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This week on Script Apart, the return of Mike Flanagan! The response to our last episode speaking to the horror auteur, one of this generation’s true titans of the genre, was so emphatic, we couldn’t wait to invite Mike back on the show to get lost in the Overlook-esque hedge maze of 2019's Doctor Sleep, his near-miraculous sequel to The Shining, Doctor Sleep. We use the word “miraculous” because it really is astonishing what the Ewan McGregor-starring chiller managed to achieve, marrying the legacies of two notoriously different visions of The Shining.  Stephen King wrote The Shining in 1977. When Stanley Kubrick made drastic changes to King's source text in his adaptation of the story three years later, it led to contempt between these two masters of their craft. Fans have been divided ever since over which version is the more powerful – King’s novel, which had a different ending and a sunnier message about the capacity for love to triumph over evil, or Kubrick’s ruthless cinematic journey into male madness; the bloody end game of toxic masculinity, as embodied by Jack Nicholson’s Jack Torrence. When Mike was presented with the chance to adapt King’s 2013 literary sequel to The Shining, which continued the canon his story, ignoring Kubrick’s changes, the Haunting of Hill House filmmaker decided to attempt the impossible. His Doctor Sleep was to knit together the visual language of Kubrick’s Shining with the storytelling that King favoured,  honouring both iterations.  The story of how he pulled it off, and the seismic personal changes it sparked in Mike’s own life, is a tale as fascinating as the film itself. Which is saying something. Doctor Sleep is a fevered festival of telekinetic children, travelling vampiric bohemians and the courage it takes to beat addiction. And though the film didn’t perform well at the box office, it’s since found a passionate community of devoted fans who rightly consider it a masterpiece. Listen out at the end for some mind-blowing information on the sequels and spin-offs that its disappointing commercial performance sadly stopped from going ahead – and a note of optimism that we may see some of Doctor Sleep’s characters again, featuring in Mike’s upcoming adaptation of King’s incredible The Dark Tower.Script Apart is hosted by Al Horner and produced by Kamil Dymek. Follow us on Twitter and Instagram, or email us on thescriptapartpodcast@gmail.com.Support for this episode comes from ScreenCraft, Arc Studio Pro and WeScreenplay.To get ad-free episodes and exclusive content, join us on Patreon.Support the show

Unlike Margot Robbie in the hedonistic tour-de-force Babylon, we at Script Apart have never fought a rattlesnake. We have, however, now had the pleasure of chatting with one of our favourite filmmakers working today, Damien Chazelle. The Whiplash writer-director’s latest epic is a fevered telling of how 1920s Hollywood reacted as the industry transitioned from silent film to sound, shining a spotlight on the drug-addled dreamers chewed up and spat out by Tinseltown as it underwent that seismic change. It’s a story that puts the “sin” in Singing In The Rain, following an ensemble cast of characters as they experience both the divinity and destruction of the American moviemaking machine, with Margot Robbie astonishing as the doomed Nellie LaRoy – a character loosely based on real-life actress Clara Bow.If all that sounds drastically unlike Damien’s previous work, well, that’s intentional – the La La Land filmmaker wanted to make a movie at the other end of the storytelling spectrum to that acclaimed 2016 musical when approaching Babylon. “If La La Land was a love letter to Hollywood, then Babylon is written with a poison pen,” he told Al when they last spoke before the film’s release. Catching up now for a spoiler breakdown of the movie and its incredible screenplay, the pair discuss how early iterations of the film centered on Brad Pitt’s character Jack Conrad, the eye-opening real-life stories of 1920s Hollywood debauchery that Damien pulled from, and where next for the filmmaker now that he’s conquered his boldest, most ambitious project to date.Script Apart is hosted by Al Horner and produced by Kamil Dymek. Follow us on Twitter and Instagram, or email us on thescriptapartpodcast@gmail.com.Support for this episode comes from ScreenCraft, Arc Studio Pro and WeScreenplay.To get ad-free episodes and exclusive content, join us on Patreon.Support the show

