On Screenwriting and Media with Dr. Rosanne Welch
Writing, Film, Television and More!
Some like to teach that writers shouldn’t “direct on the page.”
But in fact, most of the screenwriters who sell and win Oscars are people whose voice on the page is recognizable.
Those are the screenplays that sell because a person at a studio has to read the script and envision the movie. If they don’t see it, they don’t buy it.
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Transcript:
…And that’s very important why, when we’re teaching screenwriting — It’s funny. People who come from a directing background like to teach that writers shouldn’t “direct on the page.” Don’t say things about where the camera should go. Don’t say how the actor is feeling. Don’t talk casually. But in fact, most of the screenwriters who sell and win Oscars are people whose voice is so recognizable. Aaron Sorkin sounds like Aaron Sorkin in everything he does. Every single piece of action is as if you are sitting there talking to him. Right? William Goldman did that. most of the big names — Nora Ephron — who was a major American female screenwriter. Their personality comes through in the lines and they do tell the director “I need this. I need this closeup. I want this moment. This is exactly what needs to happen here. Those are the screenplays that do sell because a person at a studio has to read the thing and envision the movie. If they don’t see it. They don’t buy it and they don’t make it. So that piece of advice has never worked for me.
Watch this entire presentation
A Note About This Presentation
A clip from my keynote speech at the 10th Screenwriters´(hi)Stories Seminar for the interdisciplinary Graduation Program in “Education, Art, and History of Culture”, in Mackenzie Presbyterian University, at São Paulo, SP, Brazil, focused on the topic “Why Researching Screenwriters (has Always) Mattered.” I was especially pleased with the passion these young scholars have toward screenwriting and it’s importance in transmitting culture across the man-made borders of our world.
To understand the world we have to understand its stories and to understand the world’s stories we must understand the world’s storytellers. A century ago and longer those people would have been the novelists of any particular country but since the invention of film, the storytellers who reach the most people with their ideas and their lessons have been the screenwriters. My teaching philosophy is that: Words matter, Writers matter, and Women writers matte, r so women writers are my focus because they have been the far less researched and yet they are over half the population. We cannot tell the stories of the people until we know what stories the mothers have passed down to their children. Those are the stories that last. Now is the time to research screenwriters of all cultures and the stories they tell because people are finally recognizing the work of writers and appreciating how their favorite stories took shape on the page long before they were cast, or filmed, or edited. But also because streaming services make the stories of many cultures now available to a much wider world than ever before.
Many thanks to Glaucia Davino for the invitation.
* A portion of each sale from Amazon.com directly supports our blogs
** Many of these books may be available from your local library. Check it out!
† Available from the LA Public Library
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I’m pleased to have been invited to be the guest on the weekly Twitter show #Scriptchat, hosted by editor Jeanne Veillette Bowerman.
On Sunday Februrary 14th at 4pm PDT we’ll be talking about behavior in a writers room, and the benefits of having an MFA in TV and Screenwriting.
If you haven’t checked in with their shows you should know that #Scriptchat brings the guests to the party so you can learn in a free, unbiased and respectful platform. Their #1 goal is to thoroughly enjoy spending an hour together every Sunday with writers working hard to improve and succeed, and they’re proud to have accomplished that time and time again, since 2009! – Rosanne
ScriptChat with Dr. Rosanne Welch – Sunday, February 14, 2021
Wednesday, February 10, 2021
At 4 PM PDT – 5 PM PDT
TOPIC: Working in / behavior in a writers room, & benefits of having an MFA #WritingCommunity
@RosanneWelch – ##screenwriter, TV writer, novelist & Exec Dir, @stephenscollege MFA In TV & #Screenwriting
Wednesday, February 10, 2021
At 4 PM PDT – 5 PM PDT
Register Now
Explore the low-residency MFA in TV + Screenwriting with Executive Director Dr. Rosanne Welch. Our mission is to increase the impact of women and other under-represented voices in television and film. Our faculty and mentors include some of the best working writers in Hollywood, and our curriculum includes an in-depth look at the business side of TV and screenwriting.
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![47 More On Screenplays As Literature from Why Researching Screenwriters Has Always Mattered [Video] (51 seconds)](https://rosannewelch.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/02/rmw-sao-paolo-47.png)
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Transcript:
In my family, we like A Christmas Carol — Dickens’ A Christmas Carol — and it’s been made into movies several times and for us, the best version is the one made by The Muppets because in that version Gonzo the muppet gives the action dialogue — the narration — that you would not see in any other version of the film but he narrates — he walks around town — as Dickens narrating. So you hear language that you miss in the other movies. So, to me, that’s what’s happening when people start reading actual screenplays. They’re seeing the craft as it exists on the page. Yes, of course, we’d like it made into a film and we want to see the beautiful vistas and we want to see actors who are wonderful but I just really need the story. That’s enough for me. That’s gonna make me feel something.
