Today we’d like to introduce you to Lauren Hoover.
Lauren, can you briefly walk us through your story – how you started and how you got to where you are today.
Having a background in journalism, I never realized how much more comfortable I am with being on the other side of that question—which is probably why writing something so personal as my first feature film has been so difficult. Like any story, it can be hard to tell where to start and what to include, even more so when it’s your own.
I grew up outside of Philadelphia and started writing as soon as I learned how to spell my first words (which was pretty late, considering I struggled with dyslexia for most of my childhood). I know it’s a cliché, but it really was a form of escape for me, both from my highly dysfunctional family as well as the boredom of the suburbs. It was the one thing that made everything else slip away.
Even before then though, storytelling was more a part of my life than most “normal” childhood things. My Italian Catholic grandma used to make them up for me when I was around five, curled in the nook between her expansive knees and thighs. Her taste was what most would consider eccentric: usually stories about sex, death, cannibals, suicide, or the ghosts of dead monkeys who would come and eat my parents if I didn’t pray hard enough (I swear to God). My dad, very much on the other hand, tried to balance things out by reading me the classics: Moby Dick, A Tale of Two Cities, War and Peace, The Iliad and The Odyssey, patiently translating each page into something a grade-schooler could digest. And, while their tastes were not at all in sync, both of them helped expand my imagination and gave me my strange sense of humor which hopefully translates to my writing.
Still, after the endless years I spent locked in my room typing or scribbling down ideas, then creating illustrations for them or turning them into short films with my friends or older brother, I never thought I’d be a writer. In fact, as a kid, the only thing I wanted in the world was to be an actress. Writing just happened to fall into the category of things that came to me somewhat naturally, like painting, or singing, or baking. Just something else to add to a list in case someone challenged my place in the world.
My life changed abruptly when I was fifteen. My parents found out about what I thought was a well-hidden eating disorder and blossoming coke habit, and I was sent to a troubled youth home in the middle of Indiana, like, the-closest-gas-station-is-
Two years later, I moved to LA with an old computer containing a half-written novel, one suitcase and a lot of skeletons in my closet, and I started trying to act. I loved it. I still do. I could be an entirely new person without the fucked up family and the painful past. I could be anyone I wanted. But this was ten years ago, and the Harvey Weinstein’s of the industry ran the show (I know, unfortunately, some of them still do). Being naive eighteen-year-old without family made me an easy target.
I was lucky enough to get out when I did, after the sexual assault I endured in my first year here. Because of it, I stayed as far away as I could from the industry for a long time. I moved on to dreams of being able to write my own narrative, one in which girls were in charge, rather than being solicited for sex in order to say one line in a film, book a tampon commercial or attend Cannes Film Festival on the arm of some man who acts like human sewage.
After I stopped acting, I was lost. It’s funny, we’re taught to aspire to one thing from such a young age and that veering from that choice might hurt our chances, but most of the time, we don’t really get to know what that choice looks like in the real world until we’re completely drowned in it.
So I bounced around a lot. I sold a short story, I started a blog and vintage clothing company, I tried my hand at ghostwriting. Nothing seemed to fit. Then I landed an internship at Ladygunn Magazine and from there, got a job as a journalist for Rogue Magazine, eventually becoming their Music Editor. It all looked so good on paper. I was this fairytale success story about what someone who had struggled with dyslexia and didn’t have a college education could accomplish. But still, I felt anxious to move on.
It wasn’t until the #MeToo movement began and all of a sudden the obvious realization that I wasn’t alone came to the forefront, that I started to realize what I really wanted and needed to be doing. I wanted to be a screenwriter, and what I needed was to write the kind of films that I had always wanted a chance to be in and the kind of characters I had always wanted to read. And for my first film, I wanted to shed light on the industry itself.
Rarely, you get to experience those magical moments in your life where it’s as if you’ve willed something into being. Mine came a few days later when I was having coffee with a close friend and director. He told me about this idea he had for a psychological thriller called Karma. It was a film that would serve as a warning to people about what happens when they stop regretting and continue mounting their misdeeds. Without thinking about what it really meant at the time, I told him I could write it, and from there, I wrote my first film.
Going from being a journalist to a screenwriter hasn’t been an easy accomplishment. I started taking classes, reading scripts every night, Googling the growing list of things I didn’t understand. There have been plenty of times that I’ve given up, however briefly. I’ve worked and reworked the story, adding in many of the most painful elements of my own experiences.
