Scott Myers

Story and Structure with Stephen Gaghan, Lem Dobbs and David Seidler

From the good folks at the Writers Guild Foundation, an event from January 2015: BEVERLY HILLS COP writer Dan Petrie, Jr. interviews Stephen Gaghan (TRAFFIC), Lem Dobbs (DARK CITY) and David Seidler (THE KING’S SPEECH). For other WGF videos, go here.

Daily Dialogue — July 19, 2015

Anderton sits there thinking about what she’s suggesting. She gets up, moves to one of her plants, starts feeding it with a sprayer. She reaches out and takes a long vine in her hand and strokes it… IRIS: It’s funny how all living organisms are alike. When the

Daily Dialogue theme next week: Last Line

The Daily Dialogue theme for next week: Last line. “Louis, I think this is the beginning of a beautiful friendship.” Casablanca (1942) 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

Go Into The Story Script Reading & Analysis: Flight

This week, we have been reading, analyzing, and discussing the script and movie Flight, written by John Gatins, starring Denzel Washington, directed by Robert Zemeckis. IMDb plot summary: An airline pilot saves almost all his passengers on his malfunctioning airliner which eventually crashed, but an investigation into the accident reveals

Saturday Hot Links

Time for the 195th installment of Saturday Hot Links. Comic-Con: Batman v. Superman trailer . Comic-Con: The Man from U.N.C.L.E. trailer. Comic-Con: The Flash highlight reel. Comic-Con: The Game of Thrones panel. Comic-Con: The Hunger Games: Mockingjay — Part 2 panel. Comic-Con:

30 Things About Screenwriting: Beginning. Middle. End.

In Poetics, Aristotle wrote “A whole [story] is what has a beginning and middle and end.” His articulation of each of these three parts and how they fit together is as follows: “A beginning is that which is not itself necessarily after anything else, and which has naturally something else

Interview (Written): Amy Schumer and Judd Apatow

Vanity Fair features an excerpt from “Sick in the Head: Conversations About Life and Comedy” by Judd Apatow in which he has a wide ranging conversation with Amy Schumer. She wrote and stars in the movie Trainwreck. Judd Apatow directed it. JUDD APATOW: I was watching a movie about women

Daily Dialogue — July 18, 2015

Sundance Kid: It’s your great ideas that got us into this mess. I never want to hear another one of your great ideas. Ever! Butch Cassidy: Australia. I thought that secretly you wanted to know so I told you. Sundance Kid: That’s your great idea? Butch Cassidy: The

Go Into The Story Movie Analysis: Inside Out

Starting Monday, we begin our next installment of the Go Into The Story Movie Analysis series: Inside Out, screenplay by Meg LeFauve & Josh Cooley and Pete Docter, story by Pete Docter & Ronaldo Del Carmen, additional dialogue by Amy Poehler & Bill Hader. To date per Box Office Mojo,

Spec Script Deal: “The Fixer”

Fubar Films acquires 2013 Black List thriller spec script “The Fixer” written by Bill Kennedy. From Deadline: Set in the gritty intersection of the Los Angeles nightlife and organized crime, the plot follows a mob fixer who retires to repair his broken personal life but, finding his son distant and

Script Analysis: “Flight” — Part 5: Takeaways

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: Major Plot Points Wednesday: Sequences Thursday: Psychological Journey Friday: Takeaways Today: Takeaways. This

30 Things About Screenwriting: Get the damn thing done!

I lied. When I wrote that thing about “There are no screenwriting rules”… Actually there is one. It’s about first drafts. They are of such importance, I break my own rule about there not being any screenwriting rules by allowing this one rule. And here it is: Get the

Great Character: Howard Beale (“Network”)

It’s one of the most memorable movie roles in the last 50 years: TV anchorman become crazed prophet, and Dark Mentor Howard Beale, an Oscar-winning role for actor Peter Finch in the 1976 movie Network: A TV network cynically exploits a deranged ex-TV anchor’s ravings and

Daily Dialogue — July 17, 2015

REISMAN: Tomorrow night is going to be the real thing, and if you want to know how real, I’ll tell you. It’s my guess that a lot of you guys won’t be coming back. But, there’s no sense in squawkin’ about that, right? Because the Army

Do you have a screenwriting question?

In the 7+ years I’ve been hosting this blog, I have received a lot of questions. Via email, Twitter, and here at GITS. I have tried to provide my thoughts in response to all of them which has resulted in a nifty free online resource which you can access

Showrunner Rules from Jeffrey Lieber: Numbers 261–270

Jeff Lieber is a screenwriter and TV writer. His movie credits include Tuck Everlasting and he is currently an executive producer of the CBS series “NCIS: New Orleans”. On Twitter (@JeffLieber), he has run a series of tweets called Showrunner Rules. For background on Jeff and this Twitter series, go

Script Analysis: “Flight” — Part 4: Psychological Journey

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: Major Plot Points Wednesday: Sequences Thursday: Psychological Journey Friday: Takeaways Today: Psychological Journey.

30 Things About Screenwriting: Feet on the ground… head in the clouds

I’m sure we’ve all seen the saying, “Keep your head in the clouds and your feet on the ground.” If you Google the phrase, you find all sorts of “growth experts” and “motivational speakers” riffing off this old adage, encouraging us to seek a balance with our ambitions

The Business of Screenwriting: Everything you wanted to know about specs [Part 16]

Spec scripts, that is. I’m guessing that perhaps 90% of the people who follow this blog at some point in their lives will write a spec script. And the other 10% are involved in buying and selling them. In light of that fact, last year I interviewed a top

Daily Dialogue — July 16, 2015

CHARLES: You want to die out here, huh? Well, then die. But I tell you what… I’m not gonna die. No, sirree. I’m not gonna die. No, I’m gonna kill the bear. Say, “I’m gonna kill the bear.” Say it. “I’m gonna kill the bear.

Introducing a Protagonist: Is less more?

In my recent Core I: Plot class, we covered just about all the bases when it comes to screenplay structure. One subject which came up was an emerging mini-trend of movies that jump into action with scant work establishing the Protagonist’s background. Two recent examples: Lucy and Ex

Showrunner Rules from Jeffrey Lieber: Numbers 251–260

Jeff Lieber is a screenwriter and TV writer. His movie credits include Tuck Everlasting and he is currently an executive producer of the CBS series “NCIS: New Orleans”. On Twitter (@JeffLieber), he has run a series of tweets called Showrunner Rules. For background on Jeff and this Twitter series, go

Script Analysis: “Flight” — Part 3: Sequences

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: Major Plot Points Wednesday: Sequences Thursday: Psychological Journey Friday: Takeaways Today: Sequences. A

30 Things About Screenwriting: Break your story in prep

Break your story in prep Let me begin with this acknowledgement: There is no right way to write. Each writer is different. Each story is different. There is no single universal approach that works for everyone. However in my view, it is impossible to overstate the importance of prep-writing.

Interview (Audio): Robert Towne’s conversation with Franklin Leonard

This is gold: Robert Towne, one of the lions of contemporary American screenwriting whose credits include The Last Details, The Parallax View, Chinatown, Shampoo, and Mission: Impossible, along with dozens of uncredited projects on which he served as a script doctor, interviewed by the Black List’s Franklin Leonard. [soundcloud