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Meet the Teaching Artist: Adaptation Fascination with Lauren Veloski
by Writing Workshops Staff
3 months ago
In the ever-changing world of screenwriting, where creativity meets the constraints of cinematic storytelling, few voices are as innovative and encouraging as Lauren Veloski. A screenwriter and full-time creative coach, Lauren brings her wealth of experience and unique perspective to WritingWorkshops.com with her new course, Adaptation Fascination: Turn Your Fiction & Nonfiction Into a Screenplay 3-Week Zoom Intensive.
Lauren’s journey in the industry is marked by her indie comedy feature, SORRY, THANKS, which garnered praise from Lena Dunham for its seamless and astute dialogue. The film, an unromantic comedy about casual douchebaggery, premiered at SXSW and toured 15 international festivals before being picked up by IFC/Sundance. This success story is just one chapter in Lauren’s career, spanning over 15 years as the “story brain in the room” on numerous television and film projects.
In 2022, Lauren founded THAT'S BANANAS, a platform dedicated to working one-on-one with writers at all levels, helping them unlock their full potential and power on the page. Now, with her Adaptation Fascination intensive, Lauren is set to guide writers from all genres and backgrounds in transforming their existing stories into compelling screenplays. The course promises to demystify the art of screenwriting, showing how to adapt novels, memoirs, short stories, and essays into visually dynamic scripts.
“Screenwriting is a capital-A ‘Art,’” says Lauren, emphasizing that despite its Hollywood reputation, it is a form accessible to all with the right guidance and practice. Her course is designed to provide exactly that—helping writers distill their stories to their most essential elements and reimagine them through the lens of visual storytelling. With a hands-on approach, including one-on-one support and office hours, Lauren ensures that each student receives the personalized attention needed to bring their screenplay vision to life.
In our Meet the Teaching Artist interview, we delve into Lauren Veloski’s insights on the art of adaptation, her approach to teaching, and what students can expect from her intensive course. Join us as we explore the fascinating process of turning beloved fiction and nonfiction pieces into potential screen gems, guided by a true master of the craft.
Hi, Lauren. Please introduce yourself to our audience.
Hello! I'm a screenwriter and full-time screenwriting teacher—and I love this work! Through my company THAT'S BANANAS, I teach screenwriting and work one-on-one as a writing/creative coach. I'm particularly passionate about marginalized voices, and I'm working to bring more women and minorities into cinematic writing as unapologetic disruptors. My own scripts center on unabashedly fumbling characters and celebrate their beautiful messes with abandon—dark comedies. The human "mess," after all, is our on-ramp to empathy—and without empathy (for self or other) we are, well, goners! My very first film, SORRY, THANKS, world-premiered at the South by Southwest (SXSW) film festival in 2009, was called a "sidelong charmer" by the Los Angeles Times, praised by writer Lena Dunham as "seamless as any studio rom-com—if studio rom-coms had astute, nuanced dialogue,” and picked up by Sundance TV. I'm also deeply passionate about social justice and have worked as a writer/producer on several award-winning social justice documentaries. The common question in all my work is: What makes us the beautiful, bizarro creatures that we are and how we we can love and live better?
What made you want to teach this specific class? Is it something you are focusing on in your own writing practice? Have you noticed a need to focus on this element of craft?
I've worked one-on-one as a writing coach with so many prose writers—fiction writers especially—who want to be able to adapt their own work. Sometimes these are high-profile writers asked by their agent or publisher to adapt their "hit" book, but MANY are writers simply curious about the craft of screenwriting who are excited to imagine their book/short story/memoir/essay on the big (or small!) screen.
ALL of these writers (famous and not; commissioned or solo) have NO idea where to begin! Because screenwriting, unlike fiction or even poetry, is extremely unintuitive. It's neither how we talk, nor how we write! It's a third thing. It's formatted up the ying-yang. A blueprint for a larger vision. THINK: Ikea assembly manual! At least, that's how it feels at first glance. Once you look deeper, it has its own rhythms, its own beauty.
And I emphatically DO belief screenplays are ART! But whereas most of us writers regard language as a conduit for beauty, screenplays do not. In some ways screenplays are an easier form than all the others; in other ways far trickier. The writerly instinct that serves you on the fiction or memoir page, will flat-out not work in the screenplay form. You have to relearn your relationship to story and specifically to visualization—
I find this an INCREDIBLY EXCITING journey of narrative "translation" (transformation) and I LOVE guiding a writer through it!
Give us a breakdown of how the course is going to go. What can the students expect? What is your favorite part about this class you've dreamed up?
It's an exhilarating process, to take a story you dearly love and give it this second blast of life! I created the ADAPTATION FASCINATION curriculum to help you find the best-fit second life for YOUR UNIQUE STORY—what's "right" is so specific to the source material.
Week #1 we’ll look at the expansive narrative advantages of translating a story for the screen, as well as the limitations, genre nuances, and reconfigurations required (some doors close, but many more open!).
