women – Page 16 – On Screenwriting and Media with Dr. Rosanne Welch

24 Network Notes 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: Was there a specific instance where you had written an episode of a television show and the networking was like, we don’t like this. We don’t like this. We don’t want this and you had to be like, No and how did you do — how did you do that? How did you go about that?

Rosanne: That actually happened in my actually my second episode was a show called Picket Fences which was by David E Kelly who’d come off of LA Law and he’s done a million things since then. Quite brilliant. He wasn’t there anymore. He left the show to another producer named Jeff Melvoin who’s quite another wonderful producer in town — writer/producer — and he’s got Emmys and whatnot is brilliant, but came in to do that and it was a show about small-town America. Dad was a cop — sheriff — and mom was a doctor. So you kind of had the mix of cop and doctor shows all in one. You could decide what the episode would be and I thought that was brilliant. They had three kids right they lived in a small town and we had done — I was still a partner then — we did an episode where the younger boy, who’s about 10-ish or 11, wanted to be popular in school and we were looking at the internet and wanting to say the good and the bad. So overarching dramatic question is the internet a good influence or bad influence and of course, there’s much good about it. You can watch all kinds of educational things. You can be exposed to all kinds of things from the past that we didn’t know about. We can learn so much more about history, other countries, like I just said about Netflix shows all of that, but we wanted to balance that with okay what are the problems?

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.

Podcast: Play in new window | Download

Subscribe: RSS

11 More on Dorothy Parker’s Voice from “Female Creatives & A Star Is Born” [Video]

Transcript:

I think you’ll notice also in the lines here, this is a great bit —

“How’s your luck?

There wasn’t any.

Maybe you don’t do it right. No, take Danny McGuire here. He knows the ropes, don’t you, Danny?

Sure. Had ’em around my neck for years.”

She’s always thinking about suicide. Sadly. She’s always thinking about ways to kill yourself and this is best evidenced in this poem that she’s famous for. I don’t know if you’ve ever seen it before. You’re probably reading it to yourself right now, so I shall not read it out loud but it is quite brilliant, and look what she’s focusing on and that’s her “resume.” Think about the title and think about the words there and how they come across inside A Star Is Born.”

Watch this entire presentation

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!

Podcast: Play in new window | Download

Subscribe: RSS

23 Production Company Influence 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: Do most production companies, most executives, once the pilot is out there and people respond to it, do they normally just kind of back up after that. They’re like okay it seems like you’ve got a show on your hands. We’ll let you do it the way you want to do it.

Rosanne: It depends on your relationship with the network. Obviously, the kinds of people like Shonda Rhimes, as I mentioned, someone who’s got a track record like that can say I know what I’m doing leave me alone. Netflix basically promises that. That’s how they wooed people away from broadcast and cable. They’re like we promise not to give you notes. Just whatever you like to do, you go do it, and yay for you, right? So Ryan Murphy’s doing Pose and things like that. They’re not going to give a ton of notes. If you’re new, they might still because they’re trying to form what is going to be a sort of a Netflix brand. If you’re new in the network world or the cable world yeah you’ll get that kind of stuff for a little bit until you have a track record and can say I don’t — or you’ll still get notes but you have much more ability to say no can’t do that changes the trajectory of the show or that’s wrong for my character. Whatever those things are and that’s part of what I was saying about them earlier, you learn how to manage notes. You learn how to say all right I’ll give you this but I’m keeping that. Or we going to do this because we want this kind of an episode and if you don’t like it that’s too bad. Next week we’ll do this kind of episode which will you know smooth down some feathers if people have a problem with whatever storyline we gave last week. So your ability to be more autonomous grows as your career grows.

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.

Podcast: Play in new window | Download

Subscribe: RSS

10 Dorothy Parker’s Voice from “Female Creatives & A Star Is Born” [Video]

Transcript:

Of course, she has tons of acerbic wit. That’s her thing and in many ways, this is a Shakespearean tragedy, as all her poems are. So I think all of that speaks to her as the major writer behind this version of the film. The other guys came in, they did some stuff but I don’t see evidence of their lives on screen in the way that I see hers. Lines in this piece that she’s written are so clearly things that could come out of her very own poems. I love all of these. This is probably my favorite. “His work was beginning to interfere with his drinking.” She was always very blase about alcoholism and it’s something that she suffered from herself. This is a great one when they put him in the asylum, you know for taking care of his drinking — “They have iron bars in the windows to keep out the draft.” I mean how sarcastic and snotty can you be when you’re trying not to admit you’ve been put in a place you can’t sign your way out of until you clean up and then the heartbreak comes out of this — “For every dream of yours that may come true, you’ll pay the price in heartbreak.” So even if you’re going to get what you want, you won’t have everything and that is kind of a message of her life right? She never quite got everything that she dreamed of.

