Advice — advice

A Reader Asks: I have the rights to do a screenplay on the life of a person, but how do you handle the rights to include other people in life, like an ex-wife and others who may be important to the story. Do you need get their rights also? Larry Zerner, Esq. Responds: This is a great question and one that comes up fairly often. Ideally, when you are writing a screenplay about a real person who is not a public figure, you want to obtain rights from as many of the people who will be portrayed in the screenplay...

WS: You graduated magna cum laude AND Phi Beta Kappa from a small, private liberal arts college, Macalester in St. Paul. What was your major and did it have any impact on your careers as house painter, apartment house owner, and prize-winning screenwriter? SLO: Well it was a funky mix of physics, psychology, philosophy and neuroscience that qualified me for nothing, except maybe a housepainter or a graduate student. I was trying to get at what consciousness was. As it turns out it was also good prep for being a writer. WS: One of your comments in your bio that...

Andy Cohen is the President of Grade A Entertainment, a production and management company representing writers, directors and authors in feature films, episodic and long-form television. Before founding Grade A, Andy spent ten years as both an executive and a producer. In all, Andy has been involved in the development, sale and/or production of over 40 film projects, seven Movies-of-the-Week and three series. He currently has an eclectic slate of feature film, episodic and long-form television projects set up at studios, networks and production companies. Upcoming speaking engagements include: Selling To Hollywood in Los Angeles and The Maui Writers Conference....

We know J.D. Salinger's views on movies and writing for Hollywood by reading the second page of The Catcher in the Rye. Speaking of his brother, D.B., the hero, Holden Caulfield, says "Now he's out in Hollywood, D.B., being a prostitute. If there's one thing I hate, it's the movies. Don't even mention them to me." Where did this come from? Most people don't know that one of Salinger's short stories was made into a movie. "Uncle Wiggly in Connecticut" became "My Foolish Heart," starring Susan Hayward. And Salinger hated it. The result? No other Salinger fiction has ever been...

This sound familiar? You take a thankless job to pay bills for six months while you write the next great screenplay. Ten years and 20 jobs later, that great script still eludes you. Thinking about giving up? Marc Norman was. Fortunately, he decided to rededicate himself to learn the craft and write one last script. The result was Shakespeare in Love and Norman's reward was an Oscar. As a means of offering encouragement to others wondering if they should continue writing, Norman agreed to share his story. Norman received a Masters degree in English at UC Berkeley. As a film...