The “Making Of” Obsession

For the past few months my publicist (Hi Noah!) has been painstakingly trying to get me to do something related to social media. And I have steadfastly been too busy to do anything. It’s taken me a long time just to have the mental energy to make a couple of quips on Facebook. And one of those was about Doctor Who. But even if I wasn’t so busy saving Catholics (yes, that is my job), I probably wouldn’t be that invested in the main forms of social media I’m being advised to get involved with: Facebook, Twitter, blogging.

Twitter is something we will leave aside forever – seriously Twitter is the epitome of humanity’s demise in the postmodern quagmire.

But as for the other two, the main thing that grated about my publicist’s constant nagging was his insistence that the readers want to get to know me. All 30 of you – who actually know me anyway. It wasn’t just the futility of it that bothered me. It was the fact that what kind of reader gives a damn about the author? What does it matter what I did today? Especially when most of today did not involve writing my next novel. Surely that would be more important? The most irritating thing about George Martin is that he isn’t writing the next Song of Fire and Ice (Ice and Fire…?) novel precisely because he’s dallying about with social media and other things, like that sexist TV show. Surely you, the reader (the adoring fan), would rather that I spend my time crafting my next masterpiece rather than writing a commentary on writing a masterpiece?

Then it occurred to me, I watch “making of” documentaries. All the time! In fact, these days they’re practically a mandatory aspect of any film. If a Blu Ray (look how modern I am) comes without extras – outtakes, interviews, makings of – we feel short changed. I really hate how little extra material there is in the Battlestar Galactica box set for the first couple of series. Which made me realise that I’m applying a double standard.

Of sorts…

Thinking on it, one thing I did notice was how rarely the writer often features in those sorts of thing. Or, if they are a writer, they are also a producer or something else important to the show. Put a pure writer on screen and they look awkward as all hell. Is this surprising? Our entire skill set is based on sitting in solitude with minimal people interaction. While we may plumb the depths of the soul on page, that hardly sets the party alight. Believe me, I’ve tried…

In fact, at a guess (utterly validated by the most empirical and scientific watching of every Blu Ray I own (all 6)) the writer is often the least featured “behind the scenes” person in any documentary. We love to watch actors talking about their experiences, we love to watch the stunt and prop guys. Just look at the bazillion hours of extra material on the extended Lord of the Rings box sets. And, yes, I have watched them all. Even though I made disparaging comments about the original. (Oh the irony of that hyperlink…).

You see, those makings of do feature writers. But that’s also important. Because these guys didn’t write Lord of the Rings, they just adapted it from the books. And that’s why they’re interesting to watch. They did what not even a six-hour traffic jam in France could do – they got me interested in Lord of the Rings. Seriously, that book is boring… And it intrigued me how they took something so existentially dull and made it fascinating. I wanted to know how they pulled it off.

But this point about adaption doesn’t just apply to the writers though. Technically they’re all “adaptors”: everyone involved in the production of the film – involved in putting it up there on screen in irritating as all-fuck 3D (who needs to see a 3D bee!).

The actors, the prop guy, the director, heck even the lighting dude, they all adapt the material that has been written by the writer. What fascinates us is their interpretation of the source material – the script. We want to see how it was they came to their view of it, but in all this we take that original material as given. That’s not to say we question bad writing – of course you do. But how often does anyone watch a making of documentary to find out how some writer could come up with such atrocious dialogue? Or even in good scripts, how often do we get an explanation for how a writer did come up with their pivotal MOMENT? We don’t.

Because it doesn’t matter. What matters is what people do with the MOMENT. Deconstructing the interpretation is fine because it gives us an insight into how other people think and feel. It’s an extra layer to putting us into that experience. Partly because we have that irritating “I could do that better” thought… But deconstructing the MOMENT itself kind of ruins the whole thing. It puts why we’re there in the first place into question.

So it’s kind of interesting that readers get the “making of” obsession when it comes to authors. Because surely finding out how they built the MOMENT sullies that very MOMENT?

… at this point this feels like it’s descending into a long-winded, arsey f-you to my publicist. It’s not! Sorry about that Noah… If anything – look! I finally wrote something! And I will try and do more, promise(ish). I just find it fascinating that people – the readers – are so fascinated with finding out how the author built the MOMENT. Because I kind of feel like that sullies the very MOMENT that caught their fascination in the first place.

I will stop here. These thoughts need a little more marshaling. But watch this (blog)space for a slightly more philosophical justification of why you shouldn’t give a shit about the novel’s author…