Writer Interview: Lauren Barbato

Writer Lauren Barbato has an interesting technique to further develop and explore her characters; she often writes accompanying prose to her screenplays. I interviewed Lauren about her writing process and her screenplay I Do, You Don't. There's a scene from the script after the interview, and be sure to scroll down to the previous blog post to read an additional scene and the prose that Lauren wrote with it. 

Q: How did the story evolve through multiple drafts? What were major and minor changes?

Lauren Barbato: The story evolved the more Elle continued to evolve. Early on, I would refer to it shorthand as “Mike and Elle.” Draft after draft, it eventually just became “Elle.” The script morphed from a romance drama to a coming-of-age story, though since Elle is 28, I guess it's either a late coming-of-age or early mid-life crisis. Anyway, it wasn’t until I performed open-heart surgery on Elle to discover why and how her self-destructive nature materialized that I knew what othe story was—and it was about her and her father. The throughline of the story switched to Elle and Romeo coming to terms with the dissatisfaction they feel not only toward each other, but also toward how their own lives turned out. As Elle and Romeo’s relationship strengthened throughout the drafts, Mike became more of a "mess" the less and less he became a conventional romantic interest. Elle and Mike are both stuck in self-created ruts; while Elle is desperately trying to claw her way out, Mike is just desperate. Elle was always her own antagonist, but Mike manifested into an extension of Elle’s self-destruction. He ends up regressing—and honestly, it was a satisfying exchange of tragedies.A minor change in the story was Elle’s estranged brother, John. In the original draft, he’s the character who’s never there—just talked about. John does physically make an appearance now—twice. Because of the Elle and Romeo’s growth, John needed to come in. 

Q: How does writing prose help you further develop the plot and characters? At what stage do you write the prose?

LB: It changes from script to script. Here, the prose was written at the beginning of the process, almost as sort of a “relationship bio” for Elle and Mike. When I’m dealing with a couple, it’s sometimes more important for me to write a bio of their relationship than individual character bios. The relationship becomes a third character, taking on quirks of its own. There’s not only the timeline aspect to it, but how the relationship moves, functions, strengthens, weakens, and so on. Looking back on the prose, it takes place later in their lives—Mike’s already a married man—so it almost plays like a premonition. I think by writing that out in the prose, it forced me to place a definition on their relationship. Then when writing the script, it was easier for Elle to redefine it. The prose here also helped me find the mood and tone, which I think turned out to be a brooding sort of nostalgia. interjected at times with fleeting attraction. 

Q: Although the scene is similar, the dialogue in the prose is different from the script scene. Did the screenplay ever contain the dialogue that's in the prose, or was it always separate?

LB: It was always separate. I don’t think I ever wrote any of the dialogue into prose first, although I’ve done that for other scripts. Since this script is so dialogue-driven, once I had an understanding of the emotions for the scene, I dove in headfirst and let the characters dictate where I needed to go. 

Q: How did you come up with the story? What inspired you to write it?

LB: So many things. Both the genesis of Elle and the loose script structure resulted as sort of a retaliation against being boxed in by film school and Hollywood. At the time, I wasn’t liking what I was producing. I was fighting to fit into those process vs. product confines, so much so that I forgot why I wrote in the first place. “I Do, You Don’t” was a way for me to rediscover my voice. I wanted to go back to those small, low-concept stories that I used to tell, so it challenged me to see if I could create a low-concept that sustains itself through character and emotion alone. Elle’s profession as a photographer and her flighty creative lifestyle extended from those feelings. As an artist in any medium these days, you’re teetering the line between art and commercialism, and the more someone like Elle dips into the commercial aspect, the larger the existential crisis. The basis for Elle and her father came out of the on-and-off relationship I have with my own father. A lot of “I Do, You Don’t” was coming to terms with my father’s mortality. Mike came from those strange, undefinable sexual and romantic connections with people that you prolong when you’re too afraid to question it, because it would mean letting them go. I needed to let them go. I also had an excruciating nursing home experience with my grandmother when I was a teenager, and I’ll never forget that feeling—facing the inevitable, for both the resident and the family. It’s an unnerving, fragile time. The clock is ticking, but very slowly. Time is running out but it’s not—you don’t know if it’s two days or two months. I don’t know why I chose to put myself through that again, but something in me compelled me to capture that state of mind.

