In this first installment of Creation Stories, Ricky Gervais shares a doozy about an early, indelible writing lesson. For the full story: www.fastcocreate.com/3016916/c...
It’s all in how you describe the scene too, think of it as the opposite of an email, or a memo. Describing her home. Her house smelled of tea, lavender & mold. Right there, just those words give you an imaginary sensory perception of her I side world.
That was pissing me off so much!! I was going to say whoever cut this together totally missed the point of what Ricky was talking about!! hahahaha! "Make the audience as excited and fascinated as you are, and real life does that" was the last thing he said in the clip. that slider shot is nothing like real life..... and it just distracted me from what he was saying
teajay74 We're all going to be very excited when you retire teajay74. It's always "but what about the splatter patterns", or the dog, or the kid, or.... I don't know fucking what. Why can't it just be plain and simple? The perp did it, the victim got it bad. Wake up, Tea! But, no. There's always fucking questions with you, aren't there. Death is black or white! There's no fucking existential crisis if you do the fucking job.. Oh... Oh, shit... Okay, you're right this time. But you're a fucking broken clock, teajay. Jesus! Heaven help us. Fuck!
Lemme guess. Your name is Swallow. You're a regional detective based in the Norfolk area. Not afraid to break the law if need be. For example you might drive at 60 in a 50.... Lovely stuff.
The camerawork happening here for this interview is insane. I'm surprised Gervais could keep a straight face with at least 3 cameras doing their thing at the same time.
"Being honest is what counts. Trying to make the ordinary extraordinary is so much batter than starting with the extraordinary... it's your job to make an audience as excited and fascinated about a subject as you are." There's the gold, right there.
Mind you, ‘write what you know’ sounds like horrible advice to give a young writer. There’s a reason Harry Potter is a billion dollar industry, whereas “The Life and Times of a Cobbler” will sit there collecting dust in the bargain section.
I'll be constructive. I've made this mistake before. The thought goes, "It's an interview, it's boring, so I need to make it interesting". So I would resort to wall to wall music, quick cuts and dynamic shots. I ignored the fact that the speaker WAS in fact interesting and I got in the way. Cut musically, with the beats of the dialog, at the pace of the speaker. Use the slide cam sparingly and move it with his thoughts. Not like a ping pong. You're a filmmaker, not a side show. Be invisible.
"Think an ordinary paper company like Dunder Mifflin was a great subject for a documentary. There's a lot of beauty in ordinary things. Isn't that kind of the point?" Ricky Gervais didn't write that final line of The Office US, but they sure did him justice with it.
I know that’s what I really lie about Ricky Gervais, he may come over quite crass but you can see what does get to him or what makes him feel emotional.
“Make the ordinary extraordinary.” I came to that realization all on my own 25 years ago with my own writing. I have always had a nerdified mind about noticing small details, remembering them forever, and a decent facility for turning a phrase. My favorite authors (and songwriting lyricists, even) are the ones who do exactly that. “Make the ordinary extraordinary.” Now, if only I had gumption enough to try to get published.
I think Bob Dylan is a master of that art. He can lift seemingly ordinary topics to unexpected heights in an instant. (I'm currently reading "Philosophy of Modern Song". Probably disappointing to academics, as there seems to be no clear, laid-out, structured philosophy. But there's a lot of wisdom and a fine sense for finding the essence in the absurdity of life.)
Wow, Mr. Gervais... thank you. This, helped remind me what my writing was actually missing lately . My youth. Great work describing the process you had used, as a young immature adolescent, expecting to “stick it” to the “dumb” teacher, and in that process finding your writing passion. For me my teacher challenged me to write a short story, because I didn’t do much reading, so he said read a book and write a report about it or write a good short story so I tried and tried I felt defeated, because I wrote a 50 page story instead, and I couldn’t shorten it. I handed it in, told him I couldn’t shorten it any more than it was and he did the strangest thing, he just smiled and said oh well, maybe next time and gave me an A on my long short story and said it was excellent and that was it, I was hooked. ;)
How did ricky concentrate with that fake little desk level dolly cam shot going backwards & forwards the whole time? Jesus. Great chat from Gervais nonetheless.
That's what I'm thinking triggered some of the fooling around in the outtakes. I'm looking forward to this crew showing up in his writing in a couple years
Right well, Ricky, you hit the nail on the head and I actually ended up with a tear in my eye by the time you finished the story of how you learned to write about what you know. Good one. I do love watching you.
