The Valley Line: Awards honor the craft of screenwriting
As regular readers know, I attend a lot of events, far and wide. One of my favorites each year is the USC Libraries Scripter Awards honoring authors of printed works and the screenwriters who adapt their stories for film and television.
Catherine Quinlan, USC Dean of Libraries, is always such a gracious host as she welcomes guests.
Guests at the black-tie event gather first in the library’s exquisite rotunda, an homage to Northern Italy’s Romanesque architectural style. It’s clad in cream-colored limestone and enhanced with travertine marble. This beautiful space never fails to momentarily take my breath away.
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After cocktails and passed hors d’oeuvres are served, guests are ushered into the Los Angeles Times Reference Room with its gold-and-blue coffered ceiling designed by John D. Smeraldi.
The room’s chandeliers are made of bronze and pewter and they illuminate the books that encircle the room. The soft lighting makes the books that have golden titles glow even more warmly.
After a gourmet dinner was served Quinlan opened the ceremony. Taking top awards were the authors and screenwriters of the film “Moonlight” and the television series “The Night Manager” and “The People v. O.J. Simpson: American Crime Story.”
In the film category, the winners were playwright Tarell Alvin McCraney, author of “In Moonlight Black Boys Look Blue” and screenwriter-director Barry Jenkins, who adapted McCraney’s work into the screenplay for distributor A24’s “Moonlight.”
Accepting the award via video from the U.K., Jenkins said he’s often described the experience of first reading McCraney’s original piece as it being “Halfway between the stage and the screen. I love that this award is for the adaptation because I feel like blending Tarell’s voice with mine … has been one of the most rewarding experiences of my life.”
In the television category, the selection committee was deadlocked between “The Night Manager,” based on the 1993 novel by John le Carré and adapted by David Farr into a six-part miniseries for AMC, and Stephen Cornwell and FX’s “The People v. O.J. Simpson: American Crime Story,” The latter was adapted by USC School of Cinematic Arts alums Scott Alexander and Larry Karaszewski from the nonfiction book “The Run of His Life: The People v. O.J. Simpson” by Jeffrey Toobin.
Accepting on behalf of “The Night Manager” was Cornwell, executive producer and le Carré’s son who spoke of his father and his story. “Nothing would have existed without his mind and his imagination,” Cornwell said. “‘The Night Manager’ is a character and a story of strange brilliance, a morality tale wrapped in a thriller.”
In accepting the award for “The People v. O.J. Simpson,” Karaszewski said, “Libraries saved my life, they were literally a sanctuary for me.”
Earlier in the evening, Quinlan honored USC Trustee and longtime USC Libraries supporter Kathleen McCarthy Kostlan as the 2017 Ex Libris Award winner.
Writer-director Carl Reiner received the 2017 Literary Achievement Award and accepted the honor via video. Reiner joked that the award is one of two similarly exciting honors, the other being his donation of a toupee to the Smithsonian.
I was happy to see some of my Foothills-area neighbors at the event — Patsy Dewey, Sue and Jim Stauffer, Phyllis Winnaman, Bill Halladay, Jill Wondries, Evelyn Siracuse, and Janet and Frank McNiff.
My fabulously interesting tablemates were Leo and Dorothy Braudy. Leo got my attention immediately because he is one of America’s leading cultural historians and film critics. He is a professor and the Leo S. Bing Chair in English and American Literature at USC where he teaches Restoration literature and history. His wife Dorothy is an artist working mainly in oils and is also a photographer. Her work is so color vibrant. The next day I wandered on her website, dorothybraudy.com, to see her paintings. Leo’s website, leobraudy.com is also delightful — go take a look.
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JANE NAPIER NEELY covers the La Cañada Flintridge social scene. Email her at jnvalleysun@aol.com with news of your special event.