On Screenwriting and Media with Dr. Rosanne Welch – Page 141

05 Mary Shelley and The Evil Novel from The Sisterhood of Science Fiction – Dr. Rosanne Welch [Video] (1 minute)

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The Sisterhood of Science Fiction: A Walk Through Some Writers and Characters You (Should) Know And Love

This one allowed me to riff on some of my favorite female science fiction writers across time, whether they be novelists or television writers. It also opened up a good conversation on what art we support and include in our lives – and what that art says to us and about us. — Rosanne

Transcript:

So Frankenstein is fascinating but tell me, what you notice about these two copies of this book? What’s different? The covers are different in what way? {Audience: The font is a little more sinister.) True. True. The font is a little more sinister. There’s also a big difference. (Audience: Her name isn’t on it) In 1818 they’re not gonna publish a book written by a woman because not only were women not supposed to write novels — they weren’t supposed to read novels because they’ll rot your brain and damage your interior organs such that you can’t have children. Yes. Which is kind of what we say about video games these days. So every new piece of media is going to rot your brain and destroy you. Now we say destroys the boys as well as the girls but still there was this idea that women should not dabble in that business of novels. They were very bad for you, which is kind of hilarious cuz now I’m telling you to read a novel over the summer. It will be good for you.

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Paperback LA 3 on KPFK’s Bibliocracy Radio with comments on “Hey, Hey, They Wrote The Monkees!”

KPFK’s Andrew Tonkovitch interviewed Paperback L.A. Editor Susan La Tempa for Bibliocracy Radio last weekend and they had nice things to say about how fun my piece on the writers of The Monkees and how much he had misunderstood the band until he read my article.

They discuss the whole anthology in this interview, and touch on The Monkees around the 20:20 mark.

Host Andrew Tonkovitch interviews editor Susan LaTempa,
June 16, 2019 about the Paperback L.A. Book 3, A Casual Anthology: Secrets. SigAlerts. Ravines. Records.

He says, “This one is titled, joyfully, ‘Secrets, Sigalerts, Ravines, Records.’ Once again, this compendium-meets-literary/artistic collage includes both new discoveries and reminders, with a multi-media collection including fiction, nonfiction, photography, lists– a free-form provocation which, after reading, will inspire readers to pursue recommended or featured writers, topics, historical moments, artists and places. It’s a little hard to describe but you will know it — and love it! — when you see it.”

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See the entire collection of photos from the event

Editor Susan La Tempa hosted all the local contributors at the event space in the Helms Bakery district, which gave us a chance to check out that lovely landmark. Then I had the chance to meet Lisa See – author of On Gold Mountain, which tells the story of 4 generations of her Chinese-American family living in Los Angeles and running a factory, an antique shop and a restaurant popular with the Hollywood crowd of the 1930s and 40s. We had first heard of her book when Doug and I were docents at the Autry Western Heritage Museum in Griffith Park and they had a whole exhibit dedicated to telling the story of the book (which it turns out Lisa curated!) It was so popular an exhibit that it hung around long enough for Joseph to be born and to become old enough to play in the little mini restaurant they set up with pots and plates and menus. So it was wonderful to hear Lisa read an excerpt from the book and then to talk to her during the book signing segment of the afternoon.

I was also deeply impressed by the way Susan opened the event with a native Tongva greeting – something I had only seen done at the public events we attended in New Zealand where everyone began events with the traditional Maori greeting where you introduce yourself in terms of what is your mountain, your river, and your ancestry. Beautiful! So hearing it in Los Angeles was a lovely idea we all ought to emulate.

Then the super cool thing was that several friends made the trip down to Culver City – thanks Duke and Dena Jackels and Dan and Liz Forer – and Euphemia – for coming to the reading, and for buying books!

Audience at “When Women Wrote Hollywood” Panel, Denver Pop Culture Con

Audience at “When Women Wrote Hollywood” Panel

Dr. Rosanne Welch and writers from “When Women Wrote Hollywood” at the Denver Pop Culture Con

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Remember to Credit The Screenwriter!

While we at Screenwriting Research Network strive to force a focus on screenwriters, we need allies in the non-academic world to properly credit them.

