Monster: Living Off the Big Screen is a 1997 book in which John Gregory Dunne

John Gregory Dunne

John Gregory Dunne was an American novelist, screenwriter and literary critic.-Life:He was born in Hartford, Connecticut, and was a younger brother of author Dominick Dunne. He suffered from a severe stutter and took up writing to express himself. Eventually he learned to speak normally by...

 recounts his experiences as a screenwriter

Screenwriter

Screenwriters or scriptwriters or scenario writers are people who write/create the short or feature-length screenplays from which mass media such as films, television programs, Comics or video games are based.-Profession:...

 in Hollywood. The book focuses on the process of drafting the screenplay for Up Close & Personal

Up Close & Personal

Up Close & Personal is an American romantic drama film directed by Jon Avnet, and starring Robert Redford as a news director and Michelle Pfeiffer as his protegée, with Stockard Channing, Joe Mantegna and Kate Nelligan in supporting roles....

, 1996, a movie starring Robert Redford

Robert Redford

Charles Robert Redford, Jr. , better known as Robert Redford, is an American actor, film director, producer, businessman, environmentalist, philanthropist, and founder of the Sundance Film Festival. He has received two Oscars: one in 1981 for directing Ordinary People, and one for Lifetime...

 and Michelle Pfeiffer

Michelle Pfeiffer

Michelle Marie Pfeiffer is an American actress. She made her film debut in 1980 in The Hollywood Knights, but first garnered mainstream attention with her performance in Brian De Palma's Scarface . Pfeiffer has won numerous awards for her work...

. It details the meetings, writing, rewriting and all the other struggles in the way of creating a sellable screenplay. It also describes how a film that started being about Jessica Savitch

Jessica Savitch

Jessica Beth Savitch was an American television broadcaster and news reporter, host of PBS' Frontline and New York weekend anchor of NBC Nightly News during the short-lived Roger Mudd/Tom Brokaw era....

 ends up being a Star is Born

A Star Is Born

A Star Is Born may refer to:* A Star Is Born , starring Janet Gaynor and Fredric March, directed by William A. Wellman* A Star Is Born , starring Judy Garland and James Mason, directed by George Cukor...

-type film, where one character is a "rising star", and the person she/he is in love with becomes a "falling star".