Category Archives: Crafting Stories

Examples of how stories illustrate the story-tellers craft. Includes literature, film, graphic novels, stage and screen productions.

September 5, 2021 · 5:00 pm

The Irresistible Villains of Brassmonkey Bay: Sammy Snatch

Psychologist Bruno Bettelheim wrote in his 1977 classic, The Uses of Enchantment, that fairy tales and other fantasy stories provide a safe stage where young people can rehearse life’s big events, playing out their dreams and nightmares. Story-tale heroes are like avatars kids can use or discard without consequences. But what about villains? What is it that makes a villain so irresistible to kids? What do we mean by a ‘good’ villain?

Sammy Snatch is one of the Magic Island Gang’s three irresistible villains (c) Brio Multimedia 2020.

What role do villains play for us? What kid–or adult, for that matter–can resist a good villain in a book, film or theatre performance? How bland would our stories be without the foreboding and danger provided by a good villain?

A ‘good villain’ is definitely not a good person. Young readers need to see heroes overcome villains. Good must triumph over evil if life is not to be unbearably frightening. And a hero without a villain has no challenge.

The element of surprise in any story is exciting, and a good story-teller’s villain should be unpredictable. We should not know what he or she will do next. As kids know better than anyone, no one can be good all the time.

Villains give kids someone to relate to when they have been cruel, told lies, or hurt others. Villains give us models for our dark moments. A good villain sometimes has a tragic backstory that explains–and to a degree, excuses–their villainy. Without villains, it is hard to learn what it is to feel remorse, and to grow from it.

The Great Brassmonkey Bay Jewel Robbery introduces three villains to the Magic Island Gang series. The first we meet is Sammy Snatch, a heartless smuggler of endangered animals. Clad in a long coat with pockets that are stuffed with his tiny prey, how can Sammy be anything but despicable? He’s a rough fellow. When Sammy gloats over his successes, we imagine him at home after a long day of trapping and poaching, sitting in his chair with a groan, and bending over, we think, to pull off his muddy boots.

Until he pulls off his wooden leg and tips out a little marsupial mouse!

Immediately, we are taken aback. The unshaven Sammy is admittedly a good-looking rogue. His wooden leg adds mystery, the possibility of tragedy, and even a touch of rock-star glamour to the fellow. What is Sammy’s back story, we cannot help but wonder?

Time after time, in the story, Sammy commits unconscionable crimes. But despite this, we never quite turn our backs on him.

Instead, we forgive him when he traps and sells endangered animals to the story’s second villain, the greedy Zoo Director Caspar Hustle. We forgive him when he can’t help but flirt with the third villain, Scarlet Swindle.

We forgive Sammy when he hangs around Brassmonkey Bay, living off his ill-gotten gains, too lazy to do his job.

When he cons Director Hustle by selling Pilfer Possum as an endangered animal, we forgive him again.

We even forgive him when he tracks down the Gang, aiding and abetting a plot to bring them down.

Why?

Sammy is quirky. Dangerous. But he is also funny. Sammy is handsome enough to be the boyfriend even good girls wish they had had, if only for a short spell. In fact, Sammy is such an appealing villain, there are times in the book when he threatens to hijack our sympathy! At the end of The Great Brassmonkey Bay Jewel Robbery, Sammy gets a serious ‘time out’ to think about his crimes.

Does it work?

Either he has to redeem himself sufficiently to merit our readers’ sympathy or he has to continue to behave so appallingly, readers will stop forgiving him for his charm and good looks and attend to their own job of looking after the greater good of Sammy’s endangered victims.

Read The Great Brassmonkey Bay Jewel Robbery to find out.

Do you agree that Sammy is no exception to Bettelheim’s theory? That he offers us lessons in moral dilemmas, a caution against falling in love with the wrong guy, against making self-serving mistakes, against being tempted to make choices we regret?

Listen to Sammy’s signature song, ‘Smugglers’ Jig’ above for clues.

Then watch out for the ‘Artful Gluffster’ post about another Brassmonkey Bay villain–Scarlet Swindle. What does she have in common with Sammy Snatch? And what do Scarlet and Sammy teach us about what makes a really satisfying villain?

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September 4, 2021 · 4:51 am

Interview: Judith Lydia Mercure Talks About Who and What Gets Her Writing

Pittwater Life Editor Lisa Offord asked Judith Lydia Mercure about what motivated her to write books for young audiences during what seems to many to be a period of relentless crisis (originally published in Pittwater Life, September 2021, pp 50-51). Local (Avalon Beach) bookstores Bookoccino and Beachside Books stock Judith Lydia’s latest book, The Great Brassmonkey Bay Jewel Robbery for A$19.99.

Lisa: Tell us about yourself work/family etc and your connection to the Northern beaches.

Judith Lydia: I experienced an instant connection with the Northern Beaches when I saw a photograph in a realtor’s window. Since then, the beaches have been one of the biggest loves of my life. That Avalon house in the photograph became home and whatever else I needed at different stages of my life. It was my study after UNSW and Macquarie Uni classes. It housed offices for my small business.  Writing magazine articles and stories between work at CSIRO, it gave me characters inspired by what I saw every day.  

Lisa: When and why did you begin writing?

Judith Lydia: I started systematically recording experiences as stories in journals when I was sixteen. I’ve got 41 volumes now. It’s funny, embarrassing, and humbling to encounter your younger selves through your journals, but I encourage every writer to keep them. The things I want to remember or want to forget (but shouldn’t), they’re in my journals. They add authenticity to stories. Some of the action and characters in my new Middle Grade/YA book, can be found in them.

