Screenwriter's Utopia: Chris' Picks: Top 10 Books

Top 10 Books - General Screenwriting/Film

1. Schmucks With Underwoods - By Max Wilk

The title repeats Jack L. Warner's phrase for the chumps who cranked out scripts on his lot. What Warner couldn't have planned on was how the description would stick. What is sad however is how accurate he truly was in depicting the stature of Hollywood's screenwriters. In this wonderful collection of interviews Wilk takes us back to the Golden Age of Hollywood by taking us to the source, the screenwriter. And within the antidotes and recollections are often humorous and sometimes sad tales of Hollywood's writers. However, I suggest this book not only as a history lesson and comedic break from your writing, but also because within it are some invaluable insight into the craft of screenwriting.

2. Framework: A History of Screenwriting in the American Film - By Tom Stempel

How can you truly understand what it means to be a screenwriter without some investigation into what a screenwriter has become? Stempel informs on the development of the script and screenwriter in the Hollywood film, from the silent era to the evolution of a feature length screenplay. With the rise of the studio system, Stempel outlines the decline of the screenwriter in Hollywood's food chain and the emergence of the writer-director. Woven throughout are brief vignettes of producers, directors, stars, and, of course, screenwriters.

3. The First Time I Got Paid For It… Writers' Tales From the Hollywood Trenches - Edited by Peter Lefcourt and Laura J. Shapiro

This is a book that will give you some inspiration. Filled with dozens of short stories, including a humorous Foreword by William Goldman, writers share their experiences breaking into the business by recollecting on their first big sale or assignment. This is a book that is good for the soul.

4. I Lost it at the Movies - By Pauline Kael

Pauline has a dozen books or more out there, all dealing with her 30+ years as a film critic. Frankly, she's next to only James Agee as America's most influential and important film critic, and perhaps second to none. She too stood up for the screenwriter in the onslaught of auteurism. But here I recommend this particular book by Kael, who passed away not long ago, not because it contains numerous essays that attack the auteur theory, which are excellent, but because for me, it truly shows her at her best. As a screenwriter you get a sense of what film is or can be. This book should heighten your senses so when you sit down to write, you're more aware of the power of film to enlighten, and sometimes just provide guilty pleasure.

5. Which Lie Did I Tell? : More Adventures in the Screen Trade - By William Goldman

This follow up to his best selling book "Adventures in the Screen Trade", is once again full of wit, wisdom, and laughs. This book documents his exile and comeback as a major force in Hollywood screenwriting. Goldman is probably our greatest living screenwriter who is still working in the biz. Though his ramblings sometimes come off more flat than they did in 1983 when his first book came out, reading Goldman will fill your belly with laughter and your head with important things to ponder.

6. Zen and the Art of Screenwriting 2: More Insights and Interviews - By William Froug

Froug's interviews with some of Hollywood biggest names is a treasure to any screenwriter looking for windows into the minds of these soon to be legends of the art and craft of screenwriting. This is the second book of interviews and you can't go wrong with either. I include this one as it includes directors and producers as well: interviewed filmmakers are Richard Donner, Scott Frank, Brian Helgeland, Nicholas Kazan, Frank Pierson, Eric Roth, Robin Swicord and others.

7. Three More Screenplays by Preston Sturges - By Andrew Horton, Preston Sturges

I mention this book for its inclusion The Power and the Glory, perhaps the first really important spec screenplay sold in the modern era of Hollywood filmmaking. Preston Sturges was the first to negotiate a percentage of the backend and at a time when screenplays were even more viciously rewritten than they are today, Sturges' screenplay was left untouched. Some at the time considered it the greatest script ever written.

8. Best American Screenplays - By Sam Thomas

Sam Thomas in 1986 published the first in a three book series celebrating the American screenplay as a "literary" achievement. He was of course blasted by scholars and the like for proposing such a thing. Even today most serious writers consider screenwriting a lower class of writing. Screenplays are sometimes hard reads when produced by screenwriters who do not consider the craft to be an art as well. I suggest this book (all three of them) because of the idea of presenting the great screenplays in collected volumes was such an honorable thing to do in the early 1980s. (In the 1940s a series of books were published titled "Great Film Plays" edited by John Gassner and Dudley Nichols, which ironically faired much better than did Thomas' effort.)

9. Talking Pictures: Screenwriters in the American Cinema - By Richard Corliss.

Perhaps the first to really standup for the screenwriter in the 1960s and early 70s in the onslaught of Andrew Sarris and his auteur epigones, was then Editor-in-chief of Film Comment, Richard Corliss. This book, published in 1974, sought to lessen the blow of the auteur theory by establishing the authorship of screenwriters who indeed do participate in the movie making process. After all, are not tone, characterization, theme all established a head of time by the screenwriter? I think so.

10. Who Wrote That Movie? : Screenwriting In Review: 2000 - 2002 - By Chris Wehner

Shameless self-promotion. One reviewer called Wehner the "Pauline Kael" of screnwriting. Well, I can't argue with that. So, until I finder a better book to put here… read on and enjoy this collection of reviews for some of your favorite films of the past few years. Discover how the script changes from origination to the produced film.

MONSTER: Living off the Big Screen

Top 10 Books - General Screenwriting/Film