From the written word to the Big Screen, Schiffman closes the gap

When Barbara Schiffman and her husband moved to Whitefish in 2018 to retire from Hollywood and be nearer to their daughter’s family, the former Hollywood producer and script consultant brought an entire suite of experience and was hoping for a place to put her talents to work.

When she learned about the Bigfork Independent Film Festival (BIFF) — originally scheduled to take place this past April and now planned for Oct. 2 to 4 — she offered to help.

BIFF’s founder Steve Shapero jumped at the offer and immediately put Schiffman on his steering committee.

Schiffman then took a trip back to California and attended the noted Ojai Film Festival near Santa Barbara, which was sponsoring a screenwriting competition.

“I thought, we can do that in Bigfork!” Schiffman said.

She returned to the Flathead and spearheaded BIFF’s first screenwriting competition in the festival’s four-year existence.

“BIFF is fun because filmmakers can make low or no budget films now because of today’s technology,” Schiffman said. “Today’s filmmakers are making cheaper, shorter films faster.”

Schiffman’s goal in creating the Montana Screenwriting Competition was to help Montana writers and film lovers appreciate the craft of screenwriting as a literary art form, in addition to being the first step in the filmmaking process.

Schiffman, whose specialty is adapting novels to screen, maintains that screenplays are the blueprints for films.

“Without a script there is no film,” she said.

SCHIFFMAN WORKED for more than 30 years in Hollywood for agents, producers, directors, film/TV studios and cable networks. She has done script consulting/story analysis for the Starz Network, HBO, Miramax, DreamWorks, Disney Studios and even Warren Beatty.

She got her start in the early ’70s working for a documentary filmmaker in Chicago.

“He wrote a script called ‘The China Syndrome,’” Schiffman said, “And he wanted to take it to California to sell it. I went with him and became the script typist, consultant and development executive.” Starring Michael Douglas, Jane Fonda and Jack Lemmon, the film was nominated for four Academy Awards.

Schiffman’s career took off. At one point she was working for multiple companies, some simultaneously.

“I’d have 10 scripts to read Friday to Monday and had to write synopses and comments on each story,” she recalled.

Schiffman describes script reading and consulting work as being a gatekeeper.

“I’d weed out what wasn’t worth the executives’ time to read.”

For the Montana Screenwriting Competition, Schiffman, who has judged at least a dozen screenwriting competitions, including competitions for HBO, limited submissions to being either by Montana authors, having Montana family connections or having real Montana locations featured in the script.

She formed a panel of 13 judges: several writers, directors and producers in the industry, and two well-known local authors and Flathead Valley Community College instructors, Dennis Foley and Kathy Dunnehoff.

“We got twice as many submissions as we expected,” said Schiffman, who has read each of the 60 scripts. She narrowed the pool down to 18 semi-finalists. Each of those scripts was read by the judges, who narrowed them down to the top six finalists. All semi-finalists and finalists will be recognized and honored at the festival awards ceremony on Sunday, Oct. 4.

“Being a semi-finalist in a screenwriting competition is like the Good Housekeeping Seal of Approval,” Schiffman said. “Everyone suddenly wants to read that script, to find a diamond in the rough. It gives a screenwriter credibility.”

FOR THE Bigfork Independent Film Festival, the selected “live read” screenplay will be treated to a recorded reading by actors (rather than the live read originally planned prior to the pandemic) and will be offered free for online viewing at mtbiff.com.

“Doing a read is like reading a good novel,” Schiffman explained, adding “It’s like movies for your ears.” With all the narration — those parts of a script that help the reader visualize the setting, mood and the characters — also being read aloud, “You can close your eyes and just listen. You see the movie in your mind.”

She also attests to the caliber of writers right here in the Flathead Valley.

“There are so many good writers here writing novels and memoirs. She encourages them to consider their stories could be adapted for film and to come to BIFF.

“Films need good stories,” she said. “Write scripts. Enter contests. Come to the festival or watch it online. Watch movies. Meet filmmakers.”

Schiffman has also formed a local online screenwriters group — Montana Screenwriting and Storycrafting — at meetup.com/mtscreenwriting/ The group meets monthly to read one of the many winning screenplays she has access to.

To learn more about Barbara Schiffman’s current coaching and consulting work, visit her website, https://literasee.com/

IF YOU GO

• What: The fourth annual Bigfork Independent Film Festival will feature eight film blocks of 24 Montana films followed by Q&A sessions.

Two recently released Montana feature films will also be shown. “Mickey and the Bear” a coming-of-age drama, will be shown only at the theater on Oct. 2. The Flathead Valley produced “Useless,” a family-friendly story about a girl and her barrel racing horse, will be shown on Oct. 3, and will also available on the BIFF website.

• When and where: The festival will be held Oct. 2 to Oct. 4, both at the Bigfork Center for the Performing Arts and online. Virtual BIFF will run for three weeks starting Oct. 5 through Oct. 26.

An awards ceremony begins at 6:30 p.m. Oct. 4 at the Bigfork Center for the Performing Arts and is free and open to the public.

Masks are required in the Bigfork Center for the Performing Arts.

More information and tickets for both the live and online festival can be found at https://mtbiff.com.

Community and entertainment editor Carol Marino may be reached at 758-4440 or by email at community@dailyinterlake.com.