Lisa: What inspired you to write this book?

Judith Lydia: Two huge events and one funny Garden Party inspired The Great Brassmonkey Bay Jewel Robbery. First were the devastating wildlife losses of the Black Summer fires. Second was the explosion of video posts by kids during the Pandemic—so funny and creative despite the grinding isolation of lockdowns.  I loved those hopeful gifts of entertainment and decided to follow their lead.

The party in my back garden gave me a star character for the book. One afternoon, I settled six guests at a table under a big coral tree. As daylight faded, a brushtail possum I occasionally fed apple slices to poked her nose out of the leaves and sidled onto a tree branch over the table, unnoticed by my guests as one of them pounded us with his political opinions.

With astonishing accuracy, the possum released a golden stream, filling the man’s wine glass! For the first time, the man was speechless. He left, unlamented, soon after. People don’t believe this is a true story, but it is. I filed it in my journal as evidence of the enormous non-human intelligence I believe surrounds us in Nature. That possum got extra apple slices that night. She became the inspiration for Pilfer, my outrageous Possum Diva. 

Lisa: How did it all come together? How long did it take?

Judith Lydia: You could say I wrote it three times. Initially, inspired by internet videos, I wrote a musical theatre script about how a group of five endangered Aussie animals sold to a cold Zoo pull off an ingenious robbery—and escape!

Script-writing was a new genre to me. It was huge fun to collaborate with musicians. But I soon realised the story had a steep path to navigate before it would get traction as a performance piece, so I rewrote it as a novel.  The second draft took another year but I didn’t regret it. The experience of writing a script helped enormously with character dialogue and pacing.

When COVID  followed the bushfires, the story demanded another complete revision. I was drawn to the teenaged Zookeepers, Pip and Pax, and their personal struggles. Their experiences became a nested narrative in the third draft, with the animals’ adventures narrated by the twins, taking the reader on a journey from reality to fantasy and back.

Lisa: Any interesting or surprising feedback from readers you’d like to share with us? 

Judith Lydia: Surprisingly, some readers said the villains of the story were too appealing. Youth literature has had a meteoric development since chapbooks and fairy tales gave young readers moralistic stories and characters. Now, Taika Waititi’s films offer goofy heroes and funny villains popular with families. Apart from the comic value of their behaviours, I hope my characters that have both good and bad qualities give young readers relatable experiences of remorse, change, and redemption.

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March 26, 2021 · 6:27 am

Why Modern Story-tellers Love Ishtar, Kali, and Their Wicked Sisters

Literary villains, with their unpredictable actions, raise the stakes in most stories, creating surprise and excitement for audiences. Villains give heroes (and many authors) reason to live, giving them something or someone to overcome in the universal battle between good and evil. Villains provide a dark mirror of our weaker selves when we err or fall into temptation. As sources of temptation in cultures where deferred gratification is still a thing, villains are sexy.

The Artful Gluffster has reflected on male villains in literature in a recent post. In this post, let’s talk about female villains.

Scarlet Swindle may share her dangerous powers with goddesses and huntresses, but she is a thoroughly modern female villain.

Female villains share some of the sex appeal of their brothers, but they are rarer and have a history of being objects of ambivalence.

There are three popular sources of inspiration for female literary villains commonly used by writers:

(1) archetypes, (2) real female criminals, and (3) females who disguised themselves as males to pull off crimes.

Let’s start with archetypes, those universally understood symbols and prototypes that reappear in myths and legends across different cultures. Evil females have been a source of fascination since humankind first began to repackage fear, surprise, hostility and awe into recurrent archetypes our ancestors could comprehend and, they hoped, manage.

Throughout history, women who have not been submissive have been characterized as evil, while meek and obedient females were considered good. When their defiant ability to disquiet fathers, husbands and brothers couldn’t be managed by mere domination, non-submissive female archetypes were attributed superpowers–and dangerous.

Some scholars believe such archetypes were cultural inventions born of fear and hostility toward women, possibly linked to the mysteries of an unpredictable nature like childbirth.

Jungian psychologists categorize archetypes of women as mothers, queens, huntresses, wise women, mystics and lovers. However many other taxonomies exist. In our search for early female villains, we will look at archetypes of women and girls as powerful members of the ‘Dangerous Sex’. We probably can’t do better than Ishtar, Kali, Hecate, and Lilith. Here’s why.

The Statue of Gilgamesh at the University of Sydney, Camperdown, was created by Lewis Batros on commission from the Assyrian community, and unveiled in 2000. Photo by Yalenalovely.

Mythologies of many cultures include goddesses and witches. Supernatural archetypes are usually viewed as capable of both good and evil. This duality probably reflects a perception of women in many cultures that is both positive and negative, as sources of life and as maternal guardians and guides. It also suggests awareness of the corrupting temptations of wealth, power and sex, and the unpredictability of nature. Goddesses are often associated with both the ‘tomb and the womb’, as the source of life and a guide on the path that ends in mortality. Pretty serious subjects, no?

There are too many examples to list here, so we will focus on a few powerful female archetypes who have been particularly popular, popping up in stories and artworks like mushrooms after a rain. Such characters have been with us for a long time, populating oral tradition and filling clay tablets with great stories and dialogue. One of the earliest sources of female archetypes was the Babylonian collection of epic poetry, The Epic of Gilgamesh.