This Design Life I thought too that something would happen in the background. That Ricky Gervais gets interrupted by an exploded building that you seen through the window
I would say 2 cameras are all you need, but the slider shots do seem unnecessary. You always need a 2nd camera when shooting interviews so you have something to cut away from, especially with someone who is constantly cracking jokes. I bet they have about 5 minutes of serious footage and about 55 minutes of Ricky making the whole crew laugh.
The subject is literally just sitting on a chair the whole time and yet there's a cut every 3 seconds, the angles are terrible, the camera settings are not synchronized, the slider dolly is not only positioned wrong but it's also bumpy and way too fast, honestly, I could go on all day. I don't mean to offend anyone, but shooting a documentary on Ricky sounds like a great opportunity but it seems that this crew just completely blew it.
After watching this video, for the first time, in a very long time, I was able to put pen to paper and compose something authentic and hopefully going to be the start of something good. Thank you, Ricky! My writer's block has been opened.
I’m glad that teacher gave him that advice. His programmes are so different to anything else. With old peoples homes, dementia, death and such. But all with great humour. Ricky is a revelation. And he’s so human. Love the guy
I think this is the best video about writing anything. Especially if you're writing comedy or jokes. It works because he's not giving people a process to follow or a how things should be done, which is what you get a lot of the time. When it comes to comedy what you get is how that person does their thing. Their methods or process may not work for everyone. But writing what you know and being honest is easy. None of us will ever be able to write like those we admire, they have their way, their voice. You can only write like you in your way in your voice. For me you only find that out by writing what you know and being honest because that's your way, your voice.
Boul Shyte there’s at least 4 cameras used the interview tracking and panning unnecessarily. Those filming were Trying too hard to justify their position.
Boul Shyte fair enough. I work in TV myself and perform comedy professionally (not blowing my own trumpet ;) Although no where near Gervais. But in Ireland I’d be very well known I have a comedy Show called hardy Bucks. We had Steve Brody from life’s too short in our last series. To me it looked like the crew were over doing it a little to put it on their show reel. Speaking from experience DOPs especially, can get carried away with style over substance. But Gervais, he’s a funny little fucker. “You are half and half aren’t you? - my favorite.”
Who knew so many people would fixate on the editing? Instead, pay attention to what he is saying lol especially his advice about trying to make the ordinary the extraordinary. Great perspective, thank you!
That is so true. Who would think audience would go bonkers about a story about an old man gone fishin'. And yet it's a wonderfull story of world's literature.
"...I think my single, biggest influence was Stephen Merchant, without whom we wouldn't have had The Office, or at least it wouldn't have been half as good as it was. But I try not to credit him too much coz I like it when people think of me as a brilliant genius."
He is human after all then! Brilliantly told. Always love the fact that Ricky is normal; lots of other people have disappeared up their own arse long before this stage- but he is just.. well... Ricky. I find that inspiring.
A case in point, Haruki Murakami's novels wonderfully balance ordinary people and their lives with extraordinary situations. He goes into the detail of what the characters wear and eat and builds a close relationship with the reader who is then is taken on an incredible journey.
Teachers should always know what an important influence they are...& be respected for their caring, effort, knowledge, & skills. (Sense of humor is the perfect bonus.)
I relate to this. I had a good time in my writing classes in high school. (Not a writer.) Got good grades. Almost felt like I cheated though. I would write what was supposed to be fiction, but was what I did the day before. I cut the back of my leg stepping through a barb wire fence one day when hunting squirrels. Included that the details of my gumboot aggravating the wound as I walked. Mrs. Weller asked me how I could come up with such detail. I just kind of shrugged. I did have a college English professor tell me one day that interesting and imperfect writing is much more fun for him than precise and boring.
I rememeber writing a story about how we used to walk to school by the river and feed the ducks and a dog used to sometimes walk past and the teacher said like your memories! I'll always remember that!
Spot on. I think the difficulty with fiction is it can easily sound contrived. Many writers have preconceived ideas of what is horror, sci-fi, romance etc. should be. But if you write from what you know and your experiences, you tell a story and adjust it to fit whatever period of time you want.
Fantastic content, love his input, very valuable, and exactly my philosophy for my channel -- just be real and honest and its easy to be genuine and relatable to people! Excellent!
