Dr. Rosanne Welch – Page 30 – On Screenwriting and Media with Dr. Rosanne Welch

36 More On Finding The Time To Write…from Worry and Wonder | The Courier Thirteen Podcast [Video]

Watch the entire presentation – Worry and Wonder | The Courier Thirteen Podcast | Episode # 29 here

Transcript:

I have a friend who gets up at four in the morning and writes until six or seven and then heads off to work at 7:30. She has to be there at eight at an agency right? So she’s doing an agent thing but she wants to be a writer. So she’s — that’s her time and then the rest of the day she’s busy, busy, busy, and can’t possibly consume writing and couldn’t do it at night because she’s too darn tired from everything she did in the day but that means she goes to bed at like nine o’clock at night. So she can get up at three in the morning and still have had enough sleep to be ready to do that. That’s really disciplined but you have to be right? You have to be. When I was first — the first couple shows I was on there — the new writers always get stuck with the crummy time frames. So somebody always writes over Thanksgiving so there’ll be something to film like the Monday you come back. So there you go. Thanksgiving day. All your friends — your family’s all having dinner at the table and you’re in a different room in the house working your ass off to write something in five days that’ll be ready to produce or over summer. Some shows do. Some shows don’t or Christmas break. Yeah, it’s like well then I get this many days to do it. That’s all I’m gonna do is sit in front of this thing and just — you can’t stop.

It’s always fun to sit down with students and share stories about entering the television industry and how things work at all stages and I had that opportunity the other day.

Daniela Torres, a just-graduated (Congratulations!) student of the Columbia College Semester in LA program asked me to guest on a podcast she had recently begun hosting with another college student she met during her internship (good example of networking in action!).

We could have talked all morning (the benefit of a 3 hour class session) but we held it to about an hour and fifteen minutes or so. Hopefully, along the way I answered some questions you might have about how the business works. So often it amounts to working hard at being a better writer and gathering a group of other talented, hard-working people around you so you can all rise together.

Dr. Rosanne Welch is a television writer with credits that include Beverly Hills 90210, Picket Fences, ABCNEWS: Nightline and Touched by an Angel. She also teaches Television Writing and the Art of Film at San Jose State University.

Rosanne discusses what made shows like Beverly Hills 90210 compelling, what to do and not to do when attempting to pitch a show to broadcast or streaming, what most young writers neglect in their writing process, and much more!

The Courier Thirteen Podcast is available on YouTube, Spotify, Apple Podcasts, SoundCloud, and Audible.

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28 What Would Margaret Do Today? from Concord Days: Margaret Fuller in Italy [Video]

In researching and writing my book on Giuseppe and Anita Garibaldi and the unification of Italy (A Man Of Action Saving Liberty: A Novel Based On The Life Of Giuseppe Garibaldi) I re-discovered the first American female war correspondent – Margaret Fuller — who I had first met in a college course on the Transcendentalists. I was once again fascinated by a life lived purposefully.

Then I found Tammy Rose’s podcast on the Transcendentalists – Concord Days – and was delighted when she asked me to guest for a discussion of Fuller’s work in Italy as both a journalist – and a nurse. — Rosanne

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Concord Days sends love to Margaret Fuller on the anniversary of her death in 1850.

The conversation focuses on Margaret’s exciting days in ITALY!

Dr. Rosanne Welch takes us through her adventures and enthusiastically reminds us what she was like when she was living her best life!

Transcript:

Tammy: What are the new things you know. I’m sure that Margaret felt the same way where people were like, you know, we women aren’t supposed to be this smart. Women aren’t supposed to be able to hold their own in conversation. What’s going on?

Rosanne: …and you know it’s so funny because can you imagine what she would have done in this world of the internet to disperse her ideas in all the many ways? Whether it’s on a website or a blog or whether she would have been you know part of a podcast as you said earlier. The ability to spread your ideas so far and wide would have been such a joy I think.

Tammy: Exactly and she’s one of the people who would also like — it’s not just her ideas that were radical but she was also — she was the first I think to interpret to translate Goethe to English right? So like — it’s not like she’s just coming at it from, you know, here I am this person who’s uneducated. She has the chops to help you know place everything and give everything context.

