Work can be play on the island of Maui > Writers converge on paradise

For a writer to sell a first novel, not only to print but also to film, and to do so in an idyllic setting, sounds like a dream.

But dreams can come true.

I am a literary/film manager, formerly an agent, and work hard helping my clients, published or about to be, integrate the sale of their projects. When the excitement about a book builds, I believe that’s the time to sell it not only as a book, but also as a film and an opportunity for the book’s author to do the screenplay.

The results with a simultaneous film sale often are dramatically stronger than just launching a book.

Logical as that thought sounds though, it is logistically nearly impossible. Publishing deals tend to be done in New York. Film deals happen at meetings “taken” in Los Angeles. But both kinds can be discussed — nicely and often — on the island of Maui, Hawaii.

The venue is the Maui Writers’ Conference, arguably the best in the world.

That’s a pretty broad statement, picking as it does one conference from the dozens which are well known and well run. I think I’m qualified to judge, having attended and spoken at nearly a hundred conferences over the last five years.

I went to Maui after my client, writer John Tullius, suggested I make the keynote address at the 1993 Labor Day Maui Writers’ Conference. As his agent, I preferred he spend his time writing his second novel rather than organizing a writers’ conference. He persuaded me he needed a break — and so did I — and we both could work and play at the conference.

What makes the Maui conference so special? The physical setting is superb. The Ritz-Carlton Hotel on Maui is sited near an ancient, Hawaiian sacred place. Maybe the magic carries over. When the hotel was being built, the Hawaiians were in an uproar. The hotel folks agreed to move the foundations back several hundred yards. There was a reaction from the spirits. Owls came down from the overlooking mountain and flew in circles over the now-undisturbed sacred ground. Whales appeared off Fleming Beach, behind the hotel’s new site, flapping their tails on the water during ground-breaking ceremonies, in apparent approval.

Maybe the tranquil and beautiful beach has an effect on the conference as well. Whatever the reasons, Maui is where both kinds of deals can get discussed (and hopefully done), more so than any conference I know of. Selling is not all that happens; the Maui conference is no mere farmers’ market for writers. There is a fellowship of writers, agents and producers. There are the informal sessions in which an author’s work is tightened, elevated and focused in dialogues with peers who genuinely care.

But interspersed with the work, writers, editors, agents and publishers have a refreshing and unique interaction with nature. I remember a morning my wife and I went out on a small Zodiac boat to the island of Malokai. A friend was scuba diving in an area noted as a shark breeding ground. Not so brave as he, we snorkeled in the surf above our friend. Although at one point our friend was invisible to us, being engulfed in fish, the sharks ate neither he nor us. In my case, some said, it was professional courtesy.

On the top of Maui island is Haleakala Crater, an extinct volcano that rises some 11,000 feet above sea level, but descends more than 20,000 feet below Maui’s sea level. It’s over a two-hour drive to the summit of the crater, and it’s worth it to reach a spot where the air is so clear that the stars and comets seem so close at hand one feels able to actually reach out and touch them.

And, of course, there is the beach. It’s better, cleaner and lovelier than any photograph or video can convey. It’s not just the beauty of the sunlight — somehow different here — and not just the surf. It’s the palm trees blown by the sea wind, fresh papaya and the finest Ahi, a yellow-finned tuna which tastes so fresh as to ruin the canned substitutes forever. The beach is compelling but it does not impede stress-free conversation.

At this past year’s conference, nearly 200 writers were beach mates with agents and publishers who were there not only to share their views with the authors, but also to take something back: a terrific project or fascinating writer to represent or publish.

If swimming fast to avoid being eaten by sharks so as to be able to reach the stars is a metaphor for the commercial part of a writer’s life, I cannot think of a better reason to sample the beauties of Hawaii and to experience the joy of seeing good properties — maybe your own — find their way to success at what I call the best writers’ conference and the best working holiday in the world: the Maui Writers’ Conference.

For more information about 1994’s Labor Day conference, contact Maui Writers’ Conference; 20 Alaeloa, No. 38; Lahai, Maui, Hawaii, 96761; telephone, (808) 669-6109.

Peter Miller is president of PMA Literary and Film Management Inc., an integrated literary and management firm with offices in New York and California. Miller also is the author of “Get Published! Get Produced!” It is a literary agent’s tips on how writers can sell their works to print and screen simultaneously.