THE SCREENWRITER AESTHETIC: home edition
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THE SCREENWRITER AESTHETIC: home edition
Revelations about lighting, "MUSS" vs "MESS" as a guiding principle, the blank wall
Dear Snoops,
We hope with all hope that it will soon, again, be a very appealing prospect to be a screenwriter. That is, we hope that the Writers Guild of America (and SAG-AFTRA) get everything they want with this strike. We’re totally annoyed by Bob Iger, et al.
The strike is, of course, because the screenwriter world has changed dramatically from its Heyday, and even its Yesterday. And, ergo, so has its aesthetic – sartorially and décorially. But, we’ll take an ahistorical, fantasy view of what “SCREENWRITER” can offer domestic interiors – and that is:
An interior that suggests a cultural, but money-making pursuit
An interior that suggests a cultural, words-based intellect
In essence: the antidote to a TIKT*K HOUSE, which is Cultural Void, Amaz*n-sponsored, Doritos-stained
STYLE TANGENT
The jacket that inspired this post: FOR SCALE to the left, at EPOCA VINTAGE in Florence. (Regret not buying.) To the RIGHTis 1990s Tom Cru*se, of course. In both instances, the jacket is a pure HOLLYWOOD CLASSIC (and, though examples not shown, ‘gender neutral’). If you have on-screen looks, per Tom, the jacket is very STAR; if you don’t, it’s very Behind The Typewriter. (Like for us.)
When we consider THE SCREENWRITER at home, there are few key elements:
The desk, of course (plus a note on the chair and HOT TIP on a great source)
The wall, and the meditative qualities of having a blank one
The clock, and the screen-relief of checking the time
Why is this relevant?
As many of us endeavor to pursue punishing creative “careers” (Who’s that in the mirror?), the narcissistic-indulgent but ultimately Business-minded world of the screenwriter can teach us a lesson about a work-life-inspiration-business-drinking balance.
Plus, the office has moved home, and in the realm of the desk-and-screen-bound, let’s be honest: none hold as much cultural cachet as THE SCREENWRITER.
THE DESK
Let us review a range of legends, and take lessons from their deskscapes and general relationship to them:
We appreciate this is a very limited survey of director-writers, but we do believe it is quite a spread in terms of PERSONAL ENERGY – the minds that produced ALIEN, YOU’VE GOT MAIL, and DO THE RIGHT THING. And yet, we are able to observe a two things:
UNTIDINESS: mainly paper, even as we enter the digital era (with Nora and Spike), and we would consider this MUSS and not MESS. A critical difference in décor. MUSS being “known things in a known but untidy order”; MESS being “known and unknown things in a chaotic and confusing order” (a certain beauty in chaos, though). The former is like a pile of tangents, the latter is like a garbage dump.
LAMPLESSNESS: an absolute SHOCK to us, it’s only Nora of the three that has a desk lamp – with her very Meg-Ryan-leading-lady femme-chrome adjustable. We also observed desks such as those of WOODY ALLEN and RUTH PRAWER JHABVALA (not pictured) also lampless. What the actual f*ck?
Untidiness we expected.
Occasional lamplessness seems inexplicable, especially since we are committed LAMP PEOPLE. So, is the desk sacred space? Is “to write” the one task contained by Desk, and “to light” must be elsewhere?
Consider a desk space so needed for THOUGHTS and the muss that fuels them, and every square inch of real estate so precious, as to eschew LIGHT? Radical and inspiring.
Cast light away. Let it exist throughout the room, SOUPY and wet as possible, we’d suggest (tips on WET LIGHT here), but allow the desk to simple DESK.
Therefore, we won’t be looking at “desk lamps” in this issue, as we had planned to Before Research.
THE DESK (and ratings)
Desks are the altar – the place of ritualistic repetition – yet, there is a kind of humble neutrality to them. They are, in the end, the stage for a performance with no audience, but for the writer. They are not the desk that Intimidates, as that of the Corner Office Boss – those are very “AESTHETIC” and RICH-LOOKING, and is designed not to be sat at so much as to be sat across from. We can’t have this, for the SCREENWRITER aesthetic.
A screenwriterly desk is defined instead by sturdy practicality, and in that arena we have some options (and importantly LESSONS from them, not just “BUY-THIS”-ness):
CANAAN, 1951, by Marcel Breuer, a god of the curved bent chrome, in fact delivers here a simple wood, very square thing. But, what gives it a charm are its side-car drawers. It is as if a slim, simple frame is both burdened and enhanced by these EXTRAS. Drawers that feel more like baggage than a part of the desk itself. And BAGGAGE (if we’re talking “emotional baggage”) is copy. 9/10
“TABLE GROUP” DESK, 1981, Ron Rezek and Dave Potter with a formica laminate top. Here, a more industrial look and new-agey materials like plastic-coated steel legs. (Some of these have glass tops. STOP! Glass is too transparent – and high transparency is anathema to the screenwriter’s “craft”, where ‘the reveal’ must be slow and considered).
The key element here are really the crossed tension cables. Creating TENSION, as you likely know, is crucial in story-telling. Might as well build that into the writing zone, right? 7.5/10
THE 570 by German minimalist Dieter Rams, 1957. This is very COMPUTER AGE: it’s very “manufactured” in energy, it is very “frictionless” and yet neurotic. It’s not what, say, a Kubrick would use, but better still its what a Kubrick character would use – it says quite a lot, while not distracting from the main event: you. What we enjoy here is the metaphorical representation of the “BLANK PAGE” in all its opportunity and terrifying expectation. It begs “DO SOMETHING GREAT WITH ME, WITHOUT YOU I AM ALMOST NOTHING” – do you have it in you to transform? 7.8/10 (the pressure of blank! but the solace of its vastness)
THE DESK NEEDS: A CHAIR
The desk chair, as apposed to the desk, can be anything you’d like. This is really about butt comfort, but also might be a place for you to experiment with some eccentricity – unlike our examples above or any others we found, to be honest. Yet, the chair is practically INVISIBLE during moments of active work, and ergo, whatever. The screenwriter aesthetic is about the field of vision FROM SEATED AT DESK.
