Given last week’s post about David Lynch and screenwriting, I knew I wanted to do another screenwriting post. And then last night’s Oscar ceremony got me thinking about the film industry and its future and I remembered a column by screenwriter Billy Ray. It’s from 2016, but it doesn’t seem any less apropos in its calls to action. Note that the column is very much about Hollywood/mainstream film industry filmmaking, but it’s not like the…
Last week, I posted a few videos about David Lynch and how to hook yourself an idea or two. Well, as you might expect, I plowed through a number of Lynch videos at the same time, in part because the two I shared last week are just about the nature of getting ideas. But, in fact, the first video I watched was a piece asking Lynch about his screenwriting process… and since it’s just over…
The post from the other week about how hard hobbies are to schedule time for made me think of something I recently saw regarding how to generate ideas… and from a man generally known for having some out-of-the-box type ideas: David Lynch. As many of you might know, I love using Workflowy, including for capturing ideas. I mean, I love the habit of always carrying around an old-school notebook to jot things down in –and…
Many of you have seen the sentiment expressed in the title above, but it’s always worth remembering… and remembering we, as a species, will likely figure out how to go faster than the speed of light before we break the above constraints. A post by writer Mark Evanier reminded me of how these constraints can often come into play in the writing world, which led to a good musing on his part: How does one…
Lest any of you think I’m going to populate the blog with repeatedly grim tales of people being sucky (as I have for a couple Wednesdays and this morning), I just wanted to highlight the Patton Oswalt interview I linked in last week’s post about film distribution. Really, if you are at all interested in his career or perspective on things (he is a tremendous film geek in addition to his other geekdoms), the hour…
It’s always interesting to figure out how various writers work and this long article by George Saunders, which explains the genesis and creation (and recreation) of one of his novels, is a great window into a process that had me going “aha,” and nodding in equal measure.
As the New York Times obituary put it, a “Titan of the American Musical” has left the stage. Stephen Sondheim has died at the age of 91. The whole article is a long and excellent read — and I tend to agree with Mark Evanier in that there doesn’t seem to be much for me to individually add about my own personal connections to Sondheim’s work. However, one thing that has become evident to me…
Jabberwocky Audio Theater has been one my main creative outlets in the past few years, which has been simultaneously challenging and fortuitous during the pandemic. It’s challenging, because one of things we like to do is bring everyone together to record at the same time, an old school method that served many a vintage radio show well for decades. Now we needed to account for various different home recording set-ups, where even equally good home…
Could be I’m just thinking of writing more this week, what with NaNoWriMo looming and having just finished J. Michael Straczynski’s Becoming a Writer, Staying a Writer, I’m thinking of how little writing I’ve done of late. Reading the book above will certainly inspire you to put pen to paper or fingers to keyboard. J Michael Straczynski (aka “JMS” as he often referred to) spends a good amount of time validating the choice to be…
As readers of this blog may recall, I always celebrate Banned Book Week usually by reading a frequently challenged or banned book — something I highly encourage all of you to try. It’s fun, It’s educational, and it it’s often deadly to per-conceived notions you didn’t even know you had. The American Library Association has a great site where you can learn about some books to check out… and your local library just might have…