Cyndi Stivers: So, future of storytelling. Before we do the future, let's talk about what is never going to change about storytelling.
辛迪:嗯,讲故事的未来 在我们说到未来之前 我们先来谈谈,对于讲故事来说,有什么是永远都不会改变的
Shonda Rhimes: What's never going to change. Obviously, I think good stories are never going to change, the need for people to gather together and exchange their stories and to talk about the things that feel universal, the idea that we all feel a compelling need to watch stories, to tell stories, to share stories -- sort of the gathering around the campfire to discuss the things that tell each one of us that we are not alone in the world. Those things to me are never going to change. That essence of storytelling is never going to change.
珊达:什么永远不会变 很明显,我认为好的故事永远不会改变 大家相聚在一起然后互相交换故事的需求 还有谈论一些大家觉得普遍发生的事情的这种需求不会变 就是我们大家都有一种迫切的需要 去看故事,去讲故事,去分享故事 就像是围坐在篝火旁 去谈一些能让我们每一个人都意识到 我们在这个世界上不是孤身一人的事情 刚刚提到的那些事,对于我来说,是永远不会变的 说故事里的那种本质是永远不会变的
CS: OK. In preparation for this conversation, I checked in with Susan Lyne, who was running ABC Entertainment when you were working on "Grey's Anatomy" --
辛迪:好。在准备这场访谈的过程中 我联系到了Susan Lyne 她在你做《实习医生格蕾》的时候 曾是ABC娱乐公司的负责人
SR: Yes.
珊达:没错
CS: And she said that there was this indelible memory she had of your casting process, where without discussing it with any of the executives, you got people coming in to read for your scripts, and every one of them was the full range of humanity, you did not type anyone in any way, and that it was completely surprising. So she said, in addition to retraining the studio executives, you also, she feels, and I think this is -- I agree, retrained the expectations of the American TV audience. So what else does the audience not yet realize that it needs?
辛迪:她说她对你选角的过程 有着极其深刻的印象 在没有跟任何一个监制人谈过的情况下 你叫了人过去读你的剧本 他们中的每一个人都展现了十足的人类的多样性 你没有以任何方式干预任何人 这个是完全出人意料的 所以她说,除了重新教育了高管制片人以外, 她觉得你还... 我觉得这个... ... 我赞同 重新培养了美国电视观众的期望 所以还有什么别的是观众们还没有意识到他们自己需要的吗?
SR: What else does it not yet realize? Well, I mean, I don't think we're anywhere near there yet. I mean, we're still in a place in which we're far, far behind what looks like the real world in actuality. I wasn't bringing in a bunch of actors who looked very different from one another simply because I was trying to make a point, and I wasn't trying to do anything special. It never occurred to me that that was new, different or weird. I just brought in actors because I thought they were interesting and to me, the idea that it was completely surprising to everybody -- I didn't know that for a while. I just thought: these are the actors I want to see play these parts. I want to see what they look like if they read. We'll see what happens. So I think the interesting thing that happens is that when you look at the world through another lens, when you're not the person normally in charge of things, it just comes out a different way.
珊达:还有什么别的是他们还没意识到的 其实,我们不认为我们已经到了能思考这类问题的程度 我的意思是,我们现在还处在一个 远远落后于现实中的世界的地方 我带进来一帮看起来 各有千秋的演员 并不仅仅是因为我想去强调什么 而且我也没有想去做任何特别的事 我从来没有想过我做的这个是新颖的,不同的或是奇怪的 我带进来这些演员只是因为我觉得他们是有趣的人 对我来说,在好一段时间里,我都没意识到 这样做会让大家觉得出人意料 我当时只是想,这些演员我想看他们演这些部分 我想看一下他们读剧本的时候是什么样子 然后我们来看看这样做会如何 所以我觉得神奇的事就是 当你通过另一个角度看这个世界的时候 当你不再是那个通常应该领导这些事情的人的时候 事情会有不一样的结果
CS: So you now have this big machine that you run, as a titan -- as you know, last year when she gave her talk -- she's a titan. So what do you think is going to happen as we go on? There's a huge amount of money involved in producing these shows. While the tools of making stories have gone and gotten greatly democratized, there's still this large distribution: people who rent networks, who rent the audience to advertisers and make it all pay. How do you see the business model changing now that anyone can be a storyteller?
辛迪:所以你现在有一个大机构是你自己像个 巨人一样在经营的,如大家所知,她在去年演讲时说过 她真的是个巨人 所以,随着我们这样继续下去,你觉得会发生些什么呢 这些电视节目的制作涉及到大笔的金钱 虽然制作故事的方法已经变得非常的民主化了 但是,还是会有这样一种大的分布存在 比如那些把电视网,把观众租给广告商们 然后由此来赚钱的人 你是怎么看待现在这种
SR: I think it's changing every day.