Week #2 is focused on finding the heart of everyone's story, then deciding what in your story will need to change (/evolve!) in order to create the best possible screenplay.
Week #3: Students will share their very first script sene writing attempts, in a safe supportive community! We’ll also look at the series of decisions each writer must make for tone, style, audience, visual elements—and how to capture this “vision” in a propulsive 1-sheet pitch treatment.
I'm most looking forward to reading the (for almost everyone) VERY FIRST script scenes these writers will have ever written! I'm also excited to study some fantastic adaptations together ("Sense & Sensibility," "WILD," etc).
What was your first literary crush?
Anne Sexton! (Then Sylvia Plath, of course.) I actually began as a poet and thought that would be my life's (writing) work. I was lucky enough to study closely with the miraculous Claudia Rankine as an undergrad. In retrospect, there is something about Anne Sexton's poetry that is uniquely cinematic!
What are you currently reading?
The dynamite HOT SPRINGS DRIVE, by my brilliant former student Lindsay Hunter; THE DETAILS (also spectacular!) by the Swedish writer Ia Genberg; and William Steig's lesser known dog-becomes-seeker-nomad book DOMINIC (I have a deep love of children's books and am usually reading one alongside heavier adult stuff!).
How do you choose what you're working on? When do you know it is the next thing you want to write all the way to THE END?
I'll get ideas for screenplays (/scenes) just walking around and eavesdropping on public conversations (rather: private conversations spoken too loudly in public!). I find that that douse of realism—a "caught" moment of human fumbling or human mess—observed on an airplane, on a loop around my block, at the coffee shop, at the dog park ... these are to me the most delightful and colorful reminders of how dense and innumerable the human story archive is. And a delightful reminder of endless possible "scenes" that could populate a film or TV series.
Usually for me it starts with dialogue—sometimes overheard on one my "urban safaris"—and then I expand it by extrapolating and inventing. When these conversations start to feel like they will spill over into a NEXT scene, a next predicament or revelation for these characters, then I'm attached. Then I know there's a thread to follow to completion. A world I want to step into and shake up!
Where do you find inspiration?
Nature. The conversations of strangers. The constant comedy that is life's perma-absurdity (/our remarkably frequent choice to laugh at our fumbles).
Music and how so much drama can somehow fit into a perfect song. Nothing is more dramatic to me than music. It shows us life is in flow—and THAT makes me want to write.
I also find endless inspiration from my students! So much f-ing talent.
What is the best piece of writing wisdom you've received that you can pass along to our readers? How did it impact your work? Why has this advice stuck with you?
Comedian Amy Poehler suggests in her book that we think of our careers as “bad boyfriends.” It's so brilliant. She explains: “Your career will openly flirt with other people while you’re around. It will forget your birthday and wreck your car … Your career will never marry you.”
What she’s saying is that at the end of the day, your career is a cipher—and I feel the same way about publishing or accolades or getting your screenplay produced. It's really (largely) out of your control.
But your PASSION for the worlds you're creating, your characters and their porcelain or lion hearts, THAT MATTERS. The love between you & those worlds and those creations. That’s where your loyalty and your contentment needs to live.
What is your favorite book to recommend on the craft of writing? Why this book?
I love Samuel Delaney's "About Writing" (and I love everything-Delaney!).
I also adore Annie Dillard's "The Writing Life," and Stephen King's "On Writing" is a flat-out FUN read. For the most part, I find writing about writing tedious and smothering (as in, "I already spend most of my day in this hellhole! Let me out!"). But those three exceptions are delights!
For the comedy writers out there, Mike Sack's "Poking a Dead Frog" is a great read.
As far as screenwriting craft books go: UGH. I have (at best) only middling feelings about most screenwriting books—they tend to teach unbreakable rules and assembly line thinking. Anyone who's taken a class with me knows this is utterly antithetical to how I teach. I believe your JOY, your vision—however weird and unwieldy—is the path you must follow. And no one can teach YOU to you.
Bonus question: What’s your teaching vibe?
Conversational! Supportive! Joyful! Based in REAL LIFE and lived experience! In constant celebration of the individual and their beautiful "weird." I teach to empower. I teach to free the imagination.
My philosophy: Hollywood is a multi-headed beast flashing teeth and manned by hard-to-access gatekeepers. TRUE. You are a genius capable of squeezing a winning, utterly unique screenplay out of your innately creative brain—ALSO TRUE!
******
As our conversation with Lauren Veloski draws to a close, it's clear that her Adaptation Fascination: Turn Your Fiction & Nonfiction Into a Screenplay 3-Week Zoom Intensive is an unparalleled opportunity for writers eager to explore the dynamic world of screenwriting.
With Lauren’s expert guidance, personalized support, and a curriculum designed to unlock new creative pathways, this course offers a transformative experience for storytellers at every level. Don't miss your chance to bring your story to the screen with confidence and clarity. Enroll now and embark on this exhilarating journey with us.