Watch this entire presentation
A Note About This Presentation
A clip from my keynote speech at the 10th Screenwriters´(hi)Stories Seminar for the interdisciplinary Graduation Program in “Education, Art, and History of Culture”, in Mackenzie Presbyterian University, at São Paulo, SP, Brazil, focused on the topic “Why Researching Screenwriters (has Always) Mattered.” I was especially pleased with the passion these young scholars have toward screenwriting and it’s importance in transmitting culture across the man-made borders of our world.
To understand the world we have to understand its stories and to understand the world’s stories we must understand the world’s storytellers. A century ago and longer those people would have been the novelists of any particular country but since the invention of film, the storytellers who reach the most people with their ideas and their lessons have been the screenwriters. My teaching philosophy is that: Words matter, Writers matter, and Women writers matte, r so women writers are my focus because they have been the far less researched and yet they are over half the population. We cannot tell the stories of the people until we know what stories the mothers have passed down to their children. Those are the stories that last. Now is the time to research screenwriters of all cultures and the stories they tell because people are finally recognizing the work of writers and appreciating how their favorite stories took shape on the page long before they were cast, or filmed, or edited. But also because streaming services make the stories of many cultures now available to a much wider world than ever before.
Many thanks to Glaucia Davino for the invitation.
* A portion of each sale from Amazon.com directly supports our blogs
** Many of these books may be available from your local library. Check it out!
† Available from the LA Public Library
Podcast: Play in new window | Download
Subscribe: RSS
Watch this entire presentation
![46 Screenplays As Literature from Why Researching Screenwriters Has Always Mattered [Video] (1 minute)](https://rosannewelch.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/01/rmw-sao-paolo-46.png)
Subscribe to Rosanne’s Channel and receive notice of each new video!
Transcript:
So to me the question of why has researching screen readers — screenwriters always mattered is because of all these reasons I’ve noted. Also one of the biggest things that makes me so excited is people are beginning to read screenplays as literature. I think maybe 20 years ago I saw a book publish the top five screenplays of the year and I was amazed that I could read the scripts in their format on a page right and so the more we see that happen — somebody like William Goldman who’s very famous in the states, he published several of his screenplays. I remember when Rocky came out they published a screenplay because it’s Rocky, so everyone loves Rocky, but the idea that now we really know this isn’t a blueprint. We’re going to look at this script. We’re going to read the action lines and we’re going to hear the voice of the writer in a way that we can’t on screen because those things aren’t what the audience is given right.
Watch this entire presentation
A Note About This Presentation
A clip from my keynote speech at the 10th Screenwriters´(hi)Stories Seminar for the interdisciplinary Graduation Program in “Education, Art, and History of Culture”, in Mackenzie Presbyterian University, at São Paulo, SP, Brazil, focused on the topic “Why Researching Screenwriters (has Always) Mattered.” I was especially pleased with the passion these young scholars have toward screenwriting and it’s importance in transmitting culture across the man-made borders of our world.
To understand the world we have to understand its stories and to understand the world’s stories we must understand the world’s storytellers. A century ago and longer those people would have been the novelists of any particular country but since the invention of film, the storytellers who reach the most people with their ideas and their lessons have been the screenwriters. My teaching philosophy is that: Words matter, Writers matter, and Women writers matte, r so women writers are my focus because they have been the far less researched and yet they are over half the population. We cannot tell the stories of the people until we know what stories the mothers have passed down to their children. Those are the stories that last. Now is the time to research screenwriters of all cultures and the stories they tell because people are finally recognizing the work of writers and appreciating how their favorite stories took shape on the page long before they were cast, or filmed, or edited. But also because streaming services make the stories of many cultures now available to a much wider world than ever before.
Many thanks to Glaucia Davino for the invitation.
* A portion of each sale from Amazon.com directly supports our blogs
** Many of these books may be available from your local library. Check it out!
† Available from the LA Public Library
I’m thrilled to have been asked to make a presentation for the American Women Writers National Museum (AWWNM) on the topic of “An Introduction to the Women of Early TV: There are More Women than Lucy to Love“. I’ll be discussing the groundbreaking work of women from Gertrude Berg (one of the first women to create, write, produce and star in a long-running hit — The Goldbergs) to D.C. Fontana (Star Trek). — 
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RSVP Today!
Email AWWNM1@gmail.com
Wed Feb 10, 2021 noon-12:45 EDT
“An Introduction to the Women of Early TV: There are More Women than Lucy to Love“
Sponsored by: American Women Writers National Museum
Time & Place: noon-12:45 p.m. EDT / 9 AM PDT via Zoom
All AWWNM programs are now via Zoom until further notice. Invitations are sent via email to AWWNM’s mailing list. RSVPS are REQUIRED in order to receive a link to a specific program. If you would like an invitation, email request to AWWNM1@gmail.com.
Dr. Rosanne Welch, Executive Director of the Stephens College MFA in TV and Screenwriting, Author, Historian and Book Reviews editor of the Journal of Screenwriting will profile pioneer women who created, produced and worked on many of America’s most wildly popular early TV Programs.