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Rosanne is talking about The Monkees on The Colin McEnroe Show at WNPR Tomorrow (Feb 9, 1 pm)

@drrosannewelch I’m talking about The Monkees tomorrow on WNPR. Tune in live at 1 pm EST or listen to the archive. #themonkees #monkees #1960s #history #book #tv ♬ original sound – Dr. Rosanne Welch

Tomorrow you can catch me chatting about Why The Monkees Matter on The Colin McEnroe Show on WNPR (or streaming online).

The whole show will cover The Monkees long and wonderful career from their music to the TV (my specialty)! I’ll be in the 2nd segment from running from 1:28 to 1:43 p.m Eastern time (10:28-10:43 Pacific).

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24 All About The Women…from “Female Creatives & A Star Is Born” [Video]

Transcript:

This is the only time they made separate posters and focused on them. Almost every movie iteration you see them both together because it’s a love story. That’s what you’re being told in that poster. I don’t know what these posters are telling you except do you know the title of the movie then you’ll understand but I had several students who never knew it was a remake when they went to see it. So they had no idea. The title meant nothing to them. It’s always the female that carries the story right? This is this giant poster of Ally. That’s what this is all about. All these women are the reasons these movies were made in the first place. That’s what drew the box office. That’s what drew the studios to support and every one of these is the story of a woman doing something new against the culture of her time. Facing one of the various waves of feminism right? If you think about 1937 women had had the vote for under 20 years. A bunch of women were still not voting because their husbands wouldn’t let them even though it was legal right and 54 we’re 10 years after the end of the war and the Rosie the Riveter and all that stuff when women were told to go back home, put on your pearls, and start vacuuming right? Don’t try to be in the man’s world. That’s your job. We get around to 76 and we’re in the second wave of feminism. That’s just three years after Roe versus Wade and we’re still doing the equal pay marches. We’re still looking for equal pay and if you get around to the current version, it’s ten years after the Lilly Ledbetter act, which gave fair pay to people doing the same job. So each of these movies takes place in their female characters working truly in a world where there were still feminist issues going on. Which i think is also part of what Dorothy started with.

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Connections at conferences matter! Through the most recent SCMS, I met Vicki Callahan, whose film history focus right now is on Mabel Normand. When she learned I could put together a lecture on the importance of the female voice in the A Star is Born franchise she asked me to give that lecture to her master students.

It made for a great opportunity for me to hone the ideas I’m working on for a chapter on that franchise that I’m writing for a new book from Bloomsbury: The Bloomsbury Handbook Of International Screenplay Theory. It’s always nice when one piece of research can be purposed in other ways – and it’s always fun revisiting such a female-centric film franchise – one that drew the talents of such powerful performers as Janet Gaynor, Judy Garland, Barbara Streisand, and Lady Gaga.

Find out why in this lecture!

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10 Star Trek From Women in Early TV for the American Women Writers National Museum [Video]

Many thanks to Janice Law of the American Women Writers National Museum who invited me to give a short talk on The Women of Early TV.

I enjoyed sharing the names and careers of women like Peg Lynch, Gertrude Berg, Selma Diamond, and D.C. Fontana to the members who gathered on Zoom last Wednesday morning. There are so many more I could have talked about whose names don’t appear in mainstream books about the history of television so we have to learn who they are and carry those names forward ourselves. It’s one of the missions of the Stephens College MFA in TV and Screenwriting – and has been one of my missions all my life.

Transcript:

Desilu Productions gave the world Star Trek, a program that is credited with saving Paramount Studios from going bankrupt. This program became, as you know, such a cult following that it was followed into rerun after rerun after reruns for so many years. It’s one of the first television shows anyone thought to make into a feature film story. No one had done that with an earlier tv show before but they felt they had enough fans going in that they could get away with it and certainly the first one was not considered as critically wonderful but the second one, The Wrath of Khan, was considered one of the classic films and one of the best films in the Star Trek series and this series is so important, of course, was even rebooted with an entirely new cast right? So this story has gone on and on. We also know that it went into Star Trek: The Next Generation. It went into Star Trek Discovery. There’s now Star Trek: Picard. All of these shows have been very important in getting female writers started in the business. If you sold an episode to a Star Trek — any of the various franchises — you were considered a serious writer and you move forward. People like Jane Espenson and all kinds of women have moved forward from Star Trek.

Many thanks to Janice Law of the American Women Writers National Museum who invited me to give a short talk on The Women of Early TV.

