, this is like endlessly treading water – and I say that generously. What audiences really feel about all this is manipulated, like nothing they spent their money on mattered, like chumps.

I want you to think about network television next, if you’re old enough to remember what that was like before streamers changed everything.

Once upon a time, everyone – everyone – just watched TV for free. You didn’t mind that sitcom characters or your favorite TV drama’s characters didn’t really change much over the years. Typically, the big change happened – if it did – in the series’ last few episodes.

But with Star Wars today, you have to pay to play even on the small screen. You have to subscribe to Disney+. You still have to buy tickets to the movies –and ticket prices aren’t what they used to be.

It’s expensive to be a Star Wars fan, I mean, and it starts to feel really stupid to keep spending money watching the same story play out over and over and over without anything truly relevant happening.

I can do this with almost every Star Wars series, too.

They’re fine enough. And I don’t mean that as an insult to anyone involved. Some are good. “Andor” is obviously genius – easily one of the best TV series of any kind ever produced.

But in almost every instance, they don’t change the characters or the universe in any game-changing way. As a consequence, they feel inessential to both the brand and our lives.

See, you can’t have a fear of missing out if you sense something just doesn’t matter – and that fear of missing out drives audiences to tune in and buy tickets. They want to be transported to a galaxy Far Far Away to be moved by the drama, to be surprised by the character decisions and their consequences, to walk away unable to describe how cool what they just saw was.

I honestly couldn’t tell you what happened in The Mandalorian and Grogu that matters at all to Star Wars or even to its titular characters. They begin the story, they do some stuff, and it ends pretty much in the same place.

A beloved character from an animated series is even shoehorned in for no reason I can work out since he in no way is allowed to have a story or even character beyond “meaningless sidekick”.

I could’ve saved $40 in tickets and just waited for television, but even then, I don’t know if my life as a Star Wars fan would be any lesser if I missed it altogether.

Not one person I know has even thought to bring up the film to me, which is the most damning thing I can say about it as a piece of Star Wars.

You just can’t ask people to get excited about a brand that is now so narrative milquetoast that it’s getting beaten almost immediately by indie films at the box office. I don’t mean that box office is a metric of an artworks’ value. A lot of great films bomb.

But in this case, it is indicative of an audience base that’s lost faith – that is, I think, bored because they’re not even being asked to care.

In Disney’s defense, it did give us “Andor” – as I said. But that series does feel more like a fluke rather than something it has any interest in repeating as a company increasingly keen to appease a Far Right government. There’s certainly been no suggestion they want to repeat what made it so special.

Audiences don’t seem to respond favorably when Disney tries anything “new” either. For example, “Star Wars: Acolyte” offered a bold new vision of Star Wars. New time period, new threats, new political depth. I’m not saying it was a masterpiece or anything like that – not much of Star Wars is, to be fair – but it was fresh, it had something new to say, and it was attacked for that.

Star Wars: The Last Jedi also sought to deconstruct Star Wars and take it in a bold new direction. But it divided fans in a way that the brand still hasn’t come close to recovering from.

Most of my best friends in the business don’t agree with me that it’s actually wonderful, but that tells you where that fan base is today. It wants something new, but it wants it to be exactly like what came before.

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So, here’s my solution to this Star Wars problem, because it only seems reasonable to offer one if I’m going to point out a problem based on my area of expertise – and my solution is derived from that golden rule that all commercial storyteller’s must embrace if they want audiences to emotionally engage with their work.

Star Wars needs to stop trying to fix Star Wars by rehashing old characters, or trying to take Star Wars in radical new directions, or placating childish “fans” who want their heroes to remain white and male.

Instead, it needs to focus on simple character journeys that – through the magic of the moving image – transport people into hero journeys in a galaxy Far, Far Away.

A character starts off at Point A and, by the end, reaches Point Z – a changed being in some way or another because of their journey.

Extra points if the character’s journey is emotionally relatable to our life in this reality.

Now, if your character does not experience a dramatic transformation in the course of the story – a transformation that permanently changes their entire future – your story doesn’t have a reason to exist and it will almost certainly bomb with audiences.

This doesn’t mean every character has to change, but most of them – probably, yeah.

That change in your characters also makes audiences ask, “What’s next?” about them. The audiences want a sequel, I mean. They want to find out what happens next. They’ve invested and want to keep investing in your characters and world.

When they don’t feel that way, the alternative feelings are typically one of two things:

“That movie sucked hard.”

Or, “Wow, my loyalty to this brand just got me suckered by a corporation that doesn’t respect me.”

And if you feel the latter, you almost certainly feel the former.

As I said upfront, I don’t like badmouthing anyone else’s art. I mean, my name is on a TV series I created that is so bad I couldn’t even watch it myself. I know how hard it is to make something good when there are so many cooks in the kitchen and this much money is involved.

But The Mandalorian and Grogu isn’t poorly made. I think it’s exactly what it set out to be. It just didn’t care to give you characters that changed from where they were at the beginning of the film – and I think audiences responded in exactly the way I would’ve expected them to.

If you’re at home working on a story right now, ask yourself this incredibly simple question: How do my characters change in a meaningful way in this screenplay, this novel, this comic book?

If you can explain that in one sentence, move on to this next question: Will that transformation matter to your audience?

If you’re not confident the answer is yes, then stop working until you fix that problem.

When I was a kid, I remember very clearly the joy I felt throwing away my toy lightsaber and saying the words, “I am a Jedi, like my father before me.”

Even before I’d studied narrative, I understood the power of those words. Luke Skywalker had been transformed. His journey was complete. He was a hero – even if that meant he was about to die for it.

That’s what made him bad ass.

That’s what made us cheer for him.

And that’s what made us beg our parents to take us back to the theater to see Return of the Jedi again and again. Why else have been rewatching that film for the past 43 years?

Would this be the case if Luke had instead said, “I am the same person I was back on Tatooine, like my boring father before me.”

All the lightsaber duels in the world couldn’t make that storyline matter to audiences.

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OTHER EPISODES/ARTICLES LIKE THIS ONE YOU MIGHT ENJOY

You can read the article here.

So, here’s my question for you this week: How has your city failed (or lifted up) artists?

As someone who grew up in Detroit, I can tell you I’ve seen the results of this, I’ve seen its recovery…and I’ve also seen a lot of Black artists intentionally excluded from it for not meeting specific criteria. It’s been a very mixed bag where every visit back home over the past couple of decades left me feeling like the artists I was responding to the most, the ones who were doing the most interesting things regarding how the city’s Black identity had endured economic hardships and betrayal by corporate elites, were often even targeted.

Now, your turn: tell me about a city you love or loved and how it did its artists dirty or restored them to their former glory. Be sure to check out and react to others’ answers, too!

A few years ago, my dear friend writer-director Liz W. Garcia replied on Twitter to a tweet from a male filmmaker recommending a series of “perfect” feature scripts…written exclusively by men. Sadly, it’s far from the first time I’ve seen filmmakers (consciously or unconsciously) omit women from the cinematic conversation.

In response, I published a list of 50 great screenplays from female-identifying screenwriters. It proved quite popular, which I was glad about, but I think it’s time to update it to…80 great screenplays from women.

I’m proud of the fact that I can include links to 5AM StoryTalk conversations with so many of these screenwriters. There would be a lot more, but, alas, not everyone I ask to talk screenwriting with me agrees. That said, I’m slowly moving the ball forward with a few of the names here — we’ll see how those efforts turn out.

If you’re an aspiring, emerging, or established screenwriter and you are not reading screenplays by women, you are failing yourself in so many different ways. Amongst them:

• The educational factor: losing out on seeing how 51% of the population think to write screenplays, how they approach characters both female and male, how they tackle conflict, and more.

• The patriarchy factor: participating in the sexist system of Hollywood storytelling that has dominated for nearly a century and appears will do so, according to most data, for many years to come. Male or female or however else you identify, don’t focus entirely on what the Industry and our childhoods tell us makes great stories. Step away from the common narrative.

• The brilliance factor: there are so many spectacular screenplays out there written by women, many of which have reshaped popular culture.

All of these screenplays tend to vanish, as all things do on the Internet. I’ve compiled them all into a master archive—downloadable ASAP for all of my paid subscribers to use for personal study. And if you want more resources like this one, be sure to check out my other script curations:

10 THINGS I HATE ABOUT YOU (1999) by by Karen McCullah and Kiwi Smith

AFTERSUN (2022) by Charlotte Wells

AMERICAN PSYCHO (2000) by Mary Harron and Guinevere Turner

ANATOMY OF A FALL (2023) by Justine Triet and Arthur Harari

ARE YOU THERE GOD? IT’S ME, MARGARET. (2023) by Kelly Fremon Craig

I love me some Kelly Fremon Craig. Check out my 5AM StoryTalk Podcast conversation with my friend here for what I think is a master class in honest screenwriting:

THE BABADOOK (2014) by Jennifer Kent

BABY GIRL (2024) by Halina Reijn

BARBIE (2023) by Greta Gerwig and Noah Baumbach

BEFORE SUNRISE (1995) by Richard Linklater and Kim Krizan

BELLE (2013) by Misan Sagay

Misan is a dear personal friend and this is a beautiful script.

BODIES BODIES BODIES (2022) by Sarah DeLappe; story by Kristen Roupenian

BOOKSMART (2019) by Emily Halpern, Sarah Haskins, Susanna Fogel, and Katie Silberman

Read my artist-on-artist conversation with filmmaker Susanna Fogel here:

BRIDESMAIDS (2011) by Kristen Wiig and Annie Mumolo

THE BRUTALIST (2024) by Brady Corbet and Mona Fastvold

CAN YOU EVER FORGIVE ME? by Nicole Holofcener and Jeff Whitty

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So, how did your May go, StoryTalkers? It was a good month for me, I think, in part because of how much I love Victoria, Australia’s slow slide from autumn into winter. It’s made for some gorgeous walks. Writing-wise, I’m still neck deep in my new feature spec, but I’m now also back into the TV pilot I’ve been commissioned to write. In the latter case, I received some very strong notes to take me into the second draft, which I’ll be working on for the next several weeks. If I sound harried on Substack in the near future, this will be why.

For newcomers to 5AM StoryTalk, 5AM CoffeeTalk is a quirky monthly rundown I use to share quick bites of information with you about the arts and what’s happening in my life here in Australia. If you enjoy how I think and talk about culture and the world, then what you find here could help point you toward art, events, and news/ideas that you’ll enjoy, too. Oh, and remember it serves as a sort of sibling series to The Brew that I publish as part of the podcast here.

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Jump into the comments and share some of what’s been exciting, challenging, provoking, destroying, etc. your creative mind this past month. I want all the grizzly details. Let’s make this a two-way conversation — or, er, given how many StoryTalkers there are, a totally not awkward group chat.

SOMETHING YOU SHOULD REMEMBER

“All good ideas start out as bad ideas, that’s why it takes so long.” — Steven Spielberg

This is a skill all storytellers need to learn as early as possible in their pursuit of a life in the arts if they want to have a long life in the arts. We have ideas every day. During stretches of our lives, sometimes too many to even make heads or tails of. The trick is to know how to let them take root, how to patiently nurture them, and, most importantly, how to let them die when they don’t become what they need to be to justify your time.

Be greedy with your time, StoryTalkers. When you waste it on the wrong ideas, you lose the same amount of time to spend on the right ones.

SOMETHING I DID

Because of the fact that Disney has fumbled its Star Wars cinematic universe so catastrophically since buying Lucasfilm, there hasn’t been a new Star Wars film in seven years. Consequently, The Mandalorian and Grogu was the first time I got to take my Star Wars-obsessed 11-year-old to see a brand-new Star Wars film on the big screen. While we both had very mixed feelings about the film itself, we loved the experience of sharing it together.

I don’t share photos of my kids online, but my son thought you might enjoy his Mando and Grogu Lego mini-figs.

SOMETHING COOL ONE OF MY FRIENDS DID

When I was staffing this TV series I created called “Dracula”, I went through a hell of a time getting agents to send me writing samples by women since…well…Hollywood wasn’t such a great place to be a female screenwriter in 2012. It still isn’t, but things have at least improved. Anyway, I say this because when I finally got some reps to take me seriously, a spec pilot from an emerging screenwriter named Judalina Neira showed up in my inbox. It blew me away and I fought to get her hired for my show, only to have others involved dismiss her as “too modern”. Judalina didn’t vanish from my life at that point, though. As luck would have it, she ended up in a writers’ room next door to “Dracula’s”. We struck up a friendship and, over the years, I’ve watched in awe as her star has climbed higher and higher in Hollywood. She’s been nominated for awards and has some exciting projects of her own coming your way soon. So, why am I telling you this?

