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Method Writing: An Organic Approach to Writing
Seminar
Method Writing: An Organic Approach to Writing
with Jack & Josh Grapes
Saturday, January 21, 2017
10:30 am – 1:00 p.m.
IWOSC members: $15
Non-members: $35
“Method Writing” is an organic approach to writing, much as method acting is an organic approach to acting, stressing inner process and deep voice. “Method Writing” consists of various concepts that take the writer through techniques designed to make the writing more compelling and more effective, publishable and productive.
Back by popular demand, Jack Grapes will present this overview of the writer’s creative process, focusing on his book “Method Writing,” a technique he’s developed and used in his writing workshops over the last 35 years.
Jack will discuss the nature of the creative process, and how that applies to “Method Writing.” So bring something to write on: paper and pen, parchment and quill, stone and chisel — whatever works.
He and his son, Josh, will lead the group in a writing prompt, time permitting.
[Update: they led a fantastic writing prompt!]
Our presenters: Jack and Josh Grapes
Jack Grapes is an award-winning actor, poet, playwright, publisher, editor, and teacher.
He wrote and starred in Circle of Will, a metaphysical comedy about the lost years of William Shakespeare which ran for several years at the Globe Theatre in Hollywood.
He’s the author of 8 1/2 books of poetry, including the three most recent The Naked Eye, Poems so Far, and All the Sad Angels. All available on Amazon.com.
Jack is editor and publisher of the highly acclaimed literary journal Onthebus.
He teaches classes based on his METHOD WRITING program. Both Method Writing and Advanced Method Writing are available on Amazon.com.
Josh Grapes is a graduate of Sarah Lawrence College.
He’s a poet and writer, and a singer/songwriter.
His most recent CD is Creature Comforts, and a book of poetry.
He’s also working on an alternate history of the United States.
He teaches special writer classes and workshops.
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We look forward to seeing you at our writer’s seminars and panels.
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LA Times Festival of Books
LA Times Festival of Books
IWOSC once again exhibited at the LA Times Festival of Books as we love meeting book lovers and writers. Book enthusiasts visited us there at booth 148.
Saturday, April 9, 2016
from 10 a.m. – 6 p.m.
Sunday, April 10, 2016
from 10 a.m. – 5 p.m.
Admission:
Free! General festival admission, including all outdoor programming, is free. No ticket required.
Where:
USC Campus
Los Angeles, CA 90089
Parking & Transit options:
See this LAT Festival of Books page of transit details
The DASH F runs both days
Blue Line
Festival Shuttle Bus – Free – from Union Station
For more info:
Official webpage
Twitter
Tricks Of The Trade – Writing Advice from the Experts
Panel
TRICKS OF THE TRADE – Writing Advice from the Experts
Monday, February 29, 2016
7:30 to 9:15 p.m. (networking follows the program)
There’s no one formula for writing – there are a thousand!
Aside from raw talent and a tip or two from the Muse, we have principles, rules, devices, guidelines, categories, strategies, tools, tactics, and techniques.
Our expert panel will offer help for all writers whether writing fiction, screenplay, or even nonfiction.
![2016-02-29_20.10.46_Robert-Ramsey-speaking_[0959]](http://iwosc.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/05/2016-02-29_20.10.46_Robert-Ramsey-speaking_0959-300x182.jpg)
We will discuss (as time allows):
– Brainstorming ideas
– Pitching formulas
– Story structures
– Plot lines
– Scene dynamics
– Narrative devices
– Character development
– Strategies for reader feedback
– And more!
Our panel of writing veterans:
BRENT FORRESTER got his start as a writer for the Ben Stiller Show where he won his first writing Emmy.
Forrester has written for 6 Emmy Award-winning shows including The Simpsons, King of the Hill, Late Night With Conan and Mr. Show With Bob and Dave.
Brent spent 7 seasons as a writer and director at The Office, and was Co-Showrunner in its final season.