This collection of poems, dating from around 1000 BCE, is a rich source of female archetypes, giving us not only the warrior goddess Ishtar, but also maternal and spiritual guides in the form of the priestess and temple prostitute, Shamhat, and the tavern-keeper, Shiduri.

Gilgamesh gives us a fine female literary villain in the creator-destroyer goddess, Ishtar. Her attempts to seduce King Gilgamesh simmer deliciously through dialogue like the following: “Marry me, give me your luscious fruits, / be my husband, be my sweet man. / I will give you abundance beyond your dreams.”

For those unfamiliar with the complicated and racy plot, Gilgamesh is tempted by Ishtar’s offer, but eventually demurs on the grounds that it might be fun at first but, given the trail of corpses that were once Ishtar’s husbands, could get unpleasant later. Ishtar takes pride of place as story-tellers’ first recorded temptress goddess.

Jennifer Lawrence played Mystique in several X-men films from 2011-2019 (c) 20TH CENTURY FOX

There are many other female archetypes we might consider, but let’s look at a few who have been notably popular in literary works and films. For example, Kali is one of the most dire of Hindu goddesses. Her blue skin and necklace of skulls could be the stuff of kids’ nighttime terrors. Her duality is evident when she hunts down and kills demons to protect the innocent. Kali can also rampage out of control, with lethal impact. She was associated with the inevitability of human morality. Her name was translated as “the fullness of time” and “the changing aspect of nature that brings things to life or death” . She was created by a patriarchal culture that viewed ideal women as submissive but was in fearful awe of the unpredictable inevitability of death.

Bloodthirsty, uncontrollable, and female, Kali represented nature at its most untamed and fearsome. For story-tellers of the present as well as the past, Kali was pretty irresistible stuff. Her stuck-out blood-red tongue became a pop icon when it inspired the logo on a 1970 Rolling Stones album. An evil cult of Kali-worshippers also appeared in “Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom”. Kali may well have inspired the creation of Mystique in X-Men films from 2011-2019

How do archetypes feature in modern family entertainment? Do modern youth audiences view these characters the same way as the (admittedly not numerous) readers of Gilgamesh probably did? The challenges archetypes face are timeless. Indeed, timelessness defines archetypes and their challenges. But have archetypes evolved?

Scarlet Swindle in The Great Brassmonkey Bay Jewel Robbery, for example, is easily the most ruthless of the book series’ three villains, Scarlet, Sammy Snatch, and Caspar Hustle. Scarlet shares her ruthlessness (by exploiting vulnerable animals) and her seductiveness (in erotically manipulating both Sammy and Caspar) with female archetypes like Lilith and Ishtar. A future post will talk about Scarlet in more detail.

In Brassmonkey Bay, however, all the villains are also caricatures, as their names suggest. This exposes their behaviors and attitudes to humor for younger readers and ridicule for older ones. As a series written for family entertainment, the Magic Island Gang books are intended to be relevant to readers of different ages. With even very young audiences becoming increasingly sophisticated, comic and film superheroes of today have very often become comedians–as the characters, male and female, in ‘Deadpool’, ‘Aquaman’, ‘Ironman’, ‘Thor’, and many other comics and films demonstrate.

Check back for more Artful Gluffster posts on what makes literary villains modern.

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February 20, 2021 · 4:31 am

True Adventures of an Out-of-control Possum

How do authors create engaging characters? Let’s take the animal characters in The Great Brassmonkey Bay Jewel Robbery. What shaped those characters? Like most writers, when I created Pilfer Possum, her personality was based to a significant degree on some real possums who live in my garden, my trees, and sometimes, my garage.

Called by some readers an ‘out-of-control Diva’, Pilfer Possum is a relentless source of antics in the book. Two of her adventures inspired the teaser song at the bottom of this article. But were they invented? Not entirely. I got quite a bit of inspiration. Let me give you two examples.

Some people think Australian Brush-tailed Possums are nuisances, but they are also irresistible. Their scientific name Trichosurus vulpecula means ‘furry tailed’ and ‘little fox’. They have big, intent eyes, and improbably pink noses. Like many critters, they have become increasingly confident in their interactions with humans. They are adaptable, but also territorial. Unlike their attitudes to cats and dogs, Brush-tails get used to people coming and going onto what they clearly believe is their turf. When you have been sound asleep and they run across the roof over your head in the middle of the night, you can’t ignore them: because it sounds like they are wearing Army boots.

One night I heard something more than the usual thrashing about on my metal roof: a resounding thump that sounded like it was coming from my living room. I blundered sleepily out of my bedroom and switched on the light. To my astonishment, an adult possum was sitting on the top of my bathroom door. We stared at each other. It took some time to consider my options, as I didn’t fancy her using me as a scaling ladder or my chasing her through the house if I scared her down from her precarious perch. Eventually I fetched a chair and a towel. She braced herself for a scramble down my back to the floor but was successfully wrapped up (which, fortunately, makes them go quiet) and released into the garden. She bolted into the darkness.

But how on earth did she get into the living room, I wondered. There were no open doors or windows. I abandoned the mystery and went back to bed. The next morning, I looked around. I finally stopped in front of my gas fireplace. It has a glass front and sides. On the inside, which I rarely cleared of dust and soot, I noticed two sets of parallel ribbon-like streaks.

