Book Review of Conversations with Wilder by Cameron Crowe (1999)

Patrick Charsky
12/05/2018

Did you ever wonder how Marilyn Monroe became a star? Or how about William Holden? Or Audrey Hepburn? It was Billy Wilder who gave them their first big breaks. Their first chances at becoming stars in Hollywood. From films like The Seven Year Itch to Sunset Boulevard Wilder was a star maker with an insider’s view of how films got made. How films made stars out of nobodies. Wilder became a big time writer-director in a time when writers didn’t become directors. He was an exception to a rule in a Hollywood dominated by the studio system.

Conversations Wtih Wilder by Cameron Crowe is the tell all Hollywood history that reveals the secrets and inside dish of Billy Wilder’s decades long career in Hollywood. The book shows Wilder’s opinions about everyone he ever worked with. From William Holden and Marilyn Monroe to Cary Grant and Audrey Hepburn, he knew them well enough to show their flaws. He was the king maker in a town of pawns.

The book is great. I couldn’t put it down for more than a few days. It is a testament of Hollywood history. The films that Wilder made are talked about extensively. As are the actors in his motion pictures. He was behind so many big hits, it’s impossbile to ignore his contributions to the art of motion pictures. The book turned me on to several films I wasn’t aware of before I read the book. The Seven Year Itch, The Lost Weekend, and The Apartment are a few of the films that I caught on to because of this book.

The book is a conversation between Cameron Crowe and Billy Wilder. It takes place over several months. Most of the conversations are recorded at Wilder’s office in Beverly Hills. Crowe and Wilder go back and forth about his illustrious career in motion pictures. Wilder gives all the dish about the stars he worked with as well as how his writing process worked and how he managed to succeed as a director in Hollywood at a time when writers didn’t become directors. The book is entertaining and engrossing. So much detail about the stars and process of filmmaking. It is invaluable to the history of Hollywood in the decades which Wilder worked.

The book has few flaws. A little bit too much into nostalgia about how great things were, but otherwise an entertaining and interesting book about a filmmaker’s career that spanned decades and influenced countless filmmakers. The end is especially important. Wilder recommended that Crowe end with his death as the end of the book. Crowe demurred and included a scene with Wilder doing exercise instead. It was very funny. Very expository about Wilder.

The book is a must read for anyone interested in Hollywood History of the immediate post-war period. Wilder really became popular in the post-war years with his big hits like Lost Weeekend, Sunset Boulevard, and The Seven Year Itch. He faded from popularity, but his life and legend will live on. He was a corporation man who made many films that were just as good as any of his contemporaries. A great book of Hollywood history. It combines anecdote with history to reveal a time in Hollywood that is past but somehow still lives on.

What comes through by reading the book is how great a filmmaker Billy Wilder was. In today’s filmmaking World it seems that everyone is aspiring to be a writer-director. In Wilder’s time it was unheard of that anyone would become a writer-director. He was the first to really accomplish that feat. With his many hits he cannot be denied a place in film history alongside the best of them all. Orson Welles, Howard Hawkes, John Ford were all great in their eras, but Wilder was just as good if not better. He worked in his genres to bring big hits for big stars, but he never gained much from his films. Still he will not be forgotten. Sunset Boulevard lives on as one of the greatest films ever made about Hollywood. And Wilder’s star will shine bright for decades to come.

Review of Reading Screenplays by Lucy Scher (2011)

Reviewed by Patrick Charsky

10/10/18

Reading Screenplays: How to Analyze and Evaluate Film Scripts by Lucy Scher. Kamera Books, Great Britain. 2011.


Reading Screenplays by Lucy Scher is a concise book about script development. It is one of the few books in the market which addresses the subject of how to write coverage reports. The book is intended to give the reader an introduction or primer on the job of a script reader. It is a quick read but gets the job done. After reading it I came away with a succinct idea of what to do when I read a screenplay and write a coverage report

Scher talks about the main components of a coverage report. She goes into quick detail about conflict, character, story structure, and the difficulty of writing second acts. Her major argument is that a story should have a very strong premise at the beginning. If a story isn’t strong from the outset, then it will, according to Scher, be difficult to sustain.

She also imparts valuable knowledge about the screenplay development process. She talks about readers who are the first line in the development process for screenplays. Toward the end of the book she talks about what it’s like to be a development executive or a “developer.” It’s an interesting perspective that shows how things work in getting a script green-lighted.

The book fills a need in the field of screenplay analysis. There are only a few books that show how to do the job of a reader. Or explain the process of development. It is a very good introduction to the topic and the latest to be released. The passages about conflict and character are excellent and her point is well made about having a strong premise in the film.


Where the book suffers is it’s brevity. There are countless books out there about screenwriting which go into more detail and better explanations than Scher’s book. Sometimes I was lost because the topic changed so quickly. Other times it felt like the book was too simple or presented too quickly. But for an introduction it works well.


I would recommend this book to anyone who wants an introduction to how the screenplay development process works. It presents important information in an easy to understand and accessible way. If you are looking for something with more detail about how to actually write a screenplay it might be helpful as a short review text, but I would look elsewhere for a book about how to write a screenplay.

Review of The Secret Language of Film by Jean Claude Carriere (1994)

I liked this short book. I thought the writer gave out several pieces of good advice and ruminations about screenwritng, cinema, and making films. It got me into the films of Luis Bunuel in a big way. I saw Belle de Jour, The Discreet Charm of the Bourgeoisie, and That Obscure Object of Desire. I didn't see Phantom of Liberty because I couldn't get the DVD. It was too expensive on amazon.com. I wish it would be released on Criterion collection at a more affordable price. The films are great works of art. Bunuel was a truly great artist. I watched a documentary about Bunuel that came along with one of the other DVDs. It talked about Bunuel's youth, his time in Mexico, and his return with the great films he made in France in the 70s.

One of Carriere's anecdotes is about Africans who closed their eyes when a movie played so their souls wouldn't escape while watching. The Cinema hasn't been around for that long and it's affects on people are known and some not known.

Carriere talks about his famous meeting with Bunuel who asked him if he drank wine when they met. Carriere admitted that he did and their friendship began. It lasted through many films and is truly one of the best collaborations between a writer and director in film history. When the French New Wave was cresting and many of the directors associated with that movement were not making films, Bunuel and Carriere were making legendary pictures. Discreet Charm won an Oscar for best Foreign Language film, and his other films are equally good if not a little less better.

Belle de Jour is worth a look. It stars Catherine Denueve. I watched it for a second time and was really taken in with it's story, characters, and settings. Discreet Charm may be the Bunuel/Carreire duo's best film. At least it's its most recognized. And the two later films; That Obscure Object of Desire and Phantom of Liberty are excellent films that further Bunuel and Carriere's satirical wit in film form.

The book wasn't cheap, but I guess you have to pay for quality. A good read. .