He is currently the Showrunner on “Love” a Netflix show produced by Judd Apatow (debuts February 19th, 2016).
ELLEN SANDLER was nominated for an Emmy for her work as a Co-Executive Producer of the CBS hit series, Everybody Loves Raymond.
Sandler has written for many other prime time network television comedies, including ABC’s Coach, and has created original television pilots for ABC, CBS, NBC, Fox Family, Oxygen Network, and the Disney Channel.
Ellen is the author of The TV Writer’s Workbook (Bantam/Dell), which is used as a text by both UCLA and USC film schools.
She teaches Comedy Writing for the UCLA Extension Writer’s Program, and Television Writing for Playwrights at The Herbert Berghof Playwrights Foundation in New York.
She has been a guest lecturer at many colleges and universities, including New York University, Marymount Manhattan College, The New School, and the University of Southern California.
ROBERT RAMSEY’s feature film credits include Destiny Turns on the Radio (1995); Life (1999); Big Trouble (2002); Intolerable Cruelty (2003); Man of the House (2005); and Soul Men (2008).
Ramsey was a Fellow at the Sundance Screenwriters Workshop in 1992. He received a Bachelor of Science in Journalism from Northwestern University and has been a member of the WGA since 1988.
Robert has been teaching screenwriting at USC School of Cinematic Arts since 2012.
Our Moderator
GREG MILLER is a writer, producer and writing coach. He is the author of “How To Be A Writer Who Writes” and the new mega reference e-book “Miller’s Compendium”.
Miller has written and produced feature film and tv projects for Fox, Disney, Dino De Laurentiis, Oxygen, MTV, HBO and Comedy Central. He has also written articles for Writer’s Digest, Premiere, LA Weekly, Entertainment Weekly and news for the CBC.
As a teacher and writing coach, Greg has helped NY Times best-selling authors, TV showrunners, studio screenwriters and absolute beginning writers to write and perform for 20 years.
He has taught classes and workshops at UCLA Extension, LA Times Festival of Books, LA Gay & Lesbian Center, Humber College, Kripalu Center, Media Bistro, Teen Canteen and Story Expo.
As co-creator and producer of Uncabaret he worked with a who’s who of alternative comedians including Julia Sweeney, Margaret Cho, Patton Oswalt, Bob Odenkirk, Taylor Negron, Michael Patrick King, Larry Charles, Judd Apatow and many others to develop personal story-based comedy.
A short clip from the evening:
Magazines and Ezines: What you need to know
Panel
Magazines and Ezines: What you need to know
Monday, March 21, 2016
7:30 to 9:15 p.m. (networking follows the program)
Magazines are everywhere. It seems as if they must be starving for content, but they don’t make it easy to for writers to contribute. In fact, they can be downright secretive about the process.
Not all magazines pay well; some do not all pay at all. But sometimes the article practically writes itself, and other times the resume credit is worth the effort, even if the money does not fit. And sometimes there are other valuable perks that you might not have considered.
Our expert panel will discuss:
– How to get the attention of magazines
– How to contact the magazines
– What they look for
– A calendar of upcoming topics
– What to submit
– What not to do
– How to protect your work
– Perks associated with magazine writing
– Answers to your own questions
If you have ideas, here’s where they can find a home.
Our panel will include:
MICHELE RAPHAEL is the co-founder with David Lott of Angels Flight • literary west, a new, L.A.- based literary, arts and culture journal.
Promoting emerging, prominent and diverse voices, AFLW has featured L.A. writers Anna March, Wendy C. Ortiz, Eileen Cronin and Deanne Stillman, among others.
Previously, Michele was a staff writer and columnist for the Los Angeles Times, a features editor for latimes.com, and director of publications for the Norman Lear Center. She has written for Glamour, Quartz, Variety, The Huffington Post, Billboard and Los Angeles Review of Books, among other publications. She holds an MA in journalism from USC.
Jeff Miller is the founding editor of Thrillist Los Angeles, the ultra-popular cityguide that’s become a market leader for 21-40-year-olds looking the best local spots to eat/drink/hang out/have fun.