Last week, I watched the series fucking finale of “The Boys”. Judalina co-wrote it. She co-wrote the swan song of one of Amazon’s biggest hits and one of the most brutal shows about America ever produced. Well done, Judalina!

SOMETHING EVERY COUNTRY IN THE WORLD SHOULD DO

For a decade now, I’ve been warning filmmaker friends that Hollywood studios and streamers were slowly buying up foreign production companies and shifting production overseas as a means of evading the high production costs in the U.S. For example, a streamer can buy a script from an Australian screenwriter for a fraction of what it would pay a Writers Guild of America member. Then, the streamer can produce it in Australia where actors, crew, post — almost everything — is cheaper and do it with the help of extraordinary government tax credits. Even the U.K. is looking more favorable than the U.S. right now. The problem is, when Hollywood corporations swoop in to cut costs this way, they do so by producing U.S.-leaning stories or, at best, internationally-leaning ones. Not stories that prioritize the local culture and, thus, local storytellers. The only way to fix that is for countries to impose production quotas, ensuring a percentage of foreign investment goes toward telling local stories.

By the way, Canada just legislated that 15% of revenues from operating in its market must be used to produce homegrown media content. Australia, where I live, only demands a 7.5% investment. Do better, Albo - the Australian arts are suffering and Labor looks pretty damn indifferent to the industries’ pain right now.

Read more here.

SOMETHING I ATE

A few weeks ago, I was in Fitzroy — a suburb in Naarm/Melbourne — to meet some friends for lunch. I arrived early and decided to kill some time wandering. Almost immediately, I stumbled upon a Hector’s Deli, which I’d long wanted to try. I had no idea there was one in Fitzroy. I peeked inside, stared at the menu for a long moment, and decided to just eat there instead.

Afterward, I never told my friendsthat I wasn’t ordering lunch for myself because I’d already filled my belly with one of the best sandwiches I’ve ever had in Australia — the Hot Honey Salami (salami, Calabrian chilli paste, horseradish mayo, stracciatella, rocket, and hot honey vinaigrette, on a sesame-seeded focaccia).

If you make it to Naarm/Melbourne, be sure to give it a try. I know I’ll be back!

SOMETHING THAT MADE ME SCREAM

Three observations about this clip from Cannes of Demi Moore discussing AI in the film/TV industry:

1. The Hollywood figures telling you AI is inevitable and defending it all use the exact same argument to the degree that “parroting” is an apt verb to describe it. Like they’re reading from a script. Like maybe they’re…I don’t know…protecting their investments in AI with accepted talking points that limit the amount of controversy that can be attached to their positions? I can’t say if this is the case with Moore, but it’s certainly true of Reese Witherspoon and many others.

2. The reason why I distrust every one of these AI shills is that they always possess total confidence there’s nothing we can do about AI, it’s happening to us whether we like it or not, sort of a cultural rape — but they’ve spent zero time considering any other aspect of it. Quel mystère!

3. Moore is currently in the spotlight again, so to say, because she starred in a celebrated film about her being replaced and the lengths her character would go to hold on to her relevance.

SOMETHING ELSE THAT MADE ME SCREAM (WITH LAUGHTER)

Steven Rosenbaum, author of The Future of Truth: How A.I. Reshapes Reality, has acknowledged that his nonfiction book about the effects of AI on truth (ironically) included misattributed or fake quotes dreamed up by AI.

“These A.I. errors do not, in fact, diminish the larger questions that the book raises about truth, trust and A.I. and its impact on society, democracy and editorial.”

Um. Okay. The only reason why this is true is that The Future of Truth’s content literally proves the book’s entire argument. If he’d done any of this on purpose, it would be a genius piece of performance art. Instead, it’s a glimpse of the living nightmare tech bros and their sad acolytes are creating for us.

Resist however you can.

SOMETHING COOL ONE OF MY OTHER FRIENDS DID

There are few friends in Hollywood I would call more loyal than . Screenwriter, novelist, comic book writer. He helped birth the “Arrowverse” when he co-created “Arrow” and, later, he took his work with DC titles to a whole other level with “Legends of Tomorrow”. But he’s also an ex-lawyer who loved “L.A. Law” so much he got a chance to reboot it himself…an ultimately devastating experience he discussed with me in one of my artist-on-artist conversations. This week, he’s shooting a pilot for a new TV series he’s created called “Public Interest”. Pilots are back, baby, but they’re still intensely rare these days. Getting to shoot one is, in and of itself, a miracle.

SOMEONE YOU SHOULD FOLLOW ON SUBSTACK

Speaking of Marc Guggenheim, multi-hyphenate artist extraordinaire, you should give his Substack newsletter a follow. He talks everything from film/TV to comics to the arts industries.

LegalDispatch

News and notes about what Marc Guggenheim is writing.

By Marc Guggenheim

SOMETHING I’M LOOKING FORWARD TO

Jane Schoenbrun’s I Saw the TV Glow (2024) was a monumental piece of art more of you should’ve seen. They’re back with a new film, Teenage Sex and Death at Camp Miasma, that looks to take their work to a whole other level. This is either going to be the best kind of beavershit crazy or a glorious failure — and I’m here for it either way.

SOMETHING I READ

I stumbled upon this LinkedIn article from Emily Marks, a Kennedy Center Citizen Artist, and I’m so glad I did. It talks about how artists and creatives serve as the foundational architects of a city’s cultural value, vibrancy, and even economic appeal — only to be ultimately displaced by an “extraction economy” where developers, landlords, and corporations monetize the gentrified environment without bothering to reinvest in the community. As a result, cities systematically fail the folks who built their cultural capital, pricing out artists, and threatening — if not, dooming — the future of urban creative hubs.

Read more here.

SOMETHING THAT MADE ME LAUGH

"That’s America!” — a classic “Kids in the Hall'“ sketch that first aired in December 1990 and remains remarkably accurate today. Written and performed by Bruce McCulloch.

SOMETHING THAT BLEW MY MIND

“How to read postcolonial writing” is an extraordinary essay from Lina Abushouk. Every time you wonder if they’re losing the plot regarding AI, they tie several thoughts together with explosive power.

I know many people struggle with the words “colonial” or “postcolonial”, sensing some kind of judgment of their identity coming their way. But for those us of European descent, it’s a burden we must carry. This essay will give you a lot to think about.

Read it here.

SOMETHING ELSE I’M LOOKING FORWARD TO

I’ve come to realize the best kind of television for me, the kind I will never stop returning to, is “therapy TV”. TV series about characters desperately trying to be better, to improve, to live meaningful lives as part of a community. “Scrubs”, “The Bear”, “The Pitt”…and “Ted Lasso” are just a few current series that meet this definition. They make the world a better place in their own small ways.

SOMETHING THAT GAVE ME HOPE

It feels like the tide is turning for American cinema and the theatrical experience despite Hollywood’s best efforts to make sure it doesn’t.

SOMETHING ELSE I READ

This is a quick read, but I think an essential one from writer Alex Reszelska about the mistake we make when we use AI to chase perfection. Published in The Guardian.

Read it here.

SOMETHING ELSE THAT MADE ME LAUGH

Just to be clear, I will never stop laughing about this headline. Microsoft’s tech bros realized they were getting conned by AI’s tech bros, which is even funnier because Microsoft has also dumped enough money to lift developing countries out of poverty into its own AI projects. It’s like a circle jerk of stupidity. But yeah, tell me again about how AI is the future and nothing we can do will stop it from changing how we live.

Read it here.

SOMETHING PEOPLE KEEP OVERLOOKING

So, here’s the thing a lot of people forget to talk about when they talk about headlines like this one: films starring older women actually make money, too, since, in part, there are a lot of older women out there. Yet film markets around the world still refuse to make more of them. That means the real question is: why won’t these markets make films about older women they know there is a profitable audience for? Here are the two answers I’ve settled on after 20 years of screaming about this subject:

1) Western culture hates women so much, the Powers That Be still cannot acknowledge that women can have value beyond their youthful years.

2) Most of the Powers That Be remain men and men, being exactly what you think they are, won’t make movies about older women they don’t want to screw anymore. Better to make something with Sydney Sweeney instead.

A new study out of the United Kingdom found that out of the top films from the past three years at the U.K. box office, movies are more likely to feature a lead actor named Chris than a female lead actor over the age of 60. The Age Without Limits survey found that films are also four times more likely to have a talking animal as the lead character than a female actor over the age of 60.

Read more here.

SOMEPLACE I WORKED

I finally got to try Back Bar 77 in Daylesford (Victoria, Australia).

I’ve driven by this cocktail bar’s neon sign so many times, curious about what was on the other side of its weatherboard walls. As it turns out, a bit of magic — which is why I’m so grateful its owner Liam asked me to stop by, do some work, and try some of their cocktails*.

When I accept invitations like these, there are no promises about what I’ll say about someplace like this — but Back Bar 77 feels like every great cocktail bar that lives in your head but you can’t find in real life — great music, lots of cozy, moody nooks to gather with friends, and a drinks menu that goes on for days. Speaking about that menu, it’s so big — 100 — that it doesn’t fit on the walls so it crawls across the ceiling, too.

Ella made me two drinks, the first of which I picked out for myself: the Naked & Famous (with mezcal, Aperol, chartreuse, lime). It was…spectacular. The second, I let her surprise me: a Boulevardier (bourbon, Campari, sweet vermouth). I think I liked it even more.

As a work space for artists, Back Bar 77 is excellent…albeit, more than a little dangerous to the quality of your writing.

* This constitutes what is called a media exchange in Australia, which technically makes this work experience an ad.

SOMETHING YOU SHOULD READ ON SUBSTACK

This essay from is a perfect, though perhaps more technical complement the “How to read postcolonial writing” I shared a moment ago. The analysis here is exactly why I could never imagine using AI to help me write anything.

Tuhin's Substack

AI-slop , GrantaGate and Bad Writing

A few days ago, at a very fancy party in NYC, this young woman in her 20s walked up to me and asked, “Are you writing something?” “Academics are never not writing, my friend,” I said in a mildly sarcastic tone. “You know what, I’d like to read your stuff on Substack,” she said. “But that doesn’t get you tenure,” I replied. Since that exchange, I have wo…

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25 days ago · 636 likes · 109 comments · Tuhin Chakrabarty

SOMETHING THAT MADE ME CRY

Anthony Head, who played Giles on “Buffy the Vampire Slayer” — one of my favorite TV series — has left us. He’s the third “Buffy” main cast member to die too young in the past year. When this is compounded by the fact that Disney passed on a “Buffy” sequel series, it’s getting hard not to feel like everything I loved about the series — its friendships, its heroism and sacrifice, its relentless determination to keep fighting the darkness day after day — is becoming lost to the past.

SOMETHING THAT MADE ME SMILE

While out for one of my morning walks, I stumbled upon this wallaby living their best life. I watched for ten minutes as it splashed around, going in circles, having the time of its life in this secluded water hole. Enjoy!

SOMETHING ELSE I DID

I will never stop banging on about how vital it is that artists spend time with other artists, which is why I’ve been organizing filmmakers’ lunches for about a decade now. Every three to four months, wherever I live, I sit down with creative types who inspire and challenge me and remind me I’m not alone in the ups and downs of this crazy art life.

This past month, I hosted lunch here in Naarm/Melbourne for a super-team of film/TV types including Greg McLean (writer-director, Wolf Creek), Mark Hartley (director, Not Quite Hollywood: The Wild, Untold Story of Ozploitation!), Isabel Peppard (director, Morgana), the Cairnes Brothers (writer-directors, Late Night with the Devil), Duncan Samarasinghe (Wolf Creek Legacy), Gabriel Bergmoser (whose new novel High Rise is out now!), David Chidlow (creator, “Last Days of the Space Age”), Donna McRae (director, Lost Gully Road), and Nick Kozakis (director, Godless: The Eastfield Exorcism). I didn’t get to list everybody, but there were a lot of us there – this pic only shows about 2/3rds of the guests.

Hats off to (screenwriter and actor whose face you’ve seen in Aussie film/TV for 20 years) for taking this pic, which I’m included in for once (bottom right, second in).

Find your people, prop each other up, and celebrate them whenever you can!

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DON’T FORGET TO CHECK OUT “THE BREW” FROM 5AM STORYTALK FOR MORE LIKE THIS!

