Screenwriting

"'Gentlemen Prefer Red-Heads': Anita Loos, Jean Harlow and 'Red-Headed Woman'"

by Ellen Pullar

In "Creative Imitations and Appropriations: From Cinematic Adaptations to Re-makes (Select Refereed Papers)," edited by Erica Todd, Clément Da Gama, Ellen Pullar and Hilary Radner (Dunedin: Otago University Press, 2011).

Fundamentos del guión audiovisual

by Carmen Sofia Brenes

Tema e trama di un film

by Carmen Sofia Brenes

De qué tratan realmente las películas?: Claves prácticas para analizar y escribir guiones de cine y televisión

by Carmen Sofia Brenes

The Practical Value of Theory: Teaching Aristotle's Poetics to Screenwriters

by Carmen Sofia Brenes

This paper uses P. Ricoeur’s studies on the Poetics, and his notion of "refiguration" as developed in the... more This paper uses P. Ricoeur’s studies on the Poetics, and his notion of "refiguration" as developed in the work of Juan José García-Noblejas, under the scope of the Aristotelian doctrine. It suggests that the “first writing” of a screenplay focuses on the structure of the plot and the characters, dialogue and actions. The “re-writing” deals with these same elements; but above all, discovers the deep poetic structure that holds together the story. From that point on, the writer is able to return to the plot and refine it. This back and forth movement ends up in coherence and unity of the story, and so illuminates the writer’s personal exploration on the meaning of life.

Hollywood's Middle Ages: The Script Development of 'Knights of the Round Table' and 'Ivanhoe', 1935-53

by Jonathan Stubbs

Exemplaria: A Journal of Theory in Medieval and Renaissance Studies, 21/4 (2009).

This article examines the development of Hollywood representations of medieval Britain in Ivanhoe (1952) and Knights... more This article examines the development of Hollywood representations of medieval Britain in Ivanhoe (1952) and Knights of the Round Table (1953). Both films were initially developed in the mid 1930s before being postponed on the eve of war, revised by new producers, and put into production in the early 1950s. Drawing on archived screenplays, this article shows that the films were drafted and redrafted across three decades in response to shifting political contexts. This layered creative process reveals how both films were able to accommodate subversive and occasionally contradictory political themes, and sheds light on the rich relationship between modern America and medieval Britain. As broader political events tested America's relationship to its own historical ideals, images of Britain's Middle Ages functioned as a cultural space used to articulate ideas about democracy and race relations at home, and interventionism abroad.

Guilt Frame /Screen Memory

by Alev Adil

published in Issues, 2009.

Living in a Limited World: Omniscience and Point of View in the Works of Harlan Ellison

by Phil Nichols

Presented at The Eaton Conference, University of California Riverside, 12 February 2011.

A version of this paper has been selected for publication on the official website of Harlan Ellison (forthcoming).

Instructions and Artworks: Musical Scores, Theatrical Scripts, Architectural Plans, and Screenplays

by Ted Nannicelli

The British Journal of Aesthetics 2011 51: 399-414

This essay offers an account of the relationship between screenplay and film, and it does so by comparing this... more This essay offers an account of the relationship between screenplay and film, and it does so by comparing this relationship to the relationships that hold between other sets of instructions and artworks: score and musical work, theatrical script and theatrical work, architectural plan and architectural work. I argue that musical scores and theatrical scripts are work-determinative documents—manuscripts whose existence entails the existence of musical works and theatrical works, respectively, and which determine the facts about what those works are like. On the contrary, I argue that architectural plans and screenplays are not work-determinative because they alone do not entail the existence of any architectural work or film. Nevertheless, I conclude that this difference has no bearing upon art status: theatrical scripts are almost always artworks in their own right, musical scores almost never are, and architectural plans are in certain cases. This conclusion suggests that although the relationship between theatrical script and theatrical work is quite different from that between screenplay and film, there is no reason to think that screenplays cannot be literary artworks in their own right.

The early screenwriting practice of Ernest Lehman

by Ted Nannicelli

In Journal of Screenwriting (2010)

This article analyses Ernest Lehman's early screenwriting practice and argues that there are essential commonalities... more This article analyses Ernest Lehman's early screenwriting practice and argues that there are essential commonalities between it and his prose fiction writing practice. In the first section, I highlight the similarities between Lehman's working notes for his abandoned novel, You Scratch My Back , and his unfinished screenplay for the MGM project, Labor Story. In the second section, I look at the ways in which Lehman's prose fiction writing practice influences the composition of his first screenplay, for Executive Suite, as well as the composition of his screenplay for Sweet Smell of Success, and argue that in his prose fiction writing and screenwriting, Lehman uses language in the same aesthetically relevant ways.

Why Can't Screenplays Be Artworks?

by Ted Nannicelli

In Journal of Aesthetics and Art Criticism (Fall 2011)

Technological Other/Quasi Other: Reflection on Lived Experience

by Stacey O'Neal Irwin

Direct Measures: Embedded “authentic” Assessment

by Stacey O'Neal Irwin