“My goal is to rescue these talented women from historical oblivion”, she said.
Some of the women writers she will discuss are:
The Stephens College MFA in TV and Screenwriting is building a relationship with the Autry Museum of the American West since both organizations are devoted to bringing out more diverse and untold stories. Last year we were able to take our cohort of graduating MFA candidates to the museum’s theatre for a showing of Michael Wilson’s Salt of the Earth and we had plans to present a film of our choice this year – but of course the pandemic changed all that. Instead, Autry Curator Josh Garrett-Davis asked me if I would sit for an interview about female screenwriters in the western genre and so “When Women Wrote Westerns” came to be a part of their “What Is a Western? Interview Series”.
I had a great time discussing so many wonderful women writers – from Jeanne MacPherson to D.C. Fontana to Edna Ferber to Emily Andras. If you love westerns I suggest you watch Josh’s other interviews covering everything from the work of Native Americans in Western movies to films in the western-horror hybrid. —
![Watch Dr. Rosanne Welch on What Is a Western? Interview Series: When Women Wrote Westerns from the Autry Museum of the American West [Video] (27 minutes)](https://rosannewelch.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/01/rmw-autry-interview-w3h-20210122.jpg)
As part of a series exploring the significance of the Western genre and the ways in which the movies shape our understanding of the American West, Autry Curator Josh Garrett-Davis interviews Professor Rosanne Welch about the women screenwriters of Hollywood and their contributions to the Western genre.
Find more information at the Autry Museum of the American West
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![45 Universal Themes in Samantha! from Brazil from Why Researching Screenwriters Has Always Mattered [Video] (37 seconds)](https://rosannewelch.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/01/rmw-sao-paolo-45.png)
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Transcript:
So when I watched Samantha!, I thought, “Okay so how does this work? Oh, you know what? Pretty universal. She wants to be important. She wants to matter in the world. That’s what everybody wants, right, and she wants to be loved. That’s — that’s ridiculously universal but every story that teaches that theme just gives you the details the writer had to offer and to me, that’s one of the most beautiful things because that’s how we learn we’re all the same. All this nonsense — about borders and walls and things I don’t want to talk about — it’s nonsense because we’re all the same right? That’s what we need to learn.
Watch this entire presentation
A Note About This Presentation
A clip from my keynote speech at the 10th Screenwriters´(hi)Stories Seminar for the interdisciplinary Graduation Program in “Education, Art, and History of Culture”, in Mackenzie Presbyterian University, at São Paulo, SP, Brazil, focused on the topic “Why Researching Screenwriters (has Always) Mattered.” I was especially pleased with the passion these young scholars have toward screenwriting and it’s importance in transmitting culture across the man-made borders of our world.
To understand the world we have to understand its stories and to understand the world’s stories we must understand the world’s storytellers. A century ago and longer those people would have been the novelists of any particular country but since the invention of film, the storytellers who reach the most people with their ideas and their lessons have been the screenwriters. My teaching philosophy is that: Words matter, Writers matter, and Women writers matte, r so women writers are my focus because they have been the far less researched and yet they are over half the population. We cannot tell the stories of the people until we know what stories the mothers have passed down to their children. Those are the stories that last. Now is the time to research screenwriters of all cultures and the stories they tell because people are finally recognizing the work of writers and appreciating how their favorite stories took shape on the page long before they were cast, or filmed, or edited. But also because streaming services make the stories of many cultures now available to a much wider world than ever before.
Many thanks to Glaucia Davino for the invitation.
* A portion of each sale from Amazon.com directly supports our blogs
** Many of these books may be available from your local library. Check it out!
† Available from the LA Public Library
Podcast: Play in new window | Download
Subscribe: RSS
During every workshop intensive for the Stephens College MFA in TV and Screenwriting I have the privilege of creating and moderating a panel of female screenwriters discussing various topics.
Our most recent panel focused on “Transitioning to Television” and included panelists who came to television from previous careers. This allowed me to talk to women who came to TV whose first careers included being a doctor, lobbyist, college professor and, of especially pride for our MFA program, a former Senior Physical Security Analyst for federal agencies, U.S. Army Reserve veteran.
All of them are now writing on major television shows and their advice and honesty was greatly appreciated. — Rosanne
For this session, we teamed up with Stephens College MFA in TV and Screenwriting for a discussion on transitioning to TV writing from other careers. Learn how our panel of TV writers and producers made the jump to television, how their previous experiences inform their writing, and how that lens impacts their approach in the writers room.
Panelists are Zoanne Clack, M.D., MPH (Executive Producer, Grey’s Anatomy), Rashaan Dozier-Escalante (Staff Writer, SEAL Team), Akilah Green (Co-producer, Black Monday), and Calaya Michelle Stallworth, Ph.D (Executive Story Editor, Fear of the Walking Dead).
Moderated by Dr. Rosanne Welch, Director of Stephens College MFA in TV and Screenwriting.
Filmed on January 13, 2021.
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