Occupation:
Writer, director, producer, teacher
Interviewer:
Berry Liberman
Location:
Los Angeles
Date:
February 2023
Twenty-three years ago, I was a 21-year-old budding filmmaker, fresh out of the Victorian College of the Arts, with the feature film rights to Mirka Mora’s memoir. I was all promise and no clue, with a graduate degree that had not remotely prepared me for the gruelling, disciplined rigour of making movies, let alone writing a proper screenplay. You cannot read a book about writing - you must write. So where to start? With my ear to the ground about where I needed to be to get where I was going, I heard the script “doctor” Joan Scheckel was coming to Melbourne. Joan was known then as the script whisperer, a magician in the indie film world, whose gift was turning small films into ground-breaking ones. I got a ticket to the workshop and during a break, despite her lying exhausted on the floor, approached Joan and said something like, “I have a film to make, will you help me?” Joan said, “Well if you’re ever in LA give me a call and we’ll see.” Aged 21, I took that as an invitation. A few months later I called Joan, “I’m here”.
In the years since, Joan has refined her practice into something called The Technique: a process so profound and disciplined that you dare not do it if you are not committed to your craft. The premise of the work is this: that narrative can be (must be) driven by feeling and meaning. This is revolutionary. Every scriptwriter, actor, director, filmmaker at every film school is taught that conflict drives story. Working with Joan tears all those myths apart and cracks you open so there is nowhere to hide, only your own truth to reveal and in doing so challenges our cultural addiction to conflict and calls for a new storytelling paradigm.
Joan has worked on hundreds of films: from Little Miss Sunshine and Whale Rider to Transparent. Her students have won dozens of major awards. I knew then and I know now that I was in the presence of a master. I have been profoundly shaped by my years working with Joan. It was an honour to speak with her about storytelling in troubled times.
BERRY LIBERMAN: This is the clearest you’ve been and I can see your expression.
JOAN SCHECKEL: You know, Berry, connection is worth the effort. Being able to hear one another and see one another is the work of being human. It’s the thing that we crave most deeply. And have the opportunity to express through the arts, which is how I met
