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ProSeries Alumni — A Thriving Community of Professional Screenwriters

ProSeries Writer produces Oscar tribute

March 9th, 2010 at 2:34 pm

Kevin Lee Miller produced the moving short film honoring John Hughes shown during this year’s Academy Awards presentation.

More details at Screenwriting BUZZ …

ProSeries Writer to adapt and direct novel

March 9th, 2010 at 2:32 pm

Kenneth Kemp has been hired to adapt and direct “Near Fall,” a tween coming-of-age novel set in the world of junior wrestling.

More details at Screenwriting BUZZ …

YouTube shorts — Handsome Men’s Club

March 9th, 2010 at 2:30 pm

Jimmy Kimmel presides over a club that includes a few writers.

Go to YouTube …

Oscar winners announced

March 7th, 2010 at 10:33 pm

Original screenplay — “The Hurt Locker,” written by Mark Boal

Adapted screenplay — “Precious: Based on the Novel ‘Push’ by Sapphire,” screenplay by Geoffrey Fletcher

Go To Site …

ProSeries Writer passes on

March 5th, 2010 at 3:48 am

We were saddened to learn that our friend and colleague, Mary Dunkerly, was involved in a car accident and passed away last Friday.

Mary wrote the screenplay for “Hitchhiker’s Journey,” about a nervous bridegroom who visits his former lover for reassurance on the morning of his wedding. She also wrote, produced, and directed a number of short films, and knew a thing or two about romance, baseball, white water rafting, and kick-boxing. Prayers and condolences to her family from all of us.

Members, go to the ProSeries Alumni Social Network

Pressfield on “Depth of Work” Part Two

March 3rd, 2010 at 7:48 am

“… How do you know how crazy you are? By how genuinely nuts you get when you’re NOT doing (or not being allowed to do) what being crazy makes you want to do in the first place.

“But this state of mind isn’t really crazy. It comes from the gods. It’s a species of divine madness. Socrates called the poetic variety of this condition ‘possession by the Muses’ (and rated it superior to technical mastery), though he could have referred with equal accuracy to seizure by any Olympian deity. When this kind of nuttiness grabs us, we are possessed by forces we can’t name and can’t see, can’t measure or quantify, and whose very existence is doubted by much of the conventional world.

“But this state of possession is real, as anyone who has experienced it will testify–and so are the forces that inflict it on us. What do these forces demand? First and foremost, they want depth….”

(via Darrelyn Saloom)

Go to Steven Pressfield’s place …

ProSeries Writer signs with manager

March 2nd, 2010 at 4:45 pm

J.A. Carlton has signed with The Blackwood Company’s management division, 3R Entertainment.

More details at Screenwriting BUZZ …

YouTube shorts — OK Go music video

March 2nd, 2010 at 4:43 pm

“… The official video for the recorded version of “This Too Shall Pass” off of the album “Of the Blue Colour of the Sky”. The video was filmed in a two story warehouse, in the Echo Park neighborhood of Los Angeles, CA. The “machine” was designed and built by the band, along with members of Synn Labs … over the course of several months….”

(via Jenny Lawson and Amanda Palmer)

Go to YouTube …

ProSeries Writer passes on

March 1st, 2010 at 10:04 pm

We mourn the death last week in Vancouver, British Columbia, of our friend and colleague, Andrew Koenig. Most of the world knew him as an actor — we remember him as a tireless and talented writer, director, and video editor. Prayers and condolences to his family from all of us.

Members, go to the ProSeries Alumni Social Network

Pressfield on “Depth of Work”

February 24th, 2010 at 8:17 am

“… I read a story once about Barbra Streisand at a recording session. She did take after take of the same song. The reporter telling the story said he couldn’t tell the difference between Take One and Take Two, or even Take One and Take Nine. But, he said, he could tell the difference between Take One and Take Sixteen. Obvious Ms. Streisand could tell. That too is depth of work.

“What we’re talking about here is head-banging, non-glamorous, nut-busting labor. It’s lonely. It hurts. It drives everybody else crazy. It requires tremendous professionalism and courage (or, perhaps more accurately, stubbornness and mulishness) and control of our emotions and our fears….”

(via Darrelyn Saloom)

Go to Steven Pressfield’s place …

ProSeries Writer completes adaptation

February 23rd, 2010 at 7:51 am

Mark Kratter just completed a script-for-hire adaptation of a well-known graphic novel for Stephen L’Heureux of Solipsist Films.

More details at Screenwriting BUZZ …

YouTube shorts — Nuit Blanche

February 22nd, 2010 at 2:49 pm

“… (A) fleeting moment between two strangers …”

(via Alyssa Milano)

Go to YouTube …

Sutter on getting back into it

February 22nd, 2010 at 1:25 pm

“… I’ve been back with the writers for a month now, and today was the first day I felt like I actually plugged back into the show.  I finished a first draft of episode 301 this week, but it wasn’t until I mulled, sorted and boarded 302 that I felt reconnected to the process of running a show….”

Go to Kurt Sutter’s place …

Epstein on dialect

February 21st, 2010 at 10:00 pm

“… The danger … is that writers work so hard to nail the dialect that they think they’ve created a character and a scene. But you can wind up with a lot of dialect and no good dialogue.

“Thinking about it — it’s very easy to write a guy with a thick lower class accent and think you’ve created a character, when all you’ve done is create a stereotype. I can’t tell you how many thug characters I’ve read who come off as cartoons; I wonder if that’s partly because they’re written entirely in Thug….”

Go to Alex Epstein’s place …

The Guardian survey on ten rules for writing fiction

February 20th, 2010 at 10:59 am

“Get an accountant, abstain from sex and similes, cut, rewrite, then cut and rewrite again – if all else fails, pray. Inspired by Elmore Leonard’s 10 Rules of Writing, we asked authors for their personal dos and don’ts …”

(via NevadaGrey and Danny Stack)

Go to article at guardian.co.uk …