Final Draft Blog
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‘The L Word: Generation Q’ showrunner Marja-Lewis Ryan on voice and making room for everyone to be heard
Marja-Lewis Ryan wears a lot of hats behind the scenes of Showtime’s The L Word: Generation Q: creator, showrunner, executive producer, director, screenwriter, advocate, fresh voices champion, and all-around television fangirl.
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When Santa Goes Dark: Using Familiar Characters in New Ways
When you see Santa waving from his red sleigh as it strolls down the Christmas parade route, is your first thought how can this guy take out well-trained terrorists, drink a lot and struggle to muster the joy of the holiday season? Not exactly.
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‘The Apology’ Spins Horror’s Tired Revenge Trope To A Deeper Direction
On the eve of Christmas, a lonely mother sits in an empty house waiting for a daughter who is never coming home. Suddenly, there's a strange knock at her door. It's late. She's by herself. She's been by herself for twenty years. She opens the door to...
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What Exactly Counts As a Christmas Movie?
In recent years it’s become popular to cite Die Hard as “a Christmas movie.” There are several articles insisting that it is and outlining the various reasons: the primary being the film takes place during Christmas Eve and centers around an office C...
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7 ways to enhance your dialogue and find your voice
When you think of masterful movie dialogue the names Aaron Sorkin, Quentin Tarantino and Nora Ephron come to mind. It’s a specialty in screenwriting to craft the words that characters say that are both believable and yet like how no one else talks.
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The Bricks of Breaking In: Julie Sagalowsky Diaz On Finding Your Voice
Julie Sagalowsky Diaz (Surfside Girls, The Shannara Chronicles) always found herself interested in performing as she did a lot of choir and musical theater in her youth. She recalls, “That was kind of my avenue into television, film and the arts at l...
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How To Decide What To Write
Maybe you want to write a screenplay or pilot, but you don’t have any ideas, or you have a few ideas, but you don’t know if they’re any good. Or maybe you have too many ideas and you don’t know which is the best one to focus on. Whether it’s too many...
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Connectivity in Storytelling and Flow Lines
When you watch a movie or TV show, you’ll notice that within the larger story there are various subplots.
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Take 5: ‘Glass Onion’ unravels another murder mystery
There is no such thing as a straight-forward ‘who dun it’ story. The point is to keep the audience guessing while dropping clues and sending the narrative on any number of constant twists and turns. In his latest film Glass Onion: A Knives Out Myster...
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What’s new in Final Draft 13?
WRITING GOALS &
PRODUCTIVITY STATS
Set goals and get valuable insights to take your work to the next level
TYPEWRITER
A new typewriter-like view option improves your focus
EMOJI
Craft more realistic onscreen text exchanges and make your notes more emotive
And so much more, thoughtfully designed to help unleash your creativity.
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