He’s also written about everything from Britney Spears to ventriloquism for many, many publications including Billboard, The Los Angeles Times, Variety, and Maxim, and is the bandleader for the world’s first indie-rock tribute band, Black Crystal Wolf Kids.
You can learn more about Jeff at facebook.com/JournalistJeffMiller.
Paula Parisi is a Los Angeles-based journalist with extensive experience covering business, entertainment, technology and lifestyle topics.
She has written cover stories for Wired and Entertainment Weekly, and was a staff writer and editor at The Hollywood Reporter, exiting in 2008 from her position as VP and Executive Editor. In the ensuing years, she launched TheEquestrianNews.com and MaxTheTrax.com.
Author of the book “Titanic and the Making of James Cameron,” Parisi currently serves as Director of Events & Marketing at TheWrap.
JAMIE WOLF is a journalist, editor and photographer who is also an executive producer of documentary films. For many years she’s been actively involved with PEN Center USA, which represents the world-wide writers’ organization PEN International in the western United States; she was first a member of the Board and now serves as vice president for the Center.
Wolf was one of the original group of editors at The Washington Monthly; she has written about politics and other subjects for that magazine as well as for Harper’s; The New Yorker; New West; American Film;The Los Angeles Times Magazine; Los Angeles Magazine, for whom she was a contributing writer; and The LA Weekly, for whom she covered the Howard Dean campaign; and also for MotherJones.com. She was one of the founding board members of the on-line publication The Los Angeles Review of Books. Her two-part series about the long career of then-Congressman Howard Berman appeared in LARB in the fall of 2012, and can be accessed here and here.
Wolf’s essay dealing with parenthood and grown children, “The Shoes in the Hall,” appeared in the anthology “The Empty Nest,” published by Hyperion in 2007. Her photographs of urban landscapes have been published in DoubleTake magazine and exhibited in Washington, D.C., and in Los Angeles. She’s a member of Impact Partners, a documentary producing consortium. Independently, she has executive-produced “Open Secret,” a documentary by Steve Lickteig, which aired several times on Al Jazeera America in the fall of 20013, and “Born This Way,” by Shaun Kadlec and Deb Tullman, which won the Best Documentary prize at Los Angeles’ Outfest film festival in July of 2013, and was aired on KCET-link last December.
Together with Geralyn Dreyfous she executive produced,“ Compared to What: The Improbable Journey of Barney Frank,” which debuted at Tribeca in the spring of 2014, went on to become a staff pick and the winner of the documentary award at San Francisco’s Frameline festival in June of 20014 and aired on Showtime in October of last year. Also together with Geralyn, she executive-produced the documentary “Dogtown Redemption,” directed by Amir Soltani, which made its debut at the Mill Valley Film Festival in October of 2015, where it won the Silver Audience Award; it will be broadcast on PBS’ Independent Lens this year. Wolf is an executive producer of Laura Gabbert’s documentary “City of Gold,” which debuted at the Sundance Film Festival in 2015 and is currently showing theatrically; she is also an executive producer of “Newtown,” a documentary by Kim Snyder that was shown at Sundance this year, and is scheduled to be shown on Independent Lens this coming summer, and of “Audrey and Daisy,” directed by Jon Shenk and Bonnie Cohen, which will premiere globally in 2016 under the Netflix Original banner.
Our Moderator
BRENT SIMON is a film critic and regular contributor to Screen International, Paste, Playboy, Yahoo Movies and is West Coast correspondent for the leading Asian-language film and TV industry magazine, MTime.com.
An honors graduate of the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, Simon served for five-plus years as editor-in-chief and lead film critic of the now-defunct Entertainment Today, at the time Los Angeles’s oldest free weekly publication focused exclusively on entertainment. Simon has contributed essays and feature pieces for print publications as diverse as Los Angeles Daily News, Paper, Los Angeles CityBeat, H Magazine, Zeitgeist, Now Playing Magazine, PopSmear, New York Magazine and Vulture, IGN, Rotten Tomatoes, FilmStew and Reelz.
