What’s Next? Moving the Screenplay Forward into Development & Production

Friday, October 14, 4-6 pm, Location TBA

Join us for a lively panel discussion that examines the life of a screenplay. How do you move the printed pages from your computer screen to the big screen? Who helps in the successful navigation in that development? Should you do it yourself? What do you do when you’re not sure what the next step is? These and many more questions will be tackled by the five panelists.

Buzz McLaughlin is an independent feature film producer and partner in Either/Or Films that produced THE SENSATION OF SIGHT starring Academy Award nominee David Strathairn.  He is in development with Either/Or Films’ next feature SOMEPLACE LIKE AMERICA.  A writer of many plays and screenplays, including Sister Calling My Name that won the National Play Award, Buzz also wrote the best-selling book The Playwright’s Process and has worked with hundreds of emerging and established writers in theatre and film as a dramaturg, teacher, and consultant. He holds a Ph.D in dramatic literature, taught scriptwriting as Playwright-In-Residence for many years at Drew University, founded the Playwrights Theatre of New Jersey, and currently runs a script consulting service and a blog on scriptwriting.

Marty Soltys is Founder, Chairman and CEO of TransMedia Entertainment Partners, Ltd. He works with and invests with entrepreneurs, producers, writers, directors, and designers of video game, mobile and web applications to create and develop TransMedia Storytelling. Marty’s film & television academic background and experience is as a screenwriter, executive producer, producer, partner, and consultant. He’s been a script reader for American Zoetrope and acted as a funding intermediary for the feature films FRANKIE & ALICE and CELL 213. He serves as an Ivey Entrepreneur-in-Residence at the Richard Ivey School of Business and holds an MFA in Film & Television from UCLA. His full bio is available as a link located at the Richard Ivey School’s website.

Ross Thomas is the director, editor and producer of Anywhere But Here, a current NHFF short film, and winner of the 2010 Steeltown Film Factory screenwriting competition. His experience as an independent filmmaker is in using new technologies to produce and raise funding for his work. Ross is also a motion graphics artist, working with independent filmmakers to provide titles and effects for their films. His most recent work includes Almost There, Sentenced Home, and The Rape of Europa.

Kevin O’Malley is this year’s Grand Prize Winner of the NHFF Screenplay Competition. His Coming of Age script, BANANAFISH SANDWICH, is a quirky, heart-felt portrayal of teen ingenuity and determination.  His short script, The 254 Year Old Boy, was a finalist selection in this years’ IFFF. He wrote and produced a documentary video on Life Magazine’s millennium issue entitled, Deconstructing Life.  His documentary film, From the Other Side of the Desk, was featured as a teaching video for California Association of Independent Schools teachers.  He has been the editor and production coordinator of the series, Speaking of Movies, with interviewer Jason Rietman (director of Juno and Thank You for Smoking). Kevin has taught film production and still photography at the Harvard-Westlake School in California since 1979, and has taught at the university level and at workshops across the country.

Dana Biscotti Myskowski, Emmy-nominated producer, screenwriter, professor, playwright, and mom, produced the film UNWOUND with Granite Creek in September as part of the Producers Guild of America’s Weekend Shorts Competition to benefit the Debra Hill Fellowship. She is in development on the feature PLOWING UP A SNAKE and she is co-producing THE POINT with Maywood Productions in June 2012. Her TV series THE PROVIDER has been optioned, and she will be writing remaining episodes and co-producing the series with colleagues at a713production and TransMedia Entertainment. She can be found at Green Chair Pictures one night a week teaching screenwriting at New England College this semester.