Screenwriting From Iowa

I’m more of the sort of Lars von Trier Breaking the Waves school. The movie is primarily an emotional journey, and the movies that matter to me, you experience them here, in the heart and the gut. They’re not such intellectual exercises as visceral and emotional experiences.” Screenwriter Luke Davies (Lion) Moviemaker  Related posts: Aim for […]

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“Liberty City, one of the poorest sections of Miami and almost entirely black, is geographically tiny, little more than the housing projects and the blocks surrounding them.” Nikole Hannah-Jones/ New York Times What’s more unlikely than an Oscar-winning screenwriter being from the Liberty City section of Miami? That’s easy— how about two Oscar-winning writers being from […]

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“My first student film, written/directed shortly after 9/11. A reminder to myself to channel this energy, to create.” Barry Jenkins (@BandryBarry) 11/10/2016 Tweet Before Barry Jenkins wrote (with Tarell Alvin McCraney) and directed Moonlight—which won the Oscar last night for Best Picture and for Best Adapted Screenplay—he was a film school student at Florida State University. My […]

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Before Barry Jenkins wrote and directed Moonlight—which won the Oscar last night for Best Picture—he was a film school student at Florida State University. My Josephine was his first short film. (A good example of Start Small…But Start Somewhere.) According to Florida State News, a total of seven people from FSU graduates worked on Moonlight. […]

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“There’s no one working in television or theater today who’s not influenced by…the fountainhead of this whole thing, which is Death of a Salesman.” Mad Men creator & 9-time Primetime Emmy winner Matthew Weiner “Arthur Miller’s Death Of A Salesman was like a mirror to the story I had written.” Asgahar Farhadi on The Salesman Empire […]

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“We were actually writing the screenplay at the same time as Margot [Lee Shetterly], the author, was writing the book – all we had was the book proposal. A few years ago, the producers were looking for a writer, and they read my script on Agatha Christie, actually, and they sent me the book proposal […]

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“It took years of struggle. Years of not having anything happen, not even getting meetings, not knowing what I was really doing…Things have turned a corner.  I was really a starving artist for lot of years.  I moved to LA nine years ago, and the first five were really difficult.” Oscar-nominated screenwriter Luke Davies (Lion) […]

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Since I’ve been writing about work this week, it seem like a fitting time to repost this one from seven years ago originally titled Stephen J. Cannell’s Work Ethic: Primetime Emmy-winning writer Stephen J. Cannell overcame severe learning disabilities (and flunking three grades) to become one of modern televisions most prolific writers. He wrote more than 400 episodes […]

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When Emmy-winner Stephen J. Cannell died in 2010 his IMDB credits were extensive. I can’t image many others who wrote 450 TV episodes or produced more than 1,500 episodes. But there’s really no secret to how he did it—it’s basic math. He began his days at 3:30 AM: “You know, when you say, ‘He created 42 primetime […]

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P.S. Just after I posted this I saw this Facebook post by my director of photography friend Mac who is doing his best to work hard & be brave: Scott W. Smith    

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