What Storytelling Can Do: A Conversation with Maria Maggenti

From her 20+ years of experience in the Hollywood screenwriters’ landscape, Maria Maggenti has paved her own path in the activist and queer film industry during the ‘90s. As both a TV and film writer-director, she brings emotional clarity and a deep commitment to telling stories that challenge convention and celebrate complexity. From her breakout indie feature, The Incredibly True Adventure of Two Girls in Love, to her work in television and major motion-pictures, such as Before I Fall, Maggenti’s career is a testament to the power of personal voice.

I have had the absolute pleasure of working in class with Professor Maggenti for two semesters in Brown University’s Screenwriting I and II courses. Her perspectives on screenwriting and careers in film have been eye-opening into my own journey of self-discovery as a young writer. I sat down with her this past September to talk about her experience.

****

G: As an undergraduate student who’s studying Psychology, but also taking courses like yours and basically all my extracurriculars having to do with art, I find that this time in my life is so susceptible to my experiences in youth and subject to change. I know you’ve mentioned before that you studied Philosophy for your undergraduate degree. So, my question is, what was your pathway into filmmaking and screenwriting? Was it one that you ever foresaw in your future? I’m curious.

M: I definitely did not see screenwriting or TV writing in my future. Absolutely not. I always wanted to be a writer. I thought I was going to be writing essays, critical theory, and fiction. Then, when I graduated, I had one horrible job after another. It was so hard. I just had secretary jobs and temp jobs. Then, a friend of mine said that there was a secretary position open in a production company that was making commercials. I was really good at typing, so she said, “why don't you just try and get a job there?” So I got a job there, and that started my interest in film and TV. Then from there, I was very involved in an activist group called ACT UP, the AIDS Coalition to Unleash Power, which was a nonviolent civil disobedience group that took over a lot of places in New York City in the late '80s, early '90s. The group still exists, but its heyday was from '87 till '92, which is when I was involved.

G: Oh, wow.

M: Through that, I got very involved in advocacy and activist filmmaking. I was doing documentary work, interviewing people, and creating a body of work that was about enlightening people to the political and social structures that created AIDS discrimination.

It was very exciting, but by the time I was 25, I'd already lost a lot of friends who died from AIDS, and I still had all shit jobs, and I started to feel like I really was not made for the world. So I thought, “I'll apply to film school,” because it had three things that I love: music, pictures, and words. I wanted to learn how to do it from a fiction point-of-view, not a documentary point-of-view. So, I only applied to one school, which was NYU, and I only applied to that school because it was near where I lived in the East Village…and I got in! That started my whole new life as a writer/director, was that experience of going to graduate school. I didn't dream of it, I wasn't a nine-year-old with a camera. I definitely came to it kind of sideways, but then once I discovered it, I was like,“this is absolutely what I want to be doing,”

G: My next question is, as a female filmmaker, TV writer, and screenwriter, were there or are there still any obstacles you've had to navigate that are difficult?

M: I would say, yes, that it was definitely harder when I started out in the 90s. I feel like there were a lot less women directors and there was a lot less consciousness around women directors. I feel that now it's still hard and there's still sexism, but after Me Too and the fact that more women started to go into the business, a young female filmmaker has a much better chance than I had when I started. Trying to get my second film made took seven years.

G: Oh, wow…

M: Yeah, and the young female filmmakers that I know now are able to make their second movies within two or three years. Women are still put in a position of having to, not just fly the plane, but build it. What I mean by that is very rarely do women get directing jobs, they usually have to write their own material, and that's how they end up directing. So that's something that puts the onus on the female director to actually also be a writer. It's harder to just get hired for something just as a director, which I think young men—and aspiring male directors—can do much more easily than young women.

G: Yeah, that makes me think about Greta Gerwig, who is a really big name, but she's written, I think, all her work that she's directed.

M: She's written all of it. If you look through your list of female directors of the last 10 years, you will note that very many of them wrote their own material.

