Synecdoche, New York: The Shooting Script

by Charlie Kaufman

synecdoche [sih-NECK-doh-kee] , noun . A figure of speech inwhich a part is used for the whole, as in the screen for movies . From Charlie Kaufman, perhaps the most distinctive screenwritingvoice of our generation, comes a visual and philosophicadventure of epic proportions. Much as he did with hisgroundbreaking scripts for Being John Malkovich , Adaptation ,and Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind , Kaufman twists andsubverts the form and language of film as he delves into themind of a man who, obsessed with his own mortality, sets outto construct a massive artistic enterprise that could give somemeaning to his life. Starring Philip Seymour Hoffman,Samantha Morton, Michelle Williams, Catherine Keener,Emily Watson, Dianne Wiest, Jennifer Jason Leigh, HopeDavis, and Tom Noonan, and directed by Kaufman, Synecdoche, New York is an epic story of grand artistic ambitionsand creative madness. This Newmarket Shooting Script ® Book

Genres: Fiction, Film, Literature, Drama

161 pages, Paperback

First published January 2, 1900

About the author

Charles Stuart Kaufman is an American playwright, film producer, theater and film director, and an Academy Award, BAFTA, and Independent Spirit Award-winning screenwriter. Often regarded as one of the finest screenwriters of the 21st century, his work explores themes of death, insecurity, the artistic process, and the passage of time.

In 2003, Kaufman was listed at #100 on Premiere's annual "Power 100" list. He was also identified by Time Magazine in 2004 as one of the 100 most powerful people in Hollywood.

Reviews

[Leo Robertson · Rating 5 out of 5]

I've been going on about this film so much I'm almost embarrassed to admit I read the whole shooting script through today. Especially since the first time I tried to watch the film, I made it about 3/4s through and thought it was the worst thing I'd ever seen- but it is a rare thing where every part of it counts- I barely care about endings in books or films- often you can just Wikipedia how it wraps up and it's as if you watched it happen- that is not at all the case with this film, as it is a film (not an immaculately edited thing, but still), something that must be watched all the way through before it can be judged, which is the ultimate postmodern art's indulgent burden on the consumer which rarely pays off (so many times "Hey! you thought pages 1-400 were indulgent? You stupid philistine! You're supposed to hold all that in your head as we really get up to speed for pages 401-1200, okay? This is wasted on you!!")

Basically, you just Google the name of the script and it's there. I think it's some award submission thing that they become public domain? Or maybe they shouldn't be online. I'm not sure.

I've discussed this film at length with pretty much all people I know who might read this review, so what remains is what I picked up from reading the script, not watching the film.

Yes, well, a very odd thing to read a film- it doesn't read well. It's flat and disjointed and kinda dull. I guess with maturity and experience, the scenes flow in your head if you write something like this, and you can hear someone saying it.

What follows might constitute spoilers, but the film is an experience- no one part contains any information that could ruin the entirety of the film (lawl given the title)- likely it won't make much sense anyways!

Of course, what's most of interest is not only what's been cut, but what of what was in the film was deliberate? What symbols had meaning and what was incidental?

Here on paper the film seems like a cold puzzle, but there are things to pick up from it still. For example, that Olive's pink present had a nose on the box was deliberate, and it's easier then to spot this and make the connection with Hazel getting fired because she had 'pinkeye hands' eyes, hands and nose then constituting some part of Caden's identity? There may well be parallels with Gogol's story, The Nose also: "Kovaliov equates the loss of his nose with castration, emasculation, and impotence to a certain degree."