Watch this entire presentation

Find out why in this lecture!

Podcast: Play in new window | Download

Subscribe: RSS

On The Writers of Doctor Who: Maxine Alderton and The Haunting of the Villa Diodati

While preparation for some lectures I was giving at the San Diego Who Con (a small and friendly, all vaxxed and masked politely convention celebrating the English sci-fi drama Doctor Who) I researched how the new showrunner, Chris Chibnall, turned the 50 year old character into a female (long story unless you know the show).

That lead me to researching the writers he chose for the last two seasons to bring more diverse stories to the show.

On The Writers of Doctor Who: Maxine Alderton and The Haunting of the Villa Diodati

One such story, The Haunting of the Villa Diodati, written by Maxine Alderton, involved meeting Mary Woolstencroft on the weekend of inventing Frankenstein. For that I found this post about the importance of writing soaps and how, because so many women do it, it has often been dismissed as lesser writing – but in fact, of course, it is not. I think it is yet another area of bias against female writers that needs to be quashed.

Maxie Alderton joins the world of Doctor Who this Sunday, far from her usual stomping ground of Emmerdale. But as the architect of some of the soap opera’s most innovative and exciting episodes of the past decade, she’s a name to watch

At first glance Maxine Alderton, writer of The Haunting of Villa Diodati, seems like a strange fit for Doctor Who. After all, of the new writers to join the Doctor Who team this season, she easily has the least background in science fiction and fantasy. And her main track record so far has been across the Yorkshire Dales for popular soap opera Emmerdale. But as soon as you scratch the surface she quickly emerges as an exciting and dynamic writer. One showing every sign of bringing something very special to Doctor Who indeed.

Read the entire article

Watch the trailer for this episode

22 Bridgerton from Worry and Wonder | The Courier Thirteen Podcast [Video]

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

Transcript:

For instance, Bridgerton came out of the blue and took everybody by surprise and it was like “Oh my god, Bridgerton. Oh my god, did you see Bridgerton?” and everybody’s talking about it, etc etc. I mean it had a little bit of a built-in audience because it’s based on a book series. So that’s why all the streamers and the networks, they’re desperate to take IP — intellectual property — because you bring in an audience, and then their just going to amplify that audience by making the film version of it — the tv version of it — the limited series version of it — and then they’re going to build and build, right? So they’re really interested in that and Bridgerton was a good example of how that works and then they added the Shonda Rimes sort of gloss to it and suddenly — I had never heard of the book series — I had never read the book series. I didn’t know it existed but I certainly knew Bridgerton existed and then I had to watch it because 3 or 4 people — and I’m not necessarily a fan of those kinds of romance dramas, but everybody said you’ve got to watch this so I gave it a shot. I gave it a first episode. I always try to give things a first episode as we were saying before and if it connects, I’ll go to the next one. Right? Sometimes even if the first doesn’t work I’ll give it a second one cause what I do know is when you are making a pilot you’ve gotten so many notes from the network and the production company and you’ve had to dance for so many people to make sure they all keep saying yes to you, then it’s not necessarily exactly what you originally wanted to do but once they say yes and you get on the air the next episode is going to look more like what you’ve always wanted. So, if it works on the second one then I will stick with it. If I don’t get it on the second one then I stop watching.

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.

Podcast: Play in new window | Download

Subscribe: RSS

09 Parker, Grandmothers, and Husbands from “Female Creatives & A Star Is Born” [Video]

Transcript:

Okay. Here’s where I find Dorothy Parker’s female focus coming to us. It begins with this grandmother. A female character has the money to give her granddaughter what she needs to follow her dream. That’s a big deal. Thinking that a woman in that period — who is now some 50 years older than the woman starring in the film — could have agency and could choose to give the money and trust her granddaughter when her own parents are not trusting her. I think that relationship is so key. That maternal relationship is a very big deal. Dorothy Parker’s mother died when she was quite young. I think she was 9 or 10. She didn’t like her stepmother but she liked her grandmother. So clearly that’s represented in this piece. Also even though Esther seems a little weak and fluffy at some points, she certainly stands up for herself when she needs to right? In this, we see Norman is a very desperate and envious guy. Some of what we read about Alan Campbell, he was desperate to succeed. He was desperate to be famous. After they divorced and he couldn’t get a job screenwriting, a producer literally said to him “Look, get back together with the old lady. She’s the one we want. Together we’ll hire you.” Imagine how humiliating that would be for someone and not man or woman but I want to be talented. I want to be recognized as someone of quality but I can’t be without attaching myself to this other person.

