First Five: Runaway Heart

My wife Debbie, with her runaway heart in Pisa.

I am awfully quick to give advice about screenwriting in this blog. And some people actually accept it. The funny thing is that none of those people have ever read any of my scripts! They might have seen one of my films, but, with a finished film, it is difficult to say who contributed what. Therefore, to help people decide whether my writing advice is any good, I am posting some pages for your pleasure and perusal.

Inspired by the three-page challenges on the Scriptnotes podcast by John August and Craig Mazin, I have decided to post the opening of some of my scripts in a series of blogs. However, rather than three pages, I am going with five pages because I feel that will provide a more accurate appraisal of my writing and the stories. I am not posting the scripts of any of my produced films. That would be complicated legally since those scripts now belong to their respective production companies. Nor am I posting any script currently under option for the same reason. These scripts are either new or part of my back catalog. Some are ready to be pitched. Others need a little polishing. But you can read the first five pages now.

My first sample is Runaway Heart, co-written by the amazing Jenna Healy Gloeb. Jenna is a journalist and screenwriter. Two of her spec scripts have been optioned, and she has been hired to write a feature on assignment. She is one of the strongest, young writers I have ever met. I jumped at the opportunity to write a script with her.

I developed the original idea for Runaway Heart. However, I had trouble executing the story because I was too close to the material which was often autobiographical or based on real people I knew. Jenna provided the necessary emotional distance -- and the keen sense of character development -- needed to get the script over the finish line. The project was being initially developed by an Italian distributor as an Italian/American co-production before COVID shut everything now. Hopefully, we can bring it back to life. 

Here's the logline:

After losing touch with her family and unable to fully commit to her husband due to emotional scars from her troubled childhood, a waitress named Romy embarks on a journey to Italy to uncover the mysteries of her family's past, leading to unexpected love, unconditional acceptance, and a newfound sense of self-worth.

Here are the first five pages:

I hope you enjoyed those first five pages. You can read the whole script here:

First Fives:

Judy

The Mark

Then The Judgement

West Rhodes

Candido

Mr. Inside

Final Table

Outer Dark

The Grid

Desecrated

The 4 Sided Triangle

I, John

Runaway Heart

My novel Chapel Street is now available! You can buy the Kindle and paperback at Amazon and the Nook, paperback and hardcover at Barnes & Noble. Chapel Street is the tale of a young man battling a demonic entity that has driven members of his family to suicide for generations. It was inspired by an actual haunting. 

Learn more about the book, click Here.

Listen to me read some chapters here:

Chapel Street - Prologue - My Mother

Chapel Street - Chapter 1 - RestingPlace.com

Chapel Street - Chapter 2 - Elisabetta

Chapel Street - Chapter 3 - The Upload

Chapel Street - Chapter 4 - The Kobayashi Maru

Read about the true haunting that inspired the novel here:

The Haunting of 21 St. Helens Avenue, Part 1, An Introduction
The Haunting of 21 St. Helens Avenue, Part 2, The House
The Haunting of 21 St. Helens Avenue, Part 3, This Is Us
The Haunting of 21 St. Helens Avenue, Part 4, Arrival
The Haunting of 21 St. Helens Avenue, Part 5, Methodology
The Haunting of 21 St. Helens Avenue, Part 6, Clara's Tale, Pt. 1
The Haunting of 21 St. Helens Avenue, Part 7, Clara's Tale, Pt. 2
The Haunting of 21 St. Helens Avenue, Part 8, My Tale, Pt. 1
The Haunting of 21 St. Helens Avenue, Part 9, My Tale, Pt. 2
The Haunting of 21 St. Helens Avenue, Part 10, My Tale, Pt. 3
The Haunting of 21 St. Helens Avenue, Part 11, Natalia's Tale, Pt. 1
The Haunting of 21 St. Helens Avenue, Part 12, Natalia's Tale, Pt. 2
The Haunting of 21 St. Helens Avenue, Part 13, John's Tale, Pt. 1 
The Haunting of 21 St. Helens Avenue, Part 14, John's Tale, Pt. 2
The Haunting of 21 St. Helens Avenue, Part 15, Come Inside!
The Haunting of 21 St. Helens Avenue, Part 16, Marion's Tale, Pt. 1
The Haunting of 21 St. Helens Avenue, Part 17, Marion's Tale, Pt. 2
The Haunting of 21 St. Helens Avenue, Part 18, Jeanne's Tale, Pt. 1
The Haunting of 21 St. Helens Avenue, Part 19, Jeanne's Tale, Pt. 2
The Haunting of 21 St. Helens Avenue, Part 20, Lisa's Tale
The Haunting of 21 St. Helens Avenue, Part 21, Recap, Pt. 1
The Haunting of 21 St. Helens Avenue, Part 22, Recap, Pt. 2
The Haunting of 21 St. Helens Avenue, Part 23, Recap, Pt. 3

