The Screenwriting Life with Meg LeFauve and Lorien McKenna

In our time time-honored tradition of asking the same three questions at the end of every show, we wanted to put together a supercut of some great guest responses to be enjoyed in one fell swoop. Part two coming Monday! Featured in today's supercut: - Matt Lieberman - Monique N. Matthews - Sean Presant - Stacy Rukeyser - Sam Bain - Nicole Perlman - Stephen Karam - Anna Drezen - Jenny Lumet and Ale...

We're back for another story workshop, plus some amazing suggestions for writing exercises to help crack act 2. Join our patreon: www.patreon.com/thescreenwritinglife Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Believe it or not, documentary filmmaking has lots in common with traditional narrative feature filmmaking...tune in today to learn why, with two award-winning documentarians! TO SEE MONIQUE'S DOC (screening this week!): https://www.birthingjustice.com/screenings/ FOR MORE ON LINDA: https://ladylikefilms.com/ TO JOIN OUR PATREON: www.patreon.com/thescreenwritinglifea Learn more about your ad choic...

Throughout the 21st century, video games have become one of pop cultures most valuable mediums, and their narrative ambition grows with each passing year. Today we feature two of the industries top writers, Shanon M. Ingles (Batman: A Telltale Series) and Stephan Bugaj (Tales From the Borderlands) to discuss how the industry has evolved from a writing standpoint, and how you can break in. Learn mo...

Today, we do one of our favorite things: answer YOUR questions. As is always the case, a theme emerged across your questions and our conversation, which boils down to one of the hardest and most important questions we face as artists. How are we supposed to feel validated in our work, especially when it's hard? Don't forget to join us for our FINAL DRAFT in Austin this year on Saturday evening at...

TSL was on set this week! (Exciting - more soon)...but because our bandwidth was stretched a bit thin, we're going to be rebroadcasting a fan favorite: the lava episode! There may be no topic we discuss more on this show than lava, so we decided to put an episode together unpacking the entire volcano. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

The Austin Film Festival is known for many things — but few are as legendary as its annual 90-Second Pitch Competition, where writers have just 90 seconds to share their stories. In Hollywood, we call that “the elevator pitch” — and it’s more essential than ever. To unpack what makes a pitch truly land, we’re joined by an incredible lineup: TSL veteran and producer Sheila Hanahan Taylor, Austin Fi...

There is nothing worse than writer's block when facing a rewrite, but there's hope! Today we discuss 6 Essential Strategies To Tackle a Rewrite. JOIN OUR PATREON: www.patreon.com/thescreenwritinglife Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

We're back for part two w/ super producer Ted Hope! This week, we talk about some of Ted's top pieces of advices for living a successful creative life, and spend a long time talking about the importance of balancing multiple projects as a creative. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

You finally get the meeting, make the connection, and a bigshot producer is excited to read your script. But you panic. Is it good enough? Is it READY? Today, award-winning independent film producer Ted Hope walks us through those always complicated questions, and answers TONS more along the way. FOR MORE: https://tedhope.substack.com Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Every writer can point to a movie that made them say: "THIS. This is what I want to do." And today, Meg, Lorien, and Jeff share the movies that turned THEM into writers. Yep, we're movie nerds too. JOIN OUR PATREON: www.patreon.com/TheScreenwritingLIfe Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Though it can sometimes feel like a prison, screenplay structure is actually a very freeing element of the story process. Jill Chamberlain, a veteran script consultant, is obsessive about structure, to the point where she has created a popular technique to re-consider how we approach our work. On her technique, producer Callum Greene (Star Wars Episode 9) offers “the Nutshell Technique is like the...

As collaborators and showrunners, Kat Likkel and John Hoberg know that shutting down ideas is never helpful. This was only emphasized when they joined Pixar's Elemental team as writers. Today we discuss how to collaborate well with others (and ourselves), how to bring our personal experience into our work, and duckboat. Yes, you read that right: duckboat. Join Our Patreon: www.patreon.com/TheScree...

