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Nevertheless, the wordsmith learned to
be flexible when it came to the fluid screenwriting craft.
"The thing that I discovered with film is that
it's such a collective art that in the end it's better to be looser
because the actors will rewrite it and the directors will change
it," he noted. Adding, "it was a wonderful experience. To go
from such a controlling [literary] art to this much more open art was
fun."
Describing the process as a blast, the
self-described nerd preferred to stay at home rather than visit the
set. "Everyone and their mother was on set, but I didn't
go," he wryly revealed.
Without any current plans to pick up the
screenwriter's pen again, Diaz is busy at work on another book. His
first novel, Drown, which
brilliantly captured the Dominican immigration experience in America,
catapulted Diaz to notoriety and has influenced some to compare his
work to Piri Thomas' Down These
Mean Streets. Diaz wholeheartedly rejects such comparison.
"Piri is extraordinary," Diaz exclaims.
"Forty years after [Down These Mean Streets] was written, it
resonates with incredible force. Many writers are living under his
shadow because the book was so astonishing. The dude is on another
level," he effuses.
"[Piri Thomas] speaks across community lines
in a way that most of us dreamed we could," Diaz reflects.
Be that as it may, time will reveal the
far-reaching impact of Diaz's work whether onscreen or otherwise.
M
May 2003
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