I enjoyed sharing the names and careers of women like Peg Lynch, Gertrude Berg, Selma Diamond, and D.C. Fontana to the members who gathered on Zoom last Wednesday morning. There are so many more I could have talked about whose names don’t appear in mainstream books about the history of television so we have to learn who they are and carry those names forward ourselves. It’s one of the missions of the Stephens College MFA in TV and Screenwriting – and has been one of my missions all my life.

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Women pioneers who created, produced, or shepherded many of America’s most wildly popular, early television programs will be profiled by Dr. Rosanne Welch.

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01 Introduction from The Difficulties and Delicacies of Writing the First Female Doctor in 50+ years [Video] [Doctor Who]

It was great to be able to attend this year’s SD WhoCon in San Diego and present this lecture on “The Difficulties and Delicacies of Writing the First Female Doctor in 50+ years” in which I discuss how successful I think showrunner Christopher Chibnall was in making that transition.

It gave me a chance to talk about the creative work of a showrunner/screenwriter while also reconnecting to some friends we had met at this same convention some 3 years ago – and to talk about one of my favorite subjects – Doctor Who!

Transcript:

All right, ladies and gentlemen, it’s lovely to have you here. On my campuses, I’m kind of the Doctor of Doctor Who which makes people laugh. They’re like can you look at this academically and you can. What I’m going to talk about today is based on a chapter that I’ve written in a new book. I always feel bad about academic books. This thing is like 120 bucks because it’s meant for college libraries or whatnot and there are academics all over the UK and the US who’ve written chapters in it and of course it’s about the era of the New Dawn, the era of the Jody Whitaker Doctor. So when I saw this go up I said well I have a lot to say about screenwriting because officially this is who I am. I love that picture because it was taken at my college for an article they did on me. I worked for schools called Stephens College and we teach an MFA in screenwriting and so I always look at everything from the point of view of the person who wrote this material. I really am very interested in screenwriters more than directors because people sometimes will credit a director and I’m like well they didn’t make up the story. If you liked the twist or the character or piece of dialogue, they didn’t make that up. They just put the cameras at a lovely place and accented it. So let’s think about the people who wrote these things and so that’s what I do.

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35 Finding The Time To Write…from Worry and Wonder | The Courier Thirteen Podcast [Video]

Watch the entire presentation – Worry and Wonder | The Courier Thirteen Podcast | Episode # 29 here

Transcript:

Host: I mean how do you — how did you do it? How do you practice on your schedule? Do you like time limit yourself. You’re like, oh like one month or like one week to do three acts or something like that.

Rosanne: Well you get into a pattern when you do it. I mean the Writers Guild offers two weeks to write a script. That’s what if you’re a freelance writer they have to give you two weeks to go home but when you’re on a staff they expect you to write it in one week. They expect you to be able to write 10 to 15 producible pages a day. So that’s where you have to get yourself to if you’re really going to take it seriously. So yeah this took two months. This takes one month and you get it down to three weeks and two weeks and the best you can. You have to find the times a day that works for you. Some people are night writers. I am not but some people can work really great from 10 in the evening till two in the morning and then sleep from three to ten right? Okay then you have to know that and then you need to build a day job that allows you to do that right because that’s gonna do the most work. Some people — I go from like 6 am to like 2 p.m and then I make phone calls and do other kinds of email work and stuff like that because then I sort of run out of my creative excitement or whatever. So I have to make sure that I don’t do anything else until later. I don’t take meetings or do things like that until later in the day. If you don’t do that when you finally approach your computer to start writing something, it will take you so much longer and it will be so much more frustrating that you won’t get to the point you want and you might turn away right? So you have to be in a comfortable place to do that and you know this town is full of different kinds of jobs you can make work for that whatever is the time frame that you need.

It’s always fun to sit down with students and share stories about entering the television industry and how things work at all stages and I had that opportunity the other day.

The Courier Thirteen Podcast is available on YouTube, Spotify, Apple Podcasts, SoundCloud, and Audible.

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27 The Fuller Biographies from Concord Days: Margaret Fuller in Italy [Video]

Watch this entire presentation

Concord Days sends love to Margaret Fuller on the anniversary of her death in 1850.

The conversation focuses on Margaret’s exciting days in ITALY!

