Workspace

Who are you and what do you write?
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I’m Phil Hay, a screenwriter. I write (always have) with a partner, [Matt Manfredi](http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0542062/).

At the moment, our film [R.I.P.D.](http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0790736/) is in production in Boston, and we are back and forth from here to there. We wrote, with Adam McKay, an adaptation of the great Ennis/Robertson comic The Boys. McKay is putting that together right now. We’re also working on a quasi-secret movie for Fox and an adaptation of a Japanese movie called Big Man Japan for Sony and Neal Moritz (who is, indisputably, our main man.)

Before all this, we wrote [crazy/beautiful](http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0250224/), [Aeon Flux](http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0402022/), and co-wrote the [Clash of the Titans](http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0800320/) remake, and directed a movie, [Bug](http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0006534/) (2001).

Where and when do you write?
—–

From the beginning, Matt and I have tried to keep to a very regular schedule. We go Monday-Friday, 10-5:30 or 6 in normal times. Obviously, if in production, or when we’re close to a deadline, we can scramble into any hours.

For many years, we worked out of an office lovingly hewn from my garage. Recently, we moved to a place called “The Lot,” in West Hollywood. It looks pretty much exactly as you’d imagine a 1930s studio lot would. It’s mellow, and several of our writer and director friends are here, too, or come here when they are cutting or shooting.

We have one bigger room with two desks and a couch, and one smaller room with the corkboard and a table with chairs around it. We have a mini-fridge with beer in it, acquisition of which was a personal and professional high water mark.

My desk is piled with stuff — scripts, notes, books, scrawls. Matt’s is completely, eerily, annoyingly clean. The desks face the same direction but are angled slightly toward each other so we can talk. We used to sit directly across from each other, but I think we can all agree that that’s a bit much, right?

We’ve both realized that the immediate surroundings don’t affect us all that much. Our HQ used to be the kitchen table in an apartment we shared. At times it’s been a hotel room, a veritable broom closet at Warner Brothers, a spotless, oddly narrow room at Studio Babelsberg in Potsdam, a shivery, cavernous room with dangling electrical wires at Longcross (a tank-proving-ground- turned-studio in England,) a glass fishbowl in Boston that actually, and truly, and deeply, smells of fish.

(An interesting bit about production: during the last couple weeks of preproduction, the editorial department always comes sniffing around your office, measuring, assessing… craving. They will inevitably annex your space and kick you down the hall. 3-for-3 so far.)

But at home, going to our own office every day is a ritual that is very helpful. We always outline together, then we divide scenes and write — sometimes still in the same office, sometimes at home, sending files to each other at the end of the day. When we have the raw scenes down we manufacture a Frankenstein’s monster version, stitch it together, then come back together and work (battle) it through.

What hardware do you use?
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I use a previous-generation MacBook Pro, because I always, always pull the trigger on a new computer moments before the new model debuts. Matt uses a MacBook Pro of the current generation, bought two weeks later. I love all office products. I buy a lot of them, but I rarely I end up using them. Little cardboard folders, aluminum boxes (the greatest), envelopes, binders… going to Staples is like going to Toys ‘R Us. But as I said, I can’t figure out what to use them for. I guess what I’m realizing is that I love to store office products. That my true passion is for warehousing.

I truly love pens. I’ve only met one person who loves them more, and that’s [Robert Schwentke](http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0777881/), our friend and the director of R.I.P.D., who turned me on to the greatest pen in the world. Pilot G-TEC-C4. Do yourself a favor.

**Drawing pens.** I scribble and doodle a lot, maybe even obsessively, over all surfaces.

**Notebooks.** I also love notebooks. I’ve had some great composition books from Japan that have weirdly translated slogans on the front: “It must Perfection try to it” or “Information: here fell the NewHand”. I used to use those great hardcover lab books when I was in grad school. Now, I like those orange Rhodia deals that are the size of a pack of cigarettes and can fit in your back pocket.

**Freitag bag.** I got my first in Berlin, where they are very popular. They’re made of old truck tarps and seatbelts. For me, it’s the greatest computer bag in the world.