“任何人都可以成为说故事的人”的商业模式的转变呢
I mean, the rapid, rapid change that's happening is amazing. And I feel -- the panic is palpable, and I don't mean that in a bad way. I think it's kind of exciting. The idea that there's sort of an equalizer happening, that sort of means that anybody can make something, is wonderful. I think there's some scary in the idea that you can't find the good work now. There's so much work out there. I think there's something like 417 dramas on television right now at any given time in any given place, but you can't find them. You can't find the good ones. So there's a lot of bad stuff out there because everybody can make something. It's like if everybody painted a painting. You know, there's not that many good painters. But finding the good stories, the good shows, is harder and harder and harder. Because if you have one tiny show over here on AMC and one tiny show over here over there, finding where they are becomes much harder. So I think that ferreting out the gems and finding out who made the great webisode and who made this, it's -- I mean, think about the poor critics who now are spending 24 hours a day trapped in their homes watching everything. It's not an easy job right now. So the distribution engines are getting more and more vast, but finding the good programming for everybody in the audience is getting harder. And unlike the news, where everything's getting winnowed down to just who you are, television seems to be getting -- and by television I mean anything you can watch, television shows on -- seems to be getting wider and wider and wider. And so anybody's making stories, and the geniuses are sometimes hidden. But it's going to be harder to find, and at some point that will collapse. People keep talking about peak TV. I don't know when that's going to happen. I think at some point it'll collapse a little bit and we'll, sort of, come back together. I don't know if it will be network television. I don't know if that model is sustainable.
珊达:我觉得模式是每天都在变化的 我想说,我们现在正在经历的这种飞快的转变是很棒的 而且我感觉... ... 由此产生的恐慌是明显的 但我并没有说这个不好 我觉得这个是挺令人兴奋的 现在貌似有一种平衡正在建立 这在某种程度上意味着任何人都可以做出些什么成果 这个概念还是挺好的 我认为目前找不到好的作品这个想法还是有些可怕的 毕竟现在到处都有那么多的作品 现在,在任何时间,任何地点, 我认为都有大概417个节目在电视上播出 但是你却找不到 你找不到那些好的 因为每个人都可以做些什么,所以就有了很多不好的作品 这就有点像是每个人都画了一幅画 但是你知道,这其中并没有多少好画家 现在想找到好的故事,好的节目 真的是难上加难 因为如果AMC这里有一个小节目 然后这里那里,什么其他的地方又有几个的话 就更加难知道到好的作品在哪里了 所以我觉得挖掘到有价值的作品, 然后还要找到是谁制作了这些优秀的网络作品 真的是... ... 想想那些可怜的影评人 现在为了看完所有的东西 每天24个小时都被困在家里 这在现在这种情况下真不是份简单的工作 娱乐发行系统正在变的越来越庞大 然而找到对每位观众都合适的 节目编排却变得越来越难 这不像是在新闻界 所有的事情都能被筛除到你是谁 电视这方面好像正在变的... 说是电视,我的意思其实是任何我们可以观看的东西 好像正在变的越来越广泛 如此一来,任何人都可以制作故事 而天才有时候就难以被发现了 这个寻找的过程会越来越艰难 然后,在某个时间点,这个模式会崩溃 人们一直在谈论“电视潮” 我不知道这个模式的崩溃什么时候会开始 我认为,在某个时刻,它会开始崩溃一点 然后大家大概就会一起回到原点 我不知道网络电视是不是也会这样 我不清楚这种模式是不是可以持续发展下去
CS: What about the model that Amazon and Netflix are throwing a lot of money around right now.
辛迪:那亚马逊和Netflix目前正在 投入大量资金的这个模式会怎么样呢
SR: That is true. I think it's an interesting model. I think there's something exciting about it. For content creators, I think there's something exciting about it. For the world, I think there's something exciting about it. The idea that there are programs now that can be in multiple languages with characters from all over the world that are appealing and come out for everybody at the same time is exciting. I mean, I think the international sense that television can now take on makes sense to me, that programming can now take on. Television so much is made for, like -- here's our American audience. We make these shows, and then they shove them out into the world and hope for the best, as opposed to really thinking about the fact that America is not it. I mean, we love ourselves and everything, but it's not i. And we should be taking into account the fact that there are all of these other places in the world that we should be interested in while we're telling stories. It makes the world smaller. I don't know. I think it pushes forward the idea that the world is a universal place, and our stories become universal things. We stop being other.
