With a Off Broadway show entitled “Love, Loss and What I Wore” meeting with wonderful reviews, Nora Ephron, agreed to talk with me about her career and how it feels to have come this far.
Ephron grew up in Beverly Hills, California surrounded by people involved in the entertainment industry. Early on she developed the ability to determine what was and was not deemed intelligent and or humorous. Taking these early life lessons to heart, Ephron set out to become a writer and has ultimately become one of the most recognizable names in the modern literary world. Here is what she had to say.
How did you find yourself on these various career paths? Which led to the other?
1) I started out as a newspaper reporter, which led sort of inevitably
to becoming a magazine writer. Then in the late seventies, everyone
was trying to move into screenplays, so I did too. I don't think
there was anything conscious going on -- I mean, I never said, I'm
going to ease off on the journalism and ease into the movie business.
It just happened, and then it happened especially because I was
divorced with two kids and needed the money. Also it was fun to write
movies, and fresh, and I had no idea what I was doing, so that was
good. I think one reason I keep trying new things is that you sort of
get to the point where you repeat yourself, so it's nice to change
mediums and try something else.
Do you go through periods where you find your work focused more on a
particular area of interest, how do you choose if a piece should be a
book, screenplay...ect?
2) Sometimes I read something that interests me and I think, what is
this? Is it a movie? Is it a magazine piece? Is it a play? Does it
have a beginning, middle and end? Is it surprising in any way? Is it
substantial? Is it about anything, as opposed to what it's obviously
about? Etc. Or I look at something and say, this is a good story,
but where's the movie? Anyway, all those things go into a decision
about whether to work on it, or what it is. For years I had a story
in my head that I'd heard that I thought would make the great basis of
a caper movie, it was a delicious piece of plot, but I didn't know
what that movie was. And then finally I figured it out, and it was
the first movie script I wrote, which became a TV movie, which wasn't
any good but still ...
Can you describe the moment in which you realized you had made it?
3) Oh sure. My second book Crazy Salad got a great review in the New
York Times. It was a gorgeous day and I was walking down East 51st
Street and I just couldn't believe it.
What did it feel like to be a woman in a male dominated field? If an
issue, how do you manage, the "boys club" aspects of your job?
4) In which field? In journalism? I left the place where I started
(Newsweek) in part because they had a policy against promoting women,
and went to a newspaper where there were a lot of women. In the movie
business, the hardest part of it is that it's hard to get a movie made
about women. But if you can get one made, and you have a strong sense
of what it means to be a director, you don't really have problems with
the boy's club thing.
What piece of advice would you give up and coming writers - male or female?
5) Go be a journalist and learn about a bunch of things so you'll have
something to write about besides yourself/
process when it comes to writing?
And when I'm on an assignment, I write a set number of pages a day,
without fail. The minute I've written them, I stop, even if it's 9 in
the morning.
Can you imagine yourself in another line of work? If the powers that
be forced you to choose an alternate career path, what might you
choose?
7) if I had to go into the federal witness program, I could be a short-order cook.
Picture taken from: http://www.danshamptons.com/content/hamptonstyle/2008/aug_29/images/entertainment_list/nora_ephron.jpg
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