Screenwriting From Iowa

“[Before writing the script] I try to see the trailer in my head. I watch the preview as I’m writing and get the shape—the overall shape. Not just what happens, but what the whole thing is going to feel like. If I were to cut a mental trailer for the film that would generate the […]

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“You think I’m crazy? You call me crazy, you think I’m crazy? You wanna see crazy?” Martin Riggs (Mel Gibson) About 25 years before Iron Man 3 made over a billion dollars at the box office its writer/director Shane Black had his first feature film (Lethal Weapon) produced. As part of a panel event sponsored by Scriptwriters Network […]

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“[Shane Black] isn’t Hollywood’s most prolific writer — he only has a handful of credits, including the first Lethal Weapon, Kiss Kiss Bang Bang, and The Last Boy Scout— but for a time, he was its most highly paid, and the $4 million he earned for the 1996 action film The Long Kiss Goodnight is still a Hollywood record for […]

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Note: On this re-post Saturday I’m going to post one of my favorite screenwriting quotes by one of my favorite teachers of screenwriting—Richard Walter. The original post back in 2011 (which had a different title) was the end of seven days of posts revolving around an interview I did with Walter. (The informative links to […]

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“There was absolutely no pressure on me because I was just sitting in Minnesota writing for my own edification.” Diablo Cody on writing Juno Happy 35th birthday Diablo Cody. If you’re fairly new to this blog you may not know that a huge impetus for starting this blog back in 2008 was reading and hearing interviews […]

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“What if your script doesn’t sell?  Most of them don’t.  Doesn’t mean you should give up.  Writing involves a long learning curve.  Most scripts or early novels suck.  Usually, it takes three or four tries before some kind of talent and structure begins to emerge.  It’s frustrating to think that your initial efforts might be […]

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Screenwriter David S. Goyer was born in 1965 in Ann Arbor, Michigan and graduated from Michigan State before going to to film school at USC. His first produced feature screenplay was Death Warrant in 1990 and since then he’s written over 20 produced screenplays including Blade, Batman Begins, and Man of Steel. He’s also written three […]

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“Jerry and I discussed it in detail. We said, “Let’s put something on the front.” I think initially we wanted to use the first letter of the character’s name. We thought S was perfect. After we came up with it, we kiddingly said, “Well, it’s the first letter of Siegel and Shuster.” Progressively, as the […]

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“Since I was running into a little trouble in getting other people to go along with my desires and publish my stuff, I began publishing it myself….In the third issue of our fanzine I wrote a story called “The Reign of the Superman.” Jerry Siegel O.K., we all know that Superman was born on the […]

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On this repeat Saturday, I going back to a post I wrote back in 2008. (Back when I regularly wrote posts that were between 1,000-2,000 words.) This one keeps with the Ohio-centered theme this past week. But a few changes have occurred  in the five years since I wrote this post. First LeBron James and I both […]

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