**A corkboard.** We aren’t big on notecards, but we post a 10-12 page outline sequentially on a corkboard, and kind of check it down as we are writing. We often write out of sequence — our belief is that we should write the stuff that most excites us on any given day, both because it’s more productive for us and it eventually exposes any scene that feels obligatory or dutiful — so this is really helpful. We also put storyboards up here, diagrams of action sequences, things like that.

What software do you use?
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[Final Draft](http://www.finaldraft.com). Never occurred to me to use anything else.

Sometimes, [iAnnotate](http://itunes.apple.com/us/app/iannotate-pdf/id363998953?mt=8), which allows you to write on PDF’s on the iPad. It’s the first thing that has come around in a while that feels like a leap forward and has made a dent in my totally locked-down habits. Still, I generally need to print a script out and make notes by hand.

What would you change?
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Here’s what I definitely wouldn’t change: having an extremely talented and excellent partner. He’s truly great.

What I would change: I’d write more.

I’d be less snowed under all the time by an avalanche of thoughts and fragments and 100 movies or stories I’d like to write. I’d be more methodical and I’d move on faster. No matter how much we write — and I think objectively we write pretty much — it never feels like enough. That definitely haunts me.

But I bet I have a lot of company in this feeling out there (don’t I?!). So maybe what I’d change is accepting that more. I never stop thinking about stories. Even though I feel I do 90 percent of my own work while walking around doing something else, there’s something very important about having the dedicated physical space and an ironclad ritual about attending to it every day.

Someone once told me that as a writer you’re like the proverbial Newton under the apple tree. Your job is to be there when the apple finally falls. Sometimes that is the job, just being there, putting in the hours, as many as you can. You have to be sitting there so you don’t miss it.

Who are you and what do you write?
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I’m Heather Hach, and I’m lucky enough to call myself a mostly-employed screenwriter. My best-known credit is Freaky Friday — the recent one, not the 1970s version. I’ve also written for Broadway (Legally Blonde the Musical), TV (an ABC pilot last season that didn’t get picked up), and a book you may have seen in the Bargain Bin pile (Freaky Monday), but I still consider myself first and foremost a screenwriter.

I tend to write comedies and more female-driven material. I’ll share credit on the upcoming [What To Expect When You’re Expecting](http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1586265/), which comes out Mother’s Day 2012. (Please go opening weekend. Please.)

I probably identify myself primarily as a screenwriter because I simply love movies all out of proportion. When movies are good, I’m the woman randomly clapping and guffawing with loud delight in the back of the theater. (Actually, not the back — the middle, and always on an aisle. Always. Small bladder.)

When I went through the ego boost of having my husband walk out on me 15 years ago, I told myself, “Good god, seriously? This is my life? Okay, what do I REALLY wanna do now then? Because my personal life is in the toilet but maybe my professional life could kick ass.”

And I realized while watching Good Will Hunting, I love movies most. (And while watching Star Wars. And while watching Jaws. And while watching Crimes and Misdemeanors. You get the idea…) And I love comedy. (I used to perform with an improv troupe in Denver.) And writing. (Which is what I did professionally.)

So I combined those passions, and realized that’s called being a screenwriter. I started writing scripts, and I knew this was ‘it.’ I moved to LA in 1998. In 1999, I won the Walt Disney Fellowship, and my first assignment was Freaky Friday. I had no idea then this is generally not how Hollywood works.

Where and when do you write?
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I try — operative word being ‘try’ — to write from 9 to 5-ish at my home office, with varying degrees of success. I have a 21-month old boy at home who wants to wander into my office, and he is damned irresistible, so that’s challenging.

I also can be easily distracted and spend an inordinate amount of time looking up flash sales to places in the Bahamas I’ve never heard of and for ridiculously high heels I’ll never wear and why Kim Kardashian is the worst person on the planet.

Oh, and interactive maps predicting whether Indiana will go blue or red in 2012. I love those.

What hardware do you use?
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I use a Macintosh OS X (I had to go to the “About This Computer” icon to find out that information, if that gives you a clue) and have a painfully out-of-touch Mac laptop. It’s so old I’m not even going to look it up and embarrass myself.

What software do you use?
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[Final Draft](http://www.finaldraft.com/), of course, and I think I have version 8 but I could be wrong. I use [Word](http://office.microsoft.com/en-us/word/) a lot for my outlines. Frankly, I’m like a fawn whose mother has been shot in the woods when it comes to technology.

