Tag: screenwriting

On Adapting IP with Maria Lopez Castaño

I joined Maria Lopez Castaño’s “Adapting IP for Film and Television” workshop last evening, and it was in the style I love most. It was intimate, with only ten people, and very interactive, with both individual and group exercises in breakout rooms. We also got to chat for a few minutes with other creative professionals from around the world during the breakout exercises. I met a lovely Spanish development executive in my breakout room, and while working on an exercise about adding more drama to a story, we ended up comparing some of the tricks Spanish and Turkish TV series use to heighten the drama. I could have happily kept that conversation going. 🙂

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Writing Is a Mess. Editing Is Housekeeping.

I’m convinced life always finds ways to humble us. Just as I was celebrating getting into the TorinoFilmLab NeXT – TV Series programme as a Story Editor Trainee last week, a producer gave us this very specific note on our own pilot: “This story needs serious, serious editing.” Oh, well… 🙂

Yes, sure, it stung. But it also gave me another purpose this week as I’ve been going through meetings at TorinoFilmLab. Suddenly, I wasn’t only thinking about how to help other writers understand where their stories stop working and how they might fix them. I was also wondering how I could bring the same thinking back to our own project. So, all week, I closely observed how my mentor approached the projects we’re working on, took notes on his feedback, and kept asking myself: How does this apply to our own story?

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DJ Ahmet

I like coming-of-age films in general, and DJ Ahmet is a heartwarming one. Written and directed by Georgi Unkovski, it was awarded at Sundance Film Festival in 2025.

The film is set in a Turkish Yörük town in Macedonia and is largely in Turkish. At times, though, I felt some of the dialogue was quietly screaming, “Rewrite me, please.”

Still, I really liked the idea at the heart of it: escaping family issues and conservative traditions through electronic dance music.

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Pazartesi Script Club, Year One

Facebook memories keep reminding me, though I don’t really need them. I was already in a reflective mood with the year coming to an end. So here’s a little recap of my script club in 2025.

1. How it started: I was reading and analysing scripts on my own, reverse-engineering them to understand what made stories work. Then I discovered monthly script clubs and quickly fell in love with the idea. Inspired by CenterFrame’s Script Club and Sundance Collab, I founded my own script club in November 2024.

2. The name “Pazartesi”: It means “Monday” in Turkish. Somehow, despite its usual negative associations, I realised I actually love Mondays. I love their seriousness, that sense of beginning, the feeling that everything is still possible. Just like screenwriting, it requires discipline, but it’s also fun and exciting. Since it also marks time, it’s easier for it to feel like a tradition: meeting on a Monday once a month.

3. Groundhog Day: Groundhog Day is simply my all-time favourite movie, so it naturally became the subject of our first meeting. I was happy to find the script online, but as I kept reading, I realised it wasn’t the final draft. There were major differences between the version I had and the finished film. I got quite frustrated. My deep-dive internet search for the final version led nowhere, so I decided to ask the screenwriter himself, Danny Rubin. Audacity? Maybe. But I had nothing to lose.

4. Danny Rubin is my pen friend (not really): I sent an email explaining the situation, and he replied quickly. Not only did he kindly share a scan of the shooting script, but he also explained how Harold Ramis added an opening scene after test screenings and how Bill Murray improvised some of his lines.

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Thelma’s Toothpaste

Are you good at picking a gift for your loved ones? That skill might come unexpectedly in handy when you’re creating characters. But how?

In one of her interviews, Thelma & Louise screenwriter Callie Khouri mentioned that she once came across an interview with Geena Davis, where Davis said, “I bet Callie Khouri knows which toothpaste Thelma uses.”

Khouri later laughed and replied, “Yes, of course. Thelma uses the one with red, green, and blue stripes.”

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The Unexpected Lesson I Learned from John Yorke: Creative Community Building

At the beginning of summer, I joined John Yorke’s 16-week training on story structure, and though it ended a few weeks ago, it’s still keeping me inspired. How?

Now I’m in the alumni area, which connects not only classmates but everyone who has ever taken the course, as well as participants from other programs on the platform.
There are weekly “sit & write” sessions where writers from around the world gather online and focus on their own projects for two hours, as well as monthly interviews with authors, screenwriters and producers. Honestly, it feels like having a lifetime free-flying pass for creative growth.

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Everyone Says Call My Agent! (Spoiler: But in very different ways)

This month, our Script Club focused on the Turkish version of Call My Agent! (the acclaimed French series Dix Pour Cent).
As I dug into the pilot script, I noticed the starkly different creative choices between the French and Turkish versions.

Sure, much of it comes down to culture, industry norms, and audience expectations but what fascinated me was how these elements translate into the dramatic codes of each country. And as a writer, I wondered if I could learn something from seeing how each remake reshaped the same story through its own lens.

Here is what I did to find out.

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