Justin Benson and Aaron Moorhead are a duo who don’t wait for permission and refuse to let small budgets reign in their storytelling ambitions. Since announcing themselves as a fierce new force in independent filmmaking a decade ago with the meta-horror Resolution, the pair have released a further four films, each one a staggeringly original triumph of imagination over budgetary restraints. Spring was a low-cost Lovecraftian tale set on a gorgeous stretch of Italian coast that corkscrewed between romance and brutal body-horror. The Endless was a time-loop sci-fi head-scratcher involving a UFO cult that proved similarly spell-binding made on a similar shoestring. By 2019’s Synchronic, about a designer drug that allows users to step through time, they had A-list actors like Anthony Mackie and Jamie Dornan queuing up to work with them, and superhero studios keen to collaborate (they’ve since helmed episodes of Marvel’s Moon Knight and Loki). Together, they're storytellers capable of building epic worlds without requiring epic resources.While Benson and Moorhead have enjoyed their recent excursions into the MCU, unsettling paranormal puzzles made on a dime are where they say their hearts truly lie. Which is why, when the pandemic struck and the world was thrown into lockdown, they began planning a supernatural mystery they could shoot in Benson’s apartment, star in themselves (the duo often act in their own movies) and craft almost entirely themselves. Something In The Dirt – their most compelling film to date – tells the tale of neighbours John and Levi, drawn into an unlikely friendship by unexplainable phenomenons in their apartment block. They decide to document this activity in search of fame and fortune – but can each party trust the other, as revelations about their secretive lives follow them down a rabbit hole into the unknown?We met with Benson and Moorhead in person last summer, before Something In The Dirt’s release, while they were filming Loki season two. They told us about their writing habits and helped us decode one of the most jigsaw-like cult dramas in decades – a must-watch for fans of David Robert Mitchell’s Under The Silver Lake and films like it. This is a spoiler conversation so be sure to catch the film before tuning in – it’s available on Hulu for our listeners in America, and video on demand if you’re tuning in from the UK. Script Apart is hosted by Al Horner and produced by Kamil Dymek. Follow us on Twitter and Instagram, or email us on thescriptapartpodcast@gmail.com.Support for this episode comes from ScreenCraft, Arc Studio Pro and WeScreenplay.To get ad-free episodes and exclusive content, join us on Patreon.Support the show

Mike Flanagan is one of the defining horror storytellers of the last decade. He’s a trusted custodian of tales by some of the greatest horror authors of all time, with Stephen King, Shirley Jackson and Edgar Allan Poe just some of the names he’s adapted into acclaimed shows and movies. His credits as a writer, director and showrunner include The Haunting of Hill House, The Haunting of Bly Manor and The Shining sequel Doctor Sleep. No work is more personal to the filmmaker, however, than 2021’s astonishing vampire drama Midnight Mass.  In the conversation you’re about to hear, Mike delves into his show’s creation, going back in time over a decade to a version of Midnight Mass he intended to write as a novel. The story of its evolution into one of the most moving meditations on religion in memory (not to mention one of Netflix’s most acclaimed ever series) is the story of a series of huge life changes for the 44-year-old, as his relationship to alcohol, faith, family and other facets of his life began to alter. The show starred Zach Gilford as Riley, a recovering addict returning to his small isolated hometown of Crockett Island after serving four years in prison for killing someone in a drunk-driving incident. There he reunites with an old flame, named Erin Greene, played by Kate Siegel, Mike’s partner and frequent collaborator. Erin is pregnant, but that pregnancy takes an unexpected turn following the arrival of an enigmatic young priest on the island, who unleashes upon members of the local church-going community a series of seemingly impossible miracles. What follows is an unholy, blood-soaked baptism, as the line between what’s miraculous and what’s monstrous becomes dangerously blurred. Discover why Mike’s love for Midnight Mass is so great, he still has the angel-slash-vampire’s prosthetic wings in his garage. Find out all about abandoned plans for a second season of the show, in which Riley was to be revived as the show’s antagonist. And learn why there’s a musicality to monologues that makes them a joy to write (with some tips on how to write your own). Script Apart is hosted by Al Horner and produced by Kamil Dymek. Follow us on Twitter and Instagram, or email us on thescriptapartpodcast@gmail.com.Support for this episode comes from ScreenCraft, Arc Studio Pro and WeScreenplay.To get ad-free episodes and exclusive content, join us on Patreon.Support the show

This week we’re joined by acclaimed writer-director Todd Field, whose new drama Tar recently picked up a number of BAFTA and Oscar nominations, and understandably so. It’s an up-close portrait of a prodigious but problematic classical pianist named Lydia Tar, played by Cate Blanchett, whose achievements as the first female conductor of the Berlin Philharmonic are blighted by a history of sexual misconduct now threatening to unravel her life and mental health. Lydia’s abuses of power in this tense, sensory drama have seen the film become a lightning rod for conversations about so-called “cancel culture.” But as you’ll discover in this episode, Tar began life long before that term had been coined. There are deeply human questions of power, corrosion and culpability within this story that dovetail in interesting ways with our current climate – but are bigger than that buzzword and the volatile conversation around it. In the conversation you're about to hear, Todd breaks down key themes, scenes and characters in fascinating detail. Is Lydia really being haunted? What was the early incarnation like that before the project was rooted in the high stakes world of classical music, when the character was set to be the head of a media conglomerate? And when the film ends with a reference to a video game named Monster Hunter, how accurate is it to interpret that this has been a narrative about a cancel culture fall from grace – the titular monster, finally hunted? Script Apart is hosted by Al Horner and produced by Kamil Dymek. Follow us on Twitter and Instagram, or email us on thescriptapartpodcast@gmail.com.Support for this episode comes from ScreenCraft, Arc Studio Pro and WeScreenplay.To get ad-free episodes and exclusive content, join us on Patreon.Support the show

