Author Archive
Jun
22
2012
 
Alexander Payne on Adapting BooksPosted by: screenwritingfromiowa in Screenwriting From Iowa“When you adapt a book, you’re not making another book—you’re making a movie, which operates grammatically very, very differently. The better the book is, the more you have to change it. A good book succeeds with literary effects, but you need cinema so you have to just treat it as raw material. Anyone who expects [...]
Jun
19
2012
Screenwriting Quote #167 (John Logan)Posted by: screenwritingfromiowa in Screenwriting From Iowa“I’m not interested in characters who aren’t broken. I’m not interested in happy people. It just doesn’t draw me as a writer. Theater people say you are either a comedian or a tragedian, and I’m a tragedian. And the vexing, dark characters, the ones where I don’t understand their pain or their anguish, they are [...]
Jun
18
2012
The Original Screenwriting Rock StarPosted by: screenwritingfromiowa in Screenwriting From Iowa“Remember that the word star spelled backwards is rats.” Joe Eszterhas I’m sure Joe Eszterhas was sitting home in Chagrin Fall, Ohio last Friday when he came across my blog post Screenwriting Rock Star, and then he thought to himself, Really? (Okay, he probably didn’t, but if he had of read it that’s what he would [...] How does one become a screenwriting rock star? Well, you only have to do two things: 1) Write a screenplay that stars Tom Cruise. 2) Date Jennifer Aniston. But here’s the tricky part, you have to do them both at the same time. Yeah, I know that last stipulation is a killer for most of [...] This morning the Directors Guild of America (DGA) will have a special dedication of the Great Film Directors First-Class Forever stamps honoring John Ford, Frank Capra, Billy Wilder, and John Houston. And while the selection of directors is no surprise, you might be amazed to learn the artword was created right here in little ole [...]
Jun
13
2012
The Writer from Oklahoma (Tracy Letts)Posted by: screenwritingfromiowa in Screenwriting From Iowa“Tracy Letts’s August: Osage County is what [Eugene] O’Neil would be writing in 2007.” Jeremy McCarther New York magazine “Killer Joe has a strong moral code, bent as it is.” Screenwriter/Playwright Tracey Letts (on a character he created) A couple of years ago I drove to Chicago just to see a play Tracy Letts had [...] Well I never been to heaven But I’ve been to Oklahoma Well they tell me I was born there Never Been to Spain, hit song performed by Three Dog Night Lyrics by Hoyt Axton “I call it a little small city that’s booming.” Rod Meyer Owner of Deep Fork Grill restaurant in Oklahoma City Tonight the [...] “Lake Pepin ought to be visited by every poet and painter in the land.” William Cullen Bryant Last week I spent a couple of days on the Wisconsin side of Lake Pepin, mostly in the villages of Stockholm (founded by immigrants from Karlskoga, Sweden) and Pepin. It’s an area I try to get to once a [...]
Jun
08
2012
Little House in the Big WoodsPosted by: screenwritingfromiowa in Screenwriting From IowaFrom Shaft to the Little House on the Prairie—that’s how we roll here at Screenwriting from Iowa. In yesterday’s post I mentioned how Shaft screenwriter Ernest Tidyman didn’t start writing screenplays until he was past the age of forty. Laura Ingalls Wilder actually didn’t start writing novels until she was in her 60s. And though [...]
Jun
07
2012
Screenwriter Ernest R. TidymanPosted by: screenwritingfromiowa in Screenwriting From Iowa“He was a complex man who was full of rage and civility, but he also played violin beautifully.” Chris Clark, fourth wife and widow of screenwriter Ernest R. Tidyman (Clark also co-wrote the script for Lady Sings the Blues.) “Words are a licensed weapon and I never pull them out on people who aren’t good [...] |
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