Tag Archive for ‘Screenwriting’

A Little White Lie (aka Shriver) Trailer

A Little White Lie – Trailer from Michael Maren on Vimeo.

A Short History of Decay

On Friday morning, I met in New York City with a legendary producer of many independent films that I admire, films that have risen above the crowd to critical success and Academy Award recognition. He’s a hands-on producer who often doubles as first assistant director, something that I as a first-time director absolutely need to […]

It’s Come to This

I’ve been a working screenwriter for more than ten years. (I was a journalist before that – see the other pages on this website.) I sold the first three or four scripts I ever wrote and thought “this is easy.”  I used to get hired to write movies that I pitched to studios. And sometimes […]

Flavor of the Month

Several years ago I was in LA to pitch a project with a young, hot director.  He was fresh off a big indie success; i.e, lots of festival praise and award nominations. The first night we were in town, his agency threw a reception for him at the flavor-of-the month restaurant on Melrose.  It seemed […]

I’m a Big Fan

The first evening after the first time I ever went on a series a Hollywood pitch meetings, I was walking on air. I was with my wife, and we’d sat down with producers at Paramount, Fox as well as a number of successful independent producers in Beverly Hills. Everyone loved the project, a love-story murder […]

Chasing the Market in Hollywood

Several years ago I was pitching a film to a producer who had a deal with one of the major studios. My story hewed closely to a real life tale about some super smart middle class New York City kids who turned themselves into expert gamblers. They started playing online and eventually ending up in […]

What’s the Best Training for a Screenwriter?

What do these screenwriters have in common?  Joe Eszterhas (Basic Instinct) Paul Attanasio (Quiz Show) Cameron Crowe (Jerry Maguire), David Simon (The Wire), Mitch Glazer (Great Expectations), Nora Ephron (When Harry Met Sally), Nicholas Pileggi (Goodfellas) William Monahan (The Departed),  Mark Boal (The Hurt Locker) and, well, me. They all started out as journalists. And […]