By: debbie lynn elias
Maybe the Mayans got it right after all. Maybe 2012 is the end of the world. It certainly is the end of the Twilight saga and for many Twihard fans that may equate to world ending heartbreak. While Stephanie Meyer gave us a literary world of glittering vampires and werewolves and one of the world’s most beloved love triangles of Bella, Edward and Jacob, it has been screenwriter Melissa Rosenberg who helped transform those precious words into words and images for the big screen. With Breaking Dawn, Part 2, the final chapter of the Twilight saga now opening around the world, I had a chance to sit down for a one-on-one interview with Melissa Rosenberg as we reflected on the past and looked forward into the future, and the gift of Twilight.
Long known for her work as a television writer, Rosenberg’s first job took here into the wild west, writing several episodes for the long-running Jane Seymour series, Dr. Quinn: Medicine Woman. And as she shrieked with delight on my mention of the show and her work, it bears noting that the strength and passion written into the character of Dr. Michaela Quinn now feels like a precursor of what lay ahead for Rosenberg as both screenwriter and producer, with all paths leading to Twilight.
Energetic, enthusiastic and ebullient, Melissa Rosenberg is herself truly a gift. Abounding with success on both the big and small screens, Rosenberg is humble, grateful, generous of spirit and passionate about writing and her projects. Not one to let the grass grow under her, she did double duty with her work on Dexter and the first three Twilight movies and as soon as Breaking Dawn 2 ended, she jumped into her new ABC show, Red Widow. Smiling broadly from ear to ear as she talks about this great love of hers, her happiness is both evident and infectious.
This has been quite an undertaking, and quite a roller coast, for you the past few years. A big chunk of your life. During the first few installments of the Twilight saga, you were doing dual duty as showrunner for Dexter as well as being involved in other television ventures, but then you walked away from it all to focus on the adaptation of Breaking Dawn and the two films. Now that you can see the light at the end of the Breaking Dawn tunnel, do you have any regrets about walking away from Dexter when you did?
You know, I don’t. I have missed being in that room with those writers. That was a really great room. I have a new room of writers now with my own series, which is great! [laughing] I left after Season 4 of Dexter and it was a helluva way to go – this is when we killed Rita – and the year of John Lithgow as the attorney killer. I think that I was probably ready to move on. I had been there for four years. I had been juggling Dexter and the first three Twilight movies all that time, which was an interesting…… [bursts of laughter]
How you did that, I will never know!
I don’t know! I actually don’t remember how I did it! The whole thing goes by in a blur. But when it came to Breaking Dawn it was two movies and Dexter. There was no way I could do both. But, it was a good time for me to move on actually; just for me as a writer. I’ve never left television, though. The minute that all the Twilight stuff was done, I was talking with ABC about an early project. I still had a Paramount movie, and continue to have a Paramount movie which is moving closer and closer to, God willing, a greenlight. But, I now have a deal with ABC and I have a production company, Tall Girls Productions, which is now going to be housed at ABC. I have a series that’s coming onto the air, hopefully Spring of next year, called Red Widow based on the Dutch series called Penoza. That’s what I’ve been doing now. We’re doing just eight episodes for the Spring and we’re shooting the eighth episode on Monday and I’m (1) exhausted, but (2) it’s been extraordinary showrunning! To be a part of every decision from whether or not they wear false eyelashes to what shoes they wear to what the set should or shouldn’t look like and what car they should drive and what the story is and what each character goes through – – EVERY single aspect. I’m just having the time of my life! I’fs like a duck to water. I’ve been waiting a long time for that. I think I didn’t quite anticipate just the shear volume of decisions one must make in a day and the shear volume of work, but it is a writer’s dream, I think.
As a writer, do you have a preference between adapting the material, as with the Twilight series, or starting with original concepts?
