This is What Work (and Youngstown, Ohio) Looked Like in 1944

These mills, they built the tanks and bombsThat won this country’s wars—Bruce Springteen, Youngstown My grandfather worked for Youngstown Sheet and Tube for at least 30 years (because after 30 years of service he received a Zippo Lighter with his initials on it). I always wondered what his job was like. And thanks to YouTube, […]

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E.T. was from Youngstown (Kinda)

It’s funny when you pick an area to focus on what you can uncover. First I learned that screenwriter/producer/director Chris Columbus (Home Alone, Night at the Museum, Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone) was from the Youngstown, Ohio area. Then I learned that the producer Paula Wagner (Mission Impossible, Vanilla Sky, Valkyrie)  was born and […]

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Youngstown’s Hollywood Connection

Happy Thanksgiving. Before I take a circuitous route to point out yet one more connection between Youngstown and Hollywood let me first thank everyone for reading this screenwriting blog as it’s given me much encouragement in my quest to post daily. It’s not easy to write something original daily and finding odd connections really is […]

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Podcasting with Brass Knuckles (‘Crooked City’)

“Everyone who’s sat in that chair has died of unnatural causes.”—Sound bite from the Crooked City/Youngstown, Ohio podcast The above quote from the Crooked City podcast shows just how connected ancient Athens, Greece is to contemporary Youngstown, Ohio. (At least, a fairly recent era of Youngstown folklore.) A story that dates back a couple hundred […]

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Once Upon a Time in Nantucket (And the Superpower that Can Save You in Lean Times)

“I gotta keep breathing. Because tomorrow the sun will rise. Who knows what the tide could bring.” Chuck Nolan (Tom Hanks) Cast Away On March 1, I flew back to Orlando from Boston after attending a documentary filmmaking workshop and started reading on the plane In the Heart of the Sea; The Tragedy of the […]

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Filmmaking in Ohio (and China) … and Winning an Oscar Award

“Congrats to Julia and Steven, the filmmakers behind American Factory, for telling such a complex, moving story about the very human consequences of wrenching economic change. Glad to see two talented and downright good people take home the Oscar for Higher Ground’s first release.” Barack Obama Filmmakers Julia Reichert and Steven Bognar won an Oscar […]

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Filmmaker Sean Baker on ‘The true success of The Florida Project’

“In all this darkness, is there anybody who can make out the truth?” The Twilight Zone/ episode I Am the Night —Color Me Black (1964)   Writer/director Sean Baker spoke at Rollins College yesterday and asked the question, “Can cinema change the world?” He talked about the filmmakers and their films that have inspired him over […]

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Happy Father’s Day

“[Good Will Hunting] is a wonderful example of a hero living an emotionally safe existence and how he gradually finds the courage to abandon that identity to achieve real fulfillment.” Michael Hauge Revealing Your Hero’s Wound A few years ago I read a book where the author stated that everyone had an emotional wound—and it […]

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Eugene Vs. Columbus

This is a blog about screenwriting, but there is also an emphasis here of a sense of place. And since tonight is the first college football national championship playoff game between the University of Oregon and The Ohio State University it’s as good a time as any to talk about Eugene and Columbus. Eugene, Oregon […]

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The LeBron James Redemption

After LeBron James announced in a letter to Sports Illustrated he was returning to play basketball in Cleveland, comedian Frank Caliendo read the letter on ESPN’s Mike & Mike show in the voice of Morgan Freeman. I decided it would make a nice mash-up to combine all of those elements with a few scenes from […]

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