Ticket Giveaway: “The Psychology of Story-Telling” with Lindsay Doran She’s known as “The Script Whisperer” and unlike so-called screenwriting gurus, Lindsay Doran has the street cred to back it up. To wit: Back by Popular Demand! On March 3rd at 7:30 pm at the Writers Guild Theater, Lindsay Doran may change everything you think you know
Interview (Written): Alex Garland (“Ex Machina”) A Creative Screenwriting interview with Alex Garland, nominated as co-writer for a 2016 Academy Award for Best Original screenplay for Ex Machina: How did you describe Ava’s physicality on the page? Let me find it on my phone…It says: “We see Ava, a robot girl. She’s
Script Analysis: “Gone Girl” — Part 2: Plot Reading scripts. Absolutely critical to learn the craft of screenwriting. The focus of this weekly series is a deep structural and thematic analysis of each script we read. Our daily schedule: Monday: Scene-By-Scene Breakdown Tuesday: Plot Wednesday: Characters Thursday: Themes Friday: Dialogue Saturday: Takeaways Today: Plot. In every
2016 Dialogue-Writing Challenge: Day 12 Last year at this time, we did a month-long Dialogue-Writing Challenge. It was a big success with dozens of writers participating. We all learned quite a bit about this important aspect of the craft plus we had some fun in the process. So I’ve decided to bring
Screenwriting 101: David Fincher “The thing I always say to any writer that I’m working with is: Just make sure that in any argument, EVERYONE is right. I want every single person arguing a righteous side of the argument. That makes interesting drama.” — David Fincher Via Film Savvy Comment Archive
Daily Dialogue — February 16, 2016 “You think I’m crazy? Well, listen up, there’s a storm coming like nothing you’ve ever seen, and not a one of you is prepared for it.” — Take Shelter (2011), written by Jeff Nichols The Daily Dialogue theme for the week: Obsession, suggested by Angie Soliman. Trivia: Michael
How good are you at handling exposition? In Hollywood, there is a saying I’ve heard more than once: “Exposition = Death.” Why? Because nothing can bore readers more than the delivery of setting, information, data and backstory. Yet every script, play or story you write requires you to include exposition. That’s why I created the Screenwriting
Interview (Written): Matt Charman (“Bridge of Spies”) A Creative Screenwriting interview with Matt Charman, nominated as co-writer for a 2016 Academy Award for Best Original screenplay for Bridge of Spies: As a Brit, what was it about James Donovan’s American story that captured your interest? A great character is a great character, wherever they’re
Script Analysis: “Gone Girl” — Part 1: Scene By Scene Breakdown Reading scripts. Absolutely critical to learn the craft of screenwriting. The focus of this weekly series is a deep structural and thematic analysis of each script we read. Our daily schedule: Monday: Scene-By-Scene Breakdown Tuesday: Plot Wednesday: Characters Thursday: Themes Friday: Dialogue Saturday: Takeaways Today: Scene-By-Scene
2016 Dialogue-Writing Challenge: Day 11 Last year at this time, we did a month-long Dialogue-Writing Challenge. It was a big success with dozens of writers participating. We all learned quite a bit about this important aspect of the craft plus we had some fun in the process. So I’ve decided to bring
On Writing “What you want is practice, practice, practice. It doesn’t matter what we write (at least this is my view) at our age, so long as we write continually as well as we can. I feel that every time I write a page either of prose or of verse, with
Daily Dialogue — February 15, 2016 JEREMY: (Rises choking from the water.) Excuse me. Pardon me. MRS. BRISBY: Jeremy? JEREMY: Ssshhhh! I’m being followed. MRS. BRISBY: Followed? JEREMY: Ssshhh! There’s a crazy lady with a hat. She’s got big teeth. She tied me up, and then — ah, oohh! A sparkly! MRS. BRISBY: What?