A former three-term president of the Los Angeles Film Critics Association, Simon has worked with AFI Fest, and served on festival juries at City of Lights, City of Angels (COLCOA), Method Fest and more, and in 2007-08, his play “Pulp College” was produced Off Broadway.
You can see his blog at SharedDarkness.com and “Meet the Critic”
Twitter: @SharedDarkness
Photo by Allan Miller
Magazines and Ezines: What you need to know
Panel
Magazines and Ezines: What you need to know
Monday, March 21, 2016
7:30 to 9:15 p.m. (networking follows the program)
Magazines are everywhere. It seems as if they must be starving for content, but they don’t make it easy to for writers to contribute. In fact, they can be downright secretive about the process.
Not all magazines pay well; some do not all pay at all. But sometimes the article practically writes itself, and other times the resume credit is worth the effort, even if the money does not fit. And sometimes there are other valuable perks that you might not have considered.
Our expert panel will discuss:
– How to get the attention of magazines
– How to contact the magazines
– What they look for
– A calendar of upcoming topics
– What to submit
– What not to do
– How to protect your work
– Perks associated with magazine writing
– Answers to your own questions
If you have ideas, here’s where they can find a home.
Our panel will include:
MICHELE RAPHAEL is the co-founder with David Lott of Angels Flight • literary west, a new, L.A.- based literary, arts and culture journal.
Promoting emerging, prominent and diverse voices, AFLW has featured L.A. writers Anna March, Wendy C. Ortiz, Eileen Cronin and Deanne Stillman, among others.
Previously, Michele was a staff writer and columnist for the Los Angeles Times, a features editor for latimes.com, and director of publications for the Norman Lear Center. She has written for Glamour, Quartz, Variety, The Huffington Post, Billboard and Los Angeles Review of Books, among other publications. She holds an MA in journalism from USC.
Jeff Miller is the founding editor of Thrillist Los Angeles, the ultra-popular cityguide that’s become a market leader for 21-40-year-olds looking the best local spots to eat/drink/hang out/have fun.
He’s also written about everything from Britney Spears to ventriloquism for many, many publications including Billboard, The Los Angeles Times, Variety, and Maxim, and is the bandleader for the world’s first indie-rock tribute band, Black Crystal Wolf Kids.
You can learn more about Jeff at facebook.com/JournalistJeffMiller.
Paula Parisi is a Los Angeles-based journalist with extensive experience covering business, entertainment, technology and lifestyle topics.
She has written cover stories for Wired and Entertainment Weekly, and was a staff writer and editor at The Hollywood Reporter, exiting in 2008 from her position as VP and Executive Editor. In the ensuing years, she launched TheEquestrianNews.com and MaxTheTrax.com.
Author of the book “Titanic and the Making of James Cameron,” Parisi currently serves as Director of Events & Marketing at TheWrap.
JAMIE WOLF is a journalist, editor and photographer who is also an executive producer of documentary films. For many years she’s been actively involved with PEN Center USA, which represents the world-wide writers’ organization PEN International in the western United States; she was first a member of the Board and now serves as vice president for the Center.
Wolf was one of the original group of editors at The Washington Monthly; she has written about politics and other subjects for that magazine as well as for Harper’s; The New Yorker; New West; American Film;The Los Angeles Times Magazine; Los Angeles Magazine, for whom she was a contributing writer; and The LA Weekly, for whom she covered the Howard Dean campaign; and also for MotherJones.com. She was one of the founding board members of the on-line publication The Los Angeles Review of Books. Her two-part series about the long career of then-Congressman Howard Berman appeared in LARB in the fall of 2012, and can be accessed here and here.
