Video – On Screenwriting and Media with Dr. Rosanne Welch

Lois Weber: More than a Writer-Director She’s the Auteur Activist of Early Cinema – Dr. Rosanne Welch, Script Magazine, April 2025

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Her Career Outlasted the Hays Code: Kathryn Scola – Dr. Rosanne Welch, Script Magazine, March 2025

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Dr. Rosanne Welch Interview, Screenwriting Research Network Conversations [Video]

I sat down for an interview about my time as Chair of the Screenwriting Research Network during our last conference in Olumouc, Czech Republic, last September.

I had the chance to discuss the conference we held at Stephens College the year before, how we chose the theme, and the benefit of being a smaller group where real connections have been made. This is part of a series of oral histories on past created by the Executive Council which have morphed into these “Conversations”recorded by EC member Lucian Georgescu (with Camera and editing by Marius Donici).

You can see several other members interviewed on the SRN YouTube Channel as well.

Julia Crawford Ivers: From Rich Widow to Writer-Director – Dr. Rosanne Welch, Script Magazine, February 2025

Born just 4 years after the end of the Civil War in Boonville, Missouri, the scripts Julia Crawford Ivers wrote (and sometimes directed) often tackled issues of prejudice. After the war, her family emigrated to Los Angeles. As with many female creatives in this era, Ivers used her screenplays to highlight women’s issues from forced marriage to domestic abuse to prejudice.

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Meet Beulah Marie Dix: Award-Winning Scholar and Anti-War Novelist Turned Screenwriter – Dr. Rosanne Welch, Script Magazine, January 2025

Born on Christmas Day in 1876 in Massachusetts, Dix and her family lived in various cities around the historic state until she moved to Cambridge, Massachusetts to study English and History at Radcliffe College. There she became the first female to be granted the Sohier Literary Prize, for the best thesis of a Harvard or Radcliffe student. From there it seemed a quick move into the world of writing.

Dix began with books about her favorite subject – the history that surrounded her in Massachusetts. In 1899, at the age of 23, she published Soldier Rigdale: How He Sailed in the Mayflower and How He Served Miles Standish. Her first play, A Rose of Plymouth Town ran for a month in 1902, followed by The Road to Yesterday, which ran for 8 months in 1907. Altogether Dix wrote 18 books and 5 plays before moving into the new world of film.

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Writer, Producer, Agent and Mentor (And Mom to the DeMille Boys) – Dr. Rosanne Welch, Script Magazine, December 2024

The surname DeMille (or de Mille) brings up thoughts of the famous line from Billy Wilder and Raymond Chandler’s Sunset Boulevard “Mr. de Mille, I’m ready for my close up” which references silent screen director Cecil. Perhaps people remember his brother, William, who started as a playwright and became a Hollywood director and joined 3rd wife Clara Beranger in founding the film school at the University of Southern California. And sometimes the surname conjures of memories of Tony Award-winning choreographer Agnes de Mille (daughter of William/granddaughter of Beatrice). From now on it should bring up the writer, producer and mentor who worked frequently in both Broadway and Hollywood – Beatrice DeMille. (From here on out we will call her Beatrice to avoid confusion).

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From Silent Murder Mysteries to Andy Hardy’s Americana, Agnes Christine Johnston Wrote it All – Dr. Rosanne Welch, Script Magazine, November 2024

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The Literary References Doctor Who Has Introduced You To With Dr. Rosanne Welch– San Diego Who Con 2024 [Video]

At San Diego Who Con 2024 (https://www.sdwhocon.com/), I enjoyed lecturing on “From Shakespeare to Shelley or Dante to Dickens: The Literary References Who Has Introduced You To!”.

I first thought of it while watching an episode with my favorite classic Doctor Peter Davison. I heard a line that was so specific I thought that it had to come from some book I didn’t know. It did. So then I researched what other famous authors had been quoted by the various Doctors and deeply enjoyed finding lots of Shakespeare and Dylan Thomas and of course, Byron and Shelley were in that mix. It was a reminder that writers READ. They read a lot to fuel their work.

The lecture also allowed me to highlight some great English actors who’ve starred in Shakespeare’s works like Patrick Stewart, Derek Jacobi, and Alex Kingston – some of whom also (of course) guested on Doctor Who.

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Celebrate the Daring Dialogue of Women Writers with Dr. Rosanne Welch – Screenwriting Research Network Conference 2004, Palacky University, Olomouc, Czechia

With the conference theme “A Conversation Beyond Script,” I decided to use my presentation time to “Celebrate the Daring Dialogue of Women Writers,” which allowed me to introduce the audience to the work of famous female screenwriters, from Anita Loos to Mae West to Lillian Hellman.

Then I delved into some names lesser-known to our international SRN members because they came from the TV world before the great sharing that streaming has offered us. From Gertrude Berg of The Goldbergs in the 1950s to Susan Harris (Soap, Golden Girls) and Linda Bloodworth Thomason (Designing Women) we covered the progressive (and often controversial) topics they brought to mainstream Americans.