Q: In both excerpts -- the scene between Elle and her father, and the scene between Elle and Mike -- there is obvious tension. Was the tone difficult to get right? Which scene was more challenging to write?

LB: They were both very difficult, but the Elle-Romeo scenes were tougher. This one was perhaps the toughest because it’s the first interaction between Elle and Romeo, so there was a ton of exposition I had to relay. It also had to be a marker for Elle’s pain, but I had to be very meticulous with the emotions and zingers. I couldn’t just throw in the line, “You disappoint me” (which I tried) for fear of it being too harsh or forced. The zingers had to be sparse and they had to be motivated. It required give and take, feeling out when they should push each other’s buttons and when to scale it back so they have some breathing room. It helps, too, if I think of scenes as having a three-act structure of their own. The tension has to be there from the beginning, but it has to swell before it breaks. I had an advantage with working with characters who knew each other very well, so that made the dialogue flow. It’s at once effortless and trying—particularly with Elle and Mike—to have a conversation with these characters. Effortless because on some basic, fundamental level they understand each other; trying because everyone had such a strong backstory and therefore, a lot to say. Often, it was a lot harder to get them to quiet down.

Q: Did you have any plot lines or characters that you liked but ultimately chose to remove?

LB: Throughout the drafts, I flirted with various peripheral characters, including a former best friend to Elle and a gay nurse at the nursing home. I liked the gay nurse because his bond with Romeo exemplified a change in Romeo’s character and and indication that there was hope for Romeo and John. In the end, additional characters seemed to unnecessarily complicate things, so I fleshed out the main players and they were enough to sustain the 110 pages.

Q: Are there any films that you feel are similar to "I Do, You Don't"?

LB: “Rachel Getting Married”  definitely helped jump start my creativity at the time. I admired “Rachel” for its boldness, the way it was reminiscent of Robert Altman films. I grew up watching Altman films, so I always had an affinity for that kind of organic cinema that unfolds ignoring everything Robert McKee says at his screenwriting seminars. So structurally, “Rachel” is similar in that “I Do, You Don’t” takes place over 4-5 days.

Q: What are some of your favorite screenplays?

LB: “Manhattan” is one of my favorites because Woody Allen took a low-concept story about terribly unlikeable people and made it terribly engaging (and real). “Before Sunset” is a script I wish I wrote, but my dad still wishes I made it big with “Little Miss Sunshine.” As for 2011 films, I just saw “Beginners” and fell in love. And I can’t really say I like Mike Leigh’s screenplays since he doesn’t technically write a script until after the film is finished, but I’m constantly intrigued by his kooky process and the way he and his actors create these stories from improvisation.

Writer Bio: Lauren Barbato published her first short story in a national children's magazine at the age of 10, and since then has devoted her life to storytelling. A recent graduate of USC's School of Cinematic Arts with a BFA in Writing for Screen and Television, she has received awards for both her screenwriting and journalism work at the Daily Trojan, where she served as Lifestyle Editor and columnist. As a journalist, Lauren has written and worked for MovieMaker Magazine, The Hollywood Reporter, FILTER Magazine and Campus Circle. Currently, she contributes to Under the Radar and various online sites, including Patch.com, Examiner.com and Yahoo, and is working on transforming "I Do, You Don't" from script to screen. Although she calls Los Angeles home (for now), she remains a proud, Springsteen-loving Jersey girl at heart.

Excerpt from "I Do, You Don't"

Please note: Formatting that looks slightly "off", mainly how the dialogue is centered, is due to limitations of the blog format, not Lauren's original screenplay.

INT. ROMEO’S ROOM - NURSING HOME - DAY

Elle lingers in the DOORWAY, taking in the room:

Hospital bed and wheelchair, paisley patterned arm chairs, an armoire and dresser, and an enormous flat screen television. As for decorations, a crucifix hangs on one wall; a portrait of Ronald Reagan hangs on another.

All of this is for ROMEO (70), a strong man now beaten down by illness. He rests in the bed, remote in hand. Tubes in his nose lead to an oxygen tank.

Elle clears her throat. Romeo mutes the TV.

ROMEO

What is this — standing room only?

Elle eyes the oxygen tank.

ROMEO (CONT'D)

I’m not going to explode, you know.

ELLE

Hey, Daddy.

