Linda Seger - The Collaborative Art of Filmmaking: From Script to Screen

Thank you to:

My assistant, Katie Gardner, for typing and feedback and good advice and laughter and reliability!

My long-time researcher, Sue Terry, for checking all the details and tracking down important information.

My readers Michael Braun, Devorah Cutler-Rubenstein, Dominick Duda, Cathleen Loeser, Lisa Joy Sampson, and Pamela Jaye Smith for all their good feedback.

Louisa Velis, Assistant to Ron Howard, for her generosity, help, and all her kindness.

Riley Quinonez, for stepping in at the last minute and typing the last edits when Katie hurt her wrist, and for doing the Index.

Mara Purl of Haven Books for the initial idea for the cover and to Devorah Cutler-Rubenstein for her additional ideas and the red typewriter, and the cover design from Rogue Four Design .

My team at Taylor & Francis: Sheni Kruger, John Makowski, Jacqueline Dias, Sarah Pickles, and Naomi Hill.

And always thank you to my dear husband Peter for his support and care, and all the happiness that comes from him, even in the middle of writing a book.

After 35 years of working in the film business, it occurred to me that I had learned a few things that would be of interest to others. Perhaps it was time to do a new edition of the book, From Script to Screen , which was first published in 1994, with a second edition in 2004. In 2014, I asked my co-author Edward Whetmore (known as Edd he told me he took the war out of his name, so I will be referring to him always as Edd) how he would feel if I wrote the third edition. He told me that was just fine. We agreed that both of our names would be on the cover, but I would have full creative control over what went into this new edition. Two years later, in December 2016, Edd died, and that further motivated me to look for a publisher who would be interested in a third edition.

For the first edition, I conducted 70 interviews with some of the top names in the industry. I spoke with Ridley Scott between takes on his current movie, had a two-hour lunch with Ron Howard in his office over very good Chinese food, and sipped fabulous cappuccino with composer Bill Conti in the house that Rocky built. Edd joined me in the living room of Lawrence Kasdens home, had coffee with Leonard Nimoy in his home office with the fireplace blazing had a long lunch with Mary McDonnell at the St. James Club, and appetizers with Peter Weir in his suite at the Bel Air hotel. It was a wonderful and heady experience to meet these people, to spend time with their ideas, and to experience their graciousness and generosity. It took over a year to get the interviews and countless phone calls and letters (all before e-mail was popular and easy.)

In the days when it was easier to actually meet these people in person, I was privileged to do so. Now that there is so much great information researching online, I found that many answers to the questions that I wanted to ask about the filmmaking process could be found someplace in the plethora of wonderful interviews, master classes, articles, and even documentaries. I also was able to do several personal interviews for this edition as well.

I had two criteria in mind as I wrote this edition: I wanted to quote filmmakers who are masters of their art and craft, and who have a body of work that shows their experience and their skills over many decades. Many of these filmmakers are still working, such as directors Ridley Scott and Ron Howard, and producer Brian Grazer. Some of the people I interviewed in the first edition have died. I so valued their input and wanted to keep their quotations because these are people who have greatly influenced this industry, such as director Robert Wise, actor Robin Williams, writer Frank Pierson, and production designer Ferdinando Scarfiotti.

As I began to research, I felt invigorated realizing that making this information available in one book could help filmmakers. For the first edition, I had taken at least one class in each area explored in each chapter. In this edition I included my own knowledge about these art forms, gathered from my work as a script consultant on about 100 produced films. Through my work, I have observed the struggles and processes of many filmmakers and have added personal stories about these experiences.