珊达:这个是真的 我觉得这是个很有趣的模式 这个模式它有一些令人激动的东西 对内容创作者来说,这个模式是有些令人激动的 对这个世界来说,也是 有些节目现在能以多种语言播出 能有来自世界各地的角色 它们吸引人,而且能在同一时间让所有人都收看到 这个概念是使人兴奋的 我觉得电视目前所能呈现的 这个国际化在我看里是合情合理的 就是节目编排方面可以呈现的这种国际意识 在很大程度上,电视作品被制作出来是为了... 比如,这里目标是美国观众 我们做了这些节目 然后抱着乐观的希望 把这些节目推广到全世界 而没有真正的考虑到美国并不是一切 我想说的是,虽然我们很为自己自豪,但是这不是大家想要的 我们应该考虑到一件事 就是在我们在说故事的时候 也应该在意一下世界上的那些其他的地方 这样会让这个世界更小一点 我也不太清楚 我认为这样会推进世界是广泛的, 以及我们的故事是普遍的这样一种概念 我们不再是特殊的
CS: You've pioneered, as far as I can see, interesting ways to launch new shows, too. I mean, when you launched "Scandal" in 2012, there was this amazing groundswell of support on Twitter the likes of which nobody had seen before. Do you have any other tricks up your sleeve when you launch your next one? What do you think will happen in that regard?
辛迪:据我所见,你也成功地 开创了有意思的方法来发行新节目 你在2012年发行《丑闻》这部剧的时候 它在推特上有着令人吃惊的如海啸般的广泛的支持 点赞的数量也是前所未见的 你还有没有什么其他的杀手锏 可以用在你下一个要发行的节目上 你觉得,就这方面来说,会发生些什么呢
SR: We do have some interesting ideas. We have a show called "Still Star-Crossed" coming out this summer. We have some interesting ideas for that. I'm not sure if we're going to be able to do them in time. I thought they were fun. But the idea that we would live-tweet our show was really just us thinking that would be fun. We didn't realize that the critics would start to live-tweet along with us. But the fans -- getting people to be a part of it, making it more of a campfire -- you know, when you're all on Twitter together and you're all talking together, it is more of a shared experience, and finding other ways to make that possible and finding other ways to make people feel engaged is important.
珊达:我们确实有一些有趣的点子 我们有一个叫《悲恋再续》的剧要在这个这个夏天开播 对于它,我们有一些有意思的想法 我不确定我们是否能适时地实现那些想法 不过我觉得它们都很有意思 但是我们会实时推特我们节目的这个想法 真的只是我们自己觉得这样会很有趣 我们没有预料到剧评人们会开始跟着我们一起实时推特 而且粉丝们... 更多的人加入到这个当中, 让这个变的更像是一个篝火晚会 你懂的,当大家都在推特上 都在一起互相交流 这更像是一种共同的体验 找到能带来这种体验的其他的方法 以及找到一些其他的能让大家都一起投入互动的点子 是很重要的
CS: So when you have all those different people making stories and only some of them are going to break through and get that audience somehow, how do you think storytellers will get paid?
辛迪:现在有那么多的各色各样的人都在创作故事 但他们当中只有少数才能突破重围 以某种方式获得观众的青睐 关于说故事的人的薪酬这一方面,你是怎么想的
SR: I actually have been struggling with this concept as well. Is it going to be a subscriber model? Are people going to say, like, I'm going to watch this particular person's shows, and that's how we're going to do it?
珊达:我其实一直以来也都很为这件事所困扰 这会不会发展成为由订阅观众决定的模式呢 人们会不会说,比如,我会去看这个特定的人的节目 然后我们以后就会以这种模式进行下去了吗
CS: I think we should buy a passport to Shondaland. Right?
辛迪:那我们应该要买一个去Shonda地盘的通行证了,是吧
SR: I don't know about that, but yeah. That's a lot more work for me. I do think that there are going to be different ways, but I don't know necessarily. I mean, I'll be honest and say a lot of content creators are not necessarily interested in being distributors, mainly because what I dream of doing is creating content. I really love to create content. I want to get paid for it and I want to get paid the money that I deserve to get paid for it, and there's a hard part in finding that. But I also want it to be made possible for, you know, the people who work with me, the people who work for me, everybody to sort of get paid in a way, and they're all making a living. How it gets distributed is getting harder and harder.
珊达:不太清楚,这看起来不错,对我来说会是很大的工作量 我的确认为,薪酬模式的问题,会有很多不同的解决方法 但是我不一定知道 我的意思是,我会很诚实的说,很多内容制作者 未必会对当发行人这件事有兴趣 主要就是,因为我梦想做的事 只是创造好的内容 我很喜欢创造内容 而且我想通过这个赚钱 我想拿到我应该得到的报酬 能有这个意识目前不是件简单的事情 但是我其实也很想让它成为一种可行的模式 你懂的,为了那些跟我一起共事的人 为了那些为我工作的人,为了让每个人 都能以一种方式获得报酬,然后大家都能以此谋生 但是利润如何分配这件事正在变的越来越不容易了
CS: How about the many new tools, you know, VR, AR ... I find it fascinating that you can't really binge-watch, you can't fast-forward in those things. What do you see as the future of those for storytelling?
