Screenwriting

Happy Monday, Creative Army! Here's something I've learned in my years as Head of Community: the members who get the most out of Stage 32 are almost never the ones who understood everything on day one. They're the ones who found one thing that worked, did it consistently, and then found the next thing. This is the guide I wish every member had in their first week. I originally wrote a version of it in 2024, and enough has changed since then that it needed a proper rebuild. Whether you join...

Happy Sunday, Creative Army! Let’s kick things off with a huge shoutout to everyone who has already jumped into this month’s Introduce Yourself Weekend. Thousands of creatives from around the world are connecting, sharing their stories, and building relationships that can lead to collaborations, opportunities, and lifelong friendships. If you haven’t made your introduction yet, you still have time. Be bold. Introduce yourself. Your next great opportunity could be just one connection away. Now,...

In 2020, I wrote a Stage 32 blog about how to use struggles as creative fuel: When Life Gives You Lemons, Open a Lemonade Company - How to Use Struggles as Creative Fuel. In the last paragraph of that blog, I wrote: "Although I did not find a new well-paid job, I would not change it for the world. And I have confidence in the universe." Shortly after posting my blog on Stage 32, a published author contacted me, mentioning that she had read my wonderful blog and would like to connect. Thi...

Learning to assess yourself in an industry built partly on taste.There are two ways to ruin a flotation device.The loud way is ego. You mistake inflation for value, so you keep pumping: more air, more certainty, more expansion. Eventually, the thing built to keep you afloat swells past what it was made to hold and bursts.The quiet way barely makes a sound. A small hiss. You put a hole in your own float and let the air out a little at a time, congratulating yourself for being humble while you do...

Hi everyone, I'm Sam Rivera, Dev Services Coordinator here at Stage 32. I spend my days on the development team, working with writers on script consultations, pitch prep, and the kind of notes that get a project from "promising" to "ready." I read a lot of scripts, and I watch a lot of festivals to see what's actually landing with audiences and the industry before the trade headlines catch up. That's the job of this series. Not the noise, the signal. What actually moved this week, what it...

Happy Tuesday, Creative Community! I want to start with where we actually are in the calendar, because I don't think enough creatives are paying attention to it. Venice has wrapped. Toronto is in its final stretch, closing on Sunday. The New York Film Festival opens on the 25th. Austin Film Festival runs October 29 through November 5, and the American Film Market follows immediately after, November 10 through 15. And behind all of that, the part nobody photographs: studios and streamers ar...

Happy Sunday, Creative Army! I hope your weekend has been a creative one so far. Whether you have been writing, filming, editing, or sketching out the next spark of an idea, I have something today that will give you a boost. So grab your coffee, and let's dive in. This week's featured video comes from The Wall Street Journal: China Cracked the 90-Second Drama. Now It's Taking Over American Phones. One in ten American adults are now watching microdramas. That number alone should make you si...

Happy Thursday, Creative Community!  This one comes up in the Lounges constantly, and I've answered it in more comment threads than I can count. Usually in a few paragraphs, usually while a conversation is already halfway to an argument, and never with the space it actually needs. It's time we really dig into it. A member posts about a project they worked on. Or they post about a professional they've met and are excited to be working with. Someone else in the thread points out that the proje...

Hi everyone, Laura here. If you have been following The Industry Pulse, you know the point of this series is to find the signal underneath the noise. Some months that takes work. This month it walked right up and introduced itself. In the space of about two weeks, three separate companies launched distribution operations aimed squarely at independent filmmakers. A theater chain. A streaming platform. And one of the biggest studios in Atlanta. Three very different businesses arriving at the...

A guy once reached out because he wanted to volunteer on a proof-of-concept I was shooting in a few weeks. Great, I thought. He had never worked in film, but he was willing to show up, and willingness counts for a lot. So I sent him a list of jobs we still needed filled. Yes, production assistants. We needed PAs. His reply was: “Oh, I was thinking like... writer. Like, I could write some of your material.” I told him, as gently as I could, that writing was not what we needed. More importantl...