What would you change about how you write?
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I think writing would be a lot easier if I could somehow magically be Aaron Sorkin for 23 minutes a day — or Beyonce, even. Both, ideally.

That’s not going to happen. So I have to maximize my own skills and do the heavy lifting and painful work of breaking a story (the part that inevitably makes me want to lay down). I wish I knew how to make that process more digestible. I still don’t. I wish I could tune out the world better and not be so ADD all too often.

I strive for five pages a day when I’m in delivery mode — whether that takes me an hour or ten. If I’m ambitious, I’ll do more.

Who are you and what do you write?
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My name is Gary Whitta ([@garywhitta](http://twitter.com/garywhitta)). I started out as a journalist and editor in the video game industry; I edited PC Gamer magazine from 1993-2000 before starting a new career as a screenwriter.

I wrote the Denzel Washington movie [The Book of Eli](http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1037705/). I’ve written on projects like the live-action feature adaptations of Akira and World of Warcraft. My next movie, set to star Will and Jaden Smith, directed by M. Night Shyamalan, goes into production early next year for release in Summer 2013. I’m currently working on an animated feature for Paramount, and recently signed a TV development deal with ABC Studios. I’m working on some comic-book projects.

I also got to play a zombie in the pilot episode of The Walking Dead, which was pretty cool.

Where and when do you write?
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I work from home, in a spare bedroom converted into a quasi-office. I’m usually at my computer by 8:30 each morning but spend an hour or so catching up on news, social media stuff and generally procrastinating before knuckling down to work. Sometimes I’ll manage to blow off the whole morning but then guilt sets in after lunch and so the afternoon tends to be when I get most of my actual work done. I’m easily distracted so if I really need to concentrate I’ll turn off everything that can bleep/bing/flash at me (email, twitter, IM, etc) and go into full-screen mode on my writing program so I’m properly blinkered.

When actually writing the first draft of a new script my over/under is five pages per day — anything less, I’ll feel like I slacked off, anything more is gravy. At five pages per weekday, you’ve got a 120-page script in about five weeks, which is pretty decent. When I’m really consumed with what I’m writing it can be much more — the first draft of The Book of Eli was written in less than a week, writing well into the night, blasting out about 20 pages per day.

Those are the rare good times; more commonly each page is like pulling teeth and just making my “daily 5″ is a victory.

A daily quota is harder to quantify when outlining or rewriting. If you’re honest with yourself you just instinctively know at the end of each day if you’re satisfied with how much you got done. Particularly when rewriting you can work hard all day, coming at a problematic scene ten different ways, and still wind up back where you started. On those days I don’t beat myself up too much because at least I know I worked hard, but it’s still frustrating if you feel like you didn’t make any meaningful progress.

I know a lot of writers like to have music playing when they work but I find it a distraction usually. I need a quiet environment to work, although in some cases — mostly in the early stages of a project when I’m still feeling out the feel and tone of a piece — I’ll make an appropriate playlist of music that takes me to those places. When I was writing The Book of Eli I listened to a lot of gospel and devotional music — Sam Cooke and the Soul Stirrers, Johhny Cash, stuff like that.

I’ll also put that stuff on my iPod and listen to it in the car, I find that immersing myself in music that evokes the atmosphere of the piece I’m working on really helps me.

What hardware do you use?
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I’m an Apple guy through and through. My main desktop work machine is a 27″ iMac and I take an 11” MacBook Air with me when I travel. I also use an iPad which has become an indispensable tool when pitching. I create PDF “flash cards” in [Pages](http://www.apple.com/iwork/pages/) that I can easily swipe through with the iPad on my knee as I’m sat there pitching to someone. I write just enough information that I don’t get lost or trail off, but not so much that it feels like I’m just reading off a script.

I also use my iPad for reading scripts that are sent my way as well as comics and other things sent for consideration to adapt/rewrite. Almost everything is a PDF these days. The iPad really is an amazingly versatile device and it’s already hard to imagine what being a screenwriter without one was like.

I also have a pretty capable gaming PC under my same desk, which is hooked up to my iMac in target display mode so it’s easy to switch over when I want to play games. Which is pretty much all the time that I’m writing.