Also, his "transformation" into Ellen the cleaner is far more significant than I had anticipated. The number of times Caden is mistaken for a woman, and the fact that Ellen takes over his role, and in the script narrates Caden's stream of consciousness for him... it's unclear what he really wanted in continuing to stalk Adele, but we suppose it was to hopefully play some major role in her life and not move on, but in that he tried to do this by performing the role of Ellen the cleaner, this is how everyone started to see him (like a much darker and unforgiving version of the modern "friend zone" phenomenon- when we play friends, we expect to be interpreted as friends by those around us, and not anything else, no matter how much we might hope for something else.) And Caden at the very end traces his way back into the warehouse in the warehouse in the warehouse in the warehouse, regressing within his own creation, to die as Ellen, comforted by the actress who played her mother in the picnic scene and apologising for never bearing his own children for her.

In the performance of Death of a Salesman, Hazel laughs at Claire's choice to cry at her line "I can't cry" in the play. After Claire's mother (father?) dies, and she discusses it with Caden, she starts to cry and her face contorts into a paralysed, open-mouthed grimace (this was cut from the script- how hard it would be to make this not look stupid!) she studies the appearance of her face so that she can cry realistically while acting. Later when Caden has to cry, as part of his biofeedback training, he uses fake teardrops in the corners of his eyes. Perhaps this is about how we take social cues to release emotions, when there may be an incomprehensible disconnect of what emotion we feel we are supposed to display and the one we want to. At funerals especially there is an expectation of tears, so much so that their release can feel depersonalised. Consider Camus' "In our society, any man who doesn't cry at his mother's funeral is liable to be condemned to death."

Finally, "Little Winky", the novel by four year-old Horace Azpiazu, is introduced after Caden finds four year-old Olive's diary, such that we can see the novel as the story that Maria writes for Olive about Caden, also since Caden sits at a bus stop where he appears on the film poster for "Little Winky and Caden" or some such, and that the novel features a homosexual affair with a man named Eric (Eric
Washington Jackson Jones Johnson Jefferson) the very thing that Olive accuses Caden of having. Eric is also the name of Ellen's husband.

Also at a funeral Caden says "there's 13 million people in the world", meaning of course New York, and potentially hinting at the scope of his project, his Synecdoche to represent everyone.

Some things were cut- some obvious argumentative dialogue, some symbols and events that didn't lead anywhere and added so little to the story that they're not worth mentioning. Many literary references that might be interesting to explore (Proust was there, Kafka too, Karamazov, Hedda Gabler I think? but Lorca's play The House of Bernarda Alba left, so did Beckett's Krapp's Last Tape, and there were many more scenes from Death of a Salesman in the script also)


What isn't a spoiler, really, is that the film represents a human life: one which starts in the middle and ends at the middle- the end built into the beginning but neither really reached- that's at least to say that so little of life is captured, so much is waste, so much is misinterpreted and universes within regressive universes in our heads will go unacknowledged and so on. My favourite message, or one of my interpretations, is that a legacy, "immortality", is a cheap substitute for life and only goes so far- a piece of art of any quality isn't saved from being lost from human memory: everything has to end, at least eventually. So, we don't have to take our legacies too seriously :)

This is shown in the film without necessarily judging it to be sad, because of course it isn't to say that there is no progress in humanity at all- it is a kind of continuous rolling process of which we ultimately only play some small part, never really a beginning or an end to anything ourselves.

Also I watched the film again the night before, but after a few beers so it really wasn't that significant.

Still, 5 years well spent Mr Kaufman- now I will need to watch again!

[Rees · Rating 5 out of 5]

(THIS REVIEW IS SPOILER-FREE. A BETTER REVIEW, WITH SPOILERS, CAN BE FOUND HERE. I DID NOT WRITE THIS REVIEW AND GIVE THE REVIEWER, LEO OF leoxrobertson.wordpress.com, FIVE STARS FOR HIS FIVE-STAR REVIEW: https://www.goodreads.com/review/show...)

THE SCRIPT CAN BE READ ONLINE OR DOWNLOADED FROM THIS PDF: http://www.charliekaufmanarchivio.com...

