An Interview With Susan Johnston
Have A clear point of view : You need to know why you are telling your story, and what lens you are using to look at the world. For me, it was working in live news that gave me the urge to write social satire. When you’re exposed to the absurd repetition of tragic headlines, it makes you want to create a mirror, even a distorted one, to show what is underneath.
Some writers and authors have a knack for using language that can really move people. Some writers and authors have been able to influence millions with their words alone. What does it take to become an effective and successful author or writer? In this interview series, called “5 Things You Need To Be A Successful Author or Writer” we are talking to successful authors and writers who can share lessons from their experiences. As part of this series, I had the pleasure of interviewing Florent Agostini.
Born in Clermont-Ferrand (France), Florent Agostini moved to Paris in 2010 to study at the École Supérieure d ‘Études Cinématographiques (ESEC). In the following years, he worked as a broadcast operator for a major French news channel, where he developed a broad perspective on world affairs. Between 2015 and 2020, he self-financed several anticipation short-film projects, before receiving a debut film fund from the Corsican regional authorities in 2021 to produce the Sci-Fi short-film “Godcasting”.
Thank you so much for joining us in this interview series! Before we dive in, our readers would love to “get to know you” a bit better. Can you tell us a little about how you got started?
In my childhood, I spent time filming using my parents’ mini-DV camera. With the videos I shot, I used to create music videos by adding songs that I liked, and it is how I starting enjoying editing. Many years later, in 2015, the first project I professionally completed under my label, Similar Mind, was naturally a music video called Roll Rabbit.
Can you share the most interesting story that occurred to you in the course of your career?
In 2010, I got the opportunity to join the film shooting of “Les Anonymes”, directed by the French director Pierre Schoeller. However, my cinema school didn’t allow me to participate as I was still studying in the first year program, which was basically based on theoretical classes. I was more interested on gaining field experience, so I decided to stop studying at the cinema school. Later on, I worked for French TV live news channels and started to create my own film projects. That experience helped me to avoid being shaped by traditional film school methods and allowed me to develop my own style.
What was the biggest challenge you faced in your journey to becoming a writer? How did you overcome it? Can you share a story about that that other aspiring writers can learn from?
Writing “Godcasting” was my biggest challenge. I had tens of versions of the script, the title changed three times, I couldn’t know how to end story or when to stop editing it. This is when I received a public funding to join the GREC’s (Groupe de recherches et d’essais cinématographiques) Writers in Residence program that I could use the help of professional writers like Arnaud Dommerc to improve my writing skills and my scenario. I have learned to listen to others point of you, exchange ideas and chose the best for my movie. I also have learned that for my next project, Godcasting’s feature film adaptation, I will need to work with a co-writer.
It has been said that our mistakes can be our greatest teachers. Can you share a story about the funniest mistake you made when you were first starting? Can you tell us what lesson you learned from that?
I remember my very first day of filming as a director, in 2016, for my film “Similaires”. We were supposed to shoot an outdoor sequence, quite far away from our place, and we had a terrible weather. We went on the set, we couldn’t shoot anything great, the team was exhausted. The next day and rest of the week : a bright sun all days-long! We added an extra shooting day and shot the sequence on the last day. Retrospectively, I feel like we should have changed the schedule and skipped this first stormy day, it would have saved us energy, money and would have been less stressful! But my first assistant and I were unexperienced at that time, so we couldn’t adapt so easily.
In your opinion, were you a “natural born writer” or did you develop that aptitude later on? Can you explain what you mean?
I am not a natural born writer, but more like a natural born dreamer. However, my dreams are not always very bright and beautiful. This is probably because I grew up in a world where TV news and social media are not often very optimistic. This is through the lens of news channels that I discovered that I could write stories differently, by creating social satires of our society or dystopia.
What are some of the most interesting or exciting projects you are working on now?
The most exciting project I am working on now is the adaptation of the Godcasting project into a feature-film! While we are promoting the short-film, we use social media to organize a global casting call to select the future characters of the feature-film, who will replace those from the short-film. I say “We” because I am working closely with Velda, the artificial intelligence of my film, which is also an AI in real life, and helps me developing the concept through the Instagram account @godcasting_velda_
Here is the main question of our interview. Based on your experience, what are the “5 Things You Need To Be A Successful Author or Writer”? Please share a story or example for each.
Based on my experience, here are 5 things you need to be a successful author or writer.
- Have A clear point of view : You need to know why you are telling your story, and what lens you are using to look at the world. For me, it was working in live news that gave me the urge to write social satire. When you’re exposed to the absurd repetition of tragic headlines, it makes you want to create a mirror, even a distorted one, to show what is underneath.
- Try not to care about validation, even if it may be the hardest thing ! I got kicked out of my cinema school; my early work didn’t win over festival juries in France; in “Godcasting”, I asked the actors to overplay and some people didn’t like it… If you rely on external validation to keep going, you will burn out. Make something that you believe in, even if it confuses people.
- If possible, have technical independence : editing, filming, organizing live events : I had to learn it all because I had not enough budget. That gave me full control and forced me to find creative solutions, which became part of my style. For example, my current project “Godcasting” uses a live casting system on social media where real people can become fictional characters.
- Engage a community around you : even if you are writing alone, you need people to reflect things back to you. With “Godcasting”, I realized that the project was bigger than a single short-film and it really took shape when viewers started interacting live. Their feedback, ideas, and even their doubts helped me sharpen the concept.
- Dream big, go crazy and find someone who will keep your feet on the ground : even when it’s hard, even when you’re broke, even when no one is watching, find the way to enjoy it and the result of what you have created. I’ve worked in TV news, in editing rooms, at night… but the feeling of building a world from scratch, with my humor and my obsessions, that’s addictive! And thankfully I have Velda and some other friends to help me stay on Earth!
What is the one habit you believe contributed the most to you becoming a great writer? (i.e. perseverance, discipline, play, craft study). Can you share a story or example?
I believe that I write and work to share ideas, point of view and make people think. My goal as a writer is to stay true to my ideas, but it is not always easy, especially when I started receiving fundings from production or public authorities. I understood that I had to make concessions, and I agreed to make them when it was in the interest of the movie. I am not sure my movies are made for general public acclaim, that is the reason why I feel like perseverance is my habit that contributed the most to my work.
Which literature do you draw inspiration from? Why?
I like to read essays, listen to podcasts and watch movies that talk about humanities and social sciences. Movies like “The Congress” by Ari Folman, “The External World” by David Oreilly, magazine like Usbek & Rica, novelist Alain Damasio, help me to understand better the world we are living in, what is going wrong and what could be better.
You are a person of enormous influence. If you could start a movement that would bring the most amount of good to the most amount of people, what would that be? You never know what your idea can trigger. 🙂
If I were a person of enormous influence, I would create a movement where there are stronger connections between humans beings, and especially grieving people. I would give them the ability to join hands, support each other, using AI as a tool and not as a goal. I would help them to reduce the impact of digital clones in their current and future lives. That’s part of the Godcasting project.
How can our readers further follow you online?
They can follow us on Instagram : @godcasting_velda_ — the channel to the beyond.
About The Interviewer: Susan Johnston is a Media Futurist, Columnist as well as Founder and Director at New Media Film Festival®. The New Media Film Festival® — honoring stories worth telling since 2009, is an Award-winning, inclusive, and boundary-pushing catalyst for storytelling and technology. Susan was knighted in Rome in 2017 for her work in Arts & Humanity.
Florent Agostini On The 5 Things You Need To Be A Successful Author or Writer was originally published in Authority Magazine on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.