The Haunting of 21 St. Helens Avenue, Part 24, Bad News Betty

The Haunting of 21 St. Helens Avenue, Part 25, Joe's Tale

Let's stay in touch:

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Yippee-Ki-Yay Mother Podcast #69: Once Upon A Time In Hollywood

Here's another COVID free ZOOM edition of the Yippee-Ki-Yay Mother Podcast, a lively discussion of the movies that sometimes devolves into a group therapy session.

This week my lovely wife Debbie brought the Quentin Tarantino film Once Upon A Time .... In Hollywood to the table. She was never much of a Tarantino fan until she saw this film. Now she's a believer. Debbie also invited award-winning journalist and screenwriter Jenna Healy Gloeb to discuss the film with us. We had originally seen the film while visiting her in Minnesota. (That's two guests from Minnesota in two weeks.)

Sean Jenna Deb

Here's the trailer for the film:

 

Here's the podcast on YouTube:

       

Our Podcast is now available for download on iTunes: Yippee Ki Yay Mother Podcast

Subscribe to our YouTube page: Yippee Ki Yay Mother Podcast

Check out our webpage: Yippee-Ki-Yay Mother Podcast

Like us on Facebook: Yippee-Ki-Yay Mother Podcast.

Follow us on Twitter: YKYPodcast

Check out Wojo's webpage: Wojo's World

And follow her on Twitter: @TheMicheleWojo

Check out our other episodes here:

Yippee Ki Yay Mother Podcast Episode List

My novel Chapel Street is now available! You can currently buy the Kindle and paperback at Amazon and the Nook, paperback and hardcover at Barnes & Noble.

Learn more about the book, click Here.

Watch the book trailer:

  

Listen to me read some chapters here:

Chapel Street - Prologue - My Mother

Chapel Street - Chapter 1 - RestingPlace.com

Chapel Street - Chapter 2 - Elisabetta

Chapel Street - Chapter 3 - The Upload

Chapel Street - Chapter 4 - The Kobayashi Maru

Runaway Heart: New Spec Script Completed

Yours truly with my lovely wife Deborah
and Jenna at the Churches Making Movies Festival

I am excited to announce Jennifer Healy Gloeb and I have completed a new spec script called Romy.

Normally, I don't devote blogs to recently completed work. I like to wait until there is a development along the road to production. However, since I recently wrote a tip about collaborating, Writer Tip #27: The Ampersand and The And, I thought I should show you how the process works in practice.

First, here's the log line for the script:  Romy, a young woman on the verge of divorce, comes to grips with her troubled past on an impulsive trip to visit her family's ancestral home in Italy in this tale of family and female empowerment.

The script was co-written by Jennifer Healy Gloeb, former journalist and a winner of the Edward R. Murrow award.  I met Jennifer a little over a year ago. A budding faith-based screenwriter, she found my blog and reached out to me. She asked if I would read one of her screenplays. I said no. I was simply too busy. So Jennifer also reached out to my wife Deborah. She was a softer touch. She said she would read it.

Deborah loved Jennifer's script, Resurrection Road, and told me I should read it too. I still resisted. However, when Jenna sent my wife her new script entitled Seven Slides, I finally took the leap. I loved the script and suggested only minimal changes. I felt it was essentially production-worthy as written. Then I decided to take a look at Resurrection Road, especially after I heard that the head of development of a faith based production company advised her to dump it.

Said head of development was dead wrong. While the script had some easily repaired structural problems, the characters were vivid and well-drawn. The script had a plaintive sense of honesty and realism sorely missing from the faith-based genre.

Jennifer came to Baltimore for an intensive screenwriting workshop. We worked our way through the first act of her new screenplay. The workshop revealed we had the ability to work together. Deborah was constantly kicking me under the table throughout Jennifer's visit for me invite her to collaborate on a script. I was tempted, but the timing didn't seem right. However, I was contemplating what project would best suit our respective talents.

