“In life I wasn’t funny. I felt on stage or in movies I could do whatever I wanted. I was free.” Gene Wilder It’s hard to write something about Gene Wilder that hasn’t been written since he passed away two years ago. But I’d like to touch on his Midwestern roots and how he found […]
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Archive for August, 2016
Aug
30
2016
 
Screenwriting Quote #199 (Gene Wilder)Posted by: screenwritingfromiowa in Screenwriting From Iowa“Always and consciously, I try to hook the audience in the first five minutes. I want them right from the start to feel something—BOOM! I want an explosion right at the beginning. I always what that.” Writer/actor Gene Wilder (Young Frankenstein) Between playwright Tennessee Williams and screenwriter Diablo Cody graduating from the University of Iowa […]
Aug
29
2016
Find One Fan of Your WritingPosted by: screenwritingfromiowa in Screenwriting From IowaOn the way to becoming an Oscar Award winning screenwriter, Murray Schisgal served in the military during World War II, was a medicore musician (but good enough to be in a band), a failed novelist, a bored lawyer, and a part-time teacher before finding the seeds of success in having some one-act plays produced off-Broadway. […]
Aug
25
2016
‘Frustration, bitterness and hate…’Posted by: screenwritingfromiowa in Screenwriting From IowaThe writer that probably first comes to mind when you think about the modern classic film Tootsie is Larry Gilbert. But the co-writer of the script was Murray Schisgal. The Oscar and Tony-nominated Schisgal was born in Brooklyn and turns 90 in November. He had his Broadway debut in 1965 with a play he’d written called […] “Be so good they can’t ignore you.” Steve Martin Getting an agent is easy. The actual process I mean; Script read. Phone call made. After you written a screenplay that captures the attention of someone influential in the film business. (BTW-That’s the hard part. The part that took Oscar winning screenwriter Michael Arndt ten years […]
Aug
23
2016
Screenwriting Jamaican-Olympic Style (2.0)Posted by: screenwritingfromiowa in Screenwriting From IowaJamaica’s six gold medals at the Rio 2016 Olympic Games matched what its athletes did at the 2008 Beijing Games. That made me think of a post I wrote in 2008 on Jamaica and I thought it was worth reposting today as a reminder of how small places foster talent that can perform on a […] The 2016 Rio Olympics closing ceremony ended yesterday with many memorable moments over the past two weeks including three more gold medals for Jamaican sprinter Usain Bolt. So I thought it would be fitting to re-post what I wrote about Bolt after he won three gold medals four years ago: “I would say I’m the […] “To do any kind of creative work well, you have to run at stuff knowing that it’s usually going to fail. You have to take that into account and you have to make peace with it. We spend a lot of money and time on stuff that goes nowhere. It’s not unusual for us to […]
Aug
17
2016
Inevitability vs. PredictabilityPosted by: screenwritingfromiowa in Screenwriting From Iowa“In a well-made drama, I want to feel: ‘Of course—that’s where it was heading all along.’ And yet the inevitability mustn’t eliminate surprise. There’s not much point in spending two hours on something that became clear in the first five minutes. Inevitability doesn’t mean predictability. The script must still keep you off balance, keep you […] “I think that’s the single best piece of advice: constantly think about how you could be doing things better and questioning yourself.” Elon Musk Over the weekend I was on the Space Coast of Florida, but was asleep when the SpaceX Falcon 9 took off from Cape Canaveral at 1:26 a.m. Sunday. But a photographer […] |