Watch this entire presentation

Find out why in this lecture!

Podcast: Play in new window | Download

Subscribe: RSS

Professors Dr. Rosanne Welch and Dr. Peg Lamphier spotlight Gloria Steinem in women-centered book series – PolyPost

What’s normal in my world is working on books with my friend and colleague, Dr. Peg Lamphier, about brilliant women in U.S. history. What’s not normal is having a brilliant young journalism student, Elizabeth Casillas, approach us to write an article about our work.

This article in the PolyPost is the outcome of both of those events.

It covers the latest book in the series Peg and I are editing: Women Making History where we were asked to create 8 women’s biographies to include in the series – with the best part being we then chose the 8 writers for the job. That meant giving a few of them their first book project ever. That is when this job become the most fun. This article covers the latest book on the life of Gloria Steinem, written by William Pruden (the only male author in the whole series – why? Because women’s history IS U.S. History so men can – and should – highlight it, too).

Peg Lamphier and Rosanne Welch, lecturers in the Interdisciplinary General Education Department, teamed up to co-edit “Gloria Steinem: A Life in American History,” the second installment of their book series focused on women’s contribution to American history and culture released Aug. 2.

The book, written by William Prudent and published by ABC-CLIO, covers the life of feminist journalist Gloria Steinem. After previously working with ABC-CLIO on “Women in American History,” an encyclopedia dedicated to detailing women’s contributions in American history and culture, Lamphier and Welch were sought out by the publishing firm to co-edit a larger book series.

Other subjects in the book series include Ruth Bader Ginsburg, Hillary Clinton, Helen Keller, Sally Ride, Eleanor Roosevelt, Ida B. Wells and Delores Huerta.

“If we’re going to have a series on women, what I want is books on women that don’t have 13 other books about them,” said Lamphier on the decision to incorporate Steinem into the series. “We keep trotting out the same women; it’s like we can only know 10 women at a time in America, so we got some people like Wilma Mankiller and Gloria Steinem.” A world-renowned feminist, Steinem’s life experiences were crucial to the feminist movement which compelled the lecturers to include her story in the series.

Read the entire article

21 You Can’t Keep Up With TV Shows 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: Was it called the little things?

Rosanne: Yeah it just came out on me on Netflix or HBO sorry.

Host: Yeah HBO Max.

Rosanne: Brand new so, again, you can’t keep up with 420 TV shows

Host: No, you can’t yeah.

Roanne: That’s that’s why buzz and word of mouth is now one of the most important things. It kind of always was but when there were only three or four channels or even 50 cable channels, you found things that people gelled around, and then it became a big event like Mad Men or something like that or Breaking Bad. Now it really becomes your little circle of friends. You recommend a show. I watch it. I tell somebody else I know outside of that circle. They might tell their group. That has become such an important sort of Venn diagram. Who’s seen this and who’s seen that and if you like this you’ll like that and we — that’s where we get our information from. So it’s a really important conversation for people to have for the benefit of the programs to get their audiences.

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.

Podcast: Play in new window | Download

Subscribe: RSS

08 A Star Is Born (1937) from “Female Creatives & A Star Is Born” [Video]

Transcript:

In a nutshell, what do we see in the first version of A Star Is Born?” We have this ambitious actress. We have a drunken actor, not a director. They do marry and he is jealous of her despite how bad that makes him feel. We have this classic scene where she wins an Academy Award and he shows up drunk and destroys and humiliates the evening right? We have this classic line “Can I have one more look at you”, right before I kill myself but you don’t know that’s what I’m about to do right? We have the husband committing suicide off-screen. We’re going to see him walk off into the ocean. We’re not going to see him dead on our screen and of course, we’re going to have this ending where she defends him to the society that destroyed him — to Hollywood — by saying “I am Mrs. Norman Maine” and there’s a lot — we’ll talk about this a little if we have some time — there’s some argument. My undergrad students nowadays will say they hate that line and they’re seeing it as her stepping back and losing her identity and I don’t think that’s how it was intended. I think if we think again about the time period, this was her asserting this man meant something and you people ruined him and I will not forget him right? So it’s an interesting line to see. Everything changes as we move through society and we bring our own baggage to what we watch. So we have to think about that. It was intended to be a monument to him and not a detriment to her at this point.

Watch this entire presentation

Find out why in this lecture!

Podcast: Play in new window | Download

Subscribe: RSS