The Third Draft

I'm back from a wonderful week at DreamAgo's annual Plume & Pellicule international screenwriting workshop  (Sierre, Switzerland). Plume & Pellicule literally means "Quill & Film" but stands for "From Script to Screen." Designed as the first step in a process of taking a script into production, this year's Plume & Pellicule brought together 10 writers, 4 screenwriting consultants, and 2 directors for a series of intensive workshops.

Both writers and consultants hailed from around the globe.  The countries represented amongst the writers were: France, Martinique, Chile, Cuba, the USA, Tunisia, Cameroon, and Portugal. The coaches were John Herman Shaner (USA); Maggie Soboil (South Africa); Hasan Legzouli (Morocco); Arturo Arango (Cuba); Randa Haines (USA) and Yves Lavandier (France).

I went along as part of the organizing team. My duties included scheduling and translations (DreamAgo's working languages are English, French, and Spanish), and I had a chance to sit in on several consultations. DreamAgo's inexhaustibe founder Pascale Rey set out with a very specific goal: to foster global storytelling and to help scripts that touch on our common human experience get off the ground. Her vision is beginning to manifest. I was astounded by the quality of the scripts and the intensity and insightfulness of the coaching. The work was rigorous, the comments pertinent, and in every case the writer walked away with a new perspective on his or her story. For seven days we functioned at a very high level in three languages--sometimes speaking all of them at once. 

Days began at 8:30 with breakfast, followed by the first consultation.  Then lunch, then another consultation. Promptly thereafter, we all walked down the hill to Sierre's movie theater for the screening. Dinner was at 10 PM. We rarely got to bed before 1 AM. In addition to consultations, the writers also had sessions on scene work with Randa Haines and pitching with Yves Lavandier, and the opportunity to spend some time with special guests from the screenings, such as John Jeffcoat (director, Outsourced) and Belén Rueda (actress, Mar Adentro).

Although we worked hard, we  played hard, too. Comfortably ensconsed in the Chateau Mercier, nestled in a valley surrounded by snow-capped mountains, and spoiled by a marvellous chef and generously flowing wine, it would have been impossible  to do otherwise .  Conversation topics ranged from the state of Tunisia today, the differences between male-female relationship dynamics in the US vs. France, to sexuality in Cuba,  the US independent film distribution system, the Spanish-language telenovela market, what it's like working with Jack Nicholson, and cross-cultural lessons in flirting.  I was blown away by the diversity and the wealth of experiences each person brought to the  table (One young man claimed to be able to kiss in Spanish!).  By the end of the week, we had forged strong bonds with one another and became friends and colleagues in the truest sense of the words.

For more information on DreamAgo, go to: www.dreamago.com.

To see the YouTube videos of this year's Plume & Pellicule, go to: http://fr.youtube.com/user/dreamagoers. Make sure you check out Day 8! We took a special excursion into the Alps. You can see us ziplining through the canyons!

Also, keep your eye out for Tengri, a beautiful film by Marie-Jaoul de Poncheville, a 2005 Plume & Pellicule participant! Although it hasn't officially opened yet, DreamAgo premiered it at this year's screenings.