Free Fire Zone : A Playwright's Adventures on the Creative Battlefields of Film, TV, and Theater

by Rebeck, Theresa

• ISBN13: 9781575253640
• ISBN10: 157525364X
• Edition: 1st
• Format: Hardcover
• Copyright: 2007-03-03
• Publisher: Smith & Kraus Pub Inc

Summary

"Ms. Rebeck is an established playwright who has also worked in television, and she clearly knows how the savage, mercurial economics of the entertainment industry can shatter the fragile ego and wreak havoc on domestic equilibrium." - Charles Isherwood, New York Times "Sometimes caustically cynical but always brutally honest, Rebeck's entertaining volume is an essential read for anyone contemplating writing for show business."- Laura A. Ewald, Library Journal "Free Fire Zone is highly recommended as a one-of-a-kind guide that anyone attempting to break into multimedia writing must read."- The Midwest Book Review "....Rebeck on the structures of well-made plays and TV episodes and the rewards and difficulties of working for various media, should gratify aspiring writers."- Jack Helbig, Booklist Theresa Rebeck's career has hopscotched between the Off-Broadway successes of plays such as Spike Heels, The Family of Mann, and View of the Dome, to award- winning work writing and producing network television such as NYPD Blue, to writing screenplays for independent and studio features. Rebeck?s guide is both a discussion of the writer's craft and a no-holds-barred discussion of the politics in the movie, television, and theater worlds. In a series of hilarious and provocative discussions covering all aspects of dramatic writing, Rebeck attempts to address what she considers both of a writer's primary concerns - how to tell a story with truth and vision and how to maneuver as a dramatic writer in a dangerous world.

Author Biography

In television, Ms. Rebeck has written for Dream On, Brooklyn Bridge, L.A. Law, Maximum Bob, First Wave, Third Watch, and NYPD Blue, where she also worked as a producer. In 2004 she wrote and executive produced a television pilot for Warner Bros/CBS, ôThe Webster Report,ö directed by Barry Sonnenfeld and starring Stanley Tucci. In film, she has written the screenplay for Kalamazoo, an independent short starring Wallace Shawn and Adrienne Shelley. Other produced features include Harriet the Spy, Gossip, and the independent feature Sunday on the Rocks. Rebeck's awards include the Mystery Writer's of America's Edgar Award, the Writer's Guild of America award for Episodic Drama, the Hispanic Images Imagen Award, and the Peabody, all for her work on NYPD Blue. She has been a finalist for the Susan Smith Blackburn prize twice, won the National Theatre Conference Award (for The Family of Mann), and was awarded the William Inge New Voices Playwriting Award in 2003.