Wolf’s essay dealing with parenthood and grown children, “The Shoes in the Hall,” appeared in the anthology “The Empty Nest,” published by Hyperion in 2007. Her photographs of urban landscapes have been published in DoubleTake magazine and exhibited in Washington, D.C., and in Los Angeles. She’s a member of Impact Partners, a documentary producing consortium. Independently, she has executive-produced “Open Secret,” a documentary by Steve Lickteig, which aired several times on Al Jazeera America in the fall of 20013, and “Born This Way,” by Shaun Kadlec and Deb Tullman, which won the Best Documentary prize at Los Angeles’ Outfest film festival in July of 2013, and was aired on KCET-link last December.
Together with Geralyn Dreyfous she executive produced,“ Compared to What: The Improbable Journey of Barney Frank,” which debuted at Tribeca in the spring of 2014, went on to become a staff pick and the winner of the documentary award at San Francisco’s Frameline festival in June of 20014 and aired on Showtime in October of last year. Also together with Geralyn, she executive-produced the documentary “Dogtown Redemption,” directed by Amir Soltani, which made its debut at the Mill Valley Film Festival in October of 2015, where it won the Silver Audience Award; it will be broadcast on PBS’ Independent Lens this year. Wolf is an executive producer of Laura Gabbert’s documentary “City of Gold,” which debuted at the Sundance Film Festival in 2015 and is currently showing theatrically; she is also an executive producer of “Newtown,” a documentary by Kim Snyder that was shown at Sundance this year, and is scheduled to be shown on Independent Lens this coming summer, and of “Audrey and Daisy,” directed by Jon Shenk and Bonnie Cohen, which will premiere globally in 2016 under the Netflix Original banner.
Our Moderator
BRENT SIMON is a film critic and regular contributor to Screen International, Paste, Playboy, Yahoo Movies and is West Coast correspondent for the leading Asian-language film and TV industry magazine, MTime.com.
An honors graduate of the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, Simon served for five-plus years as editor-in-chief and lead film critic of the now-defunct Entertainment Today, at the time Los Angeles’s oldest free weekly publication focused exclusively on entertainment. Simon has contributed essays and feature pieces for print publications as diverse as Los Angeles Daily News, Paper, Los Angeles CityBeat, H Magazine, Zeitgeist, Now Playing Magazine, PopSmear, New York Magazine and Vulture, IGN, Rotten Tomatoes, FilmStew and Reelz.
A former three-term president of the Los Angeles Film Critics Association, Simon has worked with AFI Fest, and served on festival juries at City of Lights, City of Angels (COLCOA), Method Fest and more, and in 2007-08, his play “Pulp College” was produced Off Broadway.
You can see his blog at SharedDarkness.com and “Meet the Critic”
Twitter: @SharedDarkness
Photo by Allan Miller
Love the Ones You Hate — Creating Appealing Flawed Characters
Seminar
Love the Ones You Hate — Creating Appealing Flawed Characters
Presented by Diana Y. Paul, author of “Things Unsaid”
Saturday, March 19, 2016
10:30 am to 1:00 p.m.
Doors open at 10:00 am. Please arrive by 10:20 to be assured a seat.
Diana Paul will be giving a few examples of flawed characters from her novel, “Things Unsaid,” and discussing their importance for the structure of the novel. In addition to examples from her novel, she will use “Olive Kitteridge” (Elizabeth Strout) and “Dinner at the Homesick Restaurant” (Anne Tyler) and their use of character flaws. In a workshop format, Diana Paul encourages all participants to read from their own writing or from some of their favorite authors so we can open the discussion on characters we love to hate.
A good story is all about character. And plot is also character. How do you combine and interweave the two?
Some of the areas of discussion:
I. Negative Feelings can make the story compelling.
Building character profiles: what flaws work for the protagonist and for the antagonist?
II. Saints and easy solutions leading to happy endings can be forgettable and even boring.
Endings and Beginnings depend on each other. Flaws and problems drive the character and plot.
III. The challenge for the writer is to pull in the reader via characters’ imperfections.
What backstory explains the character’s flaws? Understanding the psychology of all major characters’ behavior.
