Tony Kushner is a Puliter-prize and Tony award winning screenplay writer who came to speak here this week as a part of the Syracuse University Lecture series. He is best known for his screenplay for Lincoln and his play “Angels in America: A gay Fantasia on National Themes”.
The director of the lecture series asked a lot about how he deals with the topic of slavery. Kushner said how it is difficult to write about slaves because everyone shows how they were subject to horrible violence but that happens in every group of people. He said the difference about slavery is the fact that they are denied their rights. He said that portraying slavery in the violent way is almost cliché. I think it’s really hard not to be cliché these days because most things have already been done. I applaud Kushner for being able to still come out with original work on a topic that has been done so many times.
Kushner also said that he tries not to put his own voice into his work because it isn’t about him but he knows it comes out in the way he tells jokes or writes certain things. I think in historical pieces it makes sense but for the style i want to make movies in I’d want to have a notable style. I want to make dramatic movies and I think it is important to leave your mark on that type of movie and be able to be told apart from the rest.
One thing he said that really resonated with me was that you shouldn’t tell your audience something you already know. If you are just regurgitating information then it will be boring; you have to genuinely search for something with your audience. I usually stay on a safe topic and make movies about things that I know about but I don’t want my audience to get bored so I need to find new subjects to cover to stay interesting.
I found the event very interesting. However, I didn’t get as much out of it as I do when the speaker is talking freely from their mind rather than from questions.