Today on the show, we’re joined by Samuel D. Hunter – playwright-turned-screenwriter of moving new drama, The Whale. Directed by Darren Aronofsky, the film tells the tale of Charlie (Brendan Fraser) – a reclusive former teacher who developed destructive eating habits following a devastating past tragedy. With seemingly days to live, Charlie desperately attempts to reconnect with a daughter who resents him, and is sinking into a cynicism that Charlie finds heartbreaking. It’s a film that, you may have heard, has stoked a wide range of reactions, which Sam and I get into in detail. We talk about its provoking title, which he explains was designed to prod at people’s prejudices before taking on a completely different context in the story. We discuss the challenges and opportunities presented to Sam when it came to adapting his stage play into a screenplay – and what the scarcity of media telling the tales of plus-size protagonists does for the fabric of our society.This is a spoiler-filled conversation so please be sure to watch The Whale before listening in.Script Apart is hosted by Al Horner and produced by Kamil Dymek. Follow us on Twitter and Instagram, or email us on thescriptapartpodcast@gmail.com.Support for this episode comes from ScreenCraft, Arc Studio Pro and WeScreenplay.To get ad-free episodes and exclusive content, join us on Patreon.Support the show

It’s thirty years to the day since a grouchy weatherman named Phil Connors found himself reliving the same day over and over again in Groundhog Day – a comedy that’s timeless in more ways than one. On today’s episode, we're joined by the film’s writer, Danny Rubin, as we delve into his initial screenplay for the iconic time-loop farce, which became one of the most beloved comedies of its generation.Danny wrote the film as a spec script in the early ‘90s. It soon landed in the hands of Harold Ramis of Ghostbusters and Caddyshack fame, and the pair began to develop the screenplay together. From there, Groundhog Day went through a number of changes as the pair decided to lean into the comedic potential of the premise – and lean away from some of the more "indie" and experimental elements of Danny’s original vision for the movie. Their hard work paid off – Groundhog Day was met with rave reviews on release and won a BAFTA for Best Original Screenplay. It became one of 1993's highest grossing movies and its influence has only grown from there: today, the story lives on not just in the form of the acclaimed stage musical that Danny wrote – there’s also the small matter of films and TV shows like Edge of Tomorrow, Palm Springs and Russian Doll, all of which took Groundhog Day's time-loop concept and ran with it in new directions.In the conversation you’re about to hear, Danny tells us how surreal it's been witnessing “Groundhog Day” become ingrained as an idiom in the English language. We hear about the vampire fiction that served as the movie’s surprising inspiration and talk about why weatherman”was the perfect profession for Phil and his detached, icy personality. Listen out also for details on Danny's original ending for the movie – a twist that found the character Rita beginning her own time loop on February 3rd. Script Apart is hosted by Al Horner and produced by Kamil Dymek. Follow us on Twitter and Instagram, or email us on thescriptapartpodcast@gmail.com.Support for this episode comes from ScreenCraft, Arc Studio Pro and WeScreenplay.To get ad-free episodes and exclusive content, join us on Patreon.Support the show

Tony Kushner is the Pulitzer Prize-winning creator of Angels in America and the long-time writing partner of a certain Steven Spielberg. His latest collaboration with the director, co-written with the Close Encounters filmmaker, sees Steven pulling the curtain back on his fascinating childhood, delving back to a time in which his blossoming love for filmmaking began to entwine with seismic changes in his family life. It was no surprise to see the drama collect a Best Picture nod at this week's Academy Award nominations – it's a peerless portrayal of a family shattering in real time that acknowledges both the joy of storytelling and the havoc it can wreak to us and those around us.Tony co-wrote the film with Steven having worked closely with him since 2005 – their previous collaborations include Munich, Lincoln and West Side Story. This project was different, though, with Tony required to act almost as a therapist to his friend as part of the writing process. For fifteen years, he’d been trying to convince Steven to tell the story of his adolescence. As you’ll hear in this episode, it was only after a blazing row between them on the set of West Side Story that Steven, as an olive branch to Tony, agreed to finally begin work on it. When it came to writing, Tony had to coax intimate details from Steven in a series of Zoom conversations, pressing his friend to delve deep into his recollection of those years – even the painful parts. In fact, especially the painful parts.In the spoiler-filled conversation you’re about to hear, we unpack his and Steven’s screenplay for the film in its entirety, discussing why The Fabelmans is more than a love letter to cinema as it’s been billed in some places (to Sammy, filmmaking is as much a curse as a gift, unravelling his family). We also touch on his own past experience of writing from a place of autobiography with his musical Caroline or Change, and talk about the film’s intriguing sequence with Sammy’s school bully. Oh and if you think Al was going to chat to Tony and not ask him about the brilliant end sequence involving David Lynch as John Ford, you have another thing coming – that’s one of our favourite final scenes of any film in recent memory, so of course we dig into that. Script Apart is hosted by Al Horner and produced by Kamil Dymek. Follow us on Twitter and Instagram, or email us on thescriptapartpodcast@gmail.com.Support for this episode comes from ScreenCraft, Arc Studio Pro and WeScreenplay.To get ad-free episodes and exclusive content, join us on Patreon.Support the show

