Blog
How to Write a Low-Budget Screenplay
by Writing Workshops Staff
2 years ago
Low-Budget Screenwriting is a class meant to facilitate the ground-up development of a feature-length screenplay while simultaneously keeping common production and budget constraints in mind.
Each week we will approach different aspects of story development by watching films and considering their approach to character, location, plot, and more. Production screenplays will also be provided and can be used either in lieu of the films or in addition to them.
Taught by award-winning novelist and screenwriter Ryan David Jahn, who currently has a project in development at a major streaming network and his first film, a one-location thriller, is in post-production (you can also read his story "All This Distant Beauty" in The Best American Mystery Stories 2020).
NOTE: This class also includes a Zoom Q&A with a guest speaker, writer-producer Andrew Pagana, who wrote the upcoming film Surrounded, starring Letitia Wright and Jamie Bell, and whose credits as a producer include Raze (starring Zoe Bell and Rachel Nichols), Anarchy Parlor (starring Robert LeSardo), and Ryan’s upcoming first feature, which is currently in post-production.
Although subject to change, the films we currently plan to examine are Buried (2010, written by Chris Sparling), Free Fire (2016, written by Amy Jump and Ben Wheatley), Insidious (2010, written by Leigh Whannell), and Locke (2013, written by Steven Knight).