What software do you use?
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Like most screenwriters I use [Final Draft](http://www.finaldraft.com/). And like John, I don’t love it.

It’s just what I’ve always used and I’m too set in my ways to learn something new. It works well enough despite its sometimes annoying quirks and it is the closest thing there is to an industry standard, although these days all you really need is something that will properly output PDFs (until you actually go into serious development/pre-production at which point they will want you to give them editable Final Draft files).

For general writing I use Apple’s Pages, which is a very elegant and simple word processor, and it comes with a full-screen mode that eliminates distraction. If you’re looking for something free on Mac, WriteRoom does a similar job.

I’m pretty much within the Apple ecosystem for everything else, too. I use Apple Mail and iCal synced to my iPhone via iCloud which is pretty idiot-proof and therefore perfect for me.

I had a serious hard drive crash several years ago and it really was a big wake-up call on the importance of backing up. Now everything gets backed up to my [Time Capsule](http://www.apple.com/timecapsule/) hourly every day, and I keep important work files both in my Dropbox (which is the greatest thing ever) and iCloud.

What would you change about how you write?
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Despite all the devices and tricks I’ve developed to minimize procrastination I still do it more than I’d like. The great thing about this job is that you can keep your own hours so long as the project is turned in on time (and it’s good) but the flipside is it’s so easy to decide the kitchen really needs cleaning instead because WRITING IS HARD and there’s no-one there to keep you honest.

For that reason I’ve recently found myself more attracted to collaborative writing, because two brains are always better than one (provided they’re in sync), and just the presence of that second person forces you to keep up your end. It’s okay for me to waste my own time, but not someone else’s. Plus there’s an energy and fun to collaboration that you just don’t get when you’re writing by yourself, wearing out the carpet as you pace up and down trying to crack a story problem and convincing yourself that you’re a fraud who will be found out the minute you hand in this next script.

Who are you and what do you write?
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Despite the name Chris Nee, I am not an Asian man — although I did get a staff writer job on a show because the studio was looking for an Asian male perspective. When they met me, a chick and Irish, I’d already been hired and they couldn’t exactly say anything.

I’m currently the Executive Producer, showrunner and head writer of an animated series I created for Disney Junior. The show is called Doc McStuffins. We’re in post on 26 half hour episodes (52 11-minute stories) that will premier on Disney Junior in March of 2012.

I’ve had a pretty eclectic career. I started at Sesame International and spent time in Mexico, Finland, Israel and Jordan working on local versions of Sesame Street. Somewhere I have tapes of the Arabic Bert and Ernie taking long drags on their cigarettes after every take.

For many years I juggled writing for kids TV — both animated and live action, teens to tots — and producing documentary/reality TV series. I wrote the first Wonder Pets Christmas Special from a converted WWII barracks-turned-hotel on an island halfway between Alaska and Russia while producing season one of The Deadliest Catch.

I won an Emmy for writing Little Bill on Nick Jr. while I was Supervising Producer on Roseanne Barr’s first reality show. All in all, weird and wonderful.

Where and when do you write?
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I write in one of three places. While we’re in the nine months of writing the series, I have an office/loft space, which I share with two staff writers and our writing coordinator. Or I’m in Ireland sharing an office with the director of our series; the show’s being produced in Dublin. Or I’m working in my home office. It’s a separate room in the front of the house. I watch everything that happens on our street. You can’t believe how often people drive the wrong way up a one-way street.

I have no explicit rule that my five year-old can’t come into my office, but he’s pretty good about it. Sometimes it’s a huge distraction, but mostly he’s dying to see what I’m working on, and that’s pretty validating. I think I once had a rule about my partner not coming into my office, but she pretty much just ignores that, so I gave up.

I can’t do music. Or talking. Other than that, I’m very good at blocking out the outside world. With next-door neighbors in their fourth year of construction, this is a good thing.

I do a round of emails right when I wake up, since I’m in LA while my production team is in Ireland. Conference calls are also early. I try to run four times a week. Then, I write from 10 to 6-ish. I’m almost always home for dinner.

If I’m up against a tight deadline, or at the height of the writing schedule, I sit back down for a few more hours after my son is in bed.