辛迪:那么关于新兴工具这方面呢 就是那些VR(虚拟现实),AR(增强现实)之类的 我觉得在这些技术的支持下,你不能刷剧 也不能快进的这件事是很神奇的 关于它们在说故事里的未来,你是怎么想的呢
SR: I spent a lot of time in the past year just exploring those, getting lots of demonstrations and paying attention. I find them fascinating, mainly because I think that -- I think most people think of them for gaming, I think most people think of them for things like action, and I think that there is a sense of intimacy that is very present in those things, the idea that -- picture this, you can sit there and have a conversation with Fitz, or at least sit there while Fitz talks to you, President Fitzgerald Grant III, while he talks to you about why he's making a choice that he makes, and it's a very heartfelt moment. And instead of you watching a television screen, you're sitting there next to him, and he's having this conversation. Now, you fall in love with the man while he's doing it from a television screen. Imagine sitting next to him, or being with a character like Huck who's about to execute somebody. And instead of having a scene where, you know, he's talking to another character very rapidly, he goes into a closet and turns to you and tells you, you know, what's going to happen and why he's afraid and nervous. It's a little more like theater, and I'm not sure it would work, but I'm fascinating by the concept of something like that and what that would mean for an audience. And to get to play with those ideas would be interesting, and I think, you know, for my audience, the people who watch my shows, which is, you know, women 12 to 75, there's something interesting in there for them.
珊达:我在过去的一年里用了很多时间 来探索这些工具 来看很多关于这些的演示,来关注它们 我认为它们很吸引人 主要是因为,我觉得... 我觉得很多人认为它们很适合游戏 很多人把它们和动作类的东西联系到一起 我觉得,在这些东西里 有一种很突出的私密感 意思就是,设想一下 你可以坐在这里,同Fitz展开一场谈话 或者,至少在Fitz同你讲话的时候,你是在旁边的 Fitz,是《丑闻》中的总统 当他在跟你说 为什么他做了如此的选择的时候 这个是很真心的时刻 与其是你盯着电视的屏幕 你是坐在他的旁边的,在他正说话的时候 现在,仅仅是通过电视屏幕看到他所表演的 你就已经爱上这个角色了 设想一下,如果你就坐在他附近呢 或者,你跟一个类似Huck一样的正要去杀人的角色待在一起 与其是看到他在跟另外一个角色 快速对话的这么一个场景 他会走进一个小房间,转身面向你,然后跟你说 接下来会发生什么,为什么他现在会紧张害怕 这有点像是剧场的感觉,我不知道这个可不可行 但是我是被类似这样的概念 还有它对观众来说的意义所吸引的 能够运用到这些概念会很有意思 而且我觉得,对于我的观众,那些看我节目的人 就是12到75岁的女性们来说 这其中也有一些她们感兴趣的东西
CS: And how about the input of the audience? How interested are you in the things where the audience can actually go up to a certain point and then decide, oh wait, I'm going to choose my own adventure. I'm going to run off with Fitz or I'm going to run off with --
辛迪:那对于观众们的意识呢? 你对于这方面感兴趣到什么程度呢 就是类似观众们可以到达某一个特定的节点,然后再决定 比如,等下,我要决定我自己接下来要看的 我决定要抛弃Fitz了,我决定要抛弃...
SR: Oh, the choose- your-own-adventure stories. I have a hard time with those, and not necessarily because I want to be in control of everything, but because when I'm watching television or I'm watching a movie, I know for a fact that a story is not as good when I have control over exactly what's going to happen to somebody else's character. You know, if I could tell you exactly what I wanted to happen to Walter White, that's great, but the story is not the same, and it's not as powerful. You know, if I'm in charge of how "The Sopranos" ends, then that's lovely and I have an ending that's nice and satisfying, but it's not the same story and it's not the same emotional impact.
珊达:噢,“选择你自己想看的”这种故事题材 这些题材对我来说很煎熬 并不是因为我想掌控所有的事情 而是因为在我自己看电视或者看电影的时候 我明确地知道,当我对发生在其他人创造的角色身上的事情 有全面的掌控的时候 这个故事就不会像它原来那样精彩了 如果我能跟你说我想让什么样的事情发生在Walter White身上 那很好,但是这个故事就不一样了,它不会那么有冲击力 你知道么,如果是我来负责《黑道家族》的结局 那么,很好,我会写一个美好的令人满足的结局 但是故事就变了,它带来的感情上的冲击也不一样
CS: I can't stop imagining what that might be. Sorry, you're losing me for a minute.
辛迪:我无法停止想象那会是什么样子 抱歉,我走神儿了一下
SR: But what's wonderful is I don't get to imagine it, because Vince has his own ending, and it makes it really powerful to know that somebody else has told. You know, if you could decide that, you know, in "Jaws," the shark wins or something, it doesn't do what it needs to do for you. The story is the story that is told, and you can walk away angry and you can walk away debating and you can walk away arguing, but that's why it works. That is why it's art. Otherwise, it's just a game, and games can be art, but in a very different way.