In that vein, I recently wrote to the Guardian’s film critic about a moment in his review of ‘Gangs of New York’ where he credited the director for a visual moment that occurred, clearly and firstly, in the original script — something that happens far too frequently. Often, such letters yield nothing outside of getting the issue off my chest, but today I received this response:

“Dear Dr Welch: many thanks for your email, which has been passed on to me. Your comment is entirely fair: I should have credited this moment to the screenwriters: Jay Cocks, Steven Zaillian and Kenneth Lonergan. With all good wishes,”

I received this response after sending this email to The Guardian’s film desk:

“As a professor of Screenwriting History for an MFA program in the U.S. I greatly enjoy sharing your reviews of American films with my students, so I hope you don’t mind my noting a small mistake I found while researching your review of Gangs of New York – but again, being a professor of Screenwriting History (not film history because film history is the history of directors) I found you fell victim to one of the age-old issues of the old auteur theory. You credited a visual moment to the director when, in fact, it had existed in the original script, therefore the credit ought to have gone to the writer(s) and their imaginations and use of quality research.”

“The streets erupt in a saturnalia of lawlessness, to which the director adds an inspired touch: an escaped elephant from Barnum’s circus trumpeting down the rubble-strewn streets.”

Yet that elephant was in the script (which I researched at the WGA Library in Los Angeles) all along, as you can see:

“116 EXT. CANAL STREET DAWN

The first thing we see is an ELEPHANT, who trumpets fearfully at the sudden sound of the shattered door. The gang stops, wary of this huge refugee from Barnum’s Museum, but the animal is more frightened of them. It hurries on down the street…”

I only make this point because those kinds of errors lead to the continued idea that directors are the only authors of a film – an idea most film programs are debunking by the day. I hope critics (since they are also writers) will remember screenwriters more prominently in their work in the future. I have taken to reminding people that, when you speak of your favorite films you rarely recount memorable camera angles, but in fact you recount your favorite dialogue and that is the realm of the writer. Often, as in this instance, many of the visuals credited to directors were first imagined by writers as well.

Dr. Rosanne Welch

Quote from “America’s Forgotten Founding Father” by Dr. Rosanne Welch – 59 in a series – Martha Jefferson

Learn more about the American Revolution through the eyes of an important, Italian Immigrant, Filippo Mazzei. Read his story today!

“Living and being educated in Paris had done Martha Jefferson well, and by living in the ambassador’s home she had engaged with world leaders and learned, among other things, that there were countries that had made slavery illegal. “I wish with all my soul that the poor Negroes were all freed,” she said that night.

Filippo felt gratified as the conversation turned to talk of plans to set up their slaves as free tenant farmers when they returned to Virginia.”

From America’s Forgotten Founding Father — Get Your Copy Today!

From America’s Forgotten Founding Father — Get Your Copy Today!

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Want to use this book in your classroom? Contact the Mentoris Project!

07 Women You May Know from “When Women Wrote Hollywood” with Dr. Rosanne Welch [Video] (55 seconds)

Part of the California State University, Fullerton Faculty Noon Time Talks at the Pollak Library.

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Transcript:

So let’s talk about some women you know and some women you don’t know and hopefully, you will — as I said. These are ladies, hopefully, you’ll recognize. Anybody? (Audience: Shonda Rhimes) Shonda Rhimes! Thank goodness. We must all know Shonda Rhimes. (Audience: Is that Diablo Cody?) That’s Diablo Cody. Exactly, from Juno. This lady — you have probably seen more movies than any of theirs combined. (Audience: Is that Jane Fonda?) No, looks a lot like her though. doesn’t she? Nora Ephron. Nora Ephron, right? Incredible. So these are people that I think you recognize. There’s Nora Ephron. Nora Ephron is probably the queen of screenwriting. She passed away a few years ago, but you’ve seen probably all these films or you’ve heard about them mentioned in popular culture places. You’ve seen parodied on The Simpsons. That’s how embedded in popular culture they are, right? I mean, “When Harry Met Sally” is a classic. it is something that everyone references when they think of rom-coms.

Dr. Rosanne Welch discusses the women in her new book “When Women Wrote Hollywood” which covers female screenwriters from the Silents through the early 1940s when women wrote over 50% of films and Frances Marion was the highest paid screenwriter (male or female) and the first to win 2 Oscars. Yet, she fails to appear in film history books, which continue to regurgitate the myth that male directors did it all – even though it’s been proven that the only profitable movies Cecil B. de Mille ever directed were all written by Jeannie Macpherson film ever won for Best Picture was written by Robert E. Sherwood (who people have heard of, mostly due to his connection to Dorothy Parker) and Joan Harrison.