There’s an open letter to Substack’s CEO making the rounds right now, imploring him to prioritize essays over Notes or something like that. I haven’t read it. I don’t need to. It will inevitability miss the point like so many other similar complaints that proliferate here. That’s because Substack doesn’t care about how you feel about anything except with regard to your role in making its investors money. If 20 years of social media have taught us anything, it should be that – but apparently a lot of people seem confused on the point.

Here’s the brutal reality: The Substack “experience” has been sliding backward for some time. As a publishing platform, there are multiple better options out there. Unless you’re already invested here as I am, I even encourage you to consider them first before you launch your own newsletter.

Notes aren’t the reason for this.

Nazis aren’t the reason for this.

AI isn’t the reason for this.

Capital is.

That’s going to take some unpacking, of course.

Notes, as near as I can tell, is now more important than essays/articles or even podcasts published to Substack’s leadership. Engagement there has skyrocketed for me. Meanwhile, 5AM StoryTalk’s essays/articles and podcast episodes’ engagement has held steady for a year despite the fact that my subscription base has grown by 40%. How is that possible? It would seem to defy logic.

Don’t worry, I’m going to tell you.

When I’ve checked out subscribers to 5AM StoryTalk, I often see they follow hundreds of writers here. I’ve seen some who subscribe to more than 1,000. Translation: the majority of these people aren’t reading me or any of the other legion of writers they follow.

Substack is now a platform where emails from writers are white noise at best – if the subscriber even remembers they subscribed to us in the first place — and spam at worst. In theory, all these new subscribers are supposed to be upgrade opportunities, but we all know paid subscriptions are down here, too. I’ve done a sloppy survey of my past paid subscriptions and it looks like over half of the readers who opted to financially support my work here at some point have deleted their accounts altogether. That is…concerning.

To be clear, paid subscribers at this platform are up overall. Substack is making money and Notes is clearly part of that. Leadership have successfully expanded the subscriber numbers to such a degree that quantity produces more income for them. But that quantity, that reach, has simultaneously diluted our reach, our relationships with our readers, our capacity to transform them into paid supporters – which is important for many of us. It’s the dream Substack sells, obviously.

In my case, I’m a professional screenwriter and novelist. That’s what pays most of my bills. If my ability to make money at Substack as a creatively and personally satisfying side-hustle crashes – as it has been – then I’ll have to take my writing elsewhere to places better suited to my ambitions for a healthy and vigorous community-based art conversation.

In many ways, it feels like a clock began to tick down the moment Substack started prioritizing larger writers over the aspiring writers and dreamers who will never be able to compete with A-listers, with awards winners, with some of the biggest journalists in the world. You might even say the power dynamic here has wildly changed — because it has. My success has been largely predicated on my success elsewhere, the experience and reputation and access I brought with me because of that, but even at 10,100 subscribers, my situation here has never felt more perilous.

Writers will only remain at Substack until Substack’s own policies make alternative platforms better options – which feels a year or two away for many of us, I won’t lie. I suspect Substack knows this, as well, which is why it’s expanding the way its subscriber base grows, embracing a more traditional social media format with Notes and half-hearted stabs at video, to staunch the bleeding. Being the smart readers’ Twitter isn’t a bad angle and I expect it will work for Substack in the long run, but not for its writers.

Substack is a corporation. As Capital, it is not here to provide you a warm and fuzzy community. It’s not here to help you publish your work or help you find readers. It’s here to turn you into cogs in its money-making schemes.

You have no more value to those schemes than a Nazi, rapist, or similar has.

Long story short: Writing open letters imploring Capital to not do what Capital does is like kneeling before a hurricane, clasping your hands together, and imploring it to behave more like a warm summer’s breeze.

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OTHER EPISODES/ARTICLES LIKE THIS ONE YOU MIGHT ENJOY

Last year, screenwriter and novelist Hart Hanson — the creator of “Bones” — joined the 5AM StoryTalk podcast to talk about his life and career. During the conversation, he questions whether he’s a real artist and goes on to explain the debate he’s had with his peers for decades. His argument is that the difference between an artist and a craftsperson is whether there’s an audience in mind during the act of creation. Artists, in his estimation, create for themselves and an audience manifests later. Craftspersons create for an audience or, perhaps more specifically, to sell something. “The minute you are aiming to get paid for what you do, you're already making decisions on less than purely artistic impetus,” Hard told me, “and that to me is just [a question of] how many of those shaves an artist makes.”

So, let’s use this as a jumping off point for this week’s question from 5AM StoryTalk: Is there a difference between an artist and a craftsperson and, if so, how do you describe it?

Welcome to June’s “arts seminar” from 5AM StoryTalk! Paid supporters of this newsletter can ask me and other StoryTalkers questions about craft, about the business (from breaking in to agents, etc.), or just what everyone thinks about a hot new TV series, film, book, and so on.

For my part, you’ll get the benefit of my 20 years of experience as a professional screenwriter, novelist, and comic book writer. As for your fellow StoryTalkers, I think you know what kind of supportive, thoughtful group of people they are; expect more of the same from them here.

This article will remain active until July’s issue is published. You can easily locate it at the tab in the menu. Come back to it as many times as you need to.

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And so without any further ado, I invite paid supporters of 5AM StoryTalk to jump into the comments below and get this month’s conversation going. You’re in charge here. What do you want to talk about this month?!

If you’re not yet a paid subscriber, upgrade now! You’ll get exclusive access to this monthly feature as well as more than 100 paywalled arts features, 5AM StoryTalk Podcast episodes days and sometimes weeks early, and all 5AM StoryTalk Podcast bonus episodes months before they become available for free. Don’t forget, you can gift subscriptions to others, too.

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• 📖 READ this episode by scrolling down past the intro and recommendations.

Remember when we wanted to make films, not just generate them?

In this latest edition of The Brew, a personal accounting of what I’m struggling with and getting right as an artist in 2026, let’s talk about why AI destroys the process of filmmaking — the very fun of it — by stripping away the friction, chaos, and collaboration that also produces the greatest films.

Call this corporate push to turn bespoke, human art forms into disposable, mass-produced, flat-pack junk the “IKEA-fication” of cinema (and art).

I’ll be using plenty of examples from cinematic history — especially Steven Spielberg’s filmography — to support my case. Stick around for the last third, in which I also dive into “The Pitt”, the “Scrubs” sequel series, and a Booker Prize winner that made me scream.

On the itinerary this week:

• THE PROCESS IS THE POINT: Why AI threatens to destroy the process that made me want to become a filmmaker in the first place and turn something bespoke and beautiful into disposable, mass-produced junk. 🛋️

• CHAOS, DESPERATION, AND DYSENTERY ARE YOUR FRIEND: A broken shark, Harrison Ford getting, disagreeable dinosaurs - how Steven Spielberg turns obstacles into great art. 🦈

• ART WITHOUT COMFORT: Why easy art makes stories suck hard. 🛑

• DOUG LIMAN’S BITCOIN: The sobering reality of a 20-day shoot inside a plain gray box. 📦

• IT’S A SMALL WORLD AFTER ALL: Why cutting out hundreds of people along the way makes our creative worlds — and our adventures — smaller. 🗺️

• WHAT WAS I THINKING WHEN I CALLED “THE PITT” MEDITATIVE?: The thrilling, heart-racing late-Season 1 turn that completely changed my perspective on “The Pitt”. 🏥

• '“SCRUBS”: A CURE FOR MIDLIFE CRISES: Finding something beautiful to cling to in the nostalgia and trauma-laden world of the sequel series. 🎛️

• THE IMPENETRABLE PRIZE WINNER: What happened when I put a paragraph from a Booker Prize-winning into AI three times to try to make sense of what it was trying to say? 📚

• THE REITMAN PRINCIPLE: What makes great films — and great directors according to Juno director Jason Reitman. 🎬

If you have any thoughts or questions about what we discuss today, drop them in the comments. Always here for a good debate about art.

And if you want more episodes like this one — or any of my audio essays and arts & culture interviews — to show up in your life, be sure to subscribe to 5AM StoryTalk!

If 5AM StoryTalk adds anything to your life but you’re not up for a paid subscription, you can still support my work by buying me a “coffee”. It’s hugely appreciated - and you might even get a shoutout in the Notes!

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READ THE BREW JUNE 2, 2026

One of the things that completely confuses me about AI is how it negates so much of the process of storytelling that I value – especially in film and TV where more and more I hear from respected peers that they’re beginning to see aspects of AI as beneficial to the future of the artform.

Maybe, but let’s interrogate that a bit more since the process, at least in my opinion, is the point. Let’s talk about why I’m right…or maybe I’m wrong. I’ll leave that to you to decide.

Welcome back to 5AM StoryTalk, my friends. I’m Cole Haddon, and this is another edition of The Brew – a personal blog where, in between larger episodes – I share what I’m struggling with and sometimes even getting right as an artist in the 21^st century.

Today, I’m struggling a bit with the fact that many artists don’t feel the same as I do about process, which I don’t know if I’ll ever stop expressing confusion about, but which is nonetheless true and, I suppose, complicating how I view the use of AI in various aspects of the creative process.

For the sake of convenience here, I’m just going to use AI in the place of large language models or generative AI since most of us seem to have agreed to call it that even though it’s not actually intelligent in any way.

And maybe I should provide some context about how I feel about AI, because it will color a lot of other things I say here:

I’m 100% against calling anything created by AI - art.

But I also believe AI can be a tool like a lot of things. The question is, how do we use it as a tool given its limitations and its ability to even make us idiots?

For example, I use AI to help me research, but I know AI is just pointing me toward a possible fact – almost always with less reliability than any Wikipedia article. I have to fact-check everything because I know AI is dumber than a puppy with a head injury.

Take media entrepreneur and apparent dumbass Steven Rosenbaum, whose new book is called The Future of Truth: How AI Shapes Reality. Ironically, this book contains a bunch of quotes entirely made up by AI – which he used to research and edit.

Can you imagine how brilliant all this would be if it was an actual performance art piece to prove his point rather than just a colossal and embarrassing fuck-up?

So, yeah: AI – tool, for some things. Eventually, maybe a tool for a lot of things. At least that’s what some of my friends are telling me – friends whose work I respect.

Some wonder if – maybe even hope – it will soon allow disgruntled screenwriters to produce films and TV series from their unproduced scripts. This is a big thing for a lot of us who’ve never been allowed to have our stories told before, those of us who have largely toiled in development for years. You just want someone, anyone to experience the stories you’ve invested so much of yourself in.

Then there are those, like Doug Liman, who argue it’s a great way to cut down the cost of a film – which we can’t pretend doesn’t make sense to some degree, even if it means some kinds of artistry is impacted and maybe even largely wiped out.

This is, to some degree, the nature of the beast. Digital animation has almost entirely replaced hand-drawn animation. CGI largely replaced all the special effects techniques that had preceded it in film history. Sound replaced the silent film and destroyed countless careers.

I might be cherry picking cinematic tragedies here, but the point is: film an art form that’s meant to evolve and, I suppose, some argue that’s what AI is going to force it to do.

Coming back to Doug Liman, he’s more or less taking James Cameron’s Avatar argument – that you can produce any film entirely inside a studio soundstage – to its natural conclusion with his new film Bitcoin. Over 20 days, his cast never left a London soundstage, delivering their performances inside a plain, gray box. The global sets, every background, the lightning – basically, everything except the actors – was generated by AI in post-production.

I’ve asked a handful of director friends about this and received similar responses. Making films is hard, they’ve said, especially on location. Everything goes wrong all day long. You’re fighting the elements. You’re racing the sun. You’re sometimes dealing with political factors that force compromises down your throat.

Why not do what Liman did instead?

Every single shot, perfectly composed since there are no limitations, every location dreamed up by a set designer according to the director’s vision, every costume casually replaced with a new one if someone second-guesses it later. Day becomes night. Actors replaced. Actors’ performances improved. Hell, you can even put a new face an actor in the event they’re accused of a sex crime because, which happens a lot because men are terrible.

You get my point, I hope.

We’re talking about shot after shot so perfectly created – maybe we should call it manufactured – that almost nothing about it is…real.

Can this be done well?

Yeah, I’m sure it can. In fact, I’ve seen it done well…enough.

But more often than not, I’ve seen it done catastrophically.

In most cases where a filmmaker has unlimited resources, the end result is always brutally inferior to what was done with dramatically fewer resources and significantly greater obstacle – often decades earlier, too.

But I’m getting way off topic here. Let’s get back on track, that being: I don’t know why you would want to do this.

When I was a kid, the most valuable possession I had for the longest time was a book called The Art of the Return of the Jedi. I don’t know why my mother bought it for me, but I love her for it.

It’s barely in one piece today, that’s how much I abused it. It taught me what making a movie was about.