珊达:但是很愉快的是我不用去做这种想象 因为,比如,Vincent他有他自己的结局 而且从别人的口中知道这个会让它很有冲击力 你懂的,如果你可以决定,比如 在《大白鲨》里,是鲨鱼赢了或者什么其他的 但它其实没有完成一个故事需要为你做到的事情 从别人口中讲出来的才叫故事 之后,你可以生气的走开,你可以辩论着离开 你也可以争吵着离开 但是,这就是为什么故事是有效果的 这就是为什么它是艺术 不然,它就只是一场游戏 当然游戏也可以是艺术,但是,是以一种非常不同的方式
CS: Gamers who actually sell the right to sit there and comment on what's happening, to me that's more community than storytelling.
辛迪:玩家们现在会贩售席位 然后点评正在发生的事情 这对我来这,这比起说故事更有团体的感觉
SR: And that is its own form of campfire. I don't discount that as a form of storytelling, but it is a group form, I suppose.
珊达:这是它自己独有的一种交流的形式 我不会不把它当成说故事的形式中的一种来考虑 但是,我想,它是一种团体的形式
CS: All right, what about the super-super -- the fact that everything's getting shorter, shorter, shorter. And, you know, Snapchat now has something it calls shows that are one minute long.
辛迪:好吧,那关于那个超级超级... ... 就是所有的东西都在变的越来越短的这个事实呢? 你知道么,Snapchat现在推出了一个它们叫做“节目”的 只有一分钟时长的东西
SR: It's interesting. Part of me thinks it sounds like commercials. I mean, it does -- like, sponsored by. But part of me also gets it completely. There's something really wonderful about it. If you think about a world in which most people are watching television on their phones, if you think about a place like India, where most of the input is coming in and that's where most of the product is coming in, shorter makes sense. If you can charge people more for shorter periods of content, some distributor has figured out a way to make a lot more money. If you're making content, it costs less money to make it and put it out there. And, by the way, if you're 14 and have a short attention span, like my daughter, that's what you want to see, that's what you want to make, that's how it works. And if you do it right and it actually feels like narrative, people will hang on for it no matter what you do.
珊达:这个很有意思 我有点觉得这听起来像是广告 我的意思是,听起来确实像,比如,它是被赞助的 但是,我又有点觉得这个产品是有道理的 它是有些很棒的东西在里面 如果你考虑的是一个大多数人 都会用他们的手机来看电视的世界 如果你考虑的是一个像印度一样的地方 那里是大多数的互动输入 和产品的来源 那么,把东西变的更短是有道理的 如果你能让大家为更短的内容付更多的钱 那么一些发行商已经找到了一种能挣更多钱的方式 如果你是创作内容的人 那么制作和发表内容的成本会更少 而且,顺便说一下 如果你像我14岁的女儿一样有一个较短的专注时间 那么,更短的内容是你想看见的,是你想创作的 短篇幅的内容就是这样运作的 假如你的方法是正确的而且它在感觉上确实像是叙事 那么无论你做什么,人们都会持续关注的
CS: I'm glad you raised your daughters, because I am wondering how are they going to consume entertainment, and also not just entertainment, but news, too. When they're not -- I mean, the algorithmic robot overlords are going to feed them what they've already done. How do you think we will correct for that and make people well-rounded citizens?
辛迪:我很高兴你你养大了你的女儿们 因为我一直想知道她们会怎样去消费娱乐活动 而且不仅仅是娱乐方面 还有信息新闻 我的意思是,算法机器人霸王 会为她们提供类似她们先前已经浏览过的东西 你认为我们应该如何纠正这个情况才能让人们成为全面的公民
SR: Well, me and how I correct for it is completely different than how somebody else might do it.
珊达:我用来纠正这个的方法 跟别人会如何来处理这件事的方法,是完全不同的
CS: Feel free to speculate.
辛迪:你可以随便推测一下
SR: I really don't know how we're going to do it in the future. I mean, my poor children have been the subject of all of my experiments. We're still doing what I call "Amish summers" where I turn off all electronics and pack away all their computers and stuff and watch them scream for a while until they settle down into, like, an electronic-free summer. But honestly, it's a very hard world in which now, as grown-ups, we're so interested in watching our own thing, and we don't even know that we're being fed, sometimes, just our own opinions. You know, the way it's working now, you're watching a feed, and the feeds are being corrected so that you're only getting your own opinions and you're feeling more and more right about yourself. So how do you really start to discern? It's getting a little bit disturbing. So maybe it'll overcorrect, maybe it'll all explode, or maybe we'll all just become -- I hate to be negative about it, but maybe we'll all just become more idiotic.
