Director's Cut
Director's Cut
Carlyn Greenwald on her queer romance about Hollywood and academia
In each installment of “The Usonian Interviews,” The Usonian spotlights a storyteller from a different corner of the globe. This week, The Usonian spoke with writer Carlyn Greenwald about her new queer rom-com novel, Director’s Cut (Vintage, 2024). You can order Director’s Cut from Bookshop or Amazon.
This interview has been edited for clarity and length. The views presented by the interview subject are the opinions of the subject and do not represent the views of the article’s author or this newsletter. Browse the full interview archive here.
THE USONIAN: As well as being a fiction writer, you have a background in screenwriting and development. How does your process adapt to each medium? And what are some of the lessons you’ve learned from working in both genres?
CARLYN GREENWALD: Screenwriting has always informed how I write books. It taught me structure, which has always been helpful for me. I literally do the “hero’s journey beat-sheet” for a novel. I know that now there’s a book called Save the Cat Writes a Novel, but I was doing that before that book came out—using screenwriting beats to write a novel.
There are basically nine beats to a story. I tried to figure out how long I wanted the novel to be, and how many words I typically write per chapter, which helps me figure out how many chapters I need. I put those nine beats into their place on this outline, then fill in the rest until I have a full chapter-by-chapter outline. All the work you’d put into a screenplay, I put into books. And the more creative discovery part comes from, how does each individual scene play out? What is the dialogue? Then I adjust the outline as the book gets written.
With screenwriting, I had to get rid of the instinct to write a character’s thoughts—you have to learn how to visually show something. And I think going to film school probably helped with that. Those novelistic tendencies I had to get rid of because I started with novels, and then went into screenplays.
TU: Director’s Cut is a sequel of sorts to your previous novel Sizzle Reel, featuring some characters in common. How did you develop these two stories and how they’re related?
CG: It’s a typical structure in romance, where you write the first one, and you have a side character, and then you write their story. In Sizzle Reel, there’s a love triangle. So basically, what happens to the character who didn’t win the love triangle? I thought it would be interesting to develop her story.
I went to USC. We had celebrity guest professors, like James Franco. I was always curious, does Franco actually teach this class? So I looked up his class on the course schedule, and there was another lecturer [also teaching the class]. So what was the dynamic between an actual professor, and some celebrity who comes in and wants to teach a class? I thought if I was ever going to tell that story, it would be an interesting premise for a romance. I wrote [what became Director’s Cut] before Sizzle Reel was sold. And then the publishers wanted it.
Writing a sequel is interesting because Sizzle Reel was set in stone when it was published, so I couldn’t go back and change the continuity—I was beholden to my old decisions. With Director’s Cut, I was trying to reconcile details, like, how many years did I say the lead, Val, wasn’t out? How long had she been acting for? Because I tend to write characters who are messy and like, disasters, getting into the character’s head was fun. In Sizzle Reel, Val really has it together, but when you get inside her head, it’s just chaos.
TU: Val is a complex character who is a famous actor but also wants to be an academic. In a lot of stories like this, we don’t usually start from the perspective of the person in power, we start with the person who has a lower social status, and that person is trying to meet the elevated person—i.e., the princess. What was it like to get into the headspace of a Hollywood star?
CG: The main goal was always to humanize her. But you can almost go too far in the humanization—I don’t know what this is like, am I doing this justice? What is the type of person who becomes famous? There’s a range of actors, but there has to be something that compels you to want to act and be so public. I needed to explain what drew this person to this career that messes with your head in a specific way. It was intimidating, but I just kept coming back to the fact that Val’s a person, so that aspect has to come first. Then hopefully, the layers of celebrity come across as authentic. I don’t have Emma Stone in my contacts.
TU: Director’s Cut is steeped in LA culture and Hollywood placemaking—references to places like Erewhon and the La Brea Tar Pits adds to the verisimilitude. Are there other places in the world you’d like to bring to life in other books? And how do you add these details to your stories in an organic way?
CG: I love LA in an authentic way. I’ve spent a lot of time here, so it makes it easy. I love New York, and I’ve had a lot of experience in Colorado and Aspen, so I’d love to write about those places.
It’s a matter of picking a place where I felt like I could bring in those details, somewhere where I have the time to literally go to the place at some point in the writing process and see what it feels like to be there and get those sensory details. Unless it’s a character who is an outsider visiting a place, then you can get away with not knowing as much.
TU: Let’s talk about the romance genre. What are the essential elements of a romance story?
CG: It’s very simple. The two characters should be compelling. In my mind, they should have shortcomings or flaws or longing that the other character helps bridge. I like being able to have something where they improve each other’s lives—that’s the fundamental thing.
Once you get beyond that, I think tension and some sort of conflict keep the book interesting. There’s an interesting debate in the romance world of how much conflict to put in the book. There’s always a discussion of whether or not a third-act breakup needs to happen, which in screenwriting translates to having a “darkest day.” There are so many people who don’t like that anymore, and just want the couples to stay together the whole time. So you have to create new ways to have conflict in a book—that’s an interesting storytelling problem to solve.
In a romance, the tension is often built from the main characters—their shortcomings and where they start from and being able to develop chemistry and sexual-romantic tension. If you nail fundamental elements, you can make a really good romance and leave the reader happy in the end.
Then with queer romance in particular, there’s still interesting ground to be tread. How escapist do you want the book to be? How much are the characters interacting with the world that is obviously very flawed and often against them? It’s an interesting playground to work with—rebellion through joy. That’s a lovely idea.
TU: In Director’s Cut, the hook of the story is the “hate-to-love” trope. What are some other romance spines or hooks that you find compelling?
I really like “forced proximity.” It’s very general, but it’s like when two people are either put together for a job or end up stuck in a cabin together—where people are taken out of their usual environments and forced to interact with another person. I love that.
Or the “sex lessons” trope is a fun one. There tends to be a lot of sex scenes in those stories, having characters get intimate in a specific way. Then the romance has to develop in another way, because you don’t have the buildup of sex. It’s always interesting to take people out of their regular routines to develop a love story.
Carlyn Greenwald is a YA and Adult Romance and Thriller author and screenwriter hailing from Manhattan Beach, California. She graduated from USC in 2018 with a degree in English and Film as well as minors in Screenwriting and Forensics and Criminality. She’s worked development gigs at companies including Illumination Entertainment, Mandeville Films, Vertigo Entertainment, and 141 Entertainment. She currently works as Lead Content Development Coordinator at boutique book packager Cake Creative/Electric Postcard Entertainment. Her Adult debut, SIZZLE REEL and her YA debut, TIME OUT, co-written with actor and producer Sean Hayes and producer Todd Milliner, are out now. Her latest release, DIRECTOR'S CUT, will be out with Vintage Books 6/11/24. Her YA Thriller debut, MURDER LAND, will be out with Sourcebooks Fire Summer 2025. When not writing, she’s scouring theme park YouTube, playing video games, and hanging with her dogs. When she’s not writing, she’s deep in pop culture YouTube, gaming, and hanging with her dogs.