Saturday Hot Links
Time for the 196th installment of Saturday Hot Links.
25 New Faces of Independent Film in 2015.
A Massive List of Summer 2015 Grants All Filmmakers Should Know About.
‘Trainwreck’ Box Office Success Pushes Amy Schumer on Hollywood’s A-List.
‘Jurassic World’ Passes ‘Avengers’ for №3 on All-Time Box Office List.
Why Universal Is Breaking Box Office Records.
U.K. Box Office Up 9 Percent Mid-Year.
Google’s YouTube Signs Up Everyone But TV for New Paid Service.
Amy Winehouse Film Becoming One of the Biggest Docs in Years.
Screenwriter Billy Ray Wins Seat on Academy Board of Governors.
Just For Laughs: ‘The Big Lebowski’ Live Read With Michael Fassbender & Jennifer Lawrence.
100 Great Movies By Female Directors.
A New Renaissance For Giant Monster Movies Is Almost Upon Us.
There’s A GOONIES Reboot Brewing.
Director Christopher McQuarrie’s unlikely path to ‘Mission: Impossible — Rogue Nation’.
‘House of Cards’ Writer Beau Willimon Joins BAFTA/BFI Lecture Series.
The State of the Movie Fan Union.
6 Of The World’s Greatest Writers Explain How They Deal With Writer’s Block.
Garrison Keillor Announces Retirement From ‘A Prairie Home Companion’.
‘Southpaw’ Producers on the 5-Year Fight to Make Jake Gyllenhaal’s Boxing Movie.
Why Europe Is Kicking U.S. Series Out of Primetime.
Critic’s Notebook: Todd McCarthy on BBC’s Bizarre Poll of Best American Films.
Check Out This Helpful Guide to All of Disney’s Sequels, Remakes and Spin-Offs.
Here’s How ShareGrid Plans to be the Airbnb of Production Equipment.
Tax Breaks Bringing Hollywood Productions Back to Italy.
George R.R. Martin Is Tired of Marvel’s Movie Bad Guys Already.
HBO Signs Bill Simmons For Weekly Talk Show As Part of Broader Pact.
PewDiePie: №1 in #Famechangers Digital Star Ranking.
Michael Jackson Wanted to Play Jar Jar Binks in ‘Star Wars’.
AP to Put Nearly 17,000 Hours of Archival News Footage on YouTube.
‘Transparent’s’ Jill Soloway Wants to Stop ‘Perpetuating Male Privilege Through Protagonism’.
Average Movie Ticket Price Hits Record High.
Meet Your New Fantasy Man: The Emotional Bodyguard.
5 Reasons Movie Ticket Prices Have Gone Through the Roof.
IMAX Celebrates Highest Sales Quarter Ever Thanks to Record Box Office.
Movie Admissions in U.K. Surge 10% in First Half of 2015.
25 Valuable Lessons from Seriously Successful Writers.
How ‘Paper Towns’ Screenwriters Got John Green’s Blessing to Make His Bestseller ‘More of a Fun Ride’.
‘Sharknado 3’ Screenwriter Says Franchise ‘Saved the Entire Human Race’.
Terry Huang (Black List blog): Go Big (Screen) or Go Home (Video).
The Black List Table Reads: Mr. Malcolm’s Table (Part 3).
Chicks Who Script: Episode 50.
Scriptnotes: Episode 207.
Doug Richardson: Development Notes — Killed by the Bell.
Billy Mernit: Trainwreck & Catastrophe: Things Are Looking Up.
Bob Saenz: The Acting Screenwriter.
Watch: Video Essay Explores The Art Of Anti-War Films [video].
Watch: 10-Minute Video Essay Breakdown Of Martin Scorsese’s ‘Goodfellas’ [video].
Watch: ‘The Good, The Bad & The Ugly’ Star Wars Western Mash-Up [video].
Douglas Cook Dies: Screenwriter Of ‘The Rock’, ‘Double Jeopardy’ Was 56.
Screenwriting Master Class tip of the week: I’m in the middle of another amazing Quest Writing Workshop here in Santa Monica. For those of you unable to travel, I have two upcoming online courses which lie at the heart of the Quest workshop:
August 3: Core III: Character (Scott Myers)
August 17: Prep: From Concept to Outline (Scott Myers)
Core III: Character is a 1-week online class covering the fundamentals of Character Based Screenwriting, a process which not only shows you how to develop compelling, multidimensional characters, it also elicits the plot to emerge from your characters.
Prep: From Concept to Outline is a popular 6-week online workshop which does precisely what the name says: You take a story from its core idea and through a series of weekly writing assignments develop it all the way to a scene-by-scene outline. Not only that, you learn a proven, professional approach to ‘breaking a story’ in prep.
These online classes are fantastic in their own right, amazing how participating writers from around the world join together to learn, share ideas, ask questions, and elevate their individual and collective understanding of the craft.
As always, I look forward to the opportunity to work with you!