Archive - Practical Screenwriting

The Mark of the One-Note Character

not everyone should be well-rounded

May 11 •

The Script I Would Write If I Was Trying To Break In Right Now

How I would try to get my particular set of screenwriting skills noticed by as many industry professionals as possible.

May 2 •

April 2025

"Our Job Is to Make Entertainment"

directing & screenwriting tips from my all-time filmmaking hero, Howard Hawks

Apr 14 •

February 2025

How I Write Action Lines

a very basic principle that's served me pretty well so far

Feb 17 •

The System Is Rigged

as an outsider, can you flip that to your advantage?

Feb 10 •

January 2025

The Shape & The Juice: Two Ways of Thinking About a Scene

I’m pretty sure the first post I ever published on this poor neglected substack was my personal running list of Screenwriting Principles. I started…

Jan 3 •

January 2024

What I Look For When I'm Hiring

or, the one simple selfish question I ask myself during the interview process

Jan 8, 2024 •

December 2023

Let's Make Fun Action Movies Fun Again

or, let's stop making the movie version of an NBA all-star game

Dec 20, 2023 •

August 2023

One For Them, One For Me

one way of thinking practically about a screenwriting career

Aug 19, 2023 •

July 2023

The Case for Non-Linearity

or, when to structure a story outside the bounds of linear time

Jul 14, 2023 •

June 2023

The Double-Concept Story Idea

or, what my more successful scripts have in common

Jun 26, 2023 •

The script is finished. Yeah, I'm pretty sure it's finished.

Oh shit, now I'm not so sure...

Jun 16, 2023 •

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