The productivity secret of Hollywood's most prolific screenwriter
Published: Fri, 12/06/19
He was the screenwriter and director for some of my favorite movies back in the 80’s and early 90’s. One guy in the book described Hughes as eccentric, prone to emotional mood swings, brilliant, a genius, and someone who tired of hanging out with the liberals in Hollywood before he dropped out of the game altogether to be a recluse with his family until his death in 2009. He also wrote tons of movie scripts — including some that were never even made into movies, and at least one that was made but was so dumb (the movie "Dumb & Dumber", ironically…) he didn't want his name attached to it.
Frankly, he was a writing machine.
And, I have always enjoyed some of his movies.
Especially Ferris Bueller’s Day Off, The Breakfast Club, Weird Science, & Home Alone. Incidentally, the late brilliant copywriter Gene Schwartz said every copywriter should watch Home Alone at least 2 or 3 times. He was talking about watching contemporary movies that make a huge box office gross to see what people are responding to. But, it’s still something to think about, Precious, the next time you’re scrolling through Amazon Prime looking for a movie to watch…
But you know what my favorite thing about Mr. Hughes was?
The thing I did not realize until reading this book?
John Hughes was a speed writer.
Apparently, he would write entire scripts in 1-3 days!
One story director Chris Columbus (who directed Home Alone) told was, about how John Hughes was a night owl. And he had Chris come over one evening only to get an idea and then disappear for the rest of the night while Chris slept on the couch. In the morning, John woke him up having wrote an entire first draft of a movie script.
Now that’s fast!
And, it’s one of the keys to his success:
Fast writing.
Way too many people in copywriting, email, content-marketing, content publishing, etc spend far too much time writing. They are always trying to get things perfect. Always waiting to be “inspired.” And, always making writing far harder than it needs to be. Screw that sideways. I'm all about fast writing. It’s why my latest novel first draft took just 12 days. It’s why some of my highest performing sales letters were banged out in hours instead of weeks and months. And, it’s why I can easily churn out emails, books, and other content when needed while the mush-cookies afraid to even begin are still waiting around trying to get their swans in a row.
Which brings me to the rub:
My new book “Breakneck Content” contains dozens of ways to quickly and as painlessly as possible bang out all kinds of content for your business, including:
* Emails
* Social media posts
* Books (non-fiction or fiction)
* Courses
* Videos
* Podcasts
* Articles & blog posts
* Newsletters
* Membership site content
* Premiums & bonuses
* And any other kind of content you might sell or sell with
But time is getting short to get this at the special 30% off launch discount.
Deadline is Sunday 12/8 at midnight EST.
Go here if you want to read more about the book:
http://www.EmailPlayers.com/breakneck
Ben Settle
P.S. The “guts” of this book was originally featured in the July 2019 issue of my Email Players newsletter. That means, if you have that particular issue, you already possess roughly 90% of what is inside this book, and will have to determine if it’s worth investing in it or not. Personally, I would not recommend buying it if you have that issue already, unless you have money to burn & simply want this book to adorn your office.