Buckle up, listeners – we’re heading to Pandora. Avatar: The Way of Water is the long-awaited sequel to one of the biggest movies of all time, and our guests today are two of its talented co-writers. You might know Rick Jaffa and Amanda Silver as the screenwriters behind the brilliant Planet of the Apes reboot trilogy and 2015’s Jurassic World. If you’re familiar with those movies, you’ll know exactly why legendary director James Cameron chose the pair as collaborators for this sequel to his 2009 sci-fi fantasia – both of those franchises snuck sideswipes at man’s exploitation of the natural world into their exciting set-pieces and blockbuster action. The Way of Water is a much more complex movie than the first Avatar, with a lot more moving parts, some of which are seeds for movies to come (this is the first in a number of sequels that Amanda and Rick have also worked on, in production now). The film picks up with our heroes from the first movie, Jake (Sam Worthington) and Neytiri (Zoe Saldana), fighting another battle fourteen years after the Battle of the Hallelujah Mountains – parenthood. The pair have had a family and now have an even more pronounced reason to protect their land from the colonisers from Earth, seeking to make Pandora man’s new home, having wrecked their own.Rick and Amanda – who have been married since 1989 and collaborating since 1992’s The Hand That Rocks The Cradle – told us all about how the Way of Water’s screenplay came together. We get into exactly how they, Cameron and fellow co-writer Josh Friedman brought back the villainous Colonel Quaritch, the Mowgli-esque origins of new character Spider, and the environmental truths about our own climate change-stricken world that the film takes aim at. There’s also a thorough breakdown of that death in the film’s final act, and Al at various points attempts to speak Na’vi. Badly, naturally.Script Apart is hosted by Al Horner and produced by Kamil Dymek. Follow us on Twitter and Instagram, or email us on thescriptapartpodcast@gmail.com.Support for this episode comes from ScreenCraft, Arc Studio Pro and WeScreenplay.To get ad-free episodes and exclusive content, join us on Patreon.Support the show

Today, we have with us the extraordinary Charlotte Wells – writer-director of one of the most affecting feature debuts in recent memory. Aftersun is a meditative drama about a father and daughter on a resort holiday in Turkey, told through the eyes and camcorder footage of 11-year-old Sophie, played by Frankie Corio. She shares a sweet relationship with her father Callum, played by Paul Mescal. Across their holiday, however, she’s able to steal glimpses of him wrestling with problems beyond her comprehension, – problems he attempts to hide from the world. It’s a story about memory, parenthood and the heartbreak of growing up and realising that your parents are people, too, with their own burdens to carry. Inevitably, it’s being described as an awards season frontrunner, and one of the best movies of 2022.In the conversation you’re about to hear, Charlotte tells me how the film began as an exploration of her relationship with her own dad, who she sadly lost aged sixteen. There’s a certain overlap between her life and the events of the movie that we unpack in this chat, as well as some big differences between her early drafts of Aftersun versus the final film. Initially, the film was set to feature an adult version of Sophie wandering through scenes following her childhood self, like a sun-soaked Scrooge in A Christmas Carol. There was also a romantic relationship at the holiday resort for Callum that got jettisoned, and much more melodrama, a more pronounced plot.We talk why she stripped away those elements to drill deeper into the father-daughter tensions at the heart of the film, what it is about the pressures and repetitions of a family holiday that make for such an interesting backdrop to the film, and what exactly is happening in the film’s astonishing emotional climax: a dance sequence set to Queen’s Under Pressure, whose lyrics take on a poignant new meaning in the context of Callum and Sophie’s relationship. It’s a spoiler conversation, so be sure to watch the film on Mubi before tuning in. Script Apart is hosted by Al Horner and produced by Kamil Dymek. Follow us on Twitter and Instagram, or email us on thescriptapartpodcast@gmail.com.Support for this episode comes from ScreenCraft, Arc Studio Pro and WeScreenplay.To get ad-free episodes and exclusive content, join us on Patreon.Support the show