The clues were irrefutable: the possum must have crept from the roof into the chimney, looking for shelter. She had slipped, making a desperate effort to cling to the interior of the chimney as she fell. The streaks were made by the soft pads on her paws as she made a futile effort to grip the smooth surface of the glass. Why she chose to claw her way up a wooden bathroom door and perch on the top, I’ll never know. I suspect the door may have been the first object she encountered that promised an escape route back to the roof.

To be honest, I had always found Brush-tail Possums endearing. On days when I’d be working in my office, I’d sometimes spot movement from my window. I knew the culprit would be crouching among the branches of a big paperbark tree. I’d pause my work and bring out an offering. A possum would creep closer down the tree at my approach. She would find a spot in the notch of the tree at about my head height and reach out to accept my slice of apple or carrot.

After a while, we became pretty comfortable with each other. Sometimes possums would show themselves when I had guests too. I guess they figured more people might mean more handouts.

One afternoon, I hosted a dinner party outdoors. The couple I had invited to dinner called shortly before they were to arrive to say they were getting unexpected visitors, family from overseas, should they cancel? I told them not to change their plans. I had plenty of food. Why not bring their relatives?

What I didn’t count on was that one of my friends’ in-laws was self-absorbed and excessively talkative. He had recently acquired a new job he clearly thought was pretty stellar and wanted to talk about it. It didn’t take me long to regret my hospitality. I guessed we were in for a long evening.

Bored into silence by an endless monologue, I cast about for a distraction as my guests helped themselves to the plates of food on the table. A movement above my head caught my eye. One of my possums poked her head out from a cluster of leaves on a branch above us. Her eyes were glittering with some emotion, probably greed. For the first time I realized that I hadn’t taken into account that the position of our table was near, indeed under, my possums’ favorite tree.

When the speaker reached a point in his story that he found particularly riveting, he raised his voice. I didn’t feel I could interrupt him to point out the possum to my guests. In the fading light, I appeared to be the only person at the table who had seen a full-sized brush-tail possum edge out onto a branch that overhung the table.

The possum was creeping along the branch perhaps three meters above our heads. When the animated brother-in-law grinned at his audience with what he seemed sure was shared delight, the possum paused, but still, no one noticed her. The speaker continued waving his arms in the excitement of his tale about people I didn’t know–and at that moment was convinced I wouldn’t wish to.

In the light of the candles on the table, the possum’s eyes eyes shone like obsidian. I saw her swish her tail from side to side. She edged further down the branch and turned quietly, her back to me now. She lifted her tail.

Suddenly, a golden stream of liquid hissed as it descended from the branch. Not a drop splashed onto the tablecloth as the near-empty wine glass of the speaker was miraculously filled.

I stifled a hoot of admiration.

For the first time since his arrival, my unwelcome guest was silent as a stone. He stared at his now-brimming wine glass. The moment turned into a freeze-frame tableau of five people, four who were speechless with horror, and one–I admit–with glee. I watched the possum sidle back across the branch toward the safety of the broad tree trunk.

Although quips ran through my mind like a rat pursued by a terrier, I settled for a syrupy smile. “Would anyone care for another glass of wine?” I asked. I expect no one mistook my tone for sincerity.

My guests shook their heads. They hastily made excuses and packed up to leave.

Once they had all decamped, I cleared the table –but not without bringing with me some slices of apple.

My possum was watching contentedly from her tree. The evening, our evening, she seemed to be thinking, had been saved. She took her reward from my fingers. I left her to spend the rest of the evening with a book and a glass of wine–one fresh from a bottle safely chilling in the fridge.

Those stories not only informed Pilfer’s character but also became the lyrics of a song about her stowing away on a yacht bound for Brassmonkey Bay. There is quite a bit of detail in this story, not all of which is needed to move the plot along, but it establishes the characters’ personalities.

I hope you enjoy the version of Pilfer’s antics in ‘Stowaway’s Stomp’ BTW, we used music and guest readers to introduce characters in some of the book’s marketing for a couple of reasons. First, because most book trailers are dominated by the author’s talking head, and we wanted something different and memorable, that could also be applied to later books in the series. Second, several readers asked whether a performance script based on the book might be in the works. When I imagined the story’s action on a stage, I could only imagine it performed by a youth theatre group, and I wanted to introduce songs kids could sing. The lyrics to this song were written by me, but the music was composed and sung by Nashville musician, Jon Ross. He tries our songs out on his own kids. They are hardened critics. If the songs don’t pass muster with them, they don’t pass!

We will explore different marketing tactics under the ‘Getting Noticed’ page, so stay tuned and in touch!

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November 22, 2020 · 2:47 am

Pity! Fear! Catharsis! Does Greek Drama Work on I-Phones?

Panoramic view of the Odeon of Herodes Atticus at the Acropolis of Athens, Greece.

Are ancient literary classics still relevant at a time when some fiction works are being written on smart phones? Should young readers and writers continue to study the structure, characters, and plot of narratives written centuries ago? If so, why?

British Literary Agent Julian Friedmann thinks we should. His recent Ted Talk ‘The Mystery of Storytelling’ distills his (…well, and Aristotle’s!) ideas about what makes a successful theatrical script into a few memorable messages. He argues these are as relevant now as they were when Aristotle lived and wrote (384-322 BCE).

According to Aristotle’s trinity of essential qualities, to be successful and satisfying to audiences, a theatrical performance has to evoke pity for the hero, fear of the escalating threats he or she faces, and finally catharsis when the threat is resolved.