She gently wraps her arms around Romeo. A brief hug.

ROMEO

You look skinny.

ELLE

I’ve been dieting.

ROMEO

You’re smoking again.

ELLE

Cocaine, actually.

ROMEO

That’s not too far off with you.

ELLE

(ignoring him)

TV’s impressive.

ROMEO

Installed the surround sound  

myself.

ELLE

Looks like you got the works.

ROMEO

Your mother told me you quit the

magazine.

ELLE

For Christ's sake, I just walked

in. Can’t we talk about the weather

or something?

Romeo glances out the window.

ROMEO

It’s cloudy out.

ELLE

Chillier than usual.

ROMEO

Why’d you quit?

Elle scopes out the room, looking for a way out — this isn’t going to be easy.

ELLE

I didn’t believe in what they stood

for.

ROMEO

You don’t have to believe it,

Gabrielle. You just gotta do it.

ELLE

Don’t they say you gotta love what

you do so it’s not a chore?

ROMEO

They don’t say that. You want to

know who says that?

ELLE

Happy people?

ROMEO

Idiots.

ELLE

Then I’m an idiot.

ROMEO

Did you have another job lined up?

ELLE

No, not really.

ROMEO

Do you have one now?

ELLE

No, not really.

ROMEO

Then you’re an idiot.

Elle plops down in an armchair.

ELLE
You know, it’s only been like,
three months.

ROMEO
Four months.

ELLE
Has it been four?

ROMEO
Twenty-eight years old and you
still can’t take care of yourself.

ELLE
Hey, I made it cross-country OK.

ROMEO
Did you pay your rent before you
left?

ELLE
Yes, I paid my rent.

Elle gets up from the armchair, pacing again.

ELLE
OK, no. Fuck.

ROMEO
I’m losing my patience with you,
Gabrielle.

ELLE
Well, it’s a good thing you don’t
have much time left.

Romeo breaks into a coughing fit — painful, uncontrollable. Elle moves forward, but he waves her away as he reaches for his oxygen mask.

ROMEO

Do me a favor and go back to

California.

ELLE
Gladly.

Elle stomps out of the room, passing Christine in the
DOORWAY, who narrows her eyes at Romeo.

ROMEO
(removing his mask)
She hasn’t changed.

© Lauren Barbato

I Do, You Don't - Screenplay & Prose

As Lauren Barbato describes in her interview (be sure to read it here!), she often writes prose that further explores scenes from her screenplays. Here is a scene from Lauren's feature screenplay I Do, You Don't, followed by accompanying prose.

Excerpt from I Do, You Don't

Please note: Any screenplay format that looks slightly "off", such as the way the dialogue is centered, is due to limitations of the blog format, not Lauren's original script.

EXT. WATERFRONT PROMENADE - HOBOKEN, NJ - NIGHT

Through the POV of TWO SMALL CIRCULAR VIEWFINDERS we see the glittering Manhattan skyline. Stationary only for a moment, then swiveling slowly, left to right.

Elle presses her face against a TOURIST TELESCOPE on the edge of the brick pathway overlooking the Hudson River.

Mike approaches, stumbling a bit. Elle hears him, but swivels the telescope in the opposite direction.

He takes the other telescope only a few feet away, swivels it to face Elle. And through these two telescopes, they talk.

MIKE
So. Is there still a Sky?

Elle pulls the telescope up to the sky.

ELLE
Looks like it’s still there.

MIKE
Is there still a person named Sky?

ELLE
It’s not exactly at the top of the
list of baby names, but I’m sure
there’s a few out there.

Mike straightens, peering at Elle over the top of the telescope.

MIKE
How many questions is this going to
take?

ELLE
It’s 3 a.m.

Elle fully swivels the telescope to face Mike.

ELLE
Too late for questions.

Mike hops off the telescope stand, stumbles to the BENCH across the way.

MIKE
When I have kids--

ELLE
When?

MIKE
If I have kids, I’m going to name
them Sky, Moon, and Sun.

ELLE
Why not Earth, Wind, and Fire?

MIKE
I think those might be copyrighted.

Elle straightens, removing her eyes from the telescope.

ELLE
I heard about your parents.

MIKE
Your mom’s got a big mouth.

ELLE
You know how Catholics are. They
live for death.

