The basic premise behind almost every successful feature film can be stated in one simple sentence: Someone we care about wants something badly and is having a terrible time getting it. ”Pretty simple, right?” says Terrel Seltzer. “But how do you make a character sympathetic? How do you establish a compelling goal and desire (two important, related, but very different story elements?
How do you structure rising tension so that the Hollywood Reader keeps turning the page? That’s the art and the craft of screenwriting.”
The class will devote a week each to exploring five essentials of writing a screenplay:
Breaking Story: Take an idea, build from the premise, and find the structure
Developing Character: Who is a character we care about? And that an actor wants to play?
Maintaining Conflict: It’s absolutely essential, from page one till the end
Constructing Scenes and Sequences: What is the difference between the two, and how to make them dramatic and entertaining
Writing Visually: Format, word choice, tone, and technique — what makes a script a great read?
Terrel Seltzer is a self-taught screenwriter. She learned the craft by watching and outlining literally hundreds of movies. Her career started in the Bay Area, working with SF director Wayne Wang, for whom she wrote the screenplays for the independent films Chan is Missing and Dim Sum. Her two produced Hollywood screenplays are How I Got into College (with Lara Flynn Boyle and Anthony Edwards) and One Fine Day (with Michelle Pfeiffer and George Clooney). Currently, she has two scripts in production: New Song, to be filmed in Jordan in late spring 2015, and Same River Twice, slated for early 2016.
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How do you structure rising tension so that the Hollywood Reader keeps turning the page? That’s the art and the craft of screenwriting.”
The class will devote a week each to exploring five essentials of writing a screenplay:
Breaking Story: Take an idea, build from the premise, and find the structure
Developing Character: Who is a character we care about? And that an actor wants to play?
Maintaining Conflict: It’s absolutely essential, from page one till the end
Constructing Scenes and Sequences: What is the difference between the two, and how to make them dramatic and entertaining
Writing Visually: Format, word choice, tone, and technique — what makes a script a great read?
Terrel Seltzer is a self-taught screenwriter. She learned the craft by watching and outlining literally hundreds of movies. Her career started in the Bay Area, working with SF director Wayne Wang, for whom she wrote the screenplays for the independent films Chan is Missing and Dim Sum. Her two produced Hollywood screenplays are How I Got into College (with Lara Flynn Boyle and Anthony Edwards) and One Fine Day (with Michelle Pfeiffer and George Clooney). Currently, she has two scripts in production: New Song, to be filmed in Jordan in late spring 2015, and Same River Twice, slated for early 2016.
The basic premise behind almost every successful feature film can be stated in one simple sentence: Someone we care about wants something badly and is having a terrible time getting it. ”Pretty simple, right?” says Terrel Seltzer. “But how do you make a character sympathetic? How do you establish a compelling goal and desire (two important, related, but very different story elements?
How do you structure rising tension so that the Hollywood Reader keeps turning the page? That’s the art and the craft of screenwriting.”
The class will devote a week each to exploring five essentials of writing a screenplay:
Breaking Story: Take an idea, build from the premise, and find the structure
Developing Character: Who is a character we care about? And that an actor wants to play?
Maintaining Conflict: It’s absolutely essential, from page one till the end
Constructing Scenes and Sequences: What is the difference between the two, and how to make them dramatic and entertaining
Writing Visually: Format, word choice, tone, and technique — what makes a script a great read?
Terrel Seltzer is a self-taught screenwriter. She learned the craft by watching and outlining literally hundreds of movies. Her career started in the Bay Area, working with SF director Wayne Wang, for whom she wrote the screenplays for the independent films Chan is Missing and Dim Sum. Her two produced Hollywood screenplays are How I Got into College (with Lara Flynn Boyle and Anthony Edwards) and One Fine Day (with Michelle Pfeiffer and George Clooney). Currently, she has two scripts in production: New Song, to be filmed in Jordan in late spring 2015, and Same River Twice, slated for early 2016.
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How do you structure rising tension so that the Hollywood Reader keeps turning the page? That’s the art and the craft of screenwriting.”
The class will devote a week each to exploring five essentials of writing a screenplay:
Breaking Story: Take an idea, build from the premise, and find the structure
Developing Character: Who is a character we care about? And that an actor wants to play?
Maintaining Conflict: It’s absolutely essential, from page one till the end
Constructing Scenes and Sequences: What is the difference between the two, and how to make them dramatic and entertaining
Writing Visually: Format, word choice, tone, and technique — what makes a script a great read?
Terrel Seltzer is a self-taught screenwriter. She learned the craft by watching and outlining literally hundreds of movies. Her career started in the Bay Area, working with SF director Wayne Wang, for whom she wrote the screenplays for the independent films Chan is Missing and Dim Sum. Her two produced Hollywood screenplays are How I Got into College (with Lara Flynn Boyle and Anthony Edwards) and One Fine Day (with Michelle Pfeiffer and George Clooney). Currently, she has two scripts in production: New Song, to be filmed in Jordan in late spring 2015, and Same River Twice, slated for early 2016.
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2121 Bonar Street, Berkeley, CA 94702
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