Screenwriting From Iowa

Just a quick thank you to all the people that stopped by this blog last week and helped make it the single biggest week view-wise since I started this blog just over a year ago. Those kinds of things are always encouraging. Also, Sunday I ran into a short film director I worked with a [...]

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Edward Dmytryk is not the most recognizable name in film history but you could benefit from knowing his work. First he directed 56 feature films, one of which was nominated for an Academy Award (Crossfire) and two others were nominated for DGA Awards (The Caine Mutiny, The Young Lions).  Though some believe his best films [...]

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I Hate Valentine’s Day!
That’s a movie now in post-production and was written by the female screenwriter who actually wrote the most successful romantic comedy in box office history. Any guesses on what movie she wrote?
Here’s a hint, the screenwriter was born in Canada.  Another hint? The writer’s name is Nia Vardalos and she starred in the [...]

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“When your heart speaks, take good notes.” 
                                                               Judith Campbell 
 
You’re going to think I’m making this up…and I won’t blame you.
But I’m going to tell you [...]

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It was hard for me not to notice that the last couple days I have quoted some of the heavy hitters of screenwriting (Orson Welles, John Huston, Billy Wilder) and it made me wonder what screenwriter has won the most Academy Awards for writing. Turns out there are three writers who each have three Oscars [...]

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Orson Wells was born May 6, 1915 in Kenosha, Wisconsin. His mother died when he was nine and his father when he was 15 and I’ve always wondered if there was a part of Welles that resonated with the young boy in Citizen Kane who is separated from his parents. Shortly after his mother died [...]

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John Huston was born in Nevada, Missouri in 1906 and long before he died 81 years later he was a Hollywood legend. He won two Oscars, one for directing and one for writing The Treasure of the Sierra Madre. He also directed The African Queen, Key Largo, Moby Dick and The Maltese Falcon.
He not only [...]

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“You see, I have this little problem with my apartment.”
                                                          Jack Lemmon’s character
                                 [...]

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Before screenwriter Bruce Joel Rubin won an Oscar in 1990 for his script for Ghost he spent time in the Midwest. He was born in Detroit and graduated from high school there, he was a student at Indiana University, and was living in Illinois before he and his wife and their two kinds decided to [...]

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James Whitmore died yesterday and though he was an Emmy and Tony Award winning actor who was twice nominated for an Oscar I imagine most people today remember him most for his role in The Shawshank Redemption. In that film he played the elderly Brooks Hatlen who upon being released from a long time prison sentence [...]

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