Screenwriter Jule Selbo created Building Story Through Character after years of writing on successful television shows and films and then creating the MFA in Screenwriting at California State University, Fullerton where she teaches those skills to up and coming writers. Her focus on character and her 11 Steps of Story Structure streamlines ideas from other screenwriting gurus whose lists are longer and (to my mind) more contrived. You can take Selbo’s 11 Steps and apply them to stories as old as Gilgamesh and as modern as Wonder Woman – as she does in the book so that the reader can see the pattern repeat itself over and over again.- Rosanne
Doctor Who: The Writer’s Tale by Russell T. Davies | Gifts for the Screenwriter #4It is nearly impossible to ‘teach’ a student how to become an executive producer/head writer but this collection of emails between Russell T. Davies and reporter, Benjamin Cook encapsulates a year in the life of Davies as he wrapped out the Doctor Who tenure of David Tennant . One watches a story idea go from a simple sentence about ‘water being dangerous’ to a full-fledged script called “Waters of Mars” in a matter of weeks while also reading the difficulty in planning characters for guest stars who end up changing their schedules and dropping out of a project. Those kinds of real moments make this book a must-read for aspiring television writers on either side of the pond. – Rosanne
So I teach history and I start in the silent film world, so I disagree with Warren. I go chronologically. This is a period they have never heard of and all the movies are free on YouTube. Nothing like telling them they can watch whatever they have to watch for free. That works, right? And so here they meet Anita Loos, Gene Gauntier — the first women — the first person to do filming on location. She went to Jerusalem to film the story of Jesus Christ — the first time it was put on film and it’s a really beautiful film you can see, for free, on YouTube. Then Jeanie MacPherson who wrote all of Cecil B. DeMille’s early movies that were successes. When she stopped working for him all his stuff failed. Nobody knows her name and she’s quite brilliant. So I thinks it’s important for women students today to know that women once ran Hollywood so all this discussion about “I don’t know if women should direct a movie” is not worth having, because they did and they were. They were the highest paid people in this town, so I think that’s important an important think for them to remember.
For me this on set diary by a writer who also starred in the film and had to make script changes in the evenings after a full day of filming is a wonderful look at the real life of working writer/performer. The bonus fact iis that it is written by Emma Thompson about her work on Sense and Sensibility – a most marvelous movie to view and study.
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One of the best biographies of a writer – and a female writer at that – Without Lying Down tells the story of Frances Marion, the highest paid screenwriter and a double Oscar winner whose career spanned the Silent Era and transformed into Talkies quite well (judging by the Oscars). Since she surrounded herself with a cadre of other female screenwriters at the time, the book is a marvelous introduction to a time when women ran Hollywood. — Rosanne
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You got to the next question which is my first exercise in class — Name the writer. Lucky if they can. If it’s a writer/director, they can. Otherwise, they can’t and they suddenly are embarrassed because they adore the words of a person whose name they can’t tell you. If they have a favorite book they can tell you who wrote it, but they don’t know who wrote their favorite film. So it’s my goal to make them know that. I can’t stand the Auteur Theory because I think it’s bullshit. Directors aren’t the authors of their film. I don’t want to insult any directors in the class but you can’t direct something that doesn’t exist on the page first. It’s a collaborative thing and directors have lovely, but they’ve been given all the credit for far too long because, as we know, it goes back to all the book reviews in Cahiers and they came up with that theory. It’s nonsense.
This is about strategies in teaching film and television history and current events — which is what David will do when I am done — and so, gee, I’m all about the chicks so we have Dorothy Parker and we have Tina Fey. There is a direct line between those women and if you love Tina Fey then you had better study a little bit of Dorothy Parker or you don’t understand why Tina Fey works today. So, why study screenwriting history? That’s actually the first screen of a lecture that I give on this very topic to my students on opening day because when you mention movies nobody says, “You know I love that shot in… ” They say, “My name is Inigo Montoya.You killed my father. Prepare to Die.” They remember the words in the movies. They remember the screenwriting, but when we look at the history of tv and film, we’re not doing that. We’re teaching directors. Everyone can name their favorite films and they can normally name the director of those films.
I am also on the editorial board for Written By Magazine and the book review editor of the Journal of Screenwriting so if anyone’s interested in writing book reviews for the Journal of Screenwriting which publishes out of the UK, please let me know because I am always looking for book reviewers and you get the book for free, but also I have — the schools that I teach at have subscription to the journal. I have students read journal articles because I want them — it is a Masters Program — I want them to have a comfort level with that, but I have my undergrads at least do one journal article reading as well to have an accessibility to that. And then I get the schools and/or the kids to read Written By Magazine every month. We do a different screenwriter or television writer on the front cover. It’s a wonderful inside look at how the process of writing is done. The subscription is not that expensive, rather than a textbook for undergrads, but we also publish most of that online for free at the Written By web site, so they can read these articles on their own as assignments and learn about these writers. So I think all that stuff is valid for the class.
