By David Congalton
There is a scene in my
movie screenplay Authors Anonymous where Colette, the New Age,
unpublished, Danielle Steel-wannabe, confronts fellow writer Hannah, who has
already scored an agent, a book deal, a movie deal and now an invitation to
meet a famous author.
“Why does all this
happen to you, and only to you?” a frustrated Colette demands to know. “Isn’t
there anything—some kind of cosmic creative crumb—for the rest of us to nibble
on?”
Envy is the four-letter
word that plagues many writers, especially many beginning writers. Yes, we want
our colleagues to succeed, but only to a certain degree. We smile and applaud
and cheer them on when they land an agent or sell a book, but then we go home
and scream at the sky, wondering, Why not me? Few of us will
fess up to the truth, but anyone who has ever put pen to paper, or clacked away
on a keyboard, has experienced envy at some point.
My moment came in 2000.
Catherine Ryan Hyde had sold her novel Pay It Forward to Simon
& Schuster the previous year. My wife Charlotte and I had become good
friends with Catherine—having known her before she ever sold her first short
story. But now, we could only stand back and watch in awe as Catherine
experienced this amazing career trajectory. Boom. New York
publisher. Boom. Four-book deal. Boom. Movie deal. Boom.
Kevin Spacey starring in the movie. Boom. Invitation to join
President Clinton for a private screening.
The movie version of Pay It Forward came to town and we sat behind Catherine at the local
premiere as she basked in the effusive audience praise and media spotlight. We
were driving home afterwards when the truth came bubbling out. “You know what?
I’m envious of Catherine. Look at all her success,” I confessed to my wife.
Charlotte didn’t
hesitate to put me in my place. “Catherine does the work. She’s earned her success.
You haven’t done the work.”
I felt stupid for having
said what I did. Charlotte was right. Sure, I had some good ideas and a lot of
dreams, but I lacked the work ethic that Catherine embraced daily. I hadn’t
done the work.
But five years later,
those feelings about Catherine became the basis for my screenplay Authors Anonymous,a comedy depicting the implosion of a writers’ critique group
when the members become envious of Hannah after she becomes an overnight
literary success.
It took nine years from
page to screen, an odyssey worthy of Homer, but I finally achieved success as a
writer by buckling down and doing the work. There are no shortcuts to success.
Envy has no place on the
creative journey. Catherine has gone on to publish 19 novels; she’s an amazing
writer. I couldn’t be happier for her. Why? Because the serious, mature
writer is one who is genuinely excited for the success of others—we understand
that when writers like Catherine succeed, we all succeed.
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His web site is. www.davidcongalton.com.
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