Is White Noise a disaster movie, a family drama, a drugged-out conspiracy thriller or a satirical comedy? The truth is it’s all of the above, and for its writer-director Noah Baumbach, something else altogether – a dystopian delight that represents the biggest left turn of his career so far. Since bursting into the spotlight two decades ago, the New Yorker – famous for movies like Squid and the Whale, Margot at the Wedding and Marriage Story – has become renowned for creating intimate snapshots of American family life. Whether working on his own or collaborating with the likes of his partner Greta Gerwig or Wes Anderson, his movies are typically small in scale but big in emotional depth, delving deep into the interpersonal lives of characters you can’t help but fall in love with.  At least, that’s what used to define a Baumbach movie. White Noise is the sound of an auteur stepping boldly out of his comfort zone. It’s an apocalyptic  adaptation of a novel that till now was thought to be unfilmable (Don DeLilo’s revered post-modern classic was full of dense prose, lyrical absurdity and satirical sharp-shooting at American hysteria; not the easiest thing to translate to screen). A lot of the film takes place in a supermarket that’s both a community hub and a cathedral to American consumerism. And a large chunk of the movie involves grand CGI depictions of a toxic cloud engulfing a community who descend into panic and lawlessness. All things far removed from the grounded domesticity of Noah’s normal storytelling. In the conversation you’re about to hear, Noah talks about why the time was right for such a departure. We discuss the film’s Covid-19 and Trump-era commentary, and his love for hiding in the opening scene of movies an encapsulation of the thematic content to come. You’ll also find out why he made one major change to the novel involving the character Babette, and why White Noise isn’t a cautionary tale – we as a society are already living in the disorientated, misinformation-filled world of this story, he explains. The future is now – both for America, and for Noah Baumbach.Script Apart is hosted by Al Horner and produced by Kamil Dymek. Follow us on Twitter and Instagram, or email us on thescriptapartpodcast@gmail.com.Support for this episode comes from ScreenCraft, Arc Studio Pro and WeScreenplay.To get ad-free episodes and exclusive content, join us on Patreon.Support the show

Today on Script Apart – something new! For a while, we've wondered how to cover great screenplays by writers who are not able to come on the show or are sadly no longer with us. Which led us to the idea of Script Club – a book club, but for screenplays. We'll be inviting great storytellers onto the show in the coming months to discuss scripts they adore by screenwriters who are not able to come on the show themselves. Kicking off this intermittent series of bonus episodes is an icon of modern animation – Lee Unkrich, director of films like Toy Story 3 and Coco.Lee was an integral creative force at Pixar for over 25 years before stepping down in 2019 following the incredible success of Coco two years earlier. That film told the tale of a 12-year-old boy named Miguel who is accidentally transported to the Land of the Dead. Lee's favourite movie, a film that he's poured a decade of his life into quite literally writing the book on, is similarly inhabited by ghosts and apparitions from the great beyond, in a very different way. Since he was a teenager, Lee has been obsessed with The Shining – Stanley Kubrick's seminal horror, co-written with novelist Diane Johnson. It's an obsession that recently culminated in a genuinely epic three volume book for publishing house Taschen, full of brand new interviews with all sorts of creatives who worked on the movie, as well as unseen photos from the film's creation.During his research, Lee – who was granted unheralded access to the Kubrick archives – read draft after draft of the film, gaining an astonishing insight into Kubrick's writing process. On the episode, recorded in early December in London's Picturehouse Central, he recounts some of the biggest changes across those different iterations of the Shining screenplay – including a subplot involving a scrapbook that would drastically change the feel of the film, and a more blood-soaked ending that saw practically every character meeting a grisly end. Yes, even poor little Danny.Lee also weighs in on the film's unique place in our film culture as this subject of constant speculation and theorising about its hidden meanings, sharing some of his own interpretations of the script, and breaks down key scenes and characters. This was a fun experiment to record. If you like it, and want to see us record more in this bonus format, let us know! We'd love to hear your feedback. Script Apart is hosted by Al Horner and produced by Kamil Dymek. Follow us on Twitter and Instagram, or email us on thescriptapartpodcast@gmail.com.Support for this episode comes from ScreenCraft, Arc Studio Pro and WeScreenplay.To get ad-free episodes and exclusive content, join us on Patreon.Support the show

