This is based off a profile of John Hughes, the American
Film Director of Breakfast Club, Ferris Bueller, and you know the rest. He was,
apparently, an avid sketch artist and in this article from Vanity Fair David
Kamp shows off some of his notebooks. This script is based off of the Kamp
article and a Grantland piece Hughes’s son wrote.
PAGE ONE.
1.1: Let’s open
up with three rows. The way I pictured this was the top and bottom tier will be
two panels with the middle tier having three panels. Of course, things are totally up to
your interpretation.
We’re opening on WRIGLEY FIELD and
instead of a baseball game happening the field is covered in ice. Narration
will be from the text of James Hughes’s story—mostly paraphrased.
1. CAPTION [JAMES]: My
father was from Detroit, but was a
Chicagoholic.
1.2: Close on a
pair of seats, just out in right field, where we can see JOHN HUGHES and his
youngest son JAMES HUGHES. On John Hughes’s lap is a notebook.
2. CAP: For
him, writing was a way of life. Even when he was directing the Brat Pack movies of the ‘80s.
1.3: Close on the
notebook: where we can see this image from James’s story. If you can, let’s try
a sneak at the field where we can see the familiar colors of the CHICAGO BLACK
HAWKS playing the DETROIT RED WINGS in a game of ice hockey. Here it is: https://espngrantland.files.wordpress.com/2013/05/grant_e_hughes-nb01jr_576111.jpg
3. CAP: After
he left public life he never stopped his compulsive scribbling.
1.4 CUT TO: A
jazz club and a spotlight stage where we can see a SAXOPHONIST [http://www.vanityfair.com/hollywood/photos/2010/03/john-hughes-slideshow-201003#8].
4. CAP: He
used Smythson and Moleskine notebooks. They were filled with memoirs, agendas,
op-eds,
1.5 CUT TO: REDWING
FARMS, in Northwest Illinois where John Hughes and his wife Nancy spent the
last ten years of their non-public life. There are no photos of this
farm—mostly because Hughes wanted his anonymity and people gave it to him—but we
can see Hughes back standing in the field surrounded by Apple Trees.
5. CAP: and
plans for the farm…
1.6 CUT TO: A
shoebox filled with notebooks. Looks like this: https://s-media-cache-ak0.pinimg.com/736x/4f/07/af/4f07af103929d3cdc876d21c95cdc7f9.jpg
6. CAP: When
he died in August 2009 my brother and I found over 300 notebooks filled with drawings that were similar in style to
Saul Steinberg and R. Crumb.
1.7: A dark box
where we can see the face of John Hughes.
7. DISPLAY LETT: John
Hughes, 1950-2009.
8. CAP: On
the day he died, there were some photographs and some notes a couple of steps away from where he collapsed. One thing is
clear: my father only stopped writing when his heart stopped beating.
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