G: As you know, I'm currently directing a musical, and although they follow two very different avenues of jurisdiction with the creative process, I'm curious to know about your piece of work, “The Incredibly True Adventure of Two Girls in Love,” and how that experience was like directing a queer love story based on your life and the contemporary public sentiment. Was it difficult and how was that environment for you?

M: I was surrounded by very supportive people. We also shot the movie for no money. So, it's not like anybody was taking a big risk on us, you know? The film premiered at Sundance and had great reviews, including The New York Times, which said this is maybe the crossover movie that straight people will go and see as well as gay people. But it was definitely a much more hostile context. Generally, you had not seen lesbians on television, in movies, or around town. It was a very different political environment. So, the film came out and was radical in its time because it treated girls and girls sexuality in a matter-of-fact way, with romance. At the time, a lot of people would have said that in a lot of lesbian and gay films, the characters were always dead at the end, and so they were happy that this was a movie with a happy ending. There are a lot of happy endings in gay and lesbian movies now. There are so many! But at the time, there were really none. I think that if I had not made a lesbian film, if I had made a boy-girl romantic comedy, that I would have been offered more jobs and my career would have gone very differently.

G: Interesting…but you went with your heart.

M: I did. I went with my heart, and I still write from my heart.

G: So this next question is more fun! Is there a favorite screenplay you've read before or an influential TV show/movie that inspired you to consider more of a career in filmmaking?

M: When I was growing up in Washington, DC my mother used to take us to the American Film Institute (AFI) that had Friday night screenings for families, and I fell in love with 1930s comedies. The only thing that made me ever think that I would want to write a movie was these 1930s romantic comedies: “It Happened One Night," “My Man Godfrey,” “His Girl Friday,” “Bringing Up Baby,” and “Philadelphia Story.” God, there's so many, but those are my tops, and they inspired me the most. In terms of scripts that I've read, I had an experience that was really interesting a few years ago when I was a judge on a TV scriptwriting competition where we were supposed to decide whether or not a certain TV script should go to the next level. So, I read this script. I had never seen the show and didn't know anything about the show. I just read one hour-long drama script, and it wasn't even the pilot. By page 15, I was like, “This is one of the best scripts I've ever read.” I knew everything about the characters, I cared so much about what was going to happen, and that script turned out to be “Ozark.” Nothing that I would have ever watched on my own. Drugs? That sounds terrible. I read it, and I was like, "Holy cow, how did this writer do this?" So that had a big influence on me, I've never forgotten that.

G: Did you eventually watch it?

M: Oh, yeah. I totally watched it and kept thinking as I was watching it of what the writing was. That's one thing I like to teach in my class, is having people imagine writing the script as they're watching a movie. I do want people to think as writers when they're watching movies.

G: Are there any exciting projects you’ve been working on recently?

M: As you might know, Writers Guild members were on strike in the last two years. That means that no one was working on anything, and the business has really slowed down. It's very hard to get a job now. It's very hard to make stuff right now. However, the good news about that is it means I have lots of time to write my own material. Right now I'm doing something I haven't done before, which is that I'm writing a tear jerker. I'm writing a big romantic story—a heterosexual love story—which I've actually kind of not done for my own films. So, a male-female, grown-up romantic drama that is going to end up making everybody cry at the end.

G: Have you worked on any TV shows that you were interested in?

M: I’ve worked in TV for a really long time and I have loved all the shows that I've worked on! They've all been amazing. I've worked on “UnREAL,” “Supergirl,” “Motherland: Fort Salem,” “Without a Trace,” and then in-between those jobs, I either had screenwriting jobs, or I had what's called development, which means I was writing my own pilots or my own screenplays. So that's kind of how my career has gone in the last 20 years.

G: How do you keep yourself inspired, especially throughout the writing process in the beginning of crafting your story?