Blockbuster novels and films have the same demands. The structure of The Great Brassmonkey Bay Jewel Robbery, an adventure story for young readers, was based on a script structure that adheres to this formula. The twin heroes, Pax and Pip, are separated for the first time in their lives when Pip is involved in an accident at the Zoo where the twins work. When she fails to recover as expected, the twins and their family are terrified that all their dreams for the future will collapse. Pax fears he will have to face life’s great challenges alone.

The story is successful if we care enough about Pip and Pax to pity them and fear they may not be able to transcend their challenges. I won’t reveal the resolution as it risks spoiling any potential catharsis, but Friedmann’s talk is a fascinating and worthwhile reminder of why Greek tragedies have always seemed timeless to me despite centuries of change.

It also reminded me that I even included in the story a trio of avian narrators modelled on the Greek Chorus in the story! I modernized their role into fact-checkers. The job of a Greek chorus was to describe and comment on the action in a play, often through dance and song. Fact-checkers try to make audiences believe narratives are true.

Click on at link below for Friedmann’s concise insights into why writers write, what works, how British films differ from American ones, and why the best-performing theatrical stories are visual and, regardless of culture (or the sneers of critics), generally sentimental. I hope you enjoy it as much as I did: ‘The mystery of storytelling’ : Julian Friedmann at TEDxEaling – YouTube https://youtu.be/al3-Kl4BDUQ

On the subject of structure, a future blog post will review the use of nested narratives. The technique not only applies but also multiplies Aristotle’s formula, repeating and reflecting the emotional journeys of the characters for the audience like a walk through a house of mirrors.

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October 25, 2020 · 12:20 am

Writing for the Lockdown Generation

I started writing a book that became The Great Brassmonkey Bay Jewel Robbery in 2007. When it was published in 2020, I dedicated it to my brother, Ken, and to young readers who had a tough year in 2019-2020, whom many called the Lockdown Generation. This is part of the story of why I wrote the book and dedicated it as I did.

When I left full-time employment after twenty years with Australia’s multidisciplinary scientific research organization, CSIRO, my mortgage was paid off and a modest income secured with training consultancies. I was free for the first time in my life to fulfill my dream of being a writer. But what should I write, I wondered? There were so many stories I had wanted to tell for years.

After a few false starts, I decided on a youth fantasy. I knew I needed to radically change the communication skills I had practiced for 20 years. The nonfiction commercial and scientific writing I did as a science publisher and marketer had trained me to focus more on accuracy than creativity. Youth fantasy would stretch muscles unused since university creative writing classes years earlier, I thought, and such a modest hurdle would be mastered quickly.

Right off, that should tell you how little I really knew about writing fiction!

I went through some of the earliest of the 41 journals I have written since I was sixteen years old, looking for the story ideas I had with uncharacteristic prescience cached in them for just such an occasion. I found a narrative I had drafted in my 20s. It was based on one of the curiously cinematic dreams I used to have in those days, concerning a robbery so ingenious that I remember waking up snorting in laughter. While I had the rough nugget of a story, I won’t say I had a plan.

What I did have were some aspirations I wanted to address as a writer. One of these dated from a writers’ festival I attended in 1999. A YA author whose presentation I had signed up for took a question from the audience. Why did he choose to write bleak dystopic fiction for young readers? He answered frankly, “It sells.” And after a pause, “We can’t sugar coat what’s happening.” I experienced a jolt of concern at his words. He was referring to exposing very young readers to the adrenalin rush of terrifying environmental disasters largely caused and often ignored by adults. It seemed to me more a violation of hope more than provision of equipment for the future.

In that moment, I decided writers had a profound responsibility to their audiences, and none more so than when their readers are young. Providing thrills for money is one of the world’s oldest professions. It need not be irresponsible or harmful, but when the audience is young, it can easily become both.

There are moral obligations in all professions, but I had grown up with a mother who was sadly abused as a child, so I knew youthful trauma is often an enduring and painful legacy. I decided anything I wrote—if true to a worthwhile story—would be hopeful, a quest for solutions. That at least seemed a legacy one could exercise some control over. These notions were enough to start me writing.  

Writing the first draft of The Great Brassmonkey Bay Jewel Robbery was great fun, a self-indulgent romp during which I set no boundaries on my characters or what they could do, feel, achieve, and impact. Or, for that matter, their species. Why not make my characters animals? After all, I was fascinated by the audacious cockatoos, cheeky possums, delightful fairy penguins, pensive water dragons and exuberant dolphins I had watched while living near beaches on two sides of the Pacific Ocean.

During those years, I had often mentally assigned many of my animal visitors personalities, imagined among them dialogue and conflicts, flirtations, and turf wars. I felt surrounded by a charismatic troupe of potential heroes. As my suburbs I lived in attracted development, however, I had also watched the numbers of my heroes decline. In my characters’ evident vulnerability, I had an urgent plot theme: their survival on a changing planet.

A family illness displaced other priorities for years, so it wasn’t until the 2020 COVID-19 pandemic with its strict lockdown conditions began robbing young people of many of their most important life experiences that I began rewriting my initial draft in earnest. I looked at the plot with different eyes. All around me were stories of my intended youthful audience, of cancelled proms and graduations, of college courses that had to be attended online, and of relationships that developed despite that most disappointing of matchmakers, ZOOM.

