The Artful Writer

Ed. Note: This is a reprint of a an article published earlier this year. I’ll be back with a brand new post on January 1st or 2nd. Hope you’ve all had a nice holiday break. Most WGA screenwriters are very aware that we do not retain copyright on our scripts. When we […]

Novelizationsare covered…Ed. Note: This article was published earlier this year. A commenter in another thread asked a question about novelization rights, which are covered by separated rights, so I thought I’d reprint this as a refresher course for our newer readers. It’s probably a sad commentary on my own curiosity that I’ve been hearing […]

Ed. Note: This article was originally a post I wrote on WriterAction. I subsequently revised and published it here in January of 2005. So, the theoretical question has arisen: how is it ever possible that a group of writers could write scripts connected by a single chain of title, and yet some of those […]

We ain’t himEd. Note: This is a reprint of a post that was first published February 5, 2005. You may click here to view the original comment thread, or feel free to comment under this reprinting. For as long as I’ve been a working screenwriter (nearly a decade now), I’ve been hearing versions of […]

Why are we the only ones in the movie business who get hired and fired like migrant workers? Why are we writers the only ones in the movie business who create story and are then ignored or belittled? Why are we the only ones who get overlooked when it comes to press and […]

Oh, me…I’ve talked before about an apparently intractable schism in the professional writing community–one on side you’ve got so-called “first writer advocates”, and on the other side, you have so-called “rewriters”. Putting aside the relative sloppiness of those names, I’ve decided to lower my lance and tilt firmly at one of the most persistent and inaccurate […]

A: If you’re hoping for some kind of Algonquin round table, don’t hold your breath. The emailer asks a question I’ve heard before, and it’s a good one. Most writers are hermits and slugs who sit in small rooms and lose themselves in their own imaginations, which is precisely why they can see the […]

20-20 vision, yo…After taking some expected abuse for my article on real-life mentors and why they’re mostly worthless, I figured I’d leave off the tough love angle for a bit and talk about the kind of mentors I like. The character archetype of The Mentor is one of the classics, and that’s why the Mentor often […]