Taking cool ideas and turning them into art

Pilot and art don't really relate in my mind. As in "What's Happening?" or "The Brady Bunch?"

I'm actually reading a very fine book on writing now with a lot of stuff I had not thought of: The Spooky Art, by Norman Mailer. One thing that really hit me was that he said that true writing or (art) comes from the existential experience-- that which you have no control over and really are trapped in, can't leave. When people ask me why I write, it is because I had a lousy childhood. It wasn't that it was abusive or anything, it was that it was existential, I had no control over it. Most fine writing is about existential situations. A character must bend to the breaking and change in an environment or situation where really-- there is no choice-- you are forced to change. What I see Wrong in the present writing environment is the focus on the ability to edit and adapt things, when in fact the main focus on "great writing" so called is the character's trying to run from a fate that is inevitable. That's why the X files were so great! What were the characters constantly fighting against, and yet yearning for at the same time! The truth is out there. Of course you have your entire generation of TV dramas about people who are drawn to and repelled from the truth. What is the one thing that you don't want to know? Maybe that is what is worth writing about?

Have you tried outlining your story, and/or outlining using beat sheets, and/or outlining using the sequence method (splitting the story into 10-15 minute segments)?

There are a couple of links in the screenwriting tips sticky thread that might be of interest, see the i. Outlines, Beat Sheets, Treatments & Query Letters section.

-Derek

I think the problem is that it takes two to make a film into art, the writer and the director. Also, as a screenwriter who's only starting out I am very aware of the fact that if I want to make money doing this I will probably have to think in the opposite direction of what constitutes art in writing.
To think away from art in a sense; I'm sure that's even more true when it comes to tv pilots.
I think that the "existential" side of writing can only be truly explored when you give yourself time in a story to convey things through symbolism, metaphor etc. I think you are more likely to find these elements in films that would be considered art-house films, mostly foreign films.
I saw the latest Lady Chatterley recently, the recent French version. The film was three hours long and instead of jumping from one thing to the next, it took its time, showing f.ex. L.C. walking in the woods to her lover's cabin, away from her house and her bourgeois world, entering the world of the senses etc etc. Long long looong scenes repeated as time passed and the seasons changed. They were beautiful and very effective. Just like the novel, and all great novels, the film makers thought in terms of art, not rushing the story to keep us at the edge of our seats but rather being more introspective and subtle sometimes. But those scenes would have been seriously cut if it was a Hollywood film to rush to the more salacious stuff. As a screen/tv-writer it's hard to not feel limited and or held back by that.