I was impressed by the resilience of many young people who posted often hilarious videos about how to get through long periods of isolation. At the heart of many of those posts was creative good humor and a whatever-it-takes attitude to keeping in touch with friends. Those qualities seemed essential to keeping up the spirits of the film makers. I wanted to capture those attitudes and voices in my characters and narrative that might speak to readers and their families.

So I added to my troupe of characters the teenage twins, Pip and Pax. In a future post, I’ll write about nested narratives, how and why writers might consider a plot structure that positions one hero’s journey within another.

But first, here is my first author’s reading to introduce the twin Zookeepers, Pax and Pip, to The Great Brassmonkey Bay Jewel Robbery.

Judith Lydia Mercure reads from The Great Brassmonkey Bay Jewel Robbery

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August 4, 2020 · 12:58 am

Interview: Eliza Bolli, Book and Comic Illustrator, on Unforgettable Characters

Judith Lydia Mercure: “Thanks for sharing your thoughts with The Artful Gluffster, Eliza. And thanks too for designing our blog banner! You were born in Umbria, Italy, you live in Berlin, and you work with book, comic, and film publishers and writers all over the world. You were trained both as an illustrator and a fashion designer, which have very different skill sets. Being a good illustrator must help with fashion design, but does being a fashion designer help you as an illustrator?”

Eliza Bolli: “Sadly my experience with fashion design as a working environment was rather unpleasant. I would describe it as a ‘Devil Wears Prada’ situation without the glamour—so I quickly decided that I wasn’t cut out for it. Training for the job was fascinating and very compelling, though. I did benefit greatly from the constant exercise of identifying patterns and visual rhythms in everything I laid eyes on. It was during my Fashion Design Academy years that I truly grasped the concept of “finding inspiration in everyday events and circumstances”.

JLM: “Illustrators have to balance what is recognizable against what is distinctive. You were involved in the creation of The Great Brassmonkey Bay Jewel Robbery characters for over a year, developing some Southern Hemisphere birds and animals you’d probably never seen outside of Youtube videos. Koalas are iconic all over the world, particularly since the Australian 2019-2020 Black Summer fires, so how did you create a unique koala like Chilli?”

EB: “First and foremost: you gotta watch many koalas. So, so many koalas. The trick is to form an extensive visual library of koala-features: fur patterns, color palettes, eyes shapes, pose ranges… that you can engineer in a unique way. I find that the more plausible a character is, the better it will be perceived and received: a well-characterized koala, with its grey fur and huge nose, will work better than a koala that’s been designed with blonde fur and blue eyes just for the sake of originality.”

JLM: “How does that compare with creating a plausible image and persona for, say, a less familiar Abbott’s Booby or a Magnificent Frigate Bird, both unique, endangered birds found only on Christmas Island?”

EB: “That’s where characterization comes into play: the personality traits must be added to the design in the form of posture, expressions and mannerisms. With good character writing as a guide, a flock of white sheep can be rendered as a group of highly distinctive individuals. With subjects as flamboyant as the Christmas Islands bird species in the book, it’s even easier!”

JLM: “Some of your illustrations are engaging for children, some edgier, for adults and young adults. Do you have a favorite audience?”

EB: “From Teens up. Because those group allows my artworks to convey a whole array of undertones that younger children might miss, such as humor in all of its forms. But importantly, younger readers often prefer “simpler” designs (at least in the clients’ views;  I often wonder what children think about this). And I just like details too much.”

JLM: “How would you describe your style?”

EB: “Disney-ish with a sprinkle of Leyendecker, maybe?”

Eliza created teen twins Pip and Pax for the Great Brassmonkey Bay Jewel Robbery (c) Brio Media 2020

 JLM: “As an artist, what is your responsibility to your characters?  For example, how do you feel about anthropomorphizing animal characters, especially endangered species whose habitats, behaviors, and even existence are threatened by human excesses?

EB: “My personal responsibility towards my characters mimics my personal moral code. There is a specific cluster of subjects that I refuse to represent with my craft as paid work. Anthropomorphizing animals doesn’t trouble me. Like many kids, I grew up watching Donald Duck eat chicken legs and seeing happy pigs as butcher shops’ signs. In fact, I designed one of those signs! Depicting an animal standing on hind legs and wearing a hoodie like the Magic Island Gang is not intrinsically troubling for me.  If I were asked to draw it poaching elephants for ivory, or doing something else that demeans any character, human or otherwise… that’s another matter entirely!”

JLM: “The Artful Gluffster focuses on how technology and marketing is changing the arts. Apart from access to new graphics and communications tools, what strikes you most about how technology is changing your industry and the expectations of the audience?”

EB: “Technologies are helping more and more people get in touch with their creative side without submitting to a classic training. For professionals, a growing toolkit of resources is helping cut completion times and helping enhance our results. Meanwhile, social media and communication tools allow everybody to discover talented people beyond geographical boundaries. But while technology gives us amazing tools, it is not what shapes our industry. It isn’t Photoshop that demands complex artworks at derisory payments. It isn’t Instagram’s fault if more and more jobs are awarded to creatives from developing countries. It isn’t Pinterest that steals a humongous amount of original art from online portfolios and uses it without paying royalties. That’s capitalism operating in ethically unregulated free-market economies. We know elite artists experienced fair-pay challenges by exploitative patrons in the past too. But the experience is too commonplace now.”