MIKE
Of course. The more rosaries they
have to say, the better.

Elle jumps off the telescope stand. Graceful, even after a night of drinking.

ELLE
How’d they pass?

MIKE
It’s 3 a.m. Too late for questions.

A beat, as they gauge one another. It’s too quiet. Nothing but the waves rippling softly.

MIKE
I never thought I would be an
orphan.

ELLE
That’s not really something you
think about.

MIKE
But we probably should. Save us the
trouble now.

Elle turns to the railing, raising her heels to get a better look of the city that sits so plainly in front of her.

MIKE
You miss it?

Elle shrugs as she reaches into her purse, digs around.

MIKE
Of course you don’t. Why else can’t
we keep you out of Jersey for eight
years?

ELLE
You know what happens when I come
back to Jersey.
(lighting a cigarette)
I quit smoking and start believing
in God.

Mike laughs, nodding to the cigarette as Elle takes a seat beside him.

MIKE
That right?

ELLE
(smiling)
Oops.

MIKE
And that’s why I like you.

ELLE
Because I’m a hypocrite.

MIKE
Because unlike everything else, you
never change.

It’s too much — Elle needs to look away.

ELLE
So much for the city that never
sleeps.

MIKE
I haven’t been able to sleep in a
long, long time.

ELLE
Yeah. Me neither.

Mike lightly rests his head on Elle’s shoulder. They watch the gentle waves of the Hudson.

I Do, You Don't Prose - "Revisited"

   They walk along the brick promenade overlooking the Hudson, which glistens in the late-day sunlight. Barely a foot apart, the backs of their hands graze one another’s, a continual gesture that lends itself to be deliberate. She offers him a cigarette and he complies; he only smokes when she’s around, though he never could explain why that was.

   She motions to the railing and they pause, watching the life on the river’s placid waves as the George Washington Bridge stands guard over it all—it was more than a pause, really. They had this peculiar way with silence, letting it follow them like a peripheral member of their company. He did not feel the need to speak, for he felt there was nothing left to say. She, on the other hand, did not know where to begin.

   In the growing shadows of the day, they look ten years older than what they truly are. He has dark circles under his eyes and acquired a mid-section predestined for middleage men. She is thinner than he remembered, her hair hanging limply from her crown to just below her sharp shoulders, fraying at the ends. If he looked closely enough, he thought he could see her natural hair color peeking through.

   As he smokes, a glint of gold catches her eye for barely a moment before it’s gone with the ash accumulating on the tip of his cigarette—a moment, however fleeting, that she could not claim as an illusion.

   Across the river, Manhattan is winding down its day. Traffic builds on the GW’s neatly stacked decks, one car halting to a stop after the other, the persistent honking coming to a hover over the promenade. Their silence dissipates as quickly as it solidified, leaving the pair entrapped in the sounds of foreign conversations. It was always then, compressed and claustrophobic, that they felt obliged to add to the world’s ceaseless cacophony.

   How many people live in Manhattan? she asks, pressing her hips against the railing and rising on tip-toe to get a better view of the city that stood so plainly in front of her.

   “I think a million or so.”

   “There should be more for such a ‘dream city.’”

   “It’s not such a big island.”

   “But you think they would have expanded it by now. Maybe claim parts of Jersey.”

   “This isn’t L.A.”

   “No. Thank God it’s not.”

   She finishes the last of her cigarette, much more quickly than he, and flicks it over the railing. They watch as it’s swiftly enclosed by a wave. He makes it a point to flick his into a nearby metal tray.

   “You always litter like that?” he asks when he returns.

   “There’s no difference.”

   “One’s in an ash tray, the other’s in the sea.”

   “It all gets to the same place eventually.”

   It was that loosely-threaded philosophy by which she lived her life. As a young woman, she wandered, driving mapless along the coastline and interstates only to discover that she was tracing her haphazard paths. She experimented, using her body as an absorbent for substances, both pharmaceutical and street bought, before gradually returning to her sober state, her organs healed and skin refreshed as if she were still that flawless teenager. And after years of spreading her legs for questionable men, she now found herself standing beside the first man to ever press into her. She knew he always felt guilty about possessing that honor—it was a heavy guilt that hung like a veil overhead. As two excommunicated Catholics, religious expats, they knew this guilt well, although it did not make him any less questionable.