What hardware do you use?
—-

I have a 27-inch iMac at home. The screen is ridiculously big, but I love seeing a complete top-to-bottom page on the screen. Even more, I love having an outline or notes open on the left of the screen, and a full page of a script on the right.

I’d worked exclusively on a laptop for years, but it was catching up with me. I don’t have carpel tunnel, but I get numbness in my fingertips from the track pad. So I knew it was time to set things up right in my home office. That meant a desktop computer. An Aeron chair. And a foot stool, as I’m short. [Beth Schacter short](http://johnaugust.com/2011/workspace-beth-schacter).

I use the standard Mac wireless keyboard. I’m very sensitive to the weight of keys on different keyboards, and this one feels incredibly light and easy on my fingertips. When I go to a bigger keyboard that requires more punch to get the keys down, I tend to start having finger pain.

My current laptop is a 15-inch, almost 5-year-old MacBook Pro. I take it back and forth to my writing office, the voice records, the mixes and Ireland.

I usually update computers every three years. I figure I spend most of my life on my computer so I should let myself be on one I love, but I started feeling bad about the environmental impact, and am now trying to get an extra year or two out of my laptops. About two years ago I stripped my MacBook Pro, had the memory doubled, and started clean with the machine. It’s been great for this extra time, and I feel better traveling with an older computer, but I’m itching to upgrade and am sure I will when my series gets picked up for season two.

I review all 52 episodes of my show at all of the follow stages: EMR, rough animatic, animatic, rough animation, offline animation, score pass, revised score pass, pre-mix and final. Plus I get huge amounts of artwork, voice auditions and animation tests every week. All of which is to say, my computer is overwhelmed by huge files. I stopped keeping everything on my internal hard drives. I have a 500 GB LaCie external hard drive that lives on my desk for backup. And I carry a portable 500 GB LaCie drive with me everywhere I go. My show lives on that drive, and is backed up to the other one.

I use small-sized [Moleskin notebooks](http://www.amazon.com/dp/8883701003/?tag=johnaugustcom-20) to keep lists in. I write the lists, but can’t read my own handwriting and rarely look at them. Still, it’s good to know they’re there.

I have a wall with 3×5 cards of all of our episodes — 52 of them — color coded for the stage of production they’re in. I live for it. I stare at it. I need it. Almost weekly I panic on record days and ask my assistant to take a picture of the wall and send it to me so I can visually see where I am.

I have a white board for breaking stories with the staff writers or freelancers. We take a picture of the board when we’re done and erase it.

I have a separate white board by my desk. It has three lists:

1. Everything that’s been assigned to writers.
2. Everything I need to talk to Disney about. That way when my exec calls, I can tick through the things on my agenda without fumbling or having to call back.
3. My to-do list. I love this list. I often finish something, turn to the board anticipating the satisfaction of the check mark, realize I never wrote it down in the first place, run over and write it down, wait a beat, then change to the correctly colored pen and check it. Still satisfying.

I have an HP 3-in-1 jet printer, and a laser printer. As someone who is a terrible speller and was always a bad proofreader, I’ve had to teach myself to hand in pages that are professional and error-free. I live by the printed proof pass. It’s been proven that you see more on the printed page than you do on a screen. If you’re not naturally good at proofing, always print. Put your finger on the page. Mouth the words. It is a skill you can learn and improve on. And yes, it matters. People do notice.

What software do you use?
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I use [Final Draft](http://finaldraft.com). In the world of TV animation, it’s the only format I’ve encountered. To change would be a royal pain in the ass. I try to ignore talk of greener grass.

I also use Microsoft Word. I use [Skype](http://skype.com) quite a bit when communicating with the Europeans. I envy John August and his technical relevance.

What would you change about how you write?
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I’d always write as if it were crunch time in production. When there’s more than is humanly possible to do, I’m a machine, and I do it. Well. And without angst. When my schedule lightens up, I can’t seem to get half the work done in twice the time.

For me, having a child was the greatest productivity booster of all time. A) I want him to be proud of me. B) I can’t fuck around anymore. I just sit down and get the shit done. When I think of all the times when I was single and not a parent that I said I didn’t have time to do/work on this, that or the other… I could just shoot myself. I had all the time in the world.