珊达:我真的不清楚我们在未来会如何处理这个 我想说,我可怜的孩子们一直以来都是我所有实验的对象 我们现在依就会做一个我们叫做“阿米什人的夏天“的活动 就是我关掉所有的电子产品 把他们所有的电脑和什么其他的都收起来 然后看着他们因此抓狂一段时间 直到他们安定下来接受一个没有任何电子设备的夏天 但是说实话,这一个很艰难的世道 现在,作为成年人, 我们对于自己喜欢看的东西是那么的重视 以至于我们根本都不知道我们有时候 被灌输的只是自己自以为的观念 现在运作的方式就是 你看到一个信息推送 而且推送都是已经被调整过的 所以,你得到的都是你自己倾向于相信的观念 你就会感觉自己是越来越正确的 那么,你怎么样才能真正开始察觉到这些呢 这个问题正在变的有点让人不安了 它有可能会矫枉过正,也有可能会暴涨 或者我们都将会变的... ... 我不喜欢对这件事持有消极的态度 但是有可能我们都将会变的更愚蠢
(Cyndi laughs)
(笑声)
CS: Yeah, can you picture any corrective that you could do with scripted, fictional work?
辛迪:好吧,那你能想象到任何的矫正措施 是你可以用有剧本的虚构的作品来引入的吗
SR: I think a lot about the fact that television has the power to educate people in a powerful way, and when you're watching television -- for instance, they do studies about medical shows. I think it's 87 percent, 87 percent of people get most of their knowledge about medicine and medical facts from medical shows, much more so than they do from their doctors, than from articles. So we work really hard to be accurate, and every time we make a mistake, I feel really guilty, like we're going to do something bad, but we also give a lot of good medical information. There are so many other ways to give information on those shows. People are being entertained and maybe they don't want to read the news, but there are a lot of ways to give fair information out on those shows, not in some creepy, like, we're going to control people's minds way, but in a way that's sort of very interesting and intelligent and not about pushing one side's version or the other, like, giving out the truth. It would be strange, though, if television drama was how we were giving the news.
珊达:我对于电视是有能力以一种很强大的方式 来教育人的这个事做了很多思考 当你看电视的时候... ... 举个例子,他们对医疗方面的电视节目做了研究 大概百分之八十七的人 他们所拥有的大多数关于医学或者医疗常识方面的知识 都是从这些与医疗相关的节目里得到的 这比他们从医生那里或者文章上面 获得的要多得多 所以我们很努力的在做到准确无误 每一次我们有地方出错了,我都会觉得很内疚 就像是我们要做一些什么不好的事情一样 但是我们也给予了很多好的医学信息 在这些节目里,也有很多其他的方法可以提供信息 人们正在消遣着 或许他们不想看新闻 但是,在这些娱乐节目里,传递公正的信息是有很多方法的 并不是一些诡异的,像是我们要控制人们的思想,的那种方法 而是以一种像是有点令人感兴趣的,机智的方式 这不是说要推动一方或者另一方的说法 只是提供事实真相 不过,这样会显得奇怪 如果我们是通过电视剧来提供消息的
CS: It would be strange, but I gather a lot of what you've written as fiction has become prediction this season?
辛迪:这个是奇怪的 但是很多你创作的被认为是虚构的情节 都已经在这个季度成为了对现实的预言
SR: You know, "Scandal" has been very disturbing for that reason. We have this show that's about politics gone mad, and basically the way we've always told the show -- you know, everybody pays attention to the papers. We read everything. We talk about everything. We have lots of friends in Washington. And we'd always sort of done our show as a speculation. We'd sit in the room and think, what would happen if the wheels came off the bus and everything went crazy? And that was always great, except now it felt like the wheels were coming off the bus and things were actually going crazy, so the things that we were speculating were really coming true. I mean, our season this year was going to end with the Russians controlling the American election, and we'd written it, we'd planned for it, it was all there, and then the Russians were suspected of being involved in the American election and we suddenly had to change what we were going to do for our season. I walked in and I was like, "That scene where our mystery woman starts speaking Russian? We have to fix that and figure out what we're going to do." That just comes from extrapolating out from what we thought was going to happen, or what we thought was crazy.