M: I use music a lot, so I have a playlist for my soon-to-be movie. I watch a lot of other movies to see how they're made and to see what in there is kind of what I'm trying to do. So, for instance, for romantic dramas, I watched "The Way We Were,” “Casablanca,” “Bridges of Madison County," and “The Notebook.” I watched very conventional romantic dramas, especially those that lean towards making people cry at the end. So that's how I usually get into it. I start watching other people's work and I make a playlist for myself, and then I start taking notes. I just write everything down that I can think of. Sometimes it's on my phone, in a notebook, or on my computer, but I write every single thought down, even if it's not related right away. That's how I keep my energy for the project, but it doesn't mean I don't suffer from extraordinary self doubt, because I do. Everyone who's a writer does. That's kind of how you know you're a writer, because you keep saying, “Oh my God, I can't do this!”

G: I guess I'm going in the right direction then, because I like to watch movies and always think of some of my favorite songs I would love to one day hear in a scene.

M: Yeah, that's really helpful! That really makes a difference.

G: Do you have any advice for Brown University students right now?

M: In particular to the creatives, people who are looking for a creative life, I would say don't give up. Do not be freaked out if you have periods, especially the first few years out of college, when you have really shitty jobs that don't seem to relate at all to your ambition, do not worry about that. Don't freak out if what your ambition is doesn't happen right away. That is fine, because life is short, but art is long, as they say. As long as you are focused on what you are willing to create, that will keep you going. I also think that you need to have supportive friends who know that you really want to be a writer and who read your work and always approach it in good faith with a lot of love and affection, even if they have a critique—which they should. You want to be surrounded by people who are supportive of your ambitions. I also think that my advice is try not to be swayed by a culture that cares so much about money. I know we need money to survive, and it's very expensive right now, but please don't go work on Wall Street. That's my final word.

G: That's a very powerful statement. I think a lot of people need to hear that more often, including myself, because many come into college and life in general during early adulthood with the mindset of making money, but I think there's a lot of other ways you can find happiness that’s not dependent on that.

M: I think it doesn't have to be happiness, but it has to be fulfillment and a feeling of meaningfulness. Are you doing something meaningful in the world? Are you making the world a better place? That was one of my guiding principles and is still my guiding principle. Am I making the world a better place by doing whatever it is I'm doing? If you have that as your value system, then it's going to be very hard for you to work on Wall Street.

G: I'm assuming you want people to take your class regardless of what they’re studying.

M: I want people to take screenwriting classes, for sure!

G: Can you give them a bit of a picture of why they should take your class?

M: I think the reason that screenwriting is a great class to take is because even if you will never become a screenwriter, every single thing that we do is a story. All of us have to become storytellers. If you're a lawyer, you're going to have to learn how to be a storyteller. If you're a doctor, you're going to learn how to be a storyteller. If you are a business person, you're going to have to learn how to tell a story, because stories are the way that we organize the world. Screenwriting, unlike novels or other kinds of prose, demands a kind of discipline that is very unique to the structure and the demands of the craft. I think it combines psychology, because you have to think about why characters do what they do, sociology, because you have to go into different worlds, philosophy, because it's a point of view. It could also have to do with social justice, that you are impacting the culture in a positive way which is also a reflection of your belief system. So, I think it really covers almost every possible thing that you can do with your life. And plus, it's really fun!

G: I find it therapeutic as well. Especially for writing a personal or autobiographical story. Besides that, even if it's fictional and has nothing to do with your life, you can address it about anything. I mean, why wouldn't you? I think for me, film is just such a beautiful, expressive piece of art that can really touch people through a screen. That's why I say I love sad movies. I've found some really great movies that make me have a good cry, but they also open my eyes to something new.

M: I think that's the other thing that I would emphasize about learning how to write a screenplay, is that film is a visceral medium, it is about emotion, and you do learn a lot about yourself when you're writing. You learn about where your emotions are, how to elicit emotion, and how you deal with emotions. It does help you understand yourself, and that's always good.

****

Whether you’re like me, an aspiring writer currently experiencing existential life crises, or someone who delves more into the daunting world of STEM, Maria Maggenti’s profound perspective into crafting a story revealed the true unsung heroes of filmmaking, the screenwriters.

So, if you ever find yourself scouring Courses@Brown at three a.m., consider trying your hand at screenwriting. In your process of storytelling, you may uncover more about yourself and the world than you ever imagined.