Screenwriting from Iowa
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For a more off-beat look at writing, the Screenwriting from Iowa blog provides screenwriters with a slightly removed take from the Hollywood norm. Scott Smith blogs about how people outside of Los Angeles can have their stories told and sold for production in TinselTown. It’s inspiring for those of us around the world who aspire to Hollywood magic without having to live in Hollywood itself.
Screenwriting from Iowa
1M ago
In under 5-minutes I solved the age old question, “Can Screenwriting Be Taught?” (At least I tried to.) If you’re somewhere between elementary school age and in a retirement home and ever wanted to write a screenplay there are worst places to start than the video I produced below. Onward. Scott W. Smith is the ..read more
Screenwriting from Iowa
1M ago
Emmy and BAFTA winner and Oscar-nominated producer, director, writer Edward Zwick has a book out titled Hits, Flops, and Other Illusions: My Forty Years in Hollywood. I bought the audio book yesterday and will pull some quotes from it in the coming weeks. But Zwick has had an amazing career starting out writing prestige television ..read more
Screenwriting from Iowa
2M ago
As I type this, I see that the post What Christopher Nolan Did When He Couldn’t Get Into Film School is the top read post of the day so far. That made me look back to see what other quotes from him that might be buried in past posts and I found this one from ..read more
Screenwriting from Iowa
2M ago
The odds are that she’ll break Maravich’s record this month. Congrats on an amazing feat. Des Moines-born Clark was only six years old when I started this little Screenwriting from Iowa …and Other Unlikely Places. I lived in Iowa at the time and saw it as a place that has historically served as fertile ground ..read more
Screenwriting from Iowa
2M ago
“I didn’t know I knew how to make a movie until I was doing it.”—Celine SongThe Hollywood Reporter Before Celine Song’s Oscar nomination for her Past Lives screenplay, she’s had an interesting journey. Born in South Korea, raised in Canada, and got her MFA in playwriting from Columbia University in New York City. She then ..read more
Screenwriting from Iowa
2M ago
“Most of what I know about writing I learned from Allan [Gurganus], and it is a testament to my great good luck (heart-stopping, in retrospect, such dumb luck) that it was his classroom I turned up in when I first started to write stories. . . . I needed someone to tell me how to go ..read more
Screenwriting from Iowa
2M ago
Here’s my fourth video for the Filmmaking with Brass Knuckles YouTube channels. I’ve read that most YouTubers quit before they upload 10 videos. I think the reason is simply it takes a lot of time to write, produce, shoot, edit, etc. original videos. Even a little 4-minute video like this one. But I have to ..read more
Screenwriting from Iowa
2M ago
One of my favorite discoveries in recent years was learning that the inspiration behind Mickey Mouse was Charlie Chaplin. I wrote this post about it in 2020. “We wanted something appealing, and we thought of a tiny bit of a mouse that would have something of the wistfulness of Chaplin—a little fellow trying to do ..read more
Screenwriting from Iowa
2M ago
”I don’t like comedy that’s about the big obvious things we all see. Show me something small that I never noticed, and then blow it way out of proportion. Then I’m laughing.”—Jerry Seinfeld Smartless podcast Scott W. Smith is the author of Screenwriting with Brass Knuckles and runs the Filmmaking With Brass Knuckles YouTube channel ..read more
Screenwriting from Iowa
2M ago
In Steve Martin’s Masterclass he talks about “beating an idea to ” and making it humorous. Here’s an example from The Jerk (1979) in a scene he’s in with Bernadette Peters. Martin wrote the script with Carl Gottieb and Michael Elias. Scott W. Smith is the author of Screenwriting with Brass Knuckles and runs the Filmmaking With Brass ..read more