IV. Going too far. Like a joke taken to the extreme.
Certain flaws are tool objectionable and unsympathetic; no longer a flaw but a psychosis.
V. Contrasts between positive and negative traits work best when not absolutes, but fluid and impermanent.
Examples from favorite books: how the character must change.
Assignment: Bring at least one example of a flawed character to discuss. This example can be from a novel or from your original writing.
Recommended online reading:
1) by Angela Ackerman. If you like this article Angela’s book is “The Negative Trait Thesaurus: A Writer’s Guide to Character Flaws”
2) Diana Paul’s column on being a writer – Chronicle of First Words – for the “San Diego Book Review” at SanDiegoBookReview.com/blog/first-words. The posts should be read in consecutive order, but if there isn’t time, just read the article on “Flawed Characters.”
Presenter/Author Bio — DIANA Y. PAUL
DIANA Y. PAUL, born in Akron, Ohio, is a graduate of Northwestern University, with a degree in both psychology and philosophy, and of the University of Wisconsin–Madison, with a PhD in Buddhist Studies.
Her debut novel, “Things Unsaid” (She Writes Press, 2015), has been ranked #2 in the “Top 14 Books about Families Crazier Than Yours” and was nominated for a Pushcart Prize.
A former Stanford University professor, she is also the author of three books on Buddhism, one of which has been translated into Japanese and German (Women in Buddhism, University of California Press).
Her short stories have appeared in a number of literary journals and she is currently working on a second novel, “A Perfect Match.”
Diana lives in Carmel, CA with her husband, Doug, and their white-and-grey calico, Mao. She and Doug enjoy visiting their two adult children, Maya Miller (San Francisco) and Keith Paul (Los Angeles), as often as they can.
To learn more about her and her work, visit her author website at DianaYPaul.com and her blog on movies, art, and food at UnhealedWound.com or follow her on Twitter: @DianaPaul10.
Word Processing Prowess: Easy tricks and hints
Seminar
Word Processing Prowess: Easy tricks and hints
presented by Deborah Shadovitz, who wrote the book!
Saturday, February 20, 2016
10:30 am to 1:00 p.m.
Have you ever felt that Word Processing is actually harder than writing by hand or type writing? Do you use Word or another word processor and love it — except when you end up with weird page breaks or make one tiny change and end up with rivers of white instead of columns? Are you frustrated when you edit a word and actually lose the word. Do you “get by” in Word or your writing app, but know you could be more efficient?
If you have answered yes to any of these questions or possibly have other frustrations or questions, please do yourself the favor of coming to this seminar and learning how word processing can make you a superhero-strength writer.
But there’s more to the power of word processing than knowing the mechanics. The word processing app you use on your computer is not just typewriter on a computer. It can actually help you formulate and organize your ideas.
No matter how well you get by in your computer’s writing program, chances are great that you’ll leave this seminar with more word processing power and time-saving efficiency.
Our presenter: Deborah Shadovitz
DEBORAH SHADOVITZ has been teaching and writing about using a computer efficiently since the dawn of the 90’s.
She penned many a book including Clarisworks Office for Dummies, Appleworks for Dummies, the Macworld Office 98 Bible and the Adobe GoLive Bible and contributed key chapters to many other Mac, writing, and web books. She was a Contributing Editor at MacAddict magazine and was called upon to write for Macworld and PC World magazines as well as every other major Mac or design magazine.
As a speaker at Macworld Expo, Internet World and other trade shows and events she was always well-received as a dynamic speaker.
Deborah has been solving people’s ”why does my page do this” queries since 1989 and has often helped exasperated people who felt the computer was not a time-saver at all. We are happy to have finally landed her to teach her fellow LA writers. She will teach us how to save time and end frustration. What you learn can be used on any version of Microsoft Word and with other word processing apps as well.
You can learn more about Deborah at Shadovitz.com or TalesOfTravelAndTech.com.