Yes, it’s kind of Shane Black week on The Playlist. We scored an interview with the “Kiss Kiss Bang Bang” and ”Iron Man 3” writer/director, covered a couple great podcast conversations he was part of and for this piece, dove into a recent Q&A he did for The Writer’s Panel in Los Angeles. What can we say? The guy’s been everywhere with a lot of interesting things to say, and we’ve been listening.
Black stopped by to promote his latest film “The Nice Guys” (read our glowing review), about a private investigator and an enforcer (Ryan Gosling and Russell Crowe) who investigate the case of a missing girl in 1970s Los Angeles.
If you’re a fan of the works of Shane Black, you’re probably aware of the rise/fall/rise-again trajectory of his career, and he candidly talks about it all, from the highs of finishing and selling the first “Lethal Weapon” script, to the lows of being considered a hack shortly after becoming one of the highest paid screenwriters in Hollywood. Furthermore, he discusses whether or not he had any regrets over his handling of Mandarin in “Iron Man 3” and how he plans to approach “The Predator” and “Doc Savage.” You can read excerpts from the Q&A below and list to the full Writer’s Panel podcast on the last page.
READ MORE: The 25 Best Buddy Cop Movies Ever
The Dark Undertone Behind “The Nice Guys”
‘Nice Guys,’ to me, is all about saving little girls — literally, like the daughter in the movie, played by Angourie Rice, or it can be a porn star. There’s still a teddy bear in her room. She’s a porn star, but that doesn’t matter; she’s a little girl. And she got killed. And these guys [Crowe and Gosling] are knights in tarnished armor. The trick is how tarnished can you make it and still have them respond and come back with some degree of nobility. But at some level, they understand that we live in a corrupted world. It’s 1970, there’s a crust of smog all over the city, the Hollywood sign is in tatters and no one bothered to fix it. Hollywood Boulevard is a cesspit. And they even had air raid sirens that went off when I was a kid, a teenager in LA, [and they would] say, “go back in doors.”
I loved this notion that on these compromised streets walked the tarnished knights, not the cool guys, but who understand on some basic level that little girls all need to be protected and given a chance to at least grow up with a modicum of faith and hope, that the pretty little doll you give them to play with is really something to be cherished, not something that’s gonna be ripped from them. That, to me, is the serious underpinning of “The Nice Guys.” And, of course, there’s jokes all through it.
Executives Didn’t Like The Suicidal Martin Riggs In “Lethal Weapon”
Initially we had a scene where [Martin Riggs] wants to literally take pills, kill himself, blow his head off. Every night he toys with that and then puts the thing away for one more night. And as long as it’s this sort of escape route that’s available, he’ll push the envelope further and further back. Cut to the studio meeting. They hear the hero’s suicidal — that’s the core of it, that’s kind of why the series succeeded — they didn’t like it at first. Couldn’t he just be a really good cop? And the title “Lethal Weapon” doesn’t test well with women. I said, “Well, what do you wanna call it?” [They wanted to call it] “Hot Shots.” I’m not kidding.
Nowadays, you have the hot shot. You have Kevin Hart, or you have Will Smith and Martin Lawrence, and these [movies] are entertaining on some level, but there’s no attempt made to tarnish them. It’s all just about jokes and stuff. Here’s what I think the difference is… if you hand me a thriller and told me to put some laughs in it, I’d go “Ok, good, I can do that.” If you hand me a page of blank space and said, “Write a comedy,” I’m frozen. I can’t just write jokes. And that’s the difference. I have to start with something besides the basic task of making it funny.
How To Fight Studio Notes
When a studio buys your script, they can do anything to it, right? Yes they can; they own it. They can fire you. “But how can you do that? How can you sell a script when you know they’re gonna change it?” Because, just because they have the ability [to change it], doesn’t mean they can and will.
You still have the ability, as an artist, to argue vehemently, strenuously, effectively, passionately, for the things that you perceive — don’t yell at them, but convince them. Writers panic ’cause they go, “Oh, they’ll fuck me.” Well, say, “Don’t fuck me,” but don’t say it like that, but convince them not to. Show them how fucking you is potentially hazardous.
His Approach To The New “Predator” Movie
It has to feel fresh somehow. I used to line up and see these summer films. “[Star Trek II: The] Wrath of Khan” just blew me away. Or “E.T.” Or even some of the lesser-budget films. But there was a feeling in the summer film: It’s worth the wait. You actually get in line and get excited ’cause they’re gonna try something fresh and you’re gonna leave satisfied. I owe audiences that much.
And what excited you in the first place was the verisimilitude, the tension, and it wasn’t about creature effects so much was it about the approach that they took. Start real, start on Earth, and then there’s an alien incursion. Something’s wrong. Something’s here that shouldn’t be and it’s a mystery. I think to some extent, recreating that sort of “Close Encounters [Of The Third Kind]” feel. That sense of wonder.
You know, [“Predator”] was treated as mysterious and wondrous as opposed to, “Hey Bill! Another predator out there! Let me get my keys…”
“Iron Man 3” was exciting to the tune of $1.2 billion, but not to the hardcore [fans], and I don’t like to pander, but as we approach “The Predator,” I really wanna reinvent, but I wanna make people happy. I’m not trying to take the Predator and put him in a tutu.