Later, I fell even more in love with the idea when I began watching making features and featurettes. By the early 90s, VHS tapes started coming with these. I discovered Lawrence of Arabia and the insane story of how it was made over more than a year. Stanley Kubrick’s work, kind of painting with cinema, melted my brain; the level of research and detail he brought to every shot is too much to appreciate without repeated viewings. By the time The Lord of the Rings came out on DVD, featuring what in my memory is dozens of hours of special features, I was already in Hollywood – but god, these features just reinforced what I knew all along.

I wanted to tell stories with the moving image.

I wanted to be a filmmaker – because it was fun.

I wanted to watch puppets be created.

I wanted to hold models of starships and monsters.

I wanted to pick costumes out.

Most of all, I wanted to travel to exotic locations to shoot these movies because that was an adventure.

Being on set was an integral part of these fantasies – not the success, not the triumph when you produce a hit or anything like that.

I wanted to make films, I mean.

The process was the point, I mean.

Steven Spielberg making Jaws on location, where everything went wrong – not right like it would’ve on some AI stage – that was the point.

Stanley Kubrick wading through thousands of Polaroids to create his surreal vision of New York City in Eyes Wide Shut was the point.

The Wachowski sisters working out how to make bullet time work was the point.

Peter Jackson criss-crossing New Zealand, making The Lord of the Rings, was the point.

And to go back to Spielberg, because his films very often prove why the point is the process and the process is chaos and that’s where greatness is most often found in filmmaking, consider Jaws:

The shark had to not work so Spielberg ended up keeping it mostly off screen and relying on John Williams’ score instead – which is why the film is so great.

Consider Raiders of the Lost Ark’s iconic scene where Indiana Jones faces down a sword-wielding adversary in a Cairo marketplace. Harrison Ford was meant to have a huge three-page fight with the guy, but Ford was weak from dysentery and, in his desperation to get off his feet, suggested just shooting the swordsman instead. Hilarious – brilliant – iconic now, like I said.

It also would never have happened on an AI set, because there wouldn’t have been a ticking clock.

They would’ve just squeezed shooting the fight in between some other stuff and let the AI fix it in post.

Consider Jurassic Park. The reason why the film’s CGI dinosaurs work so great is because Spielberg couldn’t get the puppets to look as convincing as he needed them to be. He was driven to shoot a combination of the two, transforming cinema forever as a result.

With unlimited AI tools, Spielberg’s unlimited options would’ve eliminated all of the film’s most innovative, moving moments.

More, it would’ve done it in ways that felt disconnected from reality – which is why later Jurassic Park films have failed to make the same kind of cultural impact, I’d suggest.

Because when anything is possible on a screen, our ability to relate to what’s happening on that screen – to the drama, to the suspense, to the peril – crashes.

So, in the end, in summary, these are the problems with AI replacing how we’ve made movies for 125 years and TV for 75.

Reason #1: the exigencies of production often lead to the most exciting, interesting, and enduring moments in a film or TV series.

An imagined sunset is never as memorable to a real one…you position Indiana Jones and a dozen diggers in silhouette in front of. That shot makes you go, “Holy fuck.”

Nobody says “Holy fuck” about a CGI shot like that because you know there’s nothing inherently amazing about it.

Reason #2 (building off that last point I just made: the less real something is, the more its relationship to something tangible is muddled, the more improbably it is that whatever is happening on screen will ever truly emotionally matter to a human being.

There’s a brilliant example of this in the history of craftsmanship and manufacturing. Look at a beautiful, hand-made coffee table – which I know a bit about as my grandfather was a carpenter and I wish I had some of his pieces now that he’s gone.

Consider the coffee table in question’s lines, its curves, its decorative grooves, the decisions that went into every feature – the way you immediately recognize a human author of its beauty.

Now, think about how you think about IKEA furniture:

Disposable - less than – junk for a starter apartment.

One you want to preserve for a century or more.

The other you assume is going to end up in a landfill in 10 years or less.

Reason #3 AI blowing up how we make films and TV (and this is the most important factor as far as I’m concerned): It’s the process. The fun of it. The whole point, as far as I’m concerned.

The reason I fantasized about making films as a kid.

The reason I packed up my life and moved from Detroit to L.A. to become a filmmaker.

The reason I still write scripts today.

I wouldn’t have done any of that if I thought the process would one day be standing around in a dark sound stage, perfectly realizing what was in my imagination, cutting out all the adventure, the chaos, the chance for experiences like the ones that inspired me in the first place.

Sure, you’re still working with a relative handful people. But you’ve cut out hundreds of people you’ll encounter along the way.

You’ve made your world smaller in the process.

You’ve made the process smaller.

And you’ve made me wonder: what’s the point?

In such a reality, I would’ve just dedicated my life to exclusively writing fiction instead – which, of course, is facing the same dilemma right now. The diminishment of the process in favor of convenience, of democratization, or McFiction, or something like that.

But as much as there are elements of truth in the advantages of AI as a tool in art, as I’ve said, you will not convince me that art is supposed to be easy.

Art that is easy tends to suck – hard.

Art without obstacles, without limitations to circumvent, without desperation tends to suck – hard.

Again, there will be exceptions, but in general, to repeat it yet again, the process is the point, my friends…at least as far as I’m concerned.

It’s like we say about life: it’s not the destination, it’s the journey.

Maybe you don’t agree. If not, drop into the comments and tell me why I’m wrong.

Before I press on, I just want to remind you to hit that subscribe button if you haven’t already. 5AM StoryTalk is a community of more than 11,000 artists and art fanatics across Substack and podcast players. At Substack, a subscription also gets you access to hundreds of writing, screenwriting, and culture essays and learning resources.

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Okay, so in other not self-promotional news, just to catch you up on what I’ve been watching, reading, whatever:

I wrapped up Season 1 of “The Pitt” and…holy shit, guys, I was very wrong when I suggested to you this show is meditative.

I was only 2/3 of the way through the season, before the major event that blows things up for the Pitt’s team of medical professionals. Once that happens…I mean, wow. Heart-pounding.

My wife and I abandoned any notion of only one episode a week at that point, which I regret a little. I like the torture of waiting to find out what happens.

We’re both anxious to dive into Season 2 soon, but need a breather first.

We also wrapped “Scrubs’” new season, another medical show, albeit a sitcom.

It’s a bit weird how many details overlapped between the two shows, from intern archetypes to trauma-laden doctors, to patients out to harm themselves, to a kind of nostalgia for youth or at least a time in our lives when things were less terrible all the time.

If you haven’t caught the “Scrubs” sequel, reboot, requel, though, it’s incredibly worth it – especially if you’re middle-aged and dealing with any kind of midlife crisis of your own. Or maybe just anyone just wanting to watch something that recognizes how terrible things are, but relentlessly tries to find something good and beautiful to cling to.

But maybe don’t watch it at the same time as “The Pitt”, though. My wife stopped me at the end of Episode 10 “The Pitt’s” first season and asked where the British intern had gone.

Guys…she was remembering an intern from “Scrubs”.

Now, when it comes to books, which I don’t talk nearly enough about here, I’m slow-reading several at the moment, probably too many – but I did wrap one I will not name because, Jesus, impenetrable isn’t the right word for this Booker Prize winner.

Long, poetical paragraphs that meander and roll and…say nothing. Paragraphs that require multiple readings just to make sure nothing substantial was said and missed.

This is an ongoing problem with a lot of literary fiction I read these days. Authors with their heads so far up their asses that AI couldn’t make sense of them – and I know, because I put a paragraph of this prize winner into AI and asked for an explanation of it. I did tried three times, and each time got the most confusing responses – which is how I felt about said paragraph, too.

Ernest Hemingway was a sonuvabitch, don’t get me wrong, but I really wish he was still around to comment on the bad habit of authors making themselves impossible to read.

I shouldn’t have to work so hard to read your fiction, I mean. I should have to work hard to understand the depths of it.

Okay, we’re almost done for today, but I want to leave you with an artist’s quote, as I like to do.

Today’s comes from writer-director Jason Reitman, responsible for helming films like Juno, Up in the Air, and Tully. He said:

“Filmmaking is a completely imperfect art form that takes years and, over those years, the movie tells you what it is. Mistakes happen, accidents happen and true great films are the results of those mistakes and the decisions that those directors make during those moments.”

Now, I ask you to wonder: what would a film be, what would a director be worth, if we removed the risk of mistakes, the risk of anything, from the process?

That’s it for now, StoryTalkers, except to say, I’m taking the week off next week, to focus on my feature spec and my quality of life, but I’ll be back in two weeks. See you soon, you beautiful people!

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Let’s talk about vertical video, guys. Specifically, video storytelling, which exists solely because people who like to watch things on their mobiles phones are too lazy to turn said phones sideways to watch anything.

A lot of people are arguing this is the future of film/TV that the masses — that you — are desperate to watch stories this way. That you, as a habitual swiper, want nothing more than exciting video content shoved into your eyeballs in super-quick episodes. Which brings me to this week’s question here at 5AM StoryTalk:

Is vertical storytelling the future of TV/cinema?

We’re constantly told all the ways this or that is going to disrupt our relationship to film/TV or transform how people consume film/TV or whatever — you get it. A lot of it never happens. A lot of it does, only to see a rebound of sorts after the culture begins to realize how it’s been conned (see music streaming). In my case, I will never watch a story this way. I refuse to even watch YouTube videos on my phone, though I will watch a clip that way. But the idea of watching something I’m meant to absorb in any way I take more seriously than someone shouting at me from a car speeding past? No, no I’d rather just give up on the art form and enjoy watching everything that came before the world I cared about died. Melodramatic? Maybe. But I’d put a gun in my mouth before telling you a story this way.

Now, your turn…whether you’re an artist or just someone who loves watching stories on screens…how interested are you in this attempt to evolve the art form?

• 🎙️ This is a 5AM StoryTalk Podcast BONUS EPISODE. Be sure to also listen to this week’s feature conversation — “Psychologist Dacher Keltner | The Cultural Necessity of Awe”.

• 📖 READ this episode instead by going to the transcript tab.

Psychologist and awe expert DR. DACHER KELTNER returns to discuss a seminal piece of art from his life — the 1670 Dutch Golden Age painting Merry Company on a Terrace by Jan Steen. It’s a madcap, hyperkinetic depiction of an unruly household that serves as a stunning visual celebration of human joy, drunkenness, and collective effervescence.

Dacher, who grew up in the artistic chaos of late-1960s Laurel Canyon, recounts how encountering this piece as a young man slowed down time, reconnected him to a deep yearning for communal life, and ultimately propelled him on the scientific course that would make the study of human emotions his life’s work.

This is a deep conversation about the vital necessity of everyday wonder, the radical history of the Dutch Masters painting “real humanity” instead of the wealthy, and why we must actively fight the modern Western bias that treats positive passions like joy and awe as less serious than the darker emotions.

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If you’d like to listen to this bonus episode with Dacher, but aren’t yet a paid subscriber yourself, you can upgrade now for $6 US a month or $60 a year. You’ll get full access to hundreds of articles and educational resources for artists and art fanatics alike, as well as exclusive articles and podcast bonus episodes like this one.

And don’t forget to listen to the first part of my conversation with Dacher!

OTHER EPISODES/ARTICLES LIKE THIS ONE YOU MIGHT ENJOY

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• 🎧 LISTEN to this 5AM StoryTalk episode as audio here at Substack.

• ▶️ WATCH this episode at YouTube below.

• 📖 READ this episode by clicking on the transcription button.

• Be sure to listen to also listen to Dacher’s bonus episode in which he breaks down a seminal piece of art from his life.

Awe is the psychological engine of human creativity, the very origin point of art, music, and the stories we use to make sense of our existence. Yet modern, hyper-individualistic culture has systematically built a buffer between us and everyday wonder — making us lonelier, feeding our anxiety, and actively handicapping our imaginations. Our art is paying the price for this, too.

UCLA Berkley Professor and psychologist DR. DACHER KELTNER knows a thing or two about this subject as the director of the Berkeley Social Interaction Lab, author of the book Awe: The New Science of Everyday Wonder and How It Can Transform Your Life, and — oh yeah, because why not?! — a key creative consultant on Pixar’s Inside Out films.

He’s dedicated his life to the study of emotions and, in this capacity, he’s become one of the world’s leading voices on the very new study of awe.

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My conversation with Dacher dives deep into:

• The biological and cultural necessity of awe.

• The startling revelations recent studies show about how autistics experience awe.

• How a deficit of awe or even the manipulation of it can break down social cohesion and lead to the rise of dangerous leaders.