Buy a signed copy of when Women Wrote Hollywood

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* 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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The Mentoris Project Podcast: Marconi and His Muses with Author, Pamela Winfrey [Audio]

My latest podcast with my fellow Mentoris authors is now available on the Mentoris Web Site. Give it a listen and Subscribe for More! — Rosanne

The Mentoris Project Podcast: Marconi and His Muses with Author, Pamela Winfrey

Hosted by Dr. Rosanne Welch

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Meet Pamela Winfrey, author of Marconi and His Muses: A Novel Based on the Life of Guglielmo Marconi. Brilliant inventor, electrical engineer, and wise entrepreneur, Guglielmo Marconi was best known for inventing long-distance radio transmissions and the telegraph system. But his success wasn’t solely a product of his curious mind. Marconi attributed his prosperity to the people in his life who encouraged him to achieve his goals.

About the Author

Pamela Winfrey is an award-winning writer and curator.

As a writer, she specializes in writing surreal plays for a thinking audience. She is especially interested in the relationship between theater, reality, science, surrealism and mental health issues. She has received funding from the Sloan Foundation and the Marin Arts Council and was a finalist at Arts and Letters. She won an award at the Method and Madness Festival in Denton, Texas, and her work received the Audience Favorite and Best Actress awards at Variations Theater in Manhattan. Her plays have been seen as far away as Toronto and Ireland. She was one of the founding members of Mobius Operandi, an electro-acoustic sound sculpture ensemble and performance company which produced five large-scale, walk-through, site-specific performance pieces in San Francisco.

As a curator, Winfrey represented the United States in the Interactive Art Panel at Ars Electronica (Linz), was the lead curatorial consultant for Emerging Artforms for Creative Capital, and curated more than 100 exhibitions, performances, artworks, and installations at the Exploratorium in San Francisco, where she is senior artist emeritus. She was the co-curator for the West Gallery, a gallery which explores human phenomena, and curated “The Changing Face of What is Normal,” an exhibition on mental health that was dear to her heart. She has a BA in theater, an MA in interdisciplinary arts, and is currently getting her MFA in screenwriting from Stephens College.

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Also from the Mentoris Project

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Quotes from When Women Wrote Hollywood – 31 in a series – Jeanie Macpherson and DeMille

Do you know about these women screenwriters? Many don’t. Learn more about them today!

Get “When Women Wrote Hollywood” Today!

Jeanie Macpherson herself repeatedly notes in press releases and interviews that Cecil B. DeMille was notoriously hard to please, requesting endless drafts of scripts, but that, “He will take advice from anyone – if it’s right. He won’t take it from anyone if it’s wrong.” Over the years, Macpherson was one of the few people who was able to appease “Mr. Hard to Please.”

Jeanie Macpherson: A Life Unknown
by Amelia Phillips

Buy a signed copy of when Women Write Hollywood or Buy the Book on Amazon

Paperback Edition | Kindle Edition | Google Play Edition

* 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

Dr. Rosanne Welch, PhD is this week’s #WriterCrushWednesday via Write or Die Chicks!

The Write Or Die Chicks, founded by 3 of my former MFA alums from Cal State Fullerton (Deanna Gomez, Mercedes Milner, and Angela Thomas) were kind enough recently to name me on their Writer Crush Wednesday post which made my day.

After their graduation a year ago May, they came out of the dust of the classroom (CP 126) where they spent so much time for two years ready to take over the town with their writing and their energy.

wish them all the luck they’ll need (because they already have all the talent required). Starting such a writers group is always a great way to continue creating new material with caring collaborators.

Dr. Rosanne Welch, PhD is this week’s #WriterCrushWednesday We thank her for being an inspiring and influential Screenwriter, Author, Professor and Mentor from her work on #TouchedByAnAngel to her lectures at CSUF and every publication in between.

#ProfessorAppreciation #RosanneWelch #CSUF
#WhenWomenWroteHollywood #WhyTheMonkeesMatter #AmericasForgotten #FoundingFather #thewriteordiechicks #thewodc#writers #writerlife #ThankYou

Working on my next book! via Instagram

Working on my next book!

Now that the heat wave has passed — for now — I took to my outdoors “desk” to work my on Fact Checking Hollywood book coming next year.

My schedule seems to include at least one book a year, along with several articles, so taking some sustained, dedicated time to write is always good — especially when it so nice outdoors!

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