Scriptnotes Podcast (.mp3)

Screenwriter Kelly Marcel joins John and Craig to play Fiasco, resulting in a tale of art, murder and sexual blackmail in the Hollywood Hills. This extended, unlike-all-before-it episode will probably be polarizing, but it was a chance to explore story in ways that you can’t do in abstract. In Fiasco, plot really does come out of character choices. This episode is filthy. If this were a cabl...

Nothing is cut-and-dried this week. John and Craig talk Game of Thrones rape, allegations against director Bryan Singer and the new report showing the same low employment numbers for female writers in film and TV. Then, what happens when a writer writes fan fiction for the novel she wrote but doesn’t own? We talk about the weird situation L.J. Smith finds herself in with The Vampire Diaries,...

Craig and John play marriage counsellor between writers and their scripts, looking at both the first spark of attraction and how to rekindle the flame when the fire has gone out. There are still some tickets available for the Summer Superhero Spectacular live show on May 15th. Next week, we’ll announce how the Three Page Challenge will work. Don’t send scripts yet. If you’ve subs...

John and Craig visit Ben Blacker’s Nerdist Writers Panel for a special crossover episode, recorded in front of a live audience on April 13, 2014. As television gets more cinematic, what if feature writing was more like TV writing, with multiple writers together in a room? Would movies get better or worse? Could a Joss Whedon or a Vince Gilligan make movies the way they make television? We ha...

John and Craig talk with WGA President Chris Keyser about the tentative deal reached between writers and the studios, and why it’s more groundbreaking than it might appear at first glance. We continue our discussion of a new screenwriting format by looking at how we got here, both the history of “modern” screenplay layout and the alternatives. Finally, John just delivered a new s...

Craig delights as John gets @-napped in a Twitter thread about copyright infringement. Then they talk disruption in television, and how it affects writers. Finally, they answer listener questions about underlining, fan fiction scripts and whether a professional writer’s script would fare well in the Three Page Challenge. Links: Tesla Model S Monkeys on Wikipedia Standing beds by Ernesto Neto and J...

John and Craig talk Lab Rats, multi-cam, and what scenes might mean in their imaginary screenplay format. Craig clarifies what “spec writing” is, and when it’s permitted, both legally and ethically. Then they dive in for another round of the Three Page Challenge, with entries ranging from second-grade bullies to cargo ship pirates to teenage crime. Links: Get tickets now for John’s WGF panel , Fro...

John and Craig discuss how you create a fictional universe for your story, and the limits of how much can fit on the page. From location to language to wardrobe, choosing which details to make explicit is a crucial early decision. Too little detail and the reader doesn’t know how your story is special; too much detail and the story gets lost. Also this week, Resurrection vs The Returned vs The Ret...

John has questions about the questions Craig answered on his Reddit AMA, but that’s just the tip of the iceberg as we answer six great listener questions: What’s the deal with the “mystery insider” Twitter accounts? Can a screenwriter use the n-word? If we had to start from scratch, what would we do? What did we mean by “lens selection?” To CONT’D, or not to CONT’D? Starting over after big life ev...

John and Craig pay their respects to Harold Ramis with an episode devoted entirely to Groundhog Day. Ramis and co-writer Danny Rubin fashioned a deceptively simple story that upended expectations and essentially created a new genre of supernatural predicament comedies. Often imitated but never surpassed, Groundhog Day is smarter than you remember, cleverly side-stepping logic traps to explore deep...

John and Craig look at the implicit contract made between screenwriters and readers — and ultimately, movies and their audience. That’s a natural introduction to our Three Page Challenge and the three new entries we look at this week. Also: Late Payments suck. You shouldn’t tolerate it, and neither should your agents. There are still a limited number of tickets available for the...

Craig and John get in your head to talk procrastination, pageorexia and generalized anxiety. They also move beyond the psychopathology to discuss all the changes in the industry, from cable mergers to lawsuits to disruptive technologies. You’re not as paranoid as you think you are. John’s new app Weekend Read is in the App Store now, and free. So check it out. The long-fabled crossover episode wit...

John and Craig tackle the greatest controversy in screenwriting: how many spaces to put after the period. From there, it’s follow-up on the Final Draft episode, including some behind-the-scene details. Why is it often better to write in public spaces? How do you keep your hero in the driver’s seat? What do you do if you’re dating an emotional vampire? We have some answers. We also have annoyances:...