   “Do you miss the East Coast,” he asks.

   She scans the skyline, all the way from Uptown to Battery Park, and says, “Not as much as I should.”

   She was flying again tomorrow. He would be at work when her plane would be taking its place on the runway. At his desk, sipping his triple shot latte—nonfat, because he was upholding his New Year’s resolution to uphold New Year’s resolutions. He would be in the middle of a phone call, throwing around statements about mayors and advisors and constituents that would later be quoted in the Times. She would be ordering a gin and tonic, smiling politely at the stewardess (or steward, she makes a point to add) and his (or her, she insists) disapproving glare at her ordering alcohol so early in the day. There would be a book resting on her lap but she would not open it; ear buds tucked in her ears but she would not turn on the radio. She would not look out the window and, despite being in his inaugural office-with-a-view, neither would he.

   “The Times?” she asks.

   He slips his wallet out from his back pocket and removes a cluster of newsprint clippings held together with an orange rubber band. She carefully relinquishes the clippings from the band and begins to shuffle through them, one by one.

   “You’re like my grandmother,” she says, squinting to read the miniscule lettering on the yellowing paper. “She always kept newspaper clippings in her purse, everything from my mother’s engagement to my uncle’s obituary.” After a moment, she returns the clipping to her lap, nestling it between the others. She averts her eyes now when she speaks, focusing instead on the worn rubber band, wrapping it into figure eight’s around her pointer and middle fingers. “You sound very intelligent in some of these.”

   “You’re that surprised?”

   “I guess I never thought of you that way.”

   “Then how do you think of me?”

   The rubber band snaps, leaving a thin pink line on her palm. He moves to take her hand—her right and his left—and that glint of gold, that new addition to his being, teases her again. She places the loose clump of clippings into his open palm. They flutter freely and he lets them. 

   “It was so easy when you were gone,” she says.

   “I never went very far.”

   She stares at him now and he notices her eyes, what he always swore were a deep brown, spiked with green.

   “Would it have mattered if I stayed?”

   Five years his junior, she was his Lolita, standing in one strapless sandal beneath the neon glow of the aging marquee at the local cineplex. Laughing at midnight in the park beside the police station, she was his student, and then, when their playground trysts turned into multi-hundred dollar affairs, she was his equal, their experiences varied yet matched. As a grown-up Lolita, he didn’t think she would have the same attraction, that same sense of danger. But here, the first time they’ve been exposed in the daylight, the scenes before the park and hotel room they’ve so often skipped, the curves of her body indiscernible in the waning sunlight, no longer naive, no longer coy, no longer lost—she just was.

   “Do you want to go to the bar tonight?” he asks.

   “You know what would happen.”

   “But it’s your last night.”

   “That’s the problem.”

   They were supposed to be water under the bridge. That’s what he said once, in the harshness of the night only insomniacs witness, and she agreed even though, truthfully, she didn’t know what it meant. Very quiet water, like a shallow stream passing through a forest at midday, he said as they waited, huddled beneath the sheets, for their room service meals. It was the easiest thing for them to do—they convinced themselves so well. But it was never as easy as they liked to believe, leaving each other there, locked in a time they are forbidden to mention not even in a letter, not even in a metaphor. Water under the bridge, an empty phrase that is exemplary in thought yet falters when taken literally.

   “So here we are,” he says.

   “Yes,” she says. “Here we are.”

   They had their moments years before—a time where they were overcome with capricious notions—and in a way, none of that has changed. He formed several wrinkles in the center of his forehead; hers were etched at the corners of her eyes. Their joints were tighter, stiff with work and age, and though they may have appeared older, they were not a mere thought wiser.

   “If we do this,” he starts.

   “It won’t ever end,” she finishes.

   Darkness has fallen now, the lights of the skyscrapers flickering off in an indecipherable pattern. Businessmen and women crossing the Hudson to return home to their spouses, the others lingering in the draining city, prolonging arrival to their empty quarters. The promenade, too, is thinning, save for couples retreating to the benches for a bit of privacy and romance. He, like the others, motions to the nearest bench—a neglected one hidden among some shrubs—and she shakes her head.

   She pulls another cigarette from her purse and places it between her lips, smoking and speaking simultaneously, out of habit.

   “Lets go to that bar,” she says.

© Lauren Barbato