DON’T WAIT FOR THE MOVIE! Act One has just completed negotiations with Baker Books who will be publishing our very first book. Special thanks to Deidre Knight our amazing agent and to Chad Allen at Baker for staying after me to get a book proposal together. Actually, all I did was hire Act One alumn Spencer Lewerenz (’02) to get the thing together. Smarrrrrt. Anyway, we’re excited. This will be some good promotion for Act One, and will help us... Read more

THE MOVIES I WANT TO WRITE If only Act One would fire me, I would have no excuse NOT to be the screenwriter I originally set out to be when I went to film school and then moved from New “land of Emily Dickinson” England to Los “land of the Osbornes” Angeles. Just to keep the dream alive, I keep collecting project ideas that I am going to write as soon as I can get out from under, you know,... Read more

PART II, WHAT CLARE SAID Zenit just posted the second part of its interview with our Act One alumn, screenwriter, Clare Sera. HOLLYWOOD, California, MARCH 26, 2004 (Zenit.org).- John Paul II exhorts parents to be pro-active about the media in his message for World Communications Day 2004. “Families should be outspoken in telling producers, advertisers and public authorities what they like and dislike,” he advises. Clare Sera, an alumna of Act One: Writing for Hollywood who is collaborating on the... Read more

EVERYBODY, WHAT CLARE SAYS! Act One alumn, Clare Sera, was interviewed for a two part series on Zenit about being a Christian in Hollywood. Clare is one of the writers on Curious George for Universal Pictures/Imagine Entertainment. Clare is also an actor and can be seen in the Princess Diary movies. Here is the interview. Here is a snippet to get you to click on the above… Q: How can Christians gauge how much Hollywood influences their lives? What are... Read more

KRISTIN‘S ROCKING MY WORLD Back in my undergraduate days at Magdalen College, there was a moment when the book Kristin Lavransdatter was sweeping the female side of the campus. I remember making a mental note to read it some day, but I just didn’t feel that inner tug to take it on then. I found a copy in a second hand bookstore the other day, and suddenly knew the time had come. It’s totally rocking my world. Has anybody else... Read more

TOO MANY COOKS, NOT ENOUGH BROTH So part of the fallout of The Passion is that many more people are calling me from all over who want to put out a shingle and start their own production company. “God has told us that we should make a movie.” Generally, these people are collecting a couple of million dollars and are eager and willing to put it all on the red of filmmaking and spin that reel. Few people have any... Read more

IT’S WORKING…. We started training Christian writers for mainstream Hollywood careers back in August of 1999. Since then, those of us on the faculty, staff, Boards and donor end of the program have been nervously brooding over our program alumni, tweeking and mentoring, advising and praying, waiting to see if the program will actually yield any results. We know it has created a supportive community of friends and aspiring filmmakers, but we have been waiting to see if it actually... Read more

“Art lost its basic creative drive the moment it was separated from worship.” Filmamker, Ingmar Bergman Read more

HOPE FOR THE RICH YOUNG MAN? I am getting emails from friends of the aspiring young filmmaker who I wrote about below in “People Not Projects.” They are telling me he is seriously committed to being part of the film industry, and did not “go away sad” from my challenge at all, but has his face firmly set into the wind. Cool. I live to be wrong about such things. Go West, Young Man! Read more

PEOPLE NOT PROJECTS Here’s the intro to my next column for National Catholic Register. I like it… At a recent talk in Washington, DC, a devout young Catholic raised his hand and asked me what he should do to enter into the world of Hollywood filmmaking. He wants to be part of producing many more Passions of the Christ on the screens of the future. I felt a little like Jesus to the rich young man, in answering him, “Give... Read more