Yet this could not be called a theft, or even a re-arrangement of
another writer's plot. The plot, characters, and setting were entirely
different in each play--it was only that one situation that was made
use of; and it seems likely that it was from the Ambrosio picture, or
the account of it, that the author of the Western story got his
inspiration. Yet who can really tell? Thoughts are marvellous things,
and both writers may have gotten their ideas from some other
original--or even conceived them in their own brains.
After all, as has been pointed out, the trouble with many young
writers is that they are not content with copying a single situation.
They have not been "in the game" long enough to realize either the
risk that they are taking or the wrong that they are doing a fellow
writer, so they not only adapt to their own needs a strong situation
in another's story but precede and follow it with other incidents and
situations which are substantially the same as those surrounding the
big situation in the original story.
But giving an old theme a new twist is a trick of the trade that comes
only with experience, and experience is gained by practice. Experience
and practice soon teach the photoplaywright not to rely too heavily
upon the newspaper for new ideas, for almost every day editors receive
two or more plots which closely resemble each other, simply because
the writers, having all chosen the same theme, have all worked that
theme up in the same way--the _obvious_ way, the _easiest_ way, the
way that involves the least care, and therefore the least ingenuity.
Pages:
373
374
375
376
377
378
379
380
381
382
383
384
385
386
387
388
389
390
391
392
393
394
395
396
397