A Masterclass in Dramatic Writing (2^nd Ed.)
Theater, Film, and Television

A Masterclass in Dramatic Writing addresses all three genres of dramatic writing - for theatre, film and TV - in a comprehensive, one-semester, 14-week masterclass for the dramatic writer.

This book is tightly focused on the practical outcome of completing a first draft and first rewrite of a dramatic work, drawing on Professor Janet Neipris? many years of experience as the head of Dramatic Writing at NYU Tisch. The fourteen chapters, organized like a semester, take the reader week-by-week and step-by-step through writing a first draft of an original play, screenplay, or TV pilot, while also teaching the core principles of dramatic writing. Chapters include Beginnings, Creating Complex Characters, Dialogue, Escalating Conflicts, Endings, Checkpoints, Comedy, and Adaptation, and there are Weekly Exercises and progressive Assignments.

This book is perfect for professional writers, teachers, and students of dramatic writing, as well as anyone who wants to complete their first dramatic work.

An award-winning playwright and Professor of Dramatic Writing at NYU, Janet Neipris has written for Screen and Television. She has also taught dramatic writers at UCLA and in China, Australia, Indonesia, South Africa, Italy, and in the UK at Oxford, CSSD, University of Birmingham, and the University of East Anglia. Previous publications include To Be A Playwright (Routledge 2006). Janet Neipris?s plays and letters are in the Theatre Collection of Harvard University?s Houghton Library. For more, see www.janetneipris.com.

Preface: The Moral Responsibility of the Artist

Introduction: The Writer’s Life

1. Week 1: Beginnings
2. Week 2: Creating Complex Characters
3. Week 3: Dialogue
4. Week 4: Escalating Conflicts
5. Week 5: Sixty Questions When Writing a Dramatic Piece
6. Week 6: Putting it all Together
7. Week 7: Endings
8. Week 8: Checkpoints
9. Week 9: Rewriting
10. Week 10: Adaptation
11. Week 11: Comedy
12. Week 12: The Fifteen Habits of Successful Dramatic Writers
13. Week 13: Lessons from Master Teachers and Students
14. Week 14: To Be a Writer