Terence Winter didn’t just write The Wolf of Wall Street – he almost was The Wolf of Wall Street. The 62-year-old creator of Boardwalk Empire – also renowned for penning some of some of the most beloved ever episodes of The Sopranos – was a stone’s throw away from the film’s subject, Jordan Belfort, on the day of the infamous “Black Monday” stock market crash of 1987. They moved in some of the same circles, and Terence – by his own admission – had a certain “conman, bullshit artist” streak to his behaviour as a young man. He sometimes wonders what might have happened had they met in real-life; the degree to which he might have been seduced into a life of selling penny stocks in the hedonistic world of high finance. Instead, Terence moved to Hollywood in 1991, intent on writing screenplays. What happened next would help define the future of television. The Brooklyn-raised writer, after a brief stint writing for sitcoms, became a man synonymous with American criminality and the humans beings behind the most monstrous behaviour imaginable. He wrote 22 episodes of The Sopranos, including the famous Pine Barrens episode. After that, he stepped out on his own with the Prohibition-era drama Boardwalk Empire, which ran for five brilliant seasons.This month, Terence added a new show to his list of accomplishments: Tulsa King, co-created with Yellowstone’s Taylor Sheridan. Starring Sly Stallone as a mobster rebuilding his life and criminal empire following a lengthy stay in prison, it hits some familiar beats for fans of Terence’s work, while also gravitating into exciting new territory. In the conversation you’re about to hear, Terence breaks down his script for The Wolf of Wall Street and gives a spoiler-free guide to how he crafted Tulsa King – delving deep into his unique storytelling philosophies and writing habits. Script Apart is hosted by Al Horner and produced by Kamil Dymek. Follow us on Twitter and Instagram, or email us on thescriptapartpodcast@gmail.com.Support for this episode comes from ScreenCraft, Arc Studio Pro and WeScreenplay.To get ad-free episodes and exclusive content, join us on Patreon.Support the show

Don’t go down to the basement. Rule number one of surviving a horror movie, right? One of the many miracles of Barbarian – the debut feature from writer-director Zach Cregger that became one of the year’s biggest hits – was how it took one of the most tried and tested tropes of the genre and managed to weave something so surprising and unpredictable out it. The film – much like the basement-dwelling creature at the heart of the movie – roared out of the shadows following a low budget production in Bulgaria to become a box office-topping behemoth admired by everyone from Stephen King and Jordan Peele. Driving its success was good old fashioned word-of-mouth, as moviegoers implored their friends to rush to the cinema to experience a story that needs to be seen to be believed; whose twists it’s near-impossible to be braced for. It might not surprise you to learn that such an unusual film was written in an unusual way. As you’ll discover in this episode, the movie began as one scene. A woman, Tess, checks into an Airbnb, only to discover there’s someone else already inside. There, she must decode a situation fraught with potential danger. Is the man she’s marooned in the apartment with a friend or a threat? Cregger wrote the scene unsure where it was leading until eventually, his subconscious took over. The rest of the movie, as you’ll hear, spilled out of him intuitively as he asked himself: what’s the most surprising thing that could happen now? If you haven’t seen the film, pause this episode until you’ve experienced Barbarian for yourself. If you’re up to speed, listen on for fascinating revelations about how Cregger’s own experience of an alcoholic father quietly informed the script, why it was important to leave no ambiguity around the true nature of Justin Long’s character AJ and what the film expresses about toxic masculinity, as well as his original ending for the movie. Script Apart is hosted by Al Horner and produced by Kamil Dymek. Follow us on Twitter and Instagram, or email us on thescriptapartpodcast@gmail.com.Support for this episode comes from ScreenCraft, Arc Studio Pro and WeScreenplay.To get ad-free episodes and exclusive content, join us on Patreon. Support the showSupport the show

What happens in Vegas stays in Vegas, right? Well, not this week on Script Apart. Today we're joined by the wonderful Ted Griffin, the screenwriter behind a heist extravaganza that, for fans of dazzling set pieces, A-lister chemistry and Brad Pitt inexplicably eating snacks in every scene, was truly like hitting the jackpot. Ocean’s Eleven – based loosely on the 1960 Rat Pack vehicle of the same name – starred George Clooney,  Julia Roberts, Matt Damon and just about every other adored actor of that era, all operating with charisma and star wattage dialled up to the max. It told the story of Danny Ocean – a fresh-outta-prison conman, played by Clooney, who’s plotting a robbery like no other. His plan is to raid the vaults of the three biggest casinos in Vegas. $150m is on the line, as well as something far more important to Danny – the affections of Tess, his ex-wife, played by Roberts. The film was directed by the great Steven Sodebergh, who – alongside Ted – pulled off the kind of lucrative score Danny Ocean would be proud of. The movie grossed $450m worldwide, launching a franchise and wowing critics to this day. In the conversation you’re about to hear, Ted tells me how he approached its charming, clockwork-intricate screenplay. We talk about capturing the seedy, neon-splashed soul of Vegas on the page. He reveals why it was important to find an emotional heartbeat of the film, that meant it wasn’t just money motivating Danny. And you’ll also hear some wild stories from a rollercoaster six weeks on set, as the biggest stars on the planet at that time descended on Vegas en masse to bring this story to life. Script Apart is hosted by Al Horner and produced by Kamil Dymek. Follow us on Twitter and Instagram, or email us on thescriptapartpodcast@gmail.com.Support for this episode comes from ScreenCraft, Arc Studio Pro and WeScreenplay.To get ad-free episodes and exclusive content, join us on Patreon.Support the show

