Product Description

Write a great script and get it into the hands of the Hollywood players!

So you want to be a screenwriter? Whether you want to write a feature film or a TV script or adapt your favorite book, this friendly guide gives you expert advice in everything from creating your story and developing memorable characters to formatting your script and selling it to the studios. You get savvy industry tips and strategies for getting your screenplay noticed!

• The screenwriting process from A to Z -- from developing a concept and thinking visually to plotline, conflicts, pacing, and the conclusion
• Craft living, breathing characters -- from creating the backstory to letting your characters speak to balancing dialogue with action
• Turn your story into a script -- from developing an outline and getting over writer's block to formatting your screenplay and handling rewrites
• Prepare for Hollywood -- from understanding the players and setting your expectations to polishing your copy and protecting your work
• Sell your script to the industry -- from preparing your pitch and finding an agent to meeting with executives and making a deal

Open the book and find:

• The latest on the biz, from entertainment blogs to top agents to box office jargon
• New story examples from recently released films
• Tips on character development, a story's time clock, dramatic structure, and dialogue
• New details on developing the nontraditional screenplay -- from musicals to animation to high dramatic style
• Expanded information on adaptation and collaboration, with examples from successful screenwriting duos

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #83042 in Books
• Published on: 2008-06-30
• Original language: English
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Paperback
• 360 pages

Features

• ISBN13: 9780470345405
• Condition: USED - VERY GOOD
• Notes:
• Click here to view our Condition Guide and Shipping Prices

Review
"Ideal for general readers, the book uses everyday examples and addresses social issues such as sweatshops and fair trade." Moneywise June 2008 "A guide for absolute beginners, it will take you through the whole process".Writers Forum June 2008

From the Back Cover
Write a great script and get it into the hands of the Hollywood players!

So you want to be a screenwriter? Whether you want to write a feature film or a TV script or adapt your favorite book, this friendly guide gives you expert advice in everything from creating your story and developing memorable characters to formatting your script and selling it to the studios. You get savvy industry tips and strategies for getting your screenplay noticed!

• The screenwriting process from A to Z — from developing a concept and thinking visually to plotline, conflicts, pacing, and the conclusion

• Craft living, breathing characters — from creating the backstory to letting your characters speak to balancing dialogue with action

• Turn your story into a script — from developing an outline and getting over writer's block to formatting your screenplay and handling rewrites

• Prepare for Hollywood — from understanding the players and setting your expectations to polishing your copy and protecting your work

• Sell your script to the industry — from preparing your pitch and finding an agent to meeting with executives and making a deal

Open the book and find:

• The latest on the biz, from entertainment blogs to top agents to box office jargon

• New story examples from recently released films

• Tips on character development, a story's time clock, dramatic structure, and dialogue

• New details on developing the nontraditional screenplay — from musicals to animation to high dramatic style

• Expanded information on adaptation and collaboration, with examples from successful screenwriting duos

About the Author
Laura Schellhardt holds an MFA in Literary Arts from Brown University and degrees in Theatre and Creative Writing from Northwestern University in Chicago. Her scripts have been produced in New York (SPF, The Hangar, The Exchange Theatre), Seattle (Seattle Repertory Theatre, ACT), Chicago (Northlight Theatre, Serendipity Theatre, New Leaf Theatre, Citadel Theatre), Washington DC (The Kennedy Center, Woolly Mammoth), Providence (Trinity Repertory Company, Brown University), Minneapolis (Theatre Limina), North Carolina (Center for Performing Arts), and Provincetown, Massachusetts (Provincetown Repertory Theatre, Provincetown Theatre Company).
Original works include The K of D, The Chair, Courting Vampires, Shapeshifter, The Apothecary’s Girl, Inheritance, and Je Ne Sais Quoi. Adaptations include The Phantom Tollbooth, The Mysteries of Harris Burdick, The Outfit (Jeff Award Nominee), and Creole Folktales.
Laura is a recipient of the Theatre Communications Group 2007–8 Playwriting Residency, The Jerome Fellowship, the New Play Award from ACT in Seattle, and a Dramatist Guild Playwriting Fellowship. She has participated in the SoHo Rep. Writer/Director Lab and the O’Neill National Playwright’s Festival. Laura has assisted in the development of new work at The Goodman, Steppenwolf Theatre, Northlight Theatre, and Trinity Repertory Company. She has studied writing with the likes of Paula Vogel, Maria Irene Fornes, Erin Cressida Wilson and has taught alongside Oscar-nominated John Logan of Aviator and Sweeney Todd fame.
Laura currently heads the playwriting program at Northwestern University in Evanston, Illinois and teaches workshops across the country.

Customer Reviews

Schellhardt provides clear analysis of structure
Screenwriting for Dummies provides comprehensive information about how to construct a screenplay, from concept to pitch, but its most valuable aspect is Schellhardt's coverage of film structure. She shows the bones of a good screenplay in a manner that doesn't seem so much formulaic as archetypal: a movie starts with its status quo, hits an inciting incident; its protagonist forms a plan of action at plot point one, hits the high or low of his story at the midpoint, renews his efforts at plot point two, and earns his reward, or tragedy, in the conclusion. Schellhardt clued me in to the pattern, and now, when I sense a movie petering out or losing its focus, I have a notion why it happened.

Schellhardt also covers outline writing in detail and takes a couple of pages to discuss the purpose and interleaving of subplot, as well as the usual stuff about formatting and marketing. This has not only become my favorite book on screenwriting, but has proven useful in my evolving understanding of plot in fiction.

Very Thorough
Laura Schellhardt, author of the book, spells it all out. I am always daunted when I set out to write a screenplay, but this book allowed me to break down that process into managable tasks. This book covers it all from the pre-writing phases of research, character development, outlines and plot structure to the writing phase of screenplay format, scene development and overall layout and ends with suggestions on how to further develop and revise your work when it is finished and eventually sell it. I recommend this book to anyone, as it covers topics that will make any screenwriter's work (whether beginner or pro) fuller and richer and the process all the more simpler.

good book. too much information in one book.
I bought it 1 month ago and I haven't finished it yet. it's more of a reference book. I refer to it quite a bit. her writing has flow and easy to understand. I personally don't like "dummies" series but this one is good.

I wish she had a CD with it for search and indexing. this book has lots of information, I orginally planned to finish it in a week and I am still reading it.

I haven't bought it for actually writing a script but for a project I am working on.

probably the best I've seen so for.

cheers