珊达:《丑闻》因为这个原因已经很令人不安了 我们的这个节目是关于政治失去了理智的 大致来说,我们一直以来讲述这部剧的方式... ... 你知道的,人人都关注报纸上的新闻 我们什么都读,什么都拿来讨论 我们有很多朋友在华盛顿 然后我们一直都是以一种推测的思维来做我们的节目的 我们会坐在一个房间里,然后来思考 假如车轮从公交车上掉落然后一切都变的疯狂了 那接下来会发生什么 这个一直都很棒 只是,现在好像感觉像是公交车已经没了轮子 像是事情真的变的疯狂了 所以我们猜测的事情真的变成现实了 我们今年的这一季 原本是要以俄罗斯人控制美国选举的这个情节来结束的 我们已经都写好了,都计划好了 所有的都准备好了 然后俄罗斯就被怀疑牵涉进美国大选了 我们忽然之间就得换掉我们原本为这一季准备的内容 我走进去,然后我的反应就是 “我们的那个神秘的女人开始讲俄语的那个情节 我们要解决掉这个,想一想我们要怎么去做“ 这个剧情只是推测出来的 是从我们认为会发生什么的角度 或者我们认为什么是不可思议的这样一种角度来创作的
CS: That's great. So where else in US or elsewhere in the world do you look? Who is doing interesting storytelling right now?
辛迪:很棒 美国哪些其他的地方,或者世界上哪些其他的地方是你关注的 现在有哪些人是在做好玩的故事的
SR: I don't know, there's a lot of interesting stuff out there. Obviously British television is always amazing and always does interesting things. I don't get to watch a lot of TV, mainly because I'm busy working. And I pretty much try not to watch very much television at all, even American television, until I'm done with a season, because things start to creep into my head otherwise. I start to wonder, like, why can't our characters wear crowns and talk about being on a throne? It gets crazy. So I try not to watch much until the seasons are over. But I do think that there's a lot of interesting European television out there. I was at the International Emmys and looking around and seeing the stuff that they were showing, and I was kind of fascinated. There's some stuff I want to watch and check out.
珊达:不太好说,现在到处都有令人感兴趣的东西 很显然,英国的电视节目一直都很了不起 一直有在做有趣的东西 我没能有机会看很多的电视 主要是因为我忙于工作 还有我在某种程度上会试着不去看太多的电视 即使是美国的电视,一直到我搞定了一个季度的剧为止 不然,我看过的东西会慢慢扎根在我的脑海里 我会开始问自己,类似,我们的人物为什么 不能戴上皇冠然后谈论关于登上王座的事呢 这让人要疯掉了 所以在剧集创作完成之前,我会尽量不去看太多的东西 但是我确实感觉现在有很多有意思的欧洲电视 我去了国际艾美奖的现场 四处逛了一下,看了他们在放映的东西 我有点着迷了 那里有些东西是我很想看的
CS: Can you imagine -- I know that you don't spend a lot of time thinking about tech stuff, but you know how a few years ago we had someone here at TED talking about seeing, wearing Google Glass and seeing your TV shows essentially in your eye? Do you ever fantasize when, you know -- the little girl who sat on the pantry floor in your parents' house, did you ever imagine any other medium? Or would you now?
辛迪:你能想象到... ... 我知道你不常花时间去想关于科技的东西 但是你知道几年前我们TED来过一个人 他讲了一些关于视觉的东西 就像,带上了谷歌眼镜,然后眼睛就能看到电视节目了 你有没有幻想过什么时候... ... 比如一个小女孩坐在 你父母家的厨房地板上 你有没有想象过什么其他的媒介 或者你现在会做这样的想象吗
SR: Any other medium. For storytelling, other than books? I mean, I grew up wanting to be Toni Morrison, so no. I mean, I didn't even imagine television. So the idea that there could be some bigger world, some more magical way of making things --- I'm always excited when new technology comes out and I'm always the first one to want to try it. The possibilities feel endless and exciting right now, which is what excites me. We're in this sort of Wild West period, to me, it feels like, because nobody knows what we're going to settle on. You can put stories anywhere right now and that's cool to me, and it feels like once we figure out how to get the technology and the creativity of storytelling to meet, the possibilities are endless.
珊达:其他的媒介 对说故事来说,像是书以外其他的媒介吗? 我从小就想成为像托妮莫里森一样的人,所以没想过 我以前根本也没想过电视也可以是媒介 所以,能有更广阔的世界 以及一些更神奇的做事情的方法的这个想法... ... 当新的科技出现的时候,我总是很激动的 而且我一直是想第一个去尝试的那种人 可能性现在给人感觉仿佛是无限的,是令人兴奋的 这个让我激动不已 我感觉我们现在正处于类似拓荒前的西部的这样一个时期 因为没人知道我们到底会选定什么 现如今你可以把故事展示在任何地方 这个对我来讲很酷 感觉像是一旦我们懂得了如何 把科技和说故事的创造力相结合 可能会发生的事就是无穷的
CS: And also the technology has enabled the thing I briefly flew by earlier, binge-viewing, which is a recent phenomenon, since you've been doing shows, right? And how do you think does that change the storytelling process at all? You always had a bible for the whole season beforehand, right?