• The terrifying ramifications for Hollywood and the arts as we navigate an era defined by the death of shared communal experiences.

• How to find more awe yourself.

• Much, much more.

Guys, I’m loathe to say this about anything I do, especially a podcast, but this is an incredibly important episode. I hope my conversation with Dacher moves and inspires you as much as it did me.

🔒 EXCLUSIVE BONUS EPISODE: JAN STEEN'S PAINTING 'MERRY COMPANY ON A TERRACE'

Be sure to also listen Dacher’s bonus episode. He breaks down a seminal piece of art from his own life — a chaotic, brilliant work of Dutch Master Jan Steen that helped set him on a quest to better understand human emotions!

If this podcast episode adds anything to your life but you’re not up for a paid subscription, you can still support my work here by buying me a “coffee”. It’s hugely appreciated - and you might even get a shoutout in the Notes!

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OTHER EPISODES/ARTICLES LIKE THIS ONE YOU MIGHT ENJOY

Back in 2024, I shared an article called “How to Find That Sweet, Sweet Creative Inspiration” in which 25 filmmakers, authors, and comic book writers and artists from around the globe weighed in on a single question. Now, I want to pose the same question to the artists who have subscribed to 5AM StoryTalk:

Creative inspiration can be elusive for some. Can you discuss how you find it, from where you go to leave yourself open to it, to the tools you’ve developed to be ready for and foster it?

This is a subject I’ve written about many times here at 5AM StoryTalk, though perhaps never as explicitly as, “Pay attention, I’m going to tell you how I work.” For example, shortly before the 2024 election, I wrote “A Eulogy for Everything We Never Were (and Never Will Be Again)” about my decision to permanently leave the United States. In it, I detail how this life-changing move was set in motion by a visit to “the Secret Annex” – the Anne Frank House. I was so shaken by the experience that I decided to write a screenplay about Otto Frank’s decision to publish his daughter’s diaries. In fact, within minutes of walking out of the Anne Frank House, I had a working idea of the film’s entire structure. However, what I left out in “Eulogy” was why I think inspiration struck in the first place.

The artist’s life is about far more than the actual act of creation. As I described a moment ago, 90% of my writing is rewriting, but that’s not entirely fair to how I really work because nearly 99% of my actual job is leaving myself open to inspiration.

Some might call this thinking — and that’s true, I suppose. I think a lot. You could even call it a form of conscious curiosity (curiosity, like thinking, requires practice). But I’d say what I’m trying to describe here is an even deeper act on par with a kind of waking meditation. When I’m in this imaginative fog, I drift through it until I collide with ideas I couldn’t see coming until – bam! – I walk face first into them.

This is what happened to me at the Anne Frank House. I entered the building with the intention of emotionally trapping myself in it, a very conscious choice. What I mean is, I didn’t feel the need to visit it to tick it off a list of must-see things to do when in Amsterdam. I needed to visit it to try to understand the terror her family experienced. I needed to at least glimpse it, as much as that was possible. I lingered in claustrophobic rooms until others left, so I could be left alone where Anne played and cried and read and slept for as long as possible. I closed my eyes, to imagine how trapped she must’ve felt. And, as thoughts of my own son slipped into my mind, I found myself in Otto Frank’s shoes, watching his daughter write, unable to communicate with her despite the years they’d spent here together.

Later in the tour, Otto revealed in a video interview he only really got to know his daughter after she died, through her diaries. That was it for me. That was more than I could bear. My son was only two at the time, but I couldn’t imagine going through life feeling so emotionally estranged from him or regretting never really knowing him if something were to happen to him. I started working on the screenplay that would become The Secret Annex before I’d even returned home to Los Angeles.

More recently, I’ve found myself struggling to create the mental space for inspiration to arrive, which I chatted about in this podcast episode. Hustle culture broke me for a while there, handicapping my ability to originate ideas with the frequency and fun I used to. Thankfully, that’s begun to rectify itself through major lifestyle changes. Oh dear, I think I’ve gone on a bit of a ramble, haven’t I?

Now, it’s your turn. Tell me how you foster creativity in your life. And don’t forget to read and weigh in on other’s responses. 5AM StoryTalk is a community, so that means supporting each other.

• 🎙️ This is a 5AM StoryTalk Podcast BONUS EPISODE. Be sure to also listen to this week’s feature conversation — “Why Writers Want to Murder You When You Give Them Notes”.

• 📖 READ this episode as text below.

Have you ever wrapped a major project – maybe a novel manuscript or a screenplay that really kicked your ass – and, afterwards, found yourself creatively depleted? You know, empty?

Well, every few months, someone asks me about this experience, whether anything like it happens to me, and if I have any thoughts about how to recharge their creative batteries.

Yes, it happens to me. And yes, I have thoughts about – some tricks, so to say – for getting you back to work if that’s what you’re after.

Maybe we should start with a little personal context, since most of you don’t know me in real life and I don’t want to presume you’ve read everything I’ve ever said here. I’ve been a professional writer for 20 or so years now. Some 17 of those have been as a full-time screenwriter. I’ve had a TV series I created produced. Other TV produced. I’ve had graphic novels published; Headline Books published my novel Psalms for the End of the World a few years ago. I’ve been published by dozens of newspapers on two continents and written more than 500 articles or essays at Substack now.

In short, I have a lot of experience with words. I’ve had a lot of huge projects land in my lap and I’m incredibly accustomed to turning them around in a short amount of time and, in the aftermath – because being a working writer tends not to afford you a lot of time sitting around neither writing nor chasing more work – finding the enthusiasm, the motivation, the capcity to get back to work right away.

I want to point out, this isn’t exactly conducive to a generally healthy creative lifestyle.

If you’ve just typed THE END on a major project, you should hit save, close the file, and walk away from it and any other creative endeavors for as long as you need to reacquaint yourself with life, with friends and family, with joy.

That all said, like I already said, sometimes we don’t have that luxury. So, after that big, taxing project, we’re left laid out, dazed, sometimes so bloodied we’re little more than a figurative corpse on a slab. In lieu of harnessing lightning to resurrect ourselves, what can we do?

Here are three tricks I use in case they help you, too.They’re simple, but, I think, effective to both help us recover and encourage positive mental health – or, at least as much as any artist can ever have positive mental health. We’re all fucking nuts in one way or another; not necessarily for who we are, but for choosing to pursue a career in the arts.

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Tip 1: Peer to peer interaction

What I mean is, artist to artist conversations – in person, always in person, if possible. The real matters. Phones and Zoom are great in a pinch, but you need to sit there across from someone else who lives and breathes your pain – preferably several someone elses – so you can just be together. Swap horror stories, debate great art you’ve recently encountered, or just listen to someone else’s ideas for a change.

Artists are inspiring, or at least they are to me. Surround yourself with them. Absorb their creative energy. Let yourself be super-charged by it – both as an artist and a human being.

Tip 2: Nature

That is, if you’re able to access it. Not everyone is as able as I am.

But if you can, disconnecting from your devices and getting out into nature will calm your nervous system and allow you to think in new, unexpected directions.

I don’t mean deep hikes into exotic locales either. Just in green space, where you’re not looking at manmade things as much as natural wonder. Try to find awe in these moments. If not awe, at least peace.

Without a device – and that includes music or podcasts to listen to – your imagination will take over. I know we’ve forgotten how to do this, but consider all those great, juicy ideas that come to you in the shower. That’s because you’re disconnected from everything else. You’re trapped in a kind of sensory bath that calms you and then, all of a sudden, your brain is exploding with great thoughts.

Turning the radio off when you’re driving will do this, too. Or at least switch to classical music or something ambient. You don’t want to overstimulate yourself. You want calm – and with that your creative well begins to bubble whether you’re ready for it or not.

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• 🎧 LISTEN to this 5AM StoryTalk episode as audio here at Substack.

• ▶️ WATCH this episode at YouTube (or scroll down).

• 📖 READ this episode in essay form (scroll down).

I could feel my heart beginning to race. The air pumping out of my lungs burned in my nostrils. My chest tightened as if someone was using their hands like vice grips to crush my ribcage.

I’d experienced this so many times before, and yet the panic still surprised me.

Should I hurl invectives at my laptop screen?

Better yet, should I just shatter my laptop against the wall?

Logic said to just start typing a pointed response to the script notes I had just been emailed – the kind of message that would utterly destroy the sender’s sense of their own intelligence…except, of course, that wouldn’t actually be logical.

Instead, I slapped my laptop screen shut and stalked away. It was the only smart thing to do, or so I’d learned over the years.

Receiving notes on your creative work — in this case, a screenplay — always provokes this response in me. It likely does for you, too.

It’s called fight-or-flight, and we evolved the instinct over millions of years to protect ourselves.

Today, it’s a constant liability to our ability to function in our personal and professional lives. In Hollywood, for example, it’s a quick route to being labeled an asshole and drummed out of the film/TV industry altogether.

You would think artists would develop “thicker skin”, as others might call it, but there’s no way to just cast aside a biological instinct more ancient than the human species.

Likewise, you would think those who give artists notes – from friends, to talent representatives, to producers and book publishers, to even other artists – would understand this…but they typically don’t.

So, let’s talk about why it’s so hard to receive notes on your art and the best way to give notes on someone else’s art.

These “rules” — and I hesitate to use that word, because the concept of “rules we must follow” in art irks me — might just save your life. Or at least your project and maybe even your professional future.

“YOU WOULDN’T LIKE ME WHEN I’M ANGRY”

The fight-or-flight response, also called the acute stress response, is a physiological reaction we have to anything we find terrifying as all fuck. Doesn’t matter if it’s a mental threat or a physical one. Doesn’t matter if the threat is to you, someone else, or, in the scenario I just described, my work on a screenplay.

When it happens, our sympathetic nervous system stimulates our pituitary and adrenal glands, which in turn releases a whole bunch of fun things like adrenaline, noradrenaline, and cortisol. The result is increased heart rate, blood pressure, and breathing rate. You can remain in this altered state for 20 to 60 minutes after the perceived threat has passed.

Why is this relevant to art and, in particular, receiving notes on our art?

If you have children, you will understand that anything that threatens them is experienced as a threat against you. About 25 years ago, my father, sister, and I were walking through a parking lot and a car began to reverse out of a parking spot right at us.

Before it ran my sister down, the brakes screamed and the car stopped, bumper mere inches from her. My father’s fist dropped like a thunder god’s hammer into the trunk lid, and he roared, “Watch where you’re going, asshole!”

My father didn’t think about what he was doing in this instance. His brain did it for him before he even understood what was transpiring because the danger to my sister registered as a danger to him. It told him murdermurdermurder or you’ll diediedie.

And so, he lashed out to protect both of them — but really himself.

Artists create artwork. They pour themselves into these works - their passions, their love and grief and traumas, everything that makes them them. The result is like a child, at least in our unconsciousness.

Consequently, notes that criticize these offspring, that pick them apart, that question their identities, are experienced by artists as an attack on themselves. It’s that perceived violence that triggers the fight-or-flight response.

HOW DO WE OUTSMART THE FIGHT-OR-FLIGHT RESPONSE AS ARTISTS?

The short answer: emotional preparation and learned response.

It took me a long time to begin to understand this, but I have to psych myself up to receive notes. I need to make sure my primitive lizard brain is essentially kept in a cage.

I breathe beforehand, I reassure myself, I remind myself about all the notes I’ve received that ultimately led to better scripts, books, or graphic novels.

Yes, many of the notes I’ve received have ruined projects — including my TV series “DRACULA”, which you can learn more about here — but there is no note, even bad ones, that can be beaten by force of will alone.

As for that learned response I referenced, this one requires more discipline in the moment.

You should avoid doing more than having a conversation about notes you disagree with – until you’ve walked away from the experience and your body has had the opportunity to recover from the hormones it’s just soaked up like a sponge.

Accept it as an axiom before you even walk into the room or get on the phone or sit down across from whomever at the coffee shop. Repeat it to yourself as you listen. Tie a string around your finger to help you remember, if necessary.

Basically, respond in such a way as to let the notes-giver know you’ve heard them, but don’t disagree. And don’t argue. Never argue. You’re not in your right mind, even if you think you are.

This doesn’t mean you shouldn’t interrogate the note. Bad notes and notes you disagree with both tend to have merit whether you like it or not. They tend to mean something and it’s your job to work out what that meaning is.

My friend Inside Out screenwriter Meg LeFauve describes notes “as the symptoms of a disease”—

and you can’t just ignore a disease, can you?

But remember, you have no opinion on said note, not until you’ve walked away from the experience and provided yourself a buffer between the hormones and reason.