Overlooked by many, this has to be one of the best movies I’ve ever watched, backed up by a solid script the cast members rarely deviated from in terms of improvisation, about a scriptwriter getting a MacArthurs ‘Genius Grant’ for his play-direction for DEATH OF A SALESMAN. Battling with many problems, including a mysterious illness based off the protagonist Caden Cotard’s surname (Cotard’s syndrome, better know as the ‘walking corpse’ syndrome: “a rare mental disorder in which the affected person holds the delusional belief that they are already dead, do not exist, are putrefying, or have lost their blood or internal organs.” Wikipedia: ‘Cotard’s delusion’.) Along with this, the main character loses and gets another wife, forever mourning about the past ones. With his ‘Genius Grant’ from MacArthur, however, he turns the stories of his past life into a play, caught up in his own life (caught up in the air), which tends to go by a lot quicker than imagined.

No spoilers here, but I will grant this film the best of my wishes by wishing everyone else saw it. I look forward to all the Little Persons who found beauty and meaning not only in the movie, but in their own life through the power of the movie. Amen to Charlie Kaufman.

It’s 7:43, you are here... It’s 7:44, you are here... It’s 7:45, you have to watch this movie before you die.

[rebeca ravara · Rating 5 out of 5]

incredibly well thought out. wonderful.

[Matty · Rating 4 out of 5]

I want to say that this screenplay and the movie are both the most in inventive and amazing idea for screen. I want to say that Charlie Kaufman has redefined cinema. I want to say that Synecdoche is the most beautiful accomplishment I have ever read or seen... But I can't. somehow while being all of those things I just mentioned it still fell short. Maybe because it was just so elusive- to elusive to transfer to film.

[Erik · Rating 5 out of 5]

Didn't read this shooting script edition but the script taken from the internet. After reading I had to go walking in the freezing cold. A lot of impact, loved it! Recommended for those aspiring screenwriters or if you just like a mesmerizing story.

[Clarko · Rating 5 out of 5]

"Dear diary, I'm afraid I'm gravely ill. It is perhaps times like these that one reflects on things past. An article of clothing from when I was young. A green jacket. I walk with my father. A game we once played. Pretend we're faeries. I'm a girl faerie. My name is Laura Lee. And you're a boy faerie. Your name is Tita Lee. Pretend, when we're faeries we fight each other, and I say "Stop hitting me I'll die!" And you hit me again and I say, "Now I have to die." And then you say, "But I'll miss you." And I say, "But I have to. And you'll have to wait a million years to see me again. And I'll be put in a box, and all I'll need is a tiny glass of water and lots of tiny pieces of pizza and the box will have wings like an airplane." And you'll ask, "Where will it take you?" "Home," I say.

[Isak Westerberg · Rating 5 out of 5]

remember liking this movie way back when, but that I found it confusing. I saw it during my most pretentious years of watching movies so I don't know fully if I understood it or if I just wanted to see myself as someone who did. So the screenplay made it make more sense I think (even if I got confused anyways). I look forward to a rewatch now. maybe I can patch things together better.

either way, I really like Kaufman's language, and his comedic language works as well in text as in movies. which I very much envy.

[S D]

CADEN
It's serious?
DOCTOR
We don't know but yes.

It's less funny than his other script, more tragic. It's great, but it always makes me feel sick.

I'm convinced the play is about indecisiveness, encouraging the audience to "just do it" (insert Shia meme)

[Nick Martin · Rating 4 out of 5]

It is a play about dating. It’s not just a play about death. It’s about everything. Dating, birth, death, life, family. All that.

(83:00)

[Gregory Eidson · Rating 5 out of 5]

HATE YOU! HATE YOU! HATE YOU! HATE YOU! HATE YOU!

[Jeremiah Matthew · Rating 5 out of 5]

One of the most depressing films and scripts I’ve ever seen

[Deryck Hodge · Rating 4 out of 5]

No one does the surreal in film like Charlie Kaufman. And yet, the story is so human and moving at the same time.

[Benito · Rating 3 out of 5]

trust me, the movie will make a lot more sense after you read this - the genius of Kaufman's physcological Russian Dolls will dance across your cerebellum...