Letters From Alex

In the 1948 British film The Red Shoes, Boris Lermontov, a famous ballet impresario, poses a question to Vicky Page, an aspiring ballerina whom he has just met:

Boris: Why do you want to dance?

Vicky: Why do you want to live?

Boris: Well, I don’t know exactly…why, er, but I must.

Vicky: That’s my answer too.

Vicki is a brilliant dancer and Lermontov casts her as the lead in a new ballet called The Red Shoes, based on the Hans Christian Andersen fairy tale, about a woman who acquires red ballet slippers that will never let her stop dancing.

Which mirrors Vicki’s life—as Lermontov demands total devotion, eventually making Vicky choose between dancing and the man she loves.

It’s all terribly melodramatic, but it raises a tantalizing question…

Why is Vicky so compelled to dance?

Why is my daughter so compelled to sing and play the guitar, which she recently did in the school talent show? (She was great, thanks for asking.)

Why are so many of you compelled to tell stories, working furiously to make them excellent?

All these things take a toll on our bodies and psyche. They pull us away from our friends and family. They seldom pay off with good money.

The challenge, I think, is part of the appeal. There’s something called the Effort Paradox, which means despite our natural aversion to taking the hard way, we find something appealing about working hard for something.

If a mysterious stranger gave you a gem of a poem or story and said, “I want you to have this, put your name on it, publish it, sell it,” and you did so to much acclaim, would that be satisfying? Probably not.

The arts are especially seductive, but the Effort Paradox can apply to anything, from science to coding to athletics to spelunking.

And it’s not just the difficulty. In these pursuits, we become possessed with a wild desire to push and push for an unattainable perfection. The quest holds at least as much pain as pleasure, but it makes us feel thrillingly alive, flying right over the mundane parts of our lives.

It’s like when you’re watching a game, it’s close, seconds left, and you’re glad you’re not the one handling the ball because that’s way too much pressure, but this moment is exactly where that player wants to be, in charge of their high-stakes destiny.

That might be how you feel when you’re conjuring a piece of writing out of the empty air.

Also…it’s a chance to create something significant. Something that makes your mark. Something that’s yours and yours alone.

It’s a way to write your name on the universe.

Alex Steele

Gotham President

Second star to the right and straight on till morning.

Those are the directions from London to the Neverland, the path followed by Peter Pan as he flies through the night sky with Wendy, John, and Michael.

I recently read the original novel, Peter and Wendy by J.M. Barrie, for the first time with my daughter, which is surprising because the Peter Pan story has always been important to me. From the day I saw a stage version when I was six, I knew I’d never grow up beyond chasing a creative life.

Peter runs off to the Neverland when he’s a baby (never mind how) because he overhears his parents discussing his future, which quite turns him off. And Peter has a marvelous time in the Neverland, never growing up, living underground with the Lost Boys, watching the mermaids at sport, and fighting the pirates, led by the fearsome Captain Hook.

However, Peter does think about his parents. One night he flew home, expecting the window to be open for him, but it was closed and he saw another boy sleeping in his bed. Peter realized that his parents no longer wanted him, and he bears this pain as he adventures through the Neverland.

Peter is playing through the pain. It’s something most of us do. Carrying on the best we can despite an ended relationship or a personal disappointment or the death of a loved one. We’ve all got something. Often we’re playing through the pain in a positive way, and sometimes we’re running from a pain that will never stop chasing us, much like the crocodile is always following Captain Hook, hoping to chomp on his other hand.

Consider what pain your characters are playing through. Even if it’s never revealed, it’ll make them more dimensional and relatable. You can do this for major characters, but also for the minor parts.

The pain comes back to Peter in the final chapter. One night he flies into Wendy’s house, hoping she’ll come play with him, but she no longer can because she’s now a married woman with a daughter of her own. Enraged…

He took a step toward the sleeping child with his dagger upraised. Of course he did not strike. He sat down on the floor instead and sobbed; And Wendy did not know how to comfort him, though she could have done it so easily once.

But then Wendy allows Peter to take her daughter, Jane, to the Neverland for a while, and years, later Jane allows Peter to take her own daughter.

It’s not the worst fate for our characters—or ourselves—to parry the pain with something we love.

Alex Steele,

President

I’ve learned to suffer the slings and arrows of life with a fairly even temper.

With one exception.

Dealing with automated phone support.

Recently, I wanted to speak with my phone provider to make sure we were all set for calls on an international trip. So I’m trying to speak with a real person, but the automated voice needs some kind of code from me, which I don’t know, and so it assigns me a new code (I’m so discombobulated I’m not sure if I gave them a code or they just picked one.) Anyway, I get a new code, but have no earthly idea what it is.

Then, after much wasted time, I manage to get a real person on the line, but they say they can’t help me unless I give them the code, which I don’t know. At the end of my rope now, I scream, “THIS IS RIDICULOUS!”

(BTW, this will never happen at Gotham. If you call or write us, you’ll be talking to a real live person, with little or no delay.)

Push your characters to the limits. It makes for great storytelling, and we’ll get to see how they handle the heat of their personal crucible. Will they stay true to form or find something new inside themselves? Will they break (like I did) or rise to the occasion? Will they somehow turn the story in a new direction?

I’m a fan of old movies and Jimmy Stewart is a favorite. He got pushed to the limit a lot—with obsessive lust in Vertigo, with despair at unfulfilled dreams in It’s a Wonderful Life. But I’m thinking now about Mr. Smith Goes to Washington.

Jimmy plays Jefferson Smith, the head of the Boy Rangers, who is appointed as a replacement in the U.S. Senate. He’s a wide-eyed optimist expected to vote in lockstep with his state’s senior senator, who is mired in all kinds of corruption.

When Smith refuses to go along with the corruption, the political machine besmirches Smith’s name with fabricated letters and news items, and the Senate is set to vote on his expulsion. Smith is almost broken—too good for cruel politics—but his aide, Clarissa, convinces him to stage a filibuster to delay his expulsion and prove his innocence.

For 24 hours, Smith holds the Senate floor, talking nonstop, barely able to stand near the end, when he proclaims hoarsely:

You all think I’m licked. Well, I’m not licked. And I’m going to stay right here and fight for this lost cause.

Fantasy? Maybe. But I might look to Mr. Smith next time I’m pushed to the limit.

Alex Steel,

Gotham President