Newsflash: How To Write a Killer Script (London) June 11th-12th 2016
How to Write a Killer Script
Do you want to see your work on the big or small screen? Would you like to learn how to write a brilliant page-turning script?
Join award-winning writer, director and producer Cal Moriarty for this 2-day, intensive screenwriting course. Over the two days you’ll learn how to approach an original screenplay idea or plan an adaptation; how to write a film scene/sequence/act; how to write a treatment, and which bits of your adaptation or notes for an original idea might not make the cut. In addition, you’ll gain an insight into the nuts and bolts of the film business, learn how screenplay options and writers contracts work, and, how to avoid endless rewrites. You will leave with valuable skills to enhance your writing portfolio and greatly increase your chances of selling your screenplay.
June 11th and 12th 2016 (weekend)
Students will arrive at 9.30am for a 10am start. Each day will finish at 5pm.
Lunch is provided on both days. Day 1 in the delicious bistro and Day 2, working lunch in the room.
The Montague Hotel, 15 Montague Street, London, WC1B 5BJ.
Russell Square (4 mins), Tottenham Court Road (7 mins), Holborn (8 mins).
Film vs TV (and what medium might best suit your original piece/adaptation)
How to kill your darlings (AKA what to leave out from your novel/notes)
How to write a movie scene/sequence/act
Structure for movies; and, for TV series/mini-series
How to plan it all out precisely
How to write a movie treatment / TV series bible/treatment
How to write a killer logline
How to avoid endless rewrites
The movie and TV businesses and how they relate to you as a screenwriter (US and UK)
How to get your script optioned/produced
During the second afternoon we will work with professional actors who will workshop extracts from the mini-scenes you will produce in class that morning (for those who wish to try out their writing skills with actors, it’s not compulsory, but you will find it invaluable to participate in).
This will be an intensive course, and in order to get the most from the weekend we will be asking you to invest some time in advance of the course. This will enable Cal to give very precise feedback about the choices you are considering for your own screenplay. The more of this you can do prior to the course, the more you will get out of the weekend.
So, before the course commences, please view:
Gone Girl, by Gillian Flynn (film)
House of Cards (US TV version with Kevin Spacey) – pilot episode (available through NetFlix)
Tuition (a total of 12+ hours tutor time across two days), lunch on both days, tea/coffee throughout the day
Travel. Evening meals. Accommodation: although the hotel will offer a delegate rate for select rooms. Further details available upon booking.
Group Meal, Saturday Evening: a chance to relax and get to know your peers better. On booking, please let us know if you are wish to attend a set evening meal (most likely at a nearby Bloomsbury Indian restaurant) on Saturday evening for an additional cost of max £30 per head, including a glass of wine, 2 courses and the service charge. (You can pay for this nearer the time of the course, should you wish to attend.)
Award winning writer-director/producer Cal Moriarty is an expert at working with new screenwriters, dramatists and novelists. Her and her mentees’ screenplays have been optioned and produced by (amongst others) Hollywood names, Channel 4 and the BBC. The Bees, the novel she championed and found an agent for, was sold to Harper Collins worldwide and shortlisted for the 2015 Baileys Prize.
Cal began her writing life on the Royal Court Young Writers Workshop a Very Long Time Ago! She has written eight feature film screenplays (3 action-adventure, 2 comedy, 1 paranormal romance, 1 crime fiction, 1 literary biopic) all of which have been optioned and two of these are also under development as TV series. Her first feature film as writer-director is currently in pre-production. Cal is the only European to have been selected for the prestigious Hollywood Blacklist Labs and through them she is developing her literary bio-pic screenplay Burn Everything which focuses on the relationship between Katherine Mansfield and Virginia Woolf. Her short film, Talk, which she wrote and directed won five short film awards, will be the focus of her feature debut. Her debut novel, The Killing of Bobbi Lomax, was the first (and, thus far, only) novel optioned by Faber from its Novel Writing course and was chosen as a Financial Times Crime Novel of the Year 2015 and long-listed for a CWA New Blood award. She’s currently working on the second novel in the series, Death in Wonderland.
Cal says: My role as tutor for the weekend is to give you confidence in what you already know and illuminate what you don’t in a fun creative environment alongside your peers. You will leave the weekend chock full of useful information you can apply directly to all your future screenplays.
Places on this workshop style course are strictly limited to 18 and can be secured with a 50% non-refundable deposit (£165), to be paid at the time of booking. The balance (£165) will be due by 18 May 2016. Prior to May 5th, there is an early bird discount of 10% bringing the course fee down to £297.
In the event that you are unable to attend the course after the full amount has been paid, all reasonable timely efforts will be made to re-sell your place in the writing community. If this cannot be achieved, we are unable to refund your payments. However, you are free at any stage to find a writer friend to replace you on the course and arrange for that person to pay you direct. Alternatively, you can transfer your booking to our online course which begins in July.
To reserve a place on this course email Cal Moriarty direct