“28 days, 6 hours, 42 minutes, 12 seconds. That is when the world will end.” In October 2001, a six-foot demonic rabbit named Frank materialised in front of a teenage Jake Gyllenhaal to issue that grave warning, setting in motion the plot of one of one of the great Halloween movies of all time. Donnie Darko was a time-twisting sci-fi curio about an emotionally troubled teen who after narrowly escaping a bizarre accident involving a falling jet plane engine, begins to experience strange visions. The result was an emotional, unknowable gem still inviting scrutiny and analysis today. The film initially struggled to find an audience in the aftermath of 9/11, then gradually became a legit cult obsession. 21 years later, fans across the world continue to attempt to unravel its mysteries. But the thing about Donnie Darko is the more you attempt to unravel it, the more it ends up unravelling you – that’s the level of emotion and existential that writer-director Richard Kelly was operating at when he wrote the film, aged just 24. In the conversation you’re about to hear, we break down in detail the mysteries and meanings of all the most intriguing motifs and moments in Donnie Darko. Discover the origins of the unsettling rabbit Frank, who shares an unlikely connection with Obi-Wan Kenobi. Hear how Y2K concerns and election time anxiety influenced the film’s atmosphere. And find out why the true evil in Donnie Darko is the puritanical streak that ran rampant in suburban America in the film’s 1980s setting and still sadly exists today.  You should probably also listen out for some intriguing details at the end about a bigger, even more ambitious sequel that Richard has been in contact with Jake Gyllenhaal about developing. Donnie’s story may not be over yet…Script Apart is hosted by Al Horner and produced by Kamil Dymek. Follow us on Twitter and Instagram, or email us on thescriptapartpodcast@gmail.com.Support for this episode comes from ScreenCraft, Arc Studio Pro and WeScreenplay.To get ad-free episodes and exclusive content, join us on Patreon.Support the show

Our guest today is a storyteller who knows great comedy. As a director, Paul Feig has manned beloved movies like Bridesmaids, Ghostbuster and The Heat, not to mention memorable episodes of smash hit TV shows like Arrested Development and The Office. When it comes to writing, he more often than not passes the baton to brilliant collaborators, like Annie Mumolo, Kristen Wiig and Katie Dippold, concentrating on bringing their scripts to life from the director’s chair. On the occasions that he does write his own screenplays, however, it’s always an absolute laugh riot, full of warmth, affection, inclusivity and infectious positivity.  In the late ‘90s, Paul created Freaks and Geeks – a deeply influential sitcom following the exploits of a band of high school misfits. The actors portraying those misfits would go on to dominate American comedy for decades to come: James Franco, Seth Rogen and Jason Segel all got their breaks in the show, which ran for just one season in 1999. Its legacy has lived on, though, as has Paul’s reputation as a storyteller who aspires to bring people together in the movies and shows he creates. In this revealing conversation, he breaks down for us not only that show’s pilot, including the scene that he believes got the show cancelled, but also elements of his hilarious 2016 espionage comedy Spy, starring Melissa McCarthy,  for a sense of how writing comedy for TV  back in the '90s differs from writing comedy for the big screen today. It’s a fascinating conversation – we hope you enjoy.Script Apart is hosted by Al Horner and produced by Kamil Dymek. Follow us on Twitter and Instagram, or email us on thescriptapartpodcast@gmail.com.Support for this episode comes from ScreenCraft, Arc Studio Pro and WeScreenplay.To get ad-free episodes and exclusive content, join us on Patreon.Support the show

