Life According to Hollywood – Telling Stories that Captivate Others

In this new salon series, showrunner Balazs Juszt and his Hollywood friends dive into the truths and lies of storytelling: What can we take away from the psychological insights of screenwriting? What are the ways in which showbusiness lies to you?

First episode guest: Peter Webber

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You go to your usual grocery store, or farmers market, or local 7-11 and buy an apple. A beautiful, ripe, apple.

Why?

Because you want to eat an apple.

Yes, but why an apple?

We don’t question the what, we all acknowledge your hunger, your initiative, but the apple has a story. It represents something to you. The first time you ate one at your grandparents’ farm, the legend of Isaac Newton also comes to mind, or the legend of William Tell, alas, the apple has a story to tell.

We all do.

Ever since the first shamans began dancing around the fire, chanting rhymes, ever since the first drawings of a mammoth hunt appeared on the walls of the cave, telling the heroic antics of legendary kills, it’s always been story. We use it for absolutely everything, from selling apples, to selling ourselves for a job interview or to a future spouse. We use it to convince our children to brush their teeth, we use it to bullsh*t our way out of being late to a zoom call and we use it when we get dressed to make an impression. Or not.

The way we tell stories has, however, remained the same in its essence ever since the first cave drawings. Sure, it’s all digital now, but it’s still not about the technology; it’s not about the 0’s and 1’s, it’s about the “ooh’s” and “aah’s.”.

How does a Hollywood storyteller build structure, arc and legend?

What’s in a series bible? The same things everyone carries with them every day, but is sometimes too afraid to dig deep enough to confront them: it’s the truth about themselves. It’s the therapy you can do without having to commit, it’s the ultimate TV guide to TikTok culture – which, for better or for worse, follows the exact pattern of how Shakespeare introduced his plays and how Aristophanes constructed conflict in Lysistrata. It’s the deconstruction of the basic fact that Die Hard and Schindler’s List tell the same exact story and it’s an analysis of story to determine what made you buy that apple in the first place.

Join showrunner Balazs Juszt and his Hollywood friends as they raise more questions than  they answer for an insider’s look at how showbusiness lies to you.*

*SPOILER ALERT: The same exact way you lie to yourself.

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Save the dates:

This event will be the intro to a monthly series!

Part 2, with Kjartan Thor Thordarson

“Sell. Your story, your show, your life, your skills, your love to another person, your business idea. It’s all the 21st century man does from morning till night. But in this business of show, we sell to more people on a daily bases than the average person sells to in her lifetime. So how do you perfect it?”

Part 3, with Ana Ularu

“Do the same thing, only better! – was Billy Wilder’s infamous instruction to actors. While it’s true on set, it’s also true in real life, where, if you are the same person today as you were yesterday, something’s wrong with you, but if you do a 180 in your social or political views, there’s also something wrong with you. So how do we change, how do we interpret the instruction, Do the same thing, only better, in a way that actually helps us grow?”

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