I have a lot of scripts in the back catalog. Some of them had been optioned.  Some of them had been represented by agents. Some of them had received great reviews from Hollywood notables. Many of them would be viable, with a little updating. I call it "adding the cellphones."

A few months ago, the three of us found ourselves all headed to New Jersey to attend the Churches Making Movies Film Festival. I was giving a screenwriting workshop. Jennifer flew in from Minnesota because two of her scripts were finalists in their screenplay competition.* Over breakfast at the hotel, I presented an unfinished screenplay to her called Arnara.

Arnara is a beautiful hilltop town in the Frosinone province of Italy. It is also the ancestral home of my Italian family. A screenplay was inspired in part by my visit to the town with my wife-to-be and two of my cousins and the wonderful reception we received.  Here's a little film I made about the visit:

The script was also partially inspired by the genealogical journey I was undergoing while I worked on my family tree. That was all fine. The problems arose with my protagonist.

I based my protagonist, now named Romy, on an old flame of mine who experienced difficulties in relationships as a result of traumatic childhood sexual assault and abandonment issues. She found it difficult to trust, and, as a result, commit to relationships. Unfortunately, I was a little to close to her to write the character accurately, and hence never finished the script. (See Writer Tip #28: The Curse of Being Nice,) After reading Jennifer's scripts, and noticing her keen eye for characterizations, I felt she had the necessary skill and distance to help make the character work.

However, the process involved more than just sprucing up the protagonist. Jennifer walked into our breakfast meeting with a desire to make major changes. Romy starts the story off married but not truly committed to the relationship. Since her previous relationships with men had always resulted in abuse or abandonment, she always keeps her eye on the door to avoid any possible hurt. In my original story, Romy and her husband had a child. I felt the presence of the child was necessary to keep Romy in the relationship.  Jennifer strongly disagreed. She felt Romy would never have a child.

Jennifer felt that Romy's husband should really want a child, but that Romy, while outwardly agreeing, should be secretly taking the pill. Her husband's discovery of the birth control pills would be the perfect catalyst to crack the marriage and send Romy on her journey which would ultimately take her to Italy.

I loved her ideas. We began working the following week. The resulting script stayed reasonably close to the original for about the first fifteen pages, but quickly took on a new life of its own. I worked in Baltimore. Jennifer worked in Minnesota. Being the structure guy, I always kept the next five or six scenes outlined while we worked. Sometimes she would write the first draft of a scene and I would rewrite it. Sometimes I would write the first draft and she would rewrite it. We finished the first draft in less than three weeks, and spent a month honing it.

We are both very happy with the script.

Now all we have to do is sell it during all of the turmoil in Hollywood due to the WGA/ATA dispute.

Should be fun.

I will keep you informed of the process.

While you're waiting to see Romy in the theaters, feel free to check out my memoir published by the good folks at TouchPoint Press. It is my true story of first faith and first love and how the two became almost fatally intertwined. Click below for a free sample.

Follow me on Twitter:  SeanPaulMurphy

*Oh, by the way, Resurrection Road, the script the head of the development suggested that Jennifer dump, won the screenplay competition. It even beat out my favorite, Seven Slides, which was also a finalist.

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Churches Making Movies Interview

LaVonne McIver James, of the Churches Making Movies Film Festival recently interviewed Jennifer Healy Gloeb and myself about our screenwriting collaboration, Romy, which began over breakfast at the film festival last summer. I was attending the festival as a guest speaker, and Jennifer was attending as the winner of their screenplay competition.

Breakfast was good. And very productive.

I plan to write a blog about the writing of the screenplay we collaborated on because the process hits on many of the issues I have discussed recently in my ongoing series of writing tips. Keep checking back for that post. Until then, read the article here:

Screenwriting Veteran and Protege Collaborate on New Project

Thanks for the shout out, LaVonne.

Now let me shout out to myself.  Be sure to check out my memoir The Promise, or the Pros and Cons of Talking with God, published by TouchPoint Press. It is my true story of first faith and first love and how the two became almost fatally intertwined.

Here are some sample chapters of The Promise:

Chapter 1 - A Photograph

Chapter 2 - My Death

Chapter 3 - Childhood

Chapter 4 - Saved!

Chapter 5 - The Promise

Chapter 6 - The Mission

Chapter 7 - Mission Accomplished
Chapter 15 - Quarter To Midnight

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