Loosely based on on the Greek myth of Echo and Narcissus, Karma is about addiction, the darkness that every one of us is capable of, and the dangers of running from what we’ve done in our pasts instead of making amends. I did my best to try and portray both the plasticity and enamor of LA, the insanity and sexual abuse that runs rampant the industry, and the monsters behind it. I wanted to really unwrap those relationships we’ve all been in where we project on another person who we want them to be, rather than seeing what they actually are. Most of all, it’s a script about female empowerment and women taking control of the narrative.
After many tears, late nights and bouts of stress acne, the screenplay for Karma is complete (barring a few minor tweaks, since nothing really feels complete as a writer). While we can’t yet disclose any names, we have some incredibly talented and respected actors involved, and I’m currently working on a teaser trailer that we’ll be filming shortly in order to help us get funding. Simultaneously, since I’ve written Karma, I’ve been working on a number of additional scripts for TV pilots, short films, and even a few features. Things don’t seem to be slowing down anytime soon, and I’ve finally found something that doesn’t make me wish they would.
Great, so let’s dig a little deeper into the story – has it been an easy path overall and if not, what were the challenges you’ve had to overcome?
It has definitely not been a smooth road. Sometimes, it still isn’t. Is anyone’s though, really? Even the journeys that look easy are usually difficult in some way.
I’ve struggled through an eating disorder, dyslexia (which is the worst struggle one can have as an aspiring writer), addiction, abuse, severe bullying, sexual harassment, terrible relationships, awful people, poverty, cheaters, depression, being drugged and assaulted, more death than one person should see in a lifetime, finding my place as a female writer without a college degree, and so many more things I can’t even name.
But on the other side of each of these experiences, I’ve gained something. I wasn’t able to say goodbye to my step-dad before he passed away, so now I try and tell the people around me how much I love them as often as possible. I never got to go to college, so I try and work harder than anyone else. My estranged mother refers to me as her late daughter, a baby who should have died at birth, but here I am, still alive. And I’m trying to keep it that way.
Some people have experienced so much worse than I have. For others, things I would consider simple may seem more complex. But the bottom line is that all of us are facing demons that most people know nothing about. And while I’ve seen a lot of pain, I’ve also been lucky enough to find some of the most incredible people in the world and to experience the kind of happiness that some people never do.
I try to live my life the way my step-dad used to, enjoying the little pleasures: sunsets, films, nature, a good cappuccino, a piece of pie, sitting down with a long book or script. Life is good, despite all the bad shit. After all, the insanity has given me a lot to write about.
Please tell us about your screenwriting specialty.
Perhaps because of my unorthodox childhood, my specialty (if I can even call it that while being so new to screenwriting) is in the dark and somewhat twisted: psychological thrillers, sci-fi screenplays about dystopian futures, stories about heartbreak and toxic relationships. What you can always count on though is there being a positive message somewhere in the sadness. That, and maybe some humor that will only make me laugh.
Do you look back particularly fondly on any memories from childhood?
When I was about ten, my little brother, step-dad, my dog and I all went for a road trip during the fall to the mountains. All the leaves were changing. The whole treeline was red, orange and yellow, and I vividly remember us walking around this lake that reflected it all back like a mirror.
While we were hiking up one of the mountains, each one of us taking it all in, I had this feeling that we were in sort of a bubble. Like we’d entered another realm where magic existed. I kept looking around, hoping I’d catch sight of something to prove it. Then, out of the corner of my eye, I saw something float among the leaves and that was all the proof I needed: fairies were real.
I told my step-dad, asking him if he believed me and if he really thought it was real. He looked at me with these big brown eyes, the only thing I can still remember about him vividly, and he said, “Of course.”
The whole rest of the hike, I felt this strange serenity. And even when I think about it now, I feel it all come rushing back. It’s not the most amazing thing to happen in my childhood, but it’s the one that’s gotten me through the most. The one thing I always go back to.
Contact Info:
- Website: Coming soon
- Email: [email protected]
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/lolohoovs
Image Credit:
Diana Mantis: www.dianamantis.com, Rogue Magazine: www.theroguemag.com, Joshua Shultz: www.joshuashultz.com
Getting in touch: VoyageLA is built on recommendations from the community; it’s how we uncover hidden gems, so if you know someone who deserves recognition please let us know here.
