Comics great Dennis O’Neil is here to give us a whoopass lesson in storytelling:
by Dennis O’Neil
Month: August 2013
Peer Production: BORROWED LIGHT
And now for the highest praise TVWriter™ can give just about anything:
Both LB and munchman loved this short (under 5 minute) masterpiece.
Animators unite! We’re thinking that with very little trouble you could take over the entertainment world.
MegaBucks Writer Damon Lindelof Gets Real About Screenwriting
Alas and alack for Save the Cat. Looks like everybody wants to trash this poor li’l bestseller. But at least Mr. Lindelof is gentle about it:
Star Script Doctor Damon Lindelof Explains the New Rules of Blockbuster Screenwriting
by Scott Brown
Damon Lindelof, the ubiquitous screenwriter-producer whose name seems attached to all of Hollywood’s biggest blockbusters, is doing his damnedest to get small. This summer, he (along with fellow triage artists Drew Goddard and Christopher McQuarrie) miraculously pulled Brad Pitt out of the mass grave that was World War Z’s zombocalyptic original third act and restored the regular-guyness that made Pitt’s character work. He also resisted the temptation to threaten Earth’s existence (yet again!) at the end of Star Trek Into Darkness, focusing instead on a personal vendetta—albeit one enacted via a dizzying mile-high pursuit across a 23rd-century cityscape. But, hey, you have to give something to get something.
Love & Money Dept – TV Writing Deals for 8/18/13
Latest News About Writers Who Are Doing Better Than We Are
- Barry Schindel (LAW & ORDER) is the new showrunner of CBS midseason drama series INTELLIGENCE. To which we feel duty bound to say – ready? sure? – “Smart move!” (Hey, look, dunno when you’re reading this,but we wrote it pretty damn early in the a.m.)
- Ken Marino & Erica Oyama (he’s a star of CHILDRENS HOSPITAL; she’s his, um, wife) have sold a sitcom about a new twist on the American dream to Fox. (And why not? Ken and Erica are living it, right? Cuz that hitch your wagon to a star thing, isn’t that the real American dream?)
- Mickey Fisher (noob!) has sold a science fiction drama, ECTANT, to CBS with a straight-to-series order. (Interestingly, this wasn’t a case of the writer pitching to the network but rather of the networks pitching to the writer. Every place in H’wood wanted this show…or, um, its producer, some old guy named Steven Spielberg. Must be the Hitch Your Wagon Syndrome we’ve been hearing about.)
- Alexandra Rushfield (PARKS & RECREATION) has written STUCK, a sitcom pilot for Fox. (Because, in line with today’s theme, it too has hitched up with a mighty fine wagon – Rashida Jones, formerly a co-star of the very same PARKS & RECREATION, will be the producer. Anybody want to bet that she’ll also end up the star?)
Why a Failed Pilot Actually Means Success
The baxic premise in the following article is that there’s no stigma to failure in the television industry, and if you buy that, then you can sit back and enjoy the read.
But we have it on good authority from Our Beloved Leader, LB, that the premise is a little off because, as LB told us while swimming through a pool of the money he made writing pilots none of us have ever heard of, “Hey, the phone definitely stops ringing after you’ve failed. It even happened to me – after I’d written about a dozen unshot pilots in a row.”
A dozen?