By the way, you will mess up. I know all of this, and I still do. I still lose my patience as a writer. You will, too.

Let’s put it this way: these rules are “rules”, if you want to call them that, to mitigate the damage and help your project.

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IS IT BETTER TO GIVE OR RECEIVE…NOTES?

As far as I’m concerned, there are only two types of people in the world who truly enjoy giving notes on another person’s artwork: those who seek to profit from said artwork and narcissists.

(Sometimes a person is both, but I’m not going to bother with narcissists here.)

In the first case, this typically means talent representatives and suits such as producers, book editors, and the like. Everything I’m about to say is relevant to you if you’re one of these people, so I encourage you to consider it along with everything I just wrote about how artists experience notes.

If you don’t fit into the groups I just described, then you are likely a fellow artist, peer, or friend/family member — or some combination of these — who has been asked to provide your opinion, wisdom, and maybe even expertise on someone’s work of art.

In other words, you’re giving notes as a favor and, to some degree, that favor is a chore. You could be finally getting around to watching “The Wire”, but instead you’re reading my script – which kind of makes me an asshole, I know.

Sorry in advance on behalf of all artists.

But here’s the thing, whoever you are, however you’re engaging in a conversation with someone’s art, you took on a responsibility when you either agreed to work with this artist or agreed to provide an opinion on this artist’s work.

That’s a burden, I know, but it’s one you accepted.

This means the biggest rule when giving notes is: take it seriously or don’t even bother.

HOW TO GIVE NOTES AND NOT ALIENATE ARTISTS

Here’s some advice on how to give notes. This is not a comprehensive list, but I think there’s much here to help you reflect and evolve and, most importantly, offer notes that will actually improve an artist’s work (and preserve their mental health).

Number 1: Before you engage with the artwork, ask what the artist needs from you.

In my case, I might tell a reader that I’m looking for help with the plot and my character arcs.

Sometimes it’s abstract, like, “I just want to know how it makes you feel.” And sometimes it’s as simple as, “I just need to make sure it makes sense. Tell me what your questions are.”

Number 2: Regarding questions, the more of them the better.

Going back to my friend Meg LeFauve, she said,

“I learned that asking questions can be the best way to give notes. To allow the dreamer in the writer to be present at the table, not just the analyzer.”

Let me illustrate that for you.

Two of my two favorite development experiences ever were with a British production company and an Italian one – Kate Lewis and Julia Walsh (who were running a company called Neon Ink at the time) and Francesca Longardi and Donatella Di Benedetto at Cattleya.

All four of them brilliant producers – in part because they don’t just throw out critiques, problems that need to be solved. They throw out questions to better understand and improve your work. “What is this scene about to you?” “What’s going on in her head?” “Why do you think he did that?”

This allows you to muse, rather than solve – which produces a lot more interesting work, I find.

This is a far more common experience outside of Hollywood, in part, I think, because Hollywood’s culture is inherently pugilistic. People will try to tell you it’s not, but conflict is baked into so many creative encounters.

In summary: ask…questions…when you’re giving notes. Ask a lot of them.

Number 3: Do not give notes on what you want a piece of artwork to be.

You are not relevant to this process.

The artwork is an expression of the artist and their creative ambitions, not yours.

Number 4: Start the conversation about the artwork with what works for you, what excites you, what moves you.

How did it make you feel? Without this context, all other questions and ensuing notes are pretty damn useless, as far as I’m concerned.

The reason: nobody trusts notes from someone who didn’t have any kind of emotional reaction to their work.

Number 5: As you get into notes about your concerns and confusion, remember your words can destroy an artist’s confidence.

These words can send them in the wrong direction and undo months or years of work.

I say this from personal experience. I’ve abandoned whole projects over bad notes, and it was only when I returned to them years later that I realized how far I’d been led astray by the shitty notes.

For example, my debut novel Psalms for the End of the World came into existence nearly a decade after a terrible response to a core storyline in it convinced me it wasn’t worth pursuing.

More recently, a very negative notes session caused me to shut down on the project for six weeks. I couldn’t even think about it despite trying to work on it. It seemed pointless to bother. When I snapped out of it, I got back to work and I ended up very happy with the outcome, but it didn’t have to be that way.

Number 6: If something doesn’t work for you, try to provide examples of why it doesn’t in the context of what does.

In the case of my fiction, my book agent wouldn’t tell me, “This chapter sucks.”

He’d tell me, “This chapter isn’t moving me like Chapter X did, but I think it needs to because of its importance to the characters’ journeys. Can you look at X and try to identify what’s missing here?”

Number 7: Your notes are not meant to solve the issue for the artist.

Your notes are meant to illuminate the issue.

It’s the artist’s job to come up with their own solution.

If they wish to engage you in conversation about that solution, lend a hand.

This rule is the one most commonly broken by producers, by the way – but representatives, too.

They break it because they’re inexperienced with story development in general, or resent that you’re a writer and not them, or want to be told how smart they are because their egos are fragile, or they suffer from narcissistic tendencies. Sometimes all the above.

But screenwriters, earlier in their journeys, can also do this, too. They’re so desperate from validation, so deep in their own struggles, that they try to play story genius with someone else’s work to get it.

Try to mitigate this impulse as much as you can.

Helping others make their stories better on their own terms helps make you a better storyteller on yours.

And, lastly, Rule 8: Always remember the artist is imperiled by your criticism.

The artist will feel attacked, no matter where they are in their career. If they don’t, they’re missing something in their emotional toolkit, and that’s probably a bigger problem.

Be aware of this fight-or-flight response, help the artist navigate it, and be kind if their biology outsmarts their reason.

“I CAN SEE CLEARLY NOW THE RAIN IS GONE”

I opened this episode with a description of how I reacted to a notes email from a collaborator not so long ago. It had been a while since I received notes of this kind on my work, and the experience of combing through them, then tearing angrily through, left me discombobulated for all the reasons I’ve laid out about the fight-or-flight response.

After 20 years as a professional writer, 17 of which I’ve been a professional screenwriter, you would think this would get easier. In some ways, it has, but in others, it certainly hasn’t.

I’ve learned how to confront these complicated, intense emotions, how to ignore their siren call to murder, and simply walk away – but it takes an intense amount of discipline on my part.

In this case, I reevaluated the notes I had been emailed the next morning. I found them considerably less distressing without adrenaline pulsing through my body. I was able to contextualize them within the wider development experience, which substantially improved what I thought about them and how my work was potentially received. And lastly, when I sat down with my collaborators, I was able to hear them and provide thoughtful, productive fixes.

Nobody was trying to kill me, despite what my lizard brain told me was happening. I wish it hadn’t taken me so long to learn and accept this because I might’ve saved myself a lot of anguish in my creative journey.

Hopefully sharing all this with you today will save you some of what I had to learn the hard way.

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OTHER EPISODES/ARTICLES LIKE THIS ONE YOU MIGHT ENJOY

The great Spanish writer-director Pedro Almdóvar was recently interview by the Los Angeles Times ahead of the premiere of his latest film Bitter Christmas at Cannes. Here’s a segment of it:

“You know, I’m not really blaming anyone in particular, but it was quite notable watching the Oscar telecast where there were not many protests against the war or against Trump. Maybe he wasn’t the only one, but the only real example I can remember came from a European, a friend of mine, Javier Bardem, who did directly say, ‘Free Palestine.’

People are obviously very frightened. The U.S. is not a democracy right now. Some people say it’s maybe an imperfect democracy, but I really don’t think the U.S. is a democracy right now. The heartbreaking and ironic thing is that democracy has given rise, through the proper, right voting mechanism, to this kind of totalitarian regime. And it’s both a paradox and it’s also incredibly sad.”

I’ve discussed this subject ad nauseam here at 5AM StoryTalk, specifically how Hollywood artists have largely abandoned the fight against fascism, racism, the disappearing of American residents, immigrants, the erosion of women’s rights, genocide, attacks on trans people — basically, anything that smacks of being evil.

In Almodóvar’s case — and the case of most of the people who have spoken out over the past few years at major ceremonies — they are non-American filmmakers, which does explain a lot. The role of the artist as cultural revolutionary is far more accepted in most Western countries, I mean. It’s typical in a lot of countries beyond the West, too.

This brings me to this week’s question. America has spent decades telling us artists should shut up and act or sing or whatever. Wherever you live around the world, maybe you feel the same.

Should artists — filmmakers (including actors), musicians, novelists, and so on — keep their mouths shut about politics and just put their opinions in their work instead?

This question will no doubt generate some vigorous debate, which means it’s time for my friendly reminder: 5AM StoryTalk is a community and I will block the hell out of anyone who treats others here disrespectfully. Many of us will have different perspectives on this matter. Once upon a time, it was even considered useful to understand how others think, especially if they come from cultures beyond your own — at least if their opinions don’t entail the oppression or dehumanization of others.

So, weigh in, read and weigh in on what others think, too…but don’t be an asshole. It’s not hard, really.

HYDE

Back in 2010, the second screenplay I was ever hired to write made it on to The Black List, which is the year’s “best unproduced scripts” according to a survey of development executives. It was called Hyde and was an adaptation of a comic book series called The Strange Case of Mr. Hyde that I’d created for Dark Horse.

The Black List was a transformative moment in my career, because suddenly everyone in Hollywood seemed to want to know me. I credit it happening to my producer and friend Keith Goldberg, who at the time was running Dark Horse Entertainment’s film/TV division. He’s a development genius as far as I’m concerned and everyone should hope he sprinkles some of his “Keith magic dust” on their work, too.

All this is just context, though, for what I really want to talk about today. There was a moment during our work on the script that will help you understand how careful you have to be with every word choice you make with your scripts, novels, whatever.

Because at the end of the day, people have a habit of imagining things that aren’t there in your work – just like they do with the moving image. That’s something to be cautious of…but also use to your advantage in your storytelling, whether for screen or the page.

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VAL LEWTON

Val Lewton is an under-appreciated – and, these days, largely overlooked – figure in horror cinema. In many ways, he and Alfred Hitchcock forged a similar road, relying on suspense, transgressive ideas, and psychological terror in their work. The major difference was that Lewton was a producer, the head of the horror department at RKO starting in 1942, and, while he was deeply involved in every element of his films, including significant uncredited rewrites, he never directed. He got people like Jacques Tourneur and Robert Wise to do that for him, people who went on to become cinematic legends in their own right.

Amongst the films Lewton produced for RKO are horror classics like Cat People (1942) and its sequel The Curse of the Cat People (1944), I Walked with a Zombie (1943), The Leopard Man (1943), and The Seventh Victim (1943). Several of his films have been remade. I’ve been in the mix to rewrite one and was meant to write another until the deal fell apart.

What made Lewton films such a “brand” is how deeply subversive they were for the time, how they relied on incredibly moody lighting that helped develop the film noir visual language, and how he relied on psychology to create his scares. Let’s focus on that last point, because it’s the important one here.

Lewton’s masters at RKO initially wanted him to make monster films in the Universal vein, hence the titles that RKO forced on him, but he threw out the monstrous in favor of the unknown. He was much more interested in what was in our imaginations. In what we couldn’t see in the shadows, what we heard in a rustling of leaves rather than what caused the sound, what we imagined was happening to us – often based on our trauma.

While Hitchcock was still pulling off rather basic suspense sequences in his films (in the context of his career), Lewton was almost singlehandedly inventing the language of horror that would persist for decades to come – right down to the “jump scare”, which made its first appearance in Cat People. I just saw The Leopard Man on the big screen last week and there’s a great one in it that made me jump in my theater seat – 83 years later.

What I mean is, a lot of his work still very much holds up today.

So, you might ask, what really makes a Lewton film so good?

Well, besides the themes, besides the beautiful cinematography that helped create the film noir language, they never show you what you’re supposed to be scared of. It’s almost all in the characters’ imaginations and, thanks to the way his films are shot and edited, in the audience’s.

Let’s take a look at this sequence from The Cat People. It’s iconic today. A woman tormented by the belief that she is cursed to become a violent cat if she gives in to her sexual desire takes a swim in an indoor pool. What happens next is…deeply unsettling.

Now, ask yourself: did you actually see anything on screen to justify such intense terror?

Here’s another great sequence from The Cat People, which I think is almost as effective and worth studying to understand better how little the human mind requires to experience fear in real life or find it in a film. It also ends in that first jump scare in cinema I referenced!