辛迪:科技同样使我先前简略提到过的事情成为了可能 刷剧,这是个新现象 自从你开始做电视节目以来,对吧 这个现象改变了说故事的方法吗?你是怎么看待这个问题的 你一直都有提前为一整季准备一个类似圣经似的万能书,对吧
SR: No, I just always knew where we were going to end. So for me, the only way I can really comment on that is that I have a show that's been going on for 14 seasons and so there are the people who have been watching it for 14 seasons, and then there are the 12-year-old girls I'd encounter in the grocery store who had watched 297 episodes in three weeks. Seriously, and that's a very different experience for them, because they've been inside of something really intensely for a very short period of time in a very intense way, and to them the story has a completely different arc and a completely different meaning because it never had any breaks.
珊达:并没有,我就是一直都知道一季要在哪里结束 所以,对于我来说 关于这个刷剧的现象,我唯一能说的就是 我有一个已经播出到第14季的节目 所以肯定有人一直追这部剧到第14季了 然后就有我在超市碰到的这么一群12岁的女孩们 她们在三个星期之内看了297集这个剧 说真的,这对她们来说是一种十分与众不同的体验 因为她们一直很强烈地沉浸在一件事里面 在相当短的一段时间内 以一种强度很大的方式 所以对她们来说,这个故事有一个完全不同轨迹 和一个完全不同的含义 因为它从来没有被打断过
CS: It's like visiting a country and then leaving it. It's a strange --
辛迪:这就像是去游览一个国家然后再离开的感觉
SR: It's like reading an amazing novel and then putting it down. I think that is the beauty of the experience. You don't necessarily have to watch something for 14 seasons. It's not necessarily the way everything's supposed to be.
珊达:这就像是阅读了一本很棒的小说然后合上它的感觉 我想这就是这个体验的美丽之处吧 你不一定非要一下子看完一个什么长达14季的东西 这不一定是所有的事都应该有的样子
CS: Is there any topic that you don't think we should touch?
辛迪:有没有任何的主题是你觉得我们应该避开的呢
SR: I don't think I think of story that way. I think of story in terms of character and what characters would do and what characters need to do in order to make them move forward, so I'm never really thinking of story in terms of just plot, and when writers come into my writer's room and pitch me plot, I say, "You're not speaking English." Like, that's the thing I say. We're not speaking English. I need to hear what's real. And so I don't think of it that way. I don't know if there's a way to think there's something I wouldn't do because that feels like I'm plucking pieces of plot off a wall or something.
珊达:我不觉得我是以这种角度来看待故事的 我是从人物角色,和他们会做什么,还有他们需要做些什么 才能继续发展下去的这些方面来看待故事的 所以我真的从来没有只从故事情节方面来考虑故事 当作家们来到我的写作室然后扔给我情节梗概的时候 我会说,“你正在说的不是英语” 这个真的是我会对他们说的 这不是英语,我需要听到实际的东西 所以我是不会从主题情节来考虑的 我不知道有没有什么办法能让我了解到什么是我不会去做的 因为想这种事让我感觉像是从墙上扯下剧情碎片一样
CS: That's great. To what extent do you think you will use -- You know, you recently went on the board of Planned Parenthood and got involved in the Hillary Clinton campaign. To what extent do you think you will use your storytelling in the real world to effect change?
辛迪:很好,你认为在多大程度上你会去用... ... 你最近加入了计划生育委员会 还参与了希拉里克林顿的竞选活动 你觉得在多大程度上你将会运用你说故事的能力 在现实生活中 去带来改变
SR: Well, you know, there's -- That's an intense subject to me, because I feel like the lack of narrative that a lot of people have is difficult. You know, like, there's a lot of organizations that don't have a positive narrative that they've created for themselves that would help them. There's a lot of campaigns that could be helped with a better narrative. The Democrats could do a lot with a very strong narrative for themselves. There's a lot of different things that could happen in terms of using storytelling voice, and I don't mean that in a fiction way, I mean that in a same way that any speechwriter would mean it. And I see that, but I don't necessarily know that that's, like, my job to do that.
珊达:嗯,你懂的 这对我来说是一个很让人紧张的主题 因为我感觉在很多人身上都存在的 这种对于叙事能力的缺乏是难解决的 你知道,有很多的组织机构都缺乏 一个它们为自己创作的,能帮到它们的 这样一个积极的故事讲述 一个更好的讲述 可以给很多竞选活动带来帮助 民主党可以做很多的事 如果他们有一个很有说服力的关于他们自己的叙述 有很多各种各样的事情都有可能发生 从一个能运用说故事的能力的角度来讲 而且我不是指在一个虚构的场景下 我这番话的意思是任何一个演讲稿撰写人都有体会的 我察觉到了这一点 但是我不是很清楚这是否应该是我的工作该做的
CS: All right.
辛迪:好的,那大家请帮我感谢一下Shonda吧
Please help me thank Shonda. SR: Thank you.
珊达:谢谢你们
(Applause)
(掌声)