There’s a lot of different writers, Steve Zalian is very much about adaptation and then my favorite writer Charlie Kaufman, that is someone who is creating from thin air and creating so wildly and imaginatively. I think I lean more towards the Steve Zalian realm which, for me, (1) there’s nothing harder than inventing something out of thin air. I’m not even going to pretend an adaptation is anything like. It’s its own art form. And (2) I like the collaborative process. That’s why I love this, the film industry, as opposed to going off and writing a novel. For me, adapting a book is very much like collaborating with another writer. You’re doing it with what’s written on the page, but you’re working with someone else’s vision. You’re shifting and molding it and extending it into a series, a movie or whatever it is. So for me, it’s all kind of an extension of that.
When you’re writing, and specifically with Twilight, where does your loyalty and responsibility lie? Does it lie with making the fans happy? Does it lie with being true to the source material? Does it lie with making the characters how you want them to be perceived? Or does it lie with yourself, being true to yourself, even if it means changing the rules?
A little bit of everything but primarily being true to the source material because then you’re being true to the fans and the original author. That is sort of the Bible, the original book. Indistinguishable from Stephanie [Meyer] herself, she’s really my gauge. Is she responding to it? Does it feel like her story? And for me, I put myself in the perspective of an audience member. Is this something I want to see? I’m the audience in my own mind. I don’t write for an audience out there. You can’t possibly sit there and go, “Oh, the audience is going to love this scene? I don’t know. They may hate that scene.” But, do I love it, do I want to actually pay money to go see this, go see this character. So, it’s sort of all those things working in tandem.
With Breaking Dawn Part 2 it‘s very visual, perhaps moreso than the others because of the twist and the “scene that shall not be named”. When you were constructing the script, and particularly that scene because this is a story twist not in the book and originates from you, do you visualize the scene and then give strong visual instruction to Bill Condon?
I give him visual “suggestions.” He and I work closely on every aspect of the story. He’s an Academy Award winning screenwriter. It’s tremendous to be working with him and bouncing ideas around him is a dream come true. He really brought me up several levels. Learned a lot from him in that process. I wrote an original draft of that whole sequence, and kind of placing people here and there and try to tell the story of what would happen in that situation, and then he would work with his stunt coordinators, special effects editor and he would come back and he’d say, “What if we put this character there?, etc.”. So, I would map it out per their stating. It was a little bit of my coming to them with, “Here’s sort of a general vicinity” and then him working with that and going back and forth and actually mapping it out on the page. Everything needs to be on the page, whether it’s my original idea or his or the stunt coordinator. It all gets there – somehow. It eventually lands on the page. [laughing]
How happy are you with the final product? How close is it to what you envisioned when you were typing those words?
Pretty damn close. It’s always going to be different. The movie in my head cost $6 billion bucks to make. [laughing] Everyone has their own movie when they’re reading the book! There’s always this moment of like, “Oh, okay, it’s not that. But, oh, that’s pretty cool!” I’m pretty happy with this. I think Bill did an amazing job on two movies.
I think these last two really surpassed the other three.
Part of that may be because we’ve all gotten more familiar, we’re all better writers, directors, actors. I’m a better writer than I was when I started. I had more time to write. Twilight was written in like three minutes. [laughing] The actors are embodying their characters are more comfortable; I’m now imaging the characters played by the actors. Twilight I was writing in a vacuum as we didn’t even have our cast. It’s just that sort of thing where you become more and more comfortable with so you begin to push things in other ways.
What did you learn about yourself through this Twilight process?
I learned that one of my strengths is with adaptation. I wouldn’t have known that. I always would have been banging my head against the wall working on these original ideas, which I have done and still continue to do, but the adaptation came so easily. Dexter started that process because that was an adaptation as well, and Penoza continues it. It’s just that kind of “who I am as a writer and what I’m drawn to as a writer and where I can shine as a writer” was very much an education.
What is the greatest gift that writing has given to you?
Ah…so many, so many. All my dreams have come true. I have the most amazing job. And I am in such a unique position. The films have given me extraordinary opportunity. I now have my production company at ABC. I’m getting to do Penoza [Red Widow]. I get to do stuff! It won’t last forever, but I’m grabbing it while I can. I get to tell the stories that I want to tell. That is so rare for people in our industry, to genuinely do what you love to do. It’s an extraordinary gift.
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