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JAWS

Thirty-two years after Cat People first scared the shit out of audiences, Steven Spielberg began shooting Jaws in May of 1974 – an adaptation of the Peter Benchley novel about a Great White shark stalking the shores of a Long Island resort town. The story was now set on and around a fictional New England island, a resort community dependent on tourist dollars, and the robot shark that was built to do the mass-murdering was not up to the task. Said shark, nicknamed Bruce after Spielberg’s lawyer, kept sinking. Panic ensued. How could you have a monster movie without a monster?

Spielberg, in his desperation, opted to take a minimalist approach to the Great White. That approach was innovated by Val Lewton and resulted in numerous sequences in Jaws – now iconic and heavily borrowed from by other filmmakers – in which the shark is not seen at all except, perhaps, a fin. But even that fin makes few appearances until the third act.

To give the Great White emotional mass, so to say, Spielberg turned to composer John Williams – whose duh-duh theme embodied the shark for audiences and, to this day, is enough to make many people shiver.

Consider the following scene, which opens the film. No shark. Silence. Waves. Breathing. A startled gasp. Anguished screams. A buoy bell. Then, silence again…except for the bell still tolling like church bells at a funeral.

Here’s another scene, which turns a broken section of a small dock into a stand-in for the Great White. Again, we don’t see the shark itself. And in that absence, the terror is actually more intense. After all, it’s not the shark that will make us squirm in our seats. It’s the human beings trying to escape it, trying to get out of the water, trying not to die. Their terror at what’s just under the surface, of the unseen, becomes our terror.

It’s fair to say that Jaws wouldn’t have become one of the most successful films of all time had we seen the Great White more. By applying Val Lewton’s approach to horror to his own film, Spielberg gave birth to the Hollywood blockbuster – and scared the shit out of millions in the process.

SCHINDLER’S LIST - AN ANTI-LEWTON FILM

Eighteen years after Jaws was released, another Steven Spielberg film horrified audiences – this time for very different reasons. Schindler’s List was – and probably remains – the most important film about the Holocaust ever made. It had a transformative impact on our culture and how we talk about the 6 million Jews who were murdered by Nazi Germany (and, to a lesser degree, the many other groups who died in concentration camps).

Spielberg achieved this result by taking a very different tact than he was forced to with Jaws – he showed the horror this time, making people stare it in the face, making it impossible to pretend the atrocity away as it had largely been for some four decades at that point. One scene after another, violence is unflinchingly, mercilessly recreated, regardless of how vomit-inducing much of it is. Because there’s a huge difference between watching a slasher flick filled with gory violence and watching Steven fucking Spielberg — the guy who gave us E.T. The Extra-Terrestrial just a decade earlier — ruthlessly, relentlessly asking us to watch Jewish people being executed by Nazis.

There’s a scene late in the film, where a train car full of Jews are led into a gas chamber, but it turns out just to be a shower. Some critics thought it was a cop-out. But how could it be a cop-out after a couple hours of non-stop, inhuman violence interrupted only for brief glimpses of the human lives being extinguished?

Thirty years later, Jonathan Glazer wrote and directed The Zone of Interest (2023), loosely adapted from Martin Amis’s 2014 novel, a film that I would argue is a cinematic response to Schindler’s List. It’s a film, I think, Spielberg couldn’t have made for a variety of reasons — both aesthetically and personally. And it’s a film that’s far more terrifying as a result, in my opinion.

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• 🎧 LISTEN to this 5AM StoryTalk episode as audio here at Substack.

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• 📖 READ this episode by scrolling down past the intro and recommendations.

Are you overcomplicating your world-building? Today, I’m breaking down why the most effective story worlds are built on simplicity — and why I opted (counterintuitively) to instead take a “maximalist” approach to my storytelling with my latest TV pilot script commission.

The good news is, I finally heard from my producers what they think about the work I did, which I’m going to be filling you in about, along with an update on my new feature spec screenplay, and what I’ve been watching lately…like “The Pitt”. Is it just me, or is it one of the most meditative shows on TV today? I’ll tell you what I mean by that and more in this latest edition of The Brew — an intimate 5AM StoryTalk series on the struggles and successes of life in the arts.

On the itinerary this week:

• THE WORLD-BUILDING SPECTRUM: From Star Wars to the grounded social dynamics of Amity Island in Jaws — what do people not understand about the term ‘world-building’? 🌍

• THE PILOT UPDATE: What's going on with my latest script commission? After almost five months, I finally got notes from my producers. 📺

• DELICATE MAXIMALISM: Swinging for the fences with an oversized draft to find the project’s perfect shape. 🏗️

• THE RARE NOTE: I got a note I’ve never received before. Find out what it was. 👤

• THE KILLER 50-PAGE PILOT: Tightening a 63-page script into a “tear-through” read. ✍️

• CELLULOID AT RADIO SPRINGS: Citizen Kane and the "fucking brilliant" French epic Camille Claudel on film. 🎞️

• WHAT I THINK OF “THE PITT”: The unique conflict of a series that feels like "what television used to be". 🏥

• THE MINGUS PRINCIPLE: Making the complicated simple so the audience can internalize the world instead of analyze it. 🎹

If you have any thoughts or questions about what we discuss today, drop them in the comments.

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READ THE BREW MAY 12, 2026

Welcome back to 5AM StoryTalk, my friends. This is an edition of The Brew – a personal blog where, in between bigger episodes, I share thoughts about what I’m struggling with and sometimes even getting right as an artist in the 21^st century.

And lately, I’ve gotten a few things right, I think…like the first draft of my latest TV drama pilot script commission.

Back in December, I turned in its first draft and then sat back and waited as the weeks and then months ticked by. The producers were buried in production and post on a couple of other shows, so I was left wondering if anyone liked anything I had written.

The good news is, I now know they apparently did – a lot. Which is a huge relief.

I can’t tell you what the project specifically is, but I can say it’s an international co-production between the UK and Australia and it’s an adaptation of a very popular book series.

It was a tricky one to convert to the screen – and obviously, we’re still working on it, so I haven’t entirely nailed it yet. Specifically, it involved a lot of world building, which, if you read the 5AM StoryTalk newsletter, is at least something of a specialty of mine.

World-building is such an interesting thing because most people seem to think it’s only about bringing unreal, exotic worlds to life – stories with complicated rules alien to how we understand and navigate our own world. You know, like Star Wars or The Matrix or that wizarding book series by She Who Will Not Be Named.

But world building is a lot more than that.

Most historical stories, even those based on true stories, require significant world building to make sure audiences can keep up with the cultural dynamics at play.

I’m going to have to record a longer audio essay on this subject in the future, but I’d love for you to drop into the comments and tell me what you’d like to know more about on this subject.

For now, I’m going to slip several script breakdowns about world-building in the episode notes. This one for The Matrix is the most obvious example:

But I think the one for Jaws will show what I mean about how the rules of world-building pertain to any new environment and social dynamic – like Amity Island.

In the case of my TV pilot, this thing probably involved more than I’ve ever had to juggle.

I adopted a strategy of more, a kind of delicate maximalism, since this was the first draft. The goal was to make sure the world was clearly defined so we could work out what aspects of it weren’t going to matter enough to hold on to.

This is the advantage of multiple drafts in development, allowing (hopefully) smart producers to help you find the project’s perfect shape. In this case, I’m definitely working with smart producers, so that’s something.

What we’ve discovered – together – is that the first third of the pilot is suffering from a bit of imbalance.

Oddly enough, too much character-building and not enough world-building.

That’s a note I’ve never received. It’s always the other way around.

So, I’m going to get to work on that over the next couple of works while tightening the rest of the script now that the producers and I are on the same page about everything.

This is another advantage of my maximalist draft. I swung for the fences, to use an Americanism. I didn’t hold back, I mean. Let’s just find out what we love, what we don’t, and go from there – if you follow.

That means the draft was also a bit longer than I hoped. There’s been a trend over the past decade of producers pushing writers toward over-sized pilots that could never be shot. Later, after a greenlight, you fix that – often hurting the script in the process. You hurt it because the story was never supposed to be that dense, so in cutting it back and back – trying to hold on to too much since everyone involved has an opinion about what should absolutely stay – you end up with scenes that can’t breathe. Too often, they’re elaborate summaries of more interesting scenes.

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In this case, what I’ve asked for and, thankfully, been granted – for now – is the opportunity to pull back, to really tighten the script, to take it from 63 pages to 50 to 53.

I’d rather have a killer 50-ish page pilot script – that you just tear through as a reader – than a much-denser, 60+ page one that sells a fantasy version of the series.

Okay, that’s enough of the pilot script update. In other not terrible news – which is basically how I describe any good news these days – I’ve made some huge strides with my feature spec script’s first draft.

This one has been an interesting one, redefining how I work in a lot of ways. When I’m further along, I’ll tell you more about what I mean.

My wife and I have also just signed a construction contract with a company that’s going to come in and knock down our four sheds and build a new super-garage and external office for me – which I’m incredibly excited about.

For one reason, it means these sheds will be gone. We call them the murder sheds because when we bought the house in December, they looked like the setting of Texas Chainsaw Massacre.

It didn’t help that their only contents were a single set of garden shears hanging at the center of the far wall when you opened the big door – like they were there waiting to be used - in some kind of ceremonial place of honor.

The other reason I’m excited is the office will be a place to work away from my kids – and it’ll include a private TV space, sort of a home theater – where my wife and I can watch films on a big screen without arguing with the aforementioned kids.

I mean, ours just think they own our living room TV. It makes it really hard to enjoy films or TV series without constant interruptions. I’m sure a lot of you can related.

Switching gears here, I haven’t told you what I’ve been watching lately. The reality is, I haven’t been able to check out anything new over the past couple of weeks – but I did get to see two brilliant classic films at the secret cinema at Radio Springs Hotel in Lyonsville here in Victoria, Australia.

Remember, these are on celluloid, reels restored by Ken who runs the series. If you live in the region, find Radio Springs on Facebook and check out a show.

As for those two classic films, they were Citizen Kane – which was the fifteenth time I’ve seen it, according to my log. I love this film so much. I just gasped at shots all the way through it.

The other was a French film – Camille Claudel. It’s from 1989, co-written and directed by Bruno Nuytten and stars Isabelle Adjani and Gerard Depardiue…and it’s fucking brilliant.

I know Claudel’s tragic story well – early 20^th century sculptor who suffered from mental health issues exacerbated by a relationship with Auguste Rodin — but this depiction is…something else. Heartbreaking. If you like epics, then you need to hunt this film down immediately. I cannot recommend it enough. I left the theater stunned, just shaking my head – kind of blown away a movie this brilliant exists and it’s not commonly referenced.

I’ve also been slow-watching my way through “The Pitt” for the first time. My wife and I are only halfway through Season 1, but guys…it’s so good. You obviously know that because you’re probably watching it too, or rather, already have because you’re smarter than I am.

I’m going to want to talk about this series more at a later point, but I’m just amazed by the writing, the performances, the depiction of autism, Noah Wyle in general, and…its gentle conflict?

Again, I’ll talk about that in more depth later, but its drama is so far so…mild? While he world it depicts, that’s not.

I don’t know. I find the characters, the grace and terror and courage with which they face their jobs in the ER is…soothing?

Is it just me, or is “The Pitt” incredibly meditative?

It’s probably just me, but I think it’s true. I find myself so relaxed spending time with this cast of characters. And I look forward to getting back to them as soon as an episode ends.

This is what television used to be like. Great drama, weekly check-ins, the comfort you experience spending quality time with friends you like – and some you don’t.

Tell me what you make of the series in the comments!

Okay, we’re almost done for today. But I want to leave you with an artist’s quote, as I like to do.

Today’s comes from the great American jazz musician Charles Mingus. He said:

“Anyone can make the simple complicated. Creativity is making the complicated simple.”

It’s a quote that has many variants out there in the multiverse, shared by many other brilliant artists. But I’ve been listening to Mingus and I’ve been thinking about this sentiment a lot lately, so I thought I’d kick it your way.

To bring it back to world-building, to a fundamental aspect of so much storytelling – something I’ve been wrestling with a lot on this TV pilot and feature spec I’m writing – you cannot hope audiences will emotionally attach themselves to a complicated explanation of a complicated subject or even idea. Simplicity, often so graceful you don’t even see it happening, is a necessity in great world-building.

Audiences are just better at internalizing than they are in analyzing new worlds and narrative experiences.

That’s it for now, StoryTalkers. Don’t forget to take advantage of all the links in the episode notes I’ve put there for you. Subscribe if you haven’t already, so 5AM StoryTalk keeps showing up at your life. And leave a 5-star review at Apple or Spotify if you think it’s warranted. It really helps new listeners find their way to this podcast and its newsletter at Substack.

