Interview (Part 1): Grace Sherman

My interview with the 2018 Nicholl Fellowships in Screenwriting winner.

Grace Sherman wrote the original screenplay “Numbers and Words” which won a 2018 Nicholl Fellowship in Screenwriting. Recently, I had the opportunity to chat with Grace about her background, her award-winning script, the craft of screenwriting, and what winning the Nicholl has meant to her.

Today in Part 1 of a 6 part series to run each day through Saturday, Grace talks about how movies played an important role in growing up and how he work as a marriage and family therapist informs her writing.

Scott Myers: You’re from Texas…

Grace Sherman: Yes. I’m living in Denton, Texas,

Scott: Could you talk about your life growing up there and maybe what role movies and TV played in growing up in Texas?

Grace: Actually, I grew up in San Antonio, Texas, so that’s south Texas. It was a single-parent home and I was an only child so movies and books, were a way of adventure.

I liked reading about new things. Seeing new things in movies — different places, people, characters. Always had an active imagination. Creative, always creating stories in my mind. That’s what it was.

I connected with movies, with dialogue, with experiences, situations. That was an outlet for me. When it’s just you and no siblings around, those pieces, like books, movies, and different things like that, they become a way of how you interact.

Scott: Do you remember some of your favorite movies, books, or TV series from when you were a youth?

Grace: Let me think. What did I like? My mom liked a lot of movies. She liked a lot of different movies. That also help expand my taste and influenced me as a writer. I remember seeing, probably too young, [laughs] but I saw Raiders of the Lost Ark as a child.

Frankly, I just remember the pace of that film, the energy, the excitement, and everything else surrounding it. There’s something about wanting to capture that sense of adventure, that sense of journey and heroism. That’s one that stands out.

Honey, I Shrunk the Kids, that’s another one. Again, an adventure, imagination. That’s the beauty of films. There is no limit in terms of where you can go. Those are just a few. There’s lot more.

Scott: At some point, you must have made the connection that, “Hey, somebody writes these things,” because, as you mentioned in the Nicholl ceremony where they were honoring you, you mentioned that your mother bought you your first screenwriting book, is that right?

Grace: Yes, she did. Up until then, I’d write little stories, like little short stories, things like that. Already, I would see movies differently. It wasn’t just I’d watch it and then go onto something else. There was something about a scene that stayed with me, about a character.

We would watch a lot of movies together. We would talk. “How do you come up with something like that? What is that like?” We didn’t know the exact formula of how it evolves, but we knew somebody wrote it, somebody directed it. She would point out little things.

I remember we went to see…What was it? “Speed,” when that came out. The scene where I think the woman’s going across the street with a stroller and the excitement of that. You think it’s a baby, but it turns out it’s cans or something like that.

She was like, “That’s a way of building intensity. When you write a movie or you direct a movie, you’ve got to think about things like that.” Those little seeds were sown into me, actually speaking into the future as if this is something you could do.

She saw that screenwriting book. She was out somewhere. I don’t know if the library had books for sale. They’ll have books at a discounted price or something, but she got it for me.

It’s a symbol of faith and encouragement, like, “I believe you can do this.” We know nothing about Hollywood. We know nothing about how movies…the nuts and bolts of how they get made, but there was that belief.

Scott: Do you remember what the book was?

Grace: “How to Write…”

All I remember is it was a dark blue book. I don’t have it with me. A lot of the movies they were referencing were black and white, so it was old.

Scott: Pretty old.

Grace: It wasn’t the most updated version., but for the first time I was seeing what a script looked like and things like that.

Scott: That’s a wonderful testament to your mother, who I guess has passed away, that she believed in you so much of the time. It seems like, when I deal with university students, it’s like their parents are saying, “No, no, no. Don’t go into writing. There’s no future in that. Get a job as a banker, or a lawyer, or whatnot.”

Your mom evidently was really attuned to your creative ambitions and interests.

Grace: Yeah. She was an English major. She was a teacher. She liked storytelling. She wrote stories as well, and I took to that. We had different [laughs] tastes, but, still, there was never a limit or a message of, “You can’t do that. Do something more practical,” things like that. That stayed with me. Even after she died, that stayed with me, that encouragement to keep going for it.

Scott: What about your educational background? Did you study writing in college or beyond? How did you go about learning the craft?

Grace: I didn’t formally study it. I am self-taught, watching movies. Again, I was watching them differently — what worked, what didn’t work, reading blogs, going to your site, reading other blogs, other websites, books, and reading a lot of screenplays. That really did help, reading a ton of screenplays.

Scott: I think you mentioned in the Nicholl ceremony you’re a therapist. Is that right?

Grace: Yes. I’m a licensed marriage and family therapist here in Texas. My background, I studied psychology and sociology in undergrad, and then I have a graduate degree in family therapy.

Scott: I always think that’s a great thing to do. I took a couple of psychology courses at the university where I went to school. I always encourage my students to do something like that because so much of what we do as writers is work with characters.

Do you find there’s a translatability there for you in terms of the work you do as a therapist and your work you do as a writer in dealing with characters in particular?

Grace: Definitely. It does inform character development and dialogue because, in my profession, you come across so many different people. Just a range of experiences, backgrounds, dialect, perspectives.

Themes begin to emerge of what certain experiences are like. What it is like being incarcerated and then being released. What it is like dealing with a crisis, a trauma, grief, or things like that. That definitely has informed the way I go about writing stories and dialogue.

With “Numbers and Words,” I get the question often, “Was it based on a real character? It has to have been based on a real character,” and it wasn’t, but I’ve been informed of that perspective. Of what that journey can look and feel like in terms of being incarcerated and going back into the community. That has definitely helped in character development.

Here is video of Grace accepting her 2018 Nicholl Award in December of last year:

Tomorrow in Part 2, Grace discusses the inspiration for her Nicholl-winning screenplay “Numbers and Words” and a mathematical problem which vexes the story’s Protagonist.

For my interviews with every Nicholl Fellowships in Screenwriting winners since 2012, go here.

For my interviews with 53 Black List writers, go here.