Dr. Rosanne Welch takes us through her adventures and enthusiastically reminds us what she was like when she was living her best life!

Transcript:

Tammy: So do you want to talk about some of the biographies and stuff that originated after she passed and how you know those versions of her might like the older versions the contemporary versions might not be so accurate?

Rosanne: I think that’s very true and of course, as you said earlier that’s true in so much of our history. Someone decided what we should share, what was acceptable, and you could — I think from Emerson’s point of view, I understand that he wanted people to love his friend. So he was he was filtering out what he thought would get in their way of understanding how great she was but then of course the next guy reads that book and only reports that much and that much. I mean it’s true also of the various iterations of the Diary of Anne Frank. Her father only lets certain things out because he didn’t want people to know that she sometimes wrote that she was mad at her mother because that was the woman he loved and he wanted you know and then later people have added those things in to say but here’s the real picture. It doesn’t mean she was a terrible little girl. It just means every teenager goes “my mom is making me crazy” It just gives her the more humanity to know all those dimensions and I think, yes, that’s what’s missing in these early biographies and we have to go back and really look at her writing — what exists — and then analyze that to get a sense of who she was but I think her activities tell us that. So teaching for Bronson Alcott tells us she was okay with an inter-racial group. She thought that you know desegregation was the proper thing to do. We wouldn’t do that. You could work for somebody else. You could tutor for anybody. You chose that job and you knew it was controversial and other people would judge you by it.

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23 More on The Bradley Cooper Version…from “Female Creatives & A Star Is Born” [Video]

Transcript:

In this scene, and these are quotes from Bradley Cooper as he was making the film he’s being interviewed right, he says he’s on stage trying to support her but his demons won’t let him right? So we still have the debacle but it’s not because he wants to ruin her night. He’s trying to be there to support her and then it’s embarrassing and terrible and sad and also he says that at the end of the movie, she’s just starting right and what she’s going to create is going to be bigger than what we’ve seen prior. That means her movie isn’t this movie — that her movie is the next one which will never be made. That means this is the Jackson Maine story and that’s not what I signed up for. I signed up for the star — the female star — being born. So I think that’s a huge change that he as a male writer has brought to this franchise. You look at the writing credits, right? So if Bradley wrote it with this guy Will Fetters. If you go to the Writers Guild when you have time when it’s open again in the library, they have a copy of the first draft and if you read it to compare to the film that you saw in 2019 you will be shocked because it is not brilliant. It is this guy who’s an Academy Award winner for Forrest Gump and I think he has two Academy Awards, Eric Roth who came in to do the rewrite that really molded the piece but he’s taking the ideas that Bradley Cooper had which are to focus more on Jackson Maine’s character. They base themselves on the Moss Heart screenplay, right? So by the time we’re done with this Dorothy’s name has finally disappeared entirely even though all the bones of it are really still there and really still her if you ask me.

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Find out why in this lecture!

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09 Other Desilu Shows From Women in Early TV for the American Women Writers National Museum [Video]

Many thanks to Janice Law of the American Women Writers National Museum who invited me to give a short talk on The Women of Early TV.

RMW Rosanne Signature for Web

Transcript:

…and those programs include some very very popular shows. The Andy Griffith Show — still in reruns today as well and something that we know in television history for a million reasons including the fact that this young man grew up to be Academy Award-winning director Ronnie Howard right? So this was an amazingly iconic show that people still recognize and reference today. Obviously The Mod Squad — very fresh and new thing for the 60s. So she had a good eye — Lucille Ball had a good eye for what would sell and what was progressive and moving forward right? Isn’t that interesting? She captured both the past and the present in the ideas that she put forward and of course, Mannix was just basically an iconic detective show. However, also think about the progressiveness of it. His “girl Friday” was an African-American woman and she was a working woman, right? Who had a real position in his company and she was very intrinsic to what he did. So that’s a pretty amazing step forward again all coming out of Lucy’s creative ideas. Yes to this no to that. These are the shows she said yes to including, I like to say, a little show called Star Trek right?

Many thanks to Janice Law of the American Women Writers National Museum who invited me to give a short talk on The Women of Early TV.

Watch this entire presentation

Women pioneers who created, produced, or shepherded many of America’s most wildly popular, early television programs will be profiled by Dr. Rosanne Welch.

Get your copy today!

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