We owe one of the most moving comedy-dramas in recent TV history to a monster truck rally. Jen Statsky was en route to Portland, Oregon to film a comedy sketch at the Monster Jam rally back in 2015 when she got chatting with her road trip accomplices, fellow comedy writers Lucia Aniello and Paul W. Downs. They spoke about the history of pushed-aside women in the entertainment industry – female comedians like Singin' In The Rain star Debbie Reynolds, whose careers were derailed by misogynistic practices in Hollywood. On that day, Hacks was born – a HBO series up for a number of awards at this year's Emmys and deservedly so. The show – starring Jean Smart as a comedian in the twilight of her career and Hannah Einbinder as the young comic sent to write new material for her – is as funny as you'd expect from Jen, whose previous TV writing credits include The Good Place, Parks and Recreation and Broad City. But it's also tremendously emotive. She and fellow series creators Lucia and Paul have crafted a show that's both heartwarming and heartbreaking in its depiction of an unlikely female friendship that makes each party look at the world a little differently.  In this episode, Jen talks about the thousands of titles explored for the show before they landed on Hacks, the evolutions in the streaming market that have allowed for shows like this and Barry to so ambitiously blend comedy with drama, and how some of the show's most memorable moments to date were written. This is a spoiler conversation so you might want to catch up on the series in its entirety before tuning in.Script Apart is hosted by Al Horner and produced by Kamil Dymek. Follow us on Twitter and Instagram, or email us on thescriptapartpodcast@gmail.com.Support for this episode comes from ScreenCraft, Arc Studio Pro and WeScreenplay.To get ad-free episodes and exclusive content, join us on Patreon.Support the show

Violent delights have violent ends, to quote one of the most daring TV shows of the last decade. And listeners, we are now officially approaching that end of that incredible series. Today on Script Apart, Westworld co-creator Lisa Joy reflects on the creation of the smash-hit HBO series, reveals the thinking behind some of the thrilling creative decisions within its gripping fourth season and confirms that next season will be the show's last, should HBO officially give it the greenlight.With Westworld, writer-director Lisa and her husband Jonathan Nolan have delivered a dazzling, dystopian vision of a future in which AI has run amok. Originally centred on a theme park recreation of the Wild West, the show has since zoomed out significantly to depict a robot uprising that, by season four, is threatening to bring an end to the human race. Though the show's ambitious philosophising hasn't been to everyone's tastes, there arguably hasn’t been a show more packed with mystery and intrigue since Damon Lindelof’s Lost. The constant swings Westworld takes demand to be admired. Lisa was born in New Jersey to immigrant parents, and grew up balancing a love of poetry and storytelling with a sense of obligation to her parents, who longed for her to follow a career path with plenty of job security. Which is how she became a lawyer, before deciding to risk it all to pursue her love of writing. In this episode, we talk about how that immigrant background influenced some of her storytelling sensibilities and how everything changed while pregnant with her first child, when she wrote a brilliant spec script titled Reminiscence, that announced to Hollywood that here was a writer capable of threading huge questions about nostalgia and the nature of human existence into captivating popcorn entertainment. We also delve into the shocking twists in Westworld that were originally going to happen in the show’s pilot, as she and Jonathan debated how to pace this series and the many secrets contained within. Also if you’re wondering what’s in store in season five, we have you covered. Lisa speaks eloquently in this episode about the parallels between the ending of Westworld season four and the predicaments that we as a species are staring down in real life right now. This is a spoiler conversation so be sure to have caught up with the show before tuning in. Script Apart is hosted by Al Horner and produced by Kamil Dymek. Follow us on Twitter and Instagram, or email us on thescriptapartpodcast@gmail.com.Support for this episode comes from ScreenCraft, Arc Studio Pro and WeScreenplay.To get ad-free episodes and exclusive content, join us on Patreon.Support the show

Un, dos, tres, toca la pared. In 2007, there was no more chilling a sentence for moviegoers, as the gripping ghost story El Orfanato swept cinemas worldwide. The Orphanage, as it was known in the UK and America, was an instant classic tale of grief and obsession that remains a cherished piece of ‘00s horror cinema. It followed a mother, Laura, who must grapple with the mystery of what happened to her adopted son, after he disappears at a party in the former orphanage she and her husband have bought and made home. The film was directed by JA Bayona, produced by Guillermo Del Toro and written by our guest today, the talented Sergio G. Sánchez. Sergio, as you’ll discover in this episode, reached deep into his own childhood to write this moving tale, interweaving stories like Peter Pan, into a script that confronted his own experiences of severe illness as a child. He told us all about his fight to keep the movie a Gothic slow-burn, resisting studio pressure to turn the film into a carnival of jump-scares. We get into all of the hidden meanings and messages of the movie, including the mythology of the orphanage itself that formed a big part of his original script, and the movie’s many misdirects that craftily keep viewers guessing till its dying embers. Also broken down in detail is the film’s devastating final reveal and bittersweet closing moments, and the plans for an American remake that never came to fruition. Script Apart is hosted by Al Horner and produced by Kamil Dymek. Follow us on Twitter and Instagram, or email us on thescriptapartpodcast@gmail.com.Support for this episode comes from ScreenCraft, Arc Studio Pro and WeScreenplay.To get ad-free episodes and exclusive content, join us on Patreon.Support the show