JLM: “Let’s get hypothetical: Would Michelangelo or Caravaggio have been as great as artists if they had trained on Photoshop and Illustrator?”

EB: “I’m pretty sure they would be even better…”

JLM: “Would they have been as successful if they had had to market their personalities and networks on the Internet before anyone would look at their portfolios?”  

EB: “Now that’s a game changer. Michelangelo wasn’t known for being a socialite so I doubt he would have bothered to open an Instagram account to begin with. Caravaggio would have wasted too much of his creative time trolling away as he was a renowned troublemaker. Leonardo would have done great in my opinion. The guy just loved to dabble with technologies. He would probably work at Boston Robotics now!”

JLM: “The Great Brassmonkey Bay Jewel Robbery was a relatively small job. Is there anything about such jobs that are worthwhile for you?”

EB: “I was delighted to work on TGBBJR: it gave me the opportunity to further develop my character design skills by drawing adorable and fascinating animals–and it was for a cause I think is noble. My 10 year-old self (a long-time WWF member, animal-nerd, bookworm, wannabe ethologist and Disney animator) can finally be proud of me!”

Find Eliza Bolli: On Facebook:
https://www.facebook.com/Eliza.Bolli.ArtWorks/

On Behance:
https://www.behance.net/elizabolliartworks

On Instagram:
https://www.instagram.com/eliza.bolli.artwork/

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July 26, 2020 · 1:37 am

Interview: Inkwell Film’s Stephan Wellink on Breaking into a Changing Industry

Judith Lydia Mercure: I’d like to welcome the Principal of Australia’s Inkwell Films, Stephan Wellink, to ‘The Artful Gluffster’. After a stellar career in universities and research organizations taking scientific products and research to the marketplace, Stephan made a remarkable career move several years ago. He entered the film industry, arguably one of the hardest industries one can imagine breaking into without a deep network of professional contacts. Stephan made a name for himself and Inkwell and showed aspiring film makers that this was possible. He made four documentary films in a little over a decade, most celebrating the careers of extraordinary personalities in the entertainment industry. That is exceptional in an industry where many people spend decades trying to make one film.  

Sir Ben Kingsley chats with Stephan Wellink about a transformed industry’s change agents

JLM: Stephan, you were educated as a scientist. Yet your 2006 ‘Winners’ Guide to the Nobel Prize’ was your only film celebrating excellence in science. What made you decide to make documentaries about the lives and work of Sam Spiegel, Jerry Lewis and Rod Taylor–all known for excellence, but in the very different domains of film production, comedy and adventure?

Stephan J Wellink: “I like character-driven narratives and I believe I can pick a good story. The films I have made have a similar theme despite the different professional settings: facing seemingly insurmountable challenges, the protagonist succeeds against the odds.  In the ‘Winners’ Guide to the Nobel Prize’ Marshall and Warren were ridiculed by the medical establishment and the pharmaceutical industry for reporting their observations that ulcers were a consequence of a bacterial infection (helicobacter pylori) and not lifestyle. Winning the Nobel Prize justified their courage.

The film industry heroes we chose also battled through enormous opposition. Rod Taylor took a chance as a relative unknown by leaving Australia for 1950s Hollywood. Through hard work and talent, he became a movie and television star, handling the crossover between these mediums effortlessly, despite it being a time when movie stars would not usually lower themselves by appearing on television. Rod succeeded at both, setting a precedent for other Australian actors, and he went on to appear in films made by legendary Directors George Stevens, John Ford, Alfred Hitchcock, Antonioni and Quentin Tarantino.

Jerry Lewis proved he was more than a sidekick and stooge for Dean Martin by becoming an auteur. He introduced innovations that revolutionised film production. His film The Nutty Professor is a hilarious retake on a literary classic, Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde.  When we interviewed Martin Scorsese, a big fan of Lewis, Scorsese told us that this film inspired his filmmaking.   

Sam Spiegel took on the big film studios and pioneered independent filmmaking. His battles with powerful studio heads such as Harry Cohn, Louis B Mayer and Sam Goldwyn are part of Hollywood folklore. Entirely on his own, Spiegel packaged The African Queen, On the Waterfront, The Bridge on the River Kwai and Lawrence of Arabia. He is the only person to win three Oscars as a sole producer—for all but the first of these films.”

JLM: “Have you discovered big differences or surprising similarities between the industries surrounding film and science? Do you have any advice for aspiring film industry entrants?”

SJW: “There are similarities in how science and film projects are realized.  In simple terms: science and film projects start with an idea. Both involve teams of creative, talented, opinionated and passionate people. They need to be managed so their creativity is encouraged while being reminded that they need to deliver quality products – whether a finished film or research results people and industries need. Both scientists and film industry professionals sometimes need to be reminded to focus on their audience as customers. And that they need repeat business to keep doing what they do. 

I have the following advice to anyone wanting to enter the film industry (mostly excluding performers). Try to:

  • become attached to a film unit.
  • find a mentor.
  • work out what you are good at doing. (Is it directing? producing? writing?)
  • hone your craft.
  • make a short film. (Then make another short film.)
  • study the works of filmmakers.
  • study the history of film.
  • find your own style and voice.
  • don’t mortgage your house for a film. (It’s a movie, not your life.)”

JLM: Three of your films focus on luminaries with full and celebrated histories in the film industry. Did you worry that their stories had already been thoroughly mined?

SJW: That’s a good question. For a biographical film, it’s important to have detailed knowledge about the life and work of the person whose story you want to tell. In the case of Rod Taylor, Sam Spiegel and Jerry Lewis I watched as many of their films as possible, read books, news clippings, watched interviews and I spoke to historians about the cultural significance of their work.  I ask myself a number of questions before committing time and resources to any biographical project:

  • Is it interesting?
  • Has it been done before?
  • Is the subject alive and accessible?
  • Are people close to the subject accessible?
  • What are the sources of investment?
  • Who are the potential producing partners?
  • What story should we tell?
  • How will we tell it?
  • What’s the best distribution route to market?”

JLM: What made you choose these particular people?

SJW: “We were fortunate to have access to Rod Taylor and Jerry Lewis in person so we were able to get their own accounts of their life and work. In both cases we wanted to emphasize what was unique about their work.  For Rod Taylor it was about being a trailblazing Australian who made good on the biggest film stage in the world – Hollywood. For Jerry, the title of the film is Jerry Lewis: the Man Behind the Clown. That tells it all. We focused on his artistry beyond the ‘Martin and Lewis’ double act. He was an innovator. Like Chaplin, he was a great artist able to write, direct, produce and star in his own films.

Although Sam Spiegel passed away in the early 1980s, we were able to interview actors, writers and historians who knew and/or worked with him. Sam was a great filmmaker. His story was as much about a changing industry as his career. He was known as a being ‘very fond of women.’ We began production before the #MeToo movement. It was interesting to hear from women who were at the time of our interviews aged in their late 70s through early 90s. They compared Sam’s interactions with them with Harvey Weinstein’s , which led to insights into changes in what is tolerated or even encouraged in an industry. So we were able to talk to women who could provide context for this aspect of the industry.”

JLM: Our blog explores the challenges and opportunities that are arising in arts fields traditionally dominated by big studios and publishers, iconic awards and relatively few high-profile players. What have been your greatest discoveries, disappointments, and surprises in a changing industry?

SJW: “My greatest discoveries? Producing a finished film is a minor miracle!

My greatest disappointments? We (and I am speaking here as an Australian film maker) don’t value the creative industries as highly as we should.

My greatest surprise? There is great respect internationally for Australian creatives.”

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July 25, 2020 · 5:01 am

Reverse Engineering A Script

Many films begin as books. Relatively few books begin as films. But there are benefits of and good reasons for writing your book first as a script, and then writing a novel based on your script, instead of the other way around.

Admittedly, the art forms are very different. Scriptwriters have different expectations from novelists. Words hardly matter in the early stages of a film’s development. In fact, visual storyboards are common early drafts. Action, characters’ development, and the outcomes are considerations that help writers structure good scripts. Films live or die on structure, plot pace, and the quality of their cinematography. Often, if a production is seriously considered, scriptwriters will be changed between drafts. A script is hardly ever your baby.

By contrast, a novel is always your baby, and you can smother it with love. Novelists love words. They love the freedom a novel gives them to move between time, setting, voice, mood, gender. Unconstrained by the limitations of a stage or a screen, novelists have the freedom to emphasize sensory effects other than the visual in their writing. Novelists can write thousands of pages. Scriptwriters? They can’t.

But here are a few reasons I have found it worth the work of starting a literary creation with a script, an approach I used with The Great Brassmonkey Bay Jewel Robbery.

First, it is commonly observed that many novelists could cut (part or all of) their first chapter and it would improve their story. So writing the first draft of a work as a script disciplines the writer to focus on the story and its essential message within a framework: one page a minute for a 2-hour film, for example.

Second, the pace of your story will be tighter and more active. As mentioned above, the art of structuring a movie is very different from that of a book. Scriptwriters often start by sketching a series of scenes briefly, often on note cards, and ordering them on a table or desk, to get a sense of the visual flow of the work. Scripts move from action moment to action moment. If you start writing a new work with a script, you’ll be less likely lose the readers attention by spending too much time setting the mood and describing the background. Making love to your words is about you showing what you can do. Scenes and images are about viewers.

Third, your dialogue will be more effective and convincing. Writers are constantly warned to ‘show, don’t tell’ their characters’ personalities and actions. If you write an exchange of banter in your first draft script, your characters will show your readers how witty, mean, or funny they are. Scripts also expose gaps we can miss in novels. Table reading a script with friends is a great way to pick up on dialogue dissonance and discover new plot directions.

Fourth, if done consistently, the ‘voice’ you create for your characters will differentiate them, create tension or attractions between them, and help drive the plot.

Fifth, dialogue-driven action and characters is more respectful to your readers. Readers like to make up their own minds about characters, their motivations, and their choices. They don’t like to be told what to think about them.

Sixth, the novel may help sell your film. Most novelists dream of getting a film option on their book–so much so that many works are written to optimize that possibility. It can take a few years to write and a year or more to publish a book but it often takes decades to produce a film. Producing a films costs millions, so investors are less likely to back a script, no matter how good, written by an unknown. Best-selling books are far less costly to publish and market and often sell film scripts by producing hard evidence of success with audiences.

Finally, if you think you might want to create a film or play, rewriting a script from the novel is much easier than writing a script from scratch. The hard work has been done, sales results of the book tell you whether it’s worth the effort of finding and convincing financial backers, and the second draft of a script will be more nuanced and effective.

Rewriting a book is really hard work. Creating a draft as a script can make the action come alive for the author as well as future readers!

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