Luiz A. D. Dantas

WHITE NIGHTS, AGAIN?

University of São Paulo, Brazil

I have written an adaptation of Dostoyevsky’s White Nights to current time São Paulo, Brazil. We were awarded funds by our Audiovisual Sector Fund and will shoot in April, 2024. In my adaptation I proposed a set of rules to be followed. The characters would be semi-literate, therefore, the dialogue would have to be scaled down, to cope with their reality. The main character, the Dreamer, would be a butcher with an artistic inclination. Someone who, without formal education, appreciates the sculptures and works that populate downtown São Paulo, and in the end, as he loses the woman he came to love, sublimates the loss by creating in the butcher shop a “work of art”. An expression of what Dostoyevsky wrote: Ohh my God a moment of jubilee, is not this enough for a lifetime?
Understanding the various functions of dialogue, exposition, characterization, advancement of plot, building subtext and nuance, creating atmosphere and tone, rhythm and pace, and also very significantly adding cultural context and significance, my challenge was to find actions, interactions and conflicts that could express inner feelings. I maintained the 4 nights structure of the story, and the flashback to the romance of Nadia (Nastenka) and the Tennant in the film, but created new events, which I believe could express, the inner feelings of the characters. I also introduced a few new characters, mainly the butcher shop owner and another worker at the shop.

This screenplay was part of my Associate Professor Dissertation at the University of São Paulo. I analyzed various prior adaptations, searching for the specific voice and idea which motivated every new approach to this story. In my presentation, having probably already a first cut, I wish to present one or two scenes which translate the challenges I expressed here.

Luiz has written and directed two feature-films, and produced a number of other ones. His latest screenplay, which he will also direct, White Nights, was awarded production funds by the Brazilian Audiovisual Sector Fund, having received the highest score in a national call for feature-film projects, it is slated to shoot first semester of 2024. Tenured Associate Professor of film at USP. MFA in screenwriting and directing from Columbia University in NY. PhD in communication from USP. Associate Professor Dissertation was dedicated to analyzing the insertion of screenwriting in Academia, and dealt with issues of structure, genre and adaptation. It included four works of screenwriting, White Nights, which also won a screenwriting doctoring award by the São Paulo Film Agency, a Prison Escape film, winner of a national development fund award, an epic historical vampire series bible, set in 19th century Brazil, and a children’s animation series bible, also winner of a national call for development funds.