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I wanted to have some fun with this week’s question, as I like to make sure we’re not too myopic in how we talk about art here - you know, craft, serious, craft, serious, craft, holy shit we’re living through the End Times, craft. I’ll just spit it out, then explain myself:

Which three living musicians would you invite to a dinner party (and why)?

I doubt this question requires much explanation, but maybe I should tell you why I like this question: A, it tells me more about who you are and think and, B, I expect it will lead to a lively and amusing conversation. So, don’t just drop three names like a grenade and make a run for it. Read your fellow StoryTalkers’ answers and let them know what you think of them.

As for me, here are my three picks to join me for a dinner party:

• Dolly Parton: Dolly is the anchor here. She brings the fun, the deep humanity, and the gravity of a long, thoroughly lived life to the conversation.

• John Williams: John is the wild card, to keep things going. The other two guests would no doubt have as many questions for him as I would, so there wouldn’t be a risk of peer indifference.

• Mick Jagger: Mick is the boundless energy. The guy doesn’t stop and, from what mutual friends have told me, he doesn’t know when to stop either. He’s the guy who shows up for a private sunrise yoga lesson with you and is still around, talking, when the sun goes down. In that regard, I’d look forward to him sticking around after Dolly and John got sleepy, to spin even more stories for me about his more than six decades in the music industry.

Overall, I’m going with older guests because I’d want to just listen to them talk to each other about their long lives and careers and collectively defining so much of our culture.

Now…your turn!

• 🎙️ This is a 5AM StoryTalk Podcast BONUS EPISODE. Be sure to also listen to this week’s feature conversation — “Actor David Dastmalchian | Letting the Darkness Speak”.

• 📖 READ this episode instead by going to the TRANSCRIPT tab.

Actor, filmmaker, podcaster, and comic book creator David Dastmalchian returns to discuss a seminal piece of art from his life — the 1971 film Harold and Maude. It’s an unconventional, hilarious, and ultimately profound love story about…suicide. But also, coming of age, everything that’s wrong with American culture, and the meaning of life.

While I didn’t see this film from screenwriter Colin Higgins and legendary director Hal Ashby until later in life, Harold and Maude was foundational to David’s development as a teenager and, later, as an artist. If you want to understand how he became the person and storyteller he is today, you’ll want to check this bonus episode out!

Please note: Like the first part of my conversation with David, suicide is discussed in this bonus episode. If you’re struggling or in crisis, I’m sorry - there are numbers you can find on the internet to reach out to if you don’t feel you can turn to those close to you. Don’t wait.

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And don’t forget to listen to the first part of my conversation with David!

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So, how did your April go, StoryTalkers? It’s autumn here in Australia, so the world around me is colorful as the foliage lights up. Writing-wise, I’m neck deep into a new spec feature script, but as hard as I try to make time for it, other responsibilities — from this newsletter/podcast to home renovations — keep pulling me away from it. I expect things will improve in May, but there’s no way to know that for sure. There could be another war or two by then and we’ll all have to get masks like this if we ever want to fill up the tank again, right?

For newcomers to 5AM StoryTalk, 5AM CoffeeTalk is a quirky monthly rundown I use to share quick bites of information with you about the arts and what’s happening in my life here in Oz. If you enjoy how I think and talk about culture and the world, then what you find here could help point you toward art, events, and news/ideas that you’ll enjoy, too. Oh, and remember it serves as a sort of sibling series to The Brew that I publish as part of the podcast here.

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Jump into the comments and share some of what’s been exciting, challenging, provoking, destroying, etc. your creative mind this past month. I want all the grizzly details. Let’s make this a two-way conversation — or, er, given how many StoryTalkers there are, a totally not awkward group chat.

SOMETHING YOU SHOULD REMEMBER

“You must stay drunk on writing so reality cannot destroy you.” — Ray Bradbury

I think about this quote a lot lately and, if you’re a writer, I expect it will speak to you, too. Bradbury’s point here is one of the reasons I have so much trouble taking time off from work. Words are like painkillers to me — but free.

SOMETHING YOU SHOULD TRY

Nature feeds creativity. The more time you spend it in, the more extraordinary places your imagination will take you. I always remind myself that Charles Darwin cracked so much of his theory of evolution — and the evolutionary ideas that followed — while taking daily strolls through his expansive garden and nearby woods.

Here’s a video of one of my recent morning bush walks here in Victoria, Australia:

SOMETHING COOL ONE OF MY FRIENDS DID

Screenwriter Cinco Paul might be a newer friend, but he’s done something amazing that makes me want to scream on his behalf. He’s turned “Schimagadoon!” — a TV series he created — into a Broadway musical that’s been getting all kinds of raves - and now he’s even been nominated for a Tony for it!

If you’re in New York City in the next few months, be sure to check it out. It’s a limited engagement through September (for now)!

Oh, and if you want to learn more about Cinco and his life and art — including some really intimate accountings of his time working on the “Schmigadoon!” TV series — check out 5AM StoryTalk’s episode with him here:

SOMETHING I’M LOOKING FORWARD TO

Good god, this restoration looks beautiful. And it’s coming back to big screens for the 40th anniversary - the perfect way to introduce my eleven-year-old to it!

SOMETHING I ATE

I met my friend fellow screenwriter David Chidlow (creator, “Last Days of the Space Age”) for brunch in Naarm/Melbourne this month. I'd been keen to try Manchester Press for some time — which is hidden down a green alley in the CBD — and it did not disappoint.

I went with the utterly bonkers bacon & maple bagel (blueberry bagel with bacon, mascarpone, banana, maple syrup...and, I shit you not, popcorn).

David insisted on photographing me before I dove in, unable to believe what I'd ordered. Believe it or not, it's delicious, too. I made it through the whole thing save for a few pieces of popcorn, which our server seemed disappointed by. I think they felt I could've tried harder.

I'll be back to write here next time. The vibe is chill, like you've wandered into a secret oasis in the middle of the city.

SOMETHING I LISTENED TO

It had been at least a decade since I listened to “Criminal” from my old friend Scott Thomas, who recorded this as one half of Ringside (actor Balthazar Getty being the other half). It instantly transported me back to my first years in Hollywood when Scott introduced me to Chuck Taylors (I still almost only wear them), played songs for me and my friends around the piano in his house in the Hollywood Hills, and let me tag along on long nights out in LA with his famous friends. In a lot of ways, Scott provided me a roadmap for how to survive the town, good and bad.

SOMETHING THAT MADE ME SCREAM

"Resurrected" — not "recreated" or "manufactured" or "animated" or "has his corpse dragged around by two charming young men who just want to enjoy their vacation."

SOMETHING COOL ONE OF MY OTHER FRIENDS DID

My friend Guy Edmonds — actor, filmmaker, author — had his third kids TV series premiere in Australia this month. It’s called “Caper Crew” and I’m confident your little ones are going to love it. His last two — “Hardball” and “Spooky Files” — were incredibly popular in my house, especially “Spooky Files”!

It’s currently available on the ABC here in Oz, but I expect it will find its ways to streamers around the globe soon — so, keep those eyes peeled.

SOMETHING YOU SHOULD READ

Many Australian filmmakers I know complain the Australian funding bodies as designed to favor the institutionally powerful and influential. I hear endless complaints of producer grift that lines their pockets at the cost of the screenwriters who originate projects. Directors are allegedly similarly disadvantaged. I haven’t engaged in the process yet myself, so I can’t have an opinion, but Australian writer-director Alex Proyas (Dark City) certainly has a lot.

Read “Why I May Never Make Another Movie in Australia” by Proyas here.

SOMETHING ELSE I LISTENED TO

In 1941, Irving Berlin — one of my favorite songwriters of the period — wrote “When That Man Is Dead and Gone” about the better world that would follow Hitler’s inevitable death. I’ve never found footage from the period of artists performing it despite how popular it proved.

Anyway, this is not a comment about Hitler.

SOMETHING THAT GOT ME EXCITED

I was aware there was a Thelma & Louise musical coming our way, but I had no idea the brilliant wrote the music and lyrics. She was actually my pick to do the same for a stage musical project of my own a while back, but the producers didn’t want to know the answer to the question, “How amazing would it be if Neko Case wrote this?” as much as I did. Now I’ll finally find out the answer to that question when Thelma & Louise premieres later this year!

SOMETHING THAT BLEW MY MIND

This new short film is beautiful but deeply unsettling for most of its running time…and then something magical happens. Something that’s one of the most remarkable things I’ve seen put on film in quite some time. Watch it on a TV screen, if you can, something bigger than your device. Because you reallly need to see this.

It’s a collaboration between Swedish rapper Yung Lean, the musical project GENER8ION, and choreography by Damien Jalet. It’s directed by Romain Gavras (Costas’s son).

SOMEPLACE I WANT TO GO BACK TO ASAP

Carboni’s Next Door opened in Buninyong (Victoria, Australia) last year…and it is a slice of Italian heaven. Killer sandwiches, delicious gelato, and one hell of a selection of deli meats. As it’s autumn right now in Oz and the leaves in Buningyong are on fire, I strongly encourage you to take the time to have lunch here.

SOMETHING THAT GAVE ME HOPE

Queensland, Australia recently passed a law that says using the term “from the river to the sea” is illegal if it makes any reasonable person feel uncomfortable - which is an easy thing to do since one person’s comfort might be another person’s oppression. Well, some Brisbanites decided to protest this silly, spectacularly ambiguous hate speech law by staging a flash mob to John Farnham’s classic pop song “Two Strong Hearts” - which includes part of the outlawed words in its lyrics.

I love Australia.

SOMETHING YOU SHOULD READ ON SUBSTACK

I hadn’t read much from before this essay from her, but I’ll be reading a lot more from her now. It’s as much about whom we’ve become as a culture as author Ocean Vuong (even though, as Linda says, it’s not about him).

(Thanks for making sure it crossed my path on Notes, !)

Hello, Writer!

The backlash against Ocean Vuong

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10 months ago · 7616 likes · 915 comments · Linda Caroll

SOMETHING ELSE THAT MADE ME SCREAM

Madonna made a surprise appearance at Coachella to perform with Sabrina Carpenter. This is a real photograph of them on stage together.

All I see is proof we’re trapped in a dystopian hell where our relationship to the real hasn’t just been blurred - but entirely traded entirely for likes.

SOMEONE YOU SHOULD FOLLOW ON SUBSTACK

has been a subscriber to 5AM StoryTalk for many moons now, and I am always grateful to see her show up in the comments because she brings so much knowledge about cinema to every conversation — specifically, knowledge about films that have either been overlooked or were intentionally ignored. Her newsletter, Widening the Lens, will introduce you to so many brilliant films from around the world — as well marginalized American artists — that you’ll find yourself constantly screaming, “Why didn’t I know this existed?!” Let her curate some of your upcoming movie nights. Trust me, you won’t be disappointed!

SOMETHING THAT MADE ME SMILE

This is just delightful. A new short film from Spike Jonze, starring Zendaya and Law Roach.

SOMETHING THAT MADE ME LAUGH

Brilliant response to a sexist question. Aisling Bea is a comedy god. And like her, I wonder why women aren’t running the world.

SOMETHING THAT BRINGS ME CALM

Old cemeteries are like libraries to me, filled with stories and mysteries and secrets waiting to be revealed. I wander them whenever I can.

Writer tip: they’re also a wonderful place to find inspiration for character names.

This pic was taken by me at Daylesford Cemetery (Daylesford, Victoria - Australia).

SOMETHING I’M LOOKING FORWARD TO

Horror in ballet is not something I’ve had enough of in my life, which is why I’m looking forward to the new ballet Dracula coming to Melbourne in October. As you know, Dracula holds a special place in my heart and I have a lot of opinions about the character and story, so I can’t wait to see if this is as dark and beautiful as I’ve heard it is.

It’s coming to several other cities, including Sydney, London, and San Francisco, so be sure to read more here if you’re intrigued.

SOMETHING COOL ONE OF MY OTHER OTHER FRIENDS DID

In this case, it’s my brilliant sister-in-law Kara Holden, who spent years writing and working on a passion project called Dinner with Audrey. It just started production in Budapest, Hungary with Thomasin McKenzie and Ansel Elgort as Audrey Hepburn and Hubert de Givenchy!

SOMETHING THAT MADE ME PROUD

My youngest son won’t pick up after himself at home, but he decided he wanted to make our town’s lake free of trash for the birds and animals — and spent all afternoon doing just that. He doesn’t follow any rules or norms, but he is a pretty fantastic example of being true to himself and his mother and I are incredibly proud of the little guy for that.

Photo courtesy of my wife.

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