The makers of Final Draft pay us a visit to clear up John and Craig’s misconceptions of, well, everything. It’s double the umbrage for your money. Then we discuss Quentin Tarantino’s leaked script, the upcoming WGA negotiations, and how to make it clear you’re attached to direct your spec. Links: Final Draft Scriptnotes 126: Punching the Salty Ocean John’s post on Final Draft, software and p...

In the tradition of the Raiders and Little Mermaid episodes, John and guest host Aline Brosh McKenna discuss and dissect the award-winning, record-setting, paradigm-shifting Frozen. But this time, we have the writer on hand to answer our questions. Jennifer Lee not only wrote Frozen, she co-directed it. She talks us through all the twists, turns, and happy surprises on the journey. We go scene-by-...

Carolyn Strauss, executive producer of Game of Thrones, joins John and Craig to discuss female directors and the death of pilot season. In one short hour, they solve all the intractable problems facing the film and television industry. (Not true. Not even remotely.) Craig and John also recount the previous Sunday’s inaugural all-screenwriter dungeon crawl. It was Craig’s first D&D...

John and Craig took a look at Final Draft 9 and the futility of Twitter arguments before launching into three brand-new Three Page Challenges. Links: Business Insider on the responses from Hollywood CCs who should have been BCCs Final Draft 9 is now for sale Three Pages by Billiam Coronel Three Pages by Jeff Pulice and the Q&A from the Holiday Spectacular Three Pages by Steven Arvanites How to...

It’s a week of big egos as Craig and John take a look at when (or whether) filmmakers will be able to pull a Beyoncé and surprise-release a feature film, and what Mrs. Carter’s tussle with Amazon and Target means for the future of retail DVD. Then we dust off an old blog post on “egoless programming” and find it has a lot to recommend for screenwriters. Finally, we look at the lawsuit over The Exp...

John, Craig, and guests take questions from the audience at the Scriptnotes Holiday Spectacular. Topics include TV writing careers, what to do once you have an agent, overcoming gender stereotypes, rewriting Dodgeball, and more. Have a happy, healthy and safe New Year. Links: The Scriptnotes Holiday Spectacular Aline Brosh McKenna on episodes 60 , 76 , 100 , 101 and 119 Franklin Leonard on episode...

‘Twas the Holiday Scriptnotes and at our behest, Craig and John were joined by our six favorite guests. “Now Kelly! Now Lindsay! Now Richard and Rawson! On Aline and on Franklin! (Whose Black List is awesome.)” They talk characters’ wants, trends good and bad, And what’s to be done when a “yes” is had. So open your eggnog, set your volume just right, Happy...

John and Craig offer advice for super-rich aspirants about the film and television industry. If you have enough money to do anything, what should you do first? Do you want to make money, or make art? Or do you just want to hang out with famous people? No judgements. Then we tackle another set of Three Page Challenges, with scripts ranging from Twitter-age slashers to animated birds. Our next episo...

Writer/director/actor/comedian Mike Birbiglia joins John and Craig to talk about writing for yourself, and how his one-man shows have translated into his films Sleepwalk With Me and My Girlfriend’s Boyfriend. We talk movies and television, stand-up and screenplays, and the upside of failure. In other news, there’s now an official app for Scriptnotes, available for iOS and Android. If you like your...

Craig and John talk readers and coverage, centering their discussion on profound_whatever’s infographic charting 300 submissions and the lessons screenwriters can take from it. After that, we talk about the recent DGA deal with the AMPTP, and the degree to which it might predict the upcoming WGA negotiations. Finally, we discuss getting high and are generally buzz-kills. Sorry. LINKS: profou...

Aline Brosh McKenna joins John and Craig to discuss watching movies with an open mind and why it’s important to befriend other writers. Also this week: what to do when your outline collapses and a look at going broke in your 50s. The Scriptnotes Live Holiday Show on December 19th is technically sold out, but there’s a chance seats will open up, so keep an eye on Twitter. LINKS: Aline B...

John and Craig wind back the clock with writer-director Richard Kelly to look at the origins of Donnie Darko, and how a recent film-school grad gets a movie made. Along the way, we talk about Sundance and slow success, scope creep and transmedia. The Scriptnotes Live Holiday Show will be Thursday, December 19th, 2013. Tickets go on sale November 20th at 10am. Links below. LINKS: Tickets are on sal...