25 Years Ago: “The Silence of the Lambs” Twenty five years ago today, The Silence of the Lambs was released by Orion Pictures. It went on to become one of three movies to win the so-called Big Five Oscars: Best Picture, Best Actor, Best Actress, Best Director, and Best Screenplay (Adapted). The other two are It Happened
Interview: Sam Regnier (2015 Nicholl Winner) Sam Regnier wrote the original screenplay “Free Agent” which won a 2015 Nicholl Fellowship in Screenwriting and has been set up at CBS Films. Recently Sam and I had an excellent phone conversation in which we covered a lot of territory, his background and how he got into writing, a
Screenwriting News (February 8-February 14, 2016) This week’s writing deals and movie project news. Isaac Adamson (2015 Black List) adapting “The Ice Twins” for Alcon Entertainment. Gregory Burke writing “Entebbe” for StudioCanal and Working Title Films. Josh Campbell and Matt Stuecken sell spec script “Horizon Line” to Svensk Filmindustri. John Collee and Anthony writing “Maras
Daily Dialogue — February 14, 2016 LOUIS TULLY pops out of his apartment LOUIS: Oh, Dana, it’s you! DANA: Oh, hi, yes Louis, it’s me. LOUIS: I thought it was the drugstore. DANA: Oh, are you sick? LOUIS: Oh! No, no, I’m fine, I feel great! Just ordered some more vitamins and stuff.
Daily Dialogue theme next week: Obsession The Daily Dialogue theme next week: Obsession, suggested by Angie Soliman. “I’m not going to be ignored, Dan.” Fatal Attraction (1987) The usual drill: * Copy/paste dialogue from IMDb Quotes or some other transcript source. * Copy/paste the URL of an accompanying video from YouTube or some other video
Interview (Part 6): Sam Regnier (2015 Nicholl Winner) Sam Regnier wrote the original screenplay “Free Agent” which won a 2015 Nicholl Fellowship in Screenwriting and has been set up at CBS Films. Recently Sam and I had an excellent phone conversation in which we covered a lot of territory, his background and how he got into writing, a
Saturday Hot Links Time for the 225th installment of Saturday Hot Links, your week’s essential reading about movies, TV, streaming, Hollywood, and other things of writerly interest. Pixar’s ‘Inside Out’ Wins Top Prize at Annie Awards. The 10 Most Anticipated Films Of The 2016 Berlin Film Festival. SXSW Unveils Midnighters, Festival
2016 Dialogue-Writing Challenge: Week 2 Here are all of Week 2’s prompts for this year’s Dialogue-Writing Challenge: Day 6 challenge: Talking aloud to oneself. Day 7 challenge: Slang. Day 8 challenge: Somebody gets fired from their job. Day 9 challenge: Saying “I love you” without saying “I love you” Day 10 challenge:
Interview (Written): Paul Wernick and Rhett Reese (“Deadpool”) A /film interview with Paul Wernick and Rhett Reese, screenwriters of the movie Deadpool which is projected to have an opening weekend north of $100M, a huge number for a February release. In fact, they have already greenlit Deadpool 2. It’s rare to see a superhero movie with so
Daily Dialogue — February 13, 2016 “They FUCK YOU at the drive-thru, okay? They FUCK YOU at the drive-thru! They know you’re gonna be miles away before you find out you got fucked! They know you’re not gonna turn around and go back, they don’t care. So who gets fucked? Ol’
Ticket Giveaway: “The Psychology of Story-Telling” with Lindsay Doran She’s known as “The Script Whisperer” and unlike so-called screenwriting gurus, Lindsay Doran has the street cred to back it up. To wit: Back by Popular Demand! On March 3rd at 7:30 pm at the Writers Guild Theater, Lindsay Doran may change everything you think you know
Interview (Part 5): Sam Regnier (2015 Nicholl Winner) Sam Regnier wrote the original screenplay “Free Agent” which won a 2015 Nicholl Fellowship in Screenwriting and has been set up at CBS Films. Recently Sam and I had an excellent phone conversation in which we covered a lot of territory, his background and how he got into writing, a
Interview (Written): Emma Donoghue (“Room”) A Creative Screenwriting interview with Emma Donoghue, nominated for a 2016 Academy Award for Best Adapted screenplay for Room: What was your point of entry into the adaptation? The very first thing I did was look for what had to go or be changed, and funnily enough, we ended up