**PLEASE NOTE THAT THIS EPISODE WAS PRE-RECORDED & PRECEDED THE 2023 WGA STRIKE.** In today's TSL epsiode, Meg gets personal about her lava, and how a recent production of Stephen Sondheim's Sunday in the Park with George is helping her to rethink the beauty of moving on from a creative project. JOIN OUR PATREON: www.patreon.com/thescreenwritinglife Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphon...

Despite being a multiple Academy Award winner, celebrated producer, and feature/TV director, Jodie Foster is still aiming for a singular goal: to tell truthful stories. On today's show, we discuss how Jodie processes her work, how she collaborates with others, and what Robert De Niro taught her on the set of Taxi Driver. Join Our Patreon: www.patreon.com/thescreenwritinglife Learn more about your...

Though she got her start in multi-cam sitcoms, it was a bold sci-fi dramedy rom-com that made Pixar interested in hiring Brenda Hsueh to co-write Elemental. On today's show, Brenda discusses how her voice has evolved as a writer over the course of her career, how she brought her own experience into her work as a writer for Elemental, and how she has learned to elegantly argue for what she believes...

With hits like BRING IT ON and STICK IT, writer/director Jessica Bendinger is known for her subversive and surprising takes on female girlhood, using archetypes in a way that audiences have celebrated. Today what discuss what archetypes are, how we can use them, and what the future of our industry looks like. FOR JESS' BOOK/PODCAST: http://www.jessicabendinger.com/ TO JOIN OUR PATREON: www.patreon...

Hi all! Today, Savana and Jeff revisit their conversation from part one of their conversation about SET! Today we discuss some of the most essential vocabulary and set dynamics that you need to understand before you take the plunge! For internship inquiries, email thescreenwriting@gmail.com with the subject line INTERN, and include a cover letter and resume. Please note that we are only considerin...

We bring our "beginning" miniseries to a close with this instant TSL classic, wherein Meg gives many pep talks. JOIN OUR PATREON: www.patreon.com/TheScreenwritingLife Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

In our continued conversation about where and how to begin as a screenwriter, we take your (excellent) questions! We talk about outlining, cards, character development, and how to quiet our inner critic. TO JOIN OUR PATREON: www.patreon.com/TheScreenwritingLife Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

So you want to be a screenwriter. Now what? Today we discuss some of these important questions to ask before you jump into a draft - questions that are JUST as valuable for emerging writers as they are for professionals. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Emmy-winning TV super-producer Javier Grillo-Marxuach is back. This time, he chats about his wonderful essay "WHAT I DO ON THE PAGE." clarifying that ultimately, the basic mechanics or writing are also the advanced mechanics of writing. HERE is the essay we're discussing: http://okbjgm.weebly.com/uploads/3/1/5/0/31506003/script_essay.pdf HERE is Javi's first appearance on our show: https://podcast...

Podcasts are one of the fastest growing mediums today (see THIS SHOW), and they can take on many forms. Today, writer/director Susan Busa Leshner discusses her podcast series THE AMERICAN IMMORTAL, and how she turned it from an idea into a quickly growing audio drama with multiple episodes, a completed first season, and a second season on the way! TO LISTEN TO THE AMERICAN IMMORTAL FOR FREE: https...

Karyn Kusama is known for film classics like Girlfight, Jennifer's Body, The Invitation, and a NEW TV classic, Yellowjackets, which she executive produces. Karyn's work is celebrated for its thoughtfully subversive approach with feminist themes across multiple genres, and today she discusses HOW she uses her body as a barometer to seek truth in her work. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit meg...

TSL-ers are going to be meeting at Disney tomorrow. That's Wednesday, May 24th at 1:00 PM Pacific. Again, Wednesday, May 24th at 1:00 PM Pacific at the Disney lot in Burbank. We're hoping for a big turnout. And in that interest, there's a couple things you can do to help when you show up. First of all, if you're able to, it would be amazing if you could bring some snacks and water to share with fo...