For what it’s worth, FOR SCALE uses a great little KNOLL desk chair that we got via the EXCEPTIONAL source that is Los Angeles fancy-used-furniture shop DEN, but specifically their more affordable surprise sales via DENSURPLUS. The chair (BELOW) we paid $140 for. Some crazies on 1stD*bs are buying ‘em for $1600.
DENSURPLUS is an absolute MUST for those in Los Angeles.
THE DÉCOR VALUE OF “EMPTY”
For the screenwriter, creative flow is FRAGILE. Like a bird of paradise, the writer is a creature whose setting much be ‘just so’ in order to perform. Often times this is a time of day; or for example, specifications around writing implement. The snob-journalist character of “FRANK NAVASKY” in MASTERPIECE “You’ve Got Mail” (Ephron is a cultural force) is obsessed with the Olympia Report DeLuxe (of which he has three). Similar to one used by Woody:
We advocate for many Things, i.e. clutter, that can support décor as RESOURCE and not simply create a décor as ‘backdrop’. The obvious example is BOOKS and MAGAZINES. The screenwriter does this with particular acuity, as they must combine artifacts from their own lives: photos, mementos, etc. One option that is particularly relevant is the PAPERWEIGHT. Here is RUTH PRAWER JHBVALA (“HOWARD’S END” screenwriter) with one. Unsurprisingly the quaintest of paperweight makers is WELSH – send them something and they’ll Weight-ify it. (They are HAFOD GRANGE.)
Yet, there is one act familiar with any writer and which must be provided for in décor – something highly underutilized by the broader at-home-work class: the blank wall.
To stare at a blank wall is an original MEDITATION.
Sadly, many interior “designers” – professional and amateur – will thoughtlessly give you something ‘to look at’, or to ‘tie a room together’ (an absolutely toxic phrase) or just because EMPTY is deemed as unfinished or uncomfortable.
This is a mistake. Empty is valuable, too. Empty reminds us we have the power to fill, but that we needn’t force ourselves. Empty is allowed to linger.
Resist the urge to fill “because”; become at peace with the “UNFINISHED”.
ASIDE: RE-NAMING ONESELF AS “DÉCOR”
Beyond one’s clothes, one’s NAME is an important piece of Personal Décor – and both are entirely changeable. (We once dated a Swede who, with some regularity i.e. every few years, would change his first name. Currently: Cy.)
One great source for excellent names are CEMETERIES. Los Angeles’s own HOLLYWOOD FOREVER is top tier and also one of the city’s nicest parks, it’s perhaps odd to say. Of the many, many exceptional names there, we lay claim to “HOLLIDAY BALDWIN”. Whoever he was, he is us now.
THE DÉCOR VALUE OF “TIME”
The clock may seem unnecessary for a domestic environment set up for some kind of unpredictable-ish productivity flow (not like you need to start of finish at any point… you’re paid for output, not time). And yet, TIME is an important reminder that this is not, in fact, play but productivity and that time is precious and should be used as wisely as possible. “Time is money” and so clocks are cash registers.
There are ways in which the device-based clock cannot provide, i.e. that of phone or computer screen. They are too present, it is not enough of an “action” to read the time in this way.
Instead, décor-clock is a relief from the screen. There is something more elegant about swinging around to decipher some moving sticks on a circle and sigh with relief like “oh, good, only X o’clock”. (And perhaps you respond well to the predictable cadence of the tick-tock, if your décor-clock does that.)
SCREENWRITER ASIDE: Time is obvious also CRITICAL to story. “When?” is, like, one of the big questions. TIME in story = flow. TIME in décor = CLOCKS (and, actually, burning candles, since they diminish).
The world’s all-time greatest clock was tragically STOLEN from Vivian of DREX earlier this year, at one of her sales. An UNIMAGINABLE LOSS. It was this:
This clock – the product of homemade ingenuity – is thrilling for its simultaneous Time-Telling and Time-Mockery. Time is only important-ISH.
BUT, to swing the pendulum, we have also been noticing a number of SPACE AGE clocks reappear on the scene, in a much-needed shock to the dominance of “midcent*ry” office. One, in particular, has popped up amongst our preferred sellers three times – not least of which via perennial faves FORMAS - and that is the Aurora Spectrum Clock, from the 1970s. It looks almost unusable, in terms of time-telling (again, a bit of time-mockery):
Yet, has the energy of some kind of U.S.S. Enterprise warp-enabled engine, and ergo espouses a very forward-plodding version of ‘time’. Less “endless circle of time” (even though it is an endless circle” and more “time as power source”.
And, that – appropriately – is all we have time for. The lessons for today are really about the BLANKNESS in DESK and WALL, and the use of CHAIR and TIME to insert some individuality into the context.
We’ll see you THURSDAY.
Love and good luck,
THE SCREENWRITER AESTHETIC: home edition
OMG I ADORE that clock you called the world greatest clock! I have not seen that before! Now the hunt begins! I have fun clock I love - each hour is the answer to a mathematical equation.
That clock is by Bill Miller!
Your friend may be able to find a replacement on eBay or message Bill on his incredibly charming